This Earth of Mankind

  “Government doctor,” he said without giving his name, “here to examine the health of Miss Annelies Mellema.”

  “Mrs.,” I retorted.

  He paid no heed to me. He led my wife off and sat her down on the bed. He took out a stethoscope from his long coat and began the examination. With eyes popping out, he then checked her blood pressure, tilting his head towards the ceiling. He put the stethoscope back in his pocket. He then examined my wife’s eyes. After that he smelled her breath coming from her nose and mouth. He shook his head.

  Mama watched all this in silence. The government doctor ordered his patient to lie down.

  “Nyai!” he said in the coarsest of Malay. “Why have you allowed this child to be drugged so heavily?”

  “Do you wish to leave this house immediately?” replied Nyai in a Malay whose tone was even coarser.

  “Don’t you understand yet? I’m the government doctor.”

  “So what do you want?” snapped Mama.

  “You can all be charged! Dr. Martinet too! Watch out!”

  “Make your charges in your own house, not here. There’s no need for you to work your mouth so much here. The door can still swing on its hinges.”

  The government doctor went scarlet. He turned to me.

  “You listen too,” he said, using, as with Mama, the coarsely familiar word for you. “You can be a witness to this talk, eh?”

  “Indeed the door hasn’t been nailed shut yet,” I said.

  Nyai and I went over to Annelies and raised her up so she could eat.

  “She’s weak, too weak. Let her sleep. Her heart. Don’t disturb her,” ordered the government doctor.

  We got her off the bed and sat her on the settee.

  “I’ll fetch some food, Ann. Pay no heed to anyone or anything.”

  She nodded weakly.

  The doctor approached me in a threatening manner, and indeed, threatened me:

  “You’re trying to oppose my orders, hey!”

  “I know my wife better than any outsider,” I answered in Malay, without looking at him.

  “Good,” he said and left the room. “Watch out!”

  “Why won’t you speak, Ann?” She was still silent. “Will you listen to me, Ann? That puffed-up doctor has gone. Don’t be afraid.”

  I followed her eyes, which were directed out the window, and let my eyes head for the mountains, which were still covered by clouds. Mama observed my actions without speaking.

  Annelies chewed slowly, very slowly, each time hesitating at swallowing.

  From behind me I heard Mama speak, more to herself:

  “Maurits before dug up past blood sins. Now he demands the wages of those sins. Before I thought he was some holy prophet. . . .”

  “There’s no use in remembering, Ma,” I said without turning to look at her.

  “Yes, memories sometimes torture. Indeed there’s no use in remembering. Have you told her, child, Nyo?”

  “Not yet, Mama.”

  “Speak Ann. You’ve been silent so long.”

  Annelies looked at me. She smiled. Smiled! Annelies smiled! Mama opened her eyes wide in amazement. You’re getting better, Ann, I exclaimed in my heart.

  Mama rose from her place, embraced her child, kissed her, mumbling:

  “The sadness disappears because of your smile, Ann, for your husband too. It’s been too much, you not speaking all this time.” And her tears streamed forth.

  Annelies blinked slowly, so slowly, as if she didn’t really want to open her eyes again.

  Dr. Martinet had once said: Her difficulty was that she wanted to consolidate tightly what was already there. She didn’t want to let go of what she had already seized hold of. But a crisis could one day occur which would force her to let go of everything and she would no longer care about anything that happened to her. Was this the stage my wife was at now? I didn’t know. Dr. Martinet was not allowed to see her. His last words had been: If Annelies could be convinced to surrender to the situation, she would be safe. And how were things now? I didn’t know. Mama didn’t know. How far away you were, Doctor!

  While she was under Martinet’s care she was, so he explained, still clinging tightly to things as they were. We’d all been defeated, he said, all our efforts had failed, while Annelies didn’t want to understand any of this. She did not seem to rebel, but within her there was disarray as an uncertain war raged. Only being sedated could save her from psychological damage. If not, it might happen that nothing again would have value for her. Or, on the other hand, she could become worthless to anyone. Remember Mr. Mellema. So, if she becomes conscious, talk to her without pause, about things beautiful, good; things of hope and pleasant things.

  And now it was my job as husband to tell her the bitter truth: Three more days! And she wouldn’t be drugged. Dr. Martinet was not allowed to see her.

  The doctor had also once said: Annelies has passed the crisis period. He said that just a little while before we married. Now a new crisis was upon her. This time also, he said, I’m not her doctor, but you, her husband, the person she loves. You must try to leave with her for the Netherlands. Nyai will be able to pay for the trip: one hundred and twenty guilders. That wouldn’t be too expensive for her.

  They had forbidden us to escort her.

  Try, said Dr. Martinet, by whatever means. Don’t let the life of your wife be wasted. She will not be able to live without you. You now are the only thing to which she clings.

  I felt that I had done everything within my power, and I had been defeated. The Amsterdam District Court could not be opposed. The Surabaya court for Europeans had pronounced that Mama and I had no connection with my wife. Nyai herself cleverly ordered Panji Darman, formerly Jan Dapperste, to set sail “to look after the spice business” in the Netherlands and to befriend Annelies as my representative. Nyai had forbidden him to come to Wonokromo to avoid suspicion falling upon him. And a Netherlands Transport Company agent brilliantly placed him in a second-class cabin next door to Annelies’s cabin. The agent was the one who also got his health certificate predated.

  The face of my wife was like chiseled marble, as if the nerves in her face had been severed from her brain. There was no movement, no expression whatsoever, and she still didn’t speak. I had tried from every angle, used every approach to tell her of the day of her departure. It had all failed.

  She ate no more than four spoonfuls, then did not want to open her mouth again. I don’t know how many times Nyai nervously walked in and out of the room. Once when the room was empty I embraced my wife and I forced myself to have the courage to whisper in her ear:

  “Ann, we’re defeated, Ann; we were to go with you on the boat to the Netherlands, but they will not allow us. Ann, do you hear me, Ann?”

  She still did not respond.

  “I don’t know what you’re thinking. But you need to know, Ann: Jan Dapperste will be there in place of Mama and me. In three days he will escort you as you set sail for Europe. Don’t be afraid, Ann. Once you’ve arrived there, Mama and I will follow.”

  And Annelies still paid no attention. Yet I had carried out my duty as her husband, a duty by no means fully accomplished: She still hadn’t responded. How many times would I have to repeat the information? I kissed her. Still no response. Perhaps Dr. Martinet was right? She had passed the crisis point and was now beginning to set everything free?

  For the umpteenth time Mama entered. This time she handed over a telegram from Herbert de la Croix and a letter from Mother.

  The assistant resident of B passed on his regrets that the attorney he had sent had failed. He shared our sadness and expressed his sympathy for us. In his rather long telegram he also stated that the Amsterdam court’s decision was unjust. He had telegraphed the government-general saying that he would resign from his position if the court’s decision was carried out. He had also sent a telegram to protest to the Ministry of Justice, all to no avail—they didn’t even bother to answer. So he was going to resign and return to Eu
rope with Miriam.

  And Annelies herself? She had still lost her interest in everything. And I talked and talked, told story after story. And she still wouldn’t talk. Perhaps she wasn’t even listening. I carried her back to bed and I laid her down, and myself lay down beside her. It was lucky I knew so many stories as well as the legends of my ancestors. And yet I had already told them all. The European story of Prince Genevieve at least four times, Gulliver’s Travels twice, Baron von Munchhausen twice, and Little Duimpje perhaps more than four times. And there were still the mouse-deer stories. My voice was already hoarse. I still added to all these stories, others of my own experiences that were a bit funny.

  Embracing my wife, I told fairy tale after fairy tale. I brought my mouth close to her ear—something she liked.

  When I awoke, the night had passed, the room was bright with the rays of the sun. Yet my tiredness hadn’t been chased away by the sleep whose length I didn’t know. And all of a sudden I realized: Annelies was embracing me, kissing me, and caressing my hair. I sat up in a hurry.

  “Ann, Annelies!” I shouted. I held her wrist and I felt how her pulse was not as slow as the day before.

  “Mas!” she answered.

  Was it true that my Annelies was beginning to speak? Or was I just dreaming? I rubbed my eyes. Dream, don’t bother me like this! But my eyes saw my wife smiling. Her face was pale, her teeth dirty. And her eyes did not share the smile.

  “Ah, Annelies, my Annelies! You’re well again, Ann!” I embraced her and kissed her. My efforts and labor all these last days hadn’t been wasted.

  “Food is ready, Mas, let’s eat,” she said gently, exactly as she used to.

  I looked at her. Was Dr. Martinet right: Had she been flung off balance, shocked, so her mind was no longer able to work properly? I looked closely at her eyes. And those eyes were sad. Her lips still smiled but her eyes did not; instead, it was as if she had gone cross-eyed.

  “Mama!” I shouted. “Annelies is well again.”

  And Mama didn’t appear.

  And without having washed first, I sat in that room facing the dinner.

  There was no spoon or fork or plate before me. Only before Annelies. Had she lost her mind or was I to eat alone?

  She began to spoon up the food and feed it to me.

  “I can eat myself, Ann. It’s you who must eat, let me feed you.”

  She didn’t eat, but fed me again. And I had to chew and swallow. I must not offend her—I knew that with certainty—and so I ate until I was full.

  “Why are you feeding me like this?”

  “Once in my life let me feed my husband.” She went silent and did not want to speak again.

  20

  This day—the last day.

  The business had come to a total standstill. The Marechaussee were stopping everybody from entering our front grounds. All we were allowed to do was milk the cows.

  Mama’s protests were ignored.

  “It’s not costing Nyai anything,” they retorted. “It’s the people of the Netherlands who are suffering the losses.”

  Many letters arrived. There was no opportunity to reply. There was no time really to read them either. The papers sent by Nijman piled up untouched.

  Mama, I, and especially Annelies, were not allowed to leave the house, except to wash and to go to the toilet. So we were under house arrest.

  The Marechaussee soldiers only left their tents in the compound to chase off people who gathered on the edge of the road who were expressing their sympathy for us, perhaps, or were only there to have a look.

  Annelies looked more like her usual self, although she was skinny and pale and her eyes were dead.

  “Tell me about Holland according to Multatuli’s stories,” she suddenly asked.

  “There was a country on the edge of the North Sea. . . . ” I began as best I could. “Its land was low-lying, so it was called the Land of Low Country—Netherlands, or Holland.” When I reached that point I could find no way to continue. Those dreaming eyes of hers, still sad, looked at me so strangely, as if I were some new kind of blue-tailed lizard that she was seeing for the first time in her life. “Because the land was so low-lying, people became bored with repairing their dikes, so it became their habit to leave their country, to wander, Ann, to admire those other countries with their mountains. Then to conquer them, of course. In those high countries they made the people low. Nobody was allowed to even approach the height of a Dutchman.”

  “Tell me about the sea.”

  A European woman in white clothes and hat entered without knocking. Nyai and I let her do so; during the last few days anyone and everyone had been coming in and out of our rooms. She would only annoy us anyway.

  “In four more hours you will be sailing across the sea, and more sea, and more sea, dear,” the new arrival said, taking over my job. “There are more fish than you would ever imagine. Waves, ripples, swell, spray, and foam. Miss will be sailing on a big ship, beautiful, crossing the ocean, dear, entering the Suez canal, passing by other ships on the way. When they pass, dear, the ship’s whistle will blow. The others will blow theirs as well. Have you seen Gibraltar? Ah, you will pass by that town of coral too. And after that, a few days later, you will set foot on the land of your ancestors. Its sands are a shining, golden yellow, flowers everywhere, all as miss wishes. It makes people happy. Soon autumn will arrive. Leaves will fall. . . . How happy you will be, looked after by your own brother—a scholar, engineer, well-known, honored, and respected by people. How happy you will be . . . if you don’t like it, perhaps in one or two years you’ll be able to decide your own life. Yes, miss, just one or two years . . .”

  “Mas, I like the waves, and foam, and swell more than ships and the Netherlands . . .”

  “No, dear,” the newcomer cut in, “in the Netherlands you will find everything. Everything that miss wants she will be able to find there.”

  “Mas, is there anything lacking here?”

  “No, Ann. You have everything here. You are happy here.”

  “If the Netherlands has everything,” Mama added angrily, “why have Europeans come out here?”

  “Don’t make my work more difficult, Nyai. Get her clothes ready.”

  “No, not just her clothes”—Mama began to become irritable—“her jewelry, also her bank book, also the letter of acknowledgment of her father, and the prayers of her mother and husband.”

  “Mama,” Annelies cut in, “does Mama remember Mama’s story before. . . . ?”

  “Yes, Ann, what story do you mean?”

  “Mama left home forever. . . .”

  “Yes, Ann, why?”

  “Mama took an old brown tin suitcase.”

  “Yes, Ann.”

  “Where is it now, Mama?”

  “Stored in the attic, Ann.”

  “I want to see it.”

  Mama went to fetch it.

  “It’s nearly time, miss,” the European woman cut in.

  Neither Annelies nor I responded. And Mama brought a small, brown, rusted, dented suitcase. Annelies took it quickly.

  “With this suitcase, I will go, Mama, my Mama.”

  “It’s too small and horrible. It’s not fitting, Ann.”

  “Mama, it was with this suitcase that Mama left that time resolving never to return. This suitcase weighs too heavily on Mama’s memory. Let me take it, Mama, along with the burdensome memories it contains. I will take nothing but the batik kains made by Minke’s mother. Only this suitcase, Mama’s memories and, Mother’s batiks, my wedding clothes, Mama. Put them in. My devoted obeisances to Minke’s Mother. I will go Mama. Don’t remind yourself of all those things from the past. That which has passed, let it pass away, my Mama, my darling Mama.”

  “What do you mean, Ann?”

  “Like Mama before, Mama, I too will never return home.”

  “Ann, Annelies, my darling child,” cried Mama and she embraced my wife. “It’s not that Mama didn’t try, Ann, it’s not that I didn’t def
end you, child. . . .”

  Mama sank into remorseful sobbing. So did I.

  “We both did all we could, Ann,” I added.

  “Don’t, don’t cry, Mama, Mas; I still have a request, Mama, don’t cry.”

  “Tell us, Ann, tell us.” Mama began to wail.

  “Mama, give me a little sister, Mama, a little sister, who will always be sweet to you . . .”

  Mama wailed even more.

  “. . . so sweet, Mama, not causing you trouble like this daughter of yours . . . until . . .”

  “Until what, Ann?”

  “. . . until Mama no longer misses Annelies.”

  “Ann, Ann, my child, how can you talk so. Forgive us that we could not defend you, forgive us, forgive, forgive.”

  “Mas, we were happy together?”

  “Of course, Ann.”

  “Remember only that happiness, Mas, nothing else.”

  “Come on!” shouted out an Indo from the door. “We’re two minutes late already.”

  “Come, dear, miss,” the European woman guided Annelies.

  Annelies at once submerged into muteness and disinterest. Her momentary dignity suddenly disappeared. She walked slowly out of the room and down the stairs, under the guidance of the European. Her body seemed so broken and exhausted.

  Mama and I ran up to support her, to take over from the woman. But the Indo man and the European woman stopped us.

  Marechaussee had congregated at the bottom of the stairs.

  And we were kept away! So we were only able to watch our beloved Annelies led away like a cow, step by step.

  Perhaps this was how Mama’s mother felt when she was treated that way by Mama because she was unable to defend Mama from Mellema. But how did Annelies feel? Was it true she had let go of everything, her own feelings too?

  I no longer knew anything. Suddenly I heard the sound of my own crying. Mother, your son had been defeated. Your beloved son did not run, Mother; he is no criminal, even though he’s proven incapable of defending his own wife, your daughter-in-law. Is this how weak a Native is in the face of Europeans? Europe, you, my teacher, is this the manner of your deeds? So that even my wife, who knows so little about you, lost all belief in her little world—a world incapable of providing security even for her. Just one person.