The Argus Pheasant

"These buildings will ruin the view, mynheer," he expostulated. "Such long huts – they are big enough for thirty men. What are they for?"

"Protection against the fevers, mynheer," Peter Gross said dryly. "The fevers that killed Mynheer de Jonge."

That evening, when Peter Gross had returned to the ship, Muller and Van Slyck met to compare notes. The captain was still boiling with anger; the resident's visit to Fort Wilhelmina had not soothed his ruffled temper.

"He told me he brought twenty-five irregulars with him for work in the bush," Van Slyck related. "They are a separate command, and won't be quartered in the fort. If this Yankee thinks he can meddle in the military affairs of the residency he will find he is greatly mistaken."

"Where will they be quartered?" Muller asked.

"I don't know."

"Maybe he will place them in the huts he has ordered me to build back of the residency," Muller remarked, rubbing his bald pate thoughtfully.

"He told you to build some huts?" Van Slyck asked.

"Yes, some long huts. Big enough for thirty men. He said they were to be a protection against the fevers."

"The fevers?" Van Slyck exclaimed in amazement.

"Yes, the fevers that killed Mynheer de Jonge, he said."

Van Slyck's face became livid with passion. "Against the fevers that killed de Jonge, eh?" he snarled. "The damned Yankee will find there are more than fevers in Bulungan."

He flashed a sharp look at Muller.

"When you see Koyala," he said, "send her to me."

CHAPTER XIV

Koyala's Defiance

From his quarters in the residency building, the same room where his predecessor, the obstinate and perverse de Jonge, had lived his brief and inglorious career, Peter Gross looked across the rolling expanse to the jungle-crested hills of Bulungan.

It was now two weeks since his coming. Many changes had been wrought during the fortnight. The residency had been cleared of vermin and made habitable. Paddy Rouse had been installed as secretary and general factotum. The tangle of cane, creeper growth, and nipa palm that had grown in the park of shapely tamarinds since de Jonge's death had been cut away. Two long, low buildings had been erected as barracks, and Captain Carver had converted the newly created plain into a drill-ground.

They were drilling now, the khaki-clad twenty-five that had crossed the Java Sea with Peter Gross. Two weeks on shore, supplementing the shipboard quizzes on the drill manual, had welded them into an efficient command. The smartness and precision with which they executed maneuvers compelled a grudging admiration from the stolid Dutch soldiers of Fort Wilhelmina who strolled over daily to watch the drills.

"They'll do, they'll do," Peter Gross assured himself with satisfaction.

He stepped back to his desk and took a document from it. It was Muller's first report as controlleur. Peter Gross ran his eyes down the column of figures and frowned. The accounts balanced and were properly drawn up. The report seemed to be in great detail. Yet he felt that something was wrong. The expenses of administration had been heavy, enormously heavy, he noted. Instead of exporting rice Bulungan had been forced to import to make good crop losses, the report showed.

"Mynheer Muller is a good accountant," he observed to himself. "But there are a few items we will have to inquire into." He laid the report aside.

The door opened and Paddy Rouse entered. His bright red hair, scrubby nose, and freckled face were in odd contrast to his surroundings, so typically Dutch. Mynheer de Jonge had made this retreat a sanctuary, a bit of old Holland transplanted bodily without regard to differences of latitude and longitude. In the east wall was a blue-tile fireplace. On the mantel stood a big tobacco jar of Delftware with the familiar windmill pattern. Over it hung a long-stemmed Dutch pipe with its highly colored porcelain bowl. The pictures on the wall were Rembrandtesque, gentlemen in doublet and hose, with thin, refined, scholarly faces and the inevitable Vandyke beard.

"A lady to see you, sir," Paddy Rouse announced with military curtness, saluting. The irrepressible Irish broke through in a sly twinkle. "She's a beauty, sir."

Peter Gross controlled the start of surprise he felt. He intuitively guessed who his visitor was.

"You may show her in," he announced.

"Yes, sir."

"And, Paddy – call Captain Carver, please."

"Yes, sir."

The shock of red hair darted away.

Peter Gross looked out of the window again. The crucial moment, the moment he had looked forward to since accepting his appointment, was upon him. What should he say to her, this woman of two alien, utterly irreconcilable races, this woman so bitterly wronged, this woman with a hot shame in her heart that would not die? How should he approach her, how should he overcome her blind, unreasoning hatred against the dominant white race, how persuade her to trust him, to give her aid for the reclamation of Bulungan?

At the same time he wondered why she had come. He had not anticipated this meeting so soon. Was there something back of it? As he asked himself the question his fingers drummed idly on the desk.

While he was meditating he became suddenly aware of another presence in the room. Turning, he found himself looking into the eyes of a woman – the woman of his thoughts. She stood beside him, silent, possessed. There was a dagger in the snakeskin girdle she wore about her waist – a single thrust and she could have killed him. He looked at her steadily. Her glance was equally steady. He rose slowly.

"You are the Juffrouw Koyala," he announced simply. "Good morning, juffrouw." He bowed.

There was an instant's hesitation – or was it only his imagination, Peter Gross asked himself – then her form relaxed a trifle. So slight was the movement that he would not have been sure had not every muscle of her perfect body yielded to it with a supple, rhythmic grace.

"Won't you be seated?" he remarked conventionally, and placed a chair for her. Not until then did she speak.

"It is not necessary, mynheer. I have only a few words to say."

The cold austerity of her voice chilled Peter Gross. Yet her tones were marvelously sweet – like silver bells, he thought. He bowed and waited expectantly. In a moment's interlude he took stock of her.

She was dressed in the native fashion, sarong and kabaya, both of purest white. The kabaya reached to midway between the knees and ankles. Her limbs were bare, except for doe-skin sandals. The girdle about her waist was made from the skins of spotted pit vipers. The handle of the dagger it held was studded with gems, rubies, turquoises, and emeralds. A huge ruby, mounted on a pin, caught the kabaya above her breasts; outside of this she wore no jewelry. Her lustrous black hair hung loosely over her shoulders. Altogether a creature of the jungle, she looked at him with a glance in which defiance was but thinly concealed.

"What did you wish to see me about?" Peter Gross asked when he saw that she was awaiting his permission to speak.

Something like a spark shot from the glowing coals of her eyes. The tragic intensity of those eyes stirred anew the feeling of pity in the resident's heart.

"I am told, mynheer, that the governor withdrew his offer for my person at your request," she said coldly.

The statement was a question, Peter Gross felt, though put in the form of a declaration. He scrutinized her face sharply, striving to divine her object.

"That is true, juffrouw," he acknowledged.

"Why did you do this, mynheer?"

Peter Gross did not answer at once. The direct question astonished him.

"Why do you ask, juffrouw?" he parried.

Her finely chiseled head tilted back. Very royal she looked, very queenly, a Diana of the tropic jungle.

"Because Koyala Bintang Burung asks no favors from you, Mynheer Gross. Nor from any white man."

It was a declaration of war. Peter Gross realized it, and his face saddened. He had expected opposition but not open defiance. He wondered what lay back of it. The Dyak blood in her, always treacherous, never acting without a purpose, was not frank without reason, he assured himself.

"I had no intention of doing you a favor, juffrouw," he announced quietly.

"What was your object, mynheer?"

The words were hardly out of her mouth before she regretted them. The quick flash of her teeth as she bit her lips revealed the slip. Peter Gross instantly divined the reason – her hostility was so implacable that she would not even parley with him.

"To do you justice, juffrouw," he replied.

The words were like oil on flame. Her whole figure stiffened rigidly. The smoldering light in her eyes flashed into fire. The dusk in her face deepened to night. In a stifled voice, bitter with scorn, she cried:

"I want none of your justice, mynheer."

"No, I suppose not," Peter Gross assented heavily. His head sagged and he stared moodily into the fireplace. Koyala looked at him questioningly for a moment, then turned swiftly and glided toward the door. A word from Peter Gross interrupted her.

"Juffrouw!"

She turned slowly. The cold disdain her face expressed was magnificent.

"What shall I do?" he entreated. His mild, gray eyes were fixed on her flaming orbs pleadingly. Her lips curled in scornful contempt.

"That is for you to decide, mynheer," she replied.

"Then I cross from the slate all that has been charged against you, juffrouw. You are free to come and go as you wish."

A flash of anger crossed Koyala's face.

"Your pardon is neither asked nor desired, mynheer," she retorted.

"I must do my duty as I see it," Peter Gross replied. "All that I ask of you, juffrouw, is that you do not use your influence with the natives to hinder or oppose the plans I have for their betterment. May I have your pledge for that?"

"I make no promises and give no pledges, mynheer," Koyala announced coldly.

"I beg your pardon – I should not have asked it of you. All I ask is a chance to work out my plans without hindrance from those whose welfare I am seeking."

Koyala's lips curled derisively. "You can promote our welfare best by going back to Java, mynheer," she retorted.

Peter Gross looked at her sadly.

"Juffrouw," he said, "you are speaking words that you do not know the meaning of. Leave Bulungan? What would happen then? The Chinese would come down on you from the north, the Bugis from the east, and the Bajaus from every corner of the sea. Your coasts would be harried, your people would be driven out of their towns to the jungles, trade would cease, the rice harvests would fail, starvation would come upon you. Your children would be torn from you to be sold in the slave-market. Your women would be stolen. You are a woman, juffrouw, a woman of education and understanding; you know what the white man saves you from."

"And what have you whites given us in return for your protection?" she cried fiercely. "Your law, which is the right of a white man to cheat and rob the ignorant Dyak under the name of trade. Your garrisons in our city, which mean taking away our weapons so that our young men become soft in muscle and short in breath and can no longer make war like their fathers did. Your religion, which you force on us with a sword and do not believe yourself. Your morals, which have corrupted the former sanctity of our homes and have wrought an infamy unspeakable. Gin, to make our men stagger like fools; opium, to debauch us all! These are the white man's gifts to the Dyaks of Borneo. I would rather see my people free, with only their bows and arrows and sumpitans, fighting a losing fight in their jungles against the Malays and the Chinese slave-hunters, than be ruined by arrach and gin and opium like they are now."

She was writhing in her passion. Her bosom rose and fell tumultuously, and her fingers opened and closed like the claws of an animal. In this mood she was a veritable tigress, Peter Gross thought.

"All that you have said is the truth," he admitted. He looked very weary, his shoulders were bent, and he stared gloomily into the hearth. Koyala stared at him with a fierce intensity, half doubtful whether he was mocking her. But his dejection was too patent to be pretense.

"If you believe that, why are you here?" she demanded.

"Because I believe that Bulungan needs me to correct these evils, juffrouw," he replied gently.

Koyala laughed shrilly, contemptuously. Peter Gross's form straightened and the thin, firm lines of his lips tightened. He lifted a restraining hand.

"May I speak for a few moments, juffrouw?" he asked. "I want to tell you what I am planning to do for Bulungan. I shall put an end to the gin and opium trade. I shall drive the slave-hunters and the pirates from these seas, and the head-hunters from their babas (jungles). I shall make Bulungan so peaceful that the rice-grower can plough, and sow, and harvest with never a backward look to see if an enemy is near him. I shall take the young men of Bulungan and train them in the art of war, that they may learn how to keep peace within their borders and the enemy without. I shall readjust the taxes so that the rich will pay their just share as well as the poor. I shall bring in honest tax-collectors who will account for the last grain of rice they receive. Before I shall finish my work the Gustis (Princes) will break their krisses and the bushmen their sumpitans; hill Dyak and coast Dyak will sit under the same tapang tree and take sirih and betel from the same box, and the Kapala Kampong shall say to the people of his village – go to the groves and harvest the cocoanut, a tenth for me and a tenth for the state, and the balance for you and your children."

Koyala looked at him searchingly. His tremendous earnestness seemed to impress her.

"You have taken a big task upon yourself, mynheer," she observed.

"I will do all this, juffrouw, if you will help me," Peter Gross affirmed solemnly.

Scornful defiance leaped again into Koyala's eyes and she drew back proudly.

"I, mynheer? I am a Dyak of Bulungan," she said.

"You are half a daughter of my people," Peter Gross corrected. "You have had the training of a white woman. Whether you are friend or foe, you shall always be a white woman to me, juffrouw."

A film came across Koyala's eyes. She started to reply, checked herself, and then spoke, lashing the words out between set teeth.

"Promise upon promise, lie upon lie, that has been the way with you whites. I hate you all, I stand by my people."

Swift as the bird whose name she bore, she flashed through the door. Peter Gross took a half-step forward to restrain her, stopped, and walked slowly back to his chair.

"She will come back," he murmured to himself; "she will come back. I have sown the seed, and it has sunk in fertile ground."

In the banyan grove Koyala, breathing rapidly because of her swift flight, came upon Kapitein Van Slyck. The captain rose eagerly as she darted through the cane.

"What did he say?" he asked. "Did he try to make love to you?"

Koyala turned on him furiously. "You are a fool, we are all fools!" she exclaimed. "He is more than a match for all of us. I will see you later, when I can think; not now." She left the clearing.

Van Slyck stalked moodily back to the fort. At the edge of the grove he slashed viciously at a pale anemone.

"Damn these women, you never can trust them," he snarled.

When the only sounds audible in the clearing were the chirping of the crickets and the fluting of the birds, a thin, yellow face with watery eyes peered cautiously through the cane. Seeing the coast clear, Cho Seng padded decorously homeward to the controlleur's house, stepping carefully in the center of the path where no snakes could lie concealed.

CHAPTER XV

The Council

The council of the chiefs was assembling. From every part of Bulungan residency they came, the Rajahs and the Gustis, the Datu Bandars or governors of the Malay villages, and the Orang Kayas and Kapala Kampongs, the Dyak village heads. Their coming was in answer to the call of Peter Gross, resident, for messengers had been sent to every part of the province to announce that a great bitchara (talk) was to be held in Bulungan town.

They came in various ways. The Malay Datu Bandars of the coast towns, where the Malays were largely in the ascendent, voyaged in royal sailing proas, some of which were covered with canopies of silk. Each had twenty men or more, armed to the teeth, in his cortège. The inland Rajahs traveled in even greater state. Relays of slaves carried them in sedan chairs, and fifty gleaming krisses marched before and fifty after. The humbler Orang Kayas and Kapala Kampongs came on foot, with not more than ten attendants in their trains, for a village head, regardless of the number of buffaloes in his herd, must not aspire to the same state as a Rajah, or even a Gusti. The Rajah Wobanguli received each arrival with a stately dignity befitting the ruler of the largest town in the residency, and assigned him and his people the necessary number of houses to shelter them.

But these were not the only strangers in Bulungan. From all the country round, and from every village along the coast, Dyaks, Malays, Chinese, and Bugis, and the Bajau sea-wanderers, streamed into the town. The usually commodious market-place seemed to shrink and dwindle as the crowd of traders expanded, and the raucous cries of the venders rang about the street to a late hour at night.

In every second house a cock-fight was in progress. Sweating, steaming bodies crushed each other in the narrow streets and threatened ruin to the thatched houses. Malays scowled at Dyaks, and Dyaks glared vindictively at Malays. Shrewd, bland Chinese intermingled with the crowd and raked in the silver and copper coins that seemed to flow toward them by a magnetic attraction. Fierce, piratical Bugis cast amorous glances at the Dyak belles who, although they shrank timidly into their fathers' huts, were not altogether displeased at having their charms noticed.

There was hardly a moment without its bickering and fierce words, and there were frequent brawls when women fled shrieking, for hill Dyak and coast Dyak and Malay and Bugi could not meet at such close quarters without the feuds of untold generations breaking out.

Foremost in the minds and on the lips of every individual in that reeking press of humanity was the question: "What will the orang blanda (white man) want?" Speculation ran riot, rumor winged upon rumor, and no tale was too fantastical to lack ready repetition and credulous listeners. Mynheer would exact heavy penalties for every act of piracy and killing traced back to Bulungan, so the stories ran; mynheer would confiscate all the next rice crop; mynheer would establish great plantations and every village would be required to furnish its quota of forced labor; mynheer would demand the three handsomest youths from each village as hostages for future good behavior. Thus long before the council assembled, the tide was setting against Peter Gross.

Bulungan was ripe and ready for revolt. It chafed under the fetters of a white man's administration, lightly as those fetters sat. Wildest of Borneo's residencies, it was the last refuge of the adventurous spirits of the Malay archipelago who found life in the established provinces of Java, Sumatra, and Celebes all too tame.

They had tasted freedom for two years under Muller's innocuous administration and did not intend to permit the old order to be changed. Diverse as their opinions on other matters might be, bitter as their feuds might be, hill Dyak and coast Dyak, Malay, Chinese, Bugi, and Bajau were united on this point. So for the first time in Bulungan's history a feeling of unanimity pervaded a conclave of such mongrel elements as were now gathered in old "Rotterdam" town. This feeling was magnified by a report – originating, no one knew where, and spreading like wildfire – that the great Datu, the chief of all the pirates of the island seas, the mysterious and silent head of the great confederation, was in Bulungan and would advise the chiefs how to answer their new white governor.

Peter Gross was not wholly ignorant of public sentiment in the town. One of Captain Carver's first acts on coming to Bulungan was to establish the nucleus of a secret service to keep him informed on public sentiment among the natives. A Dyak lad named Inchi, whom Carver had first hired to help with the coarsest camp work, and who had formed an immediate attachment for his soldierly white baas, was the first recruit in this service and brought in daily reports.

"Inchi tells me that the chiefs have decided they will pay no more tax to the government," Carver announced to Peter Gross on the morning of the council. The resident and he were on the drill-ground where they could talk undisturbed. Peter Gross's lips tightened.

"I expected opposition," he replied non-committally.

"Too bad we haven't the Prins Lodewyk here," Carver remarked. "A few shells around their ears might bring them to their senses."

"We don't need such an extreme measure yet," Peter Gross deprecated gently.

"I hardly know whether it's safe for us to venture into the town," Carver observed. "Couldn't you arrange to have the meeting here, away from all that mob? There must be thirty thousand people down below."

"I would rather meet them on their own ground."

"It's a big risk. If there should be an attack, we couldn't hold them."

"Thirty thousand against twenty-five would be rather long odds," Peter Gross assented, smiling.

"You're going to use the fort garrison, too, aren't you?" Carver asked quickly.

"I shall take just two people with me," Peter Gross announced.

"My God, Mr. Gross! You'll never get back!" Carver's face was tense with anxiety.

"Three people will be just as effective as twenty-six, captain," Peter Gross declared mildly. "The victory we must gain to-day is a moral victory – we must show the natives that we are not afraid."

"But they're bound to break loose. A show of military force would restrain them – "

"I think it would be more a provocation than a restraint, captain. They would see our helplessness. If I go alone they will reason that we are stronger than they think we are. Our confidence will beget uncertainty among them."

Carver had long since learned the futility of trying to dissuade his chief from a course once adopted. He merely remarked:

"Of course I'll go?"

"I'm sorry, captain – " Peter Gross's face expressed sincere regret. "Nothing would please me more than to have you with me, but I can't spare you here."

Carver realized that himself. He swallowed his disappointment.

"Whom were you planning on taking?" he asked abruptly.

"Inchi – "

Carver nodded approval.

– "And Paddy Rouse."

"Paddy?" the captain exclaimed. "Of what use – I beg your pardon, Mr. Gross."

Peter Gross smiled. "It does seem a peculiar mission to take that youngster on," he said. "But Paddy's going to be rarely useful to me to-day, useful in a way every man couldn't be. These natives have a superstitious reverence for red hair."

An understanding smile broke upon Carver's face.

"Of course. A mighty good idea. Bluff and superstition are two almighty-powerful weapons against savages."

"I also hope that we shall have another ally there," Peter Gross said.

"Who is that?"

"The Juffrouw Koyala."

Carver frowned. "Mr. Gross," he said, "I don't trust that woman. She's Dyak, and that's the most treacherous breed that was ever spawned. We've got to look out for her. She's an actress, and mighty clever in playing her little part, but she can't hide the hate in her heart. She'll keep us on the string and pretend she's won over, but the first chance she gets to strike, she'll do it. I've met that kind of woman in the Philippines."

"I think you are wholly mistaken," Peter Gross replied decisively.

Carver glanced at him quickly, searchingly. "She's a damn pretty woman," he remarked musingly, and shot another quick glance at the resident.