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The Argus Pheasant
The Argus Pheasant
Ah, God, for a man with a heart, head, hand,
Like some of the simple great ones gone
Forever and ever by;
One still, strong man in a blatant land,
Whatever they call him – what care I? —
Aristocrat, democrat, autocrat – one
Who can rule and dare not lie!Tennyson.
CHAPTER I
The Omniscient Sachsen
It was very apparent that his Excellency Jonkheer Adriaan Adriaanszoon Van Schouten, governor-general of the Netherlands East Indies, was in a temper. His eyes sparked like an emery-wheel biting cold steel. His thin, sharp-ridged nose rose high and the nostrils quivered. His pale, almost bloodless lips were set in rigid lines over his finely chiseled, birdlike beak with its aggressive Vandyke beard. His hair bristled straight and stiff, like the neck-feathers of a ruffled cock, over the edge of his linen collar. It was this latter evidence of the governor's unpleasant humor that his military associate, General Gysbert Karel Vanden Bosch, observed with growing anxiety.
The governor took a pinch of snuff with great deliberation and glared across the big table of his cabinet-room at the general. Vanden Bosch shrank visibly.
"Then, my dear generaal," he demanded, "you say we must let these sons of Jazebel burn down my residences, behead my residents, and feed my controlleurs to the crocodiles without interference from the military?"
"Ach, no, your excellency!" General Vanden Bosch expostulated hastily. "Not that!"
"I fear I have not understood you, my dear general. What do you advise?"
The icy sweetness of the choleric Van Schouten sent a cold shiver along the commander's spine. He wriggled nervously in the capacious armchair that he filled so snugly. Quite unconsciously he mumbled to himself the clause which the pious Javanese had added to their prayers since Van Schouten's coming to Batavia: "And from the madness of the orang blanda devil at the paleis, Allah deliver us."
"Ha! generaal, what do you say?" the governor exclaimed.
Vanden Bosch coughed noisily and rallied his wits.
"Ahem, your excellency; ah-hum! It is a problem, as your excellency knows. I could send Colonel Heyns and his regiment to Bulungan, if your excellency so desires. But – ahem – as your excellency knows, all he will find is empty huts. Not a proa on the sea; not a Dyak in his field."
"You might as well send that many wooden men!" Van Schouten snapped.