King Rat

“I just wanted some food and water, sir, and—perhaps I could stay for a little while until I’ve caught up with myself.”

“You call me sir, when three days ago you and the rest of the whites were calling us Wogs and were spitting upon us?”

“I never called you Wogs. I was sent here to try to protect your country from the Japanese.”

“They have liberated us from the pestilential Dutch! As they will liberate the whole of the Far East from the white imperialists!”

“Perhaps. But I think you’ll regret the day they came!”

“Get out of my village. Go with the rest of the imperialists. Go before I call the Japanese themselves.”

“It is written, ‘If a stranger comes to thee and asks for hospitality, give it to him that thou find favor in the sight of Allah.’”

The headman had looked at him aghast. Nut-brown skin, short baju coat, multicolored sarong and the decorating head cloth in the gathering darkness.

“What do you know of the Koran and the words of the Prophet?”

“On whose name be praise,” Peter Marlowe said. “The Koran had been translated into English for many years by many men.” He was fighting for his life. He knew that if he could stay in the village he might be able to get a boat to sail to Australia. Not that he knew how to sail a boat, but the risk was worthwhile. Captivity was death.

“Are you one of the Faithful?” the astonished headman asked.

Peter Marlowe hesitated. He could easily pretend to be a Mohammedan. Part of his training had been to study the Book of Islam. Officers of His Majesty’s forces had to serve in many lands. Hereditary officers are trained in many things over and apart from formal schooling.

If he said yes, he knew he would be safe, for Java was mostly the domain of Mohammed.

“No. I am not one of the Faithful.” He was tired and at the end of his run. “At least I don’t know. I was taught to believe in God. My father used to tell us, my sisters and I, that God has many names. Even Christians say that there is a Holy Trinity—that there are parts of God.

“I don’t think it matters what you call God. God won’t mind if he is recognized as Jesus or Allah, or Buddha or Jehovah, or even You!—because if he is God, then he knows that we are only finite and don’t know too much about anything.

“I believe Mohammed was a man of God, a Prophet of God. I think Jesus was of God, as Mohammed calls him in the Koran, the ‘most blameless of the Prophets.’ That Mohammed is the last of the Prophets as he claimed, I don’t know. I don’t think that we, humans, can be certain about anything to do with God.

“But I do not believe that God is an old man with a long white beard who sits on a golden throne far up in the sky. I do not believe, as Mohammed promised, that the Faithful will go to a paradise where they will lie on silken couches and drink wine and have many beautiful maids to serve them, or that Paradise will be a garden with an abundance of green foliage and pure streams and fruit trees. I do not believe that angels have wings growing from their backs.”

Night swooped over the village. A baby cried and was gentled back to sleep.

“One day I will know for certain by what name to call God. The day I die.” The silence gathered. “I think it would be very depressing to discover there was no God.”

The headman motioned for Peter Marlowe to sit.

“You may stay. But there are conditions. You will swear to obey our laws and be one of us. You will work in the paddy and work in the village, the work of a man. No more and no less than any man. You will learn our language and speak only our language and wear our dress and dye the color of your skin. Your height and the color of your eyes will shout that you are a white man, but perhaps color, dress and language may protect you for a time; perhaps it can be said that you are half Javanese, half white. You will touch no woman here without permission. And you will obey me without question.”

“Agreed.”

“There is one other thing. To hide an enemy of the Japanese is dangerous. You must know that when the time comes for me to choose between you and my people to protect my village, I will choose my village.”

“I understand. Thank you, sir.”

“Swear by your God—” a flicker of a smile swept the features of the old man—“swear by God that you will obey and agree to these conditions.”

“I swear by God I agree and will obey. And I’ll do nothing to harm you while I’m here.”

“You harm us by your very presence, my son,” the old man replied.

After Peter Marlowe had had the food and drink, the headman said, “Now you will speak no more English. Only Malay. From this moment on. It is the only way for you to learn quickly.”

“All right. But first may I ask you one thing?”

“Yes.”

“What is the significance of the toilet bowl? I mean, it hasn’t any pipes attached to it.”

“It has no significance, other than that it pleases me to watch the faces of my guests and hear them thinking, ‘What a ridiculous thing to have as an ornament in a house.’”