When the World Was Steady Read Free

you?’
    ‘I beg your pardon?’ The Sydney society tone again.
    ‘Well, for this whole thing.’ He gestured limply at the air. ‘Batur?’
    ‘No, Abang. I could say the same of you.’
    ‘He’s a guide, you know,’ he said, jerking his head towards the back of the building, presumably in the direction of the woman’s husband. ‘But he won’t take you up Abang. It’s not worth their while for one person.’
    The woman came in with a tray of steaming food: dinner for the Indonesian family. Both Emmy and the man—whose name, it transpired, was Frank—waited until she had left to speak again—a futile silence, seeing as she spoke little English.
    ‘Have you been here long?’ Emmy asked.
    ‘In Kintamani? On the island?’
    ‘Either. Both.’
    ‘Here, I arrived today and will leave tomorrow. I go around the islands every year—Bali, sometimes Java, sometimes Lombok, Sumatra. Other bits of the region too—Thailand, you know. Always Bali. The Last Paradise.’ He winked. Lewdly, Emmy thought. ‘Such friendly people. The only Hindus, you know, inIndonesia. Makes them more hospitable.’
    ‘Does it?’
    ‘And I love the little children. Such beautiful little girls.’
    Emmy wasn’t sure what he meant, but she didn’t like the sound of it. When she remembered his eager game with the owner’s daughter, which had drawn her in the door of the
losmen
, Emmy felt certain that this winking, grinning, flaccid apparition was a seasoned child molester. Worse than that, he was the only Western gauge the
losmen
owners had besides herself. Which meant the smiling woman, the earnest Indonesian family, they would all think she was cast from the same mould. He was still smiling.
    ‘Are you from England?’ she asked. She herself rarely felt English any more; she could perhaps wedge a gap between them here.
    ‘Used to be,’ Frank said. ‘My daughter’s gone back. But I’ve been out in Australia for years, couldn’t live in Britain again, not now.’
    This was worse: this was
her
life. It was only a matter of time till Portia set off for London. She decided not to ask more.
    She got up and went to the street door to observe the night. A few distant lamps winked in the darkness, and somewhere dogs howled at the moonless sky. The air was cold; there was a breeze, not soft and salted as by the sea, but bitter and somehow dangerous. There was no patter of feet along the road; no hushed singsong of voices in the dark; no wafting strains of
gamelan
music.
    Supper consisted of a plate of fried rice filled with lethal chili peppers, and beer. She and Frank ate in semi-silence, he slurping greedily and reddening, eventually sweating, from the chilis. Emmy picked fastidiously at her plate, careful to avoid the vermilion flecks; but there were so many that the process was lengthy, and the rice soon cooled to a glutinous and unappetizing mass. She offered it to Frank, who downed it withswigs of beer that splashed a little and dribbled down his chin.
    ‘You should speak to him.’
    Emmy looked puzzled.
    ‘Oka. The guide. The owner.’
    ‘You said he wouldn’t take me.’
    ‘He probably won’t.’
    ‘Besides, I have a name. I’ll ask the woman where I can find him.’
    Frank shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t do that. Rivalry. Ask outside, in the morning. In the market. But if Oka
would
take you,’ he said, leaning forward confidentially, ‘you could go tomorrow at dawn, and be out of here by noon. You could come with me to Singaraja. It’s not too friendly, as villages go, this one.’
    ‘Why not?’
    Frank shrugged. ‘There are rumours. People—Western people—get robbed here, or cheated. There was even a murder once, although it was never proved. A death under mysterious circumstances, shall we say.’ He sat back in his chair and belched, waiting for Emmy to take the bait. She decided not to. After a moment he said, ‘What would you say to a bit of fun?’
    Again, she did not know what this meant. It flashed through