Part 7

Mat Nuh was alone and Mĕgat Raja was accompanied by two other men, but the youth unsheathed his _kris_ and went down ready to accept the chances of a hand-to-hand struggle.

Seeing that Mat Nuh would defend himself, and knowing that he was no contemptible adversary, the three men hesitated. What was of more account in their minds was that Che Nuh belonged to a powerful family, and his father was one of the principal chiefs in the country. There was, therefore, the certainty of retaliation should they kill him, and the uncertainty of his guilt, for Mĕriam was not the only woman in the house. As the men stood mutually on the defensive, Mĕgat Raja asked him whom he had come to see, and Che Nuh replied that it was a girl in the house. Thinking to assure himself on this point, the husband entered the house and questioned one of the servant-women, but dissatisfied with what he heard he dashed out again determined to attack Che Nuh.

The latter had, however, taken advantage of Mĕgat Raja’s momentary absence to get outside the gate of the palisade, and once there he shouted for help and was soon surrounded by his friends.

In reply to a call, Che Nuh bid his adversary come outside the gate and he would give him any satisfaction he pleased.

That of course meant an internecine struggle between the two parties, and Mĕgat Raja declined it, for the odds were now against him, and he was still uncertain whether his wife were unfaithful or not.

On the strong suspicion that he held, his inclination was to at least make short work of the woman, but here again he was deterred by the knowledge that her relations would certainly be revenged on him. He, therefore, decided on another course of action. On the assumption that his wife was guilty (and of this he became tolerably well assured), he treated her as though he held the proofs, divorced her, turned her out of his house, and declined to let her have any of her own possessions or to remove any of his.

This action was considered a very serious indignity by Mĕriam’s friends, and it so happened that she possessed a relative named Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun, an adherent of the Sultan’s Wazîr, the Raja Bĕndahâra, and he was reputed one of the principal warriors in the country.

Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun called upon the Chief of Bandar and laid a formal complaint against Mĕgat Raja, demanding to know why he had taken the law into his own hands and treated Mĕriam in a manner to put all her relatives to shame.

The Chief of the village of Bandar was also one of the great officers of State named the Ôrang Kâya Shabandar. He was a man renowned for his courage, was wealthy, a trusted officer of the Sultan, the receiver of customs, and lived at the upper end of the village.

He listened politely to Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun, and when the latter wound up his complaint by saying he would certainly attack Mĕgat Raja if he obtained no redress, the Shabandar put his advice in the form of this ancient saw:

“If you have no gold, it is well to sing small; if you have no pivot-guns (jingals), it is well to put a pleasant face on the matter; and if you have no cannon, it is better to be quiet.”

The advice was meant in good part and not as a taunt, but Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun took it as the latter and retired with rage in his heart, saying “It is well for you who have gold and jingals and cannon to tell me I have none of these things, but I will have my revenge of you with only a _kris_.”

Then he returned to his own home to think how this was to be worked out.

The Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun’s house was between these of the Shabandar, up stream, and Mĕgat Raja, down stream, and he knew that he was not strong enough to resist a combined attack from both of them. Therefore he determined that force must be backed by cunning if he was to achieve his end. He concluded that his only plan was to attack the Shabandar, dispose of him first as the most important, and then deal with Mĕgat Raja at his leisure.

Meanwhile, Che Nuh had expressed his desire to marry Mĕriam, but as his relatives recognised that such an open avowal of his _liaison_ must lead to trouble with Mĕgat Raja and his folk, they declined to allow him to do this, and Che Nuh’s negative attitude towards the lady only increased the wrath of her kinsman, Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun.

I have said that this bravo, for that was his _métier_, was the henchman of the Raja Bĕndahâra, the highest authority in the State after the Sultan. Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun, having determined to kill the Shabandar, felt it necessary to report the intention to his master and, mindful of possible wrath to come, to ask his sanction.

Accordingly the Pĕnglima went up river to Blanja where the Bĕndahâra lived, told his tale and asked for leave to kill the Shabandar.

The reply of the Bĕndahâra was, “If you think you are able to do it, go on.”

That was enough. Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun returned to Bandar with a kindred spirit named Haji Ali, another bravo of reputation as evil as his own, and these two worthies soon settled their plan of operations.

The Sultan was at Pâsir Panjang (only a few miles above Bandar), with a large following and a crowd of boats, and the Pĕnglima and his friend determined to wreak their vengeance on the Shabandar on the _Râya Haji_, the day to which the most religious Muhammadans prolong the fast of Ramthân.

The day did not, however, suit, there were too many people constantly about the Shabandar’s house, and the conspirators had to return home without effecting their purpose.

On the following day, however, in the afternoon, Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun, Haji Ali, and three others, made a formal visit to the Shabandar, obtained admission to his house, and found in it no one besides himself and a Sumatran Raja, a visitor from down river. I say no one else but, as Pĕnglima Prang well knew, there were in the Shabandar’s house two aged ladies, the mother of the Sultan’s children and her sister.

The five men waited until they saw the Sumatran Raja take his departure, and in order to do this visitor honour, the Shabandar unarmed and unattended, accompanied him to the river-bank and there bid him farewell.

This was the moment for the development of the plot.

Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun took leave of the Shabandar and shook hands with him. Haji Ali, a very big powerful man, then also took leave and grasped the Shabandar’s hand, but instead of letting it go he drew the Dâtoh towards him, and the reply to his question of what this meant was a stab in the back from Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun’s _kris_.

The blade did not pierce the skin, it bent, and the thrust was repeated with the same result, Haji Ali all the while holding the unarmed man by the hand.

Then the Pĕnglima threw away the useless weapon, and, seizing another _kris_, plunged it time after time into the helpless body of the Shabandar, who fell to the ground, while Haji Ali and each of the others stabbed him in turn.

Leaving the body lying on the bank, the men rushed straight back into the house, shut the gates of the enclosure and immediately prepared to defend themselves, taking particular care that the two ladies already mentioned should not get away.

The news of a murder perpetrated like this is carried on the breeze, and for a few minutes the Shabandar’s adherents rushed up one after the other to be slaughtered as they arrived by the Pĕnglima and his party reinforced by their own men who had been awaiting the _dénoûement_.

Then gates and doors were closed, windows barred, cannon, pivot-guns, and muskets loaded, and Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun having rifled the house (which contained the customs collections as well as the Shabandar’s private property), and thus possessed himself of all those things which he previously lacked, sat down to calmly await the development of events.

The plot had been cunningly conceived. The brutal murder of the unarmed chief was certain to be instantly avenged, and that would have been done by an attack on the house had it not been that it contained, besides the murderers, the Sultan’s late wife and her sister, who were well-nigh sure to come to harm in the assault.

The risk of that possibility deterred the Sultan’s people, who had surrounded the house with stockades, and all that could be done was to prevent the Pĕnglima, Haji Ali, and their men, from escaping. The process of starving out the besieged could not be resorted to, for here also the ladies would have suffered.

The moment the deed was done, Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun proclaimed that he was merely the instrument of the Sultan’s Wazîr, and that he had acted on the authority of the Raja Bĕndahâra. That, if true, complicated the case considerably, and as matters had arrived at an _impasse_, a parley was called, and it was arranged that the Pĕnglima and his people should be given a safe-conduct to the Sultan at Pâsir Panjang.

Accordingly, the Pĕnglima Prang, Haji Ali, and the others left their shelter and embarked in boats provided for them, but they took good care not to let the ladies, who were their prisoners, get out of reach.

Arrived at Pâsir Panjang, Pĕnglima Prang at once sent a messenger to the Raja Bĕndahâra to inform him of the state of affairs and ask his aid. The Bĕndahâra responded to this appeal by taking boat, and, with a great following, descended the river to Pâsir Panjang. Once there, he availed himself of an ancient custom called _îkat-diri_—that is, to “bind yourself”—and, accompanied by all his people, he went and stood in front of the Sultan’s house with his hands loosely tied behind his back with his own head-kerchief, and, thus uncovered in the sun, he and all his following shouted _âmpun Tûan-ku, be-rîbu-rîbu âmpun_—“Pardon, my lord, a thousand-thousand pardons.”

After a quarter of an hour’s waiting, while the air was filled with this plea for mercy, and the Bĕndahâra and his company stood like prisoners in front of the closed house, a door opened, a herald bearing the Sultan’s insignia appeared and cried out: “Our lord pardons you, and permits you to enter into his presence.”

That settled the affair. The Sultan’s minister had accepted the responsibility for what had been done; he was far too great a man to be treated as a criminal, and, taking advantage of an old custom, he confessed his fault, offered himself a prisoner, sought and obtained the Sultan’s pardon.

Amongst those who had received the message of peace, and who entered into the presence, were the Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun, Haji Ali, and the three other murderers of the Shabandar.

Now, the Shabandar had a brother, and he was a man of war, and the Sultan well knew that this method of dealing with the murderers would not satisfy him, so he at once created him Dâtoh Shabandar in succession to the dead man, in the hope that the gift of this dignity might make for the general peace.

The Raja Bĕndahâra, accompanied by Pĕnglima Prang and his friends, then returned to Blanja.

The new Shabandar had no intention of leaving his brother’s murderers to boast of their exploit, and, in a very short time, he asked for the Sultan’s permission to attack them and wipe out the disgrace of his relative’s unavenged death.

The Sultan said the request must be preferred to the Raja Bĕndahâra, for so long as the Pĕnglima Prang was in his village he could not be attacked without the Wazîr’s sanction. Application was duly made to the Bĕndahâra, who replied that it would be contrary to custom to attack the Pĕnglima Prang while living at his door, but that if they could get him away they might do what they pleased.

The Pĕnglima Prang was, however, far too wary to be lured away from safety, and matters were in this state when there returned from a pilgrimage to Mecca a man called Haji Mûsah, nearly related to the late Shabandar.

Haji Mûsah was at this time a rather small, spare man of middle age, but his heart was out of proportion to the size of his body, and when he heard what had recently taken place in Bandar, and how Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun and Haji Ali had got away unpunished, his anger knew no bounds.

He promptly waited upon the Sultan and begged for permission to attack the Pĕnglima, and, if necessary, to include in the operations his protector, the Raja Bĕndahâra.

The Sultan hesitated to give the desired permission, but the fact that the proposal had been made very soon reached Blanja and the ears of both the Wazîr and Pĕnglima Prang. Whatever the latter was he could not be accused of cowardice, and he at once offered to anticipate an attack by making an expedition against Haji Mûsah to silence so arrogant a foe.

The Raja Bĕndahâra enraged at the idea that his name should have been mentioned with so little respect, and apprehensive that Haji Mûsah might find the means (as he knew he had the will) to carry out his suggestion, cordially approved the Pĕnglima’s proposal.

It did not take long to collect from the neighbouring village of Lambor enough men to fill two boats, and, as that was all the Pĕnglima wanted for his purpose, the party had started for Bâtak Râbit (Haji Mûsah’s village) before the down-stream people had the smallest inkling of their intention. The time was specially well chosen from the fact that the Shabandar was absent in a remote district.

In Japan they say, “If you have not seen Nikko you cannot say _gekko_,” and if there is anyone who knows the Malay Peninsula and yet has never watched the sun set across the rice-fields, when the ripe grain hangs heavily in the ear, his knowledge of the beauties of Malay scenery is very incomplete.

A wide, flat plain covered by the golden harvest, the rice-stalks standing five or six feet above the ground from which they have sucked all the water which nourished them in the earlier stages of growth. One yellow sea of yellow ears, the green stalks only discernible in the near foreground.

This sea is broken by islands of palms and fruit-trees in which nestle the picturesque brown huts of cottagers, houses of wood, built on wooden piles with palm-thatched roofs and mat walls.

The setting sun strikes in great beams of saffron light across this wide expanse of grain bounded by distant ranges of soft blue hills. How greedily one drinks it all in! and, as the Eye of Day droops lower, there shoot from between its closing lids rays of fire which tinge the glistening palms with a rosy effulgence, followed all too soon by the pale opalescent shades which proclaim the approach of the fast-driving chariot of night.

A grey haze rises from the damp earth, spreads in thin wreaths across the darkening plain, thickens to a heavy dead-white vapour, and as the silver sickle rises over the distant hills it shines upon clustered plumes of dark fronds mysteriously poised above a motionless drift of snow-like cloud.

On the edge of such a field was the home of Haji Mûsah. Behind stretched the rich plain, in front a great river, both wide and deep, its banks lined by groves of coco-nuts in the neighbourhood of villages, but elsewhere covered by forest and the _nipah_ palm.

The dwelling stood a few feet back from the river, and, as its owner was a man of means, the structure was of some size, the floor and walls of stout planks and a strong palisade enclosed the surrounding yard. The house was, as usual, on wooden piles, and the kitchen, also on piles but separated from the main building, was connected with it by a platform.

It was here that Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun, Haji Ali, and the rest of their crew arrived one morning before daylight and quickly landed under the cover of darkness.

The enterprise they had undertaken was a perilous one. Their force numbered about thirty men all told, they had come about ninety miles right into the heart of the enemy’s country, and, if there were any failure, retreat was a choice between a return against the current with a hostile people on either bank, or a long pull to the river’s mouth under the same conditions and then the sea.

Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun had, however, calculated the chances, and he counted on a successful surprise and, if need be, the pursuit of those tactics which he had already, at Bandar, found so useful.

Once on shore the palisade of Haji Mûsah’s house was cautiously approached, and, the gate being locked, it was scaled, and the whole party noiselessly established themselves beneath the house and waited for daylight.

It so happened that the house contained only two men and two women—Haji Mûsah and his wife, Haji Hawah, and their daughter and son-in-law, the latter named Haji Sâhil.

At daybreak the back door of the house was opened and the two women came out and went into the kitchen. In a moment Haji Hawah discovered that the space beneath the house was full of armed men, and with a scream she rushed back towards the door. Ere she could gain it, Haji Ali sprang upon the platform and seized one of her hands, while her husband, unpleasantly alive to the situation, caught hold of the other and tried to pull her within the door, an effort which she seconded with all her might.

A real tug-of-war was carried on for a few moments, and Haji Ali was joined by another man.

Local tradition says that Haji Ali experienced suddenly a feeling that something dire was going to happen, and he asked his companion to relieve him of his hold of the woman’s hand. The man took it, and Haji Mûsah from the inside making a great effort drew his wife towards him, and at the same time, with a spear, thrust out beyond her with so true an aim that he transfixed her would-be captor. The man released his hold, fell with a groan into Haji Ali’s arms, and Haji Mûsah, drawing his wife into the house and believing he had wounded Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun, shouted as he closed the door, “That has wetted you, Pĕnglima!”

Wetted him with blood.

Haji Ali called to the Pĕnglima, “Help me, a ‘watering’ has befallen our friend”; a polite way of expressing a disaster. By the time they got the man to the ground he was dead, for the spear had struck home.

The Pĕnglima, furious at this sight, leapt on the platform, and, finding the door immovable, dashed open a small side-window with the butt end of a musket and fired into the house, but hurt no one.

In the scuffle before the door was closed Haji Mûsah had accidentally given his son-in-law a flesh wound on the shoulder, and that had disabled him, so the defence of the position rested on one man alone.

Pĕnglima Prang Sĕmaun now summoned Haji Mûsah to surrender, but the reply was, “I will not surrender.”

“Then,” said the Pĕnglima, “I will riddle the house with bullets.”

“Shoot away,” was the reply.

“I will burn the house down.”

“Burn it,” said Haji Mûsah, “and do whatever else you like, but I will not give in.”

“Let us burn it,” said the Pĕnglima. But Haji Ali protested. “Are you mad,” he urged, “already our enemies are collecting outside, you would burn the house down and these people in it, and then what should we do? Caught like fish in a basket, without walls or roof to shelter us, what will become of us?”

The wisdom of this advice was apparent, and as it was necessary to deal with those in the house quickly the leader set to work to devise another plan.

An evil inspiration came to the Pĕnglima, and he told Haji Ali to get Haji Mûsah into conversation again while he, having loaded with all manner of missiles a pivot-gun which he found under the house, listened attentively to the sound of Haji Mûsah’s voice, and tying the gun to a post just beneath the spot where he thought the Haji must be standing, fired it.

A large hole was rent in the floor, and, the various missiles scattering in all directions, one of them struck Haji Mûsah in the thigh, seriously wounding him and placing him _hors de combat_. His wife was also hit, but only slightly injured.

The assailants realised the effects of the shot from what they heard said within and again called upon Haji Mûsah to yield, but he declined utterly to do so.

His wife said, “What is the use, you are wounded and cannot fight, so am I and so is Haji Sâhil, what can we do, better make terms with them?” Haji Mûsah stubbornly declined to listen to this persuasion and only said, “Let them do their worst, I will not yield.”

Strange to say it was only then that Haji Hawah realised that her daughter was missing. She remembered that the girl had left the house with her and gone into the kitchen, but until that moment, what with the discovery that the enemy was within their gates, the struggle at the door and subsequent events, she had not thought of the girl further than to suppose she was sitting terrified in some corner of the never brilliantly lighted house.

Now, however, it was certain that she had failed to get back before the door was closed and must have fallen into the hands of the enemy.

As a matter of fact nothing of the kind had happened. On the first alarm, seeing the crowd of strange men and her mother’s struggles to gain the house, the girl was too terrified to leave her shelter and had hidden herself in the kitchen. The enemy being all under the house when the women first came out, no one had particularly noticed the girl or ever thought of entering her hiding-place.

The moment Haji Hawah was convinced her daughter was not in the house, she became equally certain she was in the hands of the enemy, and that was an intolerable idea. She, therefore, besought her husband to offer to yield provided the girl were restored. This new factor in the case persuaded him, and Haji Mûsah called out that he would yield if his daughter were given back to them.

At first the besiegers could not understand the meaning of this proposal, but light very soon came to them and they argued that if the girl was not inside the house or in their hands, she must be in the kitchen, and a search of that place very soon discovered her.

The Pĕnglima accordingly replied that he accepted the proposal and would restore the girl on condition her father yielded. The door was then opened and the girl admitted, but no sooner was she in the house than it was closed again and Haji Mûsah declined to give himself up.

Shortly after, however, the loss of blood and pain of his stiffening limb made movement impossible and compelled Haji Mûsah to abandon all idea of further resistance.