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Roy Glashan's Library
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Blue Book, December 1938, with "Batavian Goddess"
James Francis Dwyer
JAMES FRANCIS DWYER (1874-1952) was an Australian writer. Born in Camden Park, New South Wales, Dwyer worked as a postal assistant until he was convicted in a scheme to make fraudulent postal orders and sentenced to seven years imprisonment in 1899. In prison, Dwyer began writing, and with the help of another inmate and a prison guard, had his work published in The Bulletin. After completing his sentence, he relocated to London and then New York, where he established a successful career as a writer of short stories and novels. Dwyer later moved to France, where he wrote his autobiography, Leg-Irons on Wings, in 1949. Dwyer wrote over 1,000 short stories during his career, and was the first Australian-born person to become a millionaire from writing. —Wikipedia
JAN KROMHOUT, the big Dutch naturalist, who was familiar with every dark corner of Malaysia told me this story of Karl Behren and his wife Lila, who was known throughout the East as the "Batavian Goddess." As Kromhout was an intimate friend of Karl Behren, his account of the strange affair is based on first-hand information. There are other versions of the Behren tragedy, but Kromhout's story is the only true narrative.
The telling was prompted by a triangle affair in the menagerie of the naturalist. A shortage of cage-space had forced the Dutchman to place a beautiful female rhesus in the compartment occupied by a pig-tailed macaque who possessed to the limit the ugly attributes of his tribe. Prior ownership of the cage gave the pig-tailed one ideas. He considered the lady rhesus as a piece of property, and he kept a sharp eye on her conduct and movements.
All went well till Kromhout acquired a young male rhesus, which he placed next to the pig-tailed macaque and his slave. Immediately the male rhesus was attracted by the beauty of the female, and the menagerie was filled with the snarlings and cries of the old pig-tail and the dashing newcomer. It was quite evident that the lady monkey viewed the male rhesus with a kindly eye; but Kromhout did not change her into the cage of the youngster.
"The pig-tail is old," he explained. "He is fond of her in his stupid way. If I take her from him, and put her with that young fellow, he will die from jealousy. The old are always jealous. They fix their minds hard on something, and they cannot let it go. With the young it is different. Ja. They think they can get better around the corner. The old know they cannot."
For a long minute he was silent; then he asked a question: "Did I ever tell you that I was a friend of Karl Behren?"
I shook my head vigorously. I had heard scraps of gossip regarding Karl Behren and his wife Lila, but those morsels had come from chattering fools who had never seen either Behren or the woman whose beauty had earned for her the title of the Batavian Goddess.
"I knew Karl Behren long before he became a millionaire," began Kromhout.
"He lived then in the Hotel der Nederlanden in Molenvliet East, and he thought more about money than any other man in Batavia. He dreamed of guilders; and all day long he chased them. He had the money-lust very bad. Never would he look at women. Neen. Women meant the spending of money, so he did not like them. And women did not look much at him, because he was as ugly as that pig-tailed macaque. So he spent his time adding up figures in his bank-books, and he would only talk to the managers of the Java Bank and the Nederlandse Handelsbank who looked after his money.
"This was in the days when Lila Sluyters was a little girl with big plaits of yellow hair hanging down her back. She lived in the central town, Kasteelplein, and her parents were poor. Many times I saw her going to and from school, and I thought she was just like any other little girl.
"It is strange about the East. The change from a girl to a woman is made in a matter of hours. In Europe and America it takes months, years even. There is that clumsy crossing-over period, when a girl is all knees and elbows, and when she is so mad with herself that she wishes she were dead; but in the Orient it is different. Ja, it is very different. Today you are buying a bag of chocolates for a nice little girl; and tomorrow she is in the marriage-market.
"It was that way with Lila Sluyters. One day she was walking down the Molenvliet without a single boy looking at her; and the day after, she was the Batavian Goddess, with people pointing her out as the prettiest girl in all Java. She had bloomed in a night like the bulb-fields of Holland.
"She was not true Dutch. The East is the great mixing-pot of the world. There the tree of genealogy has more grafts than you find in any other place. In Lila Sluyters' breeding there was a dash of Spanish and a little French, and it was whispered that way back, in the days of the revolt of Dipa Negara, a sultan of Surakarta had been friendly with her great-grandmother. Those blood-mixtures turn out the great beauties.
"Lila Sluyters became in one single day something that stirred desire, something that made men a little crazy when they looked at her. I do not know what it was but magic. She had something that you could not put into words, something that came out from her when you met her on the street, something that told you the day was bright when you thought it was raining, something that whispered you were not as old as you thought you were. It was great sorcery."
Kromhout paused in his story. The male rhesus was chattering madly at the pig-tailed macaque, probably telling him that he was an old fool to think that the prepossessing female in his cage had any interest in him. The pig-tail was firing back statements about the asininity of youth.
I ventured to make a remark to Kromhout during the interruption. "From your description I should think she had lots of—well, appeal."
"Lots?" repeated the naturalist. "Ja, she had! She had enough for five-score women. The news about her went out over the Malay like the news of the finding of a great pearl! When she walked out from the Sluyters house, crowds would follow her along Noordwijk Straat, making ooh's and aah's because her beauty hit them little blows that knocked the sounds out of them. She was very nice to look at, was that girl. She made one thank the Almighty for His kindness in fashioning her little nose and her big eyes, and her mouth that was in itself a temptation.
"When she went bathing down at Tandjong Priok, there were dozens of men watching with spy-glasses. Not all young men, either. There were old fellows who waited hours to catch a glimpse of her in a bathing-costume. Myself, I went there to look at her. I am not ashamed. She was something sent into this world to make men feel glad.
"People heard about her in Singapore, in Rangoon, in Calcutta. They heard about her in the United States. A big cinema man in California cabled his agent in Hongkong to have a look at her, and that fellow came on the run.
"He had a contract all ready for that girl, Lily Sluyters, to sign. A fine contract. She was to get thousands of dollars, with an automobile, and a big house at the place where they make the pictures in California; and her mother and her father saw their fortunes made. We Dutch have a proverb which runs: 'Dochters zijn broze waren,' Daughters are fragile ware. Those old Sluyters wanted to make all the money they could out of their daughter, but they were a bit nervous about her going to America. The agent argued with them; then, just as they were going to sign that contract, something happened. Ja, something big happened.
"I have told you that Karl Behren never looked at a woman. He did not see them when they brushed against him on the Molenvliet when he was going to and from his hotel. And because he was as ugly as that pig-tail in the cage, few women bothered to look at him. Well, the day that the Sluyters were going to sign the contract for Lily to go to that place called Hollywood, Karl Behren got a shock. Lily Sluyters looked at him, and he looked at her.
"People who were near said later that he stopped, rubbed his eyes, and gurgled like a crazy man. Lily Sluyters did not stand around to watch him. She had seen a few fellows act just like Karl Behren. She went tripping along to her father's house; and Behren, when he got the use of his legs, turned and followed.
"YOU will understand the situation: Karl Behren
had a million guilders, and he was right there in Batavia.
That was nice for Father and Mother Sluyters. They could
see Lila any time, if she was married to Karl Behren, and
they could see some of his guilders too. This picture place
in America was a long way off; so when old Karl put his
offer to Lila's parents, they said 'Ja!' very quickly.
Karl Behren was the richest Dutchman from Penang Gate to
Meester-Cornelis.
"Karl Behren was a man who did things in a hurry. He and Lila Sluyters were married two weeks after he had asked for her hand. There was a riot in Jacatra Road when they were coming back from the church. Everyone wanted to get close to the bride. Men fought with each other, and women were knocked down and trampled on.
"Behren walked with his long guilder-hunting nose in the air; but he got mad when the young fellows clawed and scratched with each other to get close to Lila. Behren did not like those young fellows. Not much. When you are fifty-three and just married to a girl of seventeen, you do not think much of young men. Karl smacked at some of those laughing youngsters who got. too close to his bride. Smacked at them, and swore quietly to himself.
"Lila did not mind. She smiled at the youngsters when they cheered her; and once she tossed a flower from her bouquet to a boy named Pete de Vries who was her playmate before that day when she jumped from a little girl into a beauty that men ran to look at. Pete de Vries could not understand that change. He was crying as he ran along close to her. Crying, and calling Karl Behren some nasty names. He was a strong boy, this Pete. Young but strong.
"That evening there was a big banquet at the Hotel des Indes. This Pete de Vries pushed into the room, and when Karl Behren was counting the guests so that he wouldn't be charged one guilder more than the exact price, this Pete ran along the room, took Lila in his arms and kissed her. Behren called to the servants and told them to throw the boy into the road. It took seven waiters to toss him into the Molenvliet. Ja, seven!
"Old men are fools. Karl Behren thought that when Lila was his wife, all those young fellows would stop looking at her. But those boys could not stop. She still had with her that something that I was telling you about. To the boys, she was just as tempting as honey to a bear. She made their mouths water just like the mouth of a leopard when he sees a nice little deer coming to a water-hole where he is waiting. She was— Ach, she was the sweetest thing in all Batavia, and it would not have been right if those boys did not look at her!
"Karl Behren had built a big house in the Weltevreden quarter for his bride; and when he saw that those young fellows would not stop looking at Lila, he put a high fence around the house. But lots of those boys could climb fences; and the best climber of them all was that Pete de Vries, who had played with Lila when she was a little girl. Ja, he could climb well. He would shin up to the top of that fence and watch till Lila came into the garden. To Pete, she was what the sun is to a mango tree.
"It is very silly for an old man to marry a young girl. It is the worst kind of foolishness. That idiot Karl Behren gave up his business so that he could stay at home all day and keep those young fellows from peeping at his wife. Mind you, it was not Lila's fault. She was a good woman. She kept her eyes on her shoes when she walked along Rijswijk to Olislaeger's jewelry shop to spend some of Behren's guilders; but— well, she was so beautiful that men could not help but stare."
KROMHOUT paused as the uproar between the
pig-tailed macaque and the rhesus became deafening. Other
occupants of the menagerie joined in. A black ape took the
side of the pig-tailed macaque, and urged him by excited
yelps to climb into the cage of the offending rhesus and
knock his block off. A capped langur and three red howlers
were all for the male rhesus, screaming encouragement when
he shook the wire netting that separated him from the
pig-tail and the lady who had attracted his eye. The big
Dutchman pulled down a piece of matting that shut off the
view of the howling monkeys; then he spoke gravely to the
disputants. The pig-tail and the rhesus appeared to listen,
and for a time there was peace.
Kromhout resumed:
"Karl Behren was as spiteful as a wounded kraik about those men staring at Lila. And the more people heard about Lila, the more trouble he had. The guides that waited down at Tandjong Priok to get the tourists who climbed down from the big steamships were told about Lila. Before her beauty made her famous, those guides would chatter to strangers about the Sacred Cannon, the fish-market at Pasar-Ikan, and Peter Erberveld's Skull on Jacatra Road; but they found those tourists were more interested when they heard of the Batavian Goddess. When the tourists smacked their lips and said they would like to see a goddess, the guides rushed them up to the big house in Weltevreden, and told them to peep through the holes in the fence. Karl Behren closed up a lot of those holes, but the boys cut new ones. It was a sad business, but people could not keep from smiling as they watched.
"Six months after his marriage, Karl Behren began to show the strain of keeping men from looking at his wife. I met him one day on Kali Besar, and he spoke to me. There was that little dancing light of madness in his eyes. 'Kromhout,' he said, 'those damn' fools are driving me insane. They will not stop gaping at my wife.'
"'It does not hurt you if they look at her,' I said.
"'Ja, it does!' he snapped. 'They have a hunger for her, and their hunger makes me so sick that I could jump in the Tjiliwoeng and drown myself.'
"'If you took no notice of them, you would not suffer,' I said.
"'How can I shut my eyes to them?' he screamed, and his voice as he asked me that question was so loud that all the people turned and stared at him.
"'Listen!' he shrieked. 'I see the damned fools in my dreams! See them peeking through the holes in the fences! I will go mad if I stay in Batavia! I am off!'
"'Where?' I cried.
"'I am buying a little island off the coast near Cape Indramajoe,' he said. 'It has just one big house on it. Just one. We will live there. We will have a few native servants, and no white man will be allowed to land on the island. Do you understand? I will put a stop to this business. If anyone comes to stare at Lila, I will put a bullet in his head!'
"I looked at his face that was black with temper, and I thought it best for everyone if he went away from Batavia. Pretty wives are always a trouble!
"All the friends of Karl Behren and Lila saw them off on the big launch that Karl hired to take them to their new home. That boy Pete de Vries was there, you bet. And there were hundreds of other boys, and middle-aged men, and old men. They thought they were having a last look at Lila, and they were sad. Very sad indeed. But the wise ones who had listened to Karl Behren thought it best that he should go. They were glad when the launch swung away from Tandjong Priok."
Once again the animal triangle halted the narrative. The lady rhesus came mincingly to the netted division between the cages and looked demurely at the male of her own race on the other side. The pig-tail macaque, his ridiculous six-inch tail expressing his indignation, attempted to drag her away. Once more the black ape advised the ugly one to tear down the netting and knock the head off the interfering rhesus.
Kromhout regarded his charges. "I think she has a lot of that something you call appeal," he said dryly. "And that young rhesus that is leaping up and down to show her how much he likes her, makes me think of young Pete de Vries."
"Was Behren's move successful?" I asked.
"For a little while," answered the Dutchman. "Karl and Lila were on that island four months without seeing another white face. No one came to it except the natives who brought supplies; and Behren was beginning to forget those fellows at Batavia who used to hang around his house. He was thinking he was a mighty smart Dutchman to get that girl and take her away where no one else could see her, but just when he was patting himself on the back, he got a big surprise. One afternoon late, he saw a little boat coming toward the landing-place, a little boat with one person in it. A white person.
KARL BEHREN took his rifle and went down to the
beach. When the boat was quite close, he hailed it. He
said that no one might land on the island without taking a
chance of a bullet in the head. And he said it quite as if
he meant it,
"The person in the boat argued with Karl, saying that there was no food or water in the boat, that it was leaking badly, and a landing was necessary, whether Karl Behren liked it or not.
"It was true that the boat was leaking, but Karl did not care. He was very angry. He fired a shot in the air as a warning, and the boat turned and stood out beyond the reef that protected the little beach from the big rollers of the Java Sea. The night came down then, and Karl Behren went back to the house.
"He did not sleep all that night. He was thinking about that visitor. He lay awake listening, and thinking about all the trouble that had come to him because at fifty-three he had married a girl of seventeen.
"When it was daylight, he went down to the beach. It was just as he thought. There was the battered skiff with an empty water-jug rolling around in it; and on the sand were the marks of bare feet. The visitor had landed in the night and had gone into the brush. There were thick clumps of bamboo and palm on the island, and a person could hide there for quite a while.
"Karl Behren was mad when he saw those footprints. Quite mad. He started to hunt for that unknown. He ran up and down the island with his rifle ready. He dashed into the clumps of prickly brush that tore his flesh and his clothing. He shouted curses. He wept because he could not find his visitor.
"This sickness of jealousy is a terrible thing. It is the worst sickness in the world. Karl Behren had it bad. Every time he would look at his wife, he would subtract seventeen from fifty-three, and that difference of thirty-six made faces at him. Thirty-six is quite a big number.
"He ate nothing, and he could not sleep. And he would not talk to his wife or permit her to talk to him. She wished badly to talk to him; but the moment she opened her mouth, he would tell her to shut up. He would not listen to one word. He was quite mad.
"He was up at dawn, poking the barrel of his rifle into the bamboos, and he would keep at that business till the dark came down. He was red-eyed for want of sleep, and his face was torn to pieces by the thorns. It was a pity. Before he had seen that girl Lila Sluyters on the Molenvliet, he was a nice quiet Dutchman whose only fault was his hunger for money.
"That business went on for thirteen days. Karl Behren did not sleep in the same room as his wife. He did not sleep at all, but he had a bed in a room at the front of the house, looking out toward the landing-place. There ne would sit by himself through the nights, and curse the unknown hiding in the bushes.
"Before daylight on the morning of the fourteenth day, Karl Behren, peeping out of his window, saw his wife leaving the house. Ja. She had a bundle in her arms, and he knew it was food. He grabbed his gun, and when she started along a little path into the woods, he followed her.
"I bet he was saying nice things to himself as he crept after her. Nice things about young wives who are faithless to old husbands. Sometimes when I am sorry because I have not married, I think of Karl Behren, and I am pleased that I am an old bachelor. I am much pleased.
"HE followed Lila along that path for half a mile.
She stopped then, and whistled softly. He did not blink his
eyes as he watched. A head came out of the bamboo clump,
and Lila spoke to the head. She said: 'I have brought some
food and water. It is very difficult. I have tried to tell
him all about you, but he will not listen to anything I
say.'
"The brain of Karl Behren turned a somersault when he heard that. You bet it did. He was certain that the unknown in the bushes was some fellow from Batavia who had followed Lila down to the island. One of the fools who peeped at her through the holes in the fence. She had said: 'I have tried to tell him all about you, but he will not listen to anything I say.'
"He thought it was surely that strong boy Pete de Vries. You see, it was nearly dark when he had waved the boat away from the landing. Ja, he was certain then that it was Pete.
"He pulled his rifle to his shoulder, and fired at the head sticking out of the bushes. He was a good shot, but he was excited at that moment. The bullet clipped a branch an inch from the ear of that head as the owner of it ducked.
"Behren swore like the devil and fired again—blindly, into the bushes. He was insane. His wife started to scream words at him, but he could not hear. He was crazy with jealousy. He was certain that the unknown in the bushes was his wife's lover.
"'I'll kill you!' he shouted, turning on Lila. 'I'll put a stop to these tricks once and for all!'
"He wheeled on her; but when he was lifting the rifle to his shoulder, the unknown in the bushes took a pot-shot with a revolver at Karl Behren. The bullet struck him in the throat—and he did not trouble any more about women. He was dead in five minutes.
"THAT afternoon a police boat from Cheribon came to
the island. The police were hunting for the person who had
had the duel with Karl Behren. It was funny. You have heard
of Margo da Costa, who poisoned three husbands in Semarang?
Ja? Well, it was she who had potted Karl Behren. She
had escaped from jail in men's clothes smuggled in by her
sweetheart. Lila had found out days before that it was a
woman on the island, by the print of her feet in the sand;
but Karl Behren was so mad with jealousy that he did not
measure that footprint. And he would not let Lila tell
him.
"It was a sad business. That da Costa woman went back to jail to serve the twenty years for poisoning her husbands. They did not try her for killing Karl Behren. Perhaps they thought the Almighty had let her out of her cell to do that job. She is still in jail at Semarang.
"Lila got all the money that Karl Behren left. She came back to Batavia, and married Pete de Vries, the boy that she used to play with before she became the Batavian Goddess who brought all the tourists running from Tandjong Priok to the big house in Weltevreden to have a look at her. She—"
Jan Kromhout broke off his narrative with a throaty curse and sprang toward the monkey-cages. For the male rhesus, with dexterous fingers, had removed a section of the netting between the two cages, and had squirmed into the territory of the pig-tailed macaque. As Kromhout leaped from his chair, the two came to grips.
Every animal in the collection of the Dutchman was aware of the battle. Screams, cries, grunts, and crazy chattering came from the cages. They understood the reason for the combat.... They had sensed its coming.
Kromhout tore the pig-tailed macaque from the clutch of the infuriated rhesus. The pig-tail was in a bad way. He was old, and the younger monk had damaged him quite a lot in the short scrimmage. The Dutchman laid him out on a mat, and regarded him with a whimsical grin.
"You are a fool!" he said, addressing the macaque.. "You are too old to be looking at nice young monkeys like that rhesus. Much too old."
BACK in his chair again, the big naturalist took
a drink of schnapps and sighed softly. "It is a pity
that women do not stay pretty," he said. "In the East
their moment is so short. Two months ago I saw Lila on
the street. She is fat now. Ja, she is very fat. It is
difficult for us Dutch to stop eating rijsttafel; and
if a woman eats rijsttafel every day, those lines that
breed longing go very quickly. Ja, it is sad. Very sad
indeed."
Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
Go to Home Page
This work is out of copyright in countries with a copyright
period of 70 years or less, after the year of the author's death.
If it is under copyright in your country of residence,
do not download or redistribute this file.
Original content added by RGL (e.g., introductions, notes,
RGL covers) is proprietary and protected by copyright.