Child of All Nations Read Online Free PDF Page A

pleading.
    “It’s up to you, Tuan; you can throw it away. You can burn it.”
    “Don’t, Nyo. I don’t even dare touch it.”
    I kept walking away. He tugged at me to stop me from going.
    “Why are you afraid? It’s Robert’s. If you don’t like it, then keep it and give it back to him when he returns.”
    “Don’t, Nyo, don’t cause us more trouble, Nyo. Sinyo knows how many children we have.” His tugs grew stronger.
    I stopped, unsure. Indeed I had no right to make trouble for him and his family. They had already suffered enough because of Robert. Victor Roomers was right after all. I shouldn’t be adding to their troubles. Mama’s teachings about principles were being tested. But it wouldn’t be right to go on with this.
    I allowed myself to be pulled back, and sat again under the mango tree. I listened to his pleas: “Take it back, Nyo,” he said, pointing with his chin to the ring, which still lay on the handkerchief.
    I wrapped up the ring and put it back into my pocket. For the second time, I took my leave. He seemed relieved. All of a sudden, he asked: “Where to now, Nyo?”
    “To hand this ring over to the district police officer, Tuan.”
    “God, Nyo, is there no other way?”
    “No, Tuan,” I answered firmly.
    “If that’s what Sinyo wants.” He paused momentarily, then didn’t go on. He escorted me back to the buggy. Before climbing aboard, I felt I had to ask his pardon: “I’m sorry, Tuan. There is nothing else I can do.”
    The buggy took me to the district police chief’s office. Along the way I couldn’t help but marvel at the presence of the police in this world. In troubles such as these, they appear as a kind of godfather—able to solve almost any problem. The civilized world could not continue without them. People say they began as groups of private individuals in Spain, hired to protect the wealthy and powerful from criminals and from the poor. Later they were taken over by governments. As in other places, the police had not been around long in the Indies, only for the last few decades. Imagine if criminal cases had still been in the hands of the officers of the Dutch East Indies Company. There would be even more trouble before I could get rid of this ring.
    The district police officer received me politely, listened to my story, took the ring, and examined it. He seemed to know what he was doing. It was not fake, he said, and was about two carats, but he called someone else in to examine it more closely.
    He handed me a receipt to sign which gave details of the ring’s diamond-carat value, its gold-carat value, and weight.
    “Can you get witnesses that this was a gift from Robert Suurhof?”
    He took down the names I gave.
    “Do you know where Suurhof is now?”
    “I do know, Tuan, from his letters.”
    “Can we borrow those letters?” he asked politely. “No? Very well. If you have no objections, could you give us his address?”
    “His actual address isn’t written there, Tuan. But the stamps on the envelope were postmarked Amsterdam Post Office.”
    “Good. Then let us borrow the envelopes. The more the better.”
    “Just the envelopes?”
    “If you have no objections, Tuan. Otherwise, please just write out a declaration giving the details.”
    I wrote out the declaration he asked for.
    On the way home I felt freed from the disturbances caused bythat accursed object, as though freed from some thorn stuck in my throat.
    “Only rich people like going to the police, Young Master,” Marjuki suddenly said. “Little people like me are afraid. If I weren’t your driver, I swear I’d never have entered that yard, Young Master.”
    “Yes, Juki,” I answered. Indeed they had no need of the police. They had little interest in the security of their wealth, selves, and name; in fact, they owned nothing. These thoughts, emerging so suddenly, aroused feelings of sympathy for them—those who had nothing, who had no need of the services of the police. To them a