Page:Max Havelaar Or The Coffee Sales of the Netherlands Trading Company Siebenhaar.djvu/305

 warning, and that further you will order an inquiry to be held as to the facts I communicated to you in my letter of yesterday, No. 88.

This request was received by the Resident on the way. An hour after his arrival at Rangkas-Betoong he paid a short visit to the Regent, and asked him on this occasion what he could allege against the Assistant-Resident, and whether, the Adhipatti, was in want of money! To the first question the Regent replied: “Nothing, I swear!” To the second question he replied in the affirmative, whereupon the Resident gave him a couple of banknotes which he—having brought them for the purpose!—took out of his waistcoat pocket. It will be understood that all this happened unknown to Havelaar, and presently we shall be shown how he became aware of this disgraceful action.

When Resident Slimering alighted at Havelaar’s house, he was paler than usual, and his words were farther than ever parted from one another. And indeed it was no trifling ordeal for one who so greatly excelled in “manœuvring” and in annual peace-reports, to have suddenly to receive letters in which there was not a trace, either of the customary official optimism, or of artistic twisting of the matter, or of the fear of making the Government dissatisfied by being “embarrassed” by unfavourable tidings. The Resident of Bantam had had a fright, and if I may be pardoned the ignobility of the figure of speech for the sake of exactness, I am inclined to compare him to a street-arab who complains of the violation of pre-ancestral customs, because an eccentric companion has hit him without preliminary invectives.

He began by asking the Controller why he had not tried to turn Havelaar from making his charge. Poor Verbrugge, who knew nothing whatever about the charge, protested to that effect, but found no credence. Mr. Slimering could not at all understand that