The sun was already baking in through the window when he awoke again. It was now two days after Eid al-Fitr. If he went up to Gandringan this morning, he could at least sort out the mechanics of the outbreak. Get the easy part out of the way. He could stay overnight, get some fresh air, and maybe get a handle on the more difficult part. He rolled over to get out of bed, then looked back at his pillow and remembered Nancy, the way she had pressed against him before she got on to her motorbike, how much he had wanted to invite her over for the night, and his confusion.
He slipped on a sarong to go to the washroom, splashed cold water over himself, dried off, slipped into his jeans and a clean cotton shirt. He realized with a sudden pang how much she had suddenly become part of his life, how he missed her when they weren’t together. Did she feel the same? But where was she now? Work? He didn’t want to be checking on her too much, didn’t want to scare her off with his nosing around, some kind of control freak. Still, what did he really know about her? He sat on the edge of the bed with his head in his hands for a moment before going out to the dining room.
He could hear Tina, the housecleaner, busying herself with cleaning up food crumbs in the kitchen. He poked his head out into the garage. Pak Budi was sitting on his stool by the gate. He stood up when he saw Ab. “Selamet bagi,” Ab said. Good morning. Budi grinned, toothlessly. Ab had never had a conversation with the old man. He realized how invisible Budi had become to him, so that he hardly noticed when the gate was opened for him, and closed, as if the man was simply another sort of automatic gate opener. Ab had no idea what the old man did when he wasn’t sitting at the gate. Where was he from? Did he have a family? Kids? Grandkids? He probably only spoke Javanese. Ab went back into the house and Budi sat down. Ab wondered what exactly this old guy could guard him against, but he remembered Sarah’s argument about servants. This wasn’t about somebody doing work for you. This was about spreading the wealth. He sighed.
Ab fixed himself a plate of greasy fried eggs and rice, drank a cup of the black sludge that passed for coffee, and left the dishes in the sink for Tina. He was already at the car before he turned around and went to the kitchen to tell Tina that he wouldn’t likely be back until the following day, so she could also take the day off.
It was going to be a hot day. He could feel it in the air, already now at eight-thirty. At the office, he dug into his own personal cupboard of supplies: needles, micro-hematocrit tubes, a microscope, a portable centrifuge. Not much. The Canadian International Development Agency representative in Ottawa had said that they were not to be providing supplies. That was an Indonesian responsibility under the contract. George had said that General Witono, the project overseer in Jakarta, had bought himself a new tinted-window Toyota Camry. All Ab knew was that none of the money for improving the diagnostic facilities actually materialized in Yogyakarta. It was just him and Soesanto and a computer. The university itself was broke. How was Ab supposed to do his job? He loaded up his car, and then realized that he had forgotten to talk to Soesanto about this trip. He had been busy with Nancy.
At Soesanto’s house, the old lady didn’t come to the door when Ab shook the gate. He could hear the birds, a tumbling wave of whistles and rustles and screams from behind the house, but nothing else. It was already nine o’clock. If he wanted to get anything done up around Gandringan, he had better leave soon. Depending on traffic, it could take two or three hours.
He scribbled a note and stuck it to Soesanto’s gate with bandage tape. Soesanto could come up later on his own. Ab wondered if he should be worried, but set that thought aside. If anyone could take care of himself, it was Soesanto.
He passed Nancy’s computer shop. The shutters were up and the shop looked open. He thought about stopping, but recalled how she had reacted when he came into the shop yesterday. Best to keep love and work separate. He had barely gotten to the edge of town when a police car with its siren screaming barrelled down the middle of the road, clearing away traffic. He pulled off to the side. In a few moments a single black Mercedes limousine sped by, heading toward Klaten and Solo. Another police car was close behind it. Ab pulled back out into the stream of traffic that closed in behind the speeding dignitary. He pulled over at a police kiosk at the next intersection to ask who had passed in the car. Ab could see his reflection in the policeman’s sunglasses.
The policeman shrugged. Someone important.
“How important? General Witono? Pak Sani? President Suharto?”
The policeman then decided he had said enough and, as if Ab no longer existed, went back to stand by the road with his thumbs under his belt.
Ab shifted into gear and sped off down the road, his mind churning, his heart pounding. What if the assassination plot was in progress? What should he do? Stay out of politics, said the clause in his CIDA contract. He knew he was in denial. He didn’t want to think about it. After passing Klaten, he debated with himself whether to continue on the main road or take the scenic, pot-holed, barely passable scenic cross-country route. At the intersection, he pulled off to the side and took a deep breath. He was a god-damned veterinarian. He would work on animal diseases and leave the rest to someone else.
He headed cross-country. The road wound up, away from the sizzling, dusty heat of the plains. He swerved to miss a big pothole in the middle of the road, and then again to miss a horse-cart.
The sun was hammering down mercilessly when he pulled into the yard of the Pak Lura. He stopped in the shade near the edge of the yard and climbed out. The Lura came out to greet him, shaking hands and then touching his breast. Ab did the same.
And to what did the Lura owe the pleasure of this visit?
“I just wanted to check if there had been any more deaths. I hadn’t heard from you and hoped you didn’t forget.” He realized that he could have phoned, if that had been all there was to it.
The Lura laughed. No, he didn’t forget. Yes, there had been a couple more die the day before Eid al-Fitr, but since then, nothing. He smiled at Ab and added that in neither case had he known beforehand that they were going to die. When Ab asked if it would be possible to talk to the farmers, the Lura called in one of his helpers and discussed the matter vigorously in Javanese with him for a few minutes. Then he switched to Bahasa Indonesia, and explained that the Canadian who lived where there was snow and ate birdseed wanted to speak with the farmers who had lost some cattle. Ab wondered what the Javanese part of the discussion had been about.
Ab went with the Lura as translator. At the first farm, they stood with the wiry, shirtless farmer, leaning on the bamboo rail outside an empty cattle shed. The old man’s cow had died like those of the other farmers. It was late at night, so suddenly. It was lucky the butcher, Pak Sumiarto, happened by when the cow died, or the meat would have been wasted.
So the butcher came by?
The Lura asked again, to make sure. Yes, the butcher had come by just as the cow was dying and had bought the meat from him, so he could at least have some money and not lose everything.
“Just like with Pak Machmud. And what time of day was this?”
“It was before first light.”
“Just when you would expect the butcher out wandering around, yes?” The old farmer stared thoughtfully at Ab.
Was there anything else? Ab wished Soesanto were here to help him probe a little deeper. Finally, after a long pause, the farmer added that this disease was never seen here before the new dairy cows started coming in, the ones that came from America. He had heard that they had a similar disease down at the main farm. Was that true?
Ab shrugged. “They have a different disease.”
“I think we will not take cows from that place again,” said the old man in Bahasa Indonesia.
Every farm was the same story. Either they died without anyone seeing, or they were very stiff and then fell over and had convulsions. With a few exceptions, mostly occurring early in the course of this “epidemic,” they reluctantly admitted that the butcher had come by and purchased their meat at salvage prices. It wasn’t much, but was better than nothing. Yes, they had received replacement cows as well. And in the days since the feast at Eid al-Fitr, there had been no cows dying. They all said they had no interest in that development project anymore.
***
Ab turned to the Lura as they drove back from the last farm. “I cannot think of very many diseases that strike only in the evening or at night, or that take a holiday at Eid al-Fitr. I do not know very many butchers that wander around the village at night, doing good deeds for farmers.”
“There was a high demand for meat at Eid al-Fitr,” the Lura commented. He paused. “Perhaps it would be good for me to have a little talk with the butcher.”
“Yes,” Ab added, “before he slips away to visit his grandmother in Jakarta.”
The Lura laughed.
That night, Ab lay down on the hard bed in the guest room of the Lura’s house and hugged his Dutch wife. He rolled over on to his back, loosened his sarong, and watched a cecak stalking a moth on the ceiling. He tried not to think about the scenario of plots and counter-plots that George had laid out for him. What could he do? It really wasn’t his business. The cecak zapped the giant moth and slowly drew the struggling insect into its mouth. The lizard sat there, perfectly still, with the wriggling tail and wings protruding from its mouth.
***
It was still dark when he was awakened, not by a call from the mosque, but by the blaring of a radio into the cool mountain air, and by the persistent crowing of a kampung rooster just outside the open window. He stood up, stiffly, and pulled the shutters open. Yes, it really was Abba resonating among the trees. Mama Mia. He tightened up his sarong, slipped outside and walked to the roofless, concrete-walled washing-up area at the corner of the yard. Someone was in there already bathing, a kerosene lantern set on one corner of the four-foot wall. Ab could just see over the top of the wall. A woman stood up and poured water over herself, a glassy stem of water breaking with a splash of light over her sleek black hair and then down over her low-hanging breasts, the nipples long and pulled-at looking. Twenty-something and a mother several times over no doubt. He looked away and squatted down on the ground just outside the entrance. In a few minutes she came out. She stared at him for a minute as if trying to figure out what kind of lowly pink-skinned animal he might be, lurking around the washing area in the morning. Then she walked away, rubbing a towel in her hair.
Ab poured a bucket of the icy water over himself. The sharp slap of water caused him to suck in his breath and shiver. The bar of soap that sat on the edge of the mandy was small and hard. He soaped himself up and then rinsed. Wrapping himself back in his sarong, he stepped back out into the open air. The music was still ricocheting off the walls of the little gully the village was in. He returned to the house, slipped into his clothes, and walked in the direction of the music.
About fifty yards away, he followed the music down a mud path and along a bamboo fence to a pole barn. There was a dairy cow tied to one corner of the barn, and a kerosene lantern hung up above. Just below the kerosene lantern, on the wall of the barn, was a big poster of Michael Jackson: Thriller. Barely out in North America, already pirated into the back country of Java. Hunched beside the cow on a three-legged stool, the farmer was milking his cow. Beside the farmer, a radio was blasting the music. Some extension agent must have once told him that if cows are played music they give more milk. No one ever told him the difference between music that was jarring and music that was soothing. Maybe all western music sounded the same. Like gamelan to Ab.
Ab approached him and greeted him with the few words of Javanese that he knew, then pointed at the cow and made signs of milking. The man nodded and continued milking. No, he interrupted him again, he, Ab, wanted to milk. He pointed at the cow and then at himself. The man laughed, thinking this hilarious. Maybe he thinks I think I am a cow? Maybe he thinks I want to breed her? Whatever. Ab shrugged his shoulders and walked away, the music thudding after him like thrown rocks.
***
Breakfast at the Lura’s, at least this morning, was a full plate of fried rice with an egg on top. The Lura’s wife served and then, as always, withdrew to eat by herself in the kitchen. The Lura apologized for not having any bread and then remarked, with approval, again, as always, that Ab was already eating rice.
Yes, Ab assured him once again. He was already eating rice.
After breakfast had been cleared away, the Lura spoke. “We had a discussion with the butcher yesterday evening.” Ab searched his face, in vain, for what kind of “discussion” it might have been. “He insists that the killing of the cows started before he was involved, and that, at first, he only walked the streets at night looking for dying animals, to salvage them for meat.” He paused. “Later, when he needed more meat, he used some strychnine to make some sick.”
“And do you believe him?”
“We asked the questions in such a way…yes, I believe him.”
“So where do we go from here? Does the butcher know who else had killed cows before he started, or in neighbouring villages? Did he say who provided him with magnets and poison? His cousin from Susu Senang maybe?”
The Lura arose. “I think it is better that you leave now. Thank you so much for discovering the cause of this illness.” Ab thought his voice was strained, but there seemed to be no room for argument. He got up to leave.
“Well, we know at least part of the story.”
The Lura herded him toward the car. “I think we know enough now. I hope you have a happy trip home.”