The Black Lake by Hella S. Haasse

Author:Hella S. Haasse [Haasse, Hella S.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Portobello Books Ltd
Published: 2012-11-01T00:00:00+00:00

My entrance exam coincided roughly with my father’s return. I had not seen him for over a year. He had put on some weight and sported a tan, which, together with his well-cut Palm Beach suit, gave him the look of a traditional gentleman planter at last. I was taken aback by his boisterous high spirits, and by his generosity with gifts from overseas, but most astonishing of all was that he had brought back a new wife with him. There had been no hint of this in his letters. They had married in Singapore, and she was staying on in Batavia for the moment to do some shopping.

Lida refrained from making any comment, but it was obvious that she took a dim view of my father’s actions. Oeroeg was transferred from one guardian to another without any deliberation, and it was decided that I should spend the long holidays at the plantation. No further mention was made by my father of any plans to send me to school in Holland, presumably because of the cost. At least that was what I thought when I got to know my stepmother, who abhorred unnecessary expense. She was a fresh, practical, down-to-earth young woman, with a pretty but somewhat expressionless face. I took an instant dislike to her, due to her imperious reorganization of the Kebon Djati household and her haughty way with the domestic servants as well as with the estate’s employees. As a governess and schoolteacher she had spent some years in a position of comparative subordination, and now seemed determined to make up for it as the manager’s wife. At home she was indisputably the one in charge. My father greatly admired her efficiency, and was visibly charmed by her health and vigour. In contrast to my mother, who had always risen late and seldom exchanged her negligee for proper daywear, Eugenie joined my father at the breakfast table neatly dressed and with the housekeeping activities well under way.

I escaped whenever I could from the new atmosphere pervading the house. Usually I went to see Oeroeg in Soekaboemi, but sometimes we would escape to the countryside to explore or go swimming in one of the mountain pools. Lida had taken over a guest-house in Batavia, where she and Oeroeg would be going to live in September. Oeroeg would be attending secondary school there, after which he would go on to study at the Netherlands-Indies Medical College in Soerabaja. Lida had the whole plan worked out.

We also paid a visit to Sidris, who found little to say to her son. The expression on her care-worn face was a mixture of pride and bewilderment as she slowly shook her head, only dimly aware of what the future held. Over the years her home had lost every trace of Western comfort. A few grimy mats served as seats in the dilapidated front porch, there was rubbish heaped up in the yard, and everywhere the stench of dried fish and trasih. Satih, now

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