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master’s eye and would resort to beatings and even poison. But slavery was, he assured her, on the wane. The English presence had had at least one effect on the Batavian attitudes. The English officers and officials brought their own free servants, who were quite cheap and worked hard and showed the old Batavians that one could do without slaves. The costs of slaves had risen dramatically, and they died too frequently. The whole business had come to be seen as uncouth and unsophisticated.
    â€œSo you see, the worm has turned. When we freed all the slaves on Brieswijk we were the laughingstock of the town, but now we are thought of as the most sophisticated and avant garde of enlightened citizens.”
    Tigran laughed, stopped the carriage and helped her down. He was glad now that Brieswijk had only freemen, for this, he could see, pleased Charlotte, and at this moment he had no higher aim than pleasing her in every possible way. He silently thanked Takouhi for her actions so long ago, which at the time had been something of a cause célèbre , arousing enormous gossip and great consternation amongst his neighbours. The Governor-General had called him to account, but his lands were not government lands. Batavia was surrounded by private estates; the government had no say here.
    A throng of villagers gathered, staring curiously at Charlotte. Tigran said something she did not understand, and there was a ripple of smiles and low murmurs. They bowed their heads slightly and put their right palms to their hearts. Tigran did the same. Then the crowd parted, and an old man came through the women and children and greeted Tigran. He was wizened and tiny, with sinewy tendons standing out on his arms and neck. His mouth was stained a bright red from betel chewing, and what teeth remained to him were quite black.
    Tigran explained that this was the headman, grandfather of his childhood friend, who was nicknamed Petruk after one of Arjuna’s wise and loyal servants in the wayang stories. Petruk’s great-great grandmother had been brought from Bali, they thought, but this history was lost in the mists of time. They were not Mohammedans, Tigran added; they still kept to the Balinese ways. Petruk and Tigran had grown up together at Brieswijk. His mother had been Tigran’s wet nurse and had taken care of him. Petruk was out now, he said, probably in the fields.
    Actually, Tigran was relatively sure that his friend was engaged in a cockfight somewhere out of sight. Petruk loved his pretty brown-and-white fighting cock more than he loved his wife. Cockfighting was farmed out to the Chinese as part of their monopoly on gambling taxes, but Tigran closed his eyes to the practice on his lands. Petruk and his family, he added, had been freed long ago and chose to stay and live here. Petruk’s father was long dead, and when his grandfather passed on, Petruk would be the headman.
    Charlotte was rather lost in all these explanations, but she could not ask questions as the headman ushered them to a highly ornate pavillion built out over the river on fat teak stilts. The headman appeared flustered. Tigran was calming him; he explained to Charlotte that their visit had been unexpected. It was quite naughty of him, for the headman was unprepared.
    Charlotte tried hurriedly to inspect this lovely building, but before she could take a long look, Tigran touched her arm and whispered for her to take off her shoes. As they stepped onto the highly polished floor, Charlotte saw a large number of instruments gathered on a raised dais to one side. This, she knew from Takouhi’s instructions, was the gamelan , the Javanese orchestra. Today it was silent, but she knew now that she had heard the strains of the gamelan from here as they had set out from the house.
    Chairs were rushed in from somewhere in the village—heaven knew where, Charlotte thought—and placed in the verandah. Two tiny young women, pretty and gaily dressed in