Some way off lay his pack. The man went to it and got something out. It was his neck cloth. He tore several shreds off and began to fasten the sticks carefully along the leg. Jan could not understand. Was the man not going to murder him, then? It was after all one of the dreaded bush-negroes? The man said, “Don’t be afraid, I’ll be back soon.”179
Then he went away. Even if he had wanted to, Jan could not have gone anywhere. The pain was too great and he was feeling totally exhausted.
A little later the man came back with another man. They had a kind of stretcher with them, bound together with lianas. They lay Jan very carefully on the stretcher and took him away.
Perhaps they wanted to murder him in the village with a lot of show, thought Jan, but he couldn’t care less. Nothing mattered any more. He would soon be dead, and how was not important. It seemed as if the men had to walk a long way. They sometimes weaved their way with difficulty through the thick bush and also went through a small creek, holding the stretcher up high so that it would not get wet. It seemed like hours. Jan closed his eyes and lost consciousness. When he came to, he was lying under a thatched roof. Someone was washing his face with fresh water. He saw negro faces looking at him, mostly women and children except for the two men who had carried him and some older men.
The women were not looking particularly friendly and he heard how some of them bickered with the two men. Jan could not understand them, but realized that the women were angry that he had been brought here to the village. One of the older men said something in a soothing tone of voice and appeared to be explaining something.
Later, the women left and an old man wrapped a dressing made of leaves and herbs very carefully around Jan’s leg and bandaged it. Now it was less painful. Then he removed all Jan’s clothes, washed him with fresh water containing herbs, and treated all his wounds and ulcers. While he was doing this he was constantly talking. Jan understood nothing, but everything felt very good and soothing. After that one of the women brought him a large calabash with a kind of delicious, strong soup, made from fish and pieces of cassava. The men lifted him carefully from the stretcher and lay him in a hammock. Wonderful, everything felt. What peace! His hand had been bandaged as well. A greasy liniment had been spread on the boils in his groin and he had been given a cloth for his shoulders. No damp, stinking, heavy clothes, no mosquitoes, no pain, what a blessing! At last he could sleep.
And sleep he did. It was late the following day before he opened his eyes again. The old man, whom everyone called Ta Jusu, came to tend to him again. Again he was given that delicious food. Jan had the feeling that he was now in paradise. Were these the dangerous negroes who had to be hunted and shot dead? Were these the people whose food crops had to be destroyed and burnt so that hunger would finally force them to surrender? Why, in fact? Because they had chosen for this life instead of slavery? There were no better or kinder people on earth, of that Jan was now convinced. Had a single soldier bothered about him for one second? No – everyone had thought only of himself.
Six weeks Jan stayed there in that village, six weeks of rest and heavenly bliss. He saw the women busy working, saw them baking loaves of cassava, drying and smoking fish, pounding rice, stripping maize. He had already understood that they were laying down large stores of food. Everything was communal, for everyone. Not that one had a lot and the other nothing. He saw how cleverly they knew how to make use of everything, making rope, roof covering, herbs for healing. He was ashamed to think that he had in the past been of the opinion that they were really stupid, because only whites had any brains. But all the whites put together could come and learn their lessons well from these negroes.
He now understood, too, how this small group of two hundred to three hundred souls managed to avoid being caught by the soldiers and always be one step ahead of the army. He saw how the women cared for the children, how they helped each other. They often stood near him while they were artfully plaiting their hair. Sometimes a child would come to him, show him something and laugh with him. And all the time Jan asked himself why. Why could they not live happily in their villages in the bush? He resolved never again to participate in the persecution and shooting of Boninegroes.
Once when Ta Jusu was nursing him and carefully applying a liniment to his wounds, Jan asked why in fact those men had not killed him. He was, after all, the enemy. Ta Jusu had explained that in their view the soldiers were not the evil ones. They had just arrived from Holland and had not done anything to the negroes. They were simply being misused. The real enemies were the planters and the government and now also that wretched Swiss colonel, who had sworn to exterminate all the negroes in the bush.