Bats

By Bakdi Soemanto

As usual, Myong Dhutt was late. He always arrived home after the Maghrib evening prayer was over. But it was very unusual that he did not say hello to his mother when he entered the house, nor to his father who was lying down on a bamboo lounge in the sitting room. He behaved as if nobody was there at all.

It was getting dark outside. The street lights had been out for days, so the villagers used oil lamps to illuminate the passage.

"Myong," his father shouted suddenly when the young man passed by heedless of him.

"Come here," he added, but still got no answer.

"Myong!" he shouted furiously.

"Shush, please don't make noises," Myong's mother said urgently, while pointing her finger eastward to remind her husband that the father in the family next door was very ill.

"Myong, Myong Dhutt. Come over here. Dhutt, over here! Are you deaf?" he shouted louder and louder to show that he was the most powerful man in the house.

"Stop it, please ..." Mother pleaded.

"You shut up!" The old man stared at her angrily instead of apologizing to her.

The lounge creaked as he suddenly arose and staggered across the floor, adjusting his sarong.

"What's up?" Myong finally asked innocently.

"What was that?"

"What do you mean what?"

"You brought in something wrapped in paper, did not you?"

"You mean this?" Myong showed Father the object he was holding.

"My goodness. A dagger!" Father said, astonished at the fearsome object.

"What is that for?" Mother, too, was surprised to see such a weapon in their home. "Where did you get that?"

"I bought it in the market," Myong replied so softly that he was difficult to hear.

Mother urged him to tell them the use of buying such a thing was, but not a sound was to be heard from the son.

"You wasted your money, you devil!" His father howled out him.

"No, I didn't. I need this for tonight," Myong finally replied as his heart pounded.

"Tonight?"

Myong nodded.

"What are you doing to do?"

Myong was bent over in fright of his father.

"Answer my question. What is this kind of thing for?"

"We are going to be on patrol. I mean village patrol."

"Good!" Father responded. "And the dagger?"

"I have to be well-equipped. I mean ... I am to be armed to the teeth," Myong, his voice cracking.

"With such a terror instilling dagger!" the old man pointed at the sharp cutting edge glittering in the light of the oil lamps.

"This is a dangerous weapon. It will be able to hurt you, yourself," Father advised.

Myong was silent.

"Are you thinking of chopping up the thieves? You are going to make meat balls, aren't you?"

No answer was heard.

"Look. You are not allowed even to hurt anyone you catch, let alone kill them. What you have to do is just to chase them away from the village, or, if it is necessary, you can apprehend them. And if you do that, you have to take them to the police instead of taking the law into your own hands. Do you understand?" the old man said.

"I know."

"Good. Give it to me ..."

"No. I need this for tonight. Just for tonight."

Myong took a seat on the bamboo chair and put the dagger on the bamboo table before him. The sparkling cutting edge of the dagger seemed to threaten his throat. He was scared of it himself.

Just that morning, on his way to Pak Rejo's house to work in the soybean factory as usual, he stopped by at the front of the market because he saw a man selling daggers. He asked him how much a weapon was. The man answered,"Rp 5,000."

"What about Rp 1,000?" Myong tried to bargain.

"Give me Rp 1,000 more and I'll sharpen it for you," the seller said.

"I don't have that amount," Myong replied. The he touched the dagger and felt how wonderful it was.

"These are special. I made them myself, you know."

"I believe you. But I don't have the money," Myong took his wallet from his pant's pocket and showed the contents to the seller.

"Believe it or not, you can see what I have in here," Myong said persuasively.

Looking at the wallet, the seller nodded three times.

"All right, young man. You can have it for Rp 1,000."

"Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, again!" Myong was very happy.

"Shall I sharpen it?"

"Sure, but ..."

"But what?" the man interrupted.

"I have no money to pay for sharpening it ..."

"No worry, my dear, I'll do it for you. For free!" The man then took one of the daggers and started sharpening it. First, he poured a glass of water on the sharpener, then, he rubbed the dagger on it repeatedly.

"Where do you live?" The man asked.

"In Manukan village," Myong answered calmly. He was content to have what he had been dreaming of for, say, hundreds of years.

"I think we are neighbors."

"Are we?" Myong was surprised.

"Exactly. I live in Bulu village, next to yours."

"You do? But we have never met."

"Of course not. You know why?"

"No. I don't."

"I do not stay in my village every day. I visit my wife and kids to give them money only once a week."

"Where do you stay then?"

"In my brother's house. He runs a small-scale industry producing daggers, hoes, kitchen knives ..."

"I see," Myong said and was silent. He concentrated on the dagger which was getting shinier as it became sharper.

"Do you plan to cut down saplings or branches off of trees?" the seller asked him.

"Right. I want to help Pak Rejo to cut the branches off of the trees which touch the roof of his house ..."

"Who's Pak Rejo?"

"A man I work for. He runs a home industry," Myong explained.

"I see," The old man went on sharpening the dagger, pausing a moment to check the edge, then honing it some more.

"I work there," the young man continued.

"Doesn't he have anything to cut with?"

"He does. But I want to have one for my own. You know, I love his daughter. I just want to show off that I have something to help her father," he smiled.

"You're a good boy."

"Not really."

"Yes. You are!" the seller insisted.

Myong, fell silent. He suddenly remembered Tarti, the sweet, dark complexioned girl, whose hair hung down on her shoulders. Once she told him that if he could help her father to cut down the branches with his own dagger she would let him touch her fingers.

"I do not even know how to be a good boy," Myong spoke again after a prolonged silence. "My father is a poor man. So am I," He lamented.

"Don't be so sad, young man. I'll tell you something that hopefully could help you to be a good boy."

"What is that. Tell me!" Myong asked him enthusiastically.

The old man reached for Myong's right hand and dragged him closer to him. He whispered something in Myong's ear.

"What?" Myong was surprised.

The old man nodded seven times.

"Use this!" the dagger seller insisted, pointing at the fearsome weapon.

After having been silent for a few moments to recall what he had heard that morning, Myong tried to explain that the dagger was going to be used to kill bats.

"Bats?" His father asked. "What bats? No bats in this vil lage."

"That's true. We do not have any bats here. But there are bats from outside coming to attack the people here," Myong repeated what the dagger seller had told him in the market.

"Are you crazy?" the father asked surprised, before bursting into laughter.

"I don't think I am insane," he answered, then paused for a few seconds.

"Just listen, father. Tonight -- I do not know how many -- but there will be bats coming to have a meeting in the village chief's office, to compel the village chief to consent to let them build a bat kingdom in our village", Myong said softly, but convincingly.

Father and Mother were struck dumb.

"You know, the bats are very unusual. They suck our blood to survive," Myong snarled.

"Its horrible!" he insisted as he banged his fist on the bamboo table.

"But why ..." Mother asked suddenly after a long silence.

"Wait, I haven't finished yet," Myong interrupted. "We will be chased away from our own land ... that's why. Before I came home, I met friends of mine to tell them all these things. We are going to help the local government to fight against the bats."

Myong rose from his seat, stood up firmly, took the dagger from the table and started to leave the house.

"Where are you going?" Mother shouted.

"Just wait here Mother. Close the doors and windows. I am going to join my friends to murder the bats before they exterminate us like rats ..."

"Please don't ... Myong, wait ..!" the old man shouted loudly. When Myong bolted for the door, the old reached out and grabbed his son, wrapping his arms around him.

"Don't go, Myong. Please don't do that!" Father pleaded. Myong did not seem to hear what his father said. He pushed him away as hard as he could. Father fell to the floor groaning. Blood gushed out of his stomach. Myong had accidentally stabbed his father during the struggle.

"No!" Mother screamed.

Seeing his father flat on his back bathed in blood, Myong cried out as well.

"Help, help ..." he shouted.

Neighbors came running in a panic to determine what had happened. One of them suggested that the old man should be taken to the hospital. Others said no, it was too far.

A heated dispute ensued, which ended in an agreement to report the accident to the chief of the village, who was in his office with guests from the city.

But before the chief came to the house, the old man had bled to death.

"What happened?" one of the guests wanted to know.

"Myong accidentally stabbed his father with a dagger," someone replied.

"My goodness. What on earth is going on in this village?" one of the guests exclaimed.

"I don't understand how the young man could have the heart to do that. Maybe, he is a mad man," another said.

"He must be a dangerous person."

"And a cruel killer. Horrible!"

The guests stopped talking for a moment as they savored special country dishes the chief's wife had prepared for their dinner.

"Later," one of them finally blurted out, "when we have finished the whole plan, we will give the villagers weekly lec tures on how to be good men. Does everybody agree?"

"Agreed!" they shouted as they clasped hands and laughed heartily.

Bakdi Soemanto is lecturer at the School of Letters of the Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta and a staff member of the university's Center for Studies of Culture and Social Change.