Amongst the strange stories I heard in Java was the strange story of my neighbor, Salim. We sometimes shared afternoon tea in our respective houses. During Ramadan, he would come ask us to join him in breaking the fast. He was wealthy. He had a three story house which towered over our one story home: itself set in a large garden: an old Dutch mansion. Beautiful. The children loved the space. So did we.

I had not seen Salim and his wife, Fatimah, for some weeks. When I finally caught up with him, he told me the strangest story. Did I believe him? Of course.

Let me tell you about Salim and Fatimah. They started off poor. They sold food at a roadside stall along Jalan Veteran, Jakarta. This they did for several years. Originally a tiny warung, their food became popular. Apart from the excellent food, our neighbours who knew them well, spoke of how well the couple worked together. They admired how hard they worked, arriving before sunrise and not getting home till after dark every day, except Friday.

They were so successful that after years of hard work, they invested their money in a larger house: the one next to which we eventually lived. Their new house was huge.  It stood out even on that main road. I sometimes though, unkindly, that it was ostentations. Most houses in the road were single storey. Salim’s house was made of white brick and stood three storeys high, towering over the neighbourhood.

‘Some of the other traders in the street, perhaps not surprisingly, became a little jealous of us’, he told me one day, chuckling. ‘One in particular, by the name of Badrul, did not like us. We had many disagreements’.

It seems that over time Badrul became so upset by Salim’s success, that he turned bitter. It seemed that the more Salim flourished, the more Badrul’s own business floundered. Badrul decided, in his misery, that Salim and his wife were to blame for his own misfortune. They should pay. Apparently, his plan was burn down their new restaurant.

‘We had no idea he was planning,’ explained Fatimah. ‘To this day, I weep when I think about what he did’.

One day, after the restaurant closed, they returned home, quite unaware that Badrul was watching and waiting, hidden in the shadows nearby the restaurant. He was carrying a can of kerosene.

Badrul waited till the street was quiet. He sneaked out of his hiding place. No one was watching, or so he thought. He tiptoed around to the back of the restaurant. The back wall was timber and a grill over the kitchen allowed him to pour the kerosene inside. He threw a match on his handiwork. He ran off, assured that no one had seen him.

With a massive whoosh the fire took off. Within minutes the place was a blazing inferno: the restaurant was destroyed.

Salim and Fatimah had gone to bed. They awoke next morning to the sound of their doorbell ringing. Salim came downstairs to be greeted by two policemen who told him the news about his restaurant. He and Fatimah drove to their shop. It was a smouldering ruin.

‘How could this have happened?’ asked Pak Salim.

The police had no answer.

‘We will investigate,’ they said, ‘and let you know.’

That afternoon, the police returned.

‘We have investigated the fire. It was deliberately lit,’ they said.

Salim was shocked. ‘Who would do such a terrible thing like that to us?’

‘We have a witness who saw someone in the lane behind the restaurant after you left last night,’ the police continued. ‘We will follow that lead up and let you know what we find out.’

As Salim and Fatimah recounted the story, I could sense that she was a little uncomfortable.

‘My husband was not happy leaving matters in the hands of the police. He was so angry’.

‘You know the police, Pak Lansell. I thought that they might demand ‘financial assistance’.

‘He got quite angry with me,’ added Fatimah quietly. ‘He did not trust the police. He intended to carry out his own investigations’.

‘I certainly did. I had decided that when I got to the bottom of it all, there would be all hell to pay.’

‘I tried to calm him down but he was so furious’, added Fatimah.

‘Of course! This was a matter of honour. The police? Help? You know this place well. I decided to take matters in to my own hands’.

Next day he made enquiries of his own. He went back to the shop. A passer-by spoke to him.

‘I saw someone hanging around’, he said.

‘Did you recognize them?’ asked Pak Salim.

He nodded. ‘I think it was Pak Badrul. I saw him carrying a jerry can. He was hiding nearby,’ the man said. ‘I know that you two were not on speaking terms, and I thought it was a little strange.’

Salim, surprised that he had found out such a useful lead so soon, nodded. What the man told him clicked. The knowledge made him even more resolute. Knowing how Fatimah thought, he said nothing more to her. He worked out a plan to punish Badrul.

Being Javanese, he knew what to do. He visited a friend, Mansoor. Mansoor was a bomoh well known as someone who could organise ‘things unusual’ to happen to others. For a fee, of course. Old and frail, he could work through spirits. Pak Salim asked if there was anything that Mansoor could ‘do’ to punish Badrul.

Mansoor thought for a little while.

‘I can arrange something that will scare him out of his wits,’ he said, ‘but in return you must promise to do something for me.’

‘What is that,’ asked Salim suspiciously. Mansoor leant over and whispered in Salim’s ear. Salim grinned. He could manage that!

Meanwhile, Badrul was already regretting what he had done. His conscience pricked him. He cried out incessantly, beating his head. He screamed at his wife and told her to take the children away for a few days, as he had to sort a few things out. Given that Badrul was, at the best of times, not easy to live with, his wife was only too happy to do so.

Mansoor acted quickly. That evening, as Badrul readied for bed, he heard a strange noise outside his house. Normally, in a Jakarta house, such a thing would not worry people, but he was not in a normal frame of mind. By now he realised that some must have known that he was responsible for the fire.

The strange noise continued. He picked up a torch and a parang and went to the door. He saw nothing outside. He went into the lane at the back of the house. He looked left and right. What he saw frightened him so much that he almost dropped his torch and parang. He had seen a fierce, ugly apparition that stared at him with burning eyes and called out his name. Convinced he had seen a ghost, he ran back into the house, slammed the door behind him and locked it.

He flopped onto the chair. Someone (or something) knocked at the door. He peeped through the curtains. It was the apparition. He shook in fear. He ignored it. The apparition pounded on the door again. It pushed against the door and the door began to give way. Badrul raced to the door to lean against it and stop it from entering.

The apparition was far too strong for him. The door splintered. The apparition rushed in. He pushed Badrul on to the floor and stood glaring at him. Badrul shook with fear. He screamed for help and rolled over in a ball to protect his body in case the apparition tried to beat him. Hearing the commotion, neighbours raced to his house. They saw the broken door and ran in. All they saw was Badrul, lying moaning on the floor.

‘What is the matter?’ they asked.

‘I saw a demon,’ stammered Badrul. ‘It tried to kill me, but when you arrived it disappeared.’

The neighbours looked round in fear. They could see no apparition, nothing. They fetched him some tea and Badrul calmed down a little. But they were suspicious. Why would such a thing happen to Badrul?

‘Where are your wife and family? Why did you send them away?’

The questions battered him non-stop. Badrul held his head in his hands. He felt like blurting out the truth but he was too ashamed. All he knew was that this was retribution and demon or not, he would have to pay for his evil deeds.

That evening Salim and Fatimah heard of the strange happenings at Badrul’s house. Salim nodded to himself in satisfaction, but he said nothing to Fatimah. She was simply concerned that anyone should be harmed; even someone who she knew did not like them. Seeing how gentle his wife was, it was Salim’s turn to feel remorse. He could contain himself no longer. He told Fatimah what he had done.

‘I went to see Mansoor, the bomoh,’ he said.

Fatimah gasped. ‘Why did you do such a bad thing?’ she asked. ‘You should be ashamed of yourself. We may have suffered misfortune, but taking revenge is against our faith!’

‘That may well be, but I did it. I think that he arranged it all,’ replied Salim.

 ‘It is still not right,’ said his wife. Fatimah, who had never quarreled with her husband screamed at him. ‘What you did was very wrong and I am ashamed of you.’

Salim knew that he had done wrong, but he also knew that he had to do something. He was already overcome with remorse. Now Fatima was turning against him. ‘I think that after what Badrul did to us, revenge was justified. What Badrul did to us needed punishing…’ he began but Fatimah cut across him.

‘…and the police will do that when they arrest him.’

Salim hung his head. Then Fatimah smiled a little and placed her hand on her husband’s arm. ‘I am sorry,’ she said. ‘I should not have screamed. We are both under so much stress.’ She looked gently at her husband.  ‘And what did this cost you?’ she said and smiled a little.

Salim calmed down, and looked at his wife. He grinned.

‘We have to provide Mansoor with dinner every night for as long as he lives,’ said Salim.

Fatimah nodded. ‘In a way, it is worth it,’ she said. ‘But what I can’t understand is how such an old man as Mansoor could have been s strong as to break in to Mansoor’s house. Could he knock the door down? How is that possible?’

‘You are assuming it was Mansoor that did it,’ smirked Salim. ‘It could have been a spirit.’

‘Or one of his henchmen’ smiled Fatimah. ‘Bomohs can have mystical powers, but they need hands to make them work’.

When the story finished I could hardly speak. It was almost unbelievable.

‘Was Badrul arrested? I asked.

‘Yes. And jailed.’

‘And Mansoor?’

Fatimah smiled again. ‘We set up a new restaurant. We did what Salim promised. We paid him each day till he died three years later.’

‘And Badrul?’

Again Fatimah smirked. ‘Someone mysteriously paid the police (and she winked at Salim) and he was released before his sentence was up.’

‘We are friends now,’ added.

‘And Mansoor?’ I asked.

‘He died two years ago’.

Salim grinned.

‘He was overweight by then.’