SET DUSK

The Part 10

Ida walked a bit hastily towards the village that was on the edge of the forest. Leaving behind Rashid who was still watching him from where they had split up. It felt like looking back at the young man, but he broke his intentions. Ida patted her cheeks slowly which began to heat up somewhat. He did not know from when he began to feel happy for the attention given by the young man.

Ida tried to get rid of that feeling, began to remember the instructions given by Mr. Zain before leaving. He did not want his first task to fail just because he thought about the problem of feeling.

From the information he got, the village had begun to be abandoned most of the population, because the Dutch had several times blindly ravaged the village. However, there are still people who survive in the village because there are family members who are not able to travel far to evacuate.

Ida turned her head left and right, watching the situation of the village on the edge of the forest carefully. According to the instructions of Mr. Zain, he had to wait for a pedati that would transport him to Lubuk Alung after his isya in an obsolete surau.

When he was about to step towards the direction of the surau, he suddenly felt a cold object pressing on his nape. Ida froze where she stood.

"Reverse!!" command a voice with a thick Dutch accent.

Ida turned her body slowly, facing the voice that ruled her. In front of him stood two Dutch officers, one pointing a gun at him, while another stood around his waist with a weapon draped over his back.

"Where are you going, miss?" ask the officer who pointed his gun at Ida.

"I'm going home, sir" Ida replied with a slightly quivering voice.

"Why is it so late at night that you're still hanging around outside?" search the officer.

"I searched early in the morning for ferns and wood into the forest, not knowing the time of master. It turned out that once I got out of the forest it was already dusk." Ida tried to calm his heartbeat that began to irregular.

"Let's put that basket down!"

Slowly Ida lowered the large basket that was on her back. His heart was no longer in control. He was very sure that the two officers found the message he carried in his basket, the end of his history.

One of the officers who was not at gunpoint checked Ida's basket. Ida looked anxiously. One by one the contents of the basket were issued by the officer. Dry wood, fern leaves, and some taro tubers.

"Doorzichtig," (clean) said the officer who checked Ida's basket while looking at his colleague.

Ida breathed a sigh of relief.

The two officers observed Ida once more. His appearance that used clothes from burlap, as well as the caping that covered his head did look like a wood seeker in the forest.

"Please continue the journey, miss" said the officer then lowered the weapon he had pointed at Ida.

Ida walked around miserably, not usually the Dutch release someone just like that. Often what happens, when the person they tell goes walking, that person gets shot in the back. Want Ida to turn her head, making sure the two officers actually released it without the intention of releasing hot lead into her body, but she pared. A prayer he said slowly as he left the two officers.

Half-hurried, Ida took a direction to the left, undoing her intention to go where she was headed. Just in case the two officers were watching him, he was not too suspicious for entering the old manau. Ida's knees still felt weak, he tried to drag his steps into the village.

The sun that began to descend from the clash created a dense orange glow in the sky that began to darken. Several birds flew over his head. Ida paused for a moment, making sure. At the end of the path he walked, his eyes caught the silhouette of a surau building facing West.

The old building looked darker with the surrounding background that was starting to lose light. Ida hesitated as she approached the surau door. The building was like it had not been used for a long time, visible from a spider web that had covered part of the door. The surau building in front of Ida today is not like the surau he saw before.

The old surau, in the form of a surau building in general resembles a stilt house, but the stairs are not located at the bottom of the entrance, but the stairs leading to the room for prayer are side by side after the entrance.

The strong afternoon breeze made the leaves of the surau door that almost escaped creaking like a shrill sound. Ida looked into the surau. There was a hint of fear beginning to crawl into his chest, as he stepped in through the front door of the mane.

By muttering the recitation of the sacred verse he memorized, Ida stepped into the surau, through a dry pond, which is commonly used to wash the feet by the worshipers who will perform the prayer.

Once inside, Ida was greeted by an empty room resembling a long dark hallway. At the end of the hallway, Ida could still see a large furnace from the rest of the twilight light coming in from its open walls. It seems that this surau was also used as a place of activity to cook the ration of the fighters. Given the furnace that Ida saw was large.

Entering the surau building, Ida smelled musty from the surau building wood. There is nothing Ida can see in the room used for prayer, the sun has sunk, making the atmosphere of the surau even more gripping. It was like Ida just left the place, but she remembered her duty, she had to wait there until midnight. Until there is a pedati who will come to pick him up and then deliver him to the market where he will deliver the message he brought.

He waited in the dark, trying to get rid of all the bad thoughts that began to nest when his eyes probed the contents of the surau room.

Ida gasped when she heard the usual bell ringing tied around the neck of a cow or buffalo carrying a pedati ringing right in front of the surau yard. Ida peeked out from behind the crack where she was hiding. A pedati with a large enough buffalo stopped in front of the surau. The buffalo skin is dark, making the pedati appear to float between the darkness of the night. Some villagers were seen loading their luggage into the pedati.

Ida inched slowly from her hiding place in order not to draw too much attention. But the pedati coachman realized his presence. Greet Ida with a question that Ida considers like the code Marwan taught her.

"Bringing the forest fern, son," asked the man who looked to be sixty years old while watching Ida with her large basket.

"Yes sir, just picked," Ida replied as instructed.

"Hurry up, you sit at the very end, yes" said the coachman.

"Okay sir, thank you." Ida climbed the pedati, the pedati coachman helped her to raise her large basket into the pedati.

After all the passengers along with their luggage entered the pedati, it moved slowly. As usual, Ida was unable to hold her eyes to stay awake, not so long ago the pedati moved leaving the surau, Ida was already asleep in her sleep.