The Last Will and Testament of a Nobleman
By Keris Mas
Translated by Chang Shih Yen
Translator’s Note
This story was written in 1946 when Deli Tua was the capital city of the Sultanate of Deli (1632-1946), in what is now North Sumatera, near the city of Medan, Indonesia. At that time, there was a social revolution by the youths and workers in East Sumatera against various sultanates, the aristocracy, and the feudal social structure. The uprising reached its peak in March 1946 and resulted in 140 deaths, mostly of members of the aristocracy. I love the way Keris Mas wrote about heartbreak in this story, and of a love between different social classes. I hope that I have managed to capture the beauty of Keris Mas’ words with this translation. I have an Indonesian friend whose great aunt, now in her nineties, is descended from the nobility in Deli Tua. She ran away from her family to marry a commoner. I was thinking of my friend and her family as I did this translation.
A few years ago, he had left the beautiful and successful city of Medan, with a sad memory, with a heart broken into bits, but with a flaming spirit and a desire for revenge that was hard to erase.
Since then, almost six years have passed. He now drifted in the waves of life here in Malaya, sinking and floating, crashing and stranded on the shore. He had experienced poverty and suffering, been cursed and destitute; he faced it all with resilience and bravery simply because he wanted to forget the bitter event from the past in the city of Medan, wanted to heal the serious injury in his soul.
Now his star had started to brighten, his life seemed to bloom, a dawn of luxury and happiness had started to awaken, and everything that for a long time had broken his heart, the bitter and harsh, all were slowly fading and disappearing.
How wide and comfortable the world had looked, how calm and peaceful, his soul ready to face life, if he had not suddenly met with the very people that he wanted to forget, the people who in the past had broken his heart into pieces, who had insulted him and looked down on him, and who had caused him to be hurled into a valley of life that was full of barbs and thorns.
This morning, quite unexpectedly, he had suddenly met a beautiful young woman, whose name was Kemalawati. Kemalawati was a noble princess, descended from the kings of the palace of Deli Tua. In the past, the past six years of yesteryear, she had been his lover, she had been the mythical stone where his soul had worshiped love. However, she had destroyed all the grandiose dreams in his soul, drowned all his ambitions and the bravery of his young spirit.
Kemalawati, who in the past had promised with her own tongue to live and die with him, to build a happy palace, suddenly had thrown him into a very deep valley of life because she wanted to protect the degree of purity of her blood as a princess descended from the original aristocracy. Just as how she had made her promises with ease, it was also with ease that she had undone the knots of her promises without any consideration for the soul of a young man whom she had caused to drift away in the depths of the sea of love.
“Even though I have opened my heart to you, Anuar, even though I cannot deny that I still love you, we should both consider, weigh up the pros and cons before we follow the desires of the heart. I don’t want to be conceited about my ancestry, but you must also realize what will befall my family later if we do get married. In this life, of course we want to find happiness, but what is the meaning of happiness, if the marriage will break customs and principles, if it will separate a child from his parents and will reduce the worth of my family in the eyes of the nobility in all of Deli, all because I have reduced my own self-worth?”
So that was how the arrogant Princess Kemalawati had crushed to bits all at once the warrior spirit that was in his chest to fight in the battlefield of life for the six years that had passed. That was the reason why he had left the city of Medan, his birthplace, throwing himself onto Malaya, meaning to forget, to forget the memories of the first woman he had loved. But no matter what, even if the love was only that one time, it could not be forgotten by the human soul as long as there was still life in the body. As it was with him, so it was with Kemalawati who was until now still unmarried even though she was almost twenty-two years of age, close to exceeding the age of adolescence. It wasn’t because there was nobody proposing to her, but because her soul had been closed after her first love fell to Anuar.
The unexpected meeting this morning had caused old bleeding wounds to return, as if this world had been attacked by a terrible earthquake that shook the feelings of both the young woman and the young man, at their first gaze after being six years apart and wanting to forget.
“Is that you, Wati?” exclaimed Anuar, as if he was dreaming.
“Yes, Anuar. Why are we meeting here under these circumstances?”
“What sort of circumstances?”
“The circumstances in which I am suffering, Anuar. It’s a long story and with great consequences.”
“Ah, what did you have to suffer? You are a noblewoman who always lives in luxury, proud and noble. Surely you are at this moment on the way to visit Malaya, seeing the remnants of war, having received an invitation from the Malay noble class here. With whom and where are you staying?”
“It’s not what you think, Anuar. Your questions and assumptions are all completely the opposite of what we are going through. I am here with my father but not for a holiday or having fun.”
“Oh, with your father, The Most Noble Sir Indera Kelana? What can His Grace, the most famous nobleman of Deli, be going through?”
“Don’t you sneer at me too, Anuar. It breaks my heart into pieces to hear that. It’s been six years since we have been apart and for six years I did not have a heart anymore, my life was empty and completely void, but I promised and put my faith in God, I surrendered my life to fate, and I was ready to just pass through this life with tears to atone for my sins to you. Not only at this moment, but ever since the harsh words that sliced your heart scattered from my mouth, I regretted them, but what is the meaning of regret? Regret came later. You had left, far away to who knew where, and I knew that you left with a broken heart, so because of that, my feelings each day became more crushed and broken.”
“Still, the old people, Anuar, like my father, who hold so fast to those old customs, who depend so firmly on their nobility, he doesn’t understand a bit about the souls of young people, the desires of the current times. My suffering had become such that I told him frankly that I would not ever be willing to get married except with you, but still he would not give in. He kept trying to marry me off to a womanizing nobleman. Finally, because I still cannot accept any of his reasoning, until now I am only engaged to my tears, with memories of a person who has gone far away, who knows where.”
“This, after we meet again, so the old wounds in my soul are bleeding again and you add to them with your spicy sarcasm as if your heart is a hard stone, not caring a bit about the heart of a person who is crushed to bits even if it’s your enemy. Don’t you, Anuar, don’t you have any sympathy? Don’t you perhaps think that pure love does not know contempt and is honourable, and does not get tired of waiting long?”
“Yeah, Wati, don’t you tell me long stories again about the matter of love. I am more knowledgeable because I was in it deeper and felt the consequences more. For me, Wati, love was a pure thing, not a made-up thing nor just lust that could be played with, exchanged, or valued in gold, riches or ancestry.”
“In the past I once said to you that I didn’t place importance on gold and property, what more to say of race and ancestry. It’s not because I felt envy or that I felt myself to be below those rich and blue-blooded people but because of my realization that riches in property as well as the noble titles that people boast about, they all got them from squeezing the energy of the weak, by enslaving the small, suffering races that have no power at all.”
“And you know that I am one of that class of small people, but despite that, I loved you, I gave my whole soul to worship you.”
“So you should know that what I worship isn’t the glory of ancestry or the wealth of assets. For me the purity of love is higher than everything, so it is on this purity that I place all my prayers.”
“Because of that, even though it was the stuff that spouted from your mouth six years ago, that lit the arrogance of the blood of your ancestry, even though that has only deepened the chasm between me and the nobility, it has not threatened the purity of love that dwelt in my soul.”
“Oh, Anuar! That’s so sweet to my ears. How happy the life we face will be if the purity of love that has been thrown up by the waves can be moored at the shores where we met.”
“Something that’s not impossible, Wati. We can moor that ship of love at the shores where we met, like you said, if not for the shore of your own heart having a sandbank of arrogance because of your ancestry, which is the obstacle. You should know, Wati, for me that sandbank is a bigger danger than the biggest waves.”
“I understand everything you mean, Anuar. So let’s finish with everything in the past and be confident that the sandbank that you talk about is really not there at all. Even though six years ago the flames of arrogance sprayed from my mouth, as you said earlier, I have regretted them and I have suffered because of them. As I have also said, the root of all of that is my father—the old folks who don’t understand the desires of the current times, but now the times have come and attacked them.”
“Earlier I talked about the circumstances that we are in now, so that everything becomes clear, let me tell you about it.”
“Perhaps you have also heard the news about a social uprising in East Sumatera that happened recently. All the kings in East Sumatera have been wiped out all at once. The people are against the kings, and the stubborn kings tried to run away, accompanied by many old noblemen. The many people from the nobility fleeing included myself and my father. I myself did not know where the refugee boats were heading.”
“It seems the destruction of the noble class has indeed been fated by God. Thus a most terrible storm and typhoon fell, on the surface of the Straits of Malacca, which is usually so calm and peaceful. It seemed not willing to let the aristocracy sail. The small boats broke apart and could not be put together anymore, each left to his own fate. I didn’t know how long the typhoon raged because I had fainted from its power, I only gained consciousness when my body was carried to shore by people on a beach I know not where. After that, I fainted again for some time. Finally, I found myself lying on a bed in a hospital and on the adjacent bed lay my father in a very sad state. His whole head was wrapped in a white bandage and I could hear him groaning in pain.”
“It’s been a week now that we have been in hospital. It was only this morning that I was allowed out, while my father is still in a serious state. All day, even though it’s very hard for him to speak, each word that he says is a word of regret. It seems he greatly regrets all the wrongs of the past.”
“So, to you, Anuar, on the purity of our love, if you have a little bit of sympathy, I hope that you can come see him for a short while at the hospital. Even though he is the biggest enemy to your sense of self, as a person of the warrior class, please forget all that in a moment like this. Look upon him as the father of your sweetheart who may apologize to you or take a gamble to give his child to the person she loves.”
So that was how the meeting had gone and Anuar returned facing a new problem after six years of struggling to forget. Indeed, his love for Wati had not been lost and now the flames of love were burning again after hearing from Wati’s own lips that his love was still reciprocated; it was not as he had thought all this time, that it had been an unrequited love.
Since then, he had said in his heart that he wanted to visit Sir Indera Kelana in hospital. It wasn’t because he had forgiven the old man, definitely not! He could never agree with anyone who still glorified the blood of their ancestry, when it was because of that ancestry that he became big and rich on the head of the small people who suffer. Nevertheless, he wanted to calm the heart of his lover.
Suddenly, a flustered messenger from the hospital came looking for him. “Sir Indera Kelana is in the throes of death, he wants to meet with you,” said the messenger.
“Very well,” he answered. “I will come immediately.”
Fifteen minutes later, he had stepped inside the hospital, with a pounding heart. All sorts of questions came to his mind. He would meet his enemy on his deathbed. He came to the threshold of the room, and he could hear crying and wailing from inside. His heart shook increasingly, he pushed open the door, he entered slowly. And the view inside was of such sadness: three officials from the hospital dressed in crisp white were trying to straighten the drooping head in front of the body that had been laid out, covered with a clean white cloth, and by its side knelt Kemalawati drowning in lament and sad sobs.
“Sir, you are late only by a few minutes,” said one of the hospital officials. “This was his message to you,” he continued, while giving him a piece of paper.
Anuar was like a sleepwalker walking step by step towards the direction of Wati who was drowning in her sobbing. He received the letter, but his attention did not shift from the unfortunate noble princess.
Slowly he took Kemalawati’s limp hand and made her stand. “That’s enough, Wati. Don’t follow the sadness of your heart, because it’s all of no use anymore. When the time comes, every person will take this same path as well, so strengthen your faith and look ahead to the land of the living that has been prepared to be travelled by the people who are left behind.”
“No, Anuar, I am not sad about death because no one can break a date with their God. But he departed with a heart that was not calm, and a soul full of worry. You read that last letter of his so that hopefully by the end it will settle my thoughts.”
Slowly Anuar read the last letter from his enemy. Wati and the three officials from the hospital listened in silence and with their full attention.
“My son Anuar.”
“I feel my soul will not be at peace if I leave to face God before I can leave this testament to you and to the people who come after.”
“Six years ago you courted Wati to be your life partner and I knew that Wati loved you with all her heart. I also knew that you were worthy to be her husband, willing to sail on the ship of marriage because the characteristics of a competent husband were all within you, but I rejected the engagement and I forced Wati to cut relations with you even though I knew that this action would be a dangerous poison to the soul of my own child.”
“What was the reason then that I made a decision as cruel as that, which would surely break into pieces the life of my own child in future? That was the arrogance of the soul of a nobleman, Anuar.”
“The arrogance of the soul is an heirloom from feudal times a few centuries in the past. And this heirloom, even though it’s outdated and rotten, it can’t be thrown away just like that with ease by the nobility of today. Each nobleman knows that the life of humans will be more advanced with each passing day and with those advances there will be lots of changes in the social order of society. A life of aristocracy based on the ancestry of blood, that is old and no longer suitable with the flow of time. Indeed, it is not fair if only blood lineage differentiates the rights and obligations of humans, when it is the common people, the majority, who play an important part in paying the duty for the happiness of human life, while the rights that they should receive were spilled luxuriously to the nobility.”
“Because of that, for centuries in this world—in the West and in the East—there have been social rebellions to bring down the power of the aristocracy, and it will happen again continuously until the lives of humans reach a fairness that is most just.”
“The turmoil of that time has come to our society and it will surround everyone on the face of our country. See how the events have hit me as a result of the arrogance of the soul of the nobility and as proof that social rebellions will continue to happen anywhere on the face of this earth.”
“So, to you, Anuar and Wati, I leave these last words, live in peace and harmony so that you become a symbol to the people in your society that the fall of the feudal class will result in a gift to human life.”
“Then only will my soul be at peace as I face God if the two of you are together forever, standing at the front line of the struggle to uphold the fairness of life.”
Five pairs of eyes looked around and there was a short period of almighty silence, each person drifting under the influence of the last testament of this nobleman. Not long afterwards, a happy palace was put up. Princess Kemalawati became the queen of justice upon the fall of the arrogance of the soul of her nobleman father.
Suluh Malaya, 1 June 1946
About the Author
Keris Mas was the pen name of Kamaluddin Muhamad (1922-1992). He was named Malaysia’s first National Laureate in 1981. He was most famous for his short stories. His first short story was “The Last Will and Testament of a Nobleman,” published in the magazine Suluh Malaya in 1946.
About the Translator
Chang Shih Yen is a writer and translator from Malaysia. She has a Master’s degree in Linguistics and speaks English, Malay, Chinese, Spanish, and Portuguese. She is the author of a collection of short fiction entitled Around The World: Short Stories by Chang Shih Yen, and a work of nonfiction, Chang Shih Yen’s Pandemic Diary: Surviving Covid-19 lockdown alone and without internet. She has also written a children’s book, Putra and his Silver Keris.
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According to his translator Atar Hadari, the late Israeli poet Avraham Chalfi was “a character actor, a clown, a dandy, and a man about town in Tel Aviv.” He was also a poet beloved by the people for his romantic and mystical verses.