For the strange happenings ceased. When everything had been cleaned and repaired, under Eva's supervision, Van Oudijck compelled Léonie to come back, because he wished to give a great ball on New Year's Day. In the morning, the resident received all his European and native officials. In the evening, the guests streamed into the brightly lit galleries from every part of the town, still inclined to shudder and very inquisitive and instinctively looking around and above them. And, while the champagne went round, Van Oudijck himself took a glass and offered it to the regent with a deliberate breach of etiquette; and, in a tone of solemn admonition mingled with good-humoured jest, he uttered these words, which were seized upon and repeated on every hand and which continued to be repeated for months throughout Labuwangi: "Drink with an easy mind, regent. I give you my word of honour that no more glasses will be broken in my house, except by accident or carelessness." He was able to say this because he knew that--this time--he had been too strong for the hidden force, merely through his simple courage as an official, a Hollander and a man. But in the regent's gaze, as he drank, there was still a very slight gleam of irony, intimating that, though the hidden force had not conquered, this time, it would yet remain an enigma, forever inexplicable to the short-sighted eyes of the Europeans.... CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE Labuwangi came to life again. It was as though people unanimously agreed not to discuss the strange affair any further with outsiders, because it was so excusable that any one should refuse to believe in the thing; and they, at Labuwangi, believed. And the up-country town, after the mystic oppression under which it had lain cowering during those unforgettable weeks, came to life again, as though shaking off all its obsession. Party followed upon party, ball upon ball, theatricals upon concert: all threw open their doors to entertain their friends and make merry, in order to feel natural and normal after the incredible nightmare. People so accustomed to the natural and tangible life, to the spacious and lavish material existence of India--to good cooking, cool drinks, wide beds, roomy houses, to everything that represents physical luxury to the European in the east--such people breathed again and shook off the nightmare, shook off the belief in strange happenings. If and when they discussed the thing nowadays, they commonly called it that incomprehensible conjuring--echoing the resident--the regent's conjuring-tricks. For that the regent had something to do with it was certain. That the resident had held a terrible threat over him and his mother, if the strange happenings did not cease, was certain. That, after this, order had been restored in everyday life was certain. So it was conjuring. All were now ashamed of their credulity and their fears and of having shuddered at what had looked like mysticism and was only clever conjuring.