ill. Just a bit out of shape.
If the man disbelieved him, he didnt show it. His veiny, big-knuckled hands lay on the table like chunks of granite. His daughter, finished with her basket, stared at Bourne while her nimble fingers, as if of their own accord, began work on another. Her mother came over, set her little boy in Bournes lap. Bourne felt his weight and his heartbeat against his chest, and was reminded of Moira, with whom hed deliberately had no contact since shed left the island.
Bapak, in what way can I help you get back in shape? the boys father said softly.
Did he suspect something or was he just being helpful? Bourne asked himself. Then he shrugged mentally. What did it matter, after all? Being Balinese, he was being genuine, which, in the end, was all that mattered. This was something Bourne had learned from his interaction with these people. They were the polar opposites of the treacherous men and women who inhabited his own shadow world. Here the only shadows were demonsand, furthermore, there were ways in which you could protect yourself against them. Bourne thought of the double ikat cloth that Suparwita had told Moira to buy for him.
There is a way, Bourne said now. You can help me find Suparwita.
Ah, the healer, yes. The Balinese paused, as if listening for a voice only he could hear. Hes not at his home.
I know. I was there, Bourne said. I saw an old woman without teeth.
The man grinned, showing his white teeth. Suparwitas mother, yes. A very old woman. Deaf as a coconut; mute as well.
She was no help.
The man nodded. What is inside her head, only Suparwita knows.
Do you know where he is? Bourne said. Its important I find him.
Suparwita is a healer, yes. The man studied Bourne in a kindly, even courteous, manner. He has gone to Goa Lowah.
Then I will go there.
Bapak, it would not be wise to follow him.
To be honest, Bourne said, I dont always do the wise thing.
The man laughed. Bapak, you are only human, after all. His grin showed again. Not to worry. Suparwita forgives foolish men as well as wise ones.
The bat, one of dozens clinging to the damp walls, opened its eyes and stared at Bourne. It blinked, as if it couldnt believe what it was seeing, then returned to its diurnal slumber. Bourne, the lower half of his body wrapped in a traditional sarong, stood in the flowing heart of the Goa Lowah temple complex amid a welter of praying Balinese and Japanese tourists taking time out from their shopping sprees.
Goa Lowah, which was near the town of Klungkung in southeast Bali, was also known locally as the Bat Cave. Many large temple complexes were built around springs because this water, erupting from the core of the island, was deemed sacred, able to spiritually cleanse those who worshipped there and partook of the water by both drinking it and sprinkling it over their heads. The sacred water at Goa Lowah bubbled up from the earth at the rear of a cave. This cave was inhabited by hundreds of bats that by day hung from the seeping calcite walls sleeping and dreaming, and by night flew into the inky sky in search of insects to gorge on. Though the Balinese often ate bats as a matter of course, the bats of Goa Lowah were spared that fate because anything that lived within a sacred space became sacred as well.
Bourne had not found Suparwita. Instead he had come upon a small, wizened priest with splayed feet and teeth like a jackrabbit, performing a cleansing ceremony in front of a small stone shrine in which were set a number of flower offerings. About a dozen Balinese sat in a semicircle. As Bourne watched in silence, the priest took a small, plaited bowl filled with holy water and, using a palm leaf switch that he dunked into the water, sprinkled the heads of those in attendance. No one looked at Bourne or paid him the slightest attention. For them, he was part of another universe. This ability of the Balinese to compartmentalize their lives with utter and absolute authority was the reason their form of Hinduism and unique culture remained uncorrupted by outsiders even after decades of tourist invasions and pressure from the Muslims who ruled every other island in the Indonesian archipelago.
There was something here for him, Bourne knew, something that was second nature to the Balinese, something that would