fortable and wholesome than those of societies tending to repress familiarity. Watson didn't think

so.

Shortly after we had disembarked, I heard him exploding at the registration clerk in the hotel at Denpensar. "If they did such disgusting things in the States, they'd be ridiculed," he fumed, referring to two men who had just greeted one another in the hotel lobby with a warm embrace. "You'd know right away what they were. Decent people wouldn't have anything to do with them."

The bewildered man behind the desk asked why.

"Why! Because it's unnatural!" Watson snapped.

"But how can it be if it does not cause pain?" the man asked, completely perplexed by Watson's manner. Watson whirled about angrily and barged down the hall.

The waiter assigned to Watson's table at dinner that evening was a dark Balinese youth, handsomely costumed in a white jacket and a maroon batik sarong. He spoke little English and whenever he found it necessary to answer Watson's questions about food he smiled shyly and nodded his head in a quick yes or no. I noticed that Watson watched his every movement carefully and furtively glanced at the smooth young hands as they served each course. Bauka was aware of this increasing attention, his sultry black eyes revealed nothing. Watson had been the first to arrive in the dining room and he was the last to leave it.

If

Later some of us went across the road to a gamelan orchestra concert and Watson came along,

expressing his interest in the music with the remark that he "didn't want to be alone in the lobby all evening." Balinese music, with its baffling rhythmic patterns, the deep throbbing precision of resonant drums, the clashing cymbals and strange sounds. hammered out on metallophones, possesses you and leaves you lax and yielding. The music had an ally that night in the balmy air, heavy with the fragrance of frangipani, and I felt myself slipping into the enchanted mood of the island. Then I noticed Watson.

Unaffected by the music, he sat cleaning his fingernails with a toothpick. Finishing that, he yawned and glanced aimlessly about the pavilion. Suddenly his face tensed as he saw Bauka sitting on the floor at one side of the orchestra, utterly lost in the music. Watson's eyes remained upon him for the rest of the evening. After the concert he searched for him, but the youth had vanished into the night.

When Watson was getting his key, I heard him ask the hotel clerk if he knew Bauka's age. The man shrugged. Was Bauka married? The clerk didn't know, he'd never seen him with a girl. But why? Did Mr. Watson want a Balinese boy? If he did. Watson's eyes flared. "No," he snarled.

The next morning we all turned out to watch a cremation ceremony, which to the Balinese is a joyous and beautiful event signifying the liberation of the soul by burning the empty body shell. An orchestra played outside the home of the deceased man before the procession began. Soon the parade started, with four men carrying ceremonial

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