‘Was she welcomed there back then?’ asked Grace.

‘No way! Australia was on the Dutch side when the revolution began. When she first arrived in Australia in 1947, the police warned her not to cause trouble. But that didn’t stop her. She started making speeches, going to meetings where she spoke to the waterside workers, revving them up to keep blockading the Dutch navy in Australian ports, to prevent ships sailing to Indonesia. She made wild speeches to get support for Indonesia’s independence and stop the Dutch moving back in. She even helped start a riot at Sydney Uni. The mounted police had to be brought in to stop it.’

Steve chuckled. ‘Incredible. She must have been so determined.’

‘She was,’ Tim said. ‘In the end, our government chucked her out, but by then she had helped reverse Australia’s position completely: Australia was backing the Indonesian revolutionaries, not the Dutch, and we ended up being the leading supporter of the new Republic in the UN. K’tut Tantri’s CIB file from that time is, ah, very interesting. And you should see her FBI and CIA files!’ He took a sip of coffee.

‘If I remember correctly, her book ends with her finally getting a passport and returning to America, if rather reluctantly,’ said Steve.

‘Did she ever go back to live in Bali with her friends? What happened to the Prince and young Pito?’ asked Grace.

Tim shrugged. ‘The Prince died, but I don’t know if he was really her lover, which is what you might think. A lot of people say the man she portrays in the book was not actually the real-life prince, but a distant relative, who wasn’t glamorous enough, so K’tut upgraded her lover to local royalty in her book. I did try to trace Pito, but I don’t think he ever existed – or more likely, he was a composite of lots of kids.’

‘Really?’ said Grace. ‘I loved that part of her book. Oh well, Pito made for a good story.’

‘Sure did. Anyway, she wrote her autobiography when she was back in the USA and it was published in 1960. It was a huge success for a while, translated into God knows how many languages – including Indonesian, of course.’

‘What happened next? After the book?’ Grace asked, keen to hear every detail.

Tim smiled. ‘That’s when the movie chase started. Went on for twenty years or more, with big-time movie producers from all over the world chasing her for the rights to film it. Even Michael Curtiz, who’d made Casablanca with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, signed her up.’

‘Why wasn’t it made?’ asked Steve.

‘Well, it’s not hard to imagine that she wanted things done her way or not at all.’ Tim rolled his eyes. ‘The movie people wanted some romance in her story . . .’

‘Between K’tut and the Prince,’ said Grace.