startx hell

[Guyren G Howe <guyren@geocities.com>]

startx won't run. It gives me:

System: '/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xkb/xkbcomp -w 1 -R/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xkb -xkm
-m us -em1 "The XKEBOARD keymap compiler (xkbcomp) reports: " -emp "? " -em1
"Errors from xkbcomp are not fatal to the X server keymap/xfree86
compiled/xfree86.xkm'

Figuring that this is because I have no keymap installed, I searched the
Debian package system for a keymap thingy. I found console-tools. However,
when I do

apt-get install console-tools

I get a character-mode (ncurses?) display labelled "Debian Configuration"
and then "Configuring Console-data", which is asking me what keyboard layout
I want (qwerty, azerty, etc). However, this script does *nothing*. No
keystroke has any effect except for Ctrl-C.

So: how do I get startx to happen?

TIA