the docks, the hackney coach in which they set off to look for a cheap lodging. We want accommodation for a married couple and two rare pheasants___
She felt the spasm of half-hysterical laughter in her throat. She took a small piece of the inner side of her cheek between her teeth and bit it hard. One emerald
button that would never be missed___Oh, the irony of
it! When she could trust her voice she said:
‘It is most kind, most generous of you … and in keeping with the way in which you have always behaved to me; but I could not take anything so valuable, so rare. I thank you from my heart for wishing to give me such a present, but I cannot accept it. For one thing you could never replace them.’
‘That is why,’ he said simply. And the words revealed the full value of the offered gift. She recognised the element of self-sacrifice___She thought rashly, I don’t care
what Richard says; somehow I will take them back and I’ll send them to his father, at Clevely. He may not wish to receive me, or Richard, but he could not resist such a gift. They’ll be safe there.
She turned to Surunda and tried to express not only her gratitude for the gift but her awareness of the subtle honour it conferred. He cut her short before she had completed her first sentence.
‘I am glad that they please you,’ he said. He beckoned to one of the watchful, unobtrusive servants, and said a
few words.
‘They will be ready. It grows dark. We go this way.’ He opened another door and she saw ahead of her a long passage, already lighted by torches, each held by a servant immobile and expressionless as a statue. Fitting her step to the Rajah’s slow, limping pace, she passed along the length of it, prey to an emotion unfamiliar and without a name. It was like dying, this feeling of ‘never more’. Surunda Ghotal would remain here, with his great possessions, warding off the encroachments of the Company, growing old, dying. And she would go on to whatever the future held for her. They would never, in this
world, meet again.
The passage led straight back to the high wide hall which lay just behind the door at the top of the marble steps by which she had entered the palace less than an hour ago. She expected that here he would take leave of her; but he hobbled forward through the doorway and down —awkwardly, clumsily down—the flight of marble steps upon which he had never set foot since the day when he had started out upon the expedition which had resulted in his disablement. As he had said, the pheasants were ready; the wide wicker cage strapped into position beside the driver of the litter. The sudden dusk had fallen and more torches lighted the scene. At the foot of the steps the Rajah paused.
‘It is now,’ he said.
She could not speak. Her eyes were dry, but there were tears at the back of them; her lips moved, but from the painful constriction of her throat no sound would come. All she could do was to reach out with her mittened hand. Surunda Ghotal moved his stick from his right hand to his left and reached out his hand. Linda took it and they stood so for a moment.
Then he said, ‘Go in peace.’
She tried to say, ‘You also’, but no words came, and she turned and hurried to the litter as though seeking shelter.
The Rajah stood and watched as the horses, under the whiplash, plunged forward. The men who had been hovering came forward with his chair and he sat down heavily and allowed himself to be carried up the steps. At the top the torchlight fell on his face, and anyone bold enough to look at him would have seen that his eyes and the heavy discoloured pouches below them were damp. But nobody saw; it would have been highly unwise to be witness to a moment of weakness in so stern and terrible
a man.
‘Well, and what glittering prize did that bit of bum-sucking gain for you, my pretty?’
‘A pair of very rare, very valuable pheasants.’
Richard’s laugh, thin and high and sneering, rang out, jangling her nerves until it was difficult not to cry ‘Stop it I’ and scream.
‘Serve you bloody well right,’ Richard said. ‘And what do you propose to do with this loot? Have a feast of the Passover?’
There’d been a time when she would have said simply, ‘Oh, but you wouldn’t kill them,’ and that would have been his cue and the birds’ death sentence.
‘Such a meal is hardly for the likes of us,’ she said lightly. ‘They’re worth their weight in gold. They’re Chinese, the only ones ever to be seen outside China. Plainly destined for Windsor, or Chatsworth—five hundred pounds the pair!’
As always, the mention of money arrested his attention.
‘So valuable?’ he asked incredulously and roused himself to go out and look at the birds.
‘Now I wonder why His Fatness should give them to you,’ he said.
She knew the answer. ‘Because he is so rich that when he wanted to give a present that would cost something he was like a pauper; he could only give me the one thing he valued at the moment.’ But that was not a thing one could say to Richard.
She said, Tart of the general lack of reality. He’d have no idea what trouble …’ Inspiration visited her. ‘Or perhaps he had I Perhaps he wanted to give you trouble.’
That was enough.
‘Ha ha!’ Richard said. ‘I shall make no trouble of it. No trouble at all, and possibly a profit.’
She knew then that the pheasants were safe. Another small victory, at the price of another enormous betrayal. She turned away, sickened by the thought of what she had become.
PART TWO
Sunset of a Philanderer
CHAPTER THREE
At first Damask thought that, after all, God meant to let her off lightly. Amos came home almost an hour before he was expected.
He wore an unfamiliar look, more unfamiliar than could be accounted for by the fact that he was wearing his chapel suit; his face was smooth and lightened with joy.
‘I bring great tidings,’ he said, as soon as he was inside the kitchen. ‘It was decided this afternoon to build a chapel in Clevely.’
Neither his wife nor his daughter was capable, at that moment, of fully sharing his joy. To Mrs Greenway, now more or less house-bound, a chapel at Clevely and a chapel at Nettleton five miles away were much the same; and Damask was preoccupied with the matter of the Squire’s unfinished boots. She knew this to be unworthy, however, and tried to force herself to enthusiasm. ‘Where is it to stand, Father?’ she asked. ‘On Abel Shipton’s little back meadow, the one they call the Flat Iron; he’ve promised the narrer end where Mrs Shipton hev kept her ducks. You know.’ Amos said, glowing with honest self-abasement, ‘I’ve wronged Abel Shipton in my mind many a time! Over and over again when a chapel in Clevely hev been mentioned I’ve thought him lukewarm in the Lord’s cause not to offer a morsel of ground, he being the only one that could, no other Methodist being his own landlord. However, today he did so and there’ll be a chapel in Clevely at last!’
It had been his dream for many years. The chapel at Nettleton served the six parishes and was large enough to
accommodate all its members, so that at first sight there might not appear to be a crying Heed for one at Clevely; but when Amos thought of the six villages he could see one lighted and five in darkness. He would look around on Sunday evenings and count—ten souls from Nettleton, four from nearby Minsham, three, two, one or none from distant places, himself and Abel Shipton the only representatives of Clevely. Five miles was a long way to walk for old people, or children, or those who were not yet fully persuaded. He was certain that if he could build a chapel in Clevely he could make converts; if he could kindle the light people would gather around it.
‘Who’s going to pay for it?’ Julie asked. She was trying, in her turn, to take interest and it was not her fault that the question had just a tinge of sharp practicality.
‘All Of us,’ said Amos eagerly. The and one or two more’ll do the work and every one of us at the meeting today made a solemn promise to give all we could towards the cost of the stuff. We reckoned we’d get the timber cheap, anyway, Judson being a member of the chapel at Baildon and being in that line of business.’ He broke off and then added, in a different, dreamier voice, ‘ “A light to lighten the Gentiles”, thass what that chapel’ll be.”