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Bone China
Roma Tearne


An epic novel of love, loss and a family uprooted, set in the contrasting landscapes of war-torn Sri Lanka and immigrant London.Grace de Silva, wife of the shiftless but charming Aloysius, has five children and a crumbling marriage. Her eldest son, Jacob, wants desperately to go to England. Thornton, the most beautiful of all the children and his mother’s favourite, dreams of becoming a poet. Alicia wants to be a concert pianist. Only Frieda has no ambition, other than to remain close to her family. But civil unrest is stirring in Sri Lanka and Christopher, the youngest and the rebel of the family, is soon caught up in the tragedy that follows.As the decade unfolds against a backdrop of increasing ethnic violence, Grace watches helplessly as the life she knows begins to crumble. Slowly, this once happy family is torn apart as four of her children each make the decision to leave their home.In London, the de Silvas are all, in their different ways, desperately homesick. Caught in a cultural clash between East and West, life is not as they expected. Only Thornton’s daughter, Meeka, moves confidently into a world that is full of possibilities. But nothing is as easy as it seems and she must overcome heartbreak, a terrible mistake and single parenthood before she is finally able to see the extraordinary effects of history on her family’s migration.






Bone China


ROMA TEARNE







For Barrie, Oliver, Alistair and Mollie.

And in memory of my parents.



‘He who never leaves his country is full of prejudices.’

CARLO GOLDONI




Contents


Title Page (#ufb6561fe-81eb-5848-9205-4f6fab12c634)Dedication (#u366202c0-67e8-546c-961e-e2e7eba01dd6)Secrets (#ub7a01587-b809-5ae9-8fef-fb0b835b3908)Chapter One (#ud2f885b4-3b9a-5011-a802-f4b71e9b9362)Chapter Two (#u38307506-5a9f-5af0-9f96-75ced9bafa53)Chapter Three (#u65a50213-4980-518f-9363-d646cfb64e93)Chapter Four (#ub91aa8c0-e02f-56f8-a514-a973e3257a2d)Chapter Five (#u9e51b5f4-c27c-533b-ac44-2a9fa1340608)Chapter Six (#u3caa0c79-cd7c-57ee-830b-d7aba00b5b6e)Chapter Seven (#u88501f59-d357-5117-8e29-218980dfad3a)Chapter Eight (#uae10dd11-7007-55ed-9cdb-537fd9591032)Chapter Nine (#u3157f433-7b5f-5021-886b-c5c0f4f8642c)Chapter Ten (#ud806d99e-f4c1-5984-9ea8-851445f7dfe8)Errors (#u5da398cf-d149-5108-ae98-d065f387ac61)Chapter Eleven (#u7422c7db-eaac-55ee-8d13-f60af7834734)Chapter Twelve (#ub0b13a1c-92c8-5362-b711-97a27037fcca)Chapter Thirteen (#uf1314d46-38f6-5cb5-bcd6-855ae6f994de)Chapter Fourteen (#u61a41063-edfd-56f3-9f13-8c723862355f)Chapter Fifteen (#ub162fcd2-cdbe-5ef4-a321-c1eb3dd0d45a)Chapter Sixteen (#ue738b436-7fec-5b8f-80ec-0b5f829722da)Chapter Seventeen (#u619f9dff-678a-53ff-8c9d-04c10fb626ee)Chapter Eighteen (#u0b416f84-a919-56f3-9ecc-cfa71013a4eb)Chapter Nineteen (#ubc313161-5414-5bf8-866c-0cd59858092f)Chapter Twenty (#u30dbd0b2-68ef-5ec3-ab6c-35fa28c32dfa)Chapter Twenty One (#u7c2c52b3-18c7-5ff1-ac6b-1e11239cd2dc)Chapter Twenty Two (#u17139466-dbf7-572d-930a-6cfe55f34b10)Beginnings (#u92829b96-7bb0-58e3-88b0-db5f51ca92ba)Chapter Twenty Three (#ub8485ace-1e57-5dbb-9c22-5b5f89f0029e)Acknowledgements (#u261923a0-523d-5651-a944-dbe4f39e139b)Literary Corner (#u80a74373-ed00-56ce-84b5-78f54a82501d)Copyright (#uef2d803a-6117-5fb4-9b37-ca585f0101a7)About the Publisher (#u4d67f69b-6583-5821-b233-5c4531780234)



Secrets (#ue9984ff8-9654-5f25-ab5e-02094550cf15)


1 (#ue9984ff8-9654-5f25-ab5e-02094550cf15)

FROM THE ROAD ALL THAT COULD be seen of the house was its long red roof. Everything else was screened by the trees. Occasionally, depending on the direction of the breeze, children’s voices or a piano being played could be heard, but usually, the only sound was the faint rush of water falling away further down the valley. Until this point where the road ended, the house and all its grandeur remained hidden. Then suddenly it burst into view. The car, approaching from the south side, wound slowly up the tea-covered hills. Passing one breathtaking view after another it climbed higher and higher until at last it rolled to a halt. For a moment Aloysius de Silva sat staring out. The house had been in his wife’s family for more than two hundred years. Local people, those who knew of it and knew the family, called it the House of Many Balconies. All around its façade were ornate carvings punctuated by small stone balconies and deep verandas. The gardens were planted with rhododendrons and foxgloves, arum lilies and soft, rain-washed flowers. ‘Serendipity,’ the Governor had called it, ‘somewhere deep in the Garden of Eden.’ It was here, in this undisturbed paradise, viridian green and temperate, that the dark-eyed Grace had grown up. And it was here that she waited for him now.

Sighing heavily, for he was returning home after an absence of several days, Aloysius opened the door of the car, nodding to the driver. He would walk the rest of the way. It was early morning, on the first day of September 1939. Thin patches of mist drifted in the rarefied air. In his haste to return home he had caught only a glimpse of the newspaper headlines. They could no longer be ignored. The war in Europe was official, and because the island of Ceylon was still under British Crown Rule he knew it would affect them all. But this morning Aloysius de Silva had other things on his mind. He was the bearer of some rather pressing news of his own. His wife, he remembered with some reluctance, was waiting. The next few hours would not be easy. Aloysius had been playing poker. He had promised her he would not, but he had broken his promise. He had been drinking, so that, as sometimes happened on such occasions, one thing had led seamlessly to another. One minute he had had the chance to win back, at a single blow, the unravelled fortunes of his family, the horses, the estates. But the next it had vanished with an inevitability that had proved hard to anticipate. A queen, a king, an ace; he could see them clearly still. He had staked his life on a hand of cards. And he had lost. Why had he done this? He had no idea how to tell her the last of her tea estates had gone. It had been the thing he dreaded most of all.

‘They’re crooks,’ he declared loudly, a bit later on.

No good beating about the bush, he thought. They were sitting in the turquoise drawing room, surrounded by the Dutch colonial furniture, the Italian glass and the exquisite collection of rare bone china that had belonged to Grace’s mother. Family portraits lined the walls, bookcases and vitrines filled the rooms, and a huge chandelier hung its droplets above them.

‘Rasanayagaim set me up,’ said Aloysius. ‘I could tell there was some funny business going on. You know, all the time there was some sort of message being passed between him and that puppy, Chesterton.’

His wife said nothing and Aloysius searched around for a match to light his cigar. When he found none he rang the bell and the servant boy appeared.

‘Bring some tea,’ he said irritably after he relit his cigar. ‘I was set up,’ he continued, when the servant had left the room. ‘As soon as I saw that bastard Rasanayagaim, I knew there’d be trouble. You remember what happened to Harold Fonsaka? And then later on, to that fellow, Sam? I’m telling you, on every single occasion Rasanayagaim was in the room!’

Aloysius blew a ring of cigar smoke and coughed. Still Grace de Silva said nothing. Aloysius could see she had her inscrutable look. This could go on for days, he thought, eyeing her warily. It was a pity really, given how good-looking she still was. Quite my best asset most of the time. He suppressed the desire to laugh. The conversation was liable to get tricky.

‘It was just bad luck, darl,’ he said, trying another tack. ‘Just wait, men, I’ll win it all back at the next game!’

He could see it clearly. The moment he fanned out the cards there had been a constellation of possibilities. A queen, a king, an ace! But then, it hadn’t been enough. Too little, too late, he thought, regretfully. All over Europe the lights were going out. As from this moment, Britain was at war with Germany. Bad luck, thought Aloysius, again. She’ll be silent for days now, weeks even, he predicted gloomily. She knows how to punish me. Always has.

The servant brought in the tea on a silver tray. The china was exquisite. Blue and white and faded. It had been in the family for years, commissioned by the Queen for the Hyde Park Exhibition. Does it still belong to us? Grace thought furiously, looking at them. Or has he signed them away too? And what about me? she wanted to shout. I’m surprised he hasn’t gambled me away. Aloysius watched her. He was well aware that his wife was corseted in good manners, bound up by good breeding, wrapped in the glow of a more elegant world than the one he had been brought up in. But he also knew, underneath, she had a temper. The servant poured the tea. The porcelain teacups were paper-thin. They let in a faint glow of light when she held them up.

‘It isn’t as bad as you think,’ he said conversationally. No use encouraging her silence, he decided, briskly. What’s done is done. Move forward, he thought. ‘We’d have had to give up the house anyway. The Governor wants it for the war. It’s been on the cards for ages, you know, darl,’ he told her, not realising what he was saying.

Grace de Silva pursed her lips. The flower in her hair trembled. Her eyes were blue-black like a kingfisher’s beak and she wanted to kill Aloysius.

‘So you see, sooner or later we’d have to move.’

He waved aside his smoke, coughing. The servant, having handed a cup of tea to Mrs de Silva, left. Dammit, thought Aloysius, again. Why does she have to be so hard on me? It was a mistake, wasn’t it? Her silence unnerved him.

‘The fact is, I’m no longer necessary to the British. We were useful as sandbags, once,’ he continued, sounding more confident than he felt. ‘Those were the days, hah! It was people like me, you know, who kept civil unrest at bay. But now, now they have their damn war looming, they don’t need me.’

Is she ever going to say anything? he wondered. Women were such strange creatures. He moved restlessly. Not having slept he was exhausted. The effort of wanting to give Grace a surprise windfall had tired him out.

‘So, it’s only the estate we’ve lost,’ he repeated uneasily, trying to gauge her mood. ‘I don’t want to be a manager on a plantation that’s no longer ours. What’s the point in that? I’ve no intention of being one of their bloody slaves!’

Grace stirred her tea. Aloysius was a Tamil man who had, by some mysterious means, acquired a Sinhalese surname. He had done this long before Grace knew him, having taken a liking to the name de Silva. When he first began working as the estate manager at her father’s factory he had been young and very clever in the sharp ways of an educated Tamil. And he had been eager to learn. But most of all he had been musical and full of high spirits, full of effervescent charm. Grace, the only daughter of the planter boss, had fallen in love. In all her life she had never met anyone as intelligent as Aloysius. He was still clever, she thought now, but his weaknesses appalled her. Soon after their marriage he had started gambling with the British officers, staying out late, drinking and losing money. Only then did Grace understand her father’s warning.

‘He will drink your fortune away, Grace,’ her father had said. ‘The British will give him special privileges because of his charm, and it will go to his head. He will not be the husband you think.’

Her father had not wanted her to marry Aloysius. He had tried to stop her, but Grace had a stubborn streak. In the end, her father, who could deny her nothing, had given in. Now, finally, she saw what she had done.

‘The children have been asked to leave Greenwood,’ she told him, coldly. ‘Their school fees haven’t been paid for a year. A year!’

Hearing her own voice rise she stopped talking. She blamed herself. Five children, she thought. I’ve borne him five children. And now this. Her anger was more than she could bear.

‘Stanley Simpson wanted me to play,’ Aloysius was saying. Stanley Simpson was his boss. ‘It would have been incorrect of me to refuse.’ He avoided Grace’s eye. ‘I have always been his equal, darl. How could I suddenly refuse to join in? These English fellows have always relied on me to make up the numbers.’

‘But they know when to stop,’ Grace said bitterly. ‘They don’t ruin themselves.’

Aloysius looked at his feet. ‘When it’s your hands on the wheel it’s so much easier to apply the brake,’ he mumbled.

They were both silent, listening to the ticking of the grandfather clock. Outside, a bird screeched and was answered by another bird.

‘Don’t worry about the children, darl,’ Aloysius said soothingly. ‘We can get Myrtle to tutor them.’

Grace started. Myrtle? Had Aloysius completely taken leave of his senses? Myrtle was her cousin. She hated Grace.

‘We’ll start again, move to Colombo. I’ll get the estates back somehow, you’ll see. And after the war, we’ll get the house back too. I promise you. It’s just a small inconvenience.’

Grace looked at him. I’ve been a fool, she thought, bitterly. I’ve no one to blame but myself. And now he wants to bring Myrtle back into our lives. She suppressed a shiver.

Outside, another day on the tea plantation continued, regardless. The early-morning mist had cleared and the coolies had brought in their baskets of leaves to be weighed. Christopher de Silva, youngest son of Grace and Aloysius, was sneaking in through the back of the house. Christopher had brought his mother a present. Well, it wasn’t exactly for her, it was his really. But if he gave it to Grace he knew he’d be allowed to keep it. The older children were still at school and no one had seen his father for some time. It was as good a moment as any. He hurried across the kitchen garden and entered the house through the servants’ quarters carrying a large cardboard box punctured with holes. The kitchen was full of activity. Lunch was being prepared. A pale cream tureen was being filled with a mound of hot rice. Napkins were pushed into silver rings.

‘Aiyo!’ said the cook, seeing him. ‘You can’t put your things there. Mr de Silva’s back and we’re late with the lunch.’

‘Christopher, master,’ said the servant boy who had just served tea for the lady of the house, ‘your brothers are coming home this afternoon.’

‘What?’ asked Christopher, startled.

The box he was holding wobbled and he put it down hastily. He stared at the servant boy in dismay. Why were his brothers coming home? Just when he had thought he was rid of them too. Disappointment leapt on his back; he felt bowed down by it. He was only ten years old, too young as yet to attend Greenwood College with Jacob and Thornton. And although he longed for the day when, at the age of eleven, he could join them there, life at home without Thornton was very good. Thornton monopolised his mother and Christopher preferred his absence.

‘Is Thornton coming too?’ he asked in dismay.

‘Yes,’ said the servant boy. ‘They’re all coming home. Alicia and Frieda too.’

His eyes were shining with excitement. He was the same age as Christopher. They were good friends.

‘You’re all going to live in Colombo now,’ he announced. ‘I’m going to come too!’ He waggled his head from side to side.

‘Namil, will you never learn to keep your mouth shut?’ cried his mother the cook, pulling the boy by the ear. ‘Here, you nuisance, take these coconuts outside to be scraped. And Christopher, master, please go and wash your hands, lunch is almost ready.’

‘What’s going on?’ muttered Christopher. ‘I’m going to find out.’

Then he remembered the cardboard box in the middle of the floor. A muffled miaowing came from within.

‘Namil,’ he said, ‘can you put this in my room, carefully? Don’t let anyone see. It’s a present for my mother.’

‘What is it?’ asked the servant boy, but Christopher had gone, unaware of the horrified expression on the cook’s face as she watched the cardboard box rocking on her kitchen floor.

Further down the valley Christopher’s older brothers waited on the steps of Greenwood College for the buggy to collect them. Jacob de Silva was worried. They had been told to leave their books before returning home. Although the real significance of the message had not fully dawned on him, the vague sense of unease and suspicion that was his constant companion grew stronger with each passing minute.

‘Why d’you think we have to go home?’ he asked Thornton.

‘I thought you said they hadn’t paid our school fees,’ Thornton replied. He was not really interested.

‘But why d’you think that is?’ insisted Jacob. ‘Why didn’t they pay them?’ Thornton did not care. He was only thirteen, the apple of his mother’s eyes, a dreamer, a chaser of the cream butterflies that invaded the valley at this time of year. Today merely signalled freedom for him.

‘Oh, who knows with grown-ups,’ he said. ‘Just think, tomorrow we’ll wake up in our own bedroom. We can go out onto the balcony and look at the garden and no one will mind. And we can have egg hoppers and mangoes for breakfast instead of toast and marmalade. So who cares!’ He laughed. ‘I’m glad we’re leaving. It’s so boring here. We can do what we want at home.’ A thought struck him. ‘I wonder if the girls have been sent back too?’

On their last holiday they had climbed down from the bedroom balcony very early one morning and crept through the mist, to the square where the nuns and the monkeys gathered beside the white Portuguese church. They had had breakfast with Father Jeremy who wheezed and coughed and offered them whisky, which they had drunk in one swift gulp. And afterwards they had staggered back home to bed. Thornton giggled at the memory.

Jacob watched him solemnly. He watched him run down the steps of Greenwood College, this privileged seat of learning for the sons of British government officials and the island’s elite, his laughter floating on the sunlight.

‘I want to stay here,’ he said softly, stubbornly, under his breath. ‘We can go home any time. But we can only learn things here.’

He frowned. He could see all the plans for his future beginning to fade. The headmaster had told him he could have gone to university had he stayed on at school and finished his studies. His Latin teacher had told him he might have done classics. Then his science teacher had told him that in his opinion Jacob could have gone to medical school. Jacob had kept these conversations to himself.

‘Oh, I can learn things anywhere,’ Thornton was saying airily. ‘I’m a poet, remember.’ He laughed again. ‘I’m so lucky,’ he said. And then, in the fleeting manner of sudden childhood insights, he thought, I’m glad I’m not the eldest.

‘Come on,’ he added kindly, sensing some invisible struggle, some unspoken battle going on between them. ‘Race you to the gate.’

But Jacob did not move. He stared morosely ahead of him, not speaking. Both boys wore the same ridiculous English public-school uniform, but whereas Thornton wore his with ease, already in possession of the looks that would mark him out for the rest of his life, Jacob simply looked hot and awkward. Again, he was aware of some difficulty, some comparison in his own mind, between himself and his brother. But what this was he could not say. Thornton’s voice drifted faintly towards him, but still Jacob did not move.

‘I can’t.’ His voice sounded strained. ‘You don’t understand. Someone must stay here to wait for the buggy.’

He was fifteen years old. He had been brought up to believe he was the inheritor of the tea plantations that rose steeply in tiers around him. The responsibilities of being the eldest child rested heavily on his small shoulders. As he stood watching his brother chasing the butterflies that slipped through the trees, he was suddenly aware of wanting to cry. Something inexplicable and infinitely precious seemed to be breaking inside him. Something he loved. And he could do nothing to stop it.

The buggy never arrived. After a while an older boy came out with a message.

‘Your parents have rung,’ the boy said. ‘Looks like you’re going to have to walk. They don’t have a buggy any more. Perhaps it’s been sold off to pay your father’s debtors,’ he grinned.

‘We have no debtors,’ muttered Jacob, but the boy had gone.

Eventually the brothers began to walk. Jacob walked slowly. The long fingers of sun shone pink and low in the sky as they left the driveway of Greenwood for the very last time. Rain had fallen earlier, dampening the ground on this ordinary afternoon, one so like the others, in their gentle upcountry childhood. The air across the valley was filled with the pungent scent of tea, rising steeply as far as the eye could see. In the distance the sound of the factory chute rattled on, endlessly processing, mixing and moving in time to the roar of the waterfall. The two boys wandered on, past the lake brimming with an abundance of water lilies, past clouds of cream butterflies, and through the height of the afternoon, their voices echoed far into the distance. Returning to their home nestling in the hills of Little England.

To his dismay, Christopher discovered the servant boy had been right. Jacob and Thornton were coming home. Alicia and Frieda, still stranded at the Carmelite Convent School, were waiting fruitlessly for another buggy to pick them up. In the end the priest, taking pity on them, drove them home and it was teatime before Grace was able to break the news to them all. The servant brought a butter cake and some Bora into the drawing room. She brought in small triangles of bread spread with butter and jaggery. And she brought in king coconut juice for the children and tea for Grace. The servant, knowing how upset Grace was, served it all on Grace’s favourite green Hartley china tea service. Alicia opened the beautiful old Bechstein piano and began to play Schubert. The others ate quietly. For a moment Grace was distracted. The mellow tone of this sonata was one she loved and Alicia’s light touch never failed to surprise her. She waited until the andante was over.

‘That was lovely,’ she said, putting her hand gently on her daughter’s shoulder. ‘It’s come along a lot since I last heard it.’

‘That’s because we’ve got a new piano teacher. She’s wonderful, Mummy!’ Alicia said. ‘She said I must be careful about the phrasing of this last section. Listen,’ and she played a few bars over again.

‘Yes, I see,’ Grace said. ‘Good! Now, I want to talk to all of you about something else. So could you leave the piano for a moment, darling?’

Five pairs of eyes watched her solemnly as she spoke.

‘We’re moving to Colombo,’ she told them slowly. ‘We’re going to live in our other house by the sea.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Because there’s going to be a war the British military needs this house, you see.’ There was a surprised pause.

Alicia was the first to speak. ‘What about the piano?’ she asked anxiously.

‘Oh, the piano will come with us, of course. Don’t worry, Alicia, nothing like that will change. I promise you.’

She smiled shakily. Jacob was watching her in stony silence. He had guessed correctly. The Greenwood days were over.

‘Myrtle will live with us,’ said Grace, carefully. ‘She’ll give you piano lessons, Alicia. And she’ll help in the house generally.’

No one spoke. Thornton helped himself to another piece of cake.

‘There’s a war on,’ Grace reminded them gently. ‘Everyone has to economise. Even us.’ She looked pale.

‘Good,’ nodded Thornton, having decided. ‘I think Colombo will be great. And we’ll have the sea, think of that!’

Grace smiled at him with relief. Christopher, noticing this, scowled. But all he said was: ‘Can I give you your present now?’

The servant boy, who had been hovering in the background, grinned and brought in the cardboard box. The family crowded around and the miaowing inside the box increased.

‘What on earth’s in there, Christopher?’ asked Alicia, astonished.

‘It’s a cat,’ guessed Thornton.

‘But we’ve already got one,’ said Frieda, puzzled. ‘We can’t have another. They’ll fight.’

‘Have you been stealing kittens again?’ asked Jacob, frowning.

‘Well, well, what’s going on now?’ asked Aloysius, coming in.

Having left his wife to break the news to his children he was now in the best of humours. A nap had been all he had needed. Glancing at Grace he assessed her mood correctly. There was still some way for them to go. The miaowing inside the box had turned to a growl. Everyone looked mystified and Christopher grinned.

‘What is it?’ asked Grace faintly, wondering how many more shocks there were in store for her.

Aloysius’s news had not come as a surprise. Grace had always known that one day they would have to leave the valley where she had been born. There had been too many rumours, too many hints dropped by the British planters during the past few months. It had all pointed to this. So much of their own land had gradually been sold off. British taxes, unrest among the workers and general mismanagement of the estates had all played a part. Her drunken husband had merely speeded things up. And with the onset of war they would lose the house anyway. She felt unutterably tired. The effort of waiting for something to happen had worn her out. Now, knowing just how bad things were, she could at least try to deal with them. In Colombo, she would take charge of her life; manage things herself. It should have happened years ago. In Colombo, things would be different, she told herself firmly. And when the war was over they would come back. To the house at any rate. Of that she was certain. Christopher was holding a box out to her. But what on earth had he brought home this time? she wondered, frowning.

‘It’s for you,’ Christopher said. ‘To take to Colombo.’

Slowly she opened the box.

‘Yes,’ said a hollow voice from within. ‘Hello, men.’

Then with a sharp rustle a small, bright-eyed mynah bird flew out and around the room, coming to rest on the grandfather clock, from where it surveyed them with interest. There was a shocked silence.

‘It’s a mynah bird,’ said Christopher unnecessarily. ‘And it can talk. We can teach it all kinds of things. It can say lazy boy, and –’

‘Lazy bugger,’ said the mynah bird, gazing at them solemnly.

‘Good God, Christopher!’ cried Aloysius, recovering first. He burst out laughing. ‘What a present to give your mother!’

They were all laughing now. The servant boy was grinning, and even Jacob was smiling.

‘But he’s wonderful,’ said Grace, laughing the most. ‘He’s a wonderful present!’

Later on she said, to Christopher’s intense joy: ‘I shall call him Jasper! And we’ll take him to our new life in Colombo.’

It was in this way that Grace de Silva dealt with their reduced family circumstance. Easily, without fuss, without a single word in public of reproach to her husband and with all the serene good manners that were the hallmark of her character. Aloysius breathed a sigh of relief. Whatever she felt, she would now keep to herself he knew. Outwardly, she would appear no different. And so, as the rumours of impending war on the island grew stronger, the house beside the lake with all its balconies and splendid rooms was emptied. Its furniture and chandeliers, its delicate bone china were packed away, and even as they watched, their beloved home was closed forever and given up to the British for their military efforts. In this way the de Silva family, cast out from the cradle where they had lived for so long, moved south to Colombo. To a white house with a sweeping veranda, close by the railway line where the humidity was very often oppressive, but where the sweet, soft sound of the Indian Ocean was never far away.


2 (#ue9984ff8-9654-5f25-ab5e-02094550cf15)

AUGUST WAS A DANGEROUS MONTH, when the heat, reaching unbearable proportions, created an oasis of stillness. Every flutter, every breeze, vanished, leaving an eerie calm. Nothing moved. Dogs stretched out on the dusty roads panting, too exhausted to move out of the shade, too parched to bark even. Dust lay tiredly on everything, on buildings, on the soles of the feet of the rickshaw men, on the sides of the old London double-decker buses. Disease scurried through the sun-crisped grass; some said there was typhoid in the south, others that the malaria season had begun. No one knew the truth. A pack of rabid dogs moved up the coast at a trot, and elsewhere in the crowds at Galle Face, baby-pink, raw-faced monkeys chattered and sometimes bit a passer-by. But this was August, when sanity was stretched to its limits.

Four years had vanished in the blink of an eye. Swallowed up beneath a peacock sky while the de Silvas grew and expanded into their new life by the sea. Five de Silva childhoods gone in a flash while the war still limped on unnoticed. It existed in places that were merely names on a map. Vichy, Paris, Dresden, Berlin, Vienna, London. But the hardships in these distant lands barely touched the fringes of the coral-ringed island. The war was a muffled drum, beating elsewhere and leaving the island largely untouched and unconcerned. Grace de Silva hurrying home after one of her trips to Colombo heard the familiar strains of piano music drifting through the long French windows that opened out into the garden. The music cascaded out onto the bougainvillea and was absorbed by it. As she slipped in through the front door, escaping the wall of blistering sunlight, the music rose and swelled and fell delicately. Jasper, the mynah bird who sat by the meshed window in the wide cool hallway, watched her beadily. He had grown enormously.

‘Hello,’ he greeted her. ‘Hello, men,’ and he shifted on his perch.

Grace, who had been trying to be quiet, giggled.

‘Good morning,’ continued Jasper severely. ‘Good morning, men.’

Having been silent and alone all day he found it difficult to stop talking. Grace looked away, suppressing a smile. She kicked off her shoes, ignoring him. Any attention, she knew, was likely to make him garrulous. She poured a glass of icy water from the fridge, gasping as she drank.

The sound of the piano drifted through the interior of the house. It travelled softly across the shuttered rooms and along the yellow stick of light that escaped through them. Alicia was playing the second movement of a Mozart sonata with startling tenderness in one so young. Grace stood listening, holding her breath, waiting as though hearing it for the first time. On and on and on played her eldest daughter in an unbroken dialogue with the music. The notes ran like quicksilver through her fingers. Grace closed her eyes. Her body ached sweetly. Without a doubt, she thought, distracted by the music, Alicia ought to be studying at the Conservatoire. But she knew discussing the financial implications of this with Aloysius was an impossibility. Better to give a monkey a ladder, thought Grace wryly. All she would do if she voiced her anxieties was provide him with an excuse to start his poker up again. No, she decided closing her eyes, I will have to find the money. There was still some of her legacy left that Aloysius knew nothing about. Grace had hoped to keep it for a rainy day. She frowned.

‘Perhaps I shall have to sell the land after all,’ she said out loud.

‘Yes,’ said Jasper as though he understood.

‘Do you think so?’ asked Grace absent-mindedly, forgetting for a moment who he was.

‘Hello, yes, yes, men,’ said Jasper imperiously, preening himself and ignoring Grace’s peal of laughter. Then he squawked flatly and turned his back on her.

Outside, the air was heavy with the smells of late afternoon. The servants were cleaning out the clay pots from lunch, laying them out in the sun to dry. The heat flattened the noises all around into slow hollow slaps as the convent clock struck the hour in a strange flat monotone. Grace paused in the darkened room listening to these unfamiliar southern noises, of crows cawing and bicycle bells. She listened to the lilting sound of the Beethoven study Alicia was now playing. It was interspersed with her husband’s drunken snores in the next room. While the steady ticking of the metronome drew and fused all of it, weaving this fleeting moment in time forever. Grace sighed with pleasure. In spite of the difficulty, her family had made the transition into their new life with ease. Their circumstances had been reduced, but they were happy. The freedom of the big city and the unbroken views of the sea had made up for a lot. She poured herself another glass of water.

Myrtle Cruz, hearing the front door, sat up in bed. She had been resting. The heat in Colombo was intolerable. She missed the cool greenness of the hill station where she had been a governess to the British family. She missed the order and calm of the English children she had taught.

‘This place is a madhouse,’ muttered Myrtle, switching off the fan and getting out of bed.

The English family had long gone. And this, thought Myrtle, this is my karma. She disliked her cousin Grace. It had happened long ago when they had been young, when Myrtle had first met the new estate manager at her uncle’s factory. He had been penniless but handsome and ambitious, often invited to dine at the House of Many Balconies. In those distant, halcyon days Myrtle had understood nothing of the world. She had fallen hopelessly in love with the young Aloysius, with his intelligence, and his good looks. It had been an act of transformation, blinding and total. Unthinkingly, assuming his friendliness meant he felt as she did, she had revealed her feelings. She had not known his interests lay elsewhere. All she had seen was her own compulsive need, her own desperation, so that throwing caution to the winds she had declared her passion. The shame was unbearable. Afterwards she felt it was the single worst thing she had ever done in her life. He had looked at her, first with horror, and then with embarrassment. Aloysius had had no idea she felt that way. He had been bewildered but kind. His kindness had been her greatest humiliation and later on, when she saw all those things he had left unsaid, she realised there had never really been a chance. The presence of the wantonly beautiful Grace in the house would have stopped anything. Her hopes had fallen like ashes of roses, at his feet. No amount of visits to the astrologer, no amount of prayers or offerings made at sacred shrines, had altered anything. Karma was karma, Myrtle had realised with bitterness. She fled her uncle’s house imagining they were all laughing at her. She had not come back for the wedding; she had not seen Grace for years after that. By the time she finally met them both again, Grace had other things on her mind. All their money had gone, frittered away. Oh the sweet irony of it! Her cousin was still as beautiful, but Myrtle could see she was no longer happy. Five children and a useless marriage, she had thought, with a small glint in her eye, that too was karma. How different life might have been for Aloysius had he married her instead. She would never have let him go to the dogs. She would have loved him.

Myrtle could hear Grace moving around the house. She glanced at the clock. Then she pulled out her diary.

Two fifteen, she wrote. This is the second time in a week! So where the devil has she been? She’s missed lunch; she’s had no breakfast and it’s three o’clock. The shops would have shut long ago. So where’s she been?

Myrtle paused, staring out at the plantain tree outside her window. Two bright sunbirds hovered briefly on a bush before disappearing from view.

There are several things that interest me, she continued, writing furiously. One, why does she have to work with the Irish nuns in Colombo? Why not work in the convent here, why take the train to Colombo all the time? The chauffeur drops her off at the station, he picks her up, she comes in and goes straight to bed. There is something very, very fishy going on. Two, what is this work she’s so involved in?

Myrtle knew it was useless asking the children. Frieda and Alicia had only the vaguest idea of what their mother did and the boys were never home, anyway. Is she some sort of spy for the British? She certainly knows plenty of them.

Myrtle stared at what she had written. Like mother like sons, she thought sourly. Then she closed her diary and went off to have a wash.

The truth about Grace was simpler. She had taken a lover. Well, why not? She was still young. Had she not been a good mother, a good wife too? Did she not deserve a little happiness, having remained with the husband who had squandered her inheritance? Well then, thought Grace, who could argue with that? Grace’s lover was called Vijay. He worked in Maya’s Silk Merchants in Pettah. One day, soon after the de Silvas had arrived in Colombo, she had gone over to buy her daughters some saris and he had served her. She had noticed him even then, a lean, handsome man probably in his mid thirties, but with the air of someone much older. A few weeks later she had returned for more silk. He had looked at her in the way that she was used to, in the way men had looked at her all her life, but without, she felt, the suggestiveness that usually accompanied such a look. His look had struck her forcefully. Vijay’s eyes had been soft and full of exhaustion and something, some long-forgotten emotion, had stirred within Grace. Years of neglect on Aloysius’s part had taken its toll. Suddenly, and without warning, she saw that she had grown indifferent without realising it. Her patience had been stretched for too long. Perhaps her marriage had simply reached its outer limits. Perhaps the end had come long ago. Once Aloysius had been her whole world. But no more. So that eventually, after what felt like a moment’s blinding desire, before she could consult her better judgement, say a prayer or argue with her conscience, she found she had given herself to Vijay.

On the first occasion it had happened with a swiftness that took them both by surprise. Grace had been ordering silk. Yards and yards of the stuff. For Frieda and for Alicia.

‘I have two daughters,’ she had told Vijay.

‘Then you will have to come back often,’ Vijay told her softly.

He had not smiled. She heard him as though from a great distance. On the second occasion he had brought out a roll of pale, flamingo-pink material, letting it flow through his hands, letting it stream to the floor.

‘See,’ he said. He could not take his eyes off her. ‘Feel it,’ he said. ‘This is pure cashmere.’

‘Yes,’ she agreed, feeling a constriction in her chest.

No one noticed. She saw, from this, they already talked a secret language. Her hand brushed the cloth and accidentally touched his. Something happened to her throat, something ancient and familiar, closing it up as though it were a flower. The shop had become stuffy in spite of the ceiling fan. She had felt she might faint. So that, stepping back, she pretended to look at other things while waiting for the room to clear. And afterwards, after she had bought her saris and given her address for them to be delivered, she had gone out into the blazing sun, only to hear a radio playing somewhere in the distance.

Love is the sweetest thing,

What else on earth could ever bring,

Such happiness to everything…

Even though she continued to walk on, she was struck by the silly coincidence of the words.

Love is the strangest thing…

I only hope that fate may bring

Love’s story to you.

Grace stood rooted to the spot listening. She was not a superstitious woman. Nor did she believe in fate, but she had left her umbrella in the shop. Turning round, as though there was no time to lose, as though he was calling her, as if she had promised him, she ran back. Like a young girl with foolish dreams in her eyes.

By now the shop was half shuttered. It was midday and the heat had spun a glistening, magical net around everything. The street was empty. Grace stopped abruptly. Why had she expected him still to be there? Perhaps, she thought in panic, it was a terrible mistake. He did not want her after all. Uncertain, feeling ridiculous, she looked around her and saw him standing silently in the doorway. Watching her. Relief exploded in her face. Desire rose like a multicoloured fountain. Happiness somersaulted across the sky. In that moment neither gave a thought to the dangers. Vijay simply waited in the shadows. It was beyond him to summon up a smile and Grace saw the time for smiling had not arrived. In spite of the heat she began to shiver, swaying slightly, mesmerised by his eyes.

‘Grace?’ he said.

He had walked towards her, something seemed to propel him, something he clearly had no control over. How did he know her name? Hearing his voice, Grace felt electric shocks travel through her. Vijay’s voice sounded threadbare, as if he had worn it out with too much longing. Like a bird that was parched; like an animal without hope. Seeing this Grace was overcome by sleepy paralysis. So, holding the heavy weight of her heart, with slow inevitability and leaden feet, she went towards him and placed her head against the length of his body. The door closed behind them. Softly, and with great care. Vijay was too frightened to speak. He rocked against her. Then he unravelled her, shedding her sari as though he were peeling ripe fruit, sinking into the moment, tasting her. A first sip of nectar that left him weakened and snared by his own desire. Slowly he removed the pins from her hair. It was as if he was detonating a bomb. His hands caught against her skin, caressing it, tricked into following a path of its own across her body. Digressing. Grace swallowed. She felt the untold disappointments of years loosen and become smooth and clear and very simple. Vijay kissed her. He kissed her neck and her ears. He pulled her gently towards him and somewhere in that moment, in the three or four seconds it took for this to happen, they crossed an invisible point of no return. The clock ticked on like a metronome. Grace waited. Soon he would kiss her in every conceivable place, in every possible way. Her eyes closed of their own accord. Her eyes seemed to have gone down deep into her body, to some watchful place of their own. She felt his ear against her navel as he listened to the hot shuddering sighs within her. He found a cleft of sweetness and felt the room spin. Then he wrapped himself around her in an ever tightening embrace as they rushed headlong into each other. Later on, exhausted, they slept, half lying, half sitting against each other and time stood still once again. She awoke to feel his mouth against her and then, hearing the beat of his heart marking time like a drum, she knew that he had begun to count the cost of what they had done. Prejudice, she saw, would march between them, like death. Uncompromising and grim. Everything and nothing had changed. She saw without surprise that there was little more she wanted in the world. As he began again, turning her over, feeling his way back into her, defiantly and with certainty she knew, no one would ever keep them apart. Afterwards, he was filled with remorse, so that sitting between the bales of turmeric-coloured silks, surrounded by the faint perfume of new cloth, she reached out and touched him. He was from another caste. To love beyond its boundaries was outside any remit he might have had. He understood too well the laws that must not be disobeyed. As did she. They stood in the darkness of the shop, cocooned by the silk and she read his thoughts for the first of many times. She felt the fear within him grow and solidify into a hard, dark, impenetrable thing. The death of a million silkworms surrounded them, stretched out into a myriad of colours. Grace was unrepentant; she felt as though a terrible fever had just passed her by and she was safe at last. Stroking the dips and slopes of his body, seeing only the smooth brownness of muscles, the long dark limbs, unashamed by his caste, or her class, she smiled. What could Vijay do after that? In the face of such a smile? He could hardly recognise his own hands let alone turn away. His hands belonged to her now. It was an unplanned passion, swift and carefree, carrying with it the last glow of youth.

Alicia was playing something new, something she had never played before. The notes floated hesitantly and with great clarity across the shuttered house. Vijay was a Tamil man and these days madness shadowed the Tamils. Luck was no longer on their side. Who knew what the future held. In the early days none of this had meant anything. She had gone on unthinkingly, acting on her instincts, a huge euphoria propelling her to his door. The sky had shouted her happiness. But no one heard. She had launched her delight into the air like a white paper kite. But no one saw. It was only lately that she had begun to think of the future.

This morning Maya’s Silk Merchants had been closed so Grace had visited Vijay in his lodgings instead. They were towards the east side of Colombo, which was why she had been late getting back. She smiled, remembering the moment, as it rose and fell to the sound of Alicia’s music.

‘I’ve just been listening to the radio,’ Aloysius said, coming in noiselessly, fresh from his afternoon nap. ‘You know, darl, it really is going to be quite bad for the Tamils when the British leave.’

Grace was startled. ‘Will they really leave, d’you think?’ she asked.

Aloysius might be a fool over money but when it came to the British, he was shrewd.

‘Of course they’ll go, and sooner than you think. I imagine there’ll be some sort of a backlash after that.’

Aloysius poured himself some water. He didn’t want to frighten Grace but rumours of a different kind of war were circulating. Sinhalese resentment grew daily, a resentment which would demand acknowledgement. Soon, they would be the majority, with unstoppable power over the Tamils. Grace shivered. Independence had begun to frighten her. Aloysius opened the shutters and stared out at the sea. He was sober. He did not like the feeling. It forced him to think of their uncertain future.

‘Is that Thornton, coming up the hill?’ he asked. ‘Good God, how can he ride his bicycle in this heat?’

Grace did not answer. She had just left Vijay’s small airless room, walking away from his rattan mattress back to her marble floors. Leaving some essential part of herself behind, carrying the sound of his voice home with her. Alicia was playing Schubert. Recently Grace had met a British officer she had known long ago as a young girl. There had been a time when she had thought she might have married him instead of Aloysius. Now she wanted to go to this man, to ask him if the British would really leave. Would there be an independent government at last? And did he think there would be civil war? But the price for such information was too high. The British, she decided, were best at arm’s length. For suddenly Grace was beginning to understand, painfully and with fear, just what might happen to her beloved country. Propelled by this late last love, she had wandered towards frontiers not normally reached by women of her class. She was walking a dangerous road. A secret door in her life had swung open. It could not now be easily closed.

‘Sweep the devils out, men,’ Aloysius said, handing his empty glass to the servant who had walked in, ‘and who knows what others will come in. The Sinhalese won’t stay marginalised forever.’

Alicia had stopped her practice; the metronome was no longer ticking.

‘I’m going to have a shower,’ Aloysius said, shaking his head. ‘Too much foreign rule is bound to tamper with the balance of this place.’ And he went out, bumping into Thornton who had just come in.

‘Ah! The wanderer returns!’ Grace heard him say.

Thornton de Silva was seventeen. In the years since they had left their old upcountry home, he had grown tall and very handsome while his smile remained incontestably beautiful. Colombo suited him. He loved its bustle and energy around him. He loved the noise. The British talked of a Japanese invasion, the navy was on constant alert, and the newspapers were full of depressing predictions. But what did Thornton care? Youth held unimaginable promise. Possibilities festooned his days like strings of coloured lights. Earlier this afternoon he had gone to meet his brother Jacob. The harbour had been a tangle of sounds; muffled horns, and shrill whistles, and waves that washed against the jetty. The air was an invisible ocean, salt-fresh and wet, with a breeze that seemed to throb in time to the sound of motor launches. Further along, in the entry-strictly-prohibited parts of the harbour, brass-buttoned British officers revved their jeeps, while stick-thin boys stepped out of rickshaws carrying native food for important personnel, balancing tiffin tins precariously on their heads. Thornton had brought Jacob his lunch. He had been wheeling his bicycle along the seafront watching the frenzy of activity when he had bumped into two English girls, one of whom he vaguely knew. She had called out to him and Thornton had smiled, a beacon of a smile, a searchlight of happiness, making the girl giggle. She was drinking a bright green limeade through a candy-striped straw. Thornton watched her lips wrap themselves around the straw. Then, regretfully, remembering that his brother was waiting for him, he had waved and moved on. But Jacob, when he met him, had been full of his usual gloom. Thornton sighed, only half listening.

‘Crown Rule,’ Jacob declared loftily, following some thread of his own, ‘my boss says it’s a privilege the Indian Empire doesn’t have. Which is why they are in such a mess!’

Thornton had not the faintest idea what his brother was talking about. The girl with the candy-striped straw filled his head.

‘Crown Rule is what keeps the elephants in the jungle and stops them trampling all over the parks.’

Jacob paused, considering his own words. It was true the parks were beautiful. And he could see, Crown Rule did keep the grass green with water sprinklers. It gave the island its economy of rubber and tea. So really, he decided, on balance, it was probably a good thing. Thornton remained silent. Personally he didn’t care if the elephants walked on the railway lines, or the grass all died, or the rubber trees dried up. He had no idea what went on in Jacob’s head.

‘Let’s go to the Skyline Hotel tonight,’ he had suggested instead. ‘There’s a jazz band I know playing there.’

‘I can’t,’ Jacob said shortly, ‘I’ve got overtime.’

Since leaving their old home, since he had turned sixteen, Jacob had been working for the Ceylon Tea Board. He was almost nineteen now and he detested Colombo. The trees here were dull green and dirty and the air, when it was not filled with water, was choked with the dust from the spice mills. His childhood was finished and the life that he had so loved gone with it. There was nothing more to say on the subject. These days his only ambition was to leave this wretched place and sail away to the United Kingdom. Life there, so he’d been led to believe, was much better. Just as soon as the war was over he planned to escape.

‘Why don’t you get a job instead of loafing around,’ he asked, his irritation barely concealed.

Thornton had stared dreamily at the sea. It lay like a ploughed field beyond the harbour wall and the day was thick and dazzling and humid. It was far too hot to argue. The air had compressed and solidified into a block of heat. It pressed against Thornton, reminding him once again of the girl with the limeade drink. Her dress had been made of a semi-transparent material that clung to her as she walked, hinting of other, interesting things. He imagined brushing his hands against her hips. Or maybe even, he thought, maybe, her neck. Thornton had a strong feeling that a poem was just beginning to develop. Something about breasts, he thought, smiling warmly to himself. And soft, rosy lips.

‘Thornton.’ Jacob’s irritation had cut across this delicious daydream. ‘It’s no joke, you know. You have to plan your future. It won’t simply happen. Don’t you want your own money?’

What? thought Thornton, confused. All around him the heat shimmered with hormonal promise. His brother’s voice buzzed like a fly against his ear. I wonder if I’ll be allowed to go to the concert on my own, he thought, whistling the snatch of jazz he had heard earlier. No, he decided, that’s not quite right. I haven’t got the timing right. When I get back, if Alicia has finished on the piano I’ll try to play it by ear.

‘Or are you planning on taking up gambling? Carrying on the family tradition perhaps?’ Jacob had continued, unable to let the subject go.

‘Oh God, Jacob!’ Thornton had laughed, refusing to be drawn. ‘Life is not simply about making money. I keep telling you, I’m a poet.’

‘What does that mean, apart from loafing around?’

Thornton had done an impromptu tap dance. Sunlight sparkled on the water.

‘I’m not loafing around! This is how I get my experience,’ he said, waving his hands at the activity in front of them. ‘There is a purpose to everything I do. Can’t you see?’

‘You’re getting worse,’ Jacob had said gloomily, throwing some crumbs at the seagulls.

Thornton, trying not to laugh again, had decided: his brother simply had no soul.

‘I’ve sent another poem to the Daily News,’ he offered. ‘It’s about fishermen. Maybe it will get published. Who knows? Then I’ll be rich and famous!’

‘That proves it,’ Jacob told him, satisfied. ‘You’re a complete idiot!’

Having finished his lunch, having had enough, he stood up.

‘Right,’ he said briskly, ‘I must get back to work. You should think about what I said. I could get you a job here, you know.’

And he was gone, leaving Thornton to his daydreams.

Having washed her face and feeling a little cooler, Myrtle went to the kitchen in search of a piece of cake. From the sound of the jazz being played she guessed Thornton was back. Myrtle pursed her lips. The boy was always playing jazz, or swimming, or wandering aimlessly around Colombo. In the past, whenever she had tried tackling Grace on the subject of Thornton’s laziness, it had had no effect. Grace merely smiled indulgently; Thornton could do no wrong.

‘He’s still young,’ was all she said in a voice that brooked no argument.

Myrtle had given up. Thornton would learn a lesson one day. She had seen it in the cards. Her cards never lied.

Myrtle cut herself an enormous slice of cake, ate it and went looking for Grace. But Grace was nowhere in sight. Thornton was still at the piano, and Jasper, moving restlessly on his perch, eyed her with interest.

‘Good evening,’ he said slowly. ‘Where’ve you been?’

Instantly Myrtle averted her eyes, not wishing to provoke him, but Jasper let out a low whistle. Myrtle retreated hastily into her room, closing the door. Then she got out her pack of cards and began to lay them out. It was her daily practice to see what misfortune might befall the family. The jazz had stopped and a door slammed. A shadow fell across her window. She caught a glimpse of Christopher disappearing into the kitchen. Ah! thought Myrtle, alert again. So he’s back. For some time she had suspected that Christopher was stealing food. It wouldn’t have surprised her if he were selling it on the black market. One way or another they were all up to no good. What else could one expect from a family of gamblers and drunks? The cards were dealt. She began to turn them over, one by one. Perhaps they would offer her an explanation.

Christopher left the house through the back with a parcel under his arm. The servants were resting and so, he hoped, was his mother. No one else mattered. No one else took much notice of him. Now fifteen, Christopher found that Colombo had made little difference to the way he lived his life. He still came and went as he pleased and he still loathed Thornton. He would never forgive his father for sending his brothers to Greenwood while he had never even been to school. Rage, never far off, threatened to overtake him whenever he thought of Thornton. To distract himself he remembered his secret. For Christopher had a secret that of late had brought him immense happiness. None of his family knew that he had fallen in love and was conducting the most wonderful romance. The object of his adoration was a little girl called Kamala whose father ran a sherbet and betel kadé on Galle Face Green. It was to Kamala, with her emaciated body and her poverty, that he went with the outpouring of all those things he kept hidden from the rest of the de Silvas. With furious energy and great passion Christopher showered her with his stolen presents. He took food, money, books; anything he could think of that might bring her happiness. This afternoon he had found a cardboard box with some silk in it. His mother was always buying saris. Christopher felt sure she would not miss one. Picking up the box and a packet of English biscuits lying on the kitchen table, he hurried out. Jasper, who had moved to his lower perch, watched him leave with narrow-eyed interest.

‘Careful, my boy!’ he said, copying Aloysius.

But Christopher only grinned and tweaked the bird’s tail feathers affectionately before sauntering out into the sun. He crossed the road and headed towards the seafront. To his surprise he saw Thornton hurrying ahead of him. Christopher slowed down. Thornton was the last person he wanted to meet just at this moment. A bus passed and Thornton ducked suddenly, and then vanished. Christopher looked around, puzzled. There was nowhere Thornton could have gone. He glanced down the road but there was no sign of him. His brother had disappeared. Perhaps he had been mistaken, Christopher thought, continuing on his way. Stepping off the bus on his afternoon off, Jacob looked across the road. He too was certain he had glimpsed Thornton. Heading off furtively in the direction of the Jewish Quarter of the town.

Having decided to do something about Alicia’s musical education, Grace went to see the Director of the Conservatoire. She had known his family from many years before, in the days when her mother was alive and used to hold concerts in their house in the hills. All she wanted, she told the Director, was an opinion on Alicia’s ability. Then she would sell her land to pay for her daughter’s studies.

‘Bring her to me, Grace,’ the Director said, smiling at her. ‘Let’s hear her play, let’s see what she can do first.’

The Director had a soft spot for Grace. He had never really understood why she had thrown her life away with Aloysius de Silva. Seeing her lovely, anxious face, he was determined to help if he could.

Grace needn’t have worried. Three weeks later Alicia was accepted on her own merits, securing a scholarship for the entire three-year diploma. Her daughter’s talent would not be wasted and the last of Grace’s legacy would remain untouched. Waiting for that rainy day.

When he heard the news Aloysius looked with admiration at his talented daughter. Alicia was sixteen. Her future was bright.

‘You see, darl,’ he said beaming at Grace. ‘She’s got our talent! Thank goodness one of them has, eh?’

‘Well, I think we should all thank Myrtle, first,’ Grace said, handing the letter of acceptance to her cousin. ‘Without her lessons, Alicia, you would have been nowhere!’

‘You’ll be able to play on a Steinway, Alicia,’ Thornton said, pleased for his sister. ‘And everything sounds wonderful on a Steinway!’

‘This calls for a celebration, darl,’ Aloysius decided, much to Grace’s alarm. ‘Our family will be famous yet, you’ll see!’

And he went out to play a game of poker, to win some money and buy his clever daughter a present. Or if not a present for Alicia, thought Aloysius unsteadily, moments before he fell into the sea at Galle Face, then at least some whisky.

Myrtle watched him go. Afterwards, she wrote in her diary.

Thursday, September 4. So, my cousin thanks me as though I am her servant. How she loves to play the good mother while neglecting her husband. As for Aloysius he will die of drink.

Towards evening, an Englishman from the Tea Board brought Aloysius home. Grace would not go to the door. She was too ashamed. She sent the servant instead.

‘He’s had a slight accident,’ the Englishman said tactfully to the servant, helping Aloysius into the hall.

There was a brief pause.

‘Is Grace de Silva at home by any chance?’

Myrtle, hearing the commotion, opened her door stealthily and listened for a moment. Then she went back to her diary.

Four o’clock, she wrote, grimly. And Aloysius is drunk again. I shall continue to record what goes on in this house. Who knows when it might come in useful? If Grace is doing something illegal, if she is caught, my diary will be useful evidence.

Grace was furious. She recognised the man’s voice. How could Aloysius make such a fool of them both? He might not mind being humiliated, but what about her?

‘Charming bastards,’ said Aloysius staggering in, stopping short at the sight of his wife skulking in the doorway. ‘Why on earth are you hiding, darl?’ he asked cheerily. ‘I know he’s white but he’s not such a bad fellow, you know, underneath. My clothes made rather a mess of his jeep, I’m afraid!’

He laughed. Grace glared at him. She would never raise her voice in front of the servants.

‘They don’t like me much any more,’ continued Aloysius mildly, unaware of her fury. ‘They think I’m no use with the local idiots.’ He wagged a finger at her. ‘They think I don’t know what’s going on, that I’m a bloody fool! But I know what the British are up to. I know what’s going on.’ He leaned unsteadily against the door. ‘Divide and rule. That’s been their game for years, darl. These fellows don’t give a damn about any of us.’ He made a gesture as though he was cutting his throat. ‘I think I’ll have a little lie-down now, if you don’t mind, darl.’

And off he went, first to wash off the seawater and then to pour out a small hair of the dog, after which, he informed the servant sternly, he would have a late afternoon nap.

All her life, Myrtle wrote, G has had everything she wanted. The looks, the wealth and the man I wanted. But she’ll never be happy. And he has wasted his life because of her.

In a month from now Alicia would leave for the Conservatoire. She would be a full-time boarder. Myrtle paused, staring out at the bright afternoon garden. That would leave Frieda, she thought.

The shadow, she wrote, whom no one notices!




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