Dishonored

by Maria Barrett

  Her face changed, it changed right in front of her eyes. The light died and her cheeks sagged, great hollows in her face appeared, the skin around them wrinkled and bagged. She put her hands up and clawed at the flesh, her eyes sank down into the black shadows below them and her face started to bleed. She screamed again. Her mouth twisted and her teeth were black. She clawed harder, frantically trying to drag the skin away from her face, her fingers covered in blood.

  “No!” she screamed, yanking the mirror from the wall and smashing it down on to the ground, shattering the glass into a thousand tiny pieces. She sank to her knees and began to sob. “No, please God, no,” she cried, biting the inside of her mouth to stop it twisting, not feeling the pain. “Oh God, no…” She covered her head with her hands and curled herself up. “Oh God…” she moaned, over and over again. “Oh God, no…”

  When she came around all she could feel was pain. It was dark and she was lying on the floor, her knees curled up tight, her body cold and stiff. She opened her eyes and moved, the metallic taste of blood in her mouth making her feel sick, the pain of her face knocking her dizzy. Disoriented and frightened, she staggered across to the wall and felt for the light switch. Clicking it on, she gasped. The room flooded with light and she saw where she had been lying, the carpet littered with glass and stained with blood. She held on to the wall and made it into the bathroom. She had no idea what had happened, her mind was blank.

  Turning on the light over the sink, Suzy had to grip the edge of the unit as she saw her face. It was horrific. Gently, she touched her eyes, swollen and bruised, then she leaned forward and ran the cold tap. She fumbled in her washbag for some cotton wool and, dipping it in the cold water, she held her breath and put her trembling hand up to swab the cuts on her cheeks. She felt sick, she couldn’t stop shaking, and the pain was making her wince. Moments later, she realized what had happened.

  Dropping the cotton wool, she ran into the bedroom and pulled open the drawer. It was empty, the velvet bag had gone. At the wardrobe, she ripped the door open and frantically rummaged through the piles of clothes, flinging them on to the floor. The money wasn’t there. Fifty thousand pounds in cash had gone. She held on to the wall and started to cry, pathetic, wailing sobs. She had been robbed; the jewels and the money had gone. She had been robbed and Suzanna had nothing left.

  Several hours later, she sat in the concierge’s office in silence and waited for his phone to ring. He sat opposite her, avoided her eye and drummed his fingers on the desk. He had no idea what to make of the incident.

  “Mrs. Harvey, I must be asking you a final time if you will consider giving a statement to the police,” he said. “It is most essential that they know what was stolen from you.”

  Suzanna looked up. “I have no idea what was stolen,” she said blankly, “and I have no wish to make a statement.”

  The concierge sighed heavily. “But there must be someone who you would like me to contact for assistance, Mrs. Harvey?”

  Suzanna shook her head. “All I would like, please, Mr. Kapoor, is a good price for my ring and my earrings.”

  “Yes, that is taken care of, Mrs. Harvey, but I am just thinking that…”

  Suzanna held her hand up to silence him. She wanted nothing except the money for the earrings and ring she had found in her wash bag, the only things the thief had missed. “Please, Mr. Kapoor, no more questions.” She couldn’t take the risk of being on police files, of Mitchell finding her. “I am tired, I would just like to get this settled and check out.”

  The concierge nodded, just as his phone rang. He picked it up, spoke quickly and smiled across at his guest. His conversation took a couple of minutes, then he replaced the receiver and said, “I have a good price from my brother-in-law, Mrs. Harvey, he will be here with the money in half an hour.”

  Suzanna nodded. She almost broke at this point, she felt relief swamp her and tears sprang to her eyes. She looked away. “Thank you,” she said quietly, and she rose, nodded at the concierge and went up to the suite to pack.

  18

  JANE FINISHED HER DINNER AND RANG THE SMALL BELL ON THE table for the bearer to come and clear. She was tired tonight, Phillip was out and all she wanted to do now was have a bath and go to bed. She patted her mouth with her napkin and rang the bell again, calling, “DhaniRam? I have finished.” Then she scraped her chair back and stood, taking her cardigan off the back of it and draping it over her shoulders. She could hear voices inside the house and, ringing her bell a third time, she walked in from the terrace and followed the noise through to the hall. There she stopped short.

  “Oh!” She walked toward a woman slumped on the chair in the hall. “It’s all right, DhaniRam,” she said to the bearer, “I’ll take care of this.” He dropped his fingers away from the woman’s arm and stepped back, muttering in Hindi.

  “Hello, may I help you?” Jane couldn’t see the woman’s face; her head was covered with a shawl, and she looked away, toward the darkness outside. She was wearing European clothes, though, expensive ones by the look of it, and Jane could tell by the skin on her arms that she wasn’t Indian. Jane moved closer and touched the woman’s arm.

  “Are you all right? Is there something I can do for you?”

  The woman turned.

  “Oh my dear! Your face! What on earth…?” Jane glanced over her shoulder. “DhaniRam? Can you send for the doctor? Now please!” She knelt down to the woman’s level. “Are you all right?” The woman stared blankly at her. “Will you come inside for a while, let my doctor have a look at your face?” Jane stood and gently helped the woman to her feet. “Come on,” she said kindly, “it’s all right, you’re among friends now.” And leading the way inside, Jane held the woman’s hand while she quietly began to sob.

  Twenty minutes later, her face bathed properly and dressed by the doctor, Suzanna Harvey sat on the white sofa in Jane’s and Phillip’s sitting-room and stared blankly across at Jane. She picked at her fingernails absent-mindedly, her hands trembled. She took in the order of the room, the framed wedding photograph, the immaculate pale Jane, and a huge swell of anger washed over her. It should be me, she thought, a bitter taste rising in the back of her throat, sitting here, helping someone, it should be me. She clenched her hands together in her lap, locking her fingers, digging her nails into the flesh. Then she looked up and, unable to stop herself, said, “You’re not at all like I expected.”

  Jane turned away from the window and looked at the woman. She had the oddest sensation, down in the pit of her stomach, a nervousness, a small, tight knot of tension. She saw an expression of distaste on the woman’s face and a gentle quizzical look crossed her own. “I’m sorry?” she said, “I don’t understand.”

  The anger erupted, a terrible, intense need to hurt, to strike out. “No,” Suzanna answered coldly, “I don’t expect you do.” She bit a fingernail and tore the skin, making it bleed and, placing her hand on the sofa beside her, she left a small smear of dark red blood on the cream silk.

  Jane winced. She had begun to feel panicky, trapped almost, and she took a deep breath to calm herself. She went to stand, to call DhaniRam for some drinks, anything to relieve the tension but as she did so Suzy said, “You think you’re so smug, don’t you? You think you’ve got it all here, servants, position, Phillip.” Her face twisted suddenly as she said his name and Jane’s stomach lurched. She held on to the arm of the sofa and froze.

  “Well you haven’t!” Suzanna cried suddenly. “Phillip is mine! He’s mine! He always has been and always will be!” A sob caught in the back of her throat and she gasped for air. “I love him… he… he loves me!” She stood and lashed out, knocking the photograph frame from the table and smashing it on the cold marble floor. Jane watched with horror. She tried to call DhaniRam but her voice dried up in her throat.

  “He doesn’t want you!” Suzanna cried. “He married you to get his job, to keep me! He told me that you were there for us, to screen us to make sure… to make sure…” Sudden
ly she lost track of what she was saying and her voice trailed away. “To make sure…” She put her hands up to her face, her eyes were blank and confused. “Oh God…” She began to weep. “Look at me, look at my face,” she murmured. “Oh God…”

  Jane took her hand off the sofa. She had been gripping it so hard that she’d left an imprint of her fingers on the silk. She moved back, away from the woman, frightened, her body sweating, her legs weak. She had never seen such emotion, such violent anger. She edged toward the door, her back to the wall, her eyes continually on the woman. She held her hands in front of her body, protectively, ready to defend herself. She was shaking.

  “He said it’d be all right,” Suzy whispered. “He said to trust him…” She looked up as Jane made it to the door. “He’s my life, you know.”

  Jane nodded, not daring to move. She heard a commotion behind her in the hall and prayed it was the bearer. She pressed herself back, holding her breath.

  “He said to trust him, he said he knew…” Suddenly Suzy’s head jerked up. Phillip had appeared in the doorway behind Jane.

  “Jesus! Suzy!” He ran forward and pulled her in to his body, surrounding her with his arms. “Oh my God… my darling! What’s happened?” Suzanna started to cry again and he stroked her hair with infinite tenderness. “Please, baby, don’t cry, don’t…” He broke off and glanced behind him. He saw Jane, saw her frightened, confused face and shut his eyes, trying to blank it out. “Suzy, please, please don’t cry,” he whispered. Gently he released her and helped her down on to the sofa. He dug in his pocket for his silk handkerchief and tenderly wiped her eyes, careful of the dressings. He turned.

  “Jane?” Jane heard her name but she didn’t react. She stood motionless, pressed back against the wall, shocked and confused by what she had just witnessed. She shook her head.

  “Jane? I…” Phillip moved toward her but she backed away, out of the door. “Jane, please…”

  She stood outside the room and stared at him inside it. She had seen his face, seen the love, seen the terrible fear there but she had to hear it, she had to know from him.

  “Is it true?” she asked. Her voice was hoarse, hardly a whisper. Phillip closed his eyes for a moment, then he nodded.

  “How long?”

  He walked toward her. “Jane, please, it doesn’t matter how…”

  “How long?” she shouted.

  He dropped his head and his shoulders slumped. “Three years,” he murmured, unable to look up. “Three years.”

  Jane stared at him for a moment longer, then she turned and ran. She ran down the steps of the bungalow, down the drive and across the palace grounds. She saw nothing and heard nothing. She ran as fast as she could, she didn’t know where she was going or what she was doing but she knew she had to get away, she knew she had to escape this horrible ugly mess.

  Jane didn’t know how far she had run or for how long when she stopped. She slowed to a walk, her whole body pounding, the blood roaring in her ears. It was dark, the clouds covered the moon and it was hot and still, the air trapped close to the earth, wrapped close around her body. She didn’t know where she was for a while, she wandered across a lawn, the grass dry and rough underfoot, she saw bushes ahead, a creeper-covered wall and then she recognized the arch, the opening to the water garden. She carried on, through the opening and down onto the low stone wall, walking along it until she jumped down into the open space and walked across to the still, black waters of the pools. She sat on the edge of one as she had done that night with Rami and curled her knees up under her. She lay her cheek down on her knees and closed her eyes. She didn’t think about Phillip, she didn’t think about anything; she felt empty and numb.

  Rami came to the water garden from the road. He left his bicycle on the ground and climbed over the lowest part of the ruined wall, dropping down the other side, silently and easily, with the grace of a cat. He stood and looked at Jane, here alone just as Shiva had told him she was, her head bowed in sadness, her body curled up in a gesture of defense. He moved forward, his footsteps silent on the ancient mosaic tiled floor, and reaching her, he knelt down before her and gently lifted her face up.

  “Jane?”

  She felt no alarm at the sight of him, no fright. She had sensed his presence; it was almost as if she had been waiting for him. “My grandfather told me you had run away. I came after you.”

  “How did he…?”

  Rami put his fingers up to her lips to silence her. He did not know and he did not care. Moving his hand to her hair, to the back of her neck, he gently eased her face toward his. He loved her, of that much he was certain, he loved her gentle strength, her kindness and her humility. He loved everything about Jane Mills in a way he had never loved before and knew he would never love again. He had found the keeper of his soul and, as he kissed her, moving his hands across her back and pulling her body down to his, he knew that this would change his life and that he wanted it to be changed.

  Jane closed her eyes. For one peculiar moment she remembered her father and what he had said about love. She smiled fleetingly and realized that he had been right, that she had found someone she would the for just as he’d said she would. Then she opened them again and looked at Ramesh as he broke their kiss and dragged his mouth down over her throat to her neck, slipping the buttons of her shirt through their holes, easing the material back, exposing her, caressing her. She wrapped her fingers in his hair, the black of it stark against the white of her breast and she moaned as his lips found her nipple. His tongue darted across it and she felt such a sharp desire run through her that it was almost painful. She wrapped her bare legs over his, and he pulled at her skirt, bunching it up over her hips, fumbling with his own churidar. He moved over her and looked down at her face, her eyes half-closed, her mouth parted. Then he knelt back and slowly he finished unbuttoning her shirt, his fingers trembling now, struggling slightly with the zip of her skirt. Gently he eased her clothes down over her narrow hips and the lean, long thighs and stared at her naked body, her pale gold skin as smooth and warm to touch as sun-drenched marble. He undressed himself, letting her help him, flinching, not with pain but with intense pleasure at her touch. Finally, he rolled his silk kurta and placed it as a pillow under her head. He covered her with his body and she moved her legs apart, high up over his hips, she looked up at the sky and for that one second the clouds parted and she caught sight of the moon. She cried out and her face was lit with its extraordinary, pale white light.

  Phillip stood in the sitting-room and looked anxiously out at the driveway to the bungalow for sight of Jane. He was worried sick; he had sent a servant to that Indian Ramesh Rai’s place and another over to the club. He hoped to God nothing had happened to her; he would be in for a hell of a scandal if it had.

  Turning away from the window for a few minutes, he walked out of the sitting-room and along the passage to the guest bedroom where Suzanna was asleep. He glanced in, watched her for a few moments filled with longing and despair, then silently he closed the door again. As he went back to the sitting-room, he saw Jane come up the steps of the bungalow and stopped in the hall, facing her.

  “Where’ve you been?” he asked.

  Jane looked away. “Walking,” she answered coldly. “Why?”

  “I was worried.” Phillip walked out toward her but stopped as she backed down the step. “Janey, I’m sorry,” he said, “I really am.”

  Jane turned to look at him. She didn’t know what to say in reply. She knew the love he felt, she understood him and she pitied him but she didn’t forgive him. He had dishonored his word, married her knowing at the time that he was shaming the vows he made. She couldn’t forgive that. She knew and she understood because she too loved, with a force and passion that astounded her but she had fought it and struggled with it until tonight, until there was nothing left to fight or struggle for.

  She put her hand on the balustrade and leaned wearily against it, pulling herself up the steps. She walked past Phillip
and into the bungalow. He caught her arm.

  “Will you stay, Jane?” His voice was desperate, pitiful.

  She carefully removed his hand. “Yes,” she answered, “I’ll stay.” She had no choice, she could not leave Rami, not now, not after tonight, even though an affair was impossible. But she could not live alone here, she knew that, the scandal would be too great, it would destroy Rami. She looked up at Phillip’s face. “But I’m not staying for you, I’m staying because I want to.”

  He nodded and hung his head, relief swamping him.

  “I never, never want to hear of this woman again or catch a hint of scandal. You do understand that, don’t you?”

  Again he nodded and Jane carried on into the house. She stopped in the hallway and glanced back. “I can understand your love, Phillip,” she said sadly, “but I cannot understand the deceit, the dishonor.” And without another word, she turned and went inside to bed.

  19

  IT WAS MID-OCTOBER AND MITCHELL HARVEY SAT IN HIS OFFICE on the Embankment, at the top of a huge stone Victorian building overlooking the Thames and buzzed his secretary. He had a file open on the desk in front of him.

  “Send in my next appointment, Miss Warner,” he said over the intercom. He released the button and sat back to wait.

  “Morning, Mr. Harvey.”

  A young man came in, half Indian, half English. He wore an expensive suit and tie, his shirt was handmade. Mitchell knew; he’d paid for it. Mitchell nodded at him.

  “Sit.” He pointed to the chair in front of his desk and the young man did as he was told. Mitchell looked at him for a few moments, enjoying the sight of him, then he said, “You saw her yourself?”