THE PLANTER'S BRIDE: A story of intrigue and passion: sequel to THE TEA PLANTER'S DAUGHTER (India Tea Series Book 2)

by Janet MacLeod Trotter

  Outwardly, she and Tam appeared a happy sociable couple, attending tea dances, picnics and fancy dress parties. Tam bought her a second-hand guitar and encouraged her to play and sing when they had company. It was as if all he wanted from her was a wife to show off and partner him at tennis and dinner dances, while he flirted with the daughters of colonels and flattered their matronly mothers. Sophie knew Tam meant nothing by such flirtation; it was just the way the British behaved on holiday in the hills. And with painful clarity, she realised that that was all he had really intended with her in Edinburgh; a summer flirtation. It was she who had pushed him into a proposal.

  But what did she want from him? Sophie puzzled. She no longer knew. She saw with resignation that he was at his most content escaping both her and hill station society to the army mess of the Ghurkha regiment, posted at the barracks further up the hillside. Tam would go there for mess dinners and return drunk on rum, unaccustomed to drink, weeping like a child and calling her his angel nurse. Once sober, she never pressed him as to what had made him so upset.

  When Tam went out alone, Sophie would call on Fluffy Hogg and talk about Mrs Besant and the recent strikes in the Lahore shops. ‘No point boycotting them,’ Fluffy was fatalistic, ‘they’ll press ahead with their protests whatever we do.’ Sophie enjoyed these conversations as Tam wasn’t interested in talking about current affairs.

  No sooner was he feeling half-restored than Tam was planning a hunting trip to the mountains towards Chamba in Kashmir.

  ‘It’ll give me the ideal opportunity to collect data on the deodar plantations and the chir pine forests up near the snow line,’ he enthused. ‘I can do a spot of game hunting too. There’s plenty of company for you here while I’m away.’

  ‘I’m coming with you,’ Sophie insisted, yearning for a camping adventure beyond the confines of the hill station. Her greatest pleasure was riding the steep paths on a sturdy Bhutan pony she had hired for their stay; now she would be able to go further and higher.

  Two days before they set off, Sophie returned from the bazaar to an unpleasant shock. Bracknall was coming down the steps of their veranda talking to Tam. He smiled and swept her with a predatory look that gave her palpitations.

  ‘I couldn’t pass up this opportunity of a trek into the Himalayas – I came as soon as I got Tam’s invitation.’

  Sophie looked at Tam in horror. How could he have done such a thing? She couldn’t possibly go. The thought of the man being anywhere near filled her with disgust.

  ‘M-Mr Bracknall,’ Sophie stuttered. ‘Tam never said.’

  ‘I told you she’d be overwhelmed at your coming, Sir,’ Tam said in delight. ‘You do us both a great honour.’

  Sophie felt nauseous at Tam’s ingratiating tone. She wanted to spit at the vile Bracknall. He had drugged her and probably taken his pleasure; in her memory it was like a bad dream but she feared it had taken place. How had she got into such a position? She had never given Bracknall the slightest encouragement. Oh why had Tam gone off and left her alone with such a man! She felt angry with her husband; the day the monsoon broke he should have woken her before he left and given her the chance to go with him. But Tam’s cross words, flung at her after the terrible trip to the depot, still rang in her head.

  ‘That’s the last time I take you with me on my rounds. You shouldn’t have been there – and you shouldn’t have interfered – your actions totally undermined me in the eyes of the depot manager. Word got round to the timber merchants and that’s why they ganged up against me.’

  Tam had punished her for his humiliation. But he would be horrified if he knew what his boss had done behind his back.

  Yet Bracknall still had not confirmed Tam as Martins’s successor. Tam had been told unofficially that the job was his; Bracknall had hinted as much at a Mason’s dinner that Tam had dragged himself to in Lahore a few weeks previously. Well, if Bracknall thought he could coerce her into going to bed with him again, then he was mistaken. Better that Tam remained in the job he had; she bitterly regretted that his boss had tricked her and taken advantage of her state of intoxication. Shame washed over her anew just seeing him again.

  ‘It’s a great pleasure,’ Bracknall replied with a satisfied smile. ‘I’m so glad that Mrs Telfer is going to be one of the party.’

  It was only as she turned from him to hide the distaste she knew must show on her face, that she saw another man standing smoking at a distance, stroking the nose of his horse.

  ‘Rafi?’ Sophie cried.

  He ground out his cigarette and came forward. ‘Hello Sophie,’ he said, his smile tentative. He did not hold out his hand.

  She was aware of the awkwardness between the three men. Then it struck her; Rafi had been left outside with the horses like a common syce while Bracknall had gone into the house to share a drink with Tam. She felt indignation rise. How could Tam be so discourteous to his friend?

  ‘Will you come inside for a refreshment?’ she asked, pointedly.

  Before he could answer, Bracknall said offhandedly. ‘He hasn’t time. There’s a lot to arrange before we set off for Chamba. Isn’t that right, Khan?’

  Rafi touched his topee in a mocking salute. ‘Yes Sir.’

  ‘So you’re coming too?’

  He smiled and nodded.

  Sophie could not hide her relief. ‘That’s wonderful! Isn’t it Tam?’

  Too late, she realised that both Tam and Bracknall were giving her stony looks at her grin of delight.

  ***

  They argued that night. Tam accused her of being rude to Bracknall.

  ‘You didn’t even shake his hand.’

  ‘I was laden down with shopping.’

  ‘One parcel.’

  ‘Oh, Tam, why can’t we just go on this trip ourselves? I thought it would be a good chance for us to be alone – enjoy our own company.’

  ‘You seemed more than happy that Khan is coming,’ he snapped.

  ‘He’s our friend,’ Sophie pointed out, ‘whereas Bracknall is your boss – you won’t relax.’ She noticed how Tam never referred to Rafi by his first name anymore, distancing himself.

  ‘This is a working trip – I’m not here to relax. And I want to impress the chief. Promise me you will be civil to him?’

  Sophie reluctantly nodded but Tam remained in a bad mood, taking himself off to sleep in his dressing-room. She lay sleepless and feeling out of sorts – bilious and head pounding – and wondered if she was succumbing to a fever.

  Perhaps it was creeping dread of the forthcoming trip with Bracknall but she felt no better the following day. It was only as she was looking out clothing and toiletries for a servant to pack, that it struck home. Her sanitary towels were still washed and unused in a linen bag, untouched since Changa Manga.

  Her heart began a slow thud. When had she last used them? Five, six weeks ago? She hadn’t had her monthly bleed since coming to Dalhousie. They were always like clockwork even when travelling; she should have had one two weeks ago. How could she not have noticed? Sophie had been too caught up with life in the hill station and worrying about Tam to give her own body a second thought.

  Sophie sat down on the bed, weak-kneed. Could she be pregnant? She swallowed down the odd metallic taste in her mouth, noticing the nausea even more. Somehow she just knew it. To her surprise, she felt elated. Tam would be over the moon. This would bring them together. She gave a small gasp of excitement. She had expected to feel frightened but she wasn’t at all. She wanted a baby. A baby!

  Sophie hugged herself. She need not pack the sanitary towels. But if she didn’t, the servants would talk. She wanted to keep the discovery to herself until she was certain. Then Tam would be the first to be told; or maybe she would write to Tilly in the meantime and share the news. She had to tell someone! How, at that moment, she longed for her Auntie Amy to be alive to share her good fortune. She would have come out on the boat at once to help her through the pregnancy and stay for the birth.

  Tam would insist
that she be put under the watchful eye of the civil surgeon or maybe one of the army doctors – Cousin Johnny for instance. They would examine her and keep her and the baby healthy. Could they give a precise date of the birth? She wondered. Sophie was light-headed with sudden plans. The baby would be born at the start of the hot weather in April. Tam would be in his new post in Lahore by then ...

  Sophie clamped a hand to her mouth in sudden fright. She was counting off nine months from mid-July when they had arrived in Dalhousie and her periods had stopped. But she and Tam had not made love since before the rains. The baby could only be ...

  Sophie rushed from the bedroom into the dingy washroom and vomited into the drain. She heaved and heaved, until her stomach was hollow and her throat burning. But she could not empty her head of the spectre of Bracknall’s white bulk on top of her as she lay beneath pliant and detached. She must be carrying Bracknall’s bastard.

  Chapter 31

  Rafi did not mind the petty snide remarks from his insufferable boss about the incompetence of Indians or that he was never invited to dine in Bracknall’s tent at night as Tam was. He relished living out of doors, riding the steep paths in the heat of day and sleeping like a hillsman wrapped in a black blanket in the chilly nights, falling asleep to the sound of horses munching forage, the shrill cry of a hill deer and distant grunt of a bear.

  He had forgotten what a beautiful country he lived in and each day brought new delights. The lower hills were covered in feathery mimosa, wild lemon trees, yellow flowered cassia and groves of wild orchids by fast rivers. Steadily they had climbed through dark forest of sal to the higher slopes of ancient oaks, cypress trees growing in isolated sunny spots amid silver firs, and up to the vast stretches of chir pines with their light green tufts of long needles.

  ‘They’re like Scotch firs,’ Sophie had gasped in awe at the massive trees that miraculously clung onto sheer cliffs, their roots twisting like corkscrews around the rocks.

  She had caught his look for a moment, gave a wistful smile and then quickly looked away. They had hardly spoken on the trek; she seemed deeply preoccupied. Perhaps Tam had warned her off being too friendly; his old friend was ignoring him too in his efforts to please Bracknall. It saddened him. Yet it was Bracknall’s over-familiarity with Sophie that made him angry. Tam did not seem to notice how tense and uncomfortable Sophie became in their boss’s presence. He was always trying to touch her and make remarks that carried a double meaning. Rafi had not noticed this before, though he had heard stories about Bracknall being predatory with Anglo-Indian women when his wife went to the hills each summer. If he were Tam he would defend Sophie’s honour with his fists and to hell with any promotion. But he wasn’t, and he had no claim to protect Tam’s beautiful wife.

  So Rafi often rode on ahead with the bearers who were tasked with choosing the next night’s camping ground or detoured up side ravines to shoot partridge and deer for the evening meal. He made sure the mules and horses were well rested at the end of the day, ignoring Bracknall’s command that their tired legs be bound together to stop them wandering off over steep cliffs.

  On one cold night, when his boss was drinking at his tent door, Rafi went and loosened the reins of Bracknall’s highly-strung Arab mare. The beast was quite unsuitable for their tour into the mountains and it had been tied to a high branch so it could not graze the lush vegetation at its hooves. The sweat of the day had cooled the animal’s flanks and the horse was shaking with the cold.

  ‘There you are, girl,’ Rafi murmured softly in the mare’s ear, as he rubbed it down and covered its trembling body with a blanket. The horse whinnied, plunged its nose into a basin of water Rafi had fetched and drank thirstily.

  Suddenly Bracknall was weaving himself towards them, stumbling on a guy rope.

  ‘What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing Khan?’ he bellowed.

  ‘Ariadne was tied too tightly,’ Rafi held his temper, ‘I’m giving her a drink and a rub down.’

  Bracknall pushed him aside. ‘Get your thieving hands off ‘er.’ He swayed and slurred. ‘Trying to take her for y’self, were ya?’

  ‘Of course not, Sir.’

  ‘Syce!’ he called for his groom. ‘Ya lazy savage! Get here now.’

  Rafi watched in fury as Blacknall took the reins of his horse and yanked the beast round, slapping it hard on the rump and shoving it towards the scurrying syce.

  ‘Tie it up again,’ the drunken chief forester ordered, then staggered back to his tent.

  Rafi helped the anxious Lahori boy calm the over-wrought animal, speaking quietly but firmly in Punjabi. ‘This is the way you secure the horse; no tighter. And never let it stand here all night without a cover. The temperature in the mountains can fall below freezing even in the season of monsoon. It’s hard for us men from Lahore to imagine a cold night at this time of year, isn’t it?’

  The young groom nodded and smiled at Rafi’s confiding tone.

  ‘The horse won’t wander off if it’s well fed and watered, my friend, understand?’

  ***

  Sophie found the narrow tracks carved into the mountainside unnerving; bound on one side by dark walls of rock and the other by dizzying drops to the valley far below. They seemed to have been travelling for days without the view ahead changing; a deep gorge with its raging torrent, side streams and waterfalls that they crossed on swaying rope bridges, and endless dark forest stretching away to snow clad mountains and distant glaciers. It was gloomy and oppressive; the stamping of their long line of pack animals and the clinking of metal pans, magnified by the silence.

  Sometimes they would come across Tibetan traders in thick woollen clothes, baskets of goods strapped to their heads and spinning prayer mills. Bracknall would order them out of the way and somehow they would cling to the cliff edges with strong bare feet a few inches from the void and let the camping expedition go by.

  With each passing day, Sophie loathed Tam’s boss more. Even her husband was beginning to mutter about Bracknall’s drinking and his bawdy remarks.

  ‘It’s a side he keeps well hidden at work. I suppose it’s his way of letting off steam.’

  Sophie could not bear to be near the man, yet he sought her out and always rode close by. She had overheard the altercation between Bracknall and Rafi a few nights before, and noticed how the Indian forester grew ever more impatient with his boss’s harsh treatment of his skittish horse Ariadne.

  They were coming to another dizzying rope bridge now. Sophie watched in alarm as Ariadne stamped at the ground and refused to go forward, unsettling the other horses. Instantly, Bracknall raised his whip and lashed at the mare; once, twice, three times. It reared up and nearly threw off her rider. Bracknall clung on, the whip slipping from his hand and disappearing over the precipice.

  Rafi dismounted and leapt forward. ‘Give her to me, Sir,’ he cried. ‘She’s terrified.’

  Without waiting for permission, Rafi stripped off his shirt, threw it over the horse’s eyes and seized the reins. Sophie watched transfixed as the muscled forester risked a kicking from the crazed mare and fought to bring it under control. It dragged him perilously close to the edge; Sophie’s heart froze in her chest. The other beasts stamped fretfully, infected by Ariadne’s fear.

  ‘Easy, easy,’ Rafi cajoled. Within minutes the horse was pacified and he was guiding it gently across the swaying bridge. Bracknall followed, puce with humiliation, his expression thunderous.

  ‘I think Ariadne is short-sighted,’ Rafi explained, helping his boss remount. ‘She sensed the huge drop but couldn’t see to the other side. I’ll get the syce to make some blinkers, then she won’t give you any more problems.’

  ‘Short-sighted?’ Bracknall barked. ‘I’ve never heard such nonsense. I’ll handle my own horse, Khan.’ He leaned down, eyes narrowing, and added under his breath. ‘You’ll regret making a fool of me, you jumped up babu! Your card is marked.’

  Sophie saw Rafi recoil as if struck, his green eyes stormy, and wond
ered what offensive remark Bracknall had made.

  They rode on in single file, Rafi going back over the bridge for his own hill pony. Sophie wanted to hang back and talk to him but there was no room to manoeuvre round and she had to keep going.

  The heat bounced off the walls of rock around them, sweat running in rivulets under her shirt and jodhpurs. She felt increasingly sick and faint. Rounding a bend, they went from white light into abrupt shade. The temperature plummeted. A waterfall was frozen; shards of ice hung down from the overhanging rock.

  All at once, Sophie’s pony skidded on icy stones towards the sheer drop. She cried out in horror. The river boiled below her, a lurid grey-green from the melted glacier.

  ‘Help!’ she screamed, yanking her pony away from the cliff edge towards the rock face.

  Tam was already around the next bend and out of sight. Bracknall leaned round, startled. His horse jumped, spooked by the noise.

  ‘Control it, damn you!’ he bawled and kicked Ariadne forward, trying to put distance between their horses.

  Sophie fought to bring the pony towards the rockface, but stubbornly it began to back away. All at once, Rafi was behind, shouting.

  ‘Pull her round to face the drop! Let her see the drop!’

  ‘I can’t!’ Sophie wailed.

  ‘Do it!’ Rafi urged.

  Seeing how Sophie was paralysed with fear, he pushed forward, his pony scrambling on the edge to keep its feet. He lunged at Sophie’s bridle and jerked the wild-eyed pony towards him.

  Just before the terrified animal pushed them both off the path, it caught sight of the ravine and stopped in its tracks. The young syce from Lahore, ran along the path and held its head, talking to it gently as he’d seen Rafi do. In moments, the pony was walking on sedately as if nothing had happened.