‘Of course you have to come to Ampang Road . . .’ Denis began, but then suddenly, unaccountably, it was all too much for me. For a second I thought I was going to faint, and then Denis’s arm was around me, keeping me upright. The next thing I remember was walking in the cool night air, with gravel under my feet and a hundred stars above me. The Alvis loomed up out of the darkness and Denis was helping me in. Then we were spinning through the night, the orange street lamps flicking past so quickly they made me feel giddy and slightly sick.
‘Where are we going?’ I managed to ask.
‘Home,’ Denis said abruptly. ‘To our house in Ampang Road. Where I should have taken you months ago. I’ve been a thoughtless beast, Nona, but everything is going to be all right from now on.’
I relaxed against him. It was so nice not to have to think. Just to know that the man beside me loved me, and that he was going to take care of everything.
Then I was in bed, and Denis was sitting beside me giving me a drink of something hot and bittersweet, full of lemon and honey. And very alcoholic – I could feel my senses swimming as I sipped it. ‘It’ll make you sleep, Nona,’ he said gently. ‘You are a bit wrought, I’m afraid. My fault. But I’ll make it up to you, my darling, I promise you that.’
‘Are we going to be happy?’ I asked sleepily.
He nodded without speaking, and teased away a curl that had fallen across one of my eyes.
Suddenly I remembered Mother, and sat up with a jerk, my eyes wide open. ‘I’ve got to tell Mother that I’m not coming home tonight!’ I said urgently. ‘She’ll think I left like Tanya – like a thief stealing away in the night!’
Denis shook his head, smiling. ‘I’ve already spoken to your mother on the phone,’ he said. ‘I’ve arranged to go around there later tonight, to explain everything and to collect some of your things. I won’t pretend she’s terribly happy, but she has accepted the situation.’
I sighed and lay back on the pillow. Whatever had been in the glass had been terribly effective, because I suddenly felt happy. Tremendously happy. The huge, crushing problem about Mother – a problem that had haunted my thoughts for months – was solved. Or at least, Denis had assumed the burden. And I was where I most wanted to be, with the man I loved.
I grinned to myself. What was a marriage certificate after all? Only a silly piece of paper. This was reality. Being with your man, cared for by your man. Carrying his baby.
Denis had left the pressure lamp alight on the bedside table, turned down low so that it cast a pale golden glow across the ceiling. I’ve been here before, I thought, staring up at the loom of light through the mosquito net. But I couldn’t remember where or when. Somewhere where I’d been sad and then become happy.
I struggled for the memory until I slipped into sleep.
I slept like a log and woke up to a glorious sunny morning and to a bright, shining new life. The first things I saw were my clothes and suitcases piled up in the dressing room, and when I turned my head I saw my toilet things laid out on the dressing table. There was a note from Denis on his pillow, scrawled across in his bold, angular hand. He had gone riding but would be back at ten. He explained that he and Babs Chrystal had visited Mother the previous evening. They had told her about the baby and explained why I had moved to Ampang Road, and had collected most of my clothes and possessions.
‘Babs and I made sure your mother was happy with things before we left,’ he wrote. ‘She is coming over for dinner tomorrow night to see that you are properly settled. Good morning, my darling, and welcome to Ampang Road.’
I leapt out of bed, my heart singing, and wandered out onto the verandah overlooking the tennis court. The sprinklers were on and a delightful scent of wet earth and freshly cut grass wafted up to me. This was my world now, and I was suddenly desperate to embrace it. I showered and dressed in a fever, and ran down into the cool, shuttered hallway. It was nearly ten, and I wanted to throw myself into Denis’s arms the moment he arrived home.
Teng Swi, the Chinese cook, appeared from nowhere. ‘Breakfast, Mem?’ he asked. Teng Swi was a wizened little man with a permanent lop-sided smile, a smile that seemed to be friendlier than normal today. When I nodded he bobbed his head in satisfaction. ‘Welcome to new home,’ he said. ‘Tuan has told us that you and he are now married, and that you will be living here forever.’
‘Perhaps not quite forever,’ I smiled. ‘But I hope it will be for a long, long time. It is a beautiful home.’
The well-bred squeak of the Alvis’s brakes signalled Denis’s arrival and I ran out onto the porch. He was climbing out of the driver’s seat, casually immaculate as always, a huge bunch of roses in one hand. My heart seemed actually to stand still with happiness.
‘You look a darn sight better this morning than you did last night,’ he said, embracing me with his free arm as he held the roses clear. ‘Cookie’s special mixture worked, I take it?’
Over breakfast, I asked him what had happened the previous night at Parry Drive. ‘How on earth did you do it? I can hardly believe that Mother didn’t bite your head off! Is she really coming over for dinner tomorrow night?’
Denis held up his hand. ‘One thing at a time, my dear. Yes, your mother is coming over tomorrow. As for how we kept her under control, you’ll have to ask Babs about that. I just hovered about in the background while she did all the hard work. Babs was absolutely magnificent. At the end of the night Julia was hanging around her neck in tears.’
‘Was Mother very angry?’ I asked seriously.
‘She wasn’t very happy to begin with. I rather think she would have scratched my eyes out if she’d had a chance. But she is a lady after all. Once she realised the lay of the land, she calmed down and acted very sensibly indeed.’
‘Did you talk to her about when I might go back to the salon?’ I asked. My absence would cause no great problems, but Mother would want to know my future plans.
‘You are never going back to that dingy little parlour,’ Denis said forcefully. ‘It was wrong of me not to have taken you away sooner. I told your mother to find someone to take your place. I also gave her a cheque on your behalf, to help sort out any problems caused by your leaving so suddenly.’
‘We don’t need to pay her anything!’ I said indignantly. ‘Half that business is mine! Actually, all of it is mine. It was bought from the sale of Burnbrae.’
‘I think we should be gracious,’ Denis said. ‘The important thing is that we can now get on with the rest of our lives without an emotional millstone around our necks.’
‘How much did you give her?’ I asked suspiciously. For a hard-bitten spymaster, my Denis could be a pushover at times.
‘I gave her ten thousand,’ he said quietly.
Ten thousand dollars was a huge sum in those days, and probably four or five times what Salon Tanya was worth. I sat stunned for a moment, trying to comprehend the magnitude of the gesture.
And then it struck me, with an unexpected stab of pain. Denis had bought me from Mother. Perhaps he had done more than that: he had also bought her, heart and soul, in the bargain.
Mother would have made a redoubtable enemy, but her greed for money was an Achilles’ heel that Denis had exploited. Now she would have to come to dinner tomorrow night, and smile and be pleasant to me, and be polite to Denis. And stay pleasant in all the years to come.
To call Mother’s need for money ‘greed’ is probably a little unfair. Mother had struggled for money all her life. Not in the sense that she had ever been close to starving, but in the sense that she needed a lot of money to maintain her lifestyle. She was profligate, and generous, and liked to treat money with the contempt she felt it deserved. That is fine if you are filthy rich, but for a Russian émigrée who had left Astrakhan with nothing but a few silver roubles sewn into her baby’s swaddling clothes it was a prescription for heartbreak and disaster. And she, and her men, had experienced both.
Denis noticed my pensive look, and sensed my feelings. ‘I’m sorry I
had to tell you about the money,’ he said. ‘But you had to know.’
I took his hand and kissed his fingertips. ‘You’ve been very thoughtful and very generous,’ I said. ‘But I don’t want Mother coming to dinner. It would be a hurtful parody for us both. I’ll go and see Mother on my own and explain things to her in private. Would you mind awfully if we did it that way?’
Denis searched my eyes, then nodded slowly. ‘I think you are a very wise young woman. And a brave one. When will you go, do you think?’
I thought for a moment. ‘Today, I think. I’ll give Mother a call and arrange a time. Will you be needing Ismail?’ I wanted to get it over with as soon as possible so that I could get on with my beautiful new life.
Ismail drove me over to Parry Drive at six that evening, sitting very upright behind the wheel with his ‘rely on me’ look on his handsome face. He obviously sensed the trepidation I was feeling, and handed me out of the car with particular formality. ‘I will be waiting close by, Mem,’ he said. ‘Allah be with you.’
Mother was waiting in the shadows of the porch, and gestured me inside with a cold flick of the hand. Once inside, I hesitated: should I go to the lounge, or to the kitchen where we usually foregathered?
‘You want that we meet in the lounge?’ Mother asked. ‘The kitchen not grand enough for my daughter?’
I sighed deeply. It was going to be every bit as painful as I had feared.
‘I’d love a cup of tea, Mother,’ I said in as normal a voice as I could manage. ‘Do you mind if I put the kettle on?’
‘Your Denis has given me some money,’ Mother said stiffly in Russian as soon as we were seated at the big kitchen table, our teacups before us. ‘I would have thrown it into his face but I need money to save my business from ruin. The salon is in trouble because of the way you and Tanya ran out on me. You have been like rats scurrying away from a sinking ship.’
I was determined not to let Mother take over the agenda. ‘Please let’s not call each other names,’ I said as pleasantly as I could. ‘I’ve really come to ask for your blessing. You see, Mother, Denis and I are to be married . . .’
Mother spat on the floor. It was an awful gesture, quite unlike her, and it shocked me badly. I tried to say something but the words just weren’t there, just a tightening in the chest and a quick, gathering breathlessness.
So I stood up and opened my arms to her, appealing wordlessly.
Just for a second I thought things might be all right because Mother actually began to smile. But it was a smile of pure malice, and when I saw that, tears sprang into my eyes before I could stop them. The tears were a dreadful, dreadful mistake because Mother despised weakness and could not help but pounce if ever she saw it in another. In a single movement she picked up the teapot I had just filled and flung it at my face.
I think – I hope – that in the last fraction of a second she changed her mind, because I was only a foot or two away and yet she somehow missed me. The pot crashed into the kitchen window just behind me, shattering the pane and exploding into fragments of glass and china. A spray of hot tea drenched my hair and shoulders.
Then there was silence. Except for the sound of running feet. I heard the front door crash open and then Ismail was by my side, a heavy steel tyre lever in his right hand. He took in the situation in a flash – my white face, the shattered window, the dark stain of tea and the bits of broken pot on my shoulders and in my hair – and then he advanced on Mother with death in the raised tyre lever and in his bulging eyes.
I grabbed his arm. ‘No, Ismail!’ I screamed. ‘Don’t! Please don’t!’
He did stop, thank God, and lowered the lever. By then he had dragged me halfway across the kitchen, upsetting the table on the way. Mother had backed into a corner but to give her credit she still stood tall, and her eyes were flashing anger rather than fear.
I managed to catch my breath. ‘Take me home, Ismail,’ I said in a quieter voice. I was still clutching his arm, but my legs had gone weak and I was now leaning on him for support.
I cannot recall Mother saying a word. She just stood there, looking at me, her kitchen a shambles around her. Over the years I have often wondered what would have happened if I had done things differently. If I had stayed and let her vent her rage, say the things she needed to say. I think we would probably have sorted out our differences, as we had done after she threw her wineglass at me in the dining room of the E&O Hotel in Penang. There would have been the usual tantrums, the usual tears, and then the glorious makingup, at which Mother was a past master.
But I didn’t stay. I let Ismail lead me away and I didn’t look back. To be perfectly honest, I don’t think I wanted reconciliation. At the bottom of my heart I wanted a clean break, and Mother had given me the perfect excuse.
I remember my overriding emotion in the car driving back to Ampang Road. It was one of unutterable relief. I was free.
Babs Chrystal spent most of the next day with me, helping me to settle in. It was a strange day, exhilarating but exhausting, happy but tinged with melancholy. We sorted out cupboard space for my clothes, arranged my few possessions to their best advantage, met and talked to all the servants, and then spent some time with Teng Swi while he explained the household accounts. Babs was a perfect mentor, helpful but not intrusive, and always sensitive to my still-fragile mood. Denis had gone up to Ipoh for the day so we were alone in the big, cool house.
‘I really do appreciate all you have done for me, Babs,’ I said. We had broken for a cup of tea, and were sitting comfortably in the cane chairs under the porch.
‘No thanks are due, Nona,’ she said shortly. She was the best kind of Australian, open-hearted and unassuming and always keen to offer a helping hand. ‘When I married Bob I was new to Malaya, and people were just fantastic. When we moved up to the Kamuning Estate, half of KL came up with us to see us settled in. I’m just repaying a little of what I received when I was first married.’
‘We’re not actually married yet,’ I said carefully. I assumed that Babs knew that, but I wanted to get it out into the open anyway. ‘Denis wants to wait until we can get married in St Andrew’s Cathedral in Singapore.’
‘You’re married as far as Bob and I are concerned,’ Babs said stoutly. ‘St Andrew’s will just be the icing on the cake.’ She suddenly grinned up at me. ‘They say that St Andrew’s is as white as it is because they mixed thousands and thousands of egg whites into the plaster when they were building the place. You might ask the minister if that’s true.’
Babs had known Denis for longer than anyone I knew, except perhaps Mac Williamson, and I decided to ask the question that had been on my mind for the past two days. ‘Babs, do you know any reason why Denis might be . . . well, a bit chary of getting married? At times it bothers me that he isn’t keen to just rush off and get married in a registry office. I’d do it in a shot. I don’t feel the least need for a church wedding.’
Babs looked at me for a moment, then put her cup down carefully. ‘Denis had an experience when he was a very young man, Nona. I think there was a girl, and perhaps a suggestion he should marry her to protect her good name. The whole business affected him quite profoundly. He’s often said he hates the thought that anyone would get married just because they are expected to.’ She picked up her cup and took a reflective sip. ‘I’m only speculating, mind, but it may be that Denis doesn’t want it to seem that your wedding was forced on you by the baby.’
I thought about that, and it made a kind of sense. If Denis had been burnt by a youthful indiscretion it would explain a lot about his attitude to marriage. ‘Gun-shy’ was what they laughingly called it at the Club.
That evening I sat down at the desk in Denis’s study and wrote to all my friends. I told them the literal truth. I said that we had decided to get married in St Andrew’s Cathedral in Singapore, and that in the meantime we had decided to live together as man and wife. I said how happy I was, and that when Denis finally ‘made an honest woman out of me’ we woul
d have a big party and invite them all along.
My final letter was to Mother:
It is a shame we had to part on such bad terms. For my part I bear you no ill will. In fact, I will always remember with gratitude the past two years, during which the three of us – you, Tanya and I – lived as a family for the first time in our lives. But all families must finally part as children grow up and find their own partners in life. It is an awful shame that you could not find it in your heart to let Tanya and me leave with your blessing. It would have meant that we could have all remained loving friends, so that the family bonds we once enjoyed would have survived even though we had gone our separate ways. But that cannot be. The terrible anger that you showed me last night – you might have injured me badly, Mother, or even killed me – means that our parting must be final.
It was a cruel letter, and I wish now that I had never sent it. But I was young then, and desperately keen to close the door on that hurly-burly life and begin an exciting new existence. I remember that I didn’t cry as I sealed the letter and tossed it on the pile with the others, but sighed with relief. A chore completed.
Mother never replied, of course. Her fierce Russian soul would have prevented her doing so, no matter how much much it cost to remain aloof and seemingly indifferent. She closed down Salon Tanya almost immediately and moved to Singapore. I heard months later that she had opened a rather up-market shop for children’s and babies’ wear in Orchard Road, presumably with Denis’s money.
Surprisingly, it was Tanya who kept me informed. Tanya, the last person I would have expected, became Mother’s warm and loving surrogate daughter. Life can be so strange.
It took about a month to get used to the idea that living with Denis was going to be a permanent affair. At first, try as I might, I couldn’t shake off the feeling that life was just too good to be true. I was frightened – literally scared to death – that my happy world would one day burst like a bubble and leave me alone and miserable. So I tried to imprint every detail of every moment in my mind, so that I would at least have memories to revisit in the lonely years I feared ahead.
In the Mouth of the Tiger Page 27