The Tea Planter's Wife

by Dinah Jefferies

  Night was different and not shared with anyone, and then the silence was unbearable. When Hugh’s breathing became laboured, it broke her heart to hear his small body struggling so, but at least she knew he was still alive. When it seemed to stop, she froze, and her heart only began to beat normally when the rasping breath started up again.

  In the night, she was overwhelmed with memories of Hugh as a baby. Such a crying baby he had been. She refused to think that the worst might happen, or how she would be able to go on living without her darling boy.

  She remembered him as a chubby toddler attempting his first wary steps, then later, how his thundering footsteps woke her in the morning. She thought of his first haircut, and the fuss he’d made at the sight of the scissors, so much so that Naveena had had to hold him down. She thought of the way he hated scrambled eggs for tea, but loved them boiled, with soldiers, in the morning. And his first words: Neena, Mumma and Dadda. Verity had so wanted him to say her name too, and had sat with him for ages, saying ‘Verity’ over and over. All Hugh had been able to manage was Witty.

  All Gwen’s old anxieties flooded back. She remembered Savi Ravasinghe’s painting of Christina, and what the woman had said more than three years ago. Everybody falls in love with him in the end. Was that it? She thought back to the ball, and the way Savi had escorted her to her room. She thought of Fran being with a man like that and ached for her cousin. And, as she watched Hugh’s eyelids flicker in his sleep, her mind returned to the Sinhalese village where Liyoni lived. If this terrible illness could strike Hugh down, a child living in luxury, how vulnerable must her little girl be?

  In the moments when she was neither awake nor asleep, she prayed for her daughter, as well as for Hugh, and entered an obscure luminal world. With her thoughts wheeling, she was torn between the village and her home. She thought of the lads washing elephants in the river and the simple way of life there, the women cooking over an open fire and men weaving on their primitive looms. Her own privileged life swam sharply into focus, now lacking even the most simple kind of peace.

  Eventually one thought dominated her mind.

  She had given up one child already. If Hugh’s illness was her punishment for sacrificing her daughter’s happiness for her own, the only way she would ever save Hugh would be by doing what was right. The truth in return for his life. It would be an exchange, a bargain with God, and even if it meant losing everything, she must confess or otherwise watch her son die.

  16

  For over a week everyone held their breath. Hugh was a much-loved member of the family, and even the houseboys and kitchen coolies walked around with long faces and spoke in hushed whispers. But once he had turned a corner and began to drink and sit up in bed, the household became a lighter place again, and the normal bang and rattle of daily life resumed.

  As she watched over the child, unable to leave his side for long, Gwen’s relief was as consuming as her fear had been. Laurence clattered about with a grin on his face and eyes sparkling with happiness. There was laughter as he sat with his son doing jigsaws on the bed and reading his best books while Gwen arranged for all Hugh’s favourite foods to be made: a Victoria sponge, green macaroons, cardamom and mango ice cream – anything she could think of to tempt him, anything that might enable him to become once again the noisy, energetic child he had been.

  Yet when he felt well enough to run around outside, she wanted to keep him with her.

  ‘We mustn’t smother the lad,’ Laurence said.

  ‘Is that what you think I’m doing?’

  ‘Let him run. It’ll do him good.’

  ‘It is quite cold today.’

  ‘Gwen. He’s a boy.’

  So she relented and watched for half an hour as he ran after the dogs, but when Laurence had gone in, she tempted Hugh back inside with crayons and a new pad of drawing paper. While she was watching him, her determination not to allow a moment’s distraction grew. As long as she was watching Hugh, she was not worrying about Liyoni. In her room, he scribbled nonsense pictures of Bobbins and Spew and little Ginger, who was still smaller than the other two. In fact, it was Ginger being under his bed that made him happiest of all.

  But the sight of the little boy’s drawings made her feel ill at ease. Full moon had been and gone and the little girl’s latest drawing had not arrived. Though she could barely breathe with the relief of knowing that her son would live, each day that he improved, she began to hear a trace of her daughter’s voice as it breached the wall of noise in her head. The child’s whispers pulled her through open doorways, beckoned her along the gloomy hallway and up the polished stairs. She thought she saw the girl silhouetted in one of the landing windows, but then the light moved and she realized it had only been a shadow cast by clouds against the sun.

  What she could suppress by day, became enormous at night. Liyoni’s voice grew loud, demanding her attention, haunting her dreams and feeling so real, she believed the child was actually in her room. When she woke, sweating and shaking, it was with a feeling of reprieve that there was no one there but Hugh, or Naveena coming in with her bed tea.

  She insisted on fresh flowers being placed throughout the house: in the hall, in the dining room, the drawing room and all their bedrooms. The moment any flower seemed to droop, the whole bunch had to go, and fresh ones were arranged in their place. But no amount of flowers could lessen her anxiety. Gwen had made a bargain with God, but she had not kept her side of it and now lived in fear of the consequences.

  After Hugh returned to sleep in the nursery, Laurence found her sitting at her small desk with her shoulders hunched, playing patience. He stood behind and stooped down to kiss the top of her head. She glanced up. For a moment their eyes met in the mirror but, afraid the tell-tale shine of hers would give her away, she turned her face so that his lips only brushed her hair.

  ‘I came to ask if you would like me to stay with you tonight?’ He glanced at the cards. ‘Or play a game with you?’

  ‘I would, but there’s no point neither of us getting any sleep.’

  ‘I thought you’d be sleeping, now Hugh’s so much better?’

  ‘I’ll be all right, Laurence. Please don’t fuss. I’ll be all right.’

  ‘Well, if you’re sure.’

  She pressed her hands together to stop them shaking. ‘I am.’

  She didn’t get into her bed when he had gone, but carried on playing cards. After an hour, she leant back in the chair, but the moment she closed her eyes and the feeling of relaxation began to spread, her eyes flew open again. She brushed all the cards to the ground.

  ‘Damn it. Leave me alone,’ she said aloud.

  But the little girl would not leave.

  Gwen walked around the room, picking up ornaments and putting them back down again. What if the child was ill? What if the child needed her?

  Eventually, too tired to stay awake, she slept. And then the nightmares began. She was back at the Owl Tree, falling out of its branches, or riding in a bullock cart that never arrived at any destination. She woke and paced the room, then wrote a long letter to Fran telling her about Savi Ravasinghe. She put it in an envelope, addressed it, looked for a stamp and then ripped the whole thing into dozens of fragments and threw them at the wastepaper basket. After that she just stared out at the darkness of the lake.

  The next day she couldn’t concentrate and lost the thread of things. Was this feeling that her world might be about to collapse around her God’s punishment? Maybe the drawing hadn’t arrived because Liyoni wasn’t well, she argued. Some trifling childhood ailment. Nothing serious. Or had she been taken? Children were sometimes taken. Or had Savi found out and was now looking for the right moment to speak up? Each day that she waited, biting her nails, unable to eat, and not knowing, the feeling of dread grew.

  She was short-tempered with Laurence, Naveena wasn’t there when she needed her and Hugh avoided her, spending time with Verity instead.

  She took out all her clothes from her wardrobe
and laid them on the bed, intending to decide which might be updated, and which she no longer wore at all. She tried them on, one by one, but every time she looked in the mirror, nothing looked right. The clothes hung from her, and she decided to remove her wedding ring, for fear it would slip from her finger and be lost. As she tried on her hats, she began to cry. Naveena came into the room and found her sitting motionless on the floor, gulping at air and surrounded by hats: felt hats, feathered hats, beaded hats and sun hats. The woman held out a hand to her and Gwen took it, then stumbled to her feet. When she was standing, she leant against Naveena, and the woman held her tight.

  ‘I’ve lost weight. Nothing fits,’ she said through her sobs.

  Naveena carried on holding her. ‘You’ve gone down a little, that is what.’

  ‘I feel so awful,’ she said when the tears stopped falling.

  Naveena handed her a handkerchief to mop her face with. ‘Hugh is better. You do not need to worry.’

  ‘It isn’t Hugh. Well, it is Hugh, but it’s not just Hugh.’

  Unable to say the words, she went to her desk and took out the little box, found the key and unlocked it. She held up the drawings to Naveena.

  ‘What if she is sick?’

  Naveena patted her back. ‘I understand. You must not break your head. Put away. Next drawing will come. You call doctor for you, Lady.’

  Gwen shook her head.

  But later that day, when she prickled all over, feeling as if her skin had been peeled away, she couldn’t stand it any longer. Her deteriorating mental state, exacerbated by the lack of sleep, made her whole body ache. She jumped at the slightest sound, heard things that weren’t there, felt unequal to the simplest task and found herself going round in circles, starting something, leaving it, then forgetting what it was she’d been doing in the first place. At the point where she felt she was losing her connection with everything she loved, she capitulated, knowing she would have to ask for help.

  17

  Luckily, the doctor had been able to call soon after Gwen had telephoned him and, knowing the powder he intended to prescribe would be on its way, she wanted to do something while she waited. In her troubled state, she was hardly in a position to attend to the cheesemaking and, in any case, she had trained one of the kitchen boys to do the job, so instead she turned her attention to the household accounts.

  Over the years she had cleared up the discrepancies between the orders that had been paid for and the deliveries that actually appeared in the house. She’d insisted on seeing for herself when deliveries came, and had checked them off against the bills that were presented for payment. The irregularities had been sorted out, and though at one point she had suspected the appu of stealing, it was difficult to prove. She didn’t expect to see any discrepancy now.

  While Naveena looked after Hugh, she sat at her desk and forced herself not to think of her worries. As she rubbed her temple to try to ease the headache there, she noticed a payment for an unusual amount of rice, whisky and oil, during the time Hugh had been ill. She went to the supplies cupboard expecting to see a much larger supply of the goods, but even less than the normal amount was there. Only the appu had the other key.

  In the kitchen, she’d hoped to confront the appu about it, but McGregor was there smoking his pipe, with a pot of tea in front of him.

  ‘Mrs Hooper,’ he said as he lifted the pot and, holding it high, poured. ‘How are you? Tea?’

  ‘A little tired, Mr McGregor. No tea, thanks. I was hoping to speak to the appu.’

  ‘He’s gone to Hatton with Verity. She’s taken the Daimler.’

  ‘Really? Why have they gone together?’

  ‘A bit of business, she said.’

  Gwen frowned. ‘What kind of business?’

  ‘She has been seeing to the ordering while you’ve been occupied with Hugh. I expect they must be picking up supplies.’

  ‘And she has been making the payments too?’

  ‘I imagine she must have been.’

  ‘And are you the one who still goes to the bank in Colombo?’

  ‘Yes, I bring back the labourers’ wages and the money for the household expenses.’ He paused. ‘Well, usually I do, but we had a huge amount of tea to process this month, and with Laurence so preoccupied, Verity went in my place.’

  ‘In the Daimler, I suppose?’

  He nodded.

  Gwen settled Hugh for the night and, hoping the sleeping draught would soon arrive, she asked Naveena to come to her room.

  As soon as the woman was sitting, Gwen looked into her calm dark eyes. ‘Why is this month’s drawing late? I need to know.’

  Naveena shrugged. What did it mean, that shrug?

  ‘Is she still thriving? Has something happened to her?’ Gwen continued.

  ‘Waiting a little longer, Lady,’ Naveena said. ‘If girl is sick I am already hearing by now.’

  Gwen felt so tired; it was hard for her to keep track of simple conversations, but she needed to know if Liyoni was safe.

  As they were talking, Verity came in. ‘Hello. I’ve got something for you.’

  ‘Thank you, Naveena,’ Gwen said as she nodded a dismissal.

  ‘We were in Hatton,’ Verity said after the woman had gone.

  ‘I heard.’

  ‘I bumped into old Doc Partridge.’

  ‘Really, Verity, he isn’t old at all. Just that his hair’s thinning.’ She smiled weakly. ‘You know he’s awfully nice. You could do a lot worse.’

  Verity blushed. ‘Don’t be silly. He gave me a prescription to have made up in the dispensary. He was on his way to do it himself, but I saved him the bother. Shall I stir a dose into some hot milk now?’

  ‘Oh, please, would you mind?’

  ‘You just settle down in bed and I’ll go to the kitchen and sweeten it with a good squirt of jaggery to take the unpleasant taste away. What do you say?’

  ‘Thank you. That is kind.’

  ‘If anyone knows how ghastly sleeplessness can be, it’s me. Though I was surprised, given that Hugh is so much better – I thought you’d be out like a light.’

  ‘It seems to have made me rather anxious generally.’

  ‘Right. Be back in a jiffy.’

  Gwen got out of her clothes and picked up the white nightdress Naveena had laid on her bed. She held it to her nose and breathed in the fresh flowery smell, then pulled it over her head and fumbled with the buttons. Her guilt had cemented her within a fearful inner space, but squeezing her hands together and wanting to think of happier times, she tried to banish the black thoughts. If Naveena was right, maybe Liyoni wasn’t ill after all, but it was still possible that the drawing had been intercepted.

  If she were to lose it all, the very best she could hope for would be to be sent back to Owl Tree, never to see her darling Hugh again. She trembled at the thought of her son without his mother, and pictured Florence and the other women with the same look of superiority on their faces if it all came out. With sly eyes they’d smile and congratulate themselves that it was she, and not they, who had succumbed to the advances of a charming native man.

  By the time Verity came back, she was trembling with fear.

  ‘Goodness. You are in a bad way. Here you are. It’s not too hot, so drink it down straight away. I’ll sit with you while you fall asleep.’

  Gwen drank the pink milky mixture, which, though bitter, wasn’t as bad as she’d expected, and very quickly felt her eyes close. She drifted for a few minutes, feeling comfortably drowsy, realized her headache had lifted, wondered what it was that she’d been worrying about and then lost all feeling of wakefulness.

  The next morning, she could barely lift her head from the pillow, even though at the same time it also hurt to rest her head on the pillow. She heard raised voices going on in the corridor sounding a bit like Naveena and Verity arguing.

  A few minutes later Naveena came in. ‘I am bringing bed tea earlier, Lady, but could not wake you. I was shaking you.’

&nbs
p; ‘Is there a problem with Verity?’ Gwen asked and glanced at the door.

  The old ayah looked troubled but didn’t speak.

  Gwen felt cold and clammy, as if she was about to go down with influenza. ‘I need to get up,’ she said, and tried to swing her feet to the floor, just as Verity entered the room.

  ‘Oh, no you don’t. Rest for you, until you feel better. You can go, Naveena.’

  ‘I’m not ill, just tired. I need to look after Hugh.’

  ‘Leave Hugh to me.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Absolutely. In fact, leave everything to me. I’ve already discussed the menus and paid the household staff.’

  ‘I wanted to talk to you.’ Gwen felt unfocussed and drifted for a moment. ‘I can’t remember. Deliveries, was it? Or something …’

  ‘There’s a daytime powder for you too. I’ll mix it up with bee honey and tea. You probably don’t need milk for this.’

  Verity went to the kitchen and came back in with a glass of cloudy reddish-brown liquid.

  ‘What is it?’

  Verity tilted her head. ‘Hmmm? Not sure. I’ve followed his directions exactly.’

  Almost as soon as she had drunk the potion, Gwen relaxed, feeling the most delicious floating sensation. Blanched of all distress and feeling wiped clean, she drifted off again.

  Gwen began to long for the ‘magic potion’ as she now thought of it. When she drank it, she floated in a mist, free from painful headaches and free from worry, but with the stupor came a complete lack of appetite and an inability to hold a normal conversation. When Laurence looked in on her one evening, she tried her best to be herself, but it was clear from the worry in his eyes she was not succeeding.

  ‘Partridge will be here in the morning,’ he said. ‘God knows what he’s been giving you.’

  Gwen shrugged as he took her hand. ‘I’m fine.’