Shadow of the Moon (6 page)

Juanita did not come so often to visit her these days, for the birth of her own second child was imminent and she preferred to remain within the seclusion of her own house. But when Marcos was absent Sabrina spent much of her time at the Gulab Mahal, talking and laughing with Juanita and Aziza Begum and playing with her niece, Juanita's black-eyed, dimpled first-born.

She was there on a golden morning in early February when Juanita's pains began, and would have stayed with her but that Aziza Begum and Juanita herself would not permit it.

‘Send her away, my mother,' whispered Juanita urgently, the sweat already pearling on her brow. ‘The English are not as we. They tell their maidens nothing of these things, and because it will go hard with her when her time comes, it were better she were not now made afraid.'

‘
Arré
! and who should know better than I?' nodded the Begum. ‘Her time will indeed be hard. She is not made for the bearing of children.
Hai mai
! I will send her away, do not fear. Rest now, my daughter, and in a little while my son's son lies in thy arms.'

Aziza Begum stuffed her mouth with
pan
leaves and waddled out to summon the carriage and reassure the anxious Sabrina. ‘Do not fear: it is but a time that comes to all women. And what woman amongst us all would forgo it had she the choice? Not one, my bird! - not one. For is not this the end for which we were born? All will be well here. I, who have borne many children, tell you so.'

To Sabrina the obese old woman who was Juanita's mother-in-law had always seemed a grotesque figure; but now, suddenly, she saw her with new eyes. Saw the kindness and the shrewd wisdom in the bright eyes that peered out of that fat, wrinkled mask; the firmness and character that lay in those small plump hands; and, all at once, the vanished beauty and charm that had once been possessed by this corpulent and shapeless old woman who had been Anne Marie's life-long friend.

Moved by a sudden impulse Sabrina put out her hand, and groping for those beringed fingers, clung to them tightly. The Begum embraced her. It was surprising how comforting that plump sandalwood-scented shoulder was to lay one's head against. ‘Haste now, little daughter, and return to thy
husband's house, and I will send word when my son's son is born.' The old woman patted Sabrina's shoulder and whisked away a sudden tear with the corner of her veil.

Juanita's son was born before moonrise. A lusty, dark-haired creature with his mother's fair skin and his father's black eyes. ‘He is born in an auspicious hour,' said the Begum. ‘
Arré, arré
, do not cry, thumbling! Thou shalt be a great king and have seven sons.'

As the cold weather neared its end and once again the days began to take on an uncomfortable warmth, Sabrina moved abroad less and less. Her slight figure was heavy now and distorted by the coming child, and she had suffered considerable unnecessary discomfort from the new tightly laced, small-waisted fashions of the day, until Juanita had persuaded her to adopt the Mohammedan form of dress for wear inside her own house. Lady Emily had been deeply shocked by the news of this innovation, but with the arrival of the hot weather Sabrina found the loose light silks of the Eastern garb unbelievably comfortable after the high, close-fitting bodices and innumerable petticoats demanded by the European mode.

The Bartons were moving to Simla once more, and Emily was anxious that Sabrina should accompany them. But Sabrina would not leave Pavos Reales, despite the fact that Marcos supported her aunt's plan.

‘It is not good for you to remain here in the heat,
querida
,' said Marcos. ‘Already the nights grow hot, and this is only the first week of March. April is a bad month in the plains, and May is worse. Go now with your aunt to the hills and I will join you there at the end of May.
Se lo prometo
!'

But Sabrina was obstinate. ‘Your mother did not go to the hills when her children were born, and neither did Juanita. Besides, my son will spend his childhood in this country as you did, so he must get used to such things as heat. It does not trouble you, and it is only because I was born and brought up in a cold country that I feel it. This is your home and mine, and I want my children to be born here.' Yet in the end she had agreed to go: though not in March. Marcos had affairs that would keep him in Oudh until May, and she would remain at Pavos Reales until these were completed, and then remove to the hills with him.

So it was arranged, and the Bartons, who had been staying at Pavos Reales on their way to the hills, bade her an affectionate if anxious farewell and left for Simla.

It was often lonely at the Casa de los Pavos Reales during the early weeks of the hot weather, for Sabrina could no longer go riding with Marcos; and with Emily in Simla and Juanita unable to leave the Gulab Mahal, there were few visitors at the great house on the banks of the Goomti. Yet Sabrina did not find her solitude irksome. She loved the high, white-walled rooms, the beautiful portraits and carvings and tapestries that the old Conde had brought from Spain; the dark, glowing devildom of the magnificent Velasquez
that hung on one wall of the vast drawing-room, and the scent of orange blossom and water on parched ground that drifted in from the patios. She loved the sound of horses' hooves that told her that Marcos had returned, and their walks together in the late evening along the stone-paved river terrace.

She was very happy, with a quiet serene happiness that nothing could touch or spoil. It was as though there was a wall around her; a shining transparent wall through which she could see the outside world, but which protected her from its harshness as the glass of a greenhouse protects a rare and delicate plant from the cold east wind. She loved and was loved. She was adored, cherished and protected. The whole world, it seemed to her, was beautiful, and life stretched ahead of her like a green path bordered with flowers along which she and Marcos would wander hand in hand, gently, happily and without haste …

Far to the north, as April drew to a close, Shah Shuja with the British Envoy, Macnaghten, riding behind him, entered Kandahar. Dost Mohammed's brother and his men had fled before the ponderous advance of the Army of the Indus, and the population of Kandahar gave the ageing Shah Shuja a riotous welcome that deceived Macnaghten into thinking that all Afghanistan was ready to welcome the puppet Amir and to depose Dost Mohammed - a conviction that the complete failure of a mammoth ‘Demonstration of Welcome', staged two weeks later and virtually unattended by the disgusted Afghan population, apparently did little or nothing to erase.

In the last week of April Marcos had once more to leave for the south. Anne Marie's father, on his retirement from the service of the East India Company's army, had acquired land on the Malabar coast and settled down to the life of a planter. His estate had prospered and he had died a rich man. Anne Marie had been his sole heiress and the property had passed on her death to her children, Marcos and Juanita, but their grandfather's old overseer, who had managed the estate for many years, had died the previous autumn, and it was this that had necessitated Marcos's visit to the estate during the early part of the cold weather. He had installed a new overseer and had returned satisfied that the property would continue to be efficiently managed, but now news had been received of the new overseer's death from snake-bite, and also of disaffection among the coolies employed on the estate.

Marcos and Wali Dad, discussing the matter, decided that their best plan would be to sell the Malabar estates and re-invest the money in Oudh, since the property was too far away to be administered except at second-hand and at long range (an arrangement which the present news had proved to be unsatisfactory), and the two rode south in the last week of April, promising to return by the end of May.

‘It will not be for long,
querida
,' said Marcos, comforting Sabrina. ‘I shall be back before May is out, I promise you.'

But Sabrina would not be comforted. ‘Why must you go? Why cannot Wali Dad go alone? Marcos, you cannot leave me now! I could not bear it. I am afraid!'

‘
Qué pasa
? Afraid of what, my heart?'

‘I do not know. I only know that I cannot bear to let you go. Let Wali Dad go.'

‘We must both go,
cara mía
,' said Marcos, his arms about her. ‘If only one were to go, it would have to be I. Wali Dad comes to help me. If he went alone the local officials and administrators might cause him trouble, for he is not of the south, but of Oudh. But once we have disposed of the estates we need never be worried by business in the south again. Does that not please you? I shall never again have the need to go more than a night's journey away from you.'

‘You think more of the money than of me,' wept Sabrina.

‘That is not true,
querida
. The property should indeed fetch a high price. But half of it is Juanita's, and if we delay, troubles and bad management may destroy its value. Would you have me rob Juanita of a large portion of the inheritance our mother left her, because I would prefer to remain with my wife instead of taking an uncomfortable and tedious journey on a business matter? I cannot believe it!'

Marcos had intended to send Sabrina to the care of her aunt before he rode south, since there was now no reason for her to delay her departure to the hills. But Sir Ebenezer had written from Simla to say that Lady Emily had suffered a severe attack of malarial fever, and though now convalescent, the state of her health was still causing anxiety. Reading that letter, Marcos realized that there would be little use in sending his wife to the care of a sick woman, since Lady Emily would be in no case to look after her, and Sabrina herself in no condition to administer to the needs of an ailing aunt.

‘She must come to me,' said Juanita. ‘I know she does not wish to leave Pavos Reales, and that it is cooler there. But it is not right that she should be alone just now. Loneliness is not good for her at such a time. Send her to me, Marcos. It will only be for a few weeks, and as soon as you return we will start for the hills. The child will not be born until late in June, and we shall be in the cool air many days before then. Have a care to my husband and return swiftly.'

So Sabrina moved from the Casa de los Pavos Reales to the pink stucco palace in Lucknow city, and watched Marcos and Wali Dad ride away under the flaming glory of the gold-mohur trees in Juanita's garden, her eyes misted with tears.

Marcos, turning in his saddle for a last look as he rode under the arch of the gateway, saw her standing among the hard, fretted shadows of the garden, an incongruous little figure with her white skin and soft blonde curls in that flamboyant oriental setting, and wished with all his heart that he were not leaving her. But it would not be for long …

With his departure it was as if the shining world of beauty and contentment in which Sabrina had walked had shattered like some fragile and iridescent soap bubble at the touch of a rough hand. She missed him with an intensity that grew rather than diminished as the days wore on. She missed, too, the cool stately rooms of Pavos Reales and the quiet of the vast park-like grounds that surrounded it.

The Gulab Mahal - the ‘Rose Palace' - was full of noise, and the rooms with their walls painted and carved or inlaid with vari-coloured marbles and shining pieces of mother-of-pearl, and their windows screened with stone tracery, were stiflingly hot. Below the innumerable carved balconies lay paved courtyards and gardens thick with mango and orange and gold-mohur trees, while beyond and all about the high wall that hemmed them in pressed the teeming city with its crowded bazaars and gilded mosques, green gardens and fantastic palaces.

The noise of the city beat about the pink walls of the Rose Palace night and day, filling the small, hot, stifling rooms with sound, as the unguents and essences used by Aziza Begum and the zenana women filled them with the heavy scent of sandalwood and attar-of-roses, and the cooking-pots of the kitchen courtyards filled them with the smell of the boiling
ghee
, curry and asafoetida.

Even the nights brought only a diminution of the noise; never silence. Tom-toms throbbed in the crowded mazes of the city, beating in counterpoint to the piping of flutes and the tinkle of sitars, the barking of pariah dogs, the crying of children, the clatter of armed horsemen riding through the narrow streets, or the drunken shouts of revellers returning from some debauch at the King's palace.

With the passing of each slow day the heat became greater, and during the hours of daylight the walls and the roofs of the houses and the stone paving of the courtyards would steadily absorb the fierce rays of the sun, so that when night fell it seemed as though every stone and brick in the city gave off the stored heat in waves, as from the open door of a potter's kiln.

Sabrina found it possible to sleep a little during the day, for a hot, dry wind frequently blew during the day-time, and then the doors and windows would be opened and hung with curious thick matted curtains made of woven roots, which were kept soaked with water. The hot winds blowing through the damp roots cooled the rooms and filled them with a not unpleasant aromatic odour. But often the wind did not blow; and always it died at sunset.

Sabrina's thin body felt hot and dry and shrivelled with heat, and she began to long for the cool pine-scented air of the hills as a man parched with thirst longs for a draught of cold water, and to regret that she had not gone to the hills with Emily in March as Marcos had wished her to do. But she would never again go to the hills with Emily. Marcos had been absent just over three weeks, and May was half-way over when a brief letter arrived from
Sir Ebenezer Barton. Emily was dead. She had suffered a return of the fever, wrote Sir Ebenezer, and had died two days later. Her distant relative, Mrs Grantham, had been with her. Sir Ebenezer's handwriting, normally so clear and firm, wavered like that of an old man far gone in years.