Plantation Doctor (8 page)

“Yes. I’ll see you then.”

He went with her down to the end of the path, gave her arm an impersonal pat and said good night.

Lyn had no appetite for dinner. She had some soup and toast and sent the boy off to his hut. The watchboy was already patrolling the house; each time he passed the lighted window he whistled breathily as if to himself, but Lyn knew he was demonstrating his watchfulness. She felt unsettled again and depressed.

She went to bed and lay listening to the soporific monotony of the drums; she dozed and dreamed, came wide awake in reasonless terror, heart pounding, throat parched. Her pulses sobered and she thought of Melia, so fatalistically prepared for the worst in that small white ward.

She badly needed some water, but had already experienced the bath of sweat which follows the unwise practice of drinking beneath a mosquito net. Dispassionately, she reflected that she had nothing to be disturbed about. Melia was tough and would get through; she wouldn’t be allowed to lie awake all night. She couldn’t possibly be in better hands and she was only across the way.

At length it came to her that her unrest was only remotely connected with Melia. It had much more to do with some troubled and elusive emotion within herself. Not long after she had admitted this she fell asleep.

The dawn was misty and chill. The boy brought tea, and after a while Lyn stiffly got into a pink linen frock and flat white shoes. She had a small breakfast and walked over, past the side of Adrian’s unconfined garden and the pool, to the clinic.

Melia looked happier. She had suddenly become so agitated last night that the colored nurse had lain in wait outside the theatre for the doctor.

“He is a good man, the doctor,” Melia whispered. “You know what he did, Miss Lyn? Right then, at ten o’clock, he made the film of me in the dark room. He must have been very tired but he knew that I could not sleep for thinking of it. This morning, when it was hardly light, he came to tell me there was nothing wrong. ‘Melia,’ he said, ‘every twist and bend is in its proper place. Now you be good and rest, so that you can go
back to Miss Russell. She is too young to
b
e alone
at
the house.’ He is the best kind of man, the doctor. One should not be afraid of him.”

Lyn was relieved. She talked for a few minutes, promised to send over Melia’s knitted shawl, and came out into the lobby. After a hesitant pause, she crossed and knocked at the door marked “Dr. Sinclair.”

“Come in,” she was instantly bidden.

He was at a refrigerated cabinet, shaking tablets from a large waterproof container into a flat plastic box.

Without turning, he said, “Good morning, Lynden,” on a cool, airy note. “I hope you are well this morning. We can start away in about fifteen minutes. I’m filling my case ready for work at the other hospital. You might shove this box into the empty compartment and bring me those in the lower row, one by one.”

She obeyed him, watched while he filled and snapped shut each box, and replaced them for him in their correct slots. She looked for signs of fatigue in him, but detected none.

“Did Melia spill the good news?” he asked as he locked the cabinet. “She’s a strange creature
—
she’ll stand any amount of pain without a murmur, but she made so much fuss about taking a sleeping draught that I had to give her an injection. I believe she intended to remain awake till I gave her the X-ray result this morning. Right.” He pulled down the hasp of the case. “Go home for your topi and I’ll get out the car and pick you up.”

His businesslike manner reduced everything to normal. A quarter of an hour later they were driving through the forest on one of those hard laterite roads. Boys worked among the rubber trees; they had been at it since daybreak and, with a couple of rests for food and drink, would go on till three.

After a while the car passed a row of cropped and. oddly shaped trees behind which stretched a tall palisade of plaited palm-leaves. Lyn twisted to look back, saw numerous half-naked boys and girls peeping over the top of the stockade and nudging one another excitedly.

“Is that a village?” she wanted to know.

“No, it’s a necessary evil
—
a bush school. A custom of the local natives compels the children to attend such
a school and undergo a period of Spartan training for adulthood. I’m afraid they have to bear all sorts of unmentionable tribulations. They’re in the hands of a masked priest and his assistants.”

“It sounds inhuman. Couldn’t you forbid it, on your land?”

“We’d lose hundreds of workers if we did, and do no good. They’d practise it somewhere else rather than break the tribal laws. At one time the children were kept more or less incarcerated in such schools for years. They used to come out between the ages of fourteen and seventeen, cicatriced and often diseased. Nowadays, they stay for a year or so, and the Christianized ones are set free after a month of confinement in a hut on a rice diet.”

“I’ve seen a woman with cicatrice marks round her waist. They look horribly cruel and primitive.”

“They are,” he said. “The actual cuts are done swiftly and with diabolical swiftness, then the wounds are forced open and filled with clay which eventually falls out, leaving the scars. My chief assistant at the native hospital is an African, trained at Lagos. He married a Bandu woman and insists on her wearing European high-necked dresses to hide the carving.” He smiled. “I believe he secretly admires it, though.”

They were entering the native township, though Lyn wouldn’t have known it if Adrian had not pointed out the fact. For the growth here was thick and ungoverned, and only an occasional group of conical roofs indicated the presence of human beings. Adrian explained that over an area of nearly a thousand acres dwelt several thousand natives under tribal conditions. The Denton company conducted regular medical inspections and laid down that the plot of land allotted to each family should be worked and planted, but did not interfere with their way of living. They had their own council of elders presided over by a chief.

Under a thorn tree he parked the car, and they got out and turned into a narrow but much-trodden path.

The native hospital was built on the lines of the clinic at the settlement, but it was much larger, and there were two African doctors in residence. One of them, Lyn learned, was an excellent surgeon, and the other had had much experience of elephantiasis, sleeping sickness and leprosy. There seemed to be no end to the diseases of the tropics; men contracted them more easily than women, but when the women fell sick they died through being obstinately opposed to any remedies but their own.

Lyn was allowed to walk down the centre of the wards, to smile at the women in the smaller ward and take a peep at the four tiny black babies which had been born during the last couple of days. One of the native doctors told Lyn that sometimes, about the third day after the birth of a child, both mother and baby would vanish. It was managed carefully and expertly by the woman herself. Questioning of the family would elicit only a bland denial of knowledge about the escape, though they were probably well aware that mother and child were securely hidden in the bush where “white man’s medicine” could not penetrate.

It was after twelve when Adrian emerged from the surgery and collected Lyn. They went back to the car, climbed into its suffocating heat and moved away at speed to create a breeze.

“You had an exhausting morning,” he commented. “Sorry I couldn’t be with you, but it turned out to be a busy time for me. Wasn’t too sickening, was it?”

“Not a bit. I saw the babies.”

“Cute, aren’t they? They hardly ever weigh anything over six pounds at birth. The latest arrival was under four pounds.”

“He was fast asleep. All the babies looked so healthy and clean in those little cots that I couldn’t help thinking of those women who are afraid of doctors and remain in the bush rather than go to the hospital.”

“Superstition is the devil to combat,” he said, “and the women are more deeply ingrained with it than the men. I’m glad you weren’t too sensitive to the more sordid side of it.”

“I didn’t find it distasteful
—
only rather humbling.”

“Don’t regard it that way. Look upon all the new sights and experiences as essentially African. What was your chief reaction?”

She considered. “The hackneyed one, I’m afraid. I wanted to pitch in and help. I can see now why you think me pretty contemptible.”

“My dear girl!” His tone was cold and displeased. After that he said nothing at all.

They drove on through the dark shade of the trees, arrived at the belt of timber, where lichens drooped from brown trunks and the grass was dappled with sunshine, and followed the path which led into the settlement. At Lyn’s house Adrian pulled in and helped her out.

Pitiless heat trembled on the air, the sky was a huge, glaring arc over the long clearing, and no other human being stirred.

“Lie down for an hour before you eat,” said Adrian very calmly.

Unconsciously, Lyn pushed back h
er
right shoulder to ease it stiffness. Just as unconsciou
sly
Adrian grasped it with a firm hand.

“Is it painful?”

“No. It aches from trying to lift Melia yesterday.”

Concerned, he let his fingers rove the fine bone, slid them along the collar-bone. “Why didn’t you say? A little massage will soon put it right.”

Perhaps the morning at the hospital had tattered Lyn’s nerves, or the heat might have teased them, or maybe a restless night had used up too much of her reserves. She only knew that suddenly his nearness hurt like the deep probing of a needle, that the exploring professional hand upon her shoulder was intolerable.

Rigid with control she jerked from his touch. “The ache will soon wear off. Thanks for sparing me so much of your time this morning.” Then she turned and ran up into the house.

The next evening Melia was released from the hospital. The sprain would probably take months to mend completely, but seeing that the arm affected was her left she was inclined to be cheerful about it. Being one of those people who inevitably anticipate the worst her swift return to the house had for Melia the unexpectedness of a miracle. When Roger came up to make neighborly enquiries and suggestions she wordlessly and contentedly displayed her disability.

To Lyn,
R
oger said, “The doctor asked me to call on you each day and make sure you’re getting everything you want while he’s away.”

“Away!” Lyn echoed. “Do you mean that he’s already gone somewhere?”

“Yes, he went this afternoon to a place on the other side of Palmas called Mkolu. He has a friend there who grows oil palms, and about every three months he goes there and gives this man and his workers a check-up. He’ll be gone for a week or so.”

A week! Lyn felt an inward pang of weakness and helplessness, as if something overwhelming and vast were threatening her personality. It was the climate, she thought again; the climate and the uncertainty of her position here at Denton.

The next time
Roger came he brought her a letter which resolved
th
e uncertainty. The postmark was blurred with dampness, but the letter had been written by an old mission doctor in the interior of Sierra Leone. Lyn read the shaky scrawl, felt her knees tremble, and read it through again.

Mrs. Latimer was dead. Like others in equatorial regions her life had gone out, a candle blown by the raging wind of fever. The old missionary had taken the liberty of reading Dr. Sinclair’s letter and decided to write to Miss Russell direct to deter her from travelling inland. There were a few effects and some manuscripts; perhaps in due course Miss Russell would inform him what to do with them.

That night Lyn went late to her uninviting bed. She had paced and drunk copiously of lime and soda and debated her situation. She no longer had any business in West Africa; and there was no longer the remotest reason why she should continue to occupy the assistant medical officer’s house at Denton.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Hazel took the
news philosophically, pointing out that had Lyn gone straight to Akasi from Cape Bandu she might have been stranded amid the swamps or even have contracted one of those foul illnesses which were prevalent in soggy, smelly country.

“People who live in such spots
—
particularly a woman who needn’t
—
must be crazy. Maybe this Mrs. Latimer hadn’t much besides the work she had set herself to live for, and she might have got a kick out of risking her life. You’re well out of it, Lyn, and don’t go all soft and think otherwise. What are you going to do?”

“That’s what I came down to talk about. Will Claud be in to lunch?”

“Sure to be.” Hazel lifted a brow, rather cynically. “I adore that brother of mine and in many ways I wouldn’t have him different, but I do wish he’d stay longer at the plantation. He’s home by one most days, and seeing that he seldom starts before ten, he can’t get much done. His boys are the laziest on the Coast.” She sighed briefly; then her expression changed slightly, became shuttered. “Are you planning to leave Denton?”

“Of course. What else could I do?” Lyn turned from the tangled garden which she had been moodily contemplating through the window. “I’m going back to England. That’s why I want to see Claud. He knows all about shipping and could fix my passage.”

“You don’t mind leaving ... the friends you’ve made?” Her pause half-way through the sentence was obvious, but Lyn missed its significance.

“I shall hate it, especially saying good-bye to you and Claud. But I’m not a person of means. True, I haven’t yet used much money
...
”

“That old chap you work for,” Hazel put in on a sudden thought. “He’s a good sort, isn’t he? Did he give you leave of absence?”

Lyn nodded. “For six months. He was fond of this sister-in-law and willing to do anything she asked. If she’d wished, he’d have let me remain with her indefinitely.”

“Then what’s in the way of your staying on for a few weeks? You could live with us
—
we can quickly shift another bed into my room. That way you and I could eventually sail away together.”

It sounded attractive. Hazel was so lovely, so easygoing and knowledgeable. To live in the same house with her above the Palmas shore would be to know the Coast at its sultry best. Yet Lyn could not ignore the threat of premonition in her own thoughts. Shouldn’t she cut right away, get out at once, even if it meant waiting in Freetown for a boat? Wasn’t that the more sensible procedure? But this reversal in her affairs was so sudden and bewildering.

“We don’t live richly,” Hazel murmured suggestively. “If you felt you ought to contribute a little towards housekeeping, you could, though it isn’t necessary. The house, such as it is, is Claud’s and almost our only bills are for food and the servant, and they don’t amount to much.”

“Hazel, you’re sweet.”

“I know I am. Is the answer yes?”

“I can’t quite decide. Let’s put it to Claud.”

Hazel smiled. “I know his reply. Claud won’t let you go. I vote we have a bottle of wine at lunch to celebrate.”

Claud, when he came, endorsed Hazel’s proposition with gusto. Since his sister’s arrival the bungalow was the target for every bachelor within twenty
miles.

“What will happen when it gets around that I have two darling honey-pots under one roof I daren’t imagine,” he exclaimed, “but I promise you we’ll have fun, Lyn, my pigeon.”

He popped the cork from the bottle of wine and filled the glasses. It seemed to have escaped both him and Hazel that Mrs. Latimer had met a lonely and ghastly death. No doubt their viewpoint
—
that the woman was just another fever victim and was the less to be mourned because she had sat up and begged for it
—
was sane, but Lyn had come to think of her as a person of courage and a wide humanity, someone to whom she would, in time, come close. She sipped at her drink, but not with pleasure.

“When will you move in with us?” Hazel was presently anxious to know. “Claud can take you back this afternoon and hang on while you pack if you like. He’ll even give you a hand.”

“That’s too soon. Don’t you think I should wait till Dr. Sinclair returns?”

“We don’t,” said Claud flatly. “Adrian doesn’t care a button for anything but his job. At the moment you’re part of that job, a part he won’t mind being relieved of,
I rather fancy. I don’t mean to be unflattering, my dear one,” he added with a charming smile and a blown kiss. “It’s Adrian’s loss if he doesn’t appreciate your freshness and youth
—
and very much our gain. Do make it today, Lyn.”

But on that point Lyn was stubborn. She would take her time, let it become known throughout the settlement that her prospective employer had died and then move out casually either late tomorrow or early the following day. She felt sure that that was what would be expected of her.

She said, “You haven’t room anywhere for Melia, have you
—
until she finds another post?”

“We have a sort of cubby-hole full of rubbish. We could clear it out and borrow a bed. I’m sure it will be as good as anything she’s been accustomed to. No quibbling, Lynn,” warned Hazel. “It’s settled.”

When Lyn got back to Denton late that afternoon she did not at once tell Melia of her plans. Here, among the sedate white houses with their wide, thatched roofs and orderly flower-beds, she was a little unnerved at the thought of walking out and into a home in Palmas. She needed reassurance that she was doing the right thing from someone other than the Merricks.

So when she had washed and changed she made her way along to the Bairds. John, busier because Adrian’s absence made him the doctor of small ailments, had not yet come in, but Rosita was in her lounge, rather startlingly attired in an emerald off-the-shoulder creation.

The manager’s wife looked
u
p from counting out table napkins, and with unconscious ostentation she set the linen aside behind the gramophone, as if what she was doing were of no moment. Lyn would have liked to assure her that she did not mind being excluded from the dinner party but one could never quite get to the point with Rosita; there was too much artificiality to penetrate. She smiled and stayed near the door.

With a show of
cordiality
, Rosita came forward. “How nice of you to call, Miss Russell, particularly as you must be feeling very sad and not a bit sociable. Roger Bailey told me about the depressing letter you had yesterday
—
he was quite upset for you; a charming boy. In a way, of course, you’re very lucky not to have to go to Akasi
—
I should be terrified of living in such a place. But it puts you in an awkward position, doesn’t it?”

Lyn had come prepared to do some of the talking, but for the moment Rosita had charge.

“I suppose it does,” Lyn agreed.

“You suppose!” Rosita’s smile hardened slightly and her black eyes flashed. “You
w
ere going to
work
for Mrs. Latimer, weren’t you, for a salary?”

“Yes, I was.”

“Well, then, surely an abortive journey to West Africa is an expense you can’t afford?”

“I’m not entirely penniless.”

“Naturally not, but as a working girl you can’t be too well off. On top of other things you’re in debt to the Denton company
—
or you will be if you remain in one of their houses, using their provisions. I wouldn’t care to be in your shoes, my dear.”

Had Lyn not been puzzled and rather stung she would have realized that she and Rosita had nothing more to say to each other. But it had never occurred to her that there was anything really vicious about Mrs. Baird, though she had known that the woman was capable of jealousy and for that reason had been careful not to push too far into the social life of the settlement.

“I dare say I’ll be able to pay my way,” she replied.

“Aren’t you counting, to some extent,” Rosita said incisively, though still with that tight glossy smile, “on Adrian Sinclair’s generosity? The young are apt to be idiotically romantic and credulous. They hope for miracles which can never happen.”

“I haven’t the haziest idea what you can mean.”

“Haven’t you? I’m not blind, Miss Russell, and not very much of a fool. Perhaps it will save you trouble
—
and a heap of girlish heartache
—
if I tell you that your ambitions where Dr. Sinclair is concerned are doomed from the start. He has no time for women.”

Lyn stood there, still as stone, unbelieving, yet unable to take her glance from Rosita’s enamelled, intense face.

“I’ve seen it a
ll,”
the edged voice hurried on. “The way you’ve ignored the younger men yet taken every single thing which the doctor offered. Your pretence of disliking him! You even thought to gain his admiration by going with him to the native hospital
...
”

“Mrs. Baird!” Lyn took a deep, quivering breath. “You’re wasting all that anger. I came here to tell your husband that I’m vacating the house and going to live in Palmas with the Merricks. I’ll send the houseboy along with the keys tomorrow morning.”

She turned and went from the house, hurried back to her own dwelling. But once inside the living-room her energy petered out, and she was filled with a sick disgust. She hated Denton and everything connected with the settlement. As soon as Adrian returned she would send up a note of thanks to close this unprofitable and somewhat painful chapter in her life. With Claud and Hazel she would be merry, and when Hazel once more knew an urge towards the footlights, they would go home together.

The change-over from Denton to the Merricks’ bungalow was affected without much trouble. Lyn’s bags and Melia’s wicker basket were taken in a jeep and Claud collected the two women and drove away to the hilarious noise of his own klaxon. He was jubi
l
ant and protective, and even Melia, who had been downcast at the prospect of trying to make her tall self small in a bungalow housing three others, smiled at the jests he directed her way and thought that it might not be so frightening, after all, to have such a man about the home.

The “cubby-hole,” which was really the result of bad planning when Claud designed and built the house seven years ago, was a huge recess between the dining-room and the kitchen. Given a free hand, Lyn had the place cleared and scrubbed and kaffir cloth curtains rigged over the opening. The camp-bed fitted under the window and there was space for a chest-of-drawers and a chair. Melia was content to hang her few frocks from wall hooks, and she had none of the usual odd possessions.

Her left arm was still unmovable, of course, but both her right arm and her tongue were in good fettle. She had no sooner entered the kitchen than a forceful flow of native dialect was directed at the s
l
oven
l
y houseboy. He was surprised into activity.

The meals, though the ingredients remained unaltered, improved in taste and appearance, the surfaces of the shoddy furniture acquired a shine, and cushions were beaten and sprayed with a lavender-smelling insecticide to dispel the musty odor, of which Claud and Hazel seemed entirely oblivious. Melia had always worked for her keep; she was happier that way. To Lyn, she shook her head over the dismal condition of the cooking-stove and the old-fashioned flat-iron which would never get hot enough
.

“That man Rollins lives in Palmas,” she said. “One day I will find him and ask that he comes to look at this stove and make it cook better. He will maybe find me a second-hand electric iron.”

“You can’t ask favors of him, Melia. He belongs to Denton.”

“Also he is kind and he hates what he calls ‘gadgets’ that do not work properly,” Melia replied imperturbably. “He told me he likes to eat pudding, but his houseboy is a bad cook who opens too many tins. I will make him puddings to pay for the iron.”

Lyn laughed helplessly at this novel application of the barter system. Melia’s logic, like her housewifery, was unassailable.

Only a day or two later Rollins did turn up in the Merrick’s kitchen, but whether by chance or invitation Lyn never discovered. From his kit he produced new parts for the stove and a new element for the antiquated toaster, and he promised to give Melia an electric iron so long as she would keep it for herself; boys dropped the things about and ruined them. He explained that he lived a couple of avenues lower down, nearer to the waterfront. A stickler for the proprieties, he said that as he and his friend were unmarried he would unfortunately be compelled to decline Melia’s offer to make some puddings, but he would not refuse a nice homely cake that you could cut into; he didn’t mind them a bit sad in the middle
.

As far as
i
t was in Melia to understand Cockney humor, she made the most of the brand dispensed by Rollins.

“That man is like a child, Miss Lyn,” she said. “He is so eager and pleased to talk, he likes cakes and puddings and sweet things. But he is also a good workman. Do you think Mr. Merrick would object if we used some dried fruit to make a cake for Rollins?”

“I’m sure he wouldn’t. You do it, Melia, and we’ll both hope it cooks nicely.”

Claud, it would appear, minded nothing that the women did. He revelled in his house transformed by flowers and wax polish into a fitting background for his two adorable and coveted girls; why hadn’t all this happened before! Two or three times a week he invited his friends to dinner. Always the same crowd comprising Jimmy, Ben, Rex Harper and the rest. Other evenings he made the girls dress for the club. Once, Hazel had demurred.