Prasanna shook his head. ‘It’s nothing like that, sir,’ he mumbled, staring at the ground.
De Silva hesitated. If it was nothing to do with Prasanna’s work, questions might be overly intrusive.
The sergeant looked up. ‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he said awkwardly. ‘If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be getting back to work.’
‘Very well.’
Puzzled, de Silva watched him go. Whatever it was, Prasanna clearly didn’t want to talk about it and it was no use relying on Nadar to enlighten him. He sighed. He’d come to Nuala hoping for a quiet life; two mysteries in one day didn’t sit well with that. He didn’t relish the prospect of double trouble.
**
‘You’re very preoccupied, Shanti,’ said Jane as they ate dinner that evening. On his drive home, he had resolved not to mention Claybourne to her. She might worry the man was a dangerous crank. Prasanna was another matter. He knew she had a soft spot for the likeable young sergeant.
‘I’m sure it’s true that it’s nothing to do with his work,’ she said when he told her what had happened that afternoon. ‘He’s a very decent young man. If something had gone wrong, I have no doubt he would own up. No, I’m convinced it’s to do with this girl, Kuveni.’
De Silva rubbed his chin. ‘I suppose I should have thought of that. He would be upset if he’d argued with his mother over her. Mrs Prasanna may be bossy but I know he’s very fond of her and takes his filial duties seriously.’
‘Well, if we’re to help in some way, we need him to talk to us.’
De Silva pushed the remains of his dinner to the side of his plate, put down his knife and fork and nodded uncertainly.
Jane chuckled. ‘Don’t worry, dear. I’m not suggesting it has to be you.’
He brightened. ‘You mean you’ll speak to him? Why that’s an excellent idea. You’ll do a far better job of it than I ever could. Are you at home tomorrow?’
‘I can be. There’s plenty to be getting on with. I’ve promised Florence to make some things for the Bring and Buy stall at the fête. I thought it might be cancelled after poor Mrs Wynne-Talbot’s death but Florence says Lady Caroline was adamant that life must go on as usual in Nuala, even though she’s made her excuses and won’t attend. Well, no one would expect her to after what’s happened. I’m sure the last thing she wants is anyone fussing over her. Florence says the family intend to have a very quiet funeral, but Reverend Peters may say a few words in church on Sunday.’
‘Then tomorrow I’ll think of an excuse to send Prasanna up here to fetch something for me.’ He grinned. ‘If I know you, you’ll have him coughing up the beans in no time.’
Chapter 25
He arrived at the station the following morning to find a still-disconsolate Sergeant Prasanna talking quietly to Constable Nadar. Their conversation ceased abruptly at the sight of de Silva and they chorused a good morning.
‘Anything new to report?’
‘No, sir.’ With Prasanna in such low spirits, there seemed to be a chance of Nadar becoming the spokesman for the two of them. The sergeant looked as if he hadn’t slept well at all and the top button of his tunic was undone. In the circumstances, de Silva refrained from telling him off.
‘I was halfway here when I realised I’d left some important papers at home,’ he said. ‘Prasanna, I’d like you to go and fetch them, please. Mrs de Silva will know where they are. If there’s nothing urgent this morning, you may take your time over it.’
If Prasanna was surprised by this unusual request, it didn’t disturb his listless expression. He merely nodded and got up from his seat behind the public counter.
Nadar, however, looked puzzled. ‘What would you like me to do this morning, sir?’ he asked as the door closed behind Prasanna.
‘I need to go out for a few hours so you’d better hold the fort, Constable. If anyone asks for me, tell them I’ll be back around lunchtime.’
Buoyed up by the conviction of a good job done, de Silva emerged into the sunshine and climbed into the Morris. If he returned to the station at lunchtime, Prasanna would probably be back and he knew he could rely on Jane to sort out the problem in the meantime. What he wanted to do was find out where Claybourne was living. It would probably involve a morning, if not longer, of scouting round the hotels but it would be worth it. He disliked being ambushed and if he let the initiative remain with Claybourne that was very likely to be what happened next.
**
After she saw her husband off to work, Jane settled herself on the verandah with her work basket containing the embroidery silks she was using to make evening purses and spectacle cases for the Bring and Buy stall at the fête. As she sewed, she listened for the sound of Sergeant Prasanna’s bicycle crunching over the gravel.
She didn’t have to wait long; she was putting the finishing touches to a particularly pretty purse embroidered with flowers and bees on a pale-green background, when one of the servants came to the verandah door. ‘The sergeant from the station is here, memsahib. He is asking if he may speak to you.’
‘Of course he may. Will you ask him to come round by the garden?’
‘Yes, memsahib.’
She made a show of looking surprised as Prasanna came up the steps, his cap in his hand. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you, ma’am, but Inspector de Silva has sent me to fetch some important papers he left behind this morning. He says you will know where they are.’
Tutting, Jane put her sewing aside and smiled at him. ‘How good of you to come all this way, Sergeant, and how forgetful my husband is becoming. I hope you aren’t in a hurry?’
‘No, ma’am, Inspector de Silva said I do not need to be back urgently.’
‘Good, because although I have some idea where the papers are, it may take me a little while to find them. Won’t you sit down and have a cold drink while you wait? You must be very warm after cycling all the way up from town.’
Prasanna looked doubtful. ‘I don’t want to be in your way, ma’am. I can wait in the kitchen.’
‘Nonsense, you won’t be in my way and it’s far too lovely a morning to be indoors. I’ll go and find the papers and in the meantime one of the servants will prepare us some iced tea.’
Inside the bungalow, Jane went to the study. She collected up a few old car magazines, put them in a large envelope and sealed the flap. What a lot of these magazines Shanti had. She’d have to speak to him about sorting them out and getting rid of some of them. But then again, she had a considerable pile of film magazines. Perhaps they should both go through and pick out the ones they would never look at again. They might fetch a few pence on the Bring and Buy stall.
In her neat, teacher’s hand, she wrote the words, “For the attention of Inspector de Silva. Most urgent.” on the envelope then waited until she heard the footsteps of the servant she had instructed to take tea to the verandah before returning to Prasanna.
The young man leapt to his feet and smiled shyly. ‘This is very kind of you, ma’am.’
‘Not at all. I usually have a little something at about this time and I’m delighted to have company to share it with. Now, do sit down. You must try a slice of our cook’s butter cake. He makes a very good one.’
They sat down and he took a piece of the cake and put it on his plate. ‘I have been admiring your sewing, ma’am.’
‘Oh, I’m not very skilled but I enjoy it and it passes the time.’ She held up the purse. ‘I’m making this for one of the stalls at the church fête that’s coming up soon. It’s the kind of thing that always sells well. I only wish I had time to make more but I fear I’m a very slow needlewoman. Does your mother like to sew, Sergeant Prasanna?’
A glum expression clouded Prasanna’s face. ‘No, ma’am.’
‘What a pity. Well, if you should happen to think of anyone who might like to give me some help, it’s for a very good cause. We hope to raise money for orphaned children of the plantation workers.’
‘As you say, ma’am, a very good cause.’ He paused, bes
towing a dejected look on the crumbs on his plate.
‘Do have another piece,’ Jane said encouragingly, pointing to the cake stand. He took a slice but instead of eating it, began crumbling it absentmindedly.
‘Have you someone in mind, Sergeant?’ she asked gently.
He looked up. ‘I have a friend who is very clever with her needle, but she will not be in Nuala much longer.’
‘Oh dear, what a pity. Are you sure she can’t be prevailed upon to stay, just for a little while?’
Prasanna reduced the cake to dust. ‘No, ma’am.’ He rubbed his eyes. ‘It is impossible.’
‘Nothing is impossible, Sergeant. Perhaps if you tell me more, I will be able to help. I have, after all, lived a great many more years than you.’
Jane watched him avert his eyes and felt a pang of annoyance with herself. Had she taken too much of a liberty and lost her chance of winning his confidence? His next words, however, reassured her.
‘Mrs de Silva… I would be very grateful if you would help me.’
‘And I’ll be delighted to do whatever I can.’
‘Inspector de Silva has been so good to me that I don’t know how to tell him.’
There was a long pause. ‘Tell him what, Sergeant?’ asked Jane eventually.
‘I must leave the police force, ma’am.’
‘Gracious me, that seems very drastic. Surely there is some other way of dealing with this problem, whatever it is? My husband is always telling me he thinks you have the ability to go far. It would be a great pity to give up now.’
Prasanna chewed his lower lip. ‘He is very kind to say so, ma’am, but there is no other way.’
‘Sergeant, does this have something to do with a young lady called Kuveni?’
Prasanna looked sheepish. ‘Yes, ma’am.’
A defiant look came into his eyes. ‘We want to be together and that is impossible if I stay. Her father is sicker and sicker every day and her brother, Vijay, wants to take him back to the jungle. He refuses to leave his sister alone in Nuala so she must go too. They will not come back here. Vijay claims it is living among so many people in a town that has made their father ill in the first place. He believes that returning to the old Vedda ways is the only thing that will cure him.’
‘But it may not be the right thing for Kuveni?’
‘I’m sure of that, but she does not want to disobey her father and her brother. The only answer is for me to hand in my notice and go with them.’ He averted his eyes. ‘I still have to tell my mother what I have decided. She will not like it but it can’t be helped.’
Jane’s forehead creased. ‘Oh dear, my husband will be very sorry and so shall I. To say nothing of how your poor mother will feel. Surely if we put our heads together, we can solve the problem?’
Prasanna looked bemused and she smiled. ‘I mean that between the two of us, we should be able to find a solution to your problem.’
‘You are very kind to say so, ma’am, but I do not think any other way is possible.’
She studied him pensively. ‘Do you know something, Sergeant? I believe you may be wrong about that.’
Chapter 26
‘By golly, when you said you would speak to Prasanna I didn’t expect everything to be settled so quickly.’
‘I didn’t see a good reason to delay. Kuveni and her family might have left Nuala at any moment and then where would we have been?’
‘Where indeed. I know that I would have been very sorry to lose my sergeant.’
De Silva stretched his legs out on the hearthrug and took a sip of his whisky and soda. It had been a tiring day and he felt he had earned a strong one. He still hadn’t managed to track down Matthew Claybourne, and all he had to show for his exertions was sore feet. The thought of losing his promising sergeant was even more disturbing than it might otherwise have been. ‘So you’ve already seen the girl and her family and they agree to her coming to live here, as we discussed?’
‘Yes. Her father and her brother were a little dubious at first but I managed to reassure them.’ She chuckled. ‘Kuveni herself needed very little persuasion. It’s clear to me she’s as fond of Prasanna as he is of her. She was happy with the idea of helping me with the sewing and after the fête is over, I’m sure I can find plenty of other little jobs for her to do for as long as she wants to stay. As you said, she seems very bright. We shall see what can be achieved with a few English lessons. If she learns to speak the language, it will open many doors.’
De Silva’s head was in a whirl. He knew from experience that once Jane seized on a plan, there was no stopping her. He thought, however, that he ought to introduce a note of caution. ‘But what about Prasanna’s mother? Suppose she remains opposed to the match? We don’t want to come between her and her son, do we?’
‘Of course not, but I’m confident that once she’s acquainted with Kuveni and sees how she and Prasanna feel about each other, she’ll give them her blessing.’
He leant across and patted her knee. ‘Congratulations, my love. Mrs Bennett was an amateur compared to you.’
‘You know, dear, I rather think she was.’
**
The days that followed passed peacefully. In fact so peacefully that de Silva put thoughts of his perplexing visitor to the back of his mind. They only returned to Claybourne when he heard that, with the funeral now over, Lady Caroline and Ralph Wynne-Talbot would shortly leave Nuala for Colombo and the ship for England. If Claybourne didn’t return soon, Wynne-Talbot would be five thousand miles away and safely installed as the 14th Earl of Axford. It would be far too late to challenge him then.
De Silva added some more curlicues to the doodle on his blotter as he mulled the matter over. It went against his principles to give up, and Claybourne’s story hung together, but what else could he do? Confronting Ralph Wynne-Talbot with an accusation of murder was going to be risky enough, but when it was solely based on the evidence of someone who had vanished into thin air, it was professional suicide.
The pen inscribed a final flourish; he replaced the cap and looked at the clock. Good, it was time to shut the station and go home. As the Morris purred towards Sunnybank, he looked forward to a pleasant evening with Jane.
**
‘Much more of this whistling around the station and Nadar and I will have to stuff a gag in Prasanna’s mouth,’ he remarked as he and Jane ate dinner. ‘I’m not sure it wasn’t better when he was behaving like a wet month.’
‘A wet weekend, dear, and I’m sure you don’t mean it.’
He grinned. ‘I’m joking, of course. But it did seem more like a month than a weekend.’
‘And what about Constable Nadar? I hope the baby isn’t still teething.’
‘I believe that is over and for the present Nadar is remarkably alert. Do you know, I believe life in Nuala may be measuring up to expectations after all?’
‘We mustn’t tempt fate, but you may be right. It’s nice to have nothing more to worry about than whether the fête will go well on Saturday.’
‘Of course it will. I feel it in my bones.’
He helped himself to spicy dahl and a large spoon of fragrant rice. ‘How is the sewing getting on?’
‘Very well. Kuveni is so much quicker than I am and has lots of good ideas for designs. I think Florence can’t fail to be impressed and that will be a very good thing. If I let her believe that Kuveni is her own discovery, she’ll recommend her to her friends. Kuveni might build up a nice little business given time.’
‘That’s excellent. So even if things don’t work out between her and my sergeant, she has a skill that will enable her to support herself.’
Jane looked at him quizzically. ‘Oh, I don’t think we need worry about that.’
She put down her knife and fork and replaced her napkin in its silver ring. ‘I think I shall read for an hour or two. I need a rest from all this sewing.’
‘I’ll join you, but I’d like a walk round the garden first.’
‘Well, b
e careful not to bump into anything.’
‘You know I have the eyes of an owl.’
The balmy night air intensified the scents in the garden. De Silva loved to walk among the flowerbeds at this time, drinking in the many aromas and admiring how the moonlight cloaked everything with a silvery sheen. Small scuffling sounds in the bushes told him he wasn’t alone. He heard the high-pitched squeak of fruit bats on their nightly hunt.
Then all at once, there was a different sound from the direction of the large tulip tree, as if a bigger creature had found its way into the garden. He froze and listened. It might be many things: monkeys, or perhaps one of the big monitor lizards, even – and the thought caused him considerable alarm – a leopard that had wandered out of the jungle in search of easy prey. Most wild animals would do you no harm unless you cornered them and he had no intention of doing that, but a leopard might be hungry.
Very cautiously, he crept across the lawn in the direction of the verandah. His heart pumped faster and the blood sang in his ears as he thought he saw something move behind a tree. Was there a low snarl too? He kept moving slowly; it was a mistake to run. A leopard had the speed to outrun the Morris, let alone a middle-aged policeman who was a little too fond of his food.
In the drawing room’s lighted window he saw Jane already settled in her chair, her head bent over her book. A few more moments and he reached the verandah and slipped inside to join her, closing the door firmly behind him.
Jane looked up. ‘Whatever’s the matter, dear? You look quite unnerved.’
‘I believe we have an intruder in the garden. A leopard possibly.’
‘Gracious. Isn’t it unusual for them to come so close?’
‘Yes, but maybe it’s an old one and not as fast as it was. Domestic animals are attractive then.’
Jane shuddered. ‘They’re such beautiful creatures but I prefer not to share the garden with one.’
Dark Clouds Over Nuala Page 15
