Under the Jeweled Sky

by Alison McQueen

  Dr. Reeves tapped a spoon against his glass, silencing the table.

  “Dear friends,” he began. “Before we unleash our appetites upon this splendid feast, I feel that now would be an appropriate moment to say a few words in honor of those of us who, in all likelihood, will probably never grace this table again.” A dull murmur rose from those gathered. “This great tradition of Christmas lunch has followed us Brits to every far-flung corner of the globe. The world over, families will be settling down to a roast goose, just like this, so let us think of them for a few moments and raise our glasses to their health and happiness.” He picked up his glass. “To absent friends,” he said. Everyone followed suit, repeating the toast and taking a sip. “And next year, among those absent friends will be quite a few of us too. The Schofields, the Rippertons, the Bridgeports, Kay and I, of course, and dear Miss Blanche. Perhaps this table shall become a thing of the past, and this palace shall never again see the likes of these gatherings.”

  It seemed a fair assessment. The Maharaja was away again, having attended the grand silver jubilee celebrations of the Maharaja of Jaipur earlier in the month before moving on to the celebrations in Baroda. Most of those at the table would be leaving soon, and word had it that they would not be replaced. They had clung on to the last vestiges of the life that once was, huddling around the dying embers of the Empire, leeching what warmth they could from the fading flames of this, the jewel in His Majesty’s crown. Soon trunks would be packed amid drawn-out good-byes and promises of everlasting friendship.

  Dr. and Mrs. Reeves had decided to go back to England and retire, taking one or two servants with them to ease the transition from luxury to the plain living of the common man. The Bridgeports were off to try their luck elsewhere, to make a new fortune in the remaining colonies. This had been the preferred choice for many of the leavers, setting off for places like Bermuda, Rhodesia, and Hong Kong. Although British in their citizenship, some had barely set foot on home soil: a few years at public school perhaps or sobering holidays spent with relatives. Indeed, even their mode of language seemed strangely antiquated, a peculiar form of English that had sprung up long ago and remained largely untouched by the progress of time. In many ways, they were the odd ones out now, and the whole occasion felt like the end of an era, a great one at that, one they would all remember for the rest of their lives. Everybody felt it, even the cooks, who had been unusually solemn while preparing the many dishes for the sahibs’ Christmas festival. The goose had been basted with quiet ceremony, the potatoes roasted with extra care. At one point, the pastry chef had taken a moment to wipe his eyes on his sleeve and blow his nose on his cloth before returning to his quietly simmering sugar syrup. How softly some things ended. How violently some begin, like the bursting forth of a new star.

  Veronica Schofield sipped from her water glass, strictly teetotal in the presence of company. The brandy she drank in the confines of her own room she considered to be no one’s business but hers. George stole a brief glance at his wife. The water would be no hardship for her. She was probably half cut by the time she came down to lunch anyway. He didn’t care. She became morose under the influence of alcohol, and he would rather that than have her shrieking at him. He had even gone so far as to encourage it recently, seeing that decanters were quietly replenished in the hope that Veronica would take herself off and rest more often, aided by the tinctures he administered to her, old remedies ground from powerful natural herbs. They had helped to calm her, to some degree, each dose suspended in a good measure of brandy, which she pretended to suffer.

  It had become intolerable, the atmosphere between them, although perhaps it was nearer to the truth that he had finally come to the end of his patience. He had done everything he could think of to salvage his family, to make something good come of it, but there was no helping Veronica. She did not want to be helped. She wanted to wallow in that twisted world of hers, wrought from bibles and beatings and cold baths. There was nothing he could do for his wife, and it had taken him half a lifetime to see it. What a fool he had been, and now here he was, marking off another Christmas Day, another year gone by.

  “The final scene of the British in India has been played out,” Dr. Reeves continued, “and in years to come, we will all be able to say that we had some small role to play in that great point in history.” He looked at his wife, seated to his right, and placed an affectionate hand on her shoulder. “As for Kay and I, we would like to think that you will all come and visit us in Dorset. There will always be room for you, although we won’t be able to promise a khitmutgar at dinner and a boy to polish your shoes.” An appreciative patter of laughter passed down the line. “In the meantime, there is always the option of taking a little of the fine hill air with the Schofields in Ooty. Some of us may even make it to Simla at the invitation of the lovely Miss Blanche, whose impending marriage we shall add to the celebrations today.” A loud call of hear, hear came from the end of the table, where Miss Blanche blushed prettily beside Mr. Ripperton.

  “I’m crushed,” Rip called to the table. “If only Fi had agreed to the divorce, Briony and I would have been able to skip off into the sunset together!”

  Everybody laughed except Mrs. Schofield, who remained detached from the proceedings, twisting the stem of her water glass, her gaze fixed on the flickering candles.

  “Not on your life!” Mrs. Ripperton said, knocking Sophie with her elbow. “Until death do us part, my dear, whether I like it or not!” A roar of laughter went up. “And what would the fair Miss Blanche want from a silly old goat like you anyway?” She turned to her side and winked at Sophie good-naturedly. Momentary distraction over, everyone returned to Dr. Reeves’ speech.

  “So today, let us eat, drink, and be merry,” he said, his voice wavering a little. “Speaking for my wife and I, it has been the most wonderful adventure, and I hope that we shall all have many more.” He picked up his glass. “To King and country!” he declared.

  • • •

  By the time it was served, the goose was almost cold. Nobody minded. If anything, it seemed that everybody would have been happy for the lunch to go on forever, suspending the moment when they finally bowed to the last curtain and allowed the lights to dim.

  “You’ve been awfully quiet, my dear,” Mrs. Ripperton whispered to Sophie when the pudding finally came around.

  “Sorry,” she said, their exchange masked by the gay hubbub of chatter.

  “Don’t worry.” Mrs. Ripperton eyed Sophie’s untouched pudding. “Just shove it all around your plate a little and hide it under a bit of custard. Nobody will notice.” Sophie smiled briefly. “We shall all miss you when you are gone, my dear, but I have to say that I think it is a marvelous idea for you to strike out on your own. There’s nothing worse than being marshaled around by one’s parents. It’s about time you took yourself off and had a little adventure.”

  “Yes,” Sophie said, the pattern of conversation now so well-rehearsed that it fell from her lips automatically. She would be leaving two weeks hence to spend a few months at a teaching mission in Orissa, leading a group of children through the rudiments of the English language, a legacy left by the Empire that India had no intention of relinquishing. That was what they had told everyone anyway. While she was away, her father would complete his service to the Maharaja, while her mother traveled down to Ooty and looked for a suitable house to rent. Her father had it all worked out. By the time Sophie’s time was over, her parents would be ensconced in the delicate climes of the hill station perched over the Nilgiris, waiting for her. A place where they could all start over. A place where they could forget.

  Sophie had been admired and congratulated as the news of her imminent departure spread, and had been reassured by everyone that she would be a gifted tutor due to her cheery nature and endless patience. She had felt such a fraud, accepting their good wishes with a false smile and a heavy heart. Her mother had wanted her to go away soone
r, but her father had refused, unable to bear the thought of his daughter incarcerated in some far-off place while he choked on his conscience. The idea of spending Christmas without her was unthinkable, and the aggressive silence his wife meted out as punishment for his decision was a small price to pay in order for him to be able to kiss his daughter on this exalted morning. He had given her a pair of ruby earrings as she lay in bed and told her not to mention them to her mother.

  “By the time you get to Ooty, all this will feel like a distant memory.” Mrs. Ripperton tucked into her pudding. “It’s quite lovely. Rip and I have spent many wonderful times there and I’m longing to see it again. You know, I have found that memories have a habit of storing themselves up, like shoving things into the back of a closet. They’ll live there for as long as you care to leave them, and then, many years from now, you might find yourself clearing out that closet one day and out they will tumble, all your memories of yesteryear.”

  Sophie hoped that that would not be so. Right now, she could hardly bear the burden of moving from one day to the next. It was like a living death, the only escape coming in the form of her dreams at night, when she would spend hours with Jag, talking to him about her worries, feeling his arms around her as he comforted her and told her that everything would be all right. She would bury her face deep into his chest, inhaling his scent, his perfume still clinging to her when she woke in the morning, yearning for him. As the baby grew, so did her thoughts of him, running riot as she slept, leaving her tossing and turning, restless for hours.

  “When you’re done at the teaching mission, you must come and stay with us for a while,” Mrs. Ripperton said to her quietly. “Your father will have his practice set up by then, but you don’t want to go moving back in with your parents. You’ll probably find it far too claustrophobic. No doubt you’ll be feeling much too grown up for all that.”

  “No,” Sophie said blankly.

  She hadn’t thought about any of it, unable to picture a future for herself at all, only the next few months. What happened after then was not something she could contemplate. It did not exist. Spring would come, and then the rainy season, and somewhere in between she would bear a child, a child that slumbered quietly within her now, hidden beneath the folds of the awful dress that she had altered last night, unpicking the seams, resewing it with a little more forgiveness. It had taken hours, but she had been glad of the task, to be able to sit and concentrate on something in the quiet of her room, taking her mind from its troubles.

  Her mother refused to speak to her at all since the shocking news had been uncovered, barely looking at her except to issue her with the occasional furious glare, as though scheming some terrible revenge. Sophie had nothing to say to her anyway. She had had enough of her mother’s rages. When she was younger, much younger, she hadn’t understood why her mother acted the way she did, convincing herself that it must be her own fault, that she somehow invited the wrath upon herself. She had tried so hard to please her, taking up and diligently completing any chore she could think of, in order to lighten her mother’s load and brighten her mood. Yet the punishment would come regardless, sometimes in a shower of criticism, sometimes in the form of a garden cane passed smartly across the backs of her legs, leaving thick red welts that burned like fire. Her room had not been tidied properly. The dishes had not been stacked straight. Her piano practice had been hesitant and full of mistakes. No matter what she did, the outcome was the same.

  Her mother no longer ate with them, and Sophie was grateful for her absence, leaving her to sit with her father, who would adopt a pained air of cheerful normality, greeting her with a kiss on the head and offering snippets of interest from the newspaper to fill the silence. Together they had tiptoed through the ghastly daily routine as though stepping through a minefield, the constant effort of it wearying for them both, the air rigid the moment Mrs. Schofield emerged from her two rooms where she remained in solitude. Sophie had heard her parents arguing this morning, something to do with Christmas lunch, judging by the way her mother had finally shown herself half an hour late with an angry slash of lipstick across her tightly clenched mouth. Sophie was glad that she could not see her mother’s face from where she sat beside Mrs. Ripperton. She couldn’t bear to look at her.

  “I have a little gift for you, my dear,” Mrs. Ripperton whispered. Sophie felt something pass into her lap under cover of the tablecloth. “I noticed you no longer wear that pretty little locket of yours and I thought perhaps you felt you had outgrown it. It’s not much. Just a little trinket to keep as a reminder of the wonderful time we have had together.”

  Sophie’s hand went to the small package, a silk pouch drawn closed with a slender cord. She looked into her lap and opened it. Mrs. Ripperton’s pearls gleamed quietly back at her.

  “To remind you of our secret afternoons,” Mrs. Ripperton said. “I want you to know that I think you’re a marvelous young woman. You’ve brought a very welcome ray of sunshine into this rather staid life of mine, and I hope we shall remain friends forever.”

  Sophie knew that she was going to cry. There was nothing she could do about it. She could manage almost anything except kindness. Mrs. Ripperton’s tender words unraveled her completely. She wanted to pass the gift back to her, to say that she didn’t deserve it and that oh, if only she knew, what would she think of her then? Dear Mrs. Ripperton, who she had been so very rude to, deliberately avoiding her when she knew her to be looking for her, ducking into doorways, hiding in the shadows as the call of her name faded. She had found her ebullience embarrassing, the way Fiona linked her arm through hers and rattled on endlessly about the things she used to get up to when she was her age. She would insist on them doing idiotic things together, like playing old parlor games that were no fun at all with just two mismatched people. But today all that fell away. Today there was no one else Sophie would have rather been sitting next to, safe in her enormous shadow, the size of her obliterating any suggestion that Sophie’s own waist had thickened so. Oh, if only she knew.

  Sophie slipped the package into her purse, feeling nothing but shame and guilt. She wished so very much that she had brought something for Mrs. Ripperton in return, a small token of her thanks now that their time together was almost over. Had she known she would feel like this, she would have hurried to finish the sampler that she had stitched reluctantly so that her hands might have something to do while in her mother’s dark presence. It was a mess. Needlework had never been her strong point, but Mrs. Ripperton wouldn’t have minded. In fact, Sophie expected that she might have liked it all the more for its dreadful incompetence. She could have wrapped it up in colored paper and tied it with a ribbon and used a festive tag, written on it: To Aunt Fifi with love, Sophie. That was what she could have done, had she thought of it.

  Mrs. Ripperton’s hand came into Sophie’s lap again, this time with a lace-edged handkerchief. She leaned her bulk into the table slightly, hiding Sophie from view, calling, “Robert darling! Is there any more of that delicious pudding?”

  • • •

  Later, in the still of the night, Sophie dreamed of Jag. They were in the water garden, sitting by the lotus pool, the ornamental fish shimmering golden beneath the surface, sliding through the lotus stems. Jag held her hand and whispered to her. Sophie found herself awakened, a strange sensation low in her belly, like the flick of a fish’s tail. She lay there and waited, her eyes now wide open. And there it was again, tiny, almost indiscernible, like a butterfly fluttering deep inside her. She held her breath and lay still, and knew it was her baby.

  1958

  The Diplomatic Enclave, New Delhi

  15

  A rush of warm air flew into the Dakota’s cabin the moment the door opened, bringing with it the thick smell of aviation fuel and clouds of dry dust. Sophie unclipped her seat belt and smoothed her hands over her hopelessly wrinkled dress. She had so wanted to look just right today and had changed several time
s before settling on her outfit for the last leg of their journey. She should have worn something more tailored, she thought with irritation, a light two-piece with a silk blouse perhaps, rather than the softly cut dress she had opted for. Now she would descend the steps looking like she had slept in her clothes. She felt her heart pounding, her palms clammy with nerves.

  “Ready to face the firing squad?” Lucien touched her hand lightly. She had been unusually quiet during the flight, and he had noticed her chewing at the corner of her lip. She turned to him, having not heard a word. “You’ll be fine,” he said. “I’ll have the driver drop you off at the house so you can have a good look around and get yourself settled.”

  “Must you go straight off?”

  “I’m afraid so, darling. Best foot forward and all that. I’ll be with you before you know it. Don’t forget about the reception this evening, will you?”