Burning Embers

by Hannah Fielding

  “Come, let’s sit down. I’ll ask Aluna to bring us some tea and cakes. You remember Aluna?”

  “Of course I remember Aluna. But I’m afraid I must beetle off. I came by to invite you out for tomorrow night. A group of us are going to the Golden Fish nightclub, and it would be lovely if you could join our party. Kenya is a wonderful place if you have friends, but if not, it can be awfully lonely and depressing. You’d be packing your bags in no time. We can’t have that!”

  “I don’t think I could ever become depressed in this country,” murmured Coral dreamily. “All these years, I longed so much for this place.”

  “Once a romantic, always a romantic…We’ll pick you up tomorrow at nine o’clock. They’re a nice bunch. You’ll like them.”

  “Thank you very much. By the way, how did you know I was here?”

  “We’re a small community with a strong grapevine. We all live more or less in each other’s pockets. It can become a little worrying and rather stifling at times, but one gets used to it.” Sandy sighed and gave Coral a sideways look. “Anyway, time and chance reveal all secrets, isn’t that how the proverb goes?”

  Coral gave a faint start. Was it her imagination or had Sandy’s gaze suddenly become more intense, more scrutinizing?

  “Remember, pick you up at nine o’clock,” called her friend over her shoulder as she ran down the stairs, blew her a kiss, and sped off. The whispering breeze blew through the branches, scattering a handful of purple blossoms off the jacaranda trees as the silver convertible disappeared around the corner of the drive. Coral remained there, leaning against one of the cedar columns and staring into the distance, deep in thought. Was she really a romantic? Certainly it was her romantic notions that had carried her away in the case of Dale and blinded her to his true nature. She thought of her stranger again. Was she once more going to be the victim of her dreams and fanciful imagination?

  “Who was that?” enquired Aluna as she joined her mistress on the veranda. “I thought I heard a car.” She squinted suspiciously over the balcony.

  “Sandy Lawson. You remember Sandy? We used to be quite inseparable.”

  “Oh, yes! I know Sandy Lawson…very odd that one,” she mumbled under her breath.

  Coral burst out laughing. “Aluna dear, you’re quite the most amazing person I have ever met. Don’t you ever have a nice word to say about anybody? Now why do you dislike poor Sandy?”

  “I don’t dislike Miss Sandy,” retorted the yaha on the defensive. “I only said that she is odd.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that still waters run deep and that the wool cannot be pulled over Aluna’s eyes.”

  “I still don’t understand. I wish you’d stop this habit of speaking in riddles.”

  “Miss Sandy seems to be a very nice young lady, very sophisticated. She comes from a respectable family and works in her father’s firm. But then she keeps strange company.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that she has some weird friends among the Africans, and for a lady of her position, I do not think it is good. She’s also a friend of that Frenchman.”

  “What Frenchman?”

  “Will you stop hectoring me, Missy Coral? I’m tired of all your questions. They make my poor brain ache.”

  “Forgive me, Aluna. I don’t mean to be a nuisance, but you’re so mysterious and there are so many things that I don’t understand,” Coral explained.

  “Stay a little and news will find you. Shall I bring your supper out here or would you prefer to have it upstairs?”

  “I’m not hungry, thank you. I’ll have a tray of fruit upstairs later on.”

  It was almost seven o’clock. While Coral had been talking, night had fallen with tropical abruptness, the countryside sinking into a black-magic void. She wondered how she would occupy herself until her bedtime. In England, she had led an active life. This forced inactivity, even for so short a time, was beginning to weigh on her. She also felt out of place. Mpingo was her house, her home, but she was not mistress here. Almost everything inside it had been transformed or altered, and she would have liked to move things about but daren’t in case that encroached on her stepmother’s territory.

  Her mind lingered for a while on Cybil Sinclair. A portrait of the woman was hanging in the living room. Coral had noticed it earlier on that day when, after her fall, Aluna had helped her into the sunny room. She had been surprised and faintly disturbed by her stepmother’s youth and beauty. The redhead’s portrait was strangely alive — the lithe and supple body seemed almost animated underneath the pleats of a black tunic, and the elongated green eyes smiled back at her enigmatically. She had tried to prompt Aluna to tell her about Cybil but had met with the same obstinate silence or cryptic nonsense that seemed to be the servant’s mantra nowadays.

  Coral suddenly remembered the keys that Robin had given her. Perhaps if she investigated those rooms in the basement she would find some answers to the list of questions that were rapidly accumulating in her mind. The keys were in her bag where she had left them, and so was the small, battery-powered torch she was in the habit of carrying around with her. She turned the key-ring over and over, examining the keys closely. They were old and rather ordinary, the sort you could have duplicated anywhere. Now why would anybody use that type of key to lock away something important? And why had Aluna discouraged her from going to the basement? She’d never know if she didn’t have a look for herself and try to throw a little light on the matter, she thought as she made her way to the back of the house where she remembered the basement stairs to be.

  Coral crossed the hall, past the kitchens. She managed to catch a glimpse of Aluna deeply engrossed in her cooking and the two servants who were busy laughing and chattering while drinking glasses of ink-black tea. The narrow corridor she traversed seemed shorter than she remembered. How many times as a child had she taken this route to go to the grounds, rather than the easier and more straightforward way that the front door offered? Eventually she reached the stone spiral staircase that ran into the garden and walked down its steps carefully. At the bottom, Coral hesitated for a moment, staring out into the opaque darkness of the great Kenyan night. Was she being reasonable? Straining her ears, she listened attentively for a sound, but could hear nothing else save the rapid beating of her own heart. Choosing to ignore her trepidation, she determinedly went round the stairway to a second door underneath the stairs, which led to the basement. Coral unbolted the door quietly, lifted the latch, and was relieved to find that it opened easily. As the vaulted ceiling was very low at the entrance, she had to bend her head to enter, and then gave a muffled cry as a moth-eaten, black cat slipped out of the darkness like a witch’s familiar, meowing languorously as it rubbed itself against her bare legs before jumping onto the ledge of a window and slipping away into the wilderness.

  Her torch only emitted a thin shaft of light, just enough for her to find her way. She crossed many vaulted rooms, some holding barrels and casks of wine. Others contained a salting tub, fruits and vegetables lined up to dry out on trestles covered with straw, and tanks of earth where the eggs had been kept fresh in the olden days. None of these rooms had doors to them, only small, barred windows.

  Coral finally came to a storeroom on a lower landing that was covered with cobwebs. There were a few steps down, and then a great wooden door, gray with dust. That must be it, she thought as she felt her pulse accelerate again with excitement. At the bottom of the stairs, she took the keys from her pocket and inserted one of them into the keyhole, disappointed when nothing happened. Coral tried the second one, and this time there was a faint click, allowing her to push the door open with an eerie creak that resounded in the silence.

  She entered a sort of gallery that was bathed in the moonlight filtering through the two encasements situated right at the top of the wall, almost at ceiling level. Coral ran her torch around the room. It was completely empty. Noticing a switch on the opposite side from w
here she stood, she went across to turn on the electricity but decided against it, lest someone outside noticed the light. Her foot involuntarily struck something hard jutting out on the flagstones. The ground shifted slightly underneath her and, jumping back, she could see there was some sort of trap door in the floor. Pulling on the heavy metal ring that lay on top, the creaking of the rusty hinges echoed through the basement as the door moved, uncovering a black gaping hole.

  Coral bent down and aimed the light into the hole. Six steep steps led to another small room that seemed crammed with all sorts of junk, not easily discernible in the weak beam from her fading torch. She was of two minds whether to continue her search or come back another day at a more reasonable hour. After all, what was there to find? Finally she made up her mind and went down the stairs into the small room, which appeared to have no other exit. This time Coral had no scruples in turning on the light, blinking as the glare from a bare bulb hanging from the ceiling flooded the room.

  There was some old furniture piled up in a corner, along with books, a stack of dusty crockery, and paintings…loads of paintings. As she took a closer look at them, Coral saw that most were paintings of her: in her childhood, as a teenager, and a few that were quite recent because they depicted her with a new hairstyle she had adopted only a year ago. She wondered: had her father been a painter? She picked up the one she thought to be the latest and scrutinized it. It was signed, but not by Walter Sinclair. In the right-hand corner, at the bottom of the portrait, clearly written in thick black ink was the name of the artist: “Raphael de Monfort.”

  Reading the name aloud, the sound of her own voice startled Coral in the silence. Another picture showed her at sixteen, at her first ball, in a beautiful pink organdie dress with satin ribbons that was still hanging up in her cupboard in London. Coral remembered sending her father a photograph of herself on that memorable day. She examined another painting, then another and another, until she had gone through the lot. Something about them was fascinating. They were so clear, so detailed, and most of all, so alive. It was as though the artist knew her, not just superficially, but deeply, intimately; he seemed to have captured the essence of her soul, and she found that thought altogether exciting and a little disturbing.

  Coral looked at her watch. Time had jogged along: it was almost nine o’clock. Aluna would be looking for her and had probably worked herself up into a panic. She swept the room with a last glance, turned off the light, and started up the steep stairs. Then suddenly there was…a sort of a muffled noise above her, like the soft rush of feet. The beam of her torch chose to go out at that moment, and she tried to turn it on again but could not. The battery had died. Her blood ran cold as she realized that she was alone and defenseless. No one would hear her if she screamed. Holding her breath, she waited and listened attentively. Nothing. Gathering her courage, she went up the few steps that separated her from the moonlit room. Her eyes now accustomed to the dark, Coral stared in horror as she made out a tall, lean shadow standing in the doorway. A sudden shiver ran down her spine, making her hair stand on end.

  “Shikamoo, Miss Coral,” the shadow greeted her in a low but friendly voice as an oil lamp was lit.

  Coral swallowed hard and tried to answer but only managed a faint squawk. She felt her legs would give way any moment now. The African man in his white caftan was already stooping in the low doorway, but he bowed politely to her. “I am Juma, head servant of Mpingo,” he went on solemnly. “Welcome to your home. I am deeply sad that I was not here to greet you on your arrival, but I had to accompany memsahib on her travel. Please, let me now escort you back to the house.”

  “Thank you, Juma,” Coral whispered, grateful that her fears had come to nothing and trying to recover her composure. “That will be very kind.”

  “Perhaps we should shut the trap door before going,” he suggested as she walked to the door.

  “Oh, yes, yes, of course, how careless of me,” she answered quickly, sensing the disapproval in the servant’s voice.

  Coral locked the door behind her and replaced the keys in her pocket. As they silently made their way back, her fear dissipated, but she felt uneasy and nervous in the presence of the proud and quiet man who soundlessly walked in front of her.

  “Has Mrs. Sinclair returned?” she asked as they went up the spiral staircase.

  “Yes, Miss Coral, memsahib has returned. She is in the drawing room and is awaiting you.”

  “I see. Well, thank you, Juma, for bringing me back safely,” she said, smiling awkwardly at him as they came into the big hall.

  “Karibu. That is my duty,” he replied with a bow. He took leave of her while Coral entered the drawing room. The room was brightly lit by the nineteenth-century crystal chandelier that hung from the ceiling, but it was empty. Closing the door, Coral lifted her head, and her eyes met those of the face in the portrait, smiling back at her in that puzzling way that had struck her earlier that day. On impulse, she crossed the room and approached the mantelpiece over which the painting was hanging, looking for the signature. The portrait was unsigned…or had the signature been removed?

  “You must be Coral,” said a rather melodious voice behind her.

  Coral turned and once again met the smiling green eyes. The woman coming toward her though was slightly older than the lady in the portrait; the years did not diminish her beauty in any way — quite the reverse. Cybil Sinclair’s appeared today as a more mature, a more languid and sensual beauty. Wearing a Givenchy dark blue dress, she was tall, slim, and elegant, with catlike features. The lush, tousled red hair that in the portrait fell over her shoulders was now pinned back into a sophisticated bun. Coral could understand why her father had been bewitched.

  “I’m Cybil Sinclair. I see you’re looking at my portrait. I don’t care much for it myself, but poor Walter liked it, and I didn’t think of removing it after…” Her voice faltered for a split second, but she continued. “Of course, now that you’re here and the house belongs to you, surely you must have other plans…”

  “No, no, not at all.” Still recovering from her eventful day, Coral was taken aback by her stepmother’s affability. “It’s a beautiful portrait. I was actually admiring it. Who’s the artist?” she asked on impulse.

  Her stepmother shrugged, and her green eyes creased into a smile. “Oh, an old friend. It’s a portrait that dates back to my early days in Tanganyika,” she said casually. “Have you had dinner? We looked for you earlier, but Aluna didn’t seem to know where you were.” She paused, fishing perhaps for Coral to tell her where she had been, but the young woman did not volunteer any information. “Will you have something to drink?” Cybil went to a trolley at the far end of the room and, without waiting for Coral’s answer, poured herself out two inches of neat scotch. She laughed. “Don’t look so alarmed, my dear. After a journey such as the one I’ve just been on, I’m sure you’d also treat yourself to a little drink. The traffic in Nairobi can be absolutely hair-raising.”

  Cybil sat in one of the winged armchairs and signaled for Coral to do the same opposite her, facing the portrait. Her beauty and grace complemented the elegance of the room, which, like the others in the house, had been altered, but to a lesser extent. It had a classical, Georgian symmetry about it, dominated as it was by three large French windows opening onto the veranda. The gleaming brown floorboards, covered with old Persian rugs that she remembered from her childhood, gave it a familiar exuberance and warmth. Still, in this room, like everywhere else in the house except for the unchanged nursery, Coral felt uncomfortable and uneasy, as though she were an intruder.

  “Yes,” said Cybil, drawing Coral back down to earth, “coming back to that portrait. You can take it down anytime. I don’t like it much, at least not anymore. You see, it was all part of another me. I was luckier in those days!” She laughed again, a little hollow chuckle that sounded false.

  “I think it blends nicely with the rest of the room,” Coral said softly. “If you have no objection, I wi
ll keep it there…for a while.”

  Cybil shrugged her shoulders and silently sipped her scotch. “When would you like me to move out?”

  Once again Coral was caught off her guard. “Please don’t feel in any way obliged to move out simply because I have arrived. After all, the house is much too vast for me to live in on my own,” she mumbled quickly.

  “Oh, I’m so grateful that there’s no hurry for me to move just yet,” exclaimed Cybil with an obvious sigh of relief. “You understand, the estate’s old cottage is still full of poor Walter’s belongings and is in a rather shabby condition. It needs complete renovation. I’ll have to redecorate it entirely, you know…and everything takes so long here in Africa. You wait ages for materials and things to be sent over, and once they are here, workers are so slow and slack if not supervised carefully. Well, that does put my mind at rest for the time being.”

  By the time Cybil Sinclair started on her third scotch, the conversation, which for the past hour had been almost one-sided, was slipping into flippant trivia, and Coral was beginning to feel the repercussions of an adventurous day. Politely taking leave of her stepmother, she said good night and went up to her room. As Coral was closing the door behind her, she noticed Cybil Sinclair turn away, her fixed smile suddenly replaced with a hard, empty stare.

  * * *

  Coral woke up the next morning to glimpse, through the veil of the mosquito netting, a sulking Aluna bearing a tray of tea.

  “Good morning, Aluna,” she called out cheerfully.

  Ignoring her mistress, the woman busied herself picking up the clothes Coral had shed the night before, still lying on the floor.

  “You don’t need to pick those up,” said the young woman apologetically. “I was so tired last night, I could hardly keep my eyes open.”

  Aluna grunted and disappeared into the bathroom. Having run a bath, she was about to leave when Coral leapt out of bed and stood in front of the door, barring her passage.

  “Don’t go, Aluna,” she cajoled, planting a kiss on her yaha’s cheeks. “I would like to talk.”