by Isobel Chace
When he had gone, I went down into the bottom of the reservoir to make sure that no stones had been left that would gash the P.V.C. and spoil its waterproofing qualities. Some of the older men were raking the loose earth into patterns that formed symbols of good luck. On feast days, they told me, their women raked the floors of their houses in the same way to please the gods. When I returned to the bank Julie was there.
“Hello,” she said as I plodded up the bank toward her. She looked cool and lovely. By way of contrast I knew quite well that my face was shiny with sweat and my clothes rumpled and sadly stained by the dusty soil.
“Hello,” I replied a trifle cagily. “What do you think of my pet project?”
“It looks ... expensive,” she said. “I suppose it has meant the delay of other things?”
“I suppose so,” I agreed, surprised by her interest. “It will be worth it, though. We badly need this water.”
She smiled faintly. “Worth it to you, don’t you mean?”
“Well, yes,” I said, frankly puzzled.
She smiled again. “What I mean is that Gideon doesn’t get anything out of it? I imagine all the credit goes down under your name?”
I laughed, relieved that I had caught on to her meaning. “Oh, we don’t work like that!” I told her. “Gideon is running the station, so of course he’ll get most of the credit—a lot of the blame, too, if it doesn’t work, come to that!”
“There isn’t any chance of that, surely?” she demanded. “It’s a distinct possibility,” I said. “I’m not an engineer, you know.”
She lifted her elegant eyebrows and stared at me.
“You mean you started all this without knowing anything about it!”
“Pretty well,” I admitted. “I’ve seen it done at home in England, but the problems aren’t quite the same.”
“Look,” she said, brushing away my remark. “I want to talk to you. Does anyone around here speak English?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Some do.”
She pouted, patting her skirt into place around her slim hips. “Never mind, it’ll have to do. Gideon doesn’t seem to get out much with his leg in plaster, so we never have an opportunity to talk back at the house, do we?”
I sat down on the bank and wished that Joseph would come back with the P.V.C. The sky looked very odd to me and I was getting increasingly fearful that the rains would come before we were ready.
“Do you think it will rain this week?” I asked pessimistically. “Who cares? Susan, I may call you Susan, mayn’t I?”
“Most people call me Suki,” I told her carelessly.
“How quaint! Not that it matters. What are you going to do when you’ve finished this dam?”
My enthusiasm was immediately aroused.
“But don’t you see? Once we have water we can really get to work! I hope to double or even treble most of the crops in my charge. It will take more than water, of course. Selective breeding, proper manures and modern methods will make a tremendous difference too. It’s exciting, don’t you think?” Julie tossed her head and I was pleased to see that she also was beginning to feel the heat. She was not a superwoman after all.
“I’m afraid it wouldn’t excite me,” she said primly. “I think it’s rather a masculine interest for a woman.”
So we were back on that again! But this time I felt more sorry for her than angry.
“Didn’t you ever want to do something other than stay at home?” I asked impulsively.
She gave me a cynical smile.
“Oh, I think you have to be rather insecure to want to compete with men in their own fields. My father has always given me everything I want. Why should I work? All I want to do is marry and be a good wife.”
I swallowed down my impatience with the whole Burnett family.
“Here, in India?” I asked her.
She leaned against the jeep with a secret look in her eyes. “It will have to be in India,” she said. “I can’t imagine England would suit me at all! Servants at a premium and those cold winters! Besides, Gideon has rather turned his back on England, hasn’t he?”
I wiped the sweat out of my eyes and looked at her.
“Not necessarily,” I told her. “He might go back any time if an interesting opportunity arose.”
She bit her lip and trembled, her hair nodding in the wind. “I’m telling you! He can’t go back to England! My parents are here and they would never leave, so you see—” Her voice trailed away and she smiled. “But I forgot,” she said. “You don’t like my parents, do you?”
“No,” I said briefly, “I don’t.”
“Charming!” she retorted. “Not that it matters. You will be going back to England.”
“Oh? Is that a threat or a promise?”
She tossed her head. She looked very sure of herself, but then perhaps she had reason. Gideon had asked her to stay, after all.
“It was advice really. Camilla will be going back to England soon. If you’re wise, you’ll go with her. There isn’t room here for us both, is there?”
“We’ll see,” I answered. The rains had not yet started and Gideon was still a free man. But I couldn’t bear to look at her again in case she knew how she had unsettled me. And I didn’t want her to know that I, too, was in love with Gideon.
Julie smiled gently into the distance.
“No, we shan’t see at all,” she said. “I’m telling you!”
That rather brought the conversation to a close, and I think my relief must have been more than obvious when Joseph came triumphantly back with the news that the supplies had arrived. He drove the jeep straight up the bank and nearly landed in the reservoir. With a paralyzing whoop, Camilla jumped clear and landed in a huddle beside us.
“Are you all right?” I asked her, laughing.
She jumped to her feet, sheer exuberance showing in her every movement. Then her eyes fell on Julie and her smile died. “What are you doing here?” she demanded rudely.
Julie looked at the young girl, noting the dust on her hair and the creases of her face.
“What are you doing, dear?” she returned coldly. “I’m sure Gideon would never approve if he knew you were holding up the great work!”
I interrupted quickly before Camilla could say anything she might later regret.
“What nonsense! She and Joseph have just been to collect some supplies. Where are they, by the way?”
“It’s following,” Joseph shouted to me triumphantly. He leaned out of the jeep and pulled Camilla back into the seat beside him. “Gideon wants to know when you start welding and he’ll be out to help.”
A tide of excitement rose within me.
“Tell him I’ll be waiting for him,” I answered cheerfully. Joe backed the jeep off down the slope, practically turning it over at the bottom, he was going at such a speed. I grinned and waved at the two of them and then turned my attention back to Julie. To my surprise her face was taut with temper.
“How dare he ignore me?” she demanded. “How dare he?” I said nothing. It didn’t seem to matter what she said just then. It was a long job. The sheets of P.V.C. were laid out, edge to edge, until they covered the whole of the dug-out area. Anxiously, I helped to walk out the air pockets underneath before we welded the edges together to form a single bottom to the gigantic tank. “Right,” I said at last. “We can begin welding.”
We sat on the bank and waited for Gideon. He arrived almost immediately. He had come to terms with his leg now and could manage quite well despite the heavy plaster cast.
“Is it as hot out here as you look?” he asked me.
I wiped the perspiration away from my brow almost resentfully. “It’s extremely hot!” I retorted. “I daresay one can stay cool with nothing to do but sit on the verandah—” His grin brought me to an abrupt halt.
“I hope you’re not referring to me,” he said quite gently. But I refused to answer. He was in love with Julie and I would do well to remember it. Instead I turned away, looking i
n the jeep for the welder, but Joseph had already taken it out on to the reservoir. Shyly, I glanced up at Gideon to find he was still smiling, so I grasped him by the hand and pulled him down the slope.
“Hmmm,” he said thoughtfully. “It should keep the water in. What else are you going to do?”
I explained that I had thought to cover it with a few inches of soil so that it would not perish in the strong rays of the sun.
“Fair enough,” he nodded. “I can see that by this time next year we shall be sitting on the banks fishing.”
“Oh, do you really think so?” I asked enthusiastically. “It would be great fun!”
“I thought you’d think so,” he said with satisfaction.
“If I’m still here,” I added uncertainly.
He looked at me in surprise. “Of course you’ll be here!” he said impatiently.
We worked hard until it grew dark and the men began to think about lighting their fires and eating their scanty meal before going to bed.
As we drove home Gideon stretched his tired limbs and grunted.
“There may be disadvantages in employing females,” he said comfortably, “but this is one of the big advantages!”
I held on to the wheel with one hand while I swatted at an insect with the other.
“What is?”
His smile was particularly charming in the dusky light. “Why, traveling through the darkness with you, what else?” It would have been bliss if I hadn’t known that he was teasing me.
“You’d better let me concentrate on my driving, then,” I said primly, “or it might not be such fun after all!”
He chuckled. “Are you planning to ditch me, Suki?”
I could feel myself blushing.
“I ... I...” I began. “I haven’t the foggiest idea what we’re talking about!”
“No? You must be feeling very obtuse!”
I made an irate gesture and we very nearly left the dusty strip that passed as a road. With an effort I pulled at the wheel to find that Gideon’s hand was already there. As soon as we were straight he placed his hand over mine and it was as much as I could do to steer at all.
“It isn’t kind to play with other people’s feelings!” I tossed at him.
His eyebrows shot up.
“Is that what I’m doing? How interesting! By the way, I’ve been meaning to tell you all afternoon that there’s a letter waiting for you at the station.”
“For me?” I stammered.
“That’s right. A pale blue envelope with an American stamp on it!”
My mouth suddenly went dry. I put my foot on the accelerator and we shot forward. I braked very nearly as sharply and almost stalled the engine.
“Timothy,” I whispered.
He grinned. “It seems likely, though if I’d known it was going to have this effect on you I would have waited until we were home before telling you about it!”
I apologized and concentrated harder on my driving.
“It isn’t really very exciting,” I tried to explain. “It’s only the answer to my letter to him.”
“So you did write?” he prompted me.
I nodded. “I don’t suppose you’ll ever understand,” I said with a sudden burst of confidence. “I can’t understand it myself! I was so sure that I was in love with Timothy!”
He turned off the ignition key and the jeep slowly came to a halt. For a second I thought my driving had fallen to pieces, but I didn’t really care. For the first time that day I felt cool and almost happy.
“Why did you do that?” I demanded.
He shrugged his shoulders.
“I just wanted to sit here forever and watch the clouds blow overhead.”
I looked up at the sky.
“Besides,” Gideon went on, “I want to hear about your letter to Timothy.”
I bit my lip, forgetting all about the clouds.
“There’s nothing to tell,” I said. “That’s the trouble. There never was anything to tell, but I only realized it a week or so ago. I suddenly couldn’t even remember his face properly!”
“Had you ever really looked at it?” he asked.
I was indignant, but I shook my head.
“Okay,” he said. “Now that you’ve admitted it, you can drive us both home and read your letter.”
“Do you think it will thunder?” I asked.
He put out his hands just as the first drops of rain began to descend from the sky.
“I think it’s going to rain,” he said, and we laughed like a couple of children. I only stopped laughing when I thought of all the welding that still had to be done.
CHAPTER TWELVE
I had never seen it rain so hard. By day I worked on the dam, the water dripping down the back of my neck. As soon as the welding was completed, the men covered the shiny black surface with mud. Gideon, his leg so much better that they had pared away at the plaster until his movements were considerably less restricted, used the roller on the edges, weighting it down and rolling it into the soil until there was no chance of any of it breaking free and tearing.
The narrow stream swelled into a river and the two tanks of the reservoir began to fill. The actual dam was not yet necessary and would have caused flooding, but everything was ready to control the flow of the water. At last, it seemed, the project was complete and there was no reason why the village should ever be short of water again.
And still it rained. Not the mild, caressing rain of the temperate lands, but a pouring torrent of raindrops bouncing off the earth again and again and penetrating deep into the earth until the land became a sea of mud.
“And to think that I thought the heat was trying!” I remarked one day to Camilla. We were both lying on our beds.
“It wouldn’t be so bad if Julie went home!” she said mournfully.
I didn’t trust myself to answer. The thought of Julie was a constant burden, weighing down my spirits and making me less and less sure of myself. She was like a cat in the rain, bad-tempered and spiteful, and she never went out if she could help it. It was only at night that she really came alive, and she and Gideon would sit for hours on the verandah until the early hours of the morning. It had become impossible for me to sleep until I heard her high heels clattering down the corridor to her bedroom.
“Perhaps she will never leave,” I said thoughtlessly.
Camilla sat up with a bounce. “What do you mean?”
I got off the bed decisively. “Nothing! Gideon likes having her here, though, so why shouldn’t she stay?”
“I could give you any number of reasons!” Camilla said flatly. I ruffled through the papers on the table and came across Timothy’s letter. How funny, I thought, that I had hardly bothered to read it that evening. I had been so taken up with Gideon and so hopeful of so many things.
“I think she’s mad, like her parents!” Camilla announced quite casually.
“Very likely!” I agreed.
Timothy’s handwriting was practically incomprehensible. He was glad I was happy in India because it was extremely unlikely that he would ever return to England. The work he was doing was interesting and, he thought, valuable to the Western world. He was making a good salary and thought he would probably marry and settle down in America.
“Joseph says she simply hates you,” Camilla told me with relish. “Lucky you, that’s all I can say. She seems determined that we shall be bosom friends.”
I laughed. “You’re Gideon’s sister,” I said dryly.
She blinked determinedly at me.
“I wonder what she’ll think when I marry Joe,” she mused. “He says we have to wait until Gideon accepts that his work is as good as anyone else’s, but that won’t take forever!”
I turned quickly. “But Camilla, you’re so young!”
Camilla hugged her knees happily. “All the better! I’ll have more years with Joseph! Is that letter from Timothy?”
I nodded sadly, because it was sad, in a way, that Timothy had never been mine and
never would be.
“He says he’ll send a card at Christmas,” I said rather bitterly. “And you like him?” Camilla demanded, wrinkling up her nose in displeasure.
“Not much,” I admitted honestly. “But he was there, and now there’s no one.”
Camilla looked very wise and nodded her head.
“Never mind,” she said. “You have the dam, and now that it’s finished—all but—and the rains have come, you’ll be famous!” Which was cold comfort indeed and not at all what I wanted. With my usual neat, precise movements, I tore Timothy’s letter up into little pieces. One of the best things about a research station is that there is always work to be done and one can’t feel sorry for oneself for long with a test tube in one hand and a spade in the other. If I couldn’t be loved at least I could be dedicated.
“Oh, by the way,” Camilla added, “you don’t really have to worry about Julie, because I have a plan to deal with her. I’m not having her for a sister-in-law, whatever she might think!”
I gazed at her helplessly.
“I don’t think you ought to interfere,” I said at last.
