Zemindar

by Valerie Fitzgerald

  ‘That’s good,’ she returned complacently, and went away to get dressed.

  The dinner party went well. Mr Erskine, accompanied by his oddly assorted retainers, arrived promptly and we sat down to the meal at half-past four. Connie smiled silently on the company from one end of the table, and Wallace did the honours boisterously from the other. The cook had excelled himself; the shabby appointments were as clean and neat as hands could make them; the silver was eked out by sundry sauceboats and entrée dishes borrowed from the Barrys—a common practice in India—and two of the Barrys’ servants helped to serve at the table. With the assistance of a respectable wine, tongues were loosened and tempers relaxed, and when the ladies left the room I could congratulate myself that my efforts on behalf of Charles and his brother had been successful.

  Despite Connie’s optimistic prognostications, the gentlemen joined us in the drawing-room when they had finished their port, and at Kate’s suggestion Emily was asked to sing. I accompanied her on Connie’s piano, one of the few Avery possessions still in almost pristine condition, and Captain Fanning gallantly turned the pages. Emily’s voice was light and sweet and had been excellently trained for ballads and the sentimental songs well within its capacity. She stood composedly, her fan clasped loosely in her hands, with the lamplight glowing gently on the rose of her dress and her golden hair, and sang without affectation—simply and with an enjoyment in singing that induced enjoyment in others. I can remember reflecting that perhaps it was at just such a moment, as she sang just such a song and made just such a graceful picture, that Charles had first fallen in love with her, in that faraway drawing-room at Mount Bellew. Air followed air, everyone requesting their own favourites, and when at last Emily herself cried a halt to the concert, I was not surprised to see Mr Erskine’s eyes fixed on my cousin with an expression of most marked approval. Immediately Emily had sat down, Wallace, who had been fidgety for some time, suggested that the gentlemen should withdraw to the dining-room where the tables had been set up. Our guests were not all eager to play, Mr Erskine less so than any, but as Charles seconded Wallace’s motion with enthusiasm, they had little option. Connie then seized the opportunity to retire to her room and her ‘night-cap’, and Kate, Emily and I were left to entertain ourselves for the rest of the evening.

  At eleven o’clock the Barrys and Captains Jennings and Hunt made their departure. Wallace saw them off with many protestations against their leaving so early, and then with a hurried goodnight to us disappeared again into the dining-room, where I caught a glimpse of Charles, Mr Erskine and Captain Fanning lounging at ease in their chairs, with a couple of decanters between them and a cloud of cigar smoke mantling the lamp. Obviously, there was no point in Emily or I waiting up to say goodnight.

  Usually I was the first up and about in the Avery household, but for little Johnny, who was also an early riser and spent the hours before his walk and breakfast sitting on his ayah’s lap on the verandah while she recounted endless and involved stories to him in Hindustani. Often I joined them, for the stories were told in infant terms, using a vocabulary that I found just within my grasp, and the ayah, a good-natured creature, was always prepared to stop and repeat what I did not understand, while Johnny, cradled like a little potentate in her vast white muslin lap, sucked his thumb and regarded me with his big eyes.

  On that particular morning, I had just settled myself in a patch of sunlight to listen to the ayah’s tale when, to the surprise of us all, we were joined by Wallace Avery.

  ‘I didn’t think you would be up so early after the party,’ I said. ‘Have you an early parade?’

  ‘No—no parade.’

  ‘Don’t tell me you haven’t been to bed yet? I must say I did not hear your guests leave, but then I sleep so soundly.’ I had intended the remark as a joke, but as I spoke realized that Wallace certainly had not been to bed. The crumpled clothes were those he had worn the night before, but now his collar and cravat were both unfastened, and there was a wine stain down the front of his shirt. Neither had he shaved nor brushed his hair. His face was white and drawn, and the expression in his protruberant blue eyes was one of utmost misery.

  ‘No, I have not been to bed,’ he said, and sitting down on a sagging cane chair near mine, buried his face in his hands.

  ‘Wallace, are you ill? Is anything the matter?’

  ‘Not ill,’ he muttered through his hands. ‘But, God, I wish I were dead!’

  ‘Wallace!’

  ‘Well, I do, and that’s the plain truth. Finally—I have finally—managed to run myself into the muck. Right down, Laura, and there is no escape for me. I am ruined! Ruined!’

  ‘But how …?’

  ‘A long story. Oh, a long story indeed. Why should I bother you with it? You can probably guess most of it anyway.’

  ‘But—ruined! Surely it cannot be as bad as that. You are very tired … and depressed for the moment … but things will look better when you are rested.’

  He shook his head in his, hands, then looked up at me and, seeing both the ayah and Johnny regarding him with open amazement, he swore at the woman and ordered her to take herself off. She got to her feet, picked up Johnny and vanished round the side of the house.

  ‘I was trying to help matters. I know, that’s what everyone says when they do this sort of thing, and I’ve always laughed at the man who expected to be believed. But really, I was trying to pull things together again. Give myself one last chance. Was sure my luck must eventually turn, d’you know?’

  ‘No, not really, Wallace. Do you mean you have lost too much at cards? Is that it?’

  ‘Too much! Good God, I’ve lost all I have! All I ever shall have.’

  ‘Last night?’ I was aghast.

  ‘Last night was just the final touch. But a very final one. What’s the good of trying to explain? I have nobody to blame but myself, but what’s a chap to do when he has no income of his own? No one can live on the sort of salary the Army gives me. Not decently anyway. And Connie …’

  ‘Yes, I know that Connie … that Connie must be a burden to you—and a great worry!’

  ‘That’s how it all started, I suppose. Not that I’m blaming poor sweet Con! Wouldn’t dream of doing that, y’know. But it helped all right. I began to get into debt very early. Everyone does out here, but most men have some sort of expectations—their Pa’s can be counted on to die before things get too bad—that sort of thing. I had no hope of anything coming to me from my Pa! He’s a country clergyman—or was. Died last year. Anyway, I managed to straighten things out pretty well, to begin with. Kept control. Until Con started to … to drink. After that there was never really any hope. I’d win a bit and put it aside; I’ve never played because I enjoyed it, d’you see. Never! Only because it was the one way I could hope to make a bit on the side. Some hope, too! I’d manage to keep what I’d won, for a couple of months sometimes, but then the tradesmen would turn up saying their bills were unpaid. I’d storm and fume and then it would come out that Connie had frittered away all the housekeeping and her pin-money. So my winnings would go. And in desperation I’d start playing again. I’ve spent seven years trying to get together enough to send her home, but it was doctors and medicines and having to send her to the hills to get over the babies, and then the funerals. Oh God, what a mess! What a damned awful mess!’

  He lifted his head and stroked his moustache nervously with his short fat fingers.

  ‘Then I managed to get a loan once, when I was pretty badly down. A fairly substantial loan. From a bunnia—a moneylender.’

  ‘Oh, Wallace!’

  ‘Yes, not a wise step, I agree. But at the time I thought it was the only thing to do. No other way out, y’know. Owed a chap money and he was going home, lucky devil. He had to have it, of course, so I went to a bunnia. Since then … well, Laura, I hope you know nothing of how bunnias operate, but you may have heard enough of their methods to guess that I have never been out of their hands since. Never will be now! I wouldn’t m
ind that so much, but I had kept a sum clear—for nearly a year I’ve been hoarding it—to use when Connie and the boy go home in the spring. But now, well, I’ll be forced to use it to pay off the bunnia’s interest. Can’t hope ever to do much about the capital, of course, but after last night and the night of the ball I’m properly skinned!’

  ‘Connie won’t be able to go home?’

  ‘Not now, no.’

  I had the tact to remain silent. Poor Wallace was well aware of what the failure of this last hope would mean to his wife.

  The world was awakening. Sunshine, the clear pale sunshine of India’s winter, flooded the garden and jewelled the arched spray from the gardener’s waterbag as he sprinkled the beds. The scent of woodsmoke from the cook’s newly lighted range and of damp earth from the flowerbeds filled the air. A string of fat mules harnessed to ammunition carts clipped past the gate, their harness jingling cheerfully. A small detachment of sepoys marched briskly down the dappled yellow dust of the road, and the milkman came up the drive leading his buffalo, which would be milked in the back yard under the watchful eye of the ayah who ensured no adulteration of the milk took place between the animal and the jug.

  ‘Is there no one in your family who could help?’ I ventured hopefully.

  ‘No one, even if I had the gall to ask ’em. No—I’ll just have to face facts.’

  He paused, then broke into a bitter laugh. ‘Oh, heavens! And I thought I was so clever to ask Erskine round for a game. I lost—well, pretty heavily the other night at the Residency, you see. Enough to make me sit up and think, d’you know, and when Erskine arrived I considered him a gift from the gods. Rich man. No gambler. Not even much interested in cards. What could be easier?’

  ‘You lost to Mr Erskine?’

  ‘And to the others, but most to him, damn him! It wasn’t my night. Not my night at all. Yes, most to Erskine. Blast him, he plays like a professional, and luck favoured him all through the evening—couldn’t do a thing wrong.’

  ‘What a pity it was him. If it had been Charles, I am sure he would have overlooked …’

  ‘No, Laura! Never! That is impossible—gaming debts are debts of honour.’

  ‘Oh, what nonsense you men talk. Surely Connie’s well-being, and little Johnny’s, are more important than this nonsense about honour? However, since it is not Charles …’

  ‘Well, there you are. There is nothing to be done. Nothing!’ He sighed deeply. ‘This will be the end of my career—in the regiment. Not that I’d mind that particularly, if there were any hope of getting myself out of the bunnia’s clutches. I’ve been warned already a couple of times, when my affairs came to the attention of the Colonel. Old Hande is a stickler for the proprieties: very God-fearing, reads his Bible every morning, that sort of thing, y’know, and wants his officers to do the same. Never touched a card in his life. Nor a drink. Holds prayer meetings for the sepoys—not that they like that, mind you—but he’s not going to be understanding about this mess. And then, of course, there’s poor Con! Everyone knows what happened to her at the ball. I expect I’ll be rusticated; sent off to some hole in the mofussil to think over my sins and recoup my finances.’

  ‘But how … why should Colonel Hande or anyone else know how much you have lost, or how much you owe these bunnia people?’

  ‘He’ll be told by the bunnia, if I don’t come up with what’s due. And I can’t. Then Hande will come down on me like a ton of bricks, and that’s when I will have to part with Connie’s passage money. It just about covers the interest I owe the swine. But even if I could get Connie home, I couldn’t support her there. Don’t you see, Laura? Not only have I nothing to fall back on, but every penny I earn is gone before I have earned it!’

  ‘I see. I had not realized that it was as bad as that.’

  All day Wallace’s confession weighed on my mind to such an extent that I was barely capable of returning a civil reply when addressed. Charles and Emily, naturally, knew nothing of the matter, and were more concerned with wondering when they would next see Mr Erskine. Charles’s opinion of his brother had improved markedly, and at dinner he took it upon himself to chaff Wallace on his losing to both Oliver Erskine and himself, saying that he looked forward to another profitable evening before Mr Erskine left Lucknow. I winced inwardly, but Wallace bore it well, though after dinner, instead of going off to the mess with Charles as usual, he came into the drawing-room and asked Emily to sing for him. After one ballad, he got up and went into the garden, where he remained pacing the gravel drive until bedtime. I could guess the unhappy nature of his thoughts, and though I pitied him, I pitied Connie even more. She was very cheerful that evening, and sufficiently sober to show an interest in the cost of lodgings, food and clothes at home, plying Emily and myself with questions, and interpreting our information as confirmation that her long-held dreams could now come true.

  ‘Oh, it’s going to be so wonderful,’ she exclaimed with an enthusiasm rare in her. ‘With things as cheap as they seem to be just now, Johnny and I will be able to manage excellently. Perhaps we could even take a little house, all to ourselves, near the sea—in Brighton. I must tell Wally that that is what I’d really like best. He is so good to me, he always considers my preferences first, and if we can afford it … . Just a little house, a small one, with a bay window looking towards the sea. Good sea air is just what Johnny needs, the doctor says.’

  I considered telling Charles of Wallace’s predicament; he was so generous and good-hearted I felt sure he would help. Even if the amount he had won from Wallace was insignificant, he was not a poor man and could certainly loan, or give, Wallace the amount for Connie’s passage. But I could not speak to him without asking Wallace’s permission to divulge his affairs, and even as I thought of this scheme, I knew that Wallace would veto it. He was a foolish man, and a reckless one, but he still had his pride, misplaced though it might be. If only Connie could be got to England. That was the most important thing. Once there, I was sure that a discreet letter to my Uncle Hewitt would bring forth some solution to keeping her there, at least for a couple of years. But I retired without approaching a solution to the problem.

  Generally I sleep quickly and soundly, but that night I tossed and turned for hours before my eyelids finally closed—and some time later wakened suddenly, knowing just what I must do.

  The plan that had suggested itself to my sleeping brain filled me with apprehension when I examined it in daylight. I shrank at putting it into practice, but the more I considered, the more I felt sure that it was the only thing possible. I knew, also, that I would not rest until I had forced myself to do what lay within my power to help Connie and little Johnny. If I failed no one need ever know that I had tried. Mr Erskine had struck me as a man who could keep his own counsel.

  After tiffin, I slipped out of the quiet house and sent the gardener to the servants’ quarters to have the horse harnessed and the carriage brought to the front. The man was obviously surprised, the afternoon hours being sacred to sleep, but the household knew I had not yet succumbed to the habit, and if my absence was noted, I would think of some excuse, such as wishing to borrow a tatting pattern from Kate Berry, who often abstained from the afternoon nap. Any surprise caused at the Averys’ by my untimely drive did not bother me nearly as much as that I could anticipate at my destination. Mr Erskine was staying at Major Cussens’s bungalow. I gave the driver the direction, sat back, and determined not to think of the impropriety of an unaccompanied lady visiting a bachelor’s residence at two o’clock in the afternoon.

  We met no other vehicles on the short drive. A slight wind soughed through the heavy foliage of the avenues, but otherwise everything was still, everyone asleep. Arrived at the bungalow, a servant, who had been dozing on the verandah, got to his feet hastily and showed me into the drawing-room, then disappeared to summon Erskine sahib. Imagining that Mr Erskine, like the rest of the population at this hour, was recumbent on his bed, I sat down to wait in the comfortless, white-washed room,
devoid of all those unnecessary niceties that transform a house into a home. Every ugly bit of furniture, arranged mathematically round the walls, spoke a bachelor’s house, and moreover a military bachelor’s. I smiled to myself, remembering the precise clipped accent that I had overheard on the Banqueting Hall verandah. Evidently Major Cussens was all of a piece.

  ‘Miss Hewitt, this is a surprise! Is something wrong?’

  Mr Erskine had come in behind me, and in my confusion, I rose to meet him instead of remaining seated in a contained and ladylike fashion. His expression was amused more than surprised, but I would not stop to wonder why he should find my call funny. I had a very good idea.

  ‘No—well, that is yes,’ I began, as he gestured me to my seat again. ‘You must forgive me coming here so unexpectedly, and without … without any invitation.’

  ‘Not at all. You are always most welcome. I am sure Major Cussens would echo my sentiments, but he is away for a couple of days. Manoeuvres.’

  ‘Oh!’ Worse and worse.

  ‘Well?’ He sat down and gave me his whole attention.

  ‘I don’t quite know how to begin. I have never done this sort of thing before, you see, and … and nobody knows that I have come, so I hope you will respect my confidence. I mean …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Well, I have come to ask your help. I realize it is very presumptuous of me, and of course you are quite free to refuse, but the matter is urgent and I …’

  ‘Yes?’

  Drat the man. Why couldn’t he make an effort to get me over the hurdle of explanation?

  As if he had heard my thoughts, Mr Erskine went on, ‘And you have no one else to turn to?’

  ‘No, if I had …’

  ‘You certainly would not come to me. I see!’

  ‘No, that’s not right either. I’m afraid you are the only person in a position to help.’

  ‘I am flattered. But before we go any further, you can trust my discretion absolutely.’