by Deborah Hale
Bethan caught Rosalia’s eye, smiled and nodded. With that encouragement, the child took her father’s hand. The three of them strolled next door to the simple timber house with its palm-thatched roof. A large open veranda at the front commanded a fine view of the busy Singapore River. Forgetting her bashfulness for a moment, Rosalia ran to the railing.
Leaning towards Simon, Bethan whispered, “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
He shook his head ruefully. “Not as hard as accepting what a poor excuse for a father I’ve been.”
It could not be easy for such a proud, successful man to admit his mistakes. The fact that Simon had owned up and was willing to try to change raised him even higher in her eyes. “You did the best you could at the time, more than most fathers might have done. But with your wife gone, Rosalia needs you to be both father and mother to her.”
Simon’s jaw clenched at her mention of his late wife. It reminded Bethan of what he’d said about her not being able to replace Rosalia’s mother. Had he been trying to warn her that she could never hope to take the place of his late wife in his heart, either? If so, it was another good reason to resist the feelings beginning to grow in her heart before they put down deep roots.
Leaving Simon’s side, she joined Rosalia and tried to concentrate on what the child was saying. “All these boats that fetch and carry cargo from the big ships are called tongkangs. The lightermen are Chuliahs. Mahmud told me they pray to Allah like the Malays and Arabs do. When I was a little girl, I used to wave to them from the veranda. They would wave back and call out to me.”
“Really?” Bethan tried not to smile at the child’s mention of being a little girl, as if that was long in the past. “What did they say?”
“I didn’t understand their language.” Rosalia waved at one of the boats that passed directly in front of the house. “But I could tell from their voices it was something nice—a blessing, maybe.”
As she watched the boats navigate the crowded river, Bethan wondered if any of those lightermen might have had contact with her brother when his ship was in Singapore. If they had, she wouldn’t know how to ask them. And she didn’t want to risk another incident like the one on her first day in Singapore.
Simon stepped up to stand beside his daughter. “Bethan tells me you miss this noisy old place—is that true?”
“Sometimes,” Rosalia admitted reluctantly. “There were lots of things to see and do here. The market is close. I remember the lantern parade on the south quay.”
“This place has come in handy to house my new workers from England,” said Simon, “but you may visit here to watch the boats whenever you like.”
“I can?”
He nodded. “I know we haven’t seen each other as much since we moved to the new house. I think it’s time we corrected that, don’t you?”
“Yes, Papa.” Rosalia sounded bewildered by this sudden change in her father.
Bethan hoped his daughter’s hesitation would not discourage Simon. This problem had been a long time in the making. It would not be solved in a single stroke.
But Simon had not made his fortune by giving up easily. “We could go on some outings if you’d like. Is there anything special you’d like to do?”
Rosalia thought for a moment. “I’ve hardly seen Agnes and Alfie since they moved out to their new house. Could we go visit them?”
“I’ll see what can be arranged,” said Simon. “Anything else?”
Rosalia pointed toward the boats on the river. “I’ve always wanted to go for a ride in a tongkang. Could we do that?”
Bethan expected Simon to commend his daughter for such a good idea.
Instead, he looked as if the child had suggested going on a tiger hunt…without any guns. “Please excuse me. I just remembered an urgent business matter I must deal with straight away. Tell Ah-Ming I may not be home for dinner.”
“Of course.” Bethan tried to sound as if she believed him. “We’ll stay and watch the boats for a while longer, if that’s all right.”
Wrapping an arm around the child’s shoulders, she shot a puzzled look at Simon over Rosalia’s head. He’d been doing so well. What on earth had got into him?
“Quite all right.” He continued to back away. “I’m sorry to rush off like this. Enjoy your boat watching.”
“Goodbye, Papa.” Rosalia sounded subdued.
It was clear she sensed something wrong. Bethan was afraid the child might think it was her fault.
Simon did not help matters. Twisting his lips into a poor mockery of a smile, he waved his daughter farewell and strode away as if something dangerous was chasing him.
Bethan wished she could follow him and demand to know what was wrong, but she could not leave Rosalia. She would have to wait up for Simon tonight, and get to the bottom of this.
Simon returned to his office at a brisk march, trying to outrun the troubling memories that pursued him.
He should have known spending time with Rosalia was bound to rouse them. The child looked so much like her mother, after all. When she’d looked up at him with Carlotta’s dark eyes and asked to ride in a tongkang, the best Simon could do was invent a transparent excuse to get away before he said something worse.
Who was he trying to fool? He’d known he was not cut out to be a doting father. He should have concentrated on the things he could do—protecting and providing for Rosalia—while leaving to others better able the challenging task of showing affection. Like Bethan. For her it seemed as easy as breathing. He envied her that natural ability.
Upon reaching the godown, he ignored a curious look from his clerk and demanded to see the accounts ledger. For the next several hours, he poured over the neat columns of figures, drawing comfort from their orderliness and simplicity, so at odds with his life. They also provided reassuring proof he could succeed at the one thing that mattered most in this town.
While he examined the accounts, Simon pulled out his flask and took several swigs of potent arrack. Though his leg was not troubling him much today, he had other wounds that cried out for relief.
It was after midnight when he returned home, expecting everyone else to be in bed. To his surprise, he found a lamp still burning in the sitting room and Bethan slumped in one corner of the sofa, fast asleep. No doubt she’d intended to ambush him and take him to task for his sudden, clumsy departure that afternoon.
Simon was strongly tempted to avoid that confrontation by dousing the light and leaving her to sleep. But he knew that would only delay the inevitable. Bethan Conway was one of the most exasperatingly tenacious people he’d ever met. If she were a man, that quality would be a great asset in business.
But she was not a man. No, indeed.
Gingerly, so as not to wake her, Simon sank on to the sofa and made the most of this unexpected opportunity to sate his eyes upon her fresh, vivid beauty. His gaze ranged over her untidy mane of auburn hair to her full pink lips, which fairly begged to be kissed. It lingered appreciatively on her lovely shoulders. There was something about that part of a woman’s body that roused him as much as fine breasts or a shapely bottom.
Desire gnawed at him, eroding his virtuous resolve to keep his hands off her. Perhaps in her arms, at her breast and between her dewy thighs, he might find a more lasting forgetfulness than he had in the pages of a business ledger or at the bottom of a flask. How many more days must he wait to make her his?
“Bethan,” he whispered. When she did not respond, he reached over and tapped her on the knee. “It’s late. You should go to bed.”
What would he do if he could not wake her—scoop her up and carry her to her room? In his present state, he did not trust himself to leave her on the bed and walk away.
Bethan settled the matter by stirring and turning towards him. Somehow, her movement shifted Simon’s hand from her knee to her thigh. Through her light muslin gown, he could feel the sultry heat of her body. It ignited an answering fever in his. He pulled back his hand abruptly, for fear they might b
oth get burned.
His sudden movement brought her more fully awake.
“Simon?” She stretched, pulling the fabric of her gown taut against her body in several intriguing places. “What time is it? Why did you rush away this afternoon?”
“It’s too late to go into all that now. We can discuss it another time.”
“When?” She yawned and rubbed her eyes. “It isn’t something I want to talk about in front of Rosalia, even if you do come home earlier some other day. She was upset after you left, though she tried not to show it. She’s a clever little thing and I know she didn’t believe your excuse about forgotten business any more than I did. She thinks she must have done something to make you angry and I couldn’t comfort her because I wasn’t certain myself. Now I’m not going to bed until you give me an answer I can understand and explain to her.”
“I told you I would try to be a more attentive father.” Simon moved back to the other end of the sofa. What would Bethan do if he got up and left without an explanation? Would she follow him to his bedroom, trusting in his honour to keep her safe? “And I did try. But I fell short, as I knew I would. I feared nothing about children and I’ve never been a demonstrative person.”
“But you were doing so well. Then all of a sudden you started acting like a horse who’d been spooked. Was it something Rosalia did? Whatever it was, she didn’t mean to. Is there something wrong with those children she wants to visit?”
“It’s nothing to do with them!” Simon snapped. He was tired and aroused and annoyed with himself and Bethan. He knew she would keep on asking and guessing until she pried the truth out of him.
“What does it have to do with, then?” she demanded, just as he’d feared she would. “Something else on that list of things you refuse to talk about, I suppose. Your injured leg? Your wife?”
Her question made Simon wince.
Bethan seized upon that slip. “But Rosalia never said a word about her mother.”
When he jammed his lips together in a stubborn barricade, her angry look muted into one of tender sympathy. “I understand if you grieve for your wife still. Young as she is, I know Rosalia would understand too, if you’d just tell her.”
“I don’t grieve for Carlotta—I never did!” The words burst out of Simon, driven by his desperation to keep Bethan from making any more false claims about his marriage. The things she was saying were so far removed from the truth they were almost obscene. “She drowned one night, while trying to board a tongkang. She slipped, struck her head and fell into the river. By the time they got her out, it was too late.”
He bit down hard on his tongue to keep from saying more. He prayed Bethan would not ask why Carlotta had been trying to board a boat at night and where he’d been at the time.
Fortunately, her sympathy overcame her curiosity. “I’m sorry, Simon. It must have brought back such awful memories when Rosalia asked to go for a ride in one of those boats. But she had no idea. You must tell her. She needs to know why you acted the way you did so she won’t think she was to blame.”
Simon sprang to his feet. “You tell her, then, if you think she needs to know.”
“It would be better coming from you,” Bethan insisted gently. “You might tell her more about her mother, too—happy things. Rosalia doesn’t have any recollection of her at all. If you think she can’t miss what she doesn’t remember, you’re wrong. The poor child feels as if a part of her is missing.”
Indignant rage blazed through Simon that Bethan dared to suggest such a thing. “I know you mean well, but what you are asking is impossible. Believe me when I tell you, the less Rosalia knows about her mother, the better!”
“Now will you tell me?” Rosalia settled on her bed the next evening, waiting for Bethan to arrange the tent of netting over it for the night. “You promised you would.”
“So I did.” Ignoring the netting for a moment, Bethan sat on the edge of the bed beside her small charge and considered how best to begin.
Her usual blunt speaking simply wouldn’t do to broach this painful subject with such a sensitive child. She would have to choose her words carefully. Rosalia’s dark, pleading gaze seemed to draw forth the difficult answers she craved.
“It’s like this.” Bethan took the child’s delicate hand in hers. “Sometimes when things happen that make people very sad, they try as hard as they can not to think about them, so they won’t be sad all the time.”
Rosalia’s fine dark brows knit in a looked of puzzled concentration. Clearly she was trying to work out what Bethan meant and how it applied to the recent incident with her father.
She needed an example she could understand, though Bethan feared it might upset her. “I know you must still miss Ah-Sam, though you don’t talk about her much.”
After a moment’s reflection, Rosalia gave a solemn nod.
“If I started talking about all the things you used to do with her,” Bethan continued, “things that made you think about her when you didn’t want to, you might run away from me so you wouldn’t have to hear what I was saying.”
The child toyed with the end of her braid.
Bethan rubbed the pad of her thumb over Rosalia’s knuckles. “I know this might be hard for you to believe, but grownups can feel that way, too. Even big, brave men like your papa. The other day, when you said how much you’d like to go for a ride on one of those river boats, it reminded him of something very sad that he didn’t want to think about. That’s why he went away so suddenly.”
“Was he angry?” The child sat bolt upright, very agitated. “I didn’t mean to make him sad.”
“Of course he’s not angry, cariad!” Bethan gathered the little girl into a reassuring embrace. “He knows you didn’t mean to.”
“What was the sad thing I made him remember?”
That was the question Bethan had been dreading.
“I’m afraid it will make you sad, too.” She eased Rosalia back on to her pillow. “But it might help you understand some of the things your papa says and does. Are you sure you want to know?”
Her features tensed in an anxious look, the child whispered, “Yes, please.”
“Very well, then.” Bethan stroked her dark, silky hair. “You know your mama went to heaven—that’s another way of saying she died. Some people die because they get very old or very sick. Others have accidents and get hurt so badly that they can’t live. If a person stays under water too long, they can die by drowning. That’s what happened to your mama.”
Rosalia stared up at her with eyes as big as saucers, taking in every word. Fortunately she didn’t seem too upset, perhaps because her mother was a vague, shadowy figure of whom she had no recollection.
As gently as she could, Bethan repeated what Simon had told her of his wife’s drowning. “So you see, when you asked to go for a ride on one of those same boats, it reminded your papa of what happened to her. And perhaps it made him worry about you.”
Rosalia looked doubtful.
Bethan felt drawn to this sensitive little girl far more powerfully than to any of the cheerful, boisterous youngsters she’d cared for in Newcastle. She understood the doubts and sorrows that beset Rosalia’s small heart. And she could not help wanting to heal them, even though it might be beyond her power. “People have different ways of showing how they feel, you know.”
“They do?”
Bethan nodded. “Some people find it hard to show their feelings at all. That doesn’t mean they don’t get just as sad or happy or loving as other people who make a bigger show.” In an encouraging tone, she added. “Do you know anybody like that?”
Slowly one corner of Rosalia’s mouth arched upwards.
“I know somebody like that, too,” said Bethan. “Your papa. He has a hard time showing his feelings because he’s used to keeping them to himself, just like you. But the reason he built this fine house and works so hard to make his fortune is so you can be well cared for and have everything you need. It’s his way of showing how much he
loves you.”
What had made her put off this talk until Rosalia’s bedtime? Bethan chided herself. How could she expect the poor child to go to sleep after all she’d heard?
“Would you like me to I sing you a lullaby?” She stretched out beside Rosalia and pulled the bed netting over them both. “I hope you don’t mind if the words are in Welsh. It’s a song my daddy used to sing to me.”
There’d been a time she couldn’t hear this song without weeping, but lately it brought her a kind of wistful comfort. Only in those familiar words could she properly recall the sound of her father’s voice.
Softly she began to sing, all the while continuing to stroke the child’s hair. That repetitive movement and the familiar melody lulled her, letting her thoughts drift in the direction from which she’d struggled to divert them since her conversation with Simon.
What had his wife done to make him want to forget all about her? Whatever it was, she must have hurt him very badly. Was that what made Ah-Sam work so hard to bring up Rosalia as a well-behaved child who would not dishonour her father? And could it be part of the reason Simon had trouble getting close to the little girl who bore such a strong likeness to her mother?
Rosalia seemed peacefully unaware of the turbulent thoughts racing through Bethan’s mind as she sang the strange soothing words of the lullaby. Or perhaps it was the closeness and a woman’s caring touch that relaxed her. In a very short time, her eyelids drooped and her breath came in slow, easy waves.
Bethan sang softer and softer until her voice died away altogether. Then, grazing her lips across Rosalia’s brow, she whispered, “I believe your papa needs you every bit as much as you need him, cariad. I wish for both your sakes I could make him see that.”
With all her heart, she longed to help heal this small family in a way she had been powerless to heal her own.
Chapter Eight
Standing in the hallway outside the nursery, Simon listened as Bethan spoke to Rosalia. A powerful sense of gratitude welled up inside him. If his stepmother had been half as understanding and open-hearted as Bethan Conway, his life might have taken a very different path. Catching himself, Simon roughly dismissed that thought.
