by Alyssa Deane
With a long, deliberate look into her eyes, Collier took her hand, assisting her to her feet. Continuing to hold it, he turned toward her father. Roxane disengaged her fingers from his, clutching the mail to her breast.
“We have met, Papa,” she said, “in Calcutta. The captain and I are already acquainted."
Max turned to the younger man, frowning slightly. “Captain,” he asked, “are you married, by chance?"
Collier's shoulders moved, beneath his jacket.
“No, sir."
The colonel frowned again. Roxane stepped forward. “Why do you ask him that, Papa?” she inquired with emphasis, handing him his packet of letters.
“I merely wanted to know how many extra plates you will have to have the servants set for tonight's dinner, Roxane. I see now,” he finished and turning to go back into his office, “there will be only one."
Roxane heard Collier chuckle, very quietly, beside her. She looked at him in amazement.
“I believe I have been ordered,” he told her with a smile, “to attend dinner here tonight. I can see no reason why I should refuse, can you? We will talk then, my love. In the meantime...” He pulled her near as they both heard the sound of the colonel's chair scraping across the floor behind his desk, kissing her with as much restraint as he could muster, there in the corridor outside her father's door.
* * * *
Perceiving a susceptibility to his nearness in a manner previously unknown to her, Roxane arranged the seating at dinner so that she was across from Collier rather than beside him. Discreetly, she watched him as he ate, conversing and laughing with those around the table, charming to all, yet noting that his eyes were never far from her own. He was, at times, a little too voluble for the Collier Harrison she knew so well; Roxane found herself just as garrulous, and made a mental note to refrain from further trivia. She also saw that Collier had consumed several glasses of wine in short order, but on the servant's fourth circulation with the wine bottle, he covered his glass with his hand and politely declined.
Roxane smiled at him across the table. He returned the look with a flame in the depth of his eyes that caused Roxane to blush and turn her gaze away. To her right, the young Mrs. Cambridge leaned toward her with a gentle tap on the arm.
“Our new captain seems quite taken with you, Miss Sheffield."
“Do you think so, Mrs. Cambridge?” Roxane responded in a manner so uncharacteristic that the other woman's eyebrows lifted, and she whispered something to her neighbor.
After dinner, the men retired to the verandah for brandy and cigars, a purely masculine address, while the women busied themselves indoors. Sera was permitted to join them for a short time, to display her progress on the pianoforte. At the conclusion of these separate interludes, the real point of the night got under way, and that was some rather high-stake card games, to which her father seemed addicted. On most evenings when these games occurred, some of the wives joined their husbands, either to watch or to play, but this night they all declined and, much to Roxane's relief, decided to go home. After excessive importuning on the part of the women for their spouses’ good luck and good judgment, they departed in a single buggy, each to be dropped at her own residence.
Sending Sera off to bed, Roxane decided, for once, to observe the gaming. As hostess, she had not before had the opportunity, for there was usually someone's wife who did not wish to join in; also, her own interest had been, at best, minimal. Now, however, a desire to be near Collier weighed heavily in her decision to watch the men in the parlor.
Already the room was hanging with smoke, which at least served to keep the insects at bay. Roxane crept in to an uncanny silence of concentration, broken only by the occasional tap of a playing card on the lacquered tabletop or the mouthing of a cigar. Lowering herself into the chair in the corner, she sat back to watch.
Abruptly, the seven men broke into a series of muttered exclamations, tossing wooden chips into the center of the table. Roxane smiled behind her hand at this unusual tactic, observing as this was repeated until only three of the men were left, one of them fanning his cards out for display to the others. Lieutenant Witmon apparently won the hand, for he scooped the chips to add to the pile before him. Beside each officer's elbow was a slip of paper on which a tally was being kept, for none of them carried any currency with them, and they kept track of the money owed in this way.
The lieutenant glanced up and, catching the expression of the man opposite him, followed his gaze to where Roxane sat, carefully avoiding all appearance of having caused her lover's demeanor.
“Miss Sheffield! How nice of you to join us. Pray, do not go away, for you seemed to have altered my luck."
“And confounded Captain Harrison's,” said her father, shuffling the cards. “First hand he's lost since we started."
“Your daughter does distract me, Colonel,” Collier admitted, smiling at Roxane. Once again, the lieutenant looked from his face to Roxane's, and back again. He began to laugh.
“A word of caution, Harrison. We've all—all the single men, I mean to say, and probably a few of the married fellows, too—attempted to capture the heart of Colonel Sheffield's lovely daughter, but she is having none of it. Is quite adamant about it, in fact. I feel I ought to warn you, as you are the new man in camp."
“My appreciation,” Collier drawled, leaning back in his chair. He picked up a chip with his thumb and forefinger and began to rotate it, edgewise, between his fingertips, back and forth, while contemplating Roxane across the room. She ducked her head, attentively removing a piece of cotton lint from her skirt.
Less than an hour later, after having lost more hands consecutively than he had won, Collier stood up from the table, stretching.
“I'm out,” he said.
Roxane sat a little straighter in her chair, preparing to rise.
“Come now,” complained Witmon, “where's the sport in that? You've only lost back what you've won, and stand even."
Collier smiled at him. “Exactly,” he said.
“I'll walk you to the door, Captain Harrison,” offered Roxane. Witmon spun about in his chair to stare at them both, before nudging Roxane's father in the arm.
“Never offered to see any of the rest of us to the door,” he jibed.
“My daughter was acquainted with Captain Harrison in Calcutta, before she came here,” answered Max, quietly. Beside him, Witmon made a small frown, looking once more to the doorway, where Collier was tucking Roxane's hand into his elbow. Roxane smiled back at the lieutenant in his chair, very sweetly.
“Apparently so,” he muttered, and returned his attention to the game.
Outside on the verandah, Roxane stood between Collier's knees as he leaned his hips against the railing. In whispered discourse, between words of love and longing and a gentle touching of hand to hand, she explained to him the precautions she had been taking with the household staff. He nodded his dark head in approval, stroking the flying, soft tendrils from the side of her neck. She told him of Sera, her half-sister, whom he remembered, having seen the two of them in the city together. As she spoke, he smoothed the hair from her brow, and kissed her on her temple. She spoke of Cesya, and of her murder, and he released her, setting her away from him at arm's length.
“Good God,” he said, lightly clasping both of her hands.
“I know. I was so frightened then, and so sad for Sera. And my father, I ... I didn't know what I could do to make it better. I sent the message through Ahmed, because I—I didn't want to be alone, Collier. I wanted you with me. I—I needed you."
“Hush, sweetheart. Don't make needing someone sound so like failure. You are tenacious, and independent, and level-headed, and strong-willed, not to mention beautiful,” he added, touching the tip of his finger to her nose, provoking a watery smile. “I've always known that,” he went on, “and though it sometimes made me feel useless, I could not help but be proud to have the love of a woman like you. Look at how you've taken matters into your hands here. Don
't ever feel it is wrong to need someone outside of yourself, Roxane."
Roxane stepped into the circle of his arms, laying her head against his chest. Closing her eyes, she listened to the sound of his heart, steady and reassuring. It was the one sound from which she derived the most comfort. She longed for the time in their lives when she could lay her head upon his breast nightly and go to sleep to the rhythm of his heart. She told him as much, and he chuckled, against her hair.
“There are many things we can do to the rhythm of my beating heart, my dear. Sleep is but one of them."
She squirmed against him in mock protest, then settled as his fingers came down to stroke the curve of her hip.
“How did you manage to be transferred to Delhi?” she asked, following the movement of his hand in fascination.
“Lord Canning. I got down on my knees and begged for a return to uniform, and this transfer."
“You didn't!"
He laughed, above her head.
“No, but it was Lord Canning's intervention, without the begging. Unfortunately, he could only intercede on my behalf while I was yet in Calcutta. I am afraid I received no dispensation for marriage."
Roxane pulled away, gazing up into his troubled countenance. She smiled.
“Was not that which you received for Olivia transferable?” she only half jested, for the hurt was still there.
“Roxane,” he answered, quite seriously, “I never applied. As far as I was concerned, there would not be a need, until the time came for you and I ... Roxane, is there any possibility you are with child?"
Had she been eating, she would have choked. She looked at him wide-eyed and did not immediately answer.
“Roxane, you do know how a woman can tell if she is pregnant?"
“Of course I do! And it hasn't been long enough for me to know for certain, since last we were together. Would it make a difference if I were?"
He nodded, shrugging his shoulders.
“Like Rose and Harry,” said Roxane.
“Yes, like Rose and Har—how did you know about that?"
“I received a letter today from Unity."
“And she mentioned it? What a precocious child."
Roxane allowed herself to be pulled back once more into his embrace. She felt the weight of his chin, borne lightly on the crown of her head.
“I love you, Roxane."
“I know you do."
“Every time we are together, you are at risk of conceiving, and though I want nothing more than for you to be the mother of our children, I would not allow you to be dishonored with the stigma of pregnancy before you are properly wed. I know"—and he pressed his fingers lightly to her lips when she would have spoken—"I know you would not care what others thought of you, but I would, for your sake. As I see it, we have two choices."
“And they are?” Roxane whispered, running her hands over his chest. She listened to the change in his breathing with a small smile. He grabbed her wrists, stilling her caresses.
“One of which will not work, if you continue to do that,” he said, exhaling loudly. “Abstinence, Roxane, until such time as my petition should be granted."
“How long does that usually take?” Roxane asked him, folding her hands demurely across his unbuttoned jacket.
“Longer than I think we may be able to wait, dear heart."
Roxane drew a deep breath and stepped away, setting his hands down at his sides on the railing.
“If I keep my distance?” she asked.
For a long time, he looked at her. She could see his eyes, dark in the night, with the pinpoints of reflected light the only signal of their motion as he studied her. She felt her skin flush with warmth under his appraisal. Finally, he shook his head.
“It will not work,” he said again. “You and I, Roxane, can accomplish anything to which we set our minds; it is India that will undermine us, India that I love, though never so much as you, which will rob of us the time we so sorely desire. Once the mallet strikes, I cannot then say when we will be together again. Handled correctly, it may only be days; but mishandled..."
He let the sentence hang. Clasping her hands behind her back, Roxane strolled slowly along the verandah to the windowless side of the house, pausing to stare into the shadowed garden. He came up beside her, standing very close, but he did not offer to touch her. She felt his breath, a warm drift of brandy scent, across her shoulder.
“Do not send me away, Collier,” she said, quietly. Beside her, he did not answer.
“That is the second option, is it not? To send me home to England, and safety?"
Still he was silent.
“I tell you, Collier, I will not go."
She heard him sigh, and then he walked over and leaned against the post. Taking out a cigarette, he lit it, the match flaring briefly in the darkness, illuminating his face with a clarity that etched every line the years in India's unrelenting sun had earned him. Shaking out the small flame, he snuffed the ember between two dampened fingers.
“Do you have another suggestion, Roxane?” he asked, blowing smoke into the air above his head. Behind him and to the right, at the farthest edge of the garden, Cesya's hut was empty and dark. Roxane had been vacillating between having it torn down or putting a new coat of whitewash on it and knocking the walls open to provide for more air, so that it was more like a gazebo, where she and Sera might go to read or engage in other harmless endeavors, so that the girl's memories of the place, and of her mother there, might remain untainted.
Crossing the verandah, Roxane stood beside Collier, turning her head so she could not see the hut where first they had lain. He had angled one leg over the railing, and his hand rested, palm up, on his thigh. She draped her forefinger into the center of it, and his fingers closed around the single digit, holding tightly.
“We could marry tomorrow,” she said softly. “And until such time as the military grants you dispensation, it will be only for you and me to know. But this way, should a child be made between us, there will be no shame—for you, for me, or for our child. We will spend what time we may together, and otherwise school ourselves to a patience that will be vexing, at best."
Collier tipped his dark head back against the post, releasing a swirling skein of smoke into the air. Roxane stepped around behind him, fitting her chin against his shoulder, and slipped her free arm around his chest to draw him nearer to her. Turning his head, he brushed his lips across her temple. He spoke quietly.
“I had hoped to seek your hand from your father, Roxane, in the time-honored custom that speaks neither of haste nor of secrecy."
For a moment, Roxane said nothing in return, feeling a vague sense of loss, hers and Collier's. Perhaps, too, she felt something of her father's forfeiture, for in better times, would he not have wished as Collier did? She shifted against Collier's back, pressing nearer.
“Speak with him, then, and explain that you would wish to pay suit. But do not seek for my hand, for he can only wonder at the relationship, for even in Calcutta our acquaintance was not of long duration. And he does not know you, as I do. At this moment, he is your superior officer and no more. Though I am quite old enough to choose the course of my life, he might still make yours more difficult than it need be. I should not wish to see you lose your commission."
“And when,” asked Collier, “he discovers he has been duped? How much more upset do you think he will be then?"
Roxane grew still against him, thinking furiously. “I don't know,” she said at last. “But I will handle that, when it comes. Later, Collier, we will let him know, and Sera, and whomever else we choose. But for now, Collier, let us say nothing and be wed, for I ... I have long been plagued by a sense of urgency, of rushing toward an uncertainty which frightens me in the night nearly to death. I have had nightmares, Collier. And did you not weep upon my breast and say that there was no more time? I feel that, too, God help me, and I am afraid to let a moment pass away that might be ours."
Collier pulled her around
to view her countenance in the silken gloom, touching his fingers to her face like a blind man. He kissed her, on the mouth, for a very long time, and when he pulled away, she witnessed an expression in his eyes that made her want to weep.
“Tomorrow, dear heart. Tomorrow, I promise you."
* * * *
They married the next day, as he had promised. In an Anglican church within the walled city of Delhi, wearing a serviceable, yet attractive blue dress that would not arouse inquiry, Roxane pledged herself to Collier before the eyes of God and man, albeit with just the vicar and his assistant as mortal witness. Their voices echoed disembodied into the rafters, mingling with the rustling sound of their garments as they knelt and rose, and knelt and rose again. The ceremony was brief and to the point, and no questions were asked of either of them in regard to the privacy of the ritual, before or at any time after. When the moment came for Collier to place the ring on Roxane's finger, his hand was far steadier than hers, and she cried, small, confused, yet happy tears, biting her lower lip as she watched him slide the ring onto her hand. Afterward, they stood side by side to sign the official church register. A wisping breeze not present in the sunlight circulated among the pews and sissoo chairs and into the small side chapel, to flutter the altar cloth. It ran softly along the exposed skin of Roxane's forearms, lifting the fine hairs there and at the back of her neck. She shivered, and found her trembling stilled by a single, gentle stroke of Collier's hand along her spine.
Ahmed had arranged for a luncheon at his quarters, and they spent the afternoon there, in his company. True to a custom not entirely their own, Roxane and Collier presented Ahmed with a bride gift, which he accepted with formality and quick, surprising, silver tears gliding over his walnut skin.
“You are truly blessed,” he said to Collier. “There are few memsahibs in India resembling your wife in temperament and intent."
Collier, lounging at a small distance from Roxane, smiled, a little too smugly, Roxane thought, and agreed. Tossing a black olive at him in retaliation for his look, Roxane watched Collier catch the oiled dark fruit before it could strike his uniform, and pop it into his mouth.
