Ryman, Rebecca

by Olivia

  "He says he has na let Raventhorne out of his sight for two days. At night, he keeps watch on the master cabin from one of the longboats on deck. So far, he reports, there are nae moves in the direction we fear. Leastways, na yet."

  "Yes," Olivia conceded after some reflection, "I panicked unnecessarily. He will not act openly, nor in any direction we anticipate. It's not that kind of a war."

  "Just what kind of a war is it then, Your Ladyship?" Donaldson pounced on that to ask quietly.

  Having let slip a comment she should not have, Olivia smiled. "I meant, this is the kind of war in which strategy is the missile, not conventional armaments." She met his quizzical eyes without a blink.

  It was Donaldson who first dropped his stare, all his remaining questions unvoiced. She had made a night journey in secret— where? His peon had lost her in the maze of gullies after she had abandoned her carriage. It was that Templewood bungalow that was somehow at the crux—how? And the Daffodil, never even claimed by Raventhorne and now stripped bare where she had lain for months—where did that fit in? Already disturbed, Donaldson was making an even more disquieting discovery. He was not a coward; in his decades of trade he had fought many battles, some lost, some won. But now he felt fear, not of Raventhorne, who was a known devil, but of this strange, enigmatic woman whose depths he had not been able to plumb at all. He ventured no more questions. He would rather not know the answers.

  "Where did you go last night?" If Willie Donaldson considered ignorance bliss, Estelle suffered no such illusions. At luncheon she put the question bluntly to her cousin.

  "On an errand."

  "Errand where? To whom?"

  "A business matter. It doesn't concern you."

  Estelle pushed her plate away, her appetite disappearing. "You are determined to have Lubbock's men pull down those rooms?"

  "Of course!"

  "Don't do it, Olivia. He will turn more rabid." Helplessly, she tried one final appeal. "Let me go and see Jai, please, Olivia! He will at least let me have my say, I'll force him to. He will not refuse to see me."

  "All right. By all means go. In fact, I was about to request you to do precisely that."

  Estelle's jaw dropped loose with amazement. "You were?" she gasped. "Why?"

  "As it happens, I would like you to deliver to him a letter from me." Olivia's tone sharpened. "It will be only a delivery, Estelle, no more. I warn you, not one iota more!"

  Estelle glared, riven with suspicion. She was no longer sure how far in her malice Olivia could be trusted. "What will you say to him in that letter?"

  "I don't know yet. I can only decide that tonight."

  Reading nothing in her cousin's expression, Estelle abandoned her efforts to probe. "Anyway, I have not seen Kinjal for a week," she said coldly. "She will be offended. Why don't we both call on her this morning? I would like to get to know her better."

  It was a pointed inquiry; neither had Olivia seen Kinjal for a week—but how could she have? She could lie to everyone; she could not lie to Kinjal. Yet, she could not tell her the truth either! "No," she replied lightly enough, "I have other matters to attend to here. Please make my sincere apologies and assure her I will see her soon."

  Whatever remorsefulness Olivia felt did not take long to dissipate in the tightness trapped inside her chest. Yes, tonight would decide once and for all the fate of that war Donaldson could not understand. If Sujata failed, then she too would have failed. Sujata was the last wild card in her pack, her final trump— she must succeed in that midnight mission! Lying unlocked somewhere in the Chitpur house was Jai Raventhorne's most precious belonging—his only precious belonging—that red velvet bundle Estelle had found on the Ganga, the bundle in which lay all the splintered memories of a childhood that never was, a mother who might never have been. Raventhorne would never have risked leaving it aboard the Ganga after she had docked and then sailed away on another voyage, Olivia calculated, praying passionately that her instincts were accurate.

  And once she held that bundle in her hand, Olivia knew, with it she would also hold Jai Raventhorne's soul. Fragments of a missing childhood for fragments of a ruptured life. Yes, it was a fair exchange.

  Olivia dispatched a note to Hal Lubbock. If he would be so kind, he should have his men ready for the demolitions on the day after the next.

  The moon sinks and then returns

  The severed branch grows again

  Ponder this, oh fool, and be not troubled

  In its own time everything ripens.

  The song of the bauls, a clan of singing minstrels in Bengal, was plaintive and sweetly melancholy. The words were in a dialect Olivia could not understand, but a helpful passer-by translated them for her into Hindustani. Dropping some coins into the hand of one of the saffron-clad singers, she urged her coachman to drive on. The pearly moistness of a monsoon midday sat heavily in the air. A light rain had come and gone. Left behind was the cool caress of a breeze but also the inescapable pall of humidity. The ambling clip-clop of the horses' hooves pulsed away time in regular beats, somehow making it malinger. Olivia felt calm, a curious calm, nerveless and numb. Only the gripping cramp in her stomach and the restless kicks of the baby disturbed the unrippled surface of her mind. Please God, don't let the baby come yet, not yet . . .

  For the hundredth time she diverted the thought with reflection.

  The velvet bundle had been in her hands soon after midnight. Goaded by her own private demons—as they all were, as they all were!—Sujata had not failed her. She had completed her assignment with faultless skill. As proof of the new ownership of that precious childhood repository, Sujata had left in the same place the silver locket and chain that Olivia had given her for the purpose. Once in possession of the bundle, Olivia had spent the rest of the night in composing her letter to Jai Raventhorne. By seven o'clock in the morning, Estelle had been away with it for delivery aboard the Tapti. Even though its composition had taken much time, the letter itself was terse.

  If you will look inside the desk in your bedchamber, the second drawer to the right, you will see why I am not as unequal an adversary as you believe. The game and its rules you devise, but I am still a fast learner. I await your response.

  She did not sign the letter. There was no need to.

  By eight o'clock Estelle must have made her delivery to Raventhorne; he would have read it at a glance. It was now almost ten. Unable to stay at home while waiting for Estelle to return, Olivia had spent the past three hours driving around aimlessly in her carriage, trying to occupy her errant mind with trivia. But now, frantic with impatience, she ordered the coach back to the house. By the time she arrived home, Estelle had returned from her assignment.

  "Did you deliver it?"

  "Yes."

  "In his hands?"

  "Yes."

  "And . . .?" Distorted with anxiety, Olivia's voice sounded shrill.

  Estelle did not reply to her question. Instead, she stared at her hard, her face set. "What did you write in that letter, Olivia?"

  "It was a private matter. Tell me, what—"

  "Private or not, I want to know what was in that letter!" Estelle's fists were clenched. Beneath her apparent calm, anger lay waiting.

  Olivia shrugged. "I offered him an olive branch. A chance to make peace." She brushed that aside and asked sharply, "What did he say? Tell me what his reaction was, tell me, Estelle!"

  "He said nothing. Only his face went strange. Strange and dead."

  Olivia's breath untangled, exhaled and became normal. She sat down. "And then what did he do?"

  Estelle's lips thinned with cutting scorn but she did not release her anger. "Then he put the letter in his pocket and left the ship without a word." She turned her back on Olivia and walked towards the window. "But before he went he stood and looked at me, just looked. I have never seen that look on him before, not even that first night on the Ganga. It was not even hate. It went beyond that, and it terrified me." She spun back to face Olivia, her expressio
n stormy. "Tell me what was in that damned letter! I know I'm somehow implicated. I have a right to know!"

  "You are not implicated," Olivia said dismissively, attempting to end the conversation and turning towards the door.

  "You've used me again, haven't you, Olivia?" Estelle asked, trembling. "You've again exploited the information I gave you in conf—"

  She was cut off by a knock on the door and Mary Ling entered. With an effort, both composed themselves and Estelle took herself off to the other end of the room. Olivia was not entirely annoyed at the interruption. "Yes, Mary? What is it?"

  "Begging your pardon, Madam," Mary looked apologetic, "it's past the time for Amos's fruit juice. I only came to fetch him upstairs."

  "He's already upstairs, Mary, We've both just returned to the house."

  Mary frowned. "He has not returned with you? Amos isn't in the nursery. I've just come from there."

  "Returned with us?" Olivia looked blank.

  "Yes. Since you sent the coach to fetch him and the ayah, I presumed he must have—"

  "I sent the coach?" Olivia echoed. "Which coach?"

  "Why, the Maharani's, of course! I sent them off myself no more than an hour ago, Madam." She stared at Olivia, puzzled.

  "Why on earth should I send the Maharani's carriage for Amos, Mary? Surely you are mistaken! Amos must be upstairs . . .," she faltered. "He ... he must be . . .!" Dropping the purse she still held in her hand, Olivia turned to run out of the room and up the stairs as fast as her cumbersome weight would allow. Their argument forgotten, Estelle followed, and behind her a pale-faced Mary.

  The nursery was empty. There was no sign of Amos.

  Gasping with the effort of her climb, Olivia clutched the doorway, her breath coming in huge, gusty wheezes. "I didn't send any coach for Amos, Mary," she whispered again and again in a stupor, "Why should I, why should I . . .?"

  "I. . . w-wouldn't know, M-madam." Mary started to stammer nervously. "They came at about nine. I had just finished the—"

  "They? Who?" Olivia went cold, her hands like blocks of ice. "Who, Mary, who?"

  Now truly frightened, Mary began to tremble. "The . . . the Maharani's coachman and the . . . other man. The note was very c-clear, Madam."

  The chill in Olivia's body produced a deathly calm. "Show me the note."

  As Mary flung herself at the waste-paper bin and started to scramble inside it, Estelle still stood in the doorway watching in stunned silence, threading and rethreading her hanky between shaking fingers. The note, when found, was just a few words in an untidy scrawl. I am sending Her Highness s coach to fetch Amos and the ayah. The initials at the end of the note were a clear O.B. And the message had been written on Kinjal's unmistakable cream and gold crested notepaper.

  Upright only by force of sheer will-power, Olivia kept persuading herself to discount the reality: I will not panic, I will not panic. It is a simple misunderstanding. Amos is indeed at Kinjal's. Amos is in the park with some irresponsible servant. Amos is in the servants' compound watching the cows in the milking shed. No other explanation was possible!

  But then Mary gave a gasp and fumbled in the pocket of her apron, mumbling tearful apologies. "They also brought a letter for M-madam. I'm sorry, I f-forgot to—"

  Olivia snatched the envelope out of her hand. It was addressed to her in a handwriting she could not mistake. The note contained within the envelope was briefer than hers but as clear: You will not see your son again. You have my response. There was no signature.

  Crumpling into Estelle's arms, Olivia started to scream.

  CHAPTER 22

  In giving birth to her second son Olivia almost lost her life. The baby's position in her womb was precarious, its arrival six weeks early and her body's remaining reserves few. With her world blotted out, its light extinguished, she was not aware of Dr. Humphries's valiant battle for her survival. Her own will to fight had died even before the battle had begun. The numbed tract of grey slush that was her brain registered only vague sensation. Half-formed creatures scuttled occasionally from the hide-outs of her semiconsciousness to hunt for footholds, but there were none in that limbo. Sometimes, through the black layers of the shroud that cocooned her she could feel pain, terrible pain, but only as if it were somebody else's. And also somebody else's was the voice that, in those terrifying final moments of her ordeal, screamed in a weak whisper, "Take it away before it cries ..."

  Crushed into pulp, beyond awareness and beyond endurance, Olivia slid away into deep, deep unconsciousness. She was not to know yet that her moral debt of honour to her husband and to his family had at last been repaid.

  Nor was Olivia to know yet that for those past two days and two nights, while others fought for her to live, Arvind Singh had launched a massive man-hunt for Jai Raventhorne. Throwing the might of his State into the search, he had sent his agents foraging into every corner of the city and the countryside for any snippet of information about Raventhorne and the child. There was none. No one at Trident had any information about their Sarkar's whereabouts, or chose not to have. He was no longer aboard the Tapti, still in port, nor was he at either of his homes. The hunt was pervasive, but it was hampered by the need for extreme secrecy. On this Kinjal had insisted. There were already too many rumours about Olivia; to expose her to more would make an even greater mockery of her poor friend's sham of a life.

  "He has taken Amos to Assam," Kinjal said. "No one knows the hills like Jai does. Pursuit would be impossible."

  "How could he have been so heartless?" Estelle cried, red eyed and stricken. Whatever her other feelings, this act of villainy she could never forgive the half brother she had defended so stoutly. "He could have at least sent word that Amos is safe and not fretting."

  "He will not harm the child," Kinjal pointed out in an effort to provide some morsel of comfort. "Wherever he hides them, he will care well for the child."

  "But we both know that that is not the point, Kinjal." Estelle's tired, swollen eyes brimmed again. "It is now both her children that Olivia is losing. And it is I who started it all . . ." Quietly, she again began to cry.

  Kinjal said nothing. What was there to say? Both she and Estelle had scarcely left Olivia's bedside over the past forty-eight hours. Assisting Dr. Humphries had been two experienced mid-wives from Kirtinagar, whose help he had gratefully accepted. Mary Ling, a competent nurse trained by the doctor himself, ran up and down tirelessly performing vital errands. Estelle had sat by her cousin, holding her hand and cooling her perspiration-drenched face with damp napkins. Because she did not show her face to strange men, Kinjal had remained in a far corner, her features draped with a veil, acting as interpreter for the midwives. It had been a frightening ordeal for them all, and Kinjal felt close to tears herself as she and Estelle waited for the doctor to emerge from the birth chamber. Yes, Olivia did stand to lose both her children, but the tragedy was not hers alone; one way or another it was to be equally shared between Amos and his parents. Sadly, what his parents were destined never to share was Amos himself.

  "Now, young miss, what was the meaning of all those silly shenanigans in there, eh?" Almost dead on his feet, Dr. Humphries bowed to Kinjal, waited for permission to sit, and subjected Estelle to a look of great severity. Kinjal quickly nodded and, exhausted, he slumped into a chair. "It is a mother's reward after hours of labour to hear the first cry of her new-born. Olivia was delirious. Dammit, what was the need for the infant to be carried away with such unholy haste? I am extremely angry, extremely!"

  "Olivia was not delirious." Serving him a large snifter of brandy, which he downed almost in a single gulp, Estelle wiped her red rimmed-eyes and blew her nose. She glanced at Kinjal, received a nod, and proceeded to tell him the facts. That Olivia was not to keep her child would be common knowledge soon anyway.

  Dr. Humphries was astounded. He lost no time in announcing that he had never heard anything so preposterous in all his years of practice! "That infant is premature! By God's grace he's a healthy littl
e nipper, but you can't subject him to mortal danger by whisking him off to England because of someone's idiotic fancy!"

  "He will not be 'whisked off,' Dr. Humphries," Estelle assured him earnestly. "Nothing will be done without your express approval and advice. It is only because of you that Olivia has pulled through."

  "Oh, fiddlesticks! She's a sturdy filly, she would have pulled through anyway." But he looked pleased. "Well, what is this plan you have then for the child? May I be permitted to know?"

  Estelle amplified her explanations without giving him the reason for Olivia's decision. That was irrelevant in the present context. The baby, she told him, was to be moved to a caretaker's lodge on Her Highness's estate in Kalighat. Mary Ling and the wet-nurse, now arrived from Kirtinagar, would care for the child under the Maharani's personal supervision. "We will not arrange passages for England until you give us permission, when you consider that the baby is fit to make the voyage. Mary, the wet-nurse and I will go with him." She started to weep. "I beg of you, please help us, Dr. Humphries. We must do our best, our very best. Or we will have made a travesty of Olivia's noble act of self-denial."

  In spite of his shock, he was moved. "Well... I can't pretend to understand the situation," he muttered gruffly, "but then, in forty years of anatomy and physiology, I've never been able to make sense of a woman's mind anyway. However," he sighed, "whatever her reasons, your cousin has my sympathy. She is a brave young woman who deserves support. I suppose I too will have to do my mite. But I warn you," he dropped his banter, "neither mother nor child is out of the woods. They will need meticulous care, meticulous."

  Suppressing her shyness, Kinjal proceeded to give him her assurances and to answer fully all the probing questions he put to her. Eventually he appeared satisfied. Promising to return in the evening, he left behind many grim warnings and a lengthy list of instructions. He prescribed medications for Olivia's sadly depleted blood, energy and weight; for her mutilated spirit, however, he had nothing. But then, neither did anyone else.