And No Regrets (21 page)

Light and shadow played over Clare’s face as her thoughts chased one another, then with a start she
realised where she
was. In
the jungle, with Ross
no
where nearby,
and rain
hammering down outside.

She uncurled
her
cramped legs and hobbled to a window. The
skies
were emptying themselves without restraint, battering down the flowers
and
spattering
the
flame and gold
petals
with dirty-red mud. The garden paths were rivers, and there was
a
constant lap
of water from the overflowing water-butt.

Clare traced profiles on the steamy glass of the window—beaky, firm-chinned profiles. The world was shrouded in greyness, and she felt acutely alone, and deeply anxious for the two men who were paddling upriver in a canoe in this tropical downpour. She went to the kitchen to ask Johnny how long he thought the
rain would last. “Three-four hours,” he said.

Three or four hours, and Ross and Bill would be sitting in the canoe on the open river all that time. They’d be soaked by the time they reached the rest-house—if
it was still standing!

Her heart was shaken by anxiety, by love, by all the emotions women have to bear alone, more often than not.

She made herself an omelette for lunch, and ate it without much appetite. The lonely hours dragged by and an early dusk came down over the bungalow. Clare lit the lamps, and for something to do went to change her blouse and slacks for a
dress.
She even applied make-up to induce a more cheerful feeling, and noticed in the mirror how thin her cheeks had grown. She had never been all that buxom, but it looked at last, as though the tropics had got to her and were wreaking a certain amount of havoc. Inner torment was helping as well, of course.

The thought of facing the empty months ahead, when no more would Ross stroll into a room, bush hat pushed to the back of sweat-tousled hair, a smile on that faintly rakish face of his. When no more would she
see him stretched out lazily in a veranda chair, smoking a cigarette with a tranquillity she often longed to shatter with something like: “I’ll be leaving my heart behind in your keeping when I go, though I know you
’ll
be too occupied with Patsy
Harriman
to care. You
’ll
have set me adrift without purpose, without the will to fight any more against the set pattern of life Aunt Letty has laid down for me. I want to travel, but I know I shall give in this time to the desires of other people. To those of my aunt and my father; to those of Simon
...
whom I can never love because I love you.”

Love! How you could hate it for taking away your independence and leaving you so at the mercy of your own emotions, and the unknowing cruelties of the one you loved
!

She returned to the living-room to eat her solitary dinner, and to drink a gin and lime in order to subdue the quake of her nerves as lightning split open the sky beyond the unshuttered windows and thunder rolled and rumbled, and seemed to shake the house.

Johnny padded in. Was the little missus all right? She nodded, determined not to give in to her nerves. “I’m going to play the gramophone,” she smiled. “Leave the door open so you and Mark can hear the music.”

They liked it when she put on records, and she knew the two boys would gyrate happily to the music out in the kitchen.

It was fairly late, gone nine o’clock, when Clare heard someone cross the compound outside and mount the veranda steps. Her heart leapt uncomfortably into her throat as she hastened to a window and peered through the slats of the blind she had long since let down. It was no longer raining, and she made out the figure of a man in oilskins that glimmered ghost-like. Suddenly he took hold of the handle of the locked door and gave it a rattle. Clare could feel her heart pounding
near her throat
... the man wasn’t Ross, he wasn’t tall or wide enough. Nor was it Bill Humphriss, who was stockier than the man standing out there on her veranda steps. Then as though a faint light through the blind slats caught his attention, he turned from the door and came right up to the window.
He stood there a moment, and he seemed to look right through the slats into Clare’s fear-widened eyes. Then she caught her breath as fingers scraped against the window. “I know you’re standing there,” said the man. “I can
just make
out your shape.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

THE voice, and the choice of words, were instantly familiar, and Clare released her breath with relief. Don
Carter!

Don? What was he doing here this time of the night
?
She hastened to let him in, and grinning, he tossed his wet oilskins to a veranda chair then his overboots, and followed her into the living-room. He carried a suitcase, and when she cast an enquiring glance at it, he said: “I’ve q
uit Kalai. Had a row with the D.O.
and came on here in a canoe.” He glanced round. “Where’s Ross? I’m hoping he’ll let me stay here until the steamer comes on Friday.”

“Ross is away with the new man. They’ve gone off to check up on the rubber trees,” she said.
“
You
’
re really leaving Kalai?”

He nodded, set down his suitcase and slicked the fair, wet hair back off his forehead. She went to pour him a whisky and water.

“That place has grown unbearable,” he accepted the tall glass and smiled his thank
s
. “Earle wasn’t too bad while his missus was there, but since she went home he’s been like a bear with a sore head. Living in the wilds is bad enough, but when a quartet of men start fighting among themselves ... well, I walked out after a terrific row with Earle. The fellow’s developed into a tyrant, and Noel and Jeffreys are welcome to tolerate him. Not me!”

Don tossed back the rest of his drink. His eyes dwelt on Clare’s over the rim. “I was counting on Ross being here—he seems to leave you alone a lot.”

“Not really,” she protested. “It’s just chance that he’s
away this time. And, naturally, you’re welcome to stay until Friday.”

“
Won
’
t he mind—you being here all alone, and putting me up?
”
Don’s blue eyes scanned her fine
-
boned fac
e
, lightly made up, with, had she known It, a sad sort of charm about
i
t tonight. “Camping out isn’t exactly congenial during the rainy seasons, Clare.”

“
Naturally I don’t expect you to camp out.” She gave him a slight frown. “You can bed down in Bill’s quarters—Bill is the man who is taking over from Ross when he leaves.”

At that moment an anxious crinkly head came poking round the door, then Johnny showed his widely spaced teeth in a grin of recognition. “Make coffee and sandwiches, Johnny,” Clare said. “Use the tongue I opened for my dinner, and bring mustard on the tray. Also a thick slab of that pineapple pie.”

“
Me do that, missus.” Johnny glanced at Don, who was now lounging on the arm of a chair and taking out his cigarette case. “You come river, sah?”

“
By canoe,
”
Don nodded. “My paddle boys went back with boat to Kalai.”

“
I see, sah. I jumps quick and gets samwiches.”

“
You
’
re a marvel, Clare,” Don said when Johnny had departed.
“
You’ve a natural talent for making a house into a home, and bush boys into thoroughly reliable servants.”

“Most women are domesticated,” she said lightly. “You’ve been out in the jungle so long, Don, that you equip every woman with wings. Back among the civilised you’d see me for what I am, a quite ordinary brunette without a halo.”

His eyes dwelt on the silvery streak that ran through her hair. He offered his cigarette case and she took one. “Angels don’t smoke,” she laughed, bending her head to
his
lighter. When she
straightened up
he had slipped
off the chair arm and was standing a little too close. She retreated, puffing out smoke.

“If you’re going to stay, you’re going to be good, she said stiffly. “As I’ve reminded you before,
I’
m
a
married woman.”

“A happily married woman?” he drawled.

“Of course,” she said defiantly.

“You don’t look it, Clare. Those violet eyes were meant to shine like amethysts, not to look like flowers in the rain. I think you’re in the mood for a sympathetic shoulder, and that it was a good thing I happened along.”

“You’ll relieve the boredom until Ross retu
r
ns,” she agreed, coolly. “What will you do now you’ve quit your post at Kalai? Isn't it breaking the company contract to walk out without due notice?”

“I’m saying goodbye to the company altogether,” he asserted. “I’m going back to England to get a civilised job.”

“You told me once that the tropics had got into your blood,” she reminded him, sitting down in one chair and gesturing to him to take another. He complied, and sat back, crossing his legs.

“Loving the tropics is like having an affair with an exotic woman,” he said. “When the spell dies, there’s nothing left but an acute longing to get away from what has infatuated you.”

“Ross felt like that after his first three years,” she said, “but he came back.”

“He brought you as his safeguard, Clare. He brought sanity in the shape of a girl with grit and the kind of looks that put one in mind of an English flower garden. Sounds corny put into words, but that’s what our shrewd Ross did right enough.”

It didn’t only sound corny, it sounded uncomfortably close to the truth, and Clare was relieved when Johnny came in with the supper tray and she was able to switch
the conversation to a less personal topic. “What kind of work are you going in for when you get back to England?” she asked, pouring coffee and handing him the cup.

“I might try being a car salesman,” he added sugar to his cup. “You’ll admit that I’ve got plenty of ready conversation, and the car market is booming.”

“You’re certainly a talker,” she smiled. “Mustard?” He quirked a blond eyebrow and met her eyes, then accepted the little pot and inserted mustard into a sandwich. “D’you think my plan’s a good one?”

“I rather think it might be. You're sociable, and the tropics can be lonely.”

“Are you lonely, Clare?”

“Not when Ross—”

“
When
Ross is here. Be truthful, honey.
”

“Don’t call me that
!
” she said sharply.

“Why not
..
.
because he does?”

“Don, I’m not going to discuss my private life with you. You have no right to expect me to—”

“I have the right of a—friend.”

“Friends don’t intrude, not the sort I want.”

“Nonsense, if they didn’t have that privilege then they would be mere acquaintances. We’re more than that, Clare
... or we could be.”

“Stop it, Don.” Her eyes were beginning to sparkle with temper. “I’d hate to have to withdraw my offer of hospitality.”

“
You
wouldn’t turn out a dog on a night like this one. The wind is howling, the jungle is benighted.” He shot her a grin of devilry. “Where would I go?”

“To the village,” she said tartly. “The chief will put you up.”

“Clare,” he sat back and stared at her, the smile fading out of his eyes, “you really mean that, don’t you?”

“If you persist in saying things I can’t allow while
my
—my husband is away.”

“You do sound prim.” He gave
a
rueful laugh. “Okay, I’ll behave myself
if
you
insist,
but it never hurt to unburden oneself to a well-meaning friend.
”

“There’s nothing I wish to unburden myself about—more coffee?”

“Yes, please.” He pushed his cup across the table,
a
faint groove between his blond brows. “When do you
and Ross leave
Bula?”

Her heart gave a jolt, for she couldn
’
t tell a lie, and the inquisition would begin again when she told him that she and Ross were not leaving Bula together. “I go at the end of March, Ross follows in June,” she said, and her violet eyes dared him to make something out
of it
.

He shrugged. “’m not going to say a word—but I’ll be in Lagos when you said and it would be nice to sail home together.”