The White Pearl (30 page)

‘He won’t go any further. You must know that.’

Fitzpayne’s voice broke into her thoughts.

‘Pardon?’

‘Your husband,’ he explained.

As he hardened up on the wind, she set about tightening the sheets. ‘You think Nigel doesn’t want to sail any further? Of
course he does, he’s going to sail to Singapore, all of us are. I know the city is still being bombed, but at least the Japanese
will never be able to invade it because it is too well protected. We’ll all be safe there. We can start again, and wait for
this dreadful war to be over.’

In the yellow rectangle of light thrown up on deck from the saloon below through the glass of the coach roof, Connie saw his
wide mouth take on a sceptical tilt.

‘You have no more intention of staying in Singapore than I have,’ he said.

‘I don’t believe I’ve ever discussed my intentions with you.’

He laughed at that, a low sound that was swallowed by the descending darkness. ‘Your husband won’t leave Malaya.’

‘You don’t know my husband.’

‘I assure you that I’ve known men like him. They are wedded to what they are, and they regard themselves as indispensable
to the Empire.’

‘Maybe they are.’

‘Their beloved Empire is about to come crumbling down around their ears, and they are blind to it. You are right to want to
return to England.’

‘Who says that’s what I want?’

‘Isn’t it?’ He laughed easily, not expecting an answer, but his grey eyes remained fixed on hers. ‘Isn’t it?’ he repeated
in an undertone designed for his own ears rather than hers.

‘Mr Fitzpayne,’ Connie flicked out her hand at a greedy mosquito that was dancing around her head, ‘did you know that the
mosquitoes that make that horrible whining noise are harmless? It’s the silent ones you have to watch out for, those that
make no noise at all. They’re the ones that can give you malaria and make you sick. They are the danger, the ones you have
to beware of.’

He regarded her intently. ‘No, Mrs Hadley. I didn’t know that.’

Below deck,
The White Pearl
’s interior was arranged into three cabins, all fitted out to the same high standard as the saloon. The large master cabin
was used by Nigel and Connie, the next one further forward also had a double berth and was allocated to Henry and Harriet.
The third one lay aft and contained a pair of bunk beds. Teddy had scrambled eagerly on the top one and dumped his satchel
of possessions on it, marking it as his territory. Johnnie Blake would be occupying the lower berth, but when Connie went
to settle her son down for the night it was still empty because Johnnie was with Nigel and the Courts, playing bridge in the
saloon. Connie hated bridge. It was an activity that seemed to her to be spitefully designed to cause friction and avoid real
conversation.

Aft, there were two more narrow bunks tucked into an alcove behind a curtain, where the crew or servants would normally sleep.
Fitzpayne had opted for one of these, but clearly had little intention of making use of it, and the other one Connie had offered
to Razak. Maya wouldn’t venture down the stairs, so Connie had provided a blanket and a bucket for her up on deck.

‘Thank you,
terimah kasih
,’ Razak said politely, but lowered his long eyelashes so that she couldn’t see what thoughts shimmered behind them.

Connie climbed up onto Teddy’s top berth, knocking her shin on the wooden lip along the edge of it, designed to keep its occupant
from falling out in rough seas.

‘Look what I’ve brought for you,’ she said when she was crouched beside him. There was little headroom up here. She waved
a book and a pencil at him. ‘It’s a diary.’

Teddy examined it, running a finger over the naked lines inside.

‘There’s a page for each day,’ she encouraged. ‘For you to write whatever you like.’

‘What should I write?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. Anything that comes into your head. You could list what you’ve seen on the river each day and …’

‘And the spider that made Mrs Court scream?’ Teddy giggled.

‘Exactly!’

‘It has a leather strap.’ He tested its buckle around his thumb.

‘That’s to fasten around the diary when you’ve finished each day, so that no one else can read it.’

‘Not even you?’

‘Not even me.’ She nodded seriously. ‘A diary is private.’

He slipped his young arms around her neck and kissed her cheek. She hugged him, inhaling the sweet, warm scent of her son,
then read him a chapter of
White Fang
. His eyes were closed, the rhythm of his breathing slow, when she finally climbed down from the bunk and crept to the door.

‘Mummy,’ he whispered after her, ‘when I grow up I want to be a pirate.’

Connie unwound the bandage from her husband’s leg and gently removed the dressing. It was stained with yellow pus. She smiled
in the hope of making him think the injury was improving, and proceeded to bathe it with antiseptic. Nigel was lying flat
on his back on the bed, feigning indifference, but in the yellow glow from the gimballed kerosene lamps on the wall, she could
see the strain in his face.

‘Johnnie’s on deck with Fitzpayne at the moment. The wind has backed a little south of east. But don’t worry,’ she said, ‘you’ll
be leaping around up there too in no time.’ A stupid comment. But she wanted to see the muscles of his cheeks relax.

Nigel didn’t even lift his head off the pillow. ‘Don’t patronise me, old thing. I’m not Teddy. How is it?’

She flushed and studied his leg. ‘The top half of the wound is healing well,’ she told him cheerfully, ‘but the bottom half
– that’s where the
parang
cut to the bone – is still swollen and infected. But less inflamed than yesterday.’ The last part was a lie.

‘Good.’ That was all. He waited for her to bind it up again.

She cradled his calf in the palm of one hand as she put on a clean dressing and bandage, and thought about the fact that until
this accident, she hadn’t touched his leg for – she had to think back a long way – probably eight or nine years. She’d forgotten
the feel of it. The strength of the muscle, the springiness of the hairs on the skin of his shin in contrast to the silkiness
of those on his calf. The skin tanned from all the years spent in shorts.

‘I think that we should put off the girl.’

Connie almost dropped his leg. ‘You mean Maya?’

‘Yes.’

‘No, Nigel.’

‘She hates sailing. Damn sick all day. Time to tell her to bugger off – in the morning.’

‘Nigel, don’t be ridiculous. She’s miles away from home now. We can’t make her disembark in the middle of nowhere and just
dump her on a stretch of beach. What on earth is the matter with you? Why do you dislike the girl so much?’

‘She’s trouble, Constance. I can feel it. I don’t want her on my boat.’

‘On
my
boat,’ she said quietly. ‘You gave
The White Pearl
to me as a wedding gift, remember?’

He gave a stiff nod, but made no comment. She finished the bandaging and patted his knee.

‘I feel responsible for the pair of them,’ Connie explained as she blew out the lamp on his side of the bed. ‘I was very touched
when I found that they had stowed away on my boat, because it means they feel they can come to me when in trouble. In place
of their mother.’

She left her own light on, intending to read awhile, and hung her robe on a hook behind the door. She was wearing a flimsy
nightdress. It would be heaven to wear nothing in bed because the air was stifling down here in the cabin – all portholes
were secure when sailing – but she knew Nigel would hate that. The bed was far smaller than the one at home … God forbid
that he might be forced to touch her in its narrow confines. She slid into the bed, and felt her husband shift his body nearer
to the far edge.

‘Tell me what the matter is, Nigel,’ she murmured.

They had both been speaking in low tones because the walls within a boat’s hull were notoriously thin. Any raised voice immediately
became audible to everyone. She heard footsteps above her head – probably Johnnie or Razak on deck – and felt an overwhelming
desire to be up there with the mosquitoes and the bats and the cool night breath of the river. She had confidence in Fitzpayne’s
decisions at the helm.

‘I know,’ she added, ‘that you’re unhappy at leaving the estate, but your manager, Davenport, will run it as best he can until
you’re back.’

‘Until
we’re
back,’ he corrected.

‘Of course.’

There was a pause while they listened to creaks and rattles as
The White Pearl
flexed her joints in response to a change of tack. Connie could picture Maya hanging her head over the black waters.

‘But you like the boy,’ she said, dropping her voice further. ‘You don’t object to Razak.’

To her surprise there was a long silence, and she saw Nigel close his eyes as though the lids were too heavy and he was drifting
into sleep. Yet after several minutes he spoke again.

‘The boy is a decent enough fellow, and means no harm. I believe the girl does.’

‘But if Maya were put off the boat, Razak would go too.’

‘You think so? I’m not so sure. He likes it here on the yacht, and is excited about seeing Singapore. He told me so. Teddy
likes him too.’

‘Nigel, Razak is her twin brother. Of course he won’t desert her.’

‘That’s a damn shame. I hope you’re wrong.’

The flatness of his tone made it clear that the conversation was ended.

‘Sleep well, Nigel.’ She picked up her book.

‘Fat chance of that.’ He suddenly twitched his head on the pillow so that he was looking directly up at her. ‘What is your
real interest in the girl? It’s not just because you killed her mother, is it?’

Killed her mother
. It was the first time he’d said the words so brutally. Connie felt somewhere raw open up inside her.

‘It’s about having choices, Nigel. We all like to feel we can choose. Poverty robs people like Maya and Razak of that chance
to make choices, Maya most of all because she’s a girl. She may reject education or my help to find a job, but I want to show
her that she has the right to …’

‘This isn’t about her, is it?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘It’s about you.’ His brown eyes grew fierce, though he spoke in no more than a whisper. ‘It’s about the fact that you refuse
to behave like other women, that you want control.’

There was a moment of silence between them, like a transparent wall of ice, and Connie felt the sweat freeze on her skin.
‘Yes,’ she said softly. ‘I want to feel in control of my own life. To know that I am responsible for my decisions, just as
you are for yours.’

‘Don’t think for one moment that I will let you take control of my son’s life.’

‘
Our
son.’

He turned his head away from her. ‘Read your book.’

It was three o’clock in the morning. Connie sensed a shift in the wind, and knew Fitzpayne had hoisted more sail. She raised
her head off the pillow, listening hard. Yes, the boat was holding steady before a following wind and moving fast. Beside
her, Nigel was snoring – but discreetly – forced by his leg to sleep on his back, so she dressed in the dark, made a pot of
tea in the galley with scarcely a sound and climbed up on deck.

The night air rushed at her, slapping her in the face. It woke her out of the numbness that had gripped her ever since Nigel
had said
my son
, in a way that told her loud and clear that he could take the boy from her if he chose. She stood on deck, adjusting to the
roll of long unfettered waves and knew they had reached the sea. She could smell its breath and taste the salt on her lips.
They were carrying full canvas aloft, and a host of silver-winged moths had clustered around the lamp at the stern like a
shimmering coat of new paint.

Johnnie lay dozing on one of the benches, but he must have worked hard earlier to hoist so much sail. Fitzpayne stood at the
helm taking a bearing, and in the moment when he was unaware of her presence because of the sound of the wind overlaying her
footsteps, she saw his profile clearly. In the reflected light from the lamps she was struck by the strong lines of it, and
how it seemed to her that it had changed in some subtle way, as though the bones had realigned overnight.

Was it
The White Pearl
that had done that to him? Was it the water flowing beneath her, and the wind streaking through the rigging high above him
that had stripped the stiffness from his manner and the tension from his movements? He swayed with the deck as though he were
a part of it, and his hair was no longer swept back in a hard line, but blew at will in dark brown tendrils across his face.

‘Tea?’ Connie offered.

She startled a laugh out of him. ‘Thank you.’

He accepted the cup from her hand, and as he did so she could see his eyes coming back from somewhere else, somewhere private
and engrossing. She realised again that she knew nothing about this man.

‘Don’t you ever sleep?’ she asked.

‘I think it is Flight Lieutenant Blake who is need of his berth. He has crewed well for me tonight.’

‘Taking my name in vain, old chap?’ Johnnie sat up and flexed his shoulder in its sling, shaking the knots out of it. They
all spoke softly so as not to disturb those sleeping below.

‘There’s a cup of tea for you down in the galley, Johnnie,’ Connie said. ‘You must be exhausted. Get some sleep, it’s my watch
now.’

Johnnie stood and yawned. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Of course I’m sure. Go and rest up that poor shoulder of yours.’

‘Give me a shout in a couple of hours and I’ll be …’

‘Go!’

He laughed, touched her arm gratefully and vanished through the hatchway.

‘Poor Johnnie,’ Connie murmured. ‘He hates being stuck here with his bad shoulder just when all his comrades are taking to
the skies.’ She tipped her head back to stare up at the great arc of black clouds, and for a moment it was impossible to tell
whether the sea was above or below her. Just the swell of its breathing in her ears.