Dangerous Inheritance (19 page)

But their reception by the officials at the airport was far from being so welcoming; and it was clear that many of them now regarded white people, particularly the British, with scarcely veiled hostility. Health, Immigration and Customs men all asked innumerable unnecessary questions and, to the Duke's fury, the latter insisted on opening every one of the air-tight tins in which he had brought a supply of his Hoyo de Monterreys thus, by premature exposure to the humid atmosphere of Ceylon, spoiling the cigars.

Even Fleur's expostulations in Sinhalese had proved of no avail and when at last they got away in her car she said:

‘I'm terribly sorry about this, but most of these people are new to their jobs, and having been given a little power it has gone to their heads.'

The hour's run to Colombo, through semi-jungle, paddy fields and villages, had lost nothing of its beauty; the vivid greens of the vegetation, the gay costumes of the women, the yellow robes of the Buddhist monks and the many flowers made
it as colourful as it had been for the past two thousand years. But on entering the city de Richleau saw that a considerable deterioration had taken place. On his last visit he had thought that it had an uncared-for appearance; but now the paint was peeling from shops and buildings even in the Fort quarter, and there seemed to be many more beggars in the streets.

When the Duke had written to Fleur to let her know that he and Simon were coming out, she had at once replied inviting them to stay; but he had declined on the grounds that he now spent a good part of his time in bed and it would be much easier for Max to look after him at the Galle Face.

After they had registered at the hotel it was agreed that they should spend the day resting, then she and Douglas should come to dine there with them that evening. Up in their rooms they found that she had arranged big vases of beautiful flowers for them and dishes of tropical fruit. She had also left a selection of drinks and tins of biscuits. Simon, who had a special liking for digestive biscuits, was touched to find she had remembered that for, although the biscuits in his bedside tin were a not very attractive sort of softish sponge, she had slipped in a note which read, ‘Sorry, no digestives, not allowed to import them any more.'

When Douglas arrived with her that evening, de Richleau thought him as good-looking as ever, but somewhat distrait and lacking his old gaiety. Over their drinks Fleur remarked that the food in the restaurant had gone off shockingly compared with what it used to be, but that it was still good in the Mascarilla, as the hotel's night-club was called; so they had dinner there. After sinking three cocktails and drinking his share of two bottles of indifferent but expensive red wine, Douglas became more cheerful but he deliberately changed the conversation every time Simon asked him about recent developments in the island.

Next day the visitors lunched with Fleur and Douglas at their home. It was a pleasant two-storey house in one of the broad, tree-lined roads out near the Racecourse, and had been built in the early 1900s. A semi-circular drive bordered by flower beds led up to a broad flight of steps at its entrance, beyond
which a row of spacious lofty rooms, with fans set in the ceilings, opened into one another. Several smiling white-coated servants attended on them and the observant Simon formed the impression that they liked their mistress; but it was not until luncheon was over that Douglas said to him:

‘Mr. Aron, I'm afraid you must have thought me very cagey last night in fobbing off a number of your questions about how things are going in Ceylon; but the fact is that people like myself find it wiser not to give our honest opinion about our government in public any more.'

De Richleau raised his white ‘devil's' eyebrows. ‘Surely you don't mean that Ceylon has actually become a Police State?'

‘No, I wouldn't say that,' Douglas replied. ‘But there are plenty of signs that, like Ghana, it might easily become one. Since the assassination of Mr. S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike there have been a considerable number of arrests made on one pretext or another, mainly of people known to be strongly opposed to the Government, and there have been unorthodox delays in bringing some of them to trial. That sort of thing naturally makes one cautious about being openly critical of our lady Prime Minister's régime.'

Simon nodded his head up and down. ‘Very understandable. But between four walls …'

‘That is another matter. Among friends I readily admit that people like myself are greatly perturbed by the way things are going. You will have seen for yourselves how dilapidated the city is becoming, and the same thing is happening throughout the whole island. If you go up-country you will find that your car has to go very slowly and cautiously over the smaller wooden bridges that span culverts, because the roads are no longer being repaired adequately. Air conditioning plants and other machinery that breaks down can no longer be repaired, because the Government cannot afford to import spare parts, let alone replacements. The docks have fallen into a hopeless state of inefficiency, because they are now run largely by people who have never been trained to administer such concerns. Cargo ships often have to lie off our harbours for several days
before they can be brought in and unloaded. In the past the traders in Colombo made a lot of money out of tourists coming ashore for the day from luxury liners; now the ships of many lines no longer call, because it is uneconomic to give the time needed to formalities before they can land their passengers. There are scores of other ways in which through ignorance and prejudice the new Sinhalese officials are ruining their own country; but I won't bother you with them.'

‘And the taxes,' added Fleur. ‘The way they have increased them is absolutely iniquitous. If things go on like this we may have to move to a smaller house.'

De Richleau smiled at her. ‘You used to favour a policy of soaking the wicked rich.'

‘I still do.' She countered the mild jibe without hesitation. ‘That is, in reason, and provided the money obtained really benefits the masses. But this isn't in reason; and so much of it is squandered by Government hangers-on giving themselves a good time.'

‘To what other uses do they put it?' asked Simon.

‘A large part of it goes on education,' she replied, ‘and one can't grumble about that.'

‘Oh yes, one can,' Douglas took her up. ‘To teach every child the three Rs and give them a good general grounding, then enable the brighter ones to pass on to a higher education, is only right. But the cranks who are now responsible for education here have the pipe-dream that every little backwoods Sinhalese boy and girl might later qualify as an accountant, musician, lawyer, radiologist or in some other highly technical capacity. So at great expense they are all being crammed with odds and ends of knowledge that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred will never be the least use to them.'

‘Every child has a right to an equal chance with the rest,' Fleur retorted, doggedly maintaining her old convictions.

Simon tittered into his hand. ‘Won't be much good to them if their country goes bankrupt.'

‘And it will,' Douglas averred, ‘if the Government continues its present policies. The ignorance and stupidity of the people whom Mrs. Bandaranaike is allowing to run the country are
almost beyond belief. They have decided that revenue could be increased if Ceylon manufactured her own brandy, gin and rum; so they are planning to build a huge distillery where they will crush cane and by adding various chemicals produce a variety of spirits. But the idiots have failed to take into account the fact that Ceylon grows enough sugar only for her ordinary needs. As they will have to buy the cane from abroad to supply the distillery, instead of helping our own agriculture it's going to put us further in the red.'

‘Bad show,' remarked Simon. ‘But I suppose one can't blame a people who have recently won their independence for wanting to stand on their own feet in various ways.'

‘There would be a case for that if we could afford such expensive experiments, but we can't. Still worse, these fanatical nationalists have such a hatred of the Western world that they are throwing away some of our best assets simply out of spite. To have antagonised the British by robbing them of many of their big commercial undertakings here was bad enough. Now they mean to treat the Americans the same way. Their latest bright idea is to withdraw the concession by which Shell and the American companies supply the greater part of the island's petrol and give it instead to the Russians.'

‘Yanks won't like that. Shouldn't be surprised if the Americans cut off the aid they're giving you.'

‘You're right, Mr. Aron. And what makes it so tragic is that Ceylon is potentially a rich country. It could well support its people in reasonable prosperity if it were administered by an able Government that, instead of squandering capital, protected it and encouraged the foreign investment which we need to develop our industries. But as things are, just the opposite is happening. People are selling up and sending their money out.'

‘Won't be allowed to much longer, I'm told.'

Douglas gave Simon a quick glance. ‘Where did you hear that?'

Simon shrugged his narrow shoulders and grinned. ‘Well, I'm a banker; and bankers hear things, you know.'

‘I hope you are wrong, but that certainly ties up with a rumour I heard a little time ago,' Douglas said with a frown.

The Duke then told him that this threat to freeze capital was his reason for having come out to Ceylon and asked his opinion about disposing of Olenevka.

As the mine had failed to show a profit, and no change of Government could be hoped for in the foreseeable future, Douglas agreed that it would be sound to sell, provided they could get a reasonable offer. So, after lunch, they drew up a suitable advertisement for insertion in the
Ceylon Times
; but de Richleau said that before finally deciding to sell and sending the advertisement in he meant to have a talk with the manager of the mine, for whom he had sent to come to see him the following morning.

The manager was a Sinhalese named de Zoysa and had been chosen for the post by Douglas from a number of applicants, soon after the court had decided the case for possession in de Richleau's favour. The Duke had asked Simon to remain with him for the interview; so when de Zoysa's name was sent up they were together in de Richleau's private sitting room.

De Zoysa proved to be a thin, angular man with a nervous manner. Although his employer urged him to be at ease, he sat throughout on the edge of his chair and fiddled uncomfortably all the time with a soiled panama that he held between his knees.

When asked why Olenevka had shown no profit during the past year, he explained that that was due largely to the state in which d'Azavedo had left it. Owing to the massacre of the Tamils the mine had been left for many months unworked. Then, when d'Azavedo had at length succeeded in collecting a skeleton labour force, he had been under the shadow of a High Court action which might still deprive him of the property; so he had not exerted himself to get the mine fully operative again. Later, when the verdict had been given against him, although it would have been difficult to prove that he had actually sabotaged the best workings, de Zoysa was of the opinion that he had done so. At all events they had been left in such a state that it had entailed months of work to get them going again. Now, too, they had to rely on Sinhalese instead of Tamils. The
former were not such good workmen, and under the Bandaranaike Government labour was receiving much higher wages than it had in the past.

Most of this de Richleau already knew from the written reports he had received. He had sent for de Zoysa only to assess his personality and judge whether it would be a good long-term bet to retain the mine with the possibility of its increasing in value under his management and proving a handsome legacy to leave Fleur. He glanced at Simon.

Not a muscle of Simon's face moved but behind his thick spectacles his dark eyes flickered swiftly from side to side. It was a silent signal that had often caused his partners to refuse a loan of many thousands to applicants who appeared to offer good security. De Richleau knew it of old and read it as, ‘This fellow's no good. Not enough guts to make a go of it. Much better sell.' Turning to de Zoysa, the Duke said:

‘As the immediate prospects of the mine are not very good I am minded to dispose of it. Since you have managed it for over a year I feel it only fair to give you the first refusal, should you care to make me a suitable offer.'

De Zoysa swallowed hard, shook his head and replied, ‘Sir, you are very kind. But I have not the capital. No way either to raise it.'

The Duke stood up and extended his slender hand. ‘Then it only remains for me to thank you for the work you have put in and to assure you that you will receive full compensation for the termination of your contract.'

When de Zoysa had awkwardly bowed himself out, Simon telephoned to the
Ceylon Times
the announcement that Olenevka was for sale, then he and de Richleau went downstairs to lunch.

On his previous visits the Duke had seen all the sights Colombo had to offer so he was content to spend most of his time in the precincts of the hotel dozing in the sun over a book; but Fleur was determined that Simon should see everything of interest and she had arranged to call for him that afternoon in her car.

They took the road out to Mount Lavinia and after a quarter
of a mile she pointed out to him on the left a wall about a hundred yards long but only about four feet high. Immediately behind it was a thick hedge of higher shrubs. As he glanced at it he was amazed to see that wedged into the hedge at intervals of only about ten feet stood a line of bored-looking soldiers, each of whom held a Sten gun.

‘Behind that hedge,' said Fleur, ‘lies Temple Trees, Mrs. Bandaranaike's residence.'

‘No, really!' exclaimed Simon. ‘Poor woman must be properly scared to keep a dozen gunmen standing about in her front garden.'