Plantation Doctor (18 page)

Claud pressed his shoulders into a more comfortable position, let his gaze wander from the moonlit face of Lyn on his left to the unsmiling Hazel on his right and over to Marceline, who sat a yard away with her feet drawn under her and her hands together in her lap. He sighed and wagged his head at the men.

“I’ve made my decision. I’m going to marry Lyn Russell,” he announced.

“Oh no, you’re not,” Lyn said emphatically.

“Darling, I am,” he reiterated, as if patiently repeating something he had said every night for years. “I’m going to marry you and cherish you. Do you remember the first time I proposed to you, Lyn?”

“Of course not. How can I remember a thing which never happened?”

Claud lifted his head and beseechingly raised both arms to the heavens. The audience laughed and called for explanations.

“The girl hasn’t a spark of romance,” he groaned at her. “Will you state flatly that we have never talked of buying a shop in Nice and filling it with antiques and whatnot with which to fleece the tourists?”

“But, Claud, you were joking!”

Lyn’s exclamation had been drowned in applause; Claud had won his point. It was all extraordinarily silly, typical of Claud and his gang. She would not have been seriously disturbed if Hazel had appeared less grim. She wanted to lean over and assure Hazel that she didn’t mind this ridiculous business; just now Claude could be excused for being a wee bit above himself. Then she became aware that Marceline had vanished, and it smote her like a heavy
h
ow that the dark girl had allowed herself to fall genuinely in love with Claud—Claud, who was fickle as the wind and had never known a truly positive desire in his life.

She met Hazel’s eyes, caught the slight shake of her head and took it that Marceline’s absence was not to be remarked upon. A great deal had transpired during the weeks she had been isolated, thought Lyn. She was completely out of her depth, and longed intensely for the safety of her own bedroom.

Hazel must have suspected as much. She got gracefully to her feet and said carelessly, “Those who fancy a nightcap before the club bar closes will have to sprint. Oh, and Charles,”—this to a man at her side—“Lyn hasn’t long recovered from fever. Be a sport and run her up to Denton, will you?”

At first, Lyn’s mental equipment could cope only with the fantastic aspect of that party, the unreality of it; but as Palmas was left behind a niggling suspicion that Claud’s fooling had been purposeful, even vindictive, took root. Poor Marceline, who must live through nine more days of frustration and unhappiness before she could begin to put him away from her.

What idiots women were, to fall such easy prey to men who had no use for them! The sapping element in the climate was chiefly to blame, the lethal heat, the ominous threat of saturating, bone-decaying rains. Once again Lyn had to put the onus on the tropics. By the time she got into bed she had completed the full circle of pointless analysis and conjecture.

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

Marceline
played tennis and some golf. She sat in at card games and tried her erratic hand at billiards. For three days she was seen here and there in the settlement, charmingly turned-out, lazy, still grumbling at the “weather,” and apprehensive besides about the trip home by yacht. With Lyn, she had reverted to the normal friendliness of one young woman for another. Hazel, she avoided. No one who had seen those small white
teeth tearing at reddened
li
ps could have believed that this was the girl who had let herself go rather thoroughly over Claud Merrick.

W
hen Friday came again Lyn made one of the crowd that motored to the club to see a cinema show. As usual, the film was old and streaked, and the inexpert blacking
-
out of the windows detracted still more from the evening’s pleasure. But such entertainment was so rare that a large percentage of the white population of Palmas packed the sultry hall and showed loud appreciation.

After the film they flowed into the vestibule and terrace. Lyn came out of the club into beneficent night air with Claud at her elbow.

“Contrived that neatly, didn’t I?
”
he whispered. “We’ve given your friends the slip.”

“They’ll think I’m lost.”

“Not they. Dear little girls like you never get lost in Palmas.”

Unwillingly, she let him lead her across the terrace to the parapet. Beyond it she would not go, but she did accept a cigarette and share the flame of his match. He puffed a ball of smoke into the darkness and watched it disperse.

“I inveigled you out here for a purpose,” he said. “I want to ask you not to think too badly of me for the way I acted the other night. The bunch didn’t take much notice—they know what a lunatic I can be—but I’d hate to feel that my foolishness had injured you, Lyn.
I wouldn’t have put over all that rot if I hadn’t been certain you’d take it as fun.”

“Well, I did. I suppose you had to answer something when they demanded what you were going to do from now on.” To divert him from the topic, she queried, “What are your plans?”

He smoked a bit and tapped away grey ash. “I shall have a holiday—maybe in France and Switzerland—and later on I’ll go to London and have those old maps of mine framed; I’ve been wanting to do that.” He grinned at her suddenly. “When you decide to get married let me know, won’t you, Lyn? I’d love to give you one of those maps—a good one of this part of the coast. It was made by a Portuguese when Palmas was a native village with a long Intriguing name and all was ju
ngle
where Denton now rears its immaculate head.” He took a last pull at his cigarette and tossed it away, bent forward to thrust aside a spray of bougainvillea so that he could peep at the stars. “I’m going to miss the African nights; the bullfrogs and crickets, the dev
i
lish thirst that keeps you awake. Everything here is so hot and highly coloured, insidiously attractive.”

The nostalgia which tinged his tone made her look at him curiously. But by now Claud was smiling again, taunting himself for a sentimentalist. He had lived in West Africa for eight years; she wondered if he realized how sadly wasted those years had been, or whether he counted them happily spent in the pursuit of selfish pleasures.

“I’ve been mad,” he said ruminatively, as though responding to her silent question. “I was satisfied till you arrived, Lyn. Hazel didn’t have the effect that you did; she didn’t much care that the bungalow was shoddy and untidy, the food poor. That kind of thing doesn’t bother her—to that extent she and I are alike. But when
y
ou came to live with us it was like a clean cool breeze in the house. You made me ashamed that I’d slipped so far from the accepted standards of living.”

“You weren’t as bad as all that. In any case, Melia did the reorganizing, not I.”

“She had nothing to do with the part that affected me most.”

What he would have added Lyn never knew, for Rosita Baird hailed them and in her wake came John Baird and Hazel, Marceline and a number of the supervisors from the rubber estate. There were prolonged and jovial leave-takings, and Lyn found herself laughingly pushed into a car with Marceline, the Bairds and Roger Bailey. As they shot away uphill she saw Claud standing bareheaded beneath a tamarind tree, saw him gallantly kiss a hand to herself or to Marceline.

Marceline had a flush and a vague smile. About the show she could make no comment beyond stating a preference for the cine films in Adrian’s lounge.

Saturday morning Lyn devoted to Melia. The new frock was such a success that the woman yearned to acquire more of those modish garments. Rollins had ordered for her many yards of pink spun silk and a generous length of fine jersey boucle in royal blue. The silk would be fashioned into underclothes such as Melia had never dared to dream of wearing, and the boucle
—
did Miss Lyn think it wicked to make of it a dressing
-
gown?

Melia confessed that all her adult life she had ached to possess a dressing-gown, but always when she had saved enough from her wages there were other, more urgent uses for the money. So far she had made do with the loose, old-fashioned linen coat, but it was rotting at the seams and grey with many launderings.

Sometimes Lyn felt she could have wept for all that Melia had missed, but mostly she was thankful for what she was at last gaining. But for Adrian, Melia would never have come to Denton to make the acquaintance of Rollins, she would never have known the excitements and pleasures of friendship and marriage.

The dressing-gown was to be tailored and lined with pale-blue Indian silk; it would have a long, wide girdle and two deep pockets and hang in rich folds almost to Melia’s ankles. Lyn explained this as she snipped and sewed the shorter seams. Melia tackled the long seams and did the pressing.

At a quarter to one Lyn jumped up from her kitchen chair. “I must change my frock. Mrs. Denton is expecting me to lunch.”

“You be there all day, Miss Lyn?”

“Probably. You can go down to town if you like. I shan’t need anything.”

Lyn put on cool, lime-green linen and white sandals. At a leisurely pace she made her way across the compound, but as she came within sight of the verandah her heart-beats quickened and pink came into her cheeks
—
for Adrian was standing at the low wall with a drink in his hand. As she reached the steps he moved towards her, let his deliberate gaze rove her freshness.

“Sweet and unsullied,” he said mockingly. “How do you do it?”

"That’s the way girls are,” she replied flippantly, “only you’re mostly too busy to notice them.”

“Maybe I’d rather keep my peace of mind.”

“I
can’t imagine the woman who would upset
your
equilibrium.”

“That’s just as well,” he said. “Lime and soda?”

“No, thanks. I had one while I was dressing.”

“Lunch may be a little late. We’re waiting for Marceline.” He leaned back upon the verandah column, regarding her appraisingly. “When I was in Freetown a week or so ago I ran into the officer of the Akasi district
—
the man I mentioned to you—and I asked for his help. This morning I received from him typed notes about Mrs. Latimer’s activities. Tomorrow, being Sunday, we may have time to go through them together.”

Her eyes were bright. “Do you think we could turn them into a form that’s easily readable—you know, with a dash of local atmosphere? That would please the old darling immensely.”

“Then we must certainly do our best. Pleasing others gives one a sense of well-being. Don’t you agree?”

Lyn looked up at him, exasperated. “Are you being horrid again?”

“No. Merely topical. This week you’ve been pleasing my aunt, and I must say you don’t appear any the worse for it. Don’t be too tender and filial or we shan’t get her off next Wednesday.”

Lyn reached for one of the silky tips of a palmetto frond and absently wrapped it about her forefinger. The trees were close, spreading their green-clad arms to make ochreous shadows upon the grass and paths.

“I’ve come to the conclusion that I must be an all
-
round disappointing person,” she said.

“Have you? What train of thought led to that sparkling remark?”

She lifted one shoulder. “I’ve never gone very high in your esteem, but I was climbing a little in your aunt’s. Recently, though, I feel that she suspects me.”

“She doesn’t suspect you, Lynden,” he said with cynical kindness, “and to me you’re not disappointing as a person, but as a woman. Is that more palatable?”

“Did you intend it to be?”

As he shook his head his smile was aloof and maddening. But under the smile she sensed a harshness which would not have far to go to become savagery. The complexities of his character were alarming, turning him from friend to stranger with the twist of a thought. It was a relief to hear Mrs. Denton cross the lounge to the verandah.

“Are you still fussing?” he chided her as she appeared.

“I do wish you’d relax.”

“She hasn’t come, but we’ll have lunch. It’s nothing, Lyn, my dear—only that Marceline has stayed in Palmas for lunch without sending a message. She’s awfully thoughtless when she’s enjoying herself—and I’m afraid it’s partly my fault. Come along in.”

It was a good meal, consisting of chilled salads and meats, iced fruits, cheese, and wholemeal bread baked in the yacht kitchen. Hazel shared it, but today no guests had been invited, which, Mrs. Denton observed with unwonted tartness, was doubtless why Marceline had chosen to eat at the club.

Hazel said, “I left my volume of Pinero on the yacht yesterday. I’ll collect it and find out what she’s going.”

“Pinero?” Adrian took her up. “Again the lure of the greasepaint?”

“No, dear man,” she returned sweetly. “We needed a wedge for the cabin door.”

They exchanged a glance of complete understanding, and when Hazel was ready to go, Adrian saw her to his own car and instructed the native driver.

Mrs. Denton went to her room for a couple of hours’ rest and Adrian had to watch a case in the native section of the hospital. So Lyn sat just inside the lounge, reading a little and occasionally bestowing a glance at the garden, above which round, cotton-wool clouds came sailing across a white-hot sky. People said those clouds presaged the rains. One day there would be no tiny white billows, no wind, no blue in the heavens. The sky would hang like a scorching brass lid with deepening purple on one rim, and as the purple spread suffocatingly over the coast a storm would break, a storm of gigantic proportions which threshed trees to ribbons and left a legacy of
disaster and terrible despondency. Then the drenching disintegrating months of rain.

Lyn would be gone from West Africa before that happened, but Adrian would be here still, Adrian
...
and Hazel. The enigma of Hazel had sharp
corner
s. Lyn let it pass and lay back to drowse. Audibly, came the thud of tennis-balls from the courts, the tones of the men. Nearer, insects were still narcotically droning.

At four she washed, and when she returned to the lounge Mrs. Denton was at the long, low table with Adrian.

“Now Hazel’s missing too," complained the older woman when Lyn had been seated. “I can’t fathom what is so attractive about that hot, wet town.”

“They’re only twenty-four,” murmured Adrian. “Have some tea, my sweet. For you, it’s the most soothing medicine I know.”

Mrs. Denton had scarcely begun to pour before the car sounded on the side path.

“They’re here,” said Adrian, “but be prepared to hear that they’re booked for dinner. If you weren’t going home next week, Aunt Evelyn, I’d lock that ward of yours in her room. You can’t keep up that pace in the tropics without consequences.”

He had got up and gone to the french window, presumably to greet the two girls. Lyn heard the tap of heels on the verandah, then Hazel’s voice, breathless, almost agonized.

“Adrian! Oh, Adrian.”

He moved to one side and Hazel saw that Mrs. Denton and Lyn were in the room. She hesitated, and passed him to enter the cool duskiness. Her lack of colour was startling, and she held herself very straight, poised even in her moment of stress.

“Mrs. Denton, I don’t know how to tell you
—
”

“It’s Marceline! Has she had an accident?”

“No. It’s nothing like that. She
...
she and Claud have gone away together.” Swiftly, before the exclamations could be followed by questions, she held up a hand. “Please let me get it told in my own way. I went straight to the club but no one there had seen either of them. I waited for a while, and then it occurred to me that Claud might be resting in his room, so I went to the desk, intending to have a messenger sent up. The clerk said Claud had paid up and checked out this morning—he was sailing on the noon coaster for Freetown. He had left a letter for me.”

Hazel smoothed the sheet which had been gripped in her hand and placed it beside the tea-tray, but no one stirred to pick it up. Lyn felt petrified in her seat, afraid to look anywhere but at Hazel’s pale, controlled face.

“What does he say?” asked Adrian tersely.

“That he and Marceline are in love, that the
...
elopement was arranged between them early this week but they had to hang on for a passage till one of the service boats put in. They’re
...
already married.”

Adrian swore softly. He strode over and swept up
t
he letter, rested a calming hand on his aunt’s shoulder while he read it. “Well, it seems to be an accomplished fact. Marceline became Mrs. Cla
u
d Merrick by special licence this morning.”