Ship's Surgeon (17 page)

“As if I were on a cloud!”

“Well, let’s sail away. You’d better come too, Miss Fenley.”

Pat followed him and his burden. Passengers eager to go ashore were already gathered on the decks, and they looked round at Deva and smiled, shouted good wishes and goodbyes. She answered them quickly, eagerly, laughed up into Bill’s face. He gave her his tolerant smile.

At the opening into the lounge he set her down, and Pat flicked the sari into its natural folds. Deva squared her thin shoulders, clasped her hands tightly in front of her, and walked out of sight.

“We’ll give them five minutes,” said Bill, and he walked to the rail.

He had nothing to say to her. It was so obvious that Pat felt it like a pain and humiliation that everyone was aware of. She exchanged good mornings with people who passed, said no, thanks to someone who offered a packet of cigarettes. The minutes went by, and then Bill turned and nodded towards the lounge. Pat went ahead of him.

Deva was sitting and three men gazed at her. She clapped her hands and said, “These are Pattie and Doctor Bill!” And more reverently, “This is my father ... and these my two uncles. My mother waits in the car.”

Mr. Wadia was a smallish man, brown-skinned and well-dressed in narrow white trousers and a loose coat. His pepper-and-salt hair was uncovered, but he held a topi-like hat in one hand while he extended the other. He spoke with emotion.

“This is a splendid day for us, Doctor ... and Miss Fenley. To think we should see Deva back like this, so well and happy. I shall never be able to thank enough all these people who have done so much for us. My house is yours while you are here.”

“That’s very kind,” said Bill. “Miss Fenley will go ashore with you now, but I’m tied up this morning. I’d like to see your doctor, though. Will he be available this afternoon?”

“Certainly. I shall be most happy if you will come to the house. It is some way out, but I will send a car. What time will you be free?”

“Say two-thirty. Could you have your doctor there at three?”

“I will arrange it. Perhaps you can tell me now whether it will be quite safe for Deva to have a different physiotherapist? Myself, I would prefer to have Miss Fenley stay with us, but I realize that our way of life is very different from yours and she might be lonely. However, the decision is with you.”

“I don’t think Deva will need therapy much longer,” Bill said suavely. “I have a letter from the specialist in London which I’ll pass on to your doctor, and I’ll tell him my own experience with your very valuable daughter. After that, she will be in his hands.”

“Thank you ... thank you. May we take her now?”

Deva said quickly, “Doctor Bill promised I would leave the ship holding his arm, and I insist on it!”

There were indulgent protestations from the Sinhalese men, but she had her way. Bill took her down to a long white car and sat her inside it. He bowed to a thickish dark woman who looked as if she was normally imperturbable but now was crumpling her face in an effort to restrain her tears. Pat ran back to her cabin for her hat and bag, exhorted a puffing Mrs. Lai to get a move on and sprinted down the gangway. She met Bill at the foot of it.

Quietly, he said, “Get her into bed and stay with her till I come. The heart will stand all this, but I’m not so sure about the nerves. Got a sedative with you?”

“Yes.”

“She may not want to take it, but if there’s any trouble pop it into one of those sickly sweetmeats she’s crazy about.”

“I will.”

There was a moment when it seemed he might say more, but it passed. He nodded and went up the gangway. Pat discovered, to her relief, that the first car was full and she would have to occupy the second with one of the uncles and Mrs. Lai. No one suggested waiting for Deva’s luggage; presumably an agent had already been detailed to take care of it.

Pat looked up at the ship, saw Kristin and Vernon Corey staring downward, and drew a shaky breath. She couldn’t think about Kristin, not yet.

They drove away from the
Walhara,
Mrs. Lai beside the driver, to whom she talked quietly in Tamil, and Pat in the back with the middle-aged Sinhalese man. He was very polite, pointed out places of interest and was pardonably proud of the modern shops in Chatham Street. It was a lovely city, Pat thought; old and new crowded together in tree-lined streets which were full of colour and noise. Chromium gleamed from long sleek cars, rickshaws weaved among them drawn by skinny brown men in drab dhotis, and there were bicycles galore. The pavements were crowded with turbaned men in white and women in vivid silks, and as they left the newer shops and entered narrower streets, Pat saw stores festooned with Indian rugs and scarves.

They left the city, drove on tarmac between tall palms and tree ferns to Mount Lavinia, where the Wadias lived. And lived splendidly, Pat discovered.

Their house was a long and very ornate one-storey building set on a hillside in an incredibly gorgeous garden. From the terrace round the house one could see a wide and beautiful tropical scene with signs of other houses here and there, and always there was that startlingly brilliant garden just below. The humid heat drew rich colour from the ground as if by magic.

They sat just inside a dim lounge which was open on one side to the terrace, and were served with tea and little confections. The parents gazed hungrily and full of love at the imperious Deva, who talked too much. Her brothers came in, two older and one younger than Deva, and they greeted her affectionately and marvelled at her English. Only once, shyly, did any of them look at Pat.

When Pat had finished her tea she said, “The doctor felt that Deva should go straight to bed, and stay there today. She’s been very excited, and she needs rest now.”

Mrs. Wadia nodded. Her English was poor and she was afraid of seeming impolite. She called Mrs. Lai from the back of the house, and in a few minutes Deva was lying on a pretty white bed in a room which was three walls and a veranda overlooking the garden. She was so tired that she swallowed a capsule without a word. Pat sat in the veranda and soaked in the view. The air was hot and languorous, Deva’s own native air. The house, Deva had once told her, could be closed right in during torrid weather; it was then that they were grateful for the air-conditioning system which her father had installed some years ago.

A barefoot servant brought lunch. Rice with curried chopped vegetables, fish in a pink sauce, seed-biscuits, grated coconut and a bowl of tropical fruits: mangoes, red bananas, litchis and tangerines. Pat ate a little while Deva slept, and when the tray had been taken she dozed herself. In such an atmosphere it was easy to slip into a state of semi-consciousness.

It was Mrs. Lai who roused Pat. “Doctor Norton is here, Miss Fenley. He is speaking to our doctor, but I thought you would like to wash before tea.”

“Yes, I would. Thank you.”

It was cool in the lounge when Pat entered it. Long glass doors shut off the hot terrace, and the gracious room, with its curly patterned wicker chairs and gay silk cushions, its fine Kashan rugs covering sea-green tiles, its bamboo cage of parakeets, was like a set for an oriental film. The tea tasted scented but not unpleasant; certainly the small cups, daintily covered with tiny Indian flowers, added to its enjoyment. At last Bill broke away from the doctor and said it was time they left. There were sincere protests from the Wadias, but Pat stood up with him.

“I’ll see if Deva is awake, to say goodbye.”

Deva was stirring, but there were clouds of sleep in her eyes. “Don’t go, Pattie,” she murmured. “You and Doctor Bill ... please stay.”

Pat was quivering. She leaned over and kissed the delicate brow. Bill passed a hand over the dark hair and soft cheek.

“Goodbye, old timer,” he said. “I’ll call and see you next time I’m this way.”

Pat said nothing; she got out of the room, went through the prolonged goodbyes to the family and walked to the car between Bill and Mr. Wadia. Another goodbye, and the car moved away. Pat leaned back in her corner of the back seat, eyes smarting, her face averted. Bill was in the other corner, and between them on the seat lay a white cardboard box.

“That’s yours,” he said. “A gift of silk from Mrs. Wadia; she was too shy to give it to you.” Pat didn’t move. He reached over and put an envelope on her lap. “Deva’s father gave me your salary cheque. He wanted to double it, but I said you wouldn’t like that. They feel that nothing they might say or give you is adequate.”

She slipped the envelope into her pocket, looked out of the window. “I want no gifts.”

“That’s what I told him.”

There was silence after that. Palms towered on either side, but occasionally they caught sight of distant green hillsides and a stretch of hot blue sea lapping at a bone-coloured beach.

“Haven’t seen much of Colombo, have you?” he said eventually. “Women go for the Pettah—oriental bazaar stuff—but you look too played out for it. Don’t happen to have a swimsuit under that dress, do you?”

“No.”

“We could probably buy one easily, if you fancy a swim?”

She shook her head. “I’d just as soon go back to the ship, thanks.”

He leaned forward and spoke to the driver, and presently they took a side road which led to a small wooded headland. The car stopped, and heat pressed in like a blanket. But standing among the trees and looking down over a yellow beach, Pat felt a breeze. Lithe, dark-skinned boys were surf-riding, but no one lounged on that grilling, shadeless beach. A little way out at sea catamarans sat squatly, an occasional diver sliding over into the water from one of them to spear a fish.

“They do pearl-fishing on the north-east shore of Ceylon,” Bill said. “Pity there’s no time for you to make a tour.”

“Maybe I’ll manage it on the return journey.”

He gave a slight shrug. “Maybe. Are you going to cable your uncle before we leave?”

“No, I’ll get Sparks to send it tomorrow, or even the next day. It wouldn’t matter if I didn’t cable till Fremantle.”

There was a silence. Bill leaned against a palm, his hands in the pockets of his trousers. He was in mufti, a light tropical suit, a white shirt and blue tie, and he looked bronzed, and more aggressive than he sounded.

“Are you always sad when you relinquish a patient?” he asked.

“No, I’m happy for them. I’m particularly happy for Deva, but ... well, she has been rather special.”

“She’s been in danger, too, and come through without knowing anything about it. I wondered if we ought to have told her father, but I think perhaps it was wise to say nothing. Thornton and Pickard will lie low for a bit before trying to escape from Pakistan, and they’re not likely to come this way now. Deva is safe enough, anyway, in the heart of her family. Pity to spoil her homecoming for them with fears.”

“That’s what I thought.”

“You’ve done very well with her.” He stared away at the sea for a moment. “I had lunch on board with the Skipper. The company wants to compensate you for that nasty incident, and he asked me to tell you that a stateroom is at your disposal for the rest of the trip, and the same goes for the return journey, if you decide to go back to England in the
Walhara
.” He paused. “Was that your original intention—to spend about ten days in Melbourne and get the same ship back?”

“I hadn’t thought about it, because I wasn’t absolutely sure, till today, that it wouldn’t be necessary for me to stay in Ceylon for two or three weeks. But it sounded sensible, though I rather think I’d prefer to return on a different ship. By Melbourne I shall have had enough of the
Walhara,
and I might like a quicker trip home.”

“What about the financial side of things?”

“I can manage.”

“I know,” he said abruptly, “but you’re not so well lined or you wouldn’t be going to Melbourne at all. Your return fare was paid only to Ceylon.”

She tapped her pocket tiredly. “I’ve already paid for the trip to Melbourne and this money will take care of the rest. I shan’t have any hotel bills or other expenses, even if I’m away from England for three and a half months, and I’ll start working as soon as I get back. In fact, if I’m lucky I might work my way home.”

Bill shifted against the palm and said nothing for some minutes. Pat’s hand closed over the reassuring bulk of the envelope. Two hundred pounds in English money was more than she had ever owned at one time. It would see her through.

At last he said, “It takes a week or so to Fremantle. You’d better get plenty of rest.”

“I intend to, Doctor. And perhaps you’ll thank the Captain for me and tell him I’d prefer to stay down on B Deck. I’ll feel more comfortable.”

Bill straightened sharply. “You’re full of prickles and too damned independent to accept anything from anyone. I know you resent the way I behaved on the night we left Bombay, but I happen to rather more than resent being used as a padded wall by a girl on the rebound. So we’ll forget it, shall we?”

“It’s forgotten,” she said a little tightly. “Do you mind if we go now?”

They got back into the car and drove, without speaking, into Colombo. They stopped outside an hotel whose front entrance blazed with flowers. Bill tipped Mr. Wadia’s driver and sent him back to Mount Lavinia, and nodded up towards the wide veranda of the hotel. “We’ll have a drink,” he said curtly.