Terror in the Sun Read online

  She had found herself understanding Amelie’s assertion that he was in actual fact a very eligible gentleman and that any other girl in her position would encourage his advances and hope fervently that he would propose marriage.

  Brucena could not explain her feelings about him. She only knew they were there and that she not only found him unpleasant but actively not like him in any way.

  She had been sure of it when she had seen his eyes searching her face on arrival and had known when he took her hand as they entered the guest house that the mere proximity of him made her flesh creep.

  ‘It’s absurd and I am quite certain that I should not allow it to happen,’ she told herself. ‘But it does and I only hope he does not manoeuvre me into a position where I am alone with him.’

  She was quite certain that that was what he intended to do and she opened the letter wondering what he would say.

  His writing was what she expected, she thought, bold and large, and the note was written in a way that was almost as if he ordered her to appreciate what he said.

  “Welcome, my dream Princess. I have been counting the hours until your arrival and now I kiss your hand in greeting and hope for very much more.”

  Brucena dropped the letter down on the dressing table and turned away from the mirror.

  “Thank you very much,” she said in Urdu to her two attendants and they giggled with delight because she had spoken to them in their own language.

  They bowed and put their hands together, palm to palm, as they left the room.

  The sitting room, which was in the centre of the building, was decorated with a huge chandelier, which, Brucena was to find later, was very characteristic of the decoration of the main Palace.

  The previous Maharajah had liked everything to glitter so that not only the chandelier but even the furniture glinted with pieces of crystal, polished gold and engraved glass.

  There were cool drinks in the sitting room and little sweetmeats that were delicious but, as Amelie remarked regretfully, extremely fattening.

  There was also Lord Rawthorne, who seemed larger and more overpowering than he had in Saugor.

  “I have planned very exciting things for you tomorrow,” he proclaimed, “but I thought tonight you would like to be quiet after your journey. So we will just dine here en famille, although, of course. His Highness is looking forward to meeting you.”

  “It sounds delightful,” Amelie said politely.

  “I have been enjoying the tiger shooting,” Lord Rawthorne continued. “I don’t know, William, whether you or Hadleigh wish to take part in a shoot while you are here. I can certainly arrange one that will guarantee you several fine animals at the end of the day.”

  Lord Rawthorne continued to describe how well he had shot and how many animals he had already bagged, but Brucena had ceased to listen to him.

  She was looking out into the flower-filled garden and the compound where The Palace with its Guesthouses stood and was wondering if it would ever be possible for her to go into the town and see the people.

  Perhaps, if luck was on her side, she would have a glimpse of the little boy who she had never forgotten.

  However she had an idea that they would be cut off from having any contact with the ordinary people and, while she was still wondering, the door opened and the Honourable Richard Cavendish, British Resident of Gwalior, was announced.

  There was no doubt that he was extremely annoyed and irritated that Captain Sleeman, whom he had forbidden to capture or harass any Thugs in the Province of Gwalior, was actually here in person.

  But he had the good sense not to say anything provocative, although it was obvious from the expression on his face and the tone of his voice that they could expect no welcome from him.

  “That I am surprised to see you, Sleeman,” he said, “is to express my feelings very mildly!”

  “I found it impossible to refuse Lord Rawthorne’s most generous invitation,” William Sleeman replied blithely, “besides which my wife and I are most eager to show a little of India to my cousin, who was recently arrived from England to stay with us. Let me introduce you.”

  Mr. Cavendish greeted Brucena with what she thought was bad grace, but, because she thought that it would please her cousin, she asked questions about Gwalior that he was bound to reply to.

  Fortunately Lord Rawthorne had invited the Resident to dinner and when the ladies retired to rest before dinner, Amelie piped up,

  “It was almost worth coming all this way to see how much it annoys Mr. Cavendish. He never expected to find William on his territory and in a position where he cannot order him to leave.”

  “I think he is a horrid man,” Brucena said, “apart from the fact that he allows the Thugs so much licence.”

  “I agree with you,” Amelie replied, “but we must be careful for William’s sake to be charming to everyone.”

  And that, Brucena thought with a sinking of her heart, included Lord Rawthorne.

  Dinner was a fairly quiet meal as they all were tired, but after it was over, Lord Rawthorne insisted that they should go out onto the verandah and look at the lights of the town below them, at the great precipice at their back and at the countryside stretching out towards a far horizon.

  With the cliffs and gorges, mango groves and a winding river it was very beautiful as the sun sank.

  There were lights coming out one by one and Brucena knew that she would find it very romantic and inspiring if Lord Rawthorne had not taken the opportunity of standing unnecessarily close to her and attempting to speak to her alone.

  “I have so much to show you and so much to talk to you about,” he said in a voice that he thought only she could hear.

  “I am too tired tonight to appreciate anything,” she replied.

  “You received my note?”

  “Yes.”

  “There were so many other things I wanted to write, but I thought I would rather say them.”

  “I hope that is something you will not do.”

  “You will not be able to stop me.”

  “Then I shall be extremely – angry.”

  “Will it really make you angry to be told that you have haunted me ever since I left Saugor,” he asked, “and that only by pretending that you were in my arms have I been able to sleep?”

  Brucena moved some steps away from him and he followed her to say,

  “Have I now made you angry?”

  “Yes, very! You are not to speak to me in such a familiar manner. It is quite outrageous after such a short acquaintance.”

  “It does not seem short to me. I feel I have known you for years and have been looking for you all my life.”

  “We actually met only forty-eight hours ago.”

  “If it was forty-eight minutes or forty-eight years, I should feel exactly the same,” Lord Rawthorne persisted.

  His face was very near to hers and, because she had no idea of how to cope with the situation, she hurried all the way down the verandah to join Amelie, who was talking to Major Hadleigh.

  “I am tired, Amelie,” she said, “and I am sure that you are too. I think we should retire to bed.”

  ‘You are quite right, Brucena,” Amelie answered. “There is always tomorrow to see everything. Goodnight, Lord Rawthorne, and thank you for your kind and generous welcome.”

  She curtseyed.

  “Goodnight, Major Hadleigh.”

  Both men bowed as Brucena curtseyed too, but then Lord Rawthorne put out his hand as if to stop her from leaving the room.

  “I want to talk to you,” he insisted again. “Must you go?”

  “I am sorry,” Brucena replied, “but I can – barely keep my eyes open.”

  She hurried quickly after Amelie and they went together to their bedrooms, which were on the other side of the Guesthouse.

  “Lord Rawthorne is obviously extremely enamoured of you,” Amelie commented.

  “He is far too forward and says things he has no right to say.”

 
; “Promise me one thing.”

  “What is that?”

  “If he does propose, that you will not turn him down immediately, but will think it over. It would, as you must know, be a brilliant marriage for you and I assure you that, although William and I could produce a number of attractive men who would meet with your approval, they would not be of Lord Rawthorne’s social standing nor would they be likely to possess much money except for what they earn.”

  “I have told you – what I want,” Brucena replied.

  “I would not ask you to marry for money and position,” Amelie said after a moment’s pause, “but you might at least try to find love where these things are.”

  Brucena laughed.

  “Now, dearest Amelie, you are being very French!”

  She kissed her and went to her own room, where she stood looking out into the night.

  ‘Suppose I never find love?’ she asked herself. ‘But it would be impossible for me to find satisfaction with anything less than what I have hoped for in my dreams.’

  She realised that the future was a very unknown quantity for she had no wish to return to Scotland to her fault-finding father and jealous stepmother.

  But she would not be able to stay with the Sleemans forever and she knew that, however much she might protest, Amelie would not let her look after her baby as she intended, but was already searching for a good Ayah whom other Englishwomen could recommend.

  As Brucena had protested, she had said,

  “You can certainly help me supervise the baby and, of course, I want him with me as much as possible. At the same time I don’t want to bore William and I know that, however pleased he will be with his child, he will still want to have me alone.”

  “That is when I can look after the baby,” Brucena said firmly.

  “With the help of an Ayah. Don’t be ridiculous, Brucena. You are far too young and attractive to want to tie yourself to a child. It is men you should be thinking about and one in particular who will be your future husband.”

  “Until this paragon of all virtues turns up,” Brucena laughed, “I might as well make myself useful.”

  She was sure that Amelie would let her do nothing of the sort and that, once she began to trust the Ayah, it would become obvious that she could not impose on their hospitality any longer.

  The alternative, of course, was to encourage Lord Rawthorne, not that he needed any encouragement.

  ‘It’s no use!’ Brucena whispered into the night. ‘I cannot like him and no amount of persuasion will ever make me feel any differently.’

  She could hear mosquitos buzzing in the darkness and she quickly summoned her maids to come and undress her and then crept under the folds of the mosquito netting.

  When she finally lay down, she fell asleep almost immediately.

  *

  There was no doubt that Lord Rawthorne had excelled himself in his efforts to entertain Brucena and there was no pretending that anyone else mattered.

  It was her face he watched as the elephants encrusted with silver paint and bearing silver howdahs moved into position, looking in the early morning mist like great prehistoric monsters, their great forelegs heaving as the howdahs rocked.

  Two Squadrons of the Gwalior Lancers jingled past and the excited crowds waited for what Brucena knew would be the great moment of the Parade.

  There was a smell of damp earth for the whole ground had been drenched with water from hundreds of goatskin bags so that the small party sitting on valuable Persian carpets and under the shade of silk umbrellas should not be incommoded by the dust.

  There was a roll of kettle-drums, the blare of many trumpets and now through the mist came a huge elephant, far larger than the others, strewn with jewels and carrying on its back a golden howdah and the young Maharajah was seated in it.

  One look at his ugly malicious face told Brucena that Cousin William was right in everything he had said about him.

  He clambered down a ladder from the elephant and they were all presented by Lord Rawthorne. She wondered if the people cheering and turning to him really accepted him as their divinely appointed Ruler.

  The Maharajah joined them, seated on a chair that was not unlike a throne and protected from the sun not only by a gold umbrella but also by fans made of peacocks’ feathers.

  Then the entertainment began.

  There were marching soldiers, jugglers, magicians, snake charmers and acrobats.

  “The dancing girls are being kept for tonight,” Lord Rawthorne pointed out. “They will doubtless amuse the other men, but I shall have eyes only for you.”

  “Tell me about the snake charmers,” Brucena said, trying to change the subject from herself.

  “You charm me in a manner that I cannot describe,” Lord Rawthorne went on. “You have caught me in a spell that I can never escape from.”

  Try as she would, Brucena could make him talk about anything but herself.

  By the time the entertainment was over and they were driving back to The Palace, she thought that, while what she had watched was fascinating, she wished that Cousin William or even Major Hadleigh had been able to explain it to her, rather than her having to listen to Lord Rawthorne turning everything she said into an over-effusive compliment.

  “I must say,” William Sleeman said when they were alone, “our host makes his feelings very obvious, Brucena. I think perhaps as your Guardian I should ask him if his intentions are strictly honourable.”

  He was teasing her, but Brucena rose almost angrily to the bait,

  “You are to do nothing of the sort, Cousin William!” she blustered. “I do my best to discourage his Lordship. If you want the truth, he has completely spoilt the morning for me. I wanted to know the history of what was happening, but he could do nothing but make ridiculous compliments even including one about my eyelashes!”

  “Well, they are rather long,” William Sleeman commented.

  Brucena stamped her foot, then realised that he was laughing at her and she began to laugh too.

  “Brucena is being quite ridiculous!” Amelie chipped in. “She ought to be delighted that the most eligible man we have ever seen in this part of the world is at her feet, instead of which all she does is to kick him away. You should speak severely to her, William.”

  “I have a feeling it is due to Brucena’s Cornish blood,” he replied, “It makes every one of us an idealist. I had decided never to marry until I met you, my darling, and then look what happened.”

  “Oh, William, was I really what you had been looking for all the years you had remained a bachelor?” Amelie asked, breaking into French as she always did when she was moved or excited.

  “I have told you so often what I felt,” her husband said, a little embarrassed because Brucena was listening, “and I will tell you again, but not at this moment. We have to be ready for luncheon when we are to meet all the grand dignitaries of Gwalior. And a very unprepossessing lot they are!”

  “Be careful, William,” Amelie cautioned him quickly. “You know in this place even the walls have ears!”

  It was not until late in the afternoon when it was growing cooler that Brucena, carrying a sunshade over her head, slipped out through her bedroom window and into the garden.

  She was anxious to avoid letting Lord Rawthorne know where she was going because she was quite certain that he would insist on accompanying her and that would spoil everything.

  She wanted to wander round by herself. She wanted to see without having to talk about it and without everything she said being changed into something personal.

  She kept out of sight of the windows of the Guesthouse by moving between the great banks of bougainvillea.

  The garden was a sheer delight with exotic flowers and creepers that climbed over and round the trees that the frangipani petals fell from like snowflakes onto the ground beneath them.

  There was no doubt that the surroundings were beautiful and it was a pity, Brucena thought, that the characters of the people who
lived in Gwalior did not match the beauty of the place.

  The compound where the Palace was situated was so enormous that it held, as is usual in India, a vast number of people living in it, all of whom she was sure served the Maharajah in one capacity or another.

  There were servants in his special uniform moving from some low houses at the back towards The Palace and there were soldiers whom she had seen on parade, now off duty, who were camping in tents in another part of the Park.

  Then she saw children playing amongst the low houses from which came the smell of cooking, while smoke, white and thick, rose slowly over them with no breeze to blow it away.

  Most of them, Brucena saw at a glance, were not as pretty as the children she had seen at Saugor and in particular one child, who she was still thinking about and who, if she was honest, she was trying to find.

  There were men, heavily moustachioed and bearded, sitting under banyan trees and deep in conversation.

  They made her think of the men she had seen with the little boy who was crying. They too were wearing turbans, white-sashed dhotis over pantaloons and sandals with curled toes.

  ‘A description,’ she told herself, ‘that might apply to millions of men all over India.’

  Several men looked up as she passed them, but they did not seem to be particularly interested and she walked on, moving amongst the trees, passing shrubs and flowers and then finding more low houses crowded with people.

  She knew that it was nothing unusual, because she had read that most Indian servants, when they were fortunate enough to have a job with the Maharajah or someone in the East India Company, supported perhaps ten or fifteen relatives. Wherever he went, they went too.

  There were many lean dogs looking for scraps and occasionally a tethered goat struggling to find grass on the dried up sun-baked ground that badly needed rain.

  ‘I must go back,’ Brucena thought. ‘It will soon be time to change for dinner.’

  Then, turning round the side of a clump of flowering bushes, she came upon half-a-dozen children playing together under some trees