Page 3 of The Girl from the Tea Garden (The India Tea #3)

H ello, sir.’ Sam Jackman gripped DrBlack in a firm handshake. Sam’s handsome, expressive face grinned with pleasure under a battered green porkpie hat that sat at a jaunty angle far back on his head.

‘So kind of you, dear boy, to collect me from the station,’ said Norman Black, delighted to see the son of his old friend Jackman, the steamship captain.

The lad had grown into a tall, athletic young man, yet his boyish looks made him look younger than his mid-twenties, as did the mischievous hazel eyes, creased in a smile.

‘Delighted to do so,’ Sam said, seizing the missionary’s battered case from the wiry porter who carried it on his head, then tipping the man in thanks. ‘And I’m looking forward to showing off my Kodak cine camera. I think it’s a great idea to film the work of the school.’

‘Well, the footage you sent me of river life was so very good,’ enthused Norman, ‘that I thought it would be an excellent way to help my sister fundraise for StNinian’s. She needs donations to cover the bursaries of the disadvantaged girls she takes in.’

Sam smiled. ‘A worthy cause,’ he said, thinking how the kind doctor had helped him with his own school fees.

Sam strode ahead, leading his old mentor to a dusty motor car– an ancient open-topped tourer that he’d won in a drunken card game from a tea planter in Gawhatty, but there was no need to tell that to the good doctor.

Sam’s pet monkey jumped up and down in the driver’s seat, hooting the horn.

‘Nelson still going strong, I see?’ Norman’s deep-set eyes and craggy face looked amused.

‘This is Nelson the Third,’ Sam introduced the monkey. ‘Nelson One died of old age, and Nelson Two ran off with a young female half his age.’

The monkey screeched in excitement, trying to grab the missionary’s dark homburg hat from his head. Sam told him off in colourful Hindustani, and the monkey leapt on to his master’s shoulder and clutched him by the ears.

With a loud bang from the exhaust, they set off up the winding road to StNinian’s, chatting loudly over the rattle and grinding gears of the labouring car.

Sam hadn’t seen DrBlack for over seven years– the missionary had been back in Scotland for five of those and in Southern India the past two– but he would always be grateful for the man’s kindness.

Norman Black had taken an interest in his welfare since the time his mother had deserted him at the age of seven, separating from his father and disappearing back to Britain without him.

It’s me and the heat of Assam she can’t stand, his father had told him, not you, lad. But it had tipped his world upside down like an earthquake.

‘I’m sorry to hear that your father died,’ Norman shouted over the straining engine. ‘Was it very sudden?’

‘Yes,’ Sam admitted, feeling a familiar pang of loss. ‘It was just a normal start to the day. We’d had breakfast on the boat and were watching the sunrise. Father said he was feeling dizzy and went off to sit in the wheelhouse for a minute. Nelson the Third found him. His heart just gave out.’

Norman patted his shoulder in sympathy. ‘Then there was nothing you could have done for him, so stop feeling guilty.’

Sam gave him a grateful look. The missionary’s knack of reading his mind was uncanny. Two and half years on, Sam was still blaming himself for not checking on his father sooner. He had been too wrapped up in gazing at the dazzling golden sunrise.

‘Thank you,’ said Sam.

Norman changed the subject, describing his recent travels and making Sam laugh, like old times.

Norman Black, who had often crossed the Brahmaputra River on the Jackmans’ ferry Cullercoats on trips to remote tea planters’ families to administer medicine and a dose of salvation, had always been a favourite of Sam’s.

The man had never treated him like a nuisance in the way other grown-ups had.

Deeply hurt at his mother’s rejection of him, Sam had often been difficult and over-boisterous, but Black had been patient with him and made Sam feel special.

It was thanks to the doctor’s generosity that Sam, aged ten, had been given a good education.

Black paid for him to go to The Lawrence School, near Simla, in the Western Himalayas– a three-day journey from home– where Sam had been happy.

He had baulked at the military discipline, but developed a passion for tennis and cricket and revelled in his studies and the chance to learn about agriculture.

He had helped out at a local dairy and went to lectures in Simla on crop rotation and forestry.

He would dearly have loved to have sat the civil service exams and joined the government department of agriculture, but at sixteen, having gained his School Certificate, his father had called him back to help on the ferry.

‘I miss you, lad,’ Jackman had said. ‘You can do farming when I’m dead and gone.’

Yet when his father had died over two years ago, Sam had continued as before, steering the ship just as his father had done. He would probably be negotiating the sandbars and swirling currents of the mighty Brahmaputra till he was as old and grey as Norman Black.

They pulled up in front of the iron gates of StNinian’s, and Nelson jumped on the horn. The frantic hooting brought the gatekeeper rushing to open up. On the far side a row of uniformed girls were lined up, ready to greet their distinguished visitor.

Norman got out and spoke to each of them in turn– there were half a dozen youngsters– and they bobbed in a little curtsy as he shook their hands.

‘Just like royalty,’ Sam teased.

‘You drive on while I walk up with the pupils to the school hall,’ said Black.

‘They can jump in the back,’ Sam offered. ‘Come on, girls, hop on.’

After a moment’s hesitation the tallest girl, a slim blonde with a saucy blue-eyed look, slipped into the seat behind Sam, and the others scrambled in after her. The two who couldn’t squeeze on the back seat perched on top of the boot at the back.

Sam grinned. ‘Hold on tight,’ he said. They arrived at the main entrance in a cacophony of hooting and giggles that brought Gertrude Black hurrying out to greet them with scolding words that belied her obvious delight in seeing her older brother.

‘Goodness, what a noise! MrJackman, so kind of you to bring DrBlack. Just leave the case– one of the staff will bring it in. Girls, get back to your houses at once and prepare for inspection. Norman, dear, it’s so very good to see you.’

Sam reached into the boot for his camera and bag full of film canisters.

Turning to go, the blonde girl gasped. ‘Is that for making films?’

‘Yes.’ Sam said, smiling. ‘I’m going to record life at the school.’

‘And the drama competition?’

He winked. ‘I’ll make film stars of you all.’

She returned the smile, and the others squealed in excitement, which set Nelson screeching. Miss Black clapped her hands for order.

‘To your houses, girls! That includes you, Nina Davidge.’ She gave the tall blonde girl a warning glare.

The girl stood her ground. ‘Shall I show MrJackman around the school, miss?’

‘No, thank you, Nina. I shall be doing that after lunch.’

Nelson took that moment to swing down from the car and scamper towards the girls. Nina shrieked as the monkey grabbed her school tunic. Sam lunged forward and pulled Nelson away. Nina and the other pupils fled with screams and giggles.

‘I’m so sorry,’ said Gertrude. ‘I don’t know what’s got into them today. My girls are not usually so unruly.’

‘No, I apologise for Nelson’s ungentlemanly behaviour,’ Sam said, putting Nelson on his lead and keeping a tight rein.

‘Perhaps, dear sister.’ Norman said with a laugh. ‘I shouldn’t have brought such a handsome young man into their midst. But maybe they will all perform their plays twice as well for the camera.’

‘And he’s got gorgeous hazel-brown eyes,’ Nina told her enthralled classmates, ‘and a wicked smile. He’s some sort of film director. Absolutely divine– apart from his horrid little monkey that smells of the bazaar.’

Adela listened from across the room; even though most of the girls were speaking to her again (including Margie when Nina was out of earshot), she was no longer part of the gang.

She and Flowers kept each other company and had been secretly practising their routines in Miss Bensham’s linen room.

The house mother must have felt sorry for them because she was allowing them to use her wind-up gramophone and had added their mystery act on to the programme.

They were going to perform a slapstick imitation of Charlie Chaplin that turned into them throwing off their hats and blazers and dancing the Charleston, a more old-fashioned dance than they had wanted, but Miss Bensham’s record collection was limited.

Nina was still going on about the good-looking film-maker who had brought DrBlack.

‘I’ve never heard of a film director with a monkey,’ Adela chimed in. ‘Can’t be anyone famous.’

‘Nobody asked you, Tea Leaf,’ Nina snapped. ‘Anyway, it doesn’t concern you, since you’re not in our play.’ She turned to the others. ‘And I could tell he liked me– he gave me a wink!’

‘And directors don’t do their own filming,’ Adela persisted. ‘If he didn’t bring a cameraman with him, then he’s not a proper director, is he?’

Nina stormed across the room and jabbed Adela hard with a long finger. ‘Nobody cares what you have to say. You’re just jealous that I’m going to be filmed, aren’t you? I’m the one who will be famous one day– not a little Tea Leaf from the back of beyond. So shut up, two annas!’

Adela stared her out, not flinching from the painful jab or answering back. Just wait and see, she thought defiantly. She, not the hateful Nina, would be the star by the end of the day.