Page 40 of The Girl from the Tea Garden (The India Tea #3)

They went down to the river and swam in her favourite rock pool, where the waterfall gushed out of the steep cliff and tiny fish flashed beneath water lilies.

Harry and Mungo splashed so much that Adela gave up and lounged on the rocks in her bathing suit next to Tilly, who was eating a slice of the massive ginger cake with buttercream icing that Mohammed Din had made for the picnic, and sweating under a large topee.

‘Don’t you look gorgeous and trim?’ Tilly said between mouthfuls. ‘You are made for the silver screen with a body like that, Adela.’

Adela self-consciously pulled her knees to her chin and swiftly changed the subject.

Late in the afternoon they returned to the compound and played tennis on the uneven court of dry grass at the side of the house: she and Rafi against Sophie and Wesley, with the boys rushing about fetching balls from the bushes and under the house.

Adela and Rafi won. Rafi was still athletic and fast, and she knew her father had paired her up with Sophie’s husband so that she would win on her birthday.

‘He didn’t always used to beat me, you know.’ Sophie smiled. ‘Rafi, do you remember the first time we ever played?’ Sophie reminisced. ‘With Boz and Auntie Amy in Edinburgh?’

Rafi’s mouth twitched in amusement. ‘I will never forget it. You beat me three sets to one and totally ignored me. I was smitten from that very moment.’

‘No, you weren’t.’ She laughed. ‘You thought I was a snobby little memsahib and I wasn’t very nice to you.’

‘You’ve made up for it since,’ he said and grinned, catching her hand and pulling her to him for a quick kiss on the lips.

Adela thought with a pang of Jay’s sensual kisses.

He’d been wrong about Rafi and Sophie; anyone could see how in love they still were after years of marriage.

They didn’t seem to need anyone else to make them happy, and it threw her once again into a dilemma about whether to mention Tommy Villiers.

At dinner that night Wesley announced their present to her.

‘A shikar trip to Gulgat, just like I promised.’ He beamed. ‘The Raja will accompany us too. Isn’t that an honour?’

Adela’s heart thudded at the mention of Gulgat. ‘Yes, it is. How wonderful!’ She glanced at Sophie who was watching her with an anxious frown. ‘Will ... will anyone else be going with us?’

‘Rafi of course,’ said her father, ‘and probably Stourton, the British Resident. He never misses a chance to bag a tiger.’

‘Tiger?’ Adela said in excitement.

‘There’s a pair of tigers the Raja wants shooting,’ Rafi explained. ‘They’ve been carrying off cattle from a riverside village.’

‘It’s worse than that,’ Sophie said. ‘A villager has gone missing, a grass cutter. They think the tigress might be lame and has attacked the man as easy prey.’

‘A man-eater?’ Clarrie gasped. ‘I don’t like the sound of that.’

Tilly exclaimed, ‘Don’t tell Mungo, or he’ll want to go. I can’t think of anything worse. Stuff of nightmares. James can’t understand it. He thinks hunting is the best thing about being in India.’

‘We won’t take any risks,’ Rafi assured Clarrie. ‘Adela will be kept out of harm’s way.’

‘But man-eaters are cunning,’ Clarrie fretted.

‘You must trust me to look after our daughter,’ said Wesley. ‘You would have jumped at such a chance at her age, Clarissa.’

Clarrie smiled. ‘You’re right of course. I used to go with my father on shikar. I’ll stop fussing.’

‘Oh, I can’t wait,’ Adela cried. ‘My first tiger shoot. We better get some rifle practice in before we go, Dad.’

‘We’ll go out at dawn,’ he promised with a wink.

Two days later Tilly and Mungo departed. ‘Next time we meet will be in Gawhatty’ – she beamed and gave Adela a clammy hug – ‘on our way home! Isn’t that exciting?’

Adela tried to sound enthusiastic, but she hadn’t really given the trip much thought.

She had agreed to it to please her mother, yet somehow it didn’t seem real.

England, Aunt Olive and the Brewis family were a place and people she had no memory of; if it wasn’t for Cousin Jane’s chatty letters, she wouldn’t know them at all.

Her thoughts were consumed with the pending hunting trip and the possibility of seeing Jay again.

Before the Khans left Belgooree, she was determined to get Sophie alone.

Adela had handed over a letter from Fatima with news of Ghulam that the doctor had been too nervous to post, but she’d had no chance to confide in her favourite aunt about the events in Simla that summer.

Adela took Sophie into the garden, sat her down and told her about Tommy.

Sophie’s brown eyes widened in astonishment and then abruptly flooded with tears. She grabbed Adela in a fierce hug.

‘Do you think it’s possible? When can I meet him? Should I write to him first?’

Adela was taken aback by Sophie’s ecstatic reaction, latching on to the idea of Tommy being her brother as if it was already proven.

She had a surge of misgiving; she wasn’t sure that Tommy even wanted a sister.

He had treated the whole idea as a bit of a joke.

He was happy being a Villiers– to the world, that’s who he was– and he might resent being unmasked as someone else entirely.

‘Perhaps I should write to him first,’ Adela said hastily. ‘Explain that you would like to be put in touch– if he’s willing.’

‘Would you?’ Sophie smiled tearfully. ‘I’d be so very grateful.

You might find this hard to understand, but I still feel there’s a little part of me missing, knowing that I have a brother, but not knowing who or where he is.

Or even if he lived beyond babyhood. No grave, no explanation, nothing.

’ Her eyes shone. ‘I make up stories about him– I know it’s silly– but my favourite one is that he was given to a kind maharajah with a large loving family, and he’s grown into a strong handsome man who helps run his father’s estates wisely when he’s not playing polo or writing sitar music. ’

‘Well,’ Adela said and gave a dry smile, ‘doesn’t sound much like Tommy– except he could probably bash out a tune on the guitar. He’s great on the piano.’

Sophie laughed. ‘If he’s been a good friend to you, I’d be happy to have a brother like Tommy.’

Adela turned the conversation to Jay, unburdening herself to Sophie. ‘I’m in love with him and I thought he was with me, but I’ve heard nothing since all that Nerikot business. Has he said anything to you about me?’

Sophie shook her head. ‘He’s been up at the old palace since he came back, so I’ve hardly seen him.

Stourton has told him to keep his head down.

Jay and Rita argue whenever he’s at the new palace; Rafi tries not to interfere.

From what Rafi can gather from Stourton, the Simla authorities are backing the Raja of Nerikot– a case of self-defence against armed communists.

If that’s the case, Jay will be able to go where he wants again, and I imagine it won’t be hanging around Gulgat. ’

‘What a relief that would be if the Raja and Jay are cleared.’

‘Rafi is more worried about Ghulam. Fatima told him everything in the letter you brought from her. But Ghulam cares nothing for his own safety.’

Adela told her aunt about the incident at the Sipi Fair and how she’d seen Sam push Ghulam out of harm’s way.

‘I think Sam Jackman saved him from being caught by the police, but landed himself in a terrible mess. Goodness knows what Sam’s doing now.’

Sophie stroked Adela’s hair. ‘You were fond of Sam, weren’t you?’

‘Very,’ Adela admitted. She didn’t want to think of Sam; it made her sad and angry and aching inside. ‘But it’s Jay I love now. I just want to see him again to find out ... Can you get Rafi to invite him on shikar?’

‘Adela, you worry me.’

‘Please!’

‘You know it can’t come to anything even if Jay loves you back.’

‘Why not?’

‘He’s already betrothed to another – has been since he was twelve. They’re not married yet– she’s in East Bengal– but it’s just a matter of time. Surely you knew?’

Adela felt punched in the stomach. Betrothed? Why had he never told her? He’d asked her to marry him! She’d believed it could be possible.

‘No, he said we could be together.’

‘Oh, that wretched boy,’ Sophie said angrily. ‘He was leading you on.’

Adela thought she was going to be sick. She got up from the garden bench, gasping for breath and retching.

‘Adela, darling,’ Sophie said, rising, ‘are you all right?’

Adela croaked, ‘No, I must—’ She ran across the lawn and down the drive and didn’t stop until she was hidden in tea bushes. She crumpled to her knees and sobbed out her pain.

She spent the next day in bed with stomach cramps.

She didn’t know what her parents and the Khans were saying, but she could hear hushed conversation beyond her room and knew they were talking about her.

Perhaps Sophie was telling of her humiliation at being led on by Jay.

At least she had stopped herself from telling Sophie that she had lost her virginity to the prince; she would keep that secret to the grave.

How stupid she felt. He was deceitful! She was furious with him.

But she couldn’t banish his handsome face; it was there whenever she closed her eyes, and her sleep was disturbed with dreams of him.

The Khans left. To Adela’s relief, no one mentioned Jay, so perhaps Sophie hadn’t told her parents about her foolish infatuation.

She emerged to sit listlessly on the veranda.

Harry annoyed her with his boisterousness, clambering over her and twanging her with a rubber band he said was his catapult.

‘Perhaps we should call off the shikar,’ Wesley suggested. ‘If you’re not feeling up to it.’

He looked so disappointed that Adela roused herself. ‘You mustn’t do that. I’ll be okay. Just a tummy bug.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Of course I am.’ She forced a smile. ‘I’m really looking forward to it.’

Wesley brightened and kissed the top of her head. ‘So am I, my darling.’