Page 141 of The Secrets of the Tea Garden

CHAPTER 28

Just before dawn Ghulam rose from the bed, kissed a sleepy Libby on the lips and crept back to the sitting room. She fell asleep again, sated by their energetic sex and no longer afraid. When she awoke, the sun was high and the street below hummed with noise. It took a few moments to remember where she was and a hot wave of pleasure washed through her at the memory of what she and Ghulam had done in the night.

She got up, feeling light-headed, and pulled on the clothes she had discarded in her haste to make love a few hours previously. Her stomach felt hollow; her appetite had returned.

In daylight, she noticed that there were two pictures hanging on the wall beyond the simple cupboard. One was a photograph of some people at a religious festival – or perhaps a political rally – and Libby peered at it more closely. At the forefront was an attractive woman in uniform, wearing a dark beret and helping Ghulam hold up a banner. Libby’s insides clenched. Could this be the woman that Fatima had told her about, the only woman Ghulam had really loved and whose photograph he still kept?

She turned away from it, uncomfortable with the thought, and looked at the other picture. It was a sketch attached to the wall withdrawing pins. On closer inspection, Libby blushed to see it was her cartoon of Ghulam as a grumpy tiger. She laughed out loud that he had not only kept it but displayed it on his bedroom wall.

Libby went to the water closet and then padded along to the sitting room, hoping to find Ghulam. The room was empty and the bedroll gone from the floor. The clock on the desk showed it was already late morning. A note on the table bore her name. She unfolded it.

Dear Goddess

Both of us have gone to work. Take the day to rest and recover from your ordeal. Fatima doesn’t want you to put yourself at any more risk – and I have to agree with her. We’ll talk tonight. Make yourself at home.

Ghulam

Libby grinned at the reference to goddess; it was the only hint at their lovers’ conversation of the previous night. Otherwise the note was friendly but not over-familiar, no doubt not wanting to draw Fatima’s suspicion. She felt a renewed yearning in the pit of her stomach. The day would drag until she saw him again.

A moment later Sitara appeared with a breakfast tray of tea, fruit and boiled eggs. Libby smiled and thanked her, frustrated that her lack of Hindustani would not allow for more than a few basic words. Her childhood fluency in the language had long been forgotten. She eyed the servant, wondering if she could have heard anything in the night. But Sitara didn’t linger and Libby was left alone to eat.

She was ravenous and devoured all the food on the tray. She glanced through the books on the bookcase and chose one at random. It was about the archaeology of Taxila by some nineteenth-century traveller. She wondered whether it was Ghulam or Fatima who was interested in the ancient site near Rawalpindi; she decided it must be Fatima.Ghulam had no patience for the past; he was a man firmly anchored in the present but always hankering after a better future for the world.

Later, as the temperature climbed again, Libby went for a wash. Returning to Ghulam’s bedroom, she found her river-soaked clothes of the day before on the chair. They had been washed, pressed and neatly folded. She blushed to think that Sitara probably missed nothing that went on in the Khan household.

Libby dressed in her own clothes, brushed out her wet hair and settled back in the sitting room to read. Sitara brought her more food and drink, which made her sleepy. She went and lay down on Ghulam’s bed and was soon fast asleep.

Libby woke with a start. There was shouting in the street below. Someone was screaming. She scrambled out of bed and ran to the window, throwing open the shutters. It was already dark outside. How long had she been asleep? She couldn’t see anything distinctly – a few shadowy figures, people running, a woman in a luminous sari bending over – but she could hear the commotion. The woman was wailing in distress. In the distance she heard the sound of a bell – perhaps from a police van – and more yelling.

Libby’s heart pounded. Then lamplight spilled out from an opening door below and she could see more clearly. A man was trying to pull the woman away, remonstrating with her. As they did so, Libby saw a person crumpled on the ground at the woman’s feet, his white clothing stained with what looked like blood. Had he been attacked? Was he dead? Something terrible had happened. They needed help. She ran to the door and then stopped. Panic caught in her throat. What if it was dangerous? What could she do? There might be a gang ofgoondas. They might turn on her. They wouldn’t see in the dark that she was British ...

Libby leant against the door gasping for breath. She couldn’t move. She stood like that for what seemed an age, paralysed by fear. And yet she wasn’t even down in the street. What was happening to the distraught woman? Who was lying on the ground? What if it was Ghulam?

Hot shame at her cowardice flooded through her. With shaking hands, Libby threw open the door and lurched up the corridor. The sitting room was empty; neither Fatima nor Ghulam were back from work. Her heart thumped in alarm. As she fumbled with putting on shoes, she heard the pounding of footsteps on the stairway beyond the flat.

The door flew open. Ghulam’s anxious face caught sight of her.

‘Are you all right?’ he demanded.

She felt dizzy with relief to see him.

‘Yes. What’s happened? I heard the noise. Has someone been hurt?’

‘There’s been a stabbing, right on our doorstep,’ he said. ‘I was frightened the attackers might have been in the building too.’

She rose and went to him, throwing her arms around him and bursting into tears. Ghulam clasped her tightly and stroked her hair.

‘Is he dead?’ she whimpered.

He swallowed. ‘I think so. They were carrying him away just as I arrived.’

‘I was so afraid it was you,’ she sobbed. ‘I was going to see ...’

‘You were going out there?’ he asked, horrified.

‘I should have gone sooner but I was too afraid.’

‘Thank God you didn’t, Libby.’