Page 197 of The Secrets of the Tea Garden

‘Yes,’ said James. Libby could see fresh beads of sweat pricking his brow.

‘Fancy that!’ Danny gave a puzzled smile. ‘I thought you didn’t know any Dunlops?’

‘Your father wasn’t called Dunlop,’ said James, ploughing on. ‘He was called Logan, Bill Logan. He was my boss in the 1890s when I first went to Assam.’

Libby stifled her astonishment. Bill Logan was Sophie and Sam’s father.

‘Logan had a ...’ James hesitated. ‘Before he was married he had a relationship with your mother. She was a beautiful hill girl – a tea picker called Aruna.’

Libby saw Danny flush pink. ‘No, I don’t think that’s right – my parents were both British – that’s what I was told.’

‘I’m sorry, but that’s not true. Your father decided that you must be sent away before he brought his newly married wife to the plantation. You looked too like him and he thought it would be awkward.’

‘You’re mistaken,’ said Danny, red with indignation. ‘Mixing me up with another boy.’

‘No,’ James insisted. ‘There’s no mistake. I was the man tasked with taking you to the orphanage in Shillong. I handed you over to Sister Placid at the Convent of the Sisters of the Holy Cross. I even gave you your name, Aidan. I chose it at random – named you after a local saint from my home county of Northumberland – because you never had a Christian name up till then. Sister Placid must have given you your surname. There were never any Dunlops working on the plantations in Assam in those days.’

Danny stared at James as if trying to recall a distant memory. ‘There was a big man who led me into the convent ...?’

‘That was me. I think you remember me, don’t you?’ James said. ‘I certainly never forgot you.’

Danny looked stunned. He was speechless.

Winnie said in agitation, ‘Why are you telling my husband this? Why come all this way to upset him? I was right; nothing good comes of digging up the past. Let sleeping dogs lie; that’s what I say.’

Danny held up his hand to ward off her criticism. ‘What was my father like?’

James hesitated. ‘Tea planting was a hard life and Logan was a hard man. Work hard, play harder, was his motto. But he was fond of you. If Logan loved anyone in his life then it would have been you, Aidan. He certainly liked you more than the children from his marriage.’

Libby winced at his bluntness. She was as shocked as Danny was at the revelation; the man sitting opposite her – Flowers’s father – was Sophie and Sam’s illegitimate half-brother.

Abruptly Danny put his face in his hands and let out a sob. Winnie rushed to comfort him.

‘I f-feel s-such a f-fool!’ Danny cried. ‘Thinking I was B-British to the core. I feel s-so ashamed.’

Winnie gave James a despairing look. ‘I think it best if you go. I don’t want you to see my husband like this.’

Libby stood up but James leant across the table and gripped Danny’s arm. ‘You shouldn’t feel ashamed! It was Logan who was in the wrong, not your mother and not you. You were a lively, happy boy – a loving boy – always singing and playing around the burra bungalow, helping Sunil Ram with thepunkahand following your father like his shadow.’

Libby could see the effect of her father’s words on the distraught man; tears were coursing down his cheeks.

‘Dad,’ she cautioned.

James’s voice grew urgent. ‘I’m not telling you all this just to unburden myself of the guilt I have felt all these years for doing Logan’s dirty work – though God knows I’ve been plagued by it. It’s because you have a right to know and the not-knowing has been haunting you all your life too, I’m sure of that. The worst thing is to bottle up secrets and let them fester. That’s what I’ve done and it’s poisoned my life. I can no longer live with such destructive secrets.’

He hung on to Danny’s arm. ‘So I want to tell you this: you may have had a flawed man as your father but your mother was a good woman. She loved you dearly – would have done anything to protect you. I have never seen a mother adore a child as much as she did you, Aidan.’

Danny looked at him in disbelief. ‘But she didn’t protect me, did she? She let me go.’

‘She tried to keep you,’ James insisted, ‘hid you in the lines, hoping Logan would forget to banish you, but you kept returning to the burra bungalow. I was ordered to take you away. Your brave mother ran after us, shouting for you, distraught at losing you.’

‘She did?’ Danny questioned.

James nodded, suddenly overcome, sinking back into his chair. Libby was alarmed to see he looked on the verge of tears too.

‘I remember riding high above the tea bushes,’ Danny whispered. ‘There was a kind man holding me so I didn’t fall.’

‘Aslam,’ James croaked, ‘my bearer.’