Pact without desire Read online

  'On a tour of his orchid plantations was what I thought,' Sara corrected. 'But he pretended I'd misunderstood him; that he'd only meant to show me the orchid specimens in his garden and for luncheon, tete-a-tete. Or not tete-a-tete, as it turned out,' she added. 'His cook came too. But she took umbrage when he grumbled about the food, and later she rode off somewhere on a moped, leaving us together.'

  'His cook or his current mistress?' questioned Rede.

  Sara started. 'What do you mean? How did you know?'

  'How did you know?'

  'He admitted it, or rather, he boasted about it and about his freedom to do as he liked out here.'

  'And so—a liar and a womaniser, and you stay with him all afternoon in cosy chat! What was next on the programme? Dinner and a stay overnight? As a matter of interest, when did you mean to leave,

  if I hadn't come along?'

  Rede's tone had edged, putting her on the defensive. 'When he was willing to take me. But he kept on making excuses, knowing, I suppose, that there was no other way I could go.'

  'You could have slapped his face and walked out on him.'

  'Walked—more than fifteen miles into the city? Besides, there was nothing—specific—to slap his face for. He'd only looked and—and hinted with a kind of leer. Oh, Rede ' she appealed, 'you've got to believe I couldn't stand the man, and that I was never so thankful in my life than when I saw your car drive in!'

  'With me at the wheel? Or would Lim have done as well?'

  'You, of course.'

  'I'd have thought one knight-errant was as good as another. But next time, switch on your intuition radar a bit earlier for a type like Merlin, and meanwhile I'll have a trenchant thing or two to say to Ina on the company she keeps,' Rede said, then changed the subject completely.

  'The Classical Dancers of Thailand are at the National Theatre tonight. Would you care to go?' 'Lovely,' she agreed. 'What time?'

  'Curtain up at eight. We'll have supper at the Hilton afterwards. Dress up.'

  This was Rede, keeping her at the arm's length of their pact, admitting nothing of whatever concern for her had taken hilt out to George Merlin's

  place in search of her. She would have liked to believe that jealousy had brought. him, the same need of possession which she had towards him—which was impossible to hope. But he had returned from Rangoon earlier than he need have done; he had accepted her recoil from that repulsive man; he did want her company on their evenings out. And there were times when her body must have attraction for him ...

  Crumbs. Probably only self--deceptive crumbs at that. But there was comfort to be had in collecting them and hoping they told the truth.

  That evening, at Rede's side, enjoying his pleasure equally with her own, she was as nearly happy as she had been yet.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE fanciful euphoria of that evening was to be disturbed by the news which Rede had for her a few days later. When he joined her in the garden for their pre-dinner drink, he told her,

  `I'd like you to have Buppa do what's necessary in the cottage for a guest who'll be arriving tomorrow night, flying in from Kota Tingii on the mainland by the afternoon plane.'

  Sara asked, 'Oh—the businessman you said might be coming semi-permanently?'

  'Not a man. A woman. Or rather, a young Malaysian girl, my protegee while she attends the Dramatic Culture School in Queenstown as a dance student.'

  'Your protegee?' Sara looked her surprise. 'You haven't mentioned her before?'

  'She's only arisen as a problem during the last few months and I've only recently decided on this arrangement for her.'

  'To live by herself in the cottage? How old is she, then?'

  'Doubtful. She must be eighteen; she could be a little more. She was abandoned by her parents who were probably killed in the Communist infiltration twenty years or so ago, and she's been brought up from a baby by a Malaysian couple, the houseman and housekeeper of some friends of mine who've retired and gone back to England and have, so to speak, bequeathed her immediate future to me. As for her using the cottage, like our other Asian guests I think she'll prefer it, and I didn't suppose that our making a permanent threesome about the house and at meals would appeal to you.'

  'No,' Sara agreed, wishing she could feel more welcome for the scheme on the face of it. 'What's her name?' she asked. 'And does she speak English?'

  'Of course, I'm not wishing a savage on you. And her name—Kluai Mai. Mai for short.'

  Sara made an effort. 'Mai—rather nice,' she said. 'And how well do you know her? When did you last see her?'

  'Only once in the last six months, when the Bar-trams, my friends, were leaving Malaya and the need for her advanced dance training came up. Anyway, Lim must meet her at the airport, and I'd like you to go along too. You'd probably like to have her to dinner on her first night, I daresay?'

  'Of course. She'll feel strange.'

  It was not until she was on her way to the airport with Lim the next evening that Sara admitted to herself that she hadn't asked Rede for a physical picture of the girl, because she hadn't wanted to hear it. While they had been talking a flash of memory had recalled his cryptic 'The Malaysian women are very beautiful. Seductive too ' and she had known that just then she couldn't bear to hear his not-so-long-ago impression of the eighteen year-old Mai, Malaysian and a dancer. Nor had he volunteered one. Why not? She was afraid of knowing that too.

  But evidently Lim was armed with the girl's description, for when the passengers from the plane came through to the visitors' barrier he bowed at once to a slight figure in a blue sari walking alone beside her porter. He brought her to Sara, standing a little apart from the crowd. Sara caught her breath, for Kluai Mai was indeed beauty in miniature—as delicately fashioned and coloured as a piece of fine porcelain; tiny, almost weighted down by a wealth of piled black hair, but hands and feet and features in perfect small-scale proportion. A child in stature, but a woman in figure—a woman whose looks Rede

  would have had to praise, if he had mentioned them at all ...

  Sara offered her hand with a smile. 'I'm Sara, Rede Forrest's wife,' she said. 'And you are Kluai Mai?'

  The girl smiled. 'Yes. But they call me Mai.' 'So Rede said. And I'd like to, if I may?'

  'Please—I did not know that Mr Rede was married. He has not told us so.'

  'I think,' said Sara, 'that when he saw you last, we weren't married. We met and were married in England only a month or two ago.'

  Mai agreed, 'Yes, it was before that when he came to Kota Tingii and brought me to Singapore for my interview at the School.' Her eyes sparkled. 'You know that I was accepted and that I am to attend there on a course before I am professional and can make the dance my career?'

  'Yes. Tell me about it, won't you, and what you'll be doing there?' Sara urged, glad to find a subject of conversation to occupy them on the return drive.

  Mai was childishly and gratifyingly delighted with the cottage. 'For me! All my own ! ' her soft voice crooned. 'A door,' opening and shutting it several times—`and a lock and a key, and a couch and cushions and—what is that?' she asked, pointing.

  'That' was a white-wrapped sheaf of flowers on a table. Sara took up the card which lay with it and passed it to the girl. Mai read aloud, 'To Mai from Rede. Happy landings for my orchid girl,' and

  snatched the paper from a single spray of orchids, deeply purple and white-hearted. Sara thought, He sent me flowers, but without a message—as Mai exulted, 'Dear Mr Rede I They are for my name, you see. Kluai Mai means in English "orchid blossom". What does your name mean?' she asked Sara.

  'I don't know. Do names have to mean something?'

  Seriously, 'Always, in Malay and in Thai,' Mai assured her. 'We are named for flowers or jewels or birds. And I have a book, telling the meanings of names from all over the world. I must look for yours and shall tell you.'

  'In the meanwhile, call me by it, won't you? And I'm sure Rede will want you to call him Rede, not "Mr" all the time,
' said Sara.

  'That will be for him to say,' Mai replied demurely.

  After telling her they expected her to dinner and leaving her to more discovery of her domain, Sara reflected that it was impossible not to warm to her eager youth. At eighteen, if that were her age, she was not much Sara's junior, but seemingly without any of the problems Sara had already gathered to herself. She realised she had even made a troubling prejudice out of Rede's failure to describe Mai as the lovely that she was, and she had been ready to be hurt by his calling Mai his 'orchid girl'.

  But what had she to fear? However slightly he knew the Mai of eighteen, he probably saw her as a child still and had known how she would appre-

  PACT' WITHOUT DESIRE

  date his thought in making her welcome with her namesake flower. Rede had such urbane gestures at his fingertips, Sara knew, and it wasn't likely he would have rapturised over the looks of a mere child. There was nothing sinister to be questioned, after all. Nothing her jealousy needed to watch ...

  When Mai came over to the house she had changed into a simple Western dress of soft crepe, had let down her hair and tied it back with a wide ribbon bow, the effect being as young-teenage as was her plunge at Rede when they met, her arms flung round his neck, a kiss for each of his cheeks. He unclasped her hands and held her off from him. 'Such unbridled enthusiasm! What on earth have I done to deserve it?' he chided.

  `Oh—my dear little house, Mr Rede! '

  'Rede and Sara—'

  'Rede, then—And sending me orchids, and all your kindness to me, and Mrs--I mean Sara's too! '

  He pinched her cheek and let her go. 'Well, cool it, lass,' he said paternally, 'and don't go overboard with thanks for what's going to be a hard grind while you're at it. For you're not going to turn out just "a" classical dancer. You're going to be "the" dancer of your year, and after that, the sky your limit. Understood?'

  She blushed and dimpled. 'Understood,' she echoed, and Sara, reassured, thought, He sees her as someone to be educated, indulged a little, but disciplined. He's ambitious for her, as he might be for a talented child of his own. If he and I ever have

  one, the thought ended on a poignant awareness that on his side it wouldn't be a child of love.

  Over dinner the talk was of Mai's plans and timetable. She would bicycle to the School every day to study posture and costume and mime as well as dancing, and would have the privacy of her cottage for practice and study.

  'And I must find myself some pupils,' she claimed seriously at one point.

  'Pupils?' echoed Rede. 'You're to be one yourself.'

  `Ah, but I must earn some money. The expense of the School

  'Forget the expense. That's been taken care of.'

  'But to accept charity does not please me, and I must live. No,' Mai insisted firmly, 'I must pass on to some little children all I know. The School will be glad to find them for me, for they should all learn when they are very young. I myself began to be taught before I was five years old. Arm movements. Hands, fingers'—she demonstrated their suppleness—'we may not all become dancers, but all of us must learn. So please,' she appealed to Rede, 'I may take some children for lessons in my cottage?'

  'Only if it doesn't interfere with your own work. Or proves too much for you.'

  'It won't, I promise you. It will help me to practise,' she beamed, and turned to Sara.

  'I looked in my book for your name. We haven't it in Malay, but in Arabic and Hebrew it means

  "princess". Does that please you?' she asked. Sara laughed. 'I'm flattered!'

  'You shouldn't be,' Mai assured her gravely. `For you are like a princess—an English one, tall and fair and—and cool. Is she not?' she added to Rede.

  'News to me that princesses are particularly cool.' Beneath half-lowered lids he affected to study Sara. 'But of Sara—yes, cool is a good description.'

  'And you find her beautiful too? You married her for that?' Mai urged.

  His eyes still upon Sara, 'And other reasons,' he said.

  'But of course—there would be love as well,' Mai conduded happily as he stood and told her,

  'Come along, it's time you were in bed. I'll see you home.'

  Palms together beneath her chin, Mai bobbed Goodnight to Sara, who, while she waited for Rede's return, thought, 'Cool'? Would he have added 'calculating' if he had dared? Mai's naive praise of her had meant 'poised', which Sara hoped she appeared, but Rede's echo and his look had had a different meaning that was all their own, and for only Sara to understand.

  When he came back he poured drinks for them both. 'Well?' he said, and then, 'I suppose I should thank you for giving Mai a civilised reception— for resisting the urge to utter two faint cheers?'

  'Why, what reception did you expect me to give her?' Sara queried.

  He shrugged. 'On the principle that two women

  are supposed to be unable to share a kitchen, they could find sharing a house even more unacceptable, couldn't they?'

  'But you'd thought of that. Mai won't be sharing the house, you said?'

  'An establishment, then. A domain. The area of sovereignty of one of them. You know very well what I mean.'

  She did, Sara thought. He meant sharing his interest, his concern. Aloud she said, wanting his reaction, 'But Mai is hardly another woman. In some ways she seems very much a child.'

  'At eighteen-plus—with those looks?'

  Sara wished he had agreed with her about Mai's immaturity. 'Yes, why didn't you tell me what a beauty she is?' she asked.

  'Probably because of the two women in a kitchen syndrome. You might have been prejudiced, without giving her a chance.'

  'I see. The typical established cat's resentment of the intrusion of a kitten? Whereas in fact, you consider I've behaved quite nicely? Thank you. I'm— gratified.' She couldn't resist the irony.

  He looked at her over the rim of his glass. 'Very nicely,' he agreed. 'According to Mai—like a princess. Noblesse oblige, and all that. You don't even question the "charity" that Mai resents so hotly. Beneath you to ask about it? More noblesse oblige, perhaps?'

  Sara said, 'I didn't expect you to think it concerned me.'

  'As my wife—no? In fact, since Mai's foster-parents couldn't possibly meet the cost, I'm sharing -the expenses of her training with my friends, the Bartrams. And if there's any more chat from Mai about charity, I hope you won't listen. If she's half as good as I think she's going to be, she'll be no liability to our sponsorship of her. She'll be an investment—'

  At the sound of the telephone Rede broke off and went to answer it. It was evidently a business call, a long one, and leaving him to it, Sara slipped from the room and went to bed.

  How did he regard Mai? Her mind worried at the question before it allowed her to sleep. For all his apparent frankness he hadn't told her in so many words—that he saw the girl only as a naive child, or only as a lovely young woman, or only as an asset to be nursed along to success. Something of all three, then? He had given no clue. He had complimented Sara on showing no jealousy—but how sincere had he been in that? Or had some sadistic urge to punish her wanted her to be jealous, 'with or without cause, and had been disappointed that she hadn't behaved like a shrew?

  She didn't know, and he would not tell her. She felt newly empty of all knowledge of him, of his motives, his emotions, his needs. It was an emptiness which craved to be filled, but it was beyond her bewilderment of that night to foresee the how and the when of its filling.

  Her last waking thought was that she would not,

  could not, be jealous of Mai.

  Later she was to question at what point she first had cause to lose sight of that resolve. Had the poison of suspicion begun working only with a certain enforced hour of Isabel Iden's company? Or had she already become reluctantly watchful of Mai's relationship with Rede—her obvious anxiety to please him, her appealing dependence on his praise? Or again, there had been a remark of George Merlin's which had had no signficance for her at the time—had her r
ecollection of that sown a canker in her mind, even before chance put it at the mercy of Isabel's calculated hints?

  The occasion was innocent enough. Ina Belmont, in addition to her social activities, was a beaver of industry in good works and charitable causes—one of which was to be served by a bazaar in the garden of her house. As usual she collected a posse of helpers for the stalls, among them, this time, Sara as her latest voluntary recruit.

  Sara was to man a fancy-goods stall with another young Temasik wife whom she liked. But on reporting for duty she found Isabel behind the display in the booth. 'Standing in for Connie West, who's gone sick,' Isabel announced laconically. `Pretty much of a bore, but Ina simply doesn't listen when one says No. If you're ever tempted to try, don't. It's only a waste of breath.'

  The bazaar was duly opened by a Government V.I.P.'s lady; the patrons circled and began to buy-

  and then the rain, unkindly and unexpectedly so early in the afternoon, began to fall. The patrons drifted away; as many as Ina was able to collect were herded into the marquee for a premature tea, and Ina made a round of the stallholders, urging courage and patience—a general instilling heart into his troops.

  'It can't last long, and at least you're under cover yourselves. At the first gleam of sun, they'll come back, and at least the ones I've managed to capture I'll send back, full of bonhomie and tea,' she promised as she sailed back to the marquee under the shelter of a carriage umbrella.

  Isabel sat back, offered cigarettes and lighted one. `So much for a wasted afternoon. What could you have done with it?' she asked Sara.

  'Considering the rain, nothing much probably,' replied Sara, forced to be civil, but wondering whether Isabel remembered the scarcely veiled hostility of their last encounter, and whether she still believed in Cliff's feet of clay.

  But Isabel had a different line of attack today. She said, 'The rain wouldn't matter, if you had anyone exciting to take you out. But one hears Rede is working all the hours there are, so when you're bored, I suppose you can't look to him?'