Dear Deceiver. Mary NicholsЧитать онлайн книгу.
She realised how wrong she was before she had been in his office five minutes. Apart from small bequests to the servants, her father’s will left everything to her and Teddy equally. This was no surprise, but what took her aback was the tiny amount involved.
‘Your father was always generous and never saw the need to husband his resources,’ Mr Chapman said. ‘He was indifferent to money and never bothered to collect his debts, though he was always scrupulous in paying his own.’
‘But surely he must have done some trading?’ she queried, knowing that it was common practice for Company employees and soldiers to supplement their pay with private trade. Some of them had become very wealthy by it. ‘Everyone does that in India, don’t they? Silks, spices, precious stones, opium, bought and sold for profit.’
He smiled at her over the top of his spectacles, which were perched on the end of his nose. ‘The days of the nabob are passed, Miss Mountforest. Company employees, whether civilian or soldier, are no longer allowed to trade privately. Oh, I know it is still done, but if your father was ever engaged in it, I know nothing of it.’
‘He was obviously a great deal more scrupulous about such things than his contemporaries,’ she said. ‘An honourable man.’
‘Yes, indeed.’
‘I believe he received an allowance from England,’ she said. ‘Will that continue?’
He looked embarrassed and shuffled the papers on the desk in front of him as if reluctant to speak. ‘The allowance was paid to Major Mountforest by his father and was conditional on his never returning to England,’ he said. ‘It ceased when his brother succeeded to the title.’
‘My uncle stopped it?’ she asked, in disbelief.
‘Yes.’
‘Then what are we left with, my brother and I?’
‘A small pension from The Company. It may be enough to live on if you are frugal. It is certainly not enough to pay school fees.’ He paused, then went on in a kindly voice, ‘I am so sorry, my dear; perhaps you should write to your uncle. I cannot believe he will hold his brother’s sins against you. As soon as he knows your circumstances, I am sure he will send for you to go and live with him.’
‘The sins were not my father’s but his brother’s,’ she retorted. ‘I would not go to him.’
‘Whatever the rights and wrongs of it, you may have to,’ he said, as Emma stood up to leave. ‘It might be as well to swallow your pride and make the best of it, for what can you do here?’
She returned to the bungalow where Teddy, red of eye and puffy of cheeks, had been going round touching everything—the ornaments, the pictures, the tiger’s head—as if by doing so he could convince himself of the enduring nature of things, that if everything around him stayed in exactly the same place, their father might still be alive.
It worried Emma, because he hardly spoke and was certainly in no mood to make plans which would mean altering their way of life. She delayed saying anything, hoping he would come out of his grief and listen to her, though what she was going to tell him, she did not know.
Instead she set about finding work. Everyone was kind to her, though critical of her father who had been so shortsighted as to think he was immortal, and him a soldier too! But it didn’t alter the fact that no one had anything to give her to do for which they were prepared to pay her and Mrs Goodwright wanted to know why she had changed her mind about returning to England when it was so obviously the thing to do. She could not, of course, tell her the true story, nor admit that they simply did not have their passage money.
Her prevarication came to an end very suddenly a month later, when, in the middle of the biggest downpour Calcutta had seen for years, she received notice to quit the bungalow.
She took it to Captain Goodwright, whom she found at the fort, hoping he might be able to help her. ‘I cannot believe anyone could be so callous,’ she said. ‘It is only a month since…’
‘I know, my dear, but the bungalow is the designated quarters of a major and there is one coming soon to replace Major Mountforest. You do understand, don’t you?’
‘But where are we to go?’
‘England,’ he said. ‘I really think you should consider it. The war in Europe is over at last and Napoleon has been sent into exile. There would be no danger.’
Exile: her father’s, Napoleon’s and now her own, for that was what it seemed like to her. She left him quickly before he could see her tears; the first she had shed since the day she learned of her father’s death. And now they had come, she could not stem the flow. People were looking at her with curiosity and she sought shelter among the trunks of a banyan tree on the Maidan, where she allowed herself the luxury of a good sob, watched by a couple of monkeys, who were sitting in its branches.
Later, when her ribs ached and her handkerchief was sodden, she stopped. Feeling sorry for herself would not achieve anything, but letting herself go had done her good. She emerged from her hiding place, straightened her back and walked home, unaware of the horses, carts of produce, fiacres, tongas, ekkas and pedestrians that eddied round her, nor the steady drip of water from trees and rooftops, which soaked her bonnet. Her mind was still in tumult, but one decision had been taken from her; she could no longer put off speaking to Teddy.
Her brother was still apathetic, but at least he was coming out of the trance-like state which had so worried her, and he sat down to listen to what she had to say with grave attention. ‘We have to leave the bungalow,’ she said. ‘And I think it best if we go to England. We have relatives there.’
‘What relatives?’ he demanded. ‘I have never heard of any.’
‘Viscount Mountforest is our uncle. I am sure he would help us.’
‘Why did Papa never mention him?’
‘I believe they quarrelled.’
‘What about?’
‘I do not know. All I know is that Papa was blamed and sent out here to India and told never to return.’
‘And you expect us to go cap in hand to him?’ he demanded, getting up from floor and pacing the room.
‘Then what do you suggest we do?’
‘Work. At least, I will and you must find yourself a rich husband with a title.’
She managed to laugh, though it sounded hollow. ‘I tried to find work, but no one would give me any. And there are no rich men with titles out in India…not unmarried ones, anyway.’
‘Then we’ll go to England, but not to our uncle. We’ll manage without his help. We’ll make our own way and when we’ve done it, we will force him tell the truth. Papa would never do a dishonourable deed. Never.’
His anger was preferable to his misery, she supposed, but she was beginning to wonder what devils she had unleashed in telling him about their father’s exile. He had suddenly turned from a grieving boy to a very angry young man. And who could blame him?
‘No, of course he wouldn’t,’ she said, deciding to say no more about their uncle for the present. Later she would try and talk to him again. ‘But we cannot go until we’ve raised the passage money.’
‘You’ve got jewellery, haven’t you?’
‘A little, yes. Not enough.’
‘And there is the furniture and the…’ He gulped suddenly, but he was too angry for sentiment. ‘The horses. Prime beasts they are.’
‘Teddy, are you sure?’
‘Yes.’ He kicked at the tigerskin rug. ‘This should fetch a few rupees.’
‘But Papa shot that.’
‘So he did, but what is it good for now, when very soon we will not have a floor to lay it