Ah King (23 page)

He smiled grimly. He was not sentimental He had enjoyed his authority, and it gave him an austere satisfaction to know that he had kept everyone up to the mark. It did not displease him to think that he had been feared rather than loved. He saw his life as a problem in higher mathematics, the working-out of which had required intense application of all his powers, but of which the result had not the least practical consequence. Its interest lay in its intricacy and its beauty in its solution. But like pure beauty it led nowhither. His future was blank. He was fifty-five, and full of energy, and to himself his mind seemed as alert as ever, his experience of men and affairs was wide: all that remained to him was to settle down in a country town in England or in a cheap part of the Riviera and play bridge with elderly ladies and golf with retired colonels. He had met, when on leave, old chiefs of his, and had observed with what difficulty they adapted themselves to the change in their circumstances. They had looked forward to the freedom that would be theirs when they retired and had pictured the charming uses to which they would put their leisure. Mirage. It was not very pleasant to be obscure after having dwelt in a spacious Residency, to make do with a couple of maids when you had been accustomed to the service of half a dozen Chinese boys and, above all, it was not pleasant to realize that you did hot matter a row of beans to anyone when you had grown used to the delicate flattery of knowing that a word of praise could delight and a frown humiliate all sorts and conditions of men.

George Moon stretched out his hand and helped himself to a cigarette from the box on his desk. As he did so he noticed all the little lines on the back of his hand and the thinness of his shrivelled fingers. He frowned with distaste. It was the hand of an old man. There was in his office a Chinese mirror-picture that he had bought long ago and that he was leaving behind. He got up and looked at himself in it. He saw a thin yellow face, wrinkled and tight-lipped, thin grey hair, and grey tired eyes. He was tallish, very spare, with narrow shoulders, and he held himself erect. He had always played polo and even now could beat most of the younger men at tennis. When you talked to him he kept his eyes fixed on your face, listening attentively, but his expression did not change, and you had no notion what effect your words had on him. Perhaps he did not realize how disconcerting this was. He seldom smiled.

An orderly came in with a name written on a chit. George Moon looked at it and told him to show the visitor in. He sat down once more in his chair and looked with his cold eyes at the door through which in a moment the visitor would come. It was Tom Saffary, and he wondered what he wanted. Presumably something to do with the festivity that night. It had amused him to hear that Tom Saffary was the head of the committee that had organized it, for their relations during the last year had been far from cordial. Saffary was a planter and one of his Tamil overseers had lodged a complaint against him for assault. The Tamil had been grossly insolent to him and Saffary had given him a thrashing. George Moon realized that the provocation was great, but he had always set his face against the planters taking the law in their own hands, and when the case was tried he sentenced Saffary to a fine. But when the court rose, to show that there was no ill feeling he asked Saffary to luncheon: Saffary, resentful of what he thought an unmerited affront, curtly refused and since then had declined to have any social relations with the Resident. He answered when George Moon, casually, but resolved not to be affronted, spoke to him; but would neither play bridge nor tennis with him. He was manager of the largest rubber estate in the district, and George Moon asked himself sardonically whether he had arranged the dinner and collected subscriptions for the presentation because he thought his dignity required it or whether, now that his Resident was leaving, it appealed to his sentimentality to make a noble gesture. It tickled George Moon’s frigid sense of humour to think that it would fall to Tom Saffary to make the principal speech of the evening, in which he would enlarge upon the departing Resident’s admirable qualities and voice the community’s regret at their irreparable loss.

Tom Saffary was ushered in. The Resident rose from his chair, shook hands with him and thinly smiled.

“How do you do? Sit down. Won’t you have a cigarette?”

“How do you do?”

Saffary took the chair to which the Resident motioned him, and the Resident waited for him to state his business. He had a notion that his visitor was embarrassed. He was a big, burly, stout fellow, with a red face and a double chin, curly black hair, and blue eyes. He was a fine figure of a man, strong as a horse, but it was plain he did himself too well. He drank a good deal and ate too heartily. But he was a good business man and a hard worker. He ran his estate efficiently. He was popular in the community. He was generally known as a good chap. He was free with his money and ready to lend a helping hand to anyone in distress. It occurred to the Resident that Saffary had come in order before the dinner to compose the difference between them. The emotion that might have occasioned such a desire excited in the Resident’s sensibility a very faint, good-humoured contempt. He had no enemies because individuals did not mean enough to him for him to hate any of them, but if he had, he thought, he would have hated them to the end.

“I dare say you’re a bit surprised to see me here this morning, and I expect, as it’s your last day and all that, you’re pretty busy.”

George Moon did not answer, and the other went on.

“I’ve come on rather an awkward business. The fact is that my wife and I won’t be able to come to the dinner tonight, and after that unpleasantness we had together last year I thought it only right to come and tell you that it has nothing to do with that. I think you treated me very harshly; it’s not the money I minded, it was the indignity, but bygones are bygones. Now that you’re leaving I don’t want you to think that I bear any more ill-feeling towards you.”

“I realized that when I heard that you were chiefly responsible for the send-off you’re giving me,” answered the Resident civilly. “I’m sorry that you won’t be able to come tonight.”

“I’m sorry, too. It’s on account of Knobby Clarke’s death,” Saffary hesitated for a moment. “My wife and I were very much upset by it.”

“It was very sad. He was a great friend of yours, wasn’t he?”

“He was the greatest friend I had in the colony.”

Tears shone in Tom Saffary’s eyes. Fat men were very emotional, thought George Moon.

“I quite understand that in that case you should have no heart for what looks like being a rather uproarious party,” he said kindly. “Have you heard anything of the circumstances?”

“No, nothing but what appeared in the paper.”

“He seemed all right when he left here.”

“As far as I know he’d never had a day’s illness in his life.”

“Heart, I suppose. How old was he?”

“Same age as me. Thirty-eight.”

“That’s young to die.”

Knobby Clarke was a planter and the estate he managed was next door to Saffary’s. George Moon had liked him. He was a rather ugly man, sandy, with high cheek-bones and hollow temples, large pale eyes in deep sockets and a big mouth. But he had an attractive smile and an easy manner. He was amusing and could tell a good story. He had a careless good-humour that people found pleasing. He played games well. He was no fool. George Moon would have said he was somewhat colourless. In the course of his career he had known a good many men like him. They came and went. A fortnight before, he had left for England on leave and the Resident knew that the Saffarys had given a large dinner-party on his last night. He was married and his wife of course went with him.

“I’m sorry for her,” said George Moon. “It must have been a terrible blow. He was buried at sea, wasn’t he?”

“Yes. That’s what it said in the paper.”

The news had reached Timbang the night before. The Singapore papers arrived at six, just as people were getting to the club, and a good many men waited to play bridge or billiards till they had had a glance at them. Suddenly one fellow had called out:

“I say, do you see this? Knobby’s dead.”

“Knobby who? Not Knobby Clarke?”

There was a three-line paragraph in a column of general intelligence:

Messrs Star, Mosley and Co. have received a cable informing them that Mr Harold Clarke of Timbang Batu died suddenly on his way home and was buried at sea.

A man came up and took the paper from the speaker’s hand, and incredulously read the note for himself. Another peered over his shoulder. Such as happened to be reading the paper turned to the page in question and read the three indifferent lines.

“By George,” cried one.

“I say, what tough luck,” said another.

“He was as fit as a fiddle when he left here.”

A shiver of dismay pierced those hearty, jovial, careless men, and each one for a moment remembered that he too was mortal. Other members came in and as they entered, braced by the thought of the six o’clock drink, and eager to meet their friends, they were met by the grim tidings.

“I say, have you heard? Poor Knobby Clarke’s dead.”

“No? I say, how awful!”

“Rotten luck, isn’t it?”

“Rotten.”

“Damned good sort.”

“One of the best.”

“It gave me quite a turn when I saw it in the paper just by chance.”

“I don’t wonder.”

One man with the paper in his hand went into the billiard-room to break the news. They were playing off the handicap for the Prince of Wales’s Cup. That august personage had presented it to the club on the occasion of his visit to Timbang Belud. Tom Saffary was playing against a man called Douglas, and the Resident, who had been beaten in the previous round, was seated with about a dozen others watching the game. The marker was monotonously calling out the score. The newcomer waited for Saffary to finish his break and then he called out to him.

“I say, Tom, Knobby’s dead.”

“Knobby? It’s not true.”

The other handed him the paper. Three or four gathered round to read with him.

“Good God!”

There was a moment’s awed silence. The paper was passed from hand to hand. It was odd that none seemed willing to believe till he saw it for himself in black and white.

“Oh, I am sorry.”

“I say, it’s awful for his wife,” said Tom Saffary. “She was going to have a baby. My poor missus’ll be upset.”

“Why, it’s only a fortnight since he left here.”

“He was all right then.”

“In the pink.”

Saffary, his fat red face sagging a little, went over to a table and, seizing his glass, drank deeply.

“Look here, Tom,” said his opponent, “would you like to call the game off?”

“Can’t very well do that.” Saffary’s eye sought the score board and he saw that he was ahead. “No, let’s finish. Then I’ll go home and break it to Violet.”

Douglas had his shot and made fourteen. Tom Saffary missed an easy in-off, but left nothing. Douglas played again, but did not score and again Saffary missed a shot that ordinarily he could have been sure of. He frowned a little. He knew his friends had betted on him pretty heavily and he did not like the idea of failing them. Douglas made twenty-two. Saffary emptied his glass and by an effort of will that was quite patent to the sympathetic onlookers settled down to concentrate on the game. He made a break of eighteen and when he just failed to do a long Jenny they gave him a round of applause. He was sure of himself now and began to score quickly. Douglas was playing well too, and the match grew exciting to watch. The few minutes during which Saffary’s attention wandered had allowed his opponent to catch up with him, and now it was anybody’s game.

“Spot two hundred and thirty-five,” called the Malay, in his queer clipped English. “Plain two hundred and twenty-eight. Spot to play.”

Douglas made eight, and then Saffary, who was plain, drew up to two hundred and forty. He left his opponent a double balk. Douglas hit neither ball, and so gave Saffary another point.

“Spot two hundred and forty-three,” called the marker. “Plain two hundred and forty-one. Plain to play.”

Saffary played three beautiful shots off the red and finished the game.

“A popular victory,” the bystanders cried.

“Congratulations, old man,” said Douglas.

“Boy,” called Saffary, “ask these gentlemen what they’ll have. Poor old-Knobby.”

He sighed heavily. The drinks were brought and Saffary signed the chit. Then he said he’d be getting along. Two others had already begun to play.

“Sporting of him to go on like that,” said someone when the door was closed on Saffary.

“Yes, it shows grit.”

“For a while I thought his game had gone all to pieces.”

“He pulled himself together in grand style. He knew there were a lot of bets on him. He didn’t want to let his backers down.”

“Of course it’s a shock, a thing like that.”

“They were great pals. I wonder what he died of.”

“Good shot, sir.”

George Moon, remembering this scene, thought it strange that Tom Saffary, who on hearing of his friend’s death had shown such self-control, should now apparently take it so hard. It might be that just as in the war a man when hit often did not know it till some time afterwards, Saffary had not realized how great a blow to him Harold Clarke’s death was till he had had time to think it over. It seemed to him, however, more probable that Saffary, left to himself, would have carried on as usual, seeking sympathy for his loss in the company of his fellows, but that his wife’s conventional sense of propriety had insisted that it would be bad form to go to a party when the grief they were suffering from made it only decent for them to eschew for a little festive gatherings. Violet Saffary was a nice little woman, three or four years younger than her husband; not very pretty, but pleasant to look at and always becomingly dressed; amiable, ladylike, and unassuming. In the days when he had been on friendly terms with the Saffarys the Resident had from time to time dined with them. He had found her agreeable, but not very amusing. They had never talked but of commonplace things. Of late he had seen little of her. When they chanced to meet she always gave him a friendly smile, and on occasion he said one or two civil words to her. But it was only by an effort of memory that he distinguished her from half a dozen of the other ladies in the community whom his official position brought him in contact with.