The Shallow Seas (31 page)

Zhen put his hands in her hair and moved her face to his and kissed her again, murmuring against her cheek, her lips. “You understand, Xia Lou, you are married to me. You are the wife of my heart. Nothing can ever change that, I told you. I write this many times to you.”

Charlotte sank against his shoulder. Why was he always so sure, so able to convince her with these extraordinarily jesuitical arguments? How she had missed him!

“Zhen, I have a son. Soon there will be another child. I have responsibilities,” she protested feebly. Charlotte was not sure what he would do if he knew that Alexander was his own son. She did not dare tell him.

Then his words began to sink in. He had mentioned letters. More than one. “You wrote to me?” she said quietly. “I never received a letter. I waited so long. I would have given anything to receive a word from you.”

He put a hand into his coat and drew out the paper, folded now and yellowing slightly. Charlotte looked at the letter in his hands, remembering that terrible morning, his anger and distress.

“The day you went away I thought I would die, but your letter saved me,” he confessed. He opened the paper and read, not the Chinese, but a translation made long ago into English:

Journeying is hard
,

Journeying is hard
,

There are many turnings
.

Which am I to follow?

I will mount a long wind some day and break the heavy waves

And set my cloudy sail straight and bridge the deep, deep sea
.

Zhen folded the letter.

“This is poem by Li Bai, Chinese poet. I did not know how you knew this poem, but it saved my heart. Then I know I have to write to you. Words can save us from this awful thing. So I write a lot. I sent the letters to this Mah Nuk house through Chinese merchant. I write in Chinese at first, then later in English. My English very good now, no?”

He looked down at her, his pride boyish and charming. She smiled and brought his face down to hers again, kissing him, his soft full lips, his cheek, letting her tongue linger on the corner of his mouth. He smiled too, letting her love him, holding her tight against him, his hand in her hair.

Charlotte remembered now about the letter she had given him. She had gone to Qian, Zhen's greatest friend, and begged him to find some words which would give Zhen solace after she was gone. Nothing she could write in English would make any difference. Qian had tried to explain the poem he had copied for her, but she had not understood. Now she was grateful to him for his deep understanding of his friend. But more than this, she began to wonder about the many letters Zhen had written to her. Her face grew serious, and suspicions began to enter her mind.

Zhen put his cheek against her hair, filled with gratitude for this moment, remembering the day she had left; it still felt like a stab in his heart. When the brig had swung on the wind towards the south, he had raced along the beachside at Telok Ayer. The inhabitants had gaped at the extraordinary sight of a Chinese man running at full tilt.

He had passed the temple and the houses and the fishing boats pulled up along the shore. Sweating, he had climbed up the steep path to the top of Mount Wallich. Hot and wretched, he had pulled off his jacket, needing the high, cool air on his fevered body.

From here, the view opened out: the red-roofed town at his feet, the sapphire sea, the green islands. He saw the black brig and sank to his knees, watching until it disappeared. Groups of Malays who had been resting there gathered their belongings and fled. Then he had let his anguish and his anger show, pacing back and forth, punching the trees, hurling his misery to the wind. Zhen knew he must get this unbearable emotion out now, for soon he would have to return, impassive and calm, to his new family and his place in society. When he needed that release he had always come here.

A gale goes ruffling down the stream

The giants of the forest crack

My thoughts are bitter
—
black as death
—

For she, my summer, comes not back
.

He had been bitter and black, and he knew he had been cold to his wife. But there was nothing he could do about it. He had thrown himself into commerce and medicine, worked longer than anyone. He had slept in the house in Circular Road, in the bed where he had first made love to her, and waited to hear from her. He never went again to the old spice orchard at the foot of Bukit Larangan, so filled with memories of them. He was grateful for Qian, his true friend, to whom he talked of her, with whom he wrote the letters in English. Qian, he knew, wished he would try to forget for his peace of mind, but it was simply not possible.

“Charlotte, where are you?”

A voice came out of the darkness. It was Robert, calling her to go back. She looked at Zhen, her eyes wide. Zhen, too, stiffened.

“You stay in Singapore. Do not go away. I find you again,” he commanded. He rose with her in his arms, kissing her again, wanting her promise. Charlotte nodded, breathing in the scent of him, feeling his hard body under his clothes, tasting him on her lips. The time without him might not have existed.

Zhen released her, turned and disappeared into the darkness of the garden. Charlotte called to Robert, and he shook his head at her mussed condition.

She sat on the bench, attempting to calm her pulse and the flutterings of tension in her stomach. Leaving him, even for this moment, even knowing they would meet again, was hard. She took a mirror and comb from her bag and tried to refashion her hair. Her hands were trembling so much she dropped her comb, and Robert, sighing, picked it up and sat with her until she had brought herself under control.

When she returned, she looked for Tigran and told him she felt very tired. Actually she
was
tired, with the pregnancy, but also with the emotion of this encounter, these last few days of upheaval.

Soon, they made their farewells and left. As she went to her room, she asked Tigran to excuse her: tonight she needed her rest and would like to be alone.

Tigran put his arms around her, wanting her kiss. She put her lips to his briefly and then turned. He frowned but made no objection. He knew she had not wanted this pregnancy, and he occasionally felt a little guilty at coming to her as he had at the river. As he turned to leave her for the night, her maid arrived, and she closed her door.

24

George went through the huge double doors of the house into the hall. He was in a very bad temper. He had written notes to Takouhi, and she had answered none. Three days with no reply, but he had been patient. He had wanted everyone to have a chance to get over the shock, to settle Maria into her new home. Now he had just been stopped as he crossed the threshold of this house he had built for Takouhi and asked to present his card. He pushed the servant away and walked inside. He stood in the middle of the hall and called her name loudly. “Takouhi!”

His voice reverberated around the circle of the hall, and he, momentarily and oddly, thought what a fine job he had done on this house. Sound rang out as in a concert hall. Then he called her again, louder, more angrily. “Takouhi, come out. I want to talk to you. If you hide, I will find you and I shall turn this house upside down to do it!”

He started towards the stairs, now in a small fury, but he stopped as the door to what had been their bedroom opened and she came out onto the landing and stood looking down at him.

His heart quieted; his anger dissipated. She had this effect on him. She radiated a calm beauty, like an aura, as if surrounded by light. He smiled up at her, an old thrill coursing. “Come down, my lovely. I must talk to you.”

Takouhi did not move.

“Don't make me come up there, I warn you, Takouhi.” He climbed two steps and saw her start. He smiled. “You are not safe on that floor, outside that room, for if I come there it will be to take what is mine, I assure you.” He moved up two more steps, and she came forward and started to descend.

He moved back to the hall and waited as she swept past him, not looking at him, and went into the sitting room. He inhaled, with a sublime pleasure, the clean and heady scent of her, the perfume of jasmine which she always wore, on her skin, in her hair.

She turned to face him as he shut the door. “Take what is yours? Nothing to take in this house.”

George could see her trembling. He had, perhaps, chosen the wrong words. He knew all of Takouhi's past, her treatment at the hands of the Dutch pig. Any suggestion of ownership made her sink into a deep stubbornness which even he could not move. Ah, but she was so lovely. She had aged a little; he could see it around her eyes, on her neck, but the difference in their ages had never meant anything to him. She had moved his heart, his body and his soul, and nothing had ever changed that. He wanted her now in his arms, but he stood, instead, behind a chair of green damask silk, leaving a space between them, giving her time to find her temper.

“You may not be angry at me any more. At first, I understand, there was a shock. I had no idea you had come back to Singapore. But now, that is enough. I had a full expectation that I would never see you again.”

He moved round the chair, and she took a small step backwards, but he paid no attention. He took both her hands in his and put them to his lips. “Takouhi, how much I longed to see you. How far away you were.”

Takouhi felt her heart soften, as it always did when George touched her. She looked at his face, his hair, unruly, falling to his shoulders, a little greyer now, but it looked well on him. He had never been conventionally handsome, but his face was that of a man, strong and well made, and his eyes, green eyes like she had never seen before, were filled with the spirit of a land far beyond her comprehension. These still had the power to shake her. The minute she had seen him on the shore, she noticed he had lost some weight, looked lean and strong—younger somehow. She had recently become aware of the passing years on her skin. She was always acutely aware of the difference in age, more than ten years, between herself and George. Now he had a wife half his age. Perhaps this contributed in some measure to his youthful appearance.

She pulled her hands from his and moved to the long, yellow silk sofa under the window. He watched her walk. She was dressed today in Javanese costume, gauzy and tight, outlining her body, the swish of her sarong sounding around her ankles. He liked to watch her walk, like a reed in water. He saw the outline of brown henna on her feet, vines and flowers rising around her ankles and disappearing under the sarong. She had anticipated his coming. He knew there would be henna too on her body, around her hips and waist, rising on her breasts. Making love to her was always like sipping at a spring filled with waving fronds or ravishing a nymph. In Europe, it was sometimes hard to remember the exquisite grace of Eastern women. All her exotic beauty was still as fresh for him as it had been twenty years before. The upward turn of her dark eyes, like an Egyptian queen, the full lips, so kissable, her supple slenderness. He walked over to her and made to put his hand round her waist. Suddenly, he could not wait to feel her against him. She sat so abruptly, though, that he found himself grasping at air.

He sat next to her and smiled. “Is it games you want to play, Takouhi?” He reached for her, putting his hand to her back, leaning her breasts against him, putting his face close to hers, waiting for her to close the tiny space between their lips. “Kiss me, my love.”

Takouhi closed her eyes and moved her lips to his. She could not resist him; he was a force, like the wind. All the years flew away and they were once again in the garden of her house in Nordwijk, where he had kissed her for the first time.

There had been few men in her life after Pieter. She had taken lovers occasionally from amongst her servants. A Balinese, one of her guards, a Javanese musician from her
gamelan
orchestra. Others now and again. She had been courted by the English officers and the Dutch merchants for her beauty and wealth, but took little interest in them.

One day, George had looked up from some plans he was discussing with her father, looked up with his green eyes and stopped talking, abruptly, as if Aphrodite herself had stepped off a cloud and walked into the room, and he had stolen her breath and quickly her will. Without the least expectation she, who had been sure of her mind, her poise, had been thrown off balance by his devilish looks, his Irish charm, his total disregard of their differences in anything, his instant and overpowering passion for her. She had been sure there would never be children. What Pieter had done to her when she was very young had ruined her in some way inside, his evil infecting her from beyond the grave. She would not marry George, though he had asked her, but to not be with him had become instantly impossible.

Meeting Takouhi had ignited a deep ambition in him, an ambition for success and wealth. He wanted none of her money, he simply wanted her; she gave him peace and pleasure and the courage and space to be bold. When he had heard of Singapore, of the establishment of this new place where there was nothing and which offered opportunities beyond his dreams, he had sought out Raffles and built Maxwell's house, now the Court House, to impress him. Raffles had trusted him with the construction of the town, and George had done it all. He had built Singapore and turned her into the Queen of the British East. Takouhi had been at his side every step of the way.

He released her now from the kiss, and she put her head on his shoulder. All her shock and anger had evaporated. “I am sorry, George. I take Meda from you,” she said.

He let her go suddenly and rose. This act, this death, stood between them like a wall. “Yes, it was a wicked thing to do to us both. Did she ask for me?” He stood, looking down at her. “No, don't tell me,” he said. “I cannot bear it, to think of her wanting—”

He began to pace the room.

“I could not forgive you, Takouhi, for a very long time,” he said, his voice hard.