Daisy's Long Road Home

‘Everyone was very helpful,’ Grayson replied, ‘without actually being very helpful.’

She looked enquiringly at him. ‘They’re a nice bunch, the new officers,’ he said, ‘but they’ve no idea about Javinder’s whereabouts and only the haziest notion of his work. So staying in the office is not going to get us too far.’

‘I’m the one who’ll be staying,’ Mike said heavily.

Grayson looked across the table at his colleague. Mike’s tone had evidently surprised him. ‘Mike will be staying in the office,’ he echoed, ‘as logistical backup. And I’m certainly going to need some. They’ve given us Javinder’s old room and we’ve made a start getting the place set up. Mike has three filing cabinets and a ton of files to sort through. Hopefully our man might have left some indication of where he was going. The first job, though, is to get the telephone company to install an extra line. One that doesn’t go through the main switchboard. We need to be able to talk privately, once I’m on the road.’

Daisy felt a small sinking in her heart. ‘When will that be?’

‘In a day or so, I imagine. Tomorrow I’ll begin making enquiries—someone may know something.’

‘But where will you start?’ It seemed to her that a search for a lone man somewhere in the huge expanse of Rajasthan would be more difficult than for the proverbial needle.

Grayson was undaunted. ‘Where I always start. The town. The bazaar.’

She brightened. At least he should be safe for a few days. And the idea of a visit to the bazaar and its delights was an attractive one.

‘Can I drive in with you?’ It would give her the chance to ask questions of her own under the guise of some innocent shopping.

‘You can, but I have to warn you, I’ll be leaving very early. You’ll have to forgo the Sleeping Beauty routine.’

She smiled at his teasing. ‘And what if my prince hasn’t hacked his way through the forest by then?’

‘I’m afraid you’ll have no choice but to abandon him and make do with me,’ he retorted.

She saw Mike frown and realised with a shock that they had come close to flirting. It would be too easy, she knew, to fall back in love with Grayson and she must guard against it. There was no such thing as a perfect man, any more than a perfect woman, but he came close. Nearly perfect men, though, had their own plan for life and she had hers, and the two were never going to fit. She must be careful. She had no wish to complicate this trip and neither did she want to upset Mike. This evening he seemed to be in a strange mood, his expression morose, his liveliness depressed. Not too many quips about Mrs H., she thought. It might be the effect of the country on him. She had loved India from the start, but she understood that it was not the same for everyone. And she knew, too, that Mike had worries back home. She would need to be extra vigilant in her dealings with Grayson. If Mike were forced to play an awkward third in their relationship, it was unlikely to make him any happier.

Grayson, too, had been surprised to find himself falling back into the easy relationship he’d once enjoyed with Daisy. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that, though he had no illusions. The long months of absence had taken their toll on both of them. Once upon a time, she had given him her heart and given it completely, but that moment hadn’t lasted. When he remembered those heady few months after the Sweetman debacle, months when they’d lived only for each other, he felt a pain that stung. And it was still there. He should have realised the truth then, of course. Daisy had saved his life and, in doing so, come close to death herself. Because of the Sweetman affair, they’d been living in an oddly heightened state and that very fact had encouraged them to step into a whirl of emotion they couldn’t control. They had thought they couldn’t live without one another. Except that the war had dragged on for another three years and they’d been forced to. Between Daisy’s nursing shifts and his punishing hours at SIS, they’d met infrequently and, when they did, they were both exhausted from the pressure of work. He’d hoped that when peace came, things would be different. They would pick up the pieces and finally make a home together. He’d told his mother he intended to marry and she’d been content. She had met Daisy on several occasions and liked her. The girl’s background hadn’t been the stumbling block he’d feared, for his mother had proved far more open-minded than he’d expected. And she’d admired Daisy for the way she had made something of her life out of so very little. But even if that had not been the case, his mother would never have rejected the girl who had saved her son from certain death.

Mrs Harte had not been the problem. Mrs Harte’s friends, clustered in their small, genteel enclave of Pimlico, had not been the problem. It had been Daisy herself. His proposal had stunned her. It was as though a stranger had asked to be her husband. After the first shock of rejection, he’d felt angry. Gerald Mortimer had died in dreadful circumstances but that had been seven years ago and, long before then, Daisy had come to know him for what he was—an adventurer, a liar, a betrayer. Memories of her dead husband could not be preventing her from saying yes, so what was? It was hard to swallow but he was forced to the simple conclusion that Daisy had no desire to marry. She was determined to stay a single, independent woman. She had no wish to share her life in any meaningful way. It was sufficient for her to see him from time to time, but she wanted no greater commitment. He’d told her plainly what he thought of that arrangement and the next thing he’d known, she’d taken a job fifty miles away and moved there without telling him. He’d lost heart then; it was better to let her slip away. His mother had been consolatory. She had begun to think that Daisy saying no was a good thing. The girl had been harmed by her harsh upbringing and would never settle to married life. After all, she had never known a family had she, so how could she create a successful one of her own?

Grayson hadn’t accepted his mother’s logic, but a part of him acknowledged there was some small truth in what Mrs Harte had said. He’d seen for himself that Daisy had not escaped her life unharmed. She’d fought the fight well and to all intents and purposes, she’d come through, but there remained a large void in her which she’d been unable to fill. And he’d been unable to help her. This was why she was here. This was what she was chasing by coming to India, a chase that, in his view, was doomed to failure and could mean only more heartache. He understood how the gaps in her story tormented her, but he couldn’t for the life of him see how coming here could help fill them. His best hope was what he’d always believed—that coming back to India would help her deal with the very bad memories she still carried.

The next morning she was already eating her chota hazri when Grayson made an appearance. He looked at her and she saw him smile.

‘Lovely dress, Daisy. But much too good for the bazaar. ‘

‘On the contrary. I have to compete with some very beautiful women and some very beautiful saris.’ Her polka dot sundress was young and fresh but against the richness of Indian materials, she knew it would go unnoticed.

‘No competition. You’ll win hands down.’ She felt herself flush beneath his gaze. She would have to be careful. She buried herself in the plate of small, sweet cakes that Ahmed had left to tempt her.

Grayson said no more and made no effort to join her at the table, ignoring the customary small breakfast and downing two cups of coffee while he stood by the window.

‘It’s going to be hotter today, if that’s possible,’ he opined. He was looking out at the garden, which was already shimmering in the heat. ‘We’d better get going unless we want to fry in the jeep.’

There were few other vehicles on the road. Several bullock carts passed them, heading out of town, and for a while they were caught behind a small boy who was driving his flock of goats to the fields. Eventually, he peeled away from the main thoroughfare and, with loud yells and brutal whackings of his stick, herded the beasts down the narrow lane leading to their barren grazing.

Grayson picked up speed again and they were halfway to the centre of town when he said suddenly, ‘Would you like to take a look at the old place?’

He meant the old bungalow, she knew, the one she’d shared with Gerald and his malevolent servant, the one that had stored stolen guns for a group of outlawed fighters and nearly cost her her life. She felt beads of perspiration on her forehead.

‘You don’t have to put yourself through it,’ he said quietly. ‘But I thought it might help.’

Would it help? She didn’t think so, yet she knew she had to see the house again. For years, she’d hoped she could break free of its frightening shadow. Grayson seemed certain that she had, that she’d coped with the past far better than she realised. But she knew differently. She hadn’t coped with it. Not really. Not deep down. She’d muffled it in bandages, layer upon layer of them. And though she’d wanted to come back to India, secretly she’d been sceptical that a return could act as any kind of purification. But here she was, and she owed it to herself to take whatever chance offered to lose the millstone she carried.

‘Yes, let’s take a look,’ she said, as casually as she could.

It was a shock when she saw the place. The garden had always been unkempt, Gerald having little interest and even less money to keep it under control. But now the alfalfa grass had grown almost to the roof line and a weed she couldn’t put a name to had started its inexorable colonisation, gripping the whitewashed walls in iron tentacles. Rajiv’s quarters to the right were almost submerged beneath the wilderness. As she looked across at the rooms he’d inhabited, she could conjure no clear picture, no clear vision of him emerging from his door, sullen-faced, suspicious, hostile. That was good. That particular image was rubbed clean.

‘It looks pretty dilapidated,’ Grayson said.

‘It never looked anything else.’

‘Not quite as bad as this though. In the ten years since you left, I don’t think it’s had a lick of paint. And see, several of the shutters are off their hinges. They won’t afford the house any kind of protection—and there’s a hole appearing in the thatch. Come the monsoon, the rain will pour through that roof and drown the interior. I imagine rot has already set in. A few more years and the house will crumble inwards.’

‘A waste of a bungalow,’ she remarked, though privately thinking that crumbling was exactly what was needed. If the house lay in ruins, she would be happy. It had only ever been the garden that she’d loved and that was beyond saving.

‘It is a waste. It would have made someone a good home. I made a few enquiries.’ That was news to her. So this unscripted visit wasn’t quite so unscripted. ‘The army tried to sell it as soon as they knew the regiment was to disband—they must have acquired the property years ago—and they were willing to sell at a knockdown price. But there were no takers. No one would even move in for free. The locals won’t come near the place.’

‘Because of what happened here?’

‘That hasn’t helped, certainly. The gang has become notorious in the district.’

Anish, too, she imagined. He would be just as notorious. ‘But they’re all in prison.’

‘That makes no difference. India is a land of superstition and superstition ensures that the gang will return to haunt the place. It doesn’t help either that the house was built on an ancestral burial ground. That in itself would be reason enough for the locals to avoid it. Far too many ghosts.’

Ghosts, she thought ironically. The ghosts she was supposed foolishly to have seen when she tried to talk to Gerald of her fears. Those particular spirits had turned out to be entirely flesh and blood, and criminal flesh and blood at that. But she’d had other phantoms to face and they were still with her. She turned away and walked back to the jeep. If she’d hoped the visit might prove an exorcism, it had been unsuccessful.

CHAPTER 4 (#ulink_0cc82fb1-fc33-58b0-ae9e-579ba8f91ff7)

Grayson dropped her at the edge of the bazaar and then disappeared in a swirl of dust, intent on a mission that would take him deep into the network of narrow alleys and hidden courtyards. For most of that morning, he would be only a few hundred yards from her but she was sure she would see nothing more of him. He would keep a low profile and so must she. She’d had second thoughts about asking questions today. It might be better to postpone them until a second visit and in the meantime, learn or relearn her way around the sprawl of shops and traders.

She spent several delightful hours wandering between brilliantly coloured stalls and, despite her best intentions not to buy until she left for home, she came away with a bolt of the most beautiful emerald silk and a stock of coloured glass bangles. They would be small presents for any patients she had in the future, when or if she found another post. Miss Thornberry’s reaction to her resignation had been typically ill natured and she wasn’t expecting a glowing reference.

In the last few minutes, her skin had begun to burn, even as she stood in deep shade. It was time to turn for home and she headed for where she remembered the tonga drivers used to gather. Weaving a complicated path through the jumble of stalls, she edged her way through one narrow space after another, skirting the sweep of craft workers who plied their trade at ground level. Very soon she spied the tall plumes of a horse’s bridle and saw them move with the shake of the animal’s head. She felt pleased with herself that she’d managed to find the place unaided.

The sun was now directly overhead, its rays arrowing through the thick air and hitting the ground with such force that they bounced upwards and slapped her in the face. She felt sandwiched between two opposing armies, both brandishing fire, and it was a relief to climb into the first carriage she came to. She lay back in the shade of the faded cloth canopy and watched its decorative bobbles jump to the rhythm of the wheels, as the tonga swerved out into the traffic and made for Tamarind Drive. She was looking forward to home, to a cold shower and an even colder drink. And then a long rest on the cool counterpane. It was a guilty pleasure, a sheer indulgence, when at this very moment she should by rights be directing the activities of a busy ward.

But when she walked up the veranda steps, her plans received a setback. Mike was sitting at the dining table surrounded by paper, and she felt disconcerted. She had expected him to be at the office. He looked up when she walked in and she thought he seemed irritated. That was probably her imagination, for his face relaxed quickly into a smile and he folded the map he’d been studying and asked her how her first day’s return to Jasirapur had gone.

‘Don’t clear the table for me.’ She gestured to the stack of papers he’d begun to load into his ancient briefcase. ‘I’m ashamed to say the bazaar has tired me out and I think I may take a sneaky nap.’

‘I don’t blame you. This heat is a killer. But I have to go back to the office in any case. I just needed a few hours’ peace and quiet to go through some difficult correspondence.’

She went to the table and poured herself a glass of water and drank it down thirstily. Mike’s words surprised her. She remembered Grayson saying that the administration team was short staffed, and it seemed odd that his friend had been unable to find a quiet haven in which to work, but perhaps the offices were in more of a mess than Grayson realised. His passion lay in fieldwork, she knew, and he was more than happy to leave the paperwork to someone else. But Mike must feel just the same and she felt sorry he had the unenviable task of trawling an endless succession of files in the meagre hope that he might uncover a clue to Javinder’s whereabouts.

He tucked his briefcase beneath one arm and walked to the door. ‘You look a trifle hot still,’ he said. ‘Ahmed is ordering me a tonga. Shall I ask him to bring you some tea?’