She could see in his eyes that he meant it.
‘I witnessed his death too.’
10
Eliza opened her eyes on a gilded morning, the air so sweet and fresh she could almost persuade herself it hadn’t been real, that it had only been a nightmare mercifully dissolved by daylight. But for the smell. She had fallen into bed the night before, still dressed; now she tore off her clothes, where the smell of human sacrifice still clung, and found a robe in a tall dark wardrobe. Wrapping it around herself, she went to the terrace in search of Jay.
Out there the day was so still that not even a leaf was moving, but still the scent of aromatic herbs drifted across from where they seemed to be growing, and the scent of jasmine and something like honeysuckle infused the air. She noticed that the arched arcade that lined the terrace was the colour of sand and was shimmering in the sunlight. The evening before she hadn’t noticed the colour.
‘If only it could always be like this,’ she said, as she saw Jay following the butler, who carried a tray of what looked like coffee.
‘How?’
‘Peaceful.’
He stared into the sky as if looking for an answer and then glanced at her.
‘It’s where my heart is,’ he said, his eyes glowing with feeling. ‘It’s where I come when the world feels impossible. And, as it happens, where I was born.’
‘Was the room I’m staying in your mother’s?’
He nodded as they looked at each other. ‘We all of us have broken hearts. You, me, Indi. It’s what unites us.’
As he sank into thought she could believe what he’d said. With stubble on his chin, he was still dressed in yesterday’s clothes, smelling of dirt, sand and smoke, and though his face was clear of black smears, he looked somehow lost.
‘You need fresh clothes?’ he asked. ‘I certainly do.’
She nodded.
‘I can sort that.’
‘I need to wash my hair too.’
Eliza, unlike Clifford, increasingly did not think that the British in India had been sensitive to the customs of the native races. But up until now she had believed the British had right on their side, and yet if they were just going to turn their back on such horrors it made them culpable too. They had certainly overreacted when subduing rebellions, and really, what right did they have to be there at all? This awful thing made her feel sick to her soul. Misogyny had many faces in different parts of the world, but nobody deserved to be burned alive, cooked as if they were nothing but meat. Nobody.
She gazed out at the beautiful tangled garden and felt its calmness and tranquillity. It was wild and it was wonderful, with pathways still kept clear and flowers – climbing roses, jasmine, she knew not what – all tumbling in profusion. Though it wasn’t hard to see how it could be made even more magnificent, with perhaps the vista opened up in places. It was clear there was water somewhere too, and perhaps the slope of the land had something to do with it.
She decided to ask.
‘Some of it is rainwater, collected in small tanks. There are small rivers ornallahswhich flow in the rains and we have wells here. But we need to do more by constructing dams, tanks and bunds. Basically we need irrigation works, but I’m not sure what I can do.’
‘Don’t you want to make a difference to people’s lives?’
He frowned, but her last thought had struck her with force.
She carried on thinking about the water. There might not be anything she could do about the treatment of women, but it made her feel better to think of other ways to help people.
‘There must be a way to help the people.’
‘I do everything I can, employ only locals, allow them to come for well water in our courtyard, but it’s up to my brother to make the taxation fairer and he will not.’
‘But what about irrigation?’
‘Well, as I’ve said –’
She interrupted. ‘Surely you could build some kind of system,’ she said.
‘I have looked into it.’
