The Plantation (34 page)

‘Are you coming along?’

‘I hadn’t planned to, it seems more of a family night out.’

‘Come on, Christopher. It’s just Peter, Shane, Martine and me, and I know that all the others have also made plans. You can’t stay on your own. Wouldn’t you like to meet Marjorie? She sounds like a legend.’

Christopher smiled. ‘I would like to come. I was going to say, do you want to meet for a swim and maybe a cold beer now?’

‘Sounds good. I haven’t done a thing all day. Just been sitting here thinking about Grandfather’s memoir that I read when I was at Utopia. Do you know that when he got back to the plantation it was a shambles, his father was dead, and his son had been separated from my grandmother and wasn’t back in Australia as he had assumed?’

Small electric buggies, driven by charming staff in smart uniforms, zipped them through the floodlit tropical gardens of the exclusive beach resort, stopping outside the entrance to the elegant seafood restaurant.

‘You might get your fish dinner, after all,’ said Julie as Christopher helped her from the buggy. They walked past flaming torches and into the restaurant and were taken to a table in a private section, separate from the airy, open dining area with its polished wood and rattan furniture.

Marjorie was already seated at the table, leaning back among silk cushions. Her hair was coiled on top of her head and she wore a dramatic scarlet and green print top, which was matched with sparkling green earrings. Her nails were manicured and painted scarlet, and she wore several gold bangles on her wrist. She smiled warmly at Peter and Shane, who leaned over and greeted her with a kiss.

‘Forgive me not standing up to hug you all. Martine, dear, how elegant you look, as always. And you must be Julie. Come, sit next to me.’

‘I’m Christopher, a friend of the family,’ said Christopher shaking her hand.

‘You’re Australian, too?’ Marjorie spoke with a soft, well-bred accent.

‘I can’t thank you enough for coming over here,’ said Julie shyly. ‘To see me, I mean.’

‘Dear girl, this place is no hardship.’ Marjorie waved her hand towards the restaurant, to the gardens and the strip of illuminated sand in front of the hotel. ‘I love staying here. I feel very elegant and very spoiled. But I do hope you will visit me in Penang. It’s such an interesting city. Do you know it, Christopher?’

‘I do. I’m working at Butterworth,’ he smiled.

‘Then you’re very close. You must pop in and see me, young man. Now, Julie, tell me all about yourself.’

As the champagne was poured, and the others started looking at the seafood menu, Julie briefly told Marjorie about herself, how she and her mother had not known until now, that Margaret and Philip had been separated during the war, that Philip had spent the war years in a Japanese POW camp with Bette.

Marjorie nodded, studying Julie. ‘So all this, for you, was a family secret. We all have them, I suppose.’

‘We didn’t even know we had a family secret!’ exclaimed Julie.

‘One sometimes hears stories that sound too fantastic to be true, but they are. Often one simply didn’t want to make public what happened behind closed doors. Everyone might know that things went on but saved face by keeping matters private. It’s how it was. Children born out of wedlock, children handed over to be raised by other members of the family or even non-relatives. Sex, love, money, religion, politics, the drivers of extraordinary actions, wouldn’t you say?’ Marjorie raised her glass of champagne. ‘Here’s to you, my dear. I hope I can help you in some small way.’

‘What would you prefer, Marjorie, the old ways of hushing up family secrets, keeping the skeletons in the closet, or letting it all hang out in public as it is today?’ asked Peter.

Marjorie wrinkled her nose. ‘I do so hate the way people bare their private lives on TV and so on. But I have to say, honesty is the best policy at the end of the day. Secrets always have a way of coming out, eventually. But Julie, if you would like to know more about my experiences during the war, I could tell you, perhaps tomorrow? Now, what are we ordering to eat? The food is so lovely here.’

In the buggy after dinner Julie and Christopher agreed it was one the most enjoyable evenings they’d had in a long time. Marjorie was a delightful soul who’d made them laugh, and made them think, and made everyone hope they could be as warm, friendly, funny and bright when they reached eighty.

‘I’m certainly going to keep in touch with her and pop in and see her in Penang when I get the chance,’ said Christopher.

‘She’d love to have a handsome young gentleman caller, I’m sure,’ said Julie. ‘She must have had a hard time during the war and yet she isn’t bitter, in fact, she is a very generous spirit.’

‘She was young, I suppose that helped. Shane and Peter told me their grandfather was a bit taciturn and didn’t like talking about the war years,’ said Christopher. ‘Maybe that’s a male thing. Men never talk about things that have affected them deeply. Or so my mother tells me.’

‘Does that apply today? I thought you guys had worked through the snag era and we’re all equal when it comes to emotional maturity,’ said Julie.

‘I’m not sure. I guess what Marjorie said about being honest is the safest way to go. Here are the others.’ Christopher jumped out of the buggy as it pulled up at the valet parking reception where Shane’s car was waiting.

Julie had arranged to meet Marjorie at her resort for morning tea, so she bought some flowers, popped a notebook into her handbag and called a taxi. Marjorie was in her villa facing the beach and greeted Julie warmly. Julie thought that she looked a little older in the bright light, compared to the candlelight of the evening before, but she was just as charming.

The villa was surrounded by an oasis of lush greenery, which screened Marjorie from the neighbouring villas. In front of it, on the beach, was a gauzy tent, under which sat tables and chairs. The sand had been swept clean in a raked pattern, and flame torches were stuck in it, ready for the evening.

‘Wow, is that where you eat?’ asked Julie as Marjorie took her out onto the shady deck where’d she’d been relaxing on the daybed.

‘That setting is for romantic dinners for two. I’m happy to get the buggy to the beach café. You can reach it by walking along the sand, but that’s a bit difficult for me with my legs, these days. Now, let’s sit at the table. I have tea, coffee or cool drinks.’

‘A fresh lime juice, if you have it, would be lovely. Thanks, Marjorie,’ said Julie. ‘Do you stay over here on the island regularly?’

‘I do. I loved being invited to the Elliotts’ beach house. The boys sold it after Philip and Stephanie were killed, such a tragedy. But the boys have done very well for themselves since then. I hope Peter marries his girl soon, but she doesn’t seem keen on the idea of life in Asia. She hasn’t been here enough, that’s the trouble.’

‘It’s a beautiful place to visit, but perhaps the thought of life on a plantation doesn’t appeal to a young career girl,’ said Julie.

‘What about you? Could you live here?’ asked Marjorie with a quizzical smile. ‘After all, your family lived here in the old days.’

‘Yes, they did,’ said Julie. ‘But I didn’t know anything about this life till recently, and I’m not sure that I’d be all that keen to leave a career and my way of living to move here, unless I was really in love. What about you? Did you grow up here?’ Julie had thought that she would be anxious to plunge in and ask about her great aunt and her uncle, but now she felt she wanted to know more about Marjorie first. ‘I found out last night that you lived in Sarawak. I’ve just been there – it was wonderful. So very beautiful and so interesting. I bet that it’s changed since you were young.’

‘It certainly has. I’ve been back to Kuching a few times, and I find it almost impossible to reconcile it with the place where I was born. My parents were Scots. My father was with the Civil Service under the last of the White Rajahs, Charles Vyner Brooke. He was a district officer, up-country. My two older brothers were at boarding school in England, and I had my parents’ undivided attention, so I was the spoiled baby of the family. I had a very indulged childhood.’ Marjorie smiled.

‘Servants? Being the only child?’ asked Julie.

‘Yes. Though my parents were just ordinary people back home, in Sarawak, I had an amah and there was a lot of staff. My goodness, the life in Sarawak in the thirties was great fun. I remember trips on the river with the Iban, hauling the boat over the rapids, punting in the Sarawak River, hiking through the jungle to a waterfall, being spoiled, a Chinese cobbler who drew around my foot and made pretty embroidered shoes for me. My parents went to wonderful parties at the palace, my father often went on hunting trips. I had some very odd pets and played with the children from the kampong.

‘Mother taught me at home. There was a school at the palace, for privileged children like myself, but Mother knew that I would have to go back to England eventually, so she wanted to keep me with her as long as she could. There were only about thirty European women living in Kuching at this time, and she certainly was the only white woman where we lived, so I suspect that she just didn’t want me to leave her, as it would have made her life very lonely. But before I was sent away to school, the war broke out …’ She paused and added, ‘And life was never the same again.’

‘The Brookes, the White Rajahs, they seem such an amazing family. Do you remember them? I’ve seen the places they built in Kuching. Their rule in Sarawak seems to be like something out of a novel,’ said Julie.

‘I’m glad you’ve been to Sarawak. While it’s a very different place from when I grew up there, it’s still very lovely. Yes, I remember Sir Charles Vyner Brooke very clearly. He was a lovely old gentleman, very proper and charming. When my parents and I came into Kuching, which was a few times a year, he would always meet us. He always knew my name and asked after my brothers. Occasionally we would be asked to the palace for dinner. He never seemed to mind when my parents brought me along.

‘He always said that all the Europeans working for him had to be accessible to everyone. The locals had to be able to speak to them directly, and that included the rajah. So every evening the Dayaks, Malays and Chinese used to go to the palace and talk to him and tell him what their problems were. He even invited the Dayaks to drink with him, but at eight a gun was fired and that signalled the time for the rajah’s dinner and everyone had to leave. Then we would go across to the palace and join him for dinner. It’s impossible to forget memories like that.’

‘And after the war, you went back to the UK? I know from Peter and Shane that you have a family. Can I ask about it? Do you have grandchildren?’ asked Julie.

‘Oh, yes, tribes of them back in Scotland. Some of them have been out here for holidays with me because I loathe the cold winters in Scotland, but of course they don’t have the same affection for this place as I do.’

The two women had settled themselves at the table under a fan, their backs to the glaring white sand and the stretch of blue water.

‘When you look at this peaceful setting, the war must be a distant memory. Or do those years come back to haunt?’ asked Julie tentatively.

‘Haunt isn’t the right word. I didn’t talk about it much for many years. But now, what does it matter? Oddly enough, I don’t remember when the war actually started, but I know that my parents thought that we would be able to sit it out on the river where we lived because it was so remote. Then they realised that by staying up-country, they were putting the lives of the Dayaks, whom they loved, at risk. If the Japanese found out that they were sheltering us, they would have been severely punished. So my father made the decision to turn ourselves in. We made our way to Kuching and my father was taken to one camp and Mother and I went to another.’

‘How terrible it must have been for you,’ said Julie, wondering how she would have felt if, as a twelve year old, she had been separated from her father in such a brutal way.

‘I believe that I was very fortunate to survive and so I’ve put it behind me but, occasionally, some small thing will trigger a memory. And what I remember most is not the Japanese soldiers who guarded us, although it is impossible to forget them, but the women who were strong, resourceful, trying their best to be positive. Women like my mother, keeping the little ones fed, occupied and hopeful. It couldn’t have been easy. They went without, they stood up to the Japanese, and they continually fought so hard just to keep us all alive.’

‘And my Great Aunt Bette? Was she one of these women?’

Marjorie smiled. ‘She was one of the best. She was a leader, in spite of her age, she was only about twenty-one. She took some terrible risks. She was a fierce little tiger, always protecting Philip. Amazing, actually, when I think back. I mean Philip was her nephew, not her own child, and yet I know that she could not have done more for him.’

‘I’d love to know more about her and Philip,’ said Julie.

‘I understand that. When Martine and Shane rang me to suggest that I might like to meet you, I was very happy to do so, and the flight from Penang is very short, but before I tell you about Bette and Philip, there’s something that I’d like to show you.’

Marjorie leaned across and picked up a small flat box from the coffee table. ‘I thought you might like to see this,’ she said, handing it to Julie.

Julie opened the little box. Inside was some tissue paper, which she carefully unwrapped, around a yellowed piece of paper. On it was a drawing of two young people, one a little boy, the other a young girl. They were sitting on some steps, eating bowls of rice with chopsticks. They both looked thin, their clothes were threadbare and they wore no shoes. And yet between the two was clearly a bond, almost an intimacy, as they watched each other eating. Written on top of the card were the words ‘Happy Birthday, Marjorie’.