The Plantation (6 page)

‘Why not? Thank you.’ Margaret let her wrap drop from her bare shoulders and sat back in her chair. ‘It’s going to be hard to settle down at home after this trip. I’ve discovered I love travelling. It can be so stimulating. It’s been a bit tiresome having Miss Monkton along looking after me, but my parents insisted.’

‘Quite right. Perhaps you could plan another trip. When we get to Port Said, you’ll find that interesting, I’m sure. I know Colombo jolly well, too, if you would let me show it to you. With Miss Monkton, of course. I’m leaving the ship there, but we would have some time to sightsee before this ship continues on to Singapore. Perhaps we could organise something.’

‘Oh, so you’re disembarking at Colombo. I wouldn’t like to impose on your time …’

He gave an airy wave with his cigarette. ‘I’d be delighted. You won’t have much time there, but we can make the most of it.’

Margaret was sorry that he wouldn’t be travelling all the way to Australia, but she flashed him a dazzling smile, thinking that she would just have to make the most of every minute.

‘That would be wonderful. Adelaide is a bit nervous about venturing ashore in some of these places. But I’m sure you know the very best sights.’ She smiled, hoping that Roland Elliott would take her out on her own and not with his group of friends.

‘There’s the dinner gong,’ said Roland standing and holding out his hand to help Margaret from the chair.

‘Thank you for the champagne,’ said Margaret.

‘My pleasure.’ He gave a nod and a warm smile as they walked together into the dining room.

Adelaide and Margaret had both been impressed by the decorations in the grand dining room. Candles glowed above epergnes filled with fresh roses from the coldroom. The crystal glassware sparkled and the dinner service with the shipping company’s crest was edged in gold. In the centre of the room a vaulted skylight surrounded by delicate plasterwork was supported by columns wound with gauzy drapery and clusters of leaves.

Margaret was escorted to the captain’s table by Roland, while a stiffly attired ship’s officer escorted Adelaide. The men at the table rose while the ladies were seated. Having met the captain already at his cocktail reception, both ladies were at ease as they were introduced to the other guests at the table. After a few pleasantries, the men quickly dominated the conversation.

When Margaret was finally asked by the man on her right about where she’d been and what her future plans were, she answered quietly, ‘Miss Monkton and I have been touring Europe, which has been most interesting. My trip was a twenty-first birthday present from my parents. I’m returning home to Brisbane now. I haven’t made any specific plans, but I would like to travel some more.’

Adelaide blinked at this. It was the first time she’d heard Margaret’s wish for further travel.

‘Jolly good idea to travel before settling down,’ agreed another woman at the table.

Margaret added politely, ‘I’m looking forward to seeing Port Said and especially Colombo. Mr Elliott has offered to show me some of the sights there.’

‘Keep away from those thieving markets,’ advised the captain. ‘And be careful about buying precious stones. Many can be fakes, you understand.’

Roland smiled at Margaret. ‘Perhaps there will be time to take a trip to Kandy, the old Sinhalese capital. See some of the exotic Buddhist temples.’

‘How exotic?’ asked Adelaide with a faint frown. ‘I hear some of those places, well, the carvings, can be somewhat explicit. Maybe they are not suitable for a young lady.’

‘There’s always the Cinnamon Gardens,’ suggested one of the women at the table.

‘Yes, good idea,’ agreed Roland and turned to Adelaide. ‘Have you seen much of the Far East, Miss Monkton?’

‘No, I prefer the culture of Europe,’ replied Adelaide.

‘You should go out to Malaya. You’ll find it frightfully interesting,’ said the captain cheerfully. ‘Isn’t that so, Mr Elliott?’

‘Is that where you live?’ asked Adelaide.

The captain gave a hearty laugh. ‘By Jove, yes. These young chaps are making their fortune in rubber, isn’t that so?’ he boomed.

‘Some do,’ said Roland, modestly.

‘Which rubber estate are you on?’ asked one of the men, a retired colonel travelling to Australia to visit his aged sister.

‘The plantation’s called Utopia and it’s in Perak state, which I must admit can still be a bit wild,’ said Roland before he changed the subject, asking the captain about his sea-going adventures.

Adelaide glanced at Margaret as she finished her dessert and thought to herself, ‘Well, Mr Elliott will be out of the running now.’ She couldn’t see Margaret anywhere near a jungle.

But Margaret’s interest in the charming Roland Elliott didn’t wane at all. In fact most afternoons while Adelaide took her afternoon rest, the pair could be found sitting on the upper deck verandah, Margaret drinking American-style ice cream sodas while Roland contented himself with tea.

She asked him many questions about his life in Malaya, trying to understand exactly what he did and how a plantation worked. She found all of his answers interesting, even when he talked about the daily muster, the need to keep a close eye on the native workers, the problems with up-country estates, the communist troublemakers, the drop in tin prices, the idea of turning some of the rubber estate over to oil palms, and the renewed interest in rubber as the effects of the Depression eased. However, what Margaret really wanted to know about was his social life. Did he have a special lady friend?

In the ship’s library she’d found an autobiography of a British planter who’d been in Malaya in the early 1900s and he had not been shy in writing about the charms of the local women in the brothels. Margaret wondered if Roland knew about this side of life in Malaya. But while she asked a lot of pleasant and superficial questions, she was having trouble scratching beneath the debonair veneer Roland Elliott presented.

Later she broached the subject with Adelaide. ‘Why do you think Mr Elliott hasn’t married? Do you think he has some native paramour?’

Adelaide was shocked. ‘Margaret! What do you know – or care – about such matters? It’s none of your business. I suggest you take less interest in a gentleman who’s shortly going to be leaving the ship, and whom you will never see again.’

Privately, Adelaide too had wondered why Mr Elliott was still unattached since he came from such a good background and was evidently well off. But he was courteous and affable so she supposed there was no harm in Margaret indulging in a small shipboard flirtation. Nonetheless Adelaide was aware of her responsibility in keeping an eye on her young charge.

Even though Roland talked a lot about his life in Malaya and his family, Margaret managed to keep her end of the conversation up too, as she described her life in Queensland. She told him how her father had taught her and her sister to sail a small wooden, single-sail dinghy on Moreton Bay and described the Great Barrier Reef, which she had seen when the family had holidayed in the Whitsunday Islands.

Roland and Margaret became something of a pair at the social events on board, dancing under the stars at pool deck soirees and at the jazz and tea dances in the ballroom. They played deck tennis and quoits regularly and occasionally made a foursome at cards in the writing room. Margaret now became a fixture at the outdoor pool on B Deck where she sunbathed while Roland and his friends played a version of water polo in the pool. He laughingly admitted Margaret could probably outswim him, but said that he preferred to watch her lounging in a deck chair.

‘You’re pretty as a picture, sunbaking,’ he said.

For Margaret it was a glorious time. She felt she’d been given membership to a glamorous club, where every one was her best friend, where she was admired and flattered and waited upon, where days were frittered away between music and laughter and dances. She knew she was falling in love with Roland as they meandered the quiet decks in the moonlight, pausing to watch the phosphorescence in the sea before he kissed her sweetly.

Adelaide noted Margaret’s possessive arm linked through Roland’s, the closeness as they sat together in earnest conversation, sometimes broken by Margaret’s trilling laugh.

‘Just enjoy the voyage,’ advised Adelaide. ‘But don’t get your hopes up that anything will come of this friendship.’

Margaret was cosseted in the world of the shipboard routine sprinkled with starry nights, an ocean breeze, and the warmth of Roland’s arms about her as they danced or kissed. Together they played and sang and enjoyed the frivolous fun of fancy dress balls, games, quiz nights and an hilarious talent contest. The outside world was excluded as the days at sea rolled on.

Roland and Margaret and three other couples had become good friends. They toured Port Said together, shopping in the marketplace and the bazaar, and ended up in a club of dubious repute where they ate strange spicy food with their fingers and were entertained by a bellydancer. But while Margaret acted with worldly sophistication she found it all rather tawdry and intimidating and clung to Roland like a limpet.

Adelaide watched the transformation in Margaret, who had always been so independent and outspoken. She started to become attentive to Roland’s every word as he held forth. Adelaide also observed the blossoming shipboard romances among the other couples and, in a quiet moment, mentioned it to her friend, the purser.

The purser smiled and shrugged. ‘Happens every voyage. Can’t blame these young fellows. Usually the young men are under contract, so they aren’t allowed to marry until they’ve put in several years work out in the East. So when the companies they work for allow them to settle down, they begin courting in earnest. There’s not much opportunity for wife hunting in the colonies so if they don’t find a wife on home leave they meet her on board ship. Many of these young women are known as the fishing fleet travelling to the East, looking for suitable husbands.’

‘I suppose so. It just seems, well, rather calculated,’ said Adelaide.

‘Ah, aided and abetted by the moonlight, the stars and the sea. It’s a time without cares. There’ll be long and lonely hours for some of these chaps stationed out in the hills and jungles. And it’s not without its dangers. These fellows can tell some terrifying stories. Not the sort of thing they want the ladies to hear,’ added the purser.

‘And do these shipboard liaisons last?’ wondered Adelaide.

‘I believe so. I’ve seen couples meet and sail back on home leave a few years later with youngsters in tow,’ said the purser.

While Adelaide found Roland Elliott to be very polite and eligible, she couldn’t imagine Margaret being happy living so far away from Australia and her family in what could be very primitive and isolated conditions. Adelaide knew from experience that, whatever Margaret might say, her young charge wouldn’t like life in a foreign place surrounded by smells, filth and strange customs. But she bit her tongue and waited, knowing that the situation would resolve itself when Roland left the ship at Colombo.

Any disappointment Margaret felt about Roland she kept to herself. When she awoke one morning to find the ship engines stilled, she looked out the porthole, and exclaimed to Adelaide, ‘We’re in Colombo! Oh, how romantic. Look, palm trees and a beach!’

Adelaide squeezed beside Margaret. ‘What a lovely looking place. Is that a fort or something?’

‘Oh, look at all those little boats, how sweet,’ said Margaret.

‘Yes, very colourful. All selling something no doubt.’

Margaret dressed quickly and hurried onto the deck to find Roland at the railing as the liner passed the breakwater. The ship was greeted by a flotilla of small, makeshift craft carrying excited children and adults holding up their wares.

‘Goodness me, how do some of those things stay afloat?’ she exclaimed. ‘Wouldn’t catch me in one of them. What are they selling?’

‘Everything you don’t need but will be enticed to buy – from a fan, a necklace, a basket, to a piece of silk,’ laughed Roland.

‘Oh, they’re coming on board!’ She grasped Roland’s hand. ‘They’ve climbed up the side just like monkeys! And what’s that smell?’ Margaret wrinkled her nose.

‘Cinnamon most likely, my dear.’ Roland reached into his pocket and held up a coin, calling out to the young men and boys all shouting and waving to the passengers from the water below. As soon as the coin left Roland’s hand, the children dived into the waters of the harbour until, triumphant, one boy surfaced with the penny clenched between his teeth. Other passengers began throwing coins, taking photos and enjoying the entertainment. Roland took Margaret’s arm. ‘Come on, let’s see if the snake charmer has appeared on deck.’

They found a small crowd around a dark-skinned man wearing what looked to Margaret to be a length of bright cloth knotted like a baby’s nappy. He was cajoling everyone for coins to be thrown on a mat in front of his lidded basket.

‘Is there really a snake in there?’ whispered Margaret.

‘There certainly is – a dangerous cobra,’ said Roland with a grin.

As the man removed the basket lid and began playing a reedy flute, a snake, a curved hood over its head, swayed from the basket.

Margaret clutched Roland’s arm. ‘I hope it doesn’t come out!’

There were squeals and laughter as the snake rose up, swaying to the music. ‘These Hindu magic men are pretty amazing with their tricks,’ said Roland.