The Pearl of Penang by Clare Flynn (best books to read for students txt) 📗

He bent down, crouching in front of her. A drip of water from his hair landed on her leg but the shiver that ran through her was less from this than from the unexpected pleasure of seeing him.

‘I didn’t expect to find you here, Evie. What a pleasant surprise.’

‘After what Dorothy said last night, I decided I’d have to come and see if this place was as delightful as she said it was.’

‘And?’

‘It’s magical. Truly beautiful. I had a delicious swim in the pool.’

‘It’s a good time to come. It’s always quiet in the middle of the week. Most people turn up at weekends and in the late afternoon or early evening to cool off and enjoy a sundowner while watching the sunset.’

‘Shouldn’t you be at work?’

‘Don’t give me away, Evie. I often come to the beach when I get a quiet spell. It can be insufferable cooped up inside all day when I’m here in George Town. And I get no chance to swim when I’m on the road.’

He looked at her. That same intense look that made Evie feel exposed, slightly uncomfortable, as if he wanted something from her but couldn’t bring himself to ask.

‘Come with me. You need to swim in the sea.’ He took hold of her hand and pulled her to her feet. Self-conscious in only a swimsuit, she draped her towel around herself like a sarong, and followed him over the hot sand.

They walked for a couple of hundred yards, keeping to the shade as the sand was burning hot in the full sun, following the curve of the coast, away from the Swimming Club. The shore was beautiful: the pale sand interspersed by smooth dark rocks like whales emerging from the deep. Palm trees, bent by the wind, leaned over and offered protective shade, as did casuarinas with their distinctive pine smell. In the distance she could see the brilliant primary colours of a small Chinese temple.

Arthur looked at her. ‘You love it here, don’t you? I can tell.’

‘It would be impossible not to.’

‘Malaya’s a beautiful country, with kind and gentle people and the sun shining every day.’

‘You must be very good at your job to have been sent here.’

‘I was lucky. I put the time in. And maybe I got it because I didn’t particularly want it. They’re like that. Reluctant to give you something if you really want it. I actually would have preferred to stay in Nairobi.’

They sat down on the sand, close to the water’s edge where the beach narrowed and the casuarina trees still cast some shade.

‘Why? Is Africa as beautiful as this?’

‘It’s different. When I was there, the only way I could get to the beach was if I managed to grab a few days leave in Mombasa. East Africa’s hot but it’s a dry heat. None of the suffocating humidity we have here. Penang is beautiful but it’s tame in comparison. There’s nowhere like Africa – sometimes on the savannah you feel you’ve been transported to prehistoric times. All these strange wild animals moving across empty scorched plains – wildebeests, elephants, rhinos. It wouldn’t be hard to imagine dinosaurs lumbering along among them. Miles and miles of grasslands. Acacia trees. Tribesmen and herders doing what they’ve been doing for thousands of years. Africa makes one feel small and insignificant, a tiny speck in the vastness of the continent. It has a savage beauty like nowhere else. Very different from all this.’ He gestured with his hand.

‘So why did you leave?’

‘It was time to move on. It was impossible to refuse the job here.’

She wanted to ask him what Veronica had thought about it, whether she had instigated the move as it was hard to imagine her liking those vast primordial plains, but Evie didn’t want to spoil the moment by allowing mention of Arthur’s wife.

They said nothing for a while, until Arthur, staring ahead at the distant horizon, broke the silence. ‘I was young, ambitious, but lacking connections. Just pond life lurking in the depths of the Foreign Service, watching while less capable men were promoted ahead of me just because they went to the right school.’ He leaned back, resting on his elbows. ‘I had to work harder, be cleverer than my colleagues, but no matter how much effort I put in, I always came up short. I became the indispensable right-hand man to a succession of very average, barely competent officers, all of whom patted me on the head like a dog, and then promoted the idiot in the next desk. There’s something bred into public school boys – and the Etonians in particular – a deep-rooted sense of entitlement. I, on the other hand, had to sweat blood and scrabble for the leftovers.’ He sighed. ‘Sorry, Evie, I must sound cynical and bitter. Anyway, I kept my head down and tried to do the job so well that they wouldn’t be able to ignore me. But it never worked. I was always that reliable and indispensable fellow who wasn’t “one of us”.’

‘But you went to Oxford, didn’t you?’

‘Yes. But that merely gets you in the door of the Colonial Office – it’s the old school tie that gets you advancement. Doug is “one of us”. But the funny thing is, he never gave a damn. He’s always accepted people for what they deliver not where they come from. That’s probably why we get along.’

‘But Doug wasn’t in the Foreign Service.’

‘Good lord, can you imagine? Doug and diplomacy are not a marriage made in heaven.’

Pushing away the thought that neither were Doug and Evie, she continued to listen, rapt.

‘To cap it all, as a single man, I wasn’t exactly first choice in the pile either. The foreign service like to get good value for money and see wives as unpaid employees. They even assess them and grade them, as well as their husbands.’

‘Really? Why?’

‘So much of the job revolves around entertaining people, and the wife is key