skin. Back in bed, I stretched out next to Jock’s hulking form. He made a solid mountain, seeming to take up even more space now that he was unconscious. He breathed on gutturally, dreaming his unknowable dreams while I lay there in the dark, willing myself to sleep.
The next morning at Nairobi Station we climbed aboard the train that would take us to Mombasa, and then onto the ship that would ferry us to India for our honeymoon.
I was Beryl Purves—and still a virgin.
I n Bombay the air was full of spices and the crying sitars of street musicians. White bungalows crowded the lanes, with peeling shutters that closed at the hottest part of every day and then opened again at night when the sky went red and deep purple. We stayed with Jock’s aunt and uncle, in their compound below the posh Malabar Hill. Jock’s parents and two of his three brothers were there, having come to see if I was up to snuff. I wanted to have a long look at them all, too—the new family I’d won, as if in a lottery.
On the voyage, Jock had told me how his family had moved to India from Edinburgh when he was a boy, but I found it hard to remember details of landholdings and business mergers when I stood and looked at them—a band of ruddy, high-boned Scots in a silky brown Indian sea. Jock’s mother was the pinkest of all, like a flamingo in bright silk. She wore her auburn hair in a high coil that was being quietly taken over by strands of pure white. Jock’s father, Dr. William, was a version of Jock, with strong-looking hands and bright blue eyes that winked at me, trying to put me at ease, as his wife asked a string of questions that weren’t really questions.
“You’re very tall, aren’t you?” she kept saying. “Unnaturally so, don’t you think, Will?”
“I don’t think I’d go so far as to say un
natural,
darling…. ” His brogue tipped the ends of his sentences up expectantly. I always thought he was about to say something more, but then he didn’t.
Jock patted my knee nervously. “It means she’s healthy, Mother.”
“Well, she’s got plenty of sun, hasn’t she?”
Later, when Jock and I were alone in our room dressing for dinner, I studied myself in the full-length looking glass. I wasn’t used to frocks and stockings, or the strapped high-heeled shoes that were the fashion then. My stocking seams wouldn’t line up straight. My new underthings, bought in Nairobi with Emma’s instructions, pinched at my waist and under my arms. I felt like an impostor.
“Don’t fret,” Jock said. He sat on the bed, tightening the elastic on his braces. “You look fine.”
I reached behind me to adjust the stockings again. “Your mother doesn’t like me.”
“She just doesn’t want to lose me. That’s how mothers are.” He’d spoken the words so lightly, but they stung. What would I know about it?
“She looks down her nose at me,” I said.
“Don’t be silly. You’re my wife.” He got up and came to take my hands, giving them a strong, reassuring squeeze—but as soon as he let go, his words clattered to the floor. I didn’t feel old enough to be anyone’s wife, or that I knew enough or had lived enough, or understood the essential things. I didn’t know how to say any of this to Jock, either. That I was afraid of the promises we’d made. That late at night as I lay beside him in bed I felt lonely and numb, as if some part of me had died.
“Please kiss me,” I said, and he did, and though I leaned against him and tried to meet the kiss and to take it in, I couldn’t quite feel it. I couldn’t feel
us.
—
I had never spent so much time by the sea, and hated the way the air thickened with salt and sat on my skin and made me always long for a bath. I was far more comfortable with dust. Here, moisture puddled on everything and seeped into the walls, swelling the windows shut. Black spores of mould grew on the walls of the houses, ageing them like a skin.
“It seems wrong,” I said to Jock.
The next morning at Nairobi Station we climbed aboard the train that would take us to Mombasa, and then onto the ship that would ferry us to India for our honeymoon.
I was Beryl Purves—and still a virgin.
I n Bombay the air was full of spices and the crying sitars of street musicians. White bungalows crowded the lanes, with peeling shutters that closed at the hottest part of every day and then opened again at night when the sky went red and deep purple. We stayed with Jock’s aunt and uncle, in their compound below the posh Malabar Hill. Jock’s parents and two of his three brothers were there, having come to see if I was up to snuff. I wanted to have a long look at them all, too—the new family I’d won, as if in a lottery.
On the voyage, Jock had told me how his family had moved to India from Edinburgh when he was a boy, but I found it hard to remember details of landholdings and business mergers when I stood and looked at them—a band of ruddy, high-boned Scots in a silky brown Indian sea. Jock’s mother was the pinkest of all, like a flamingo in bright silk. She wore her auburn hair in a high coil that was being quietly taken over by strands of pure white. Jock’s father, Dr. William, was a version of Jock, with strong-looking hands and bright blue eyes that winked at me, trying to put me at ease, as his wife asked a string of questions that weren’t really questions.
“You’re very tall, aren’t you?” she kept saying. “Unnaturally so, don’t you think, Will?”
“I don’t think I’d go so far as to say un
natural,
darling…. ” His brogue tipped the ends of his sentences up expectantly. I always thought he was about to say something more, but then he didn’t.
Jock patted my knee nervously. “It means she’s healthy, Mother.”
“Well, she’s got plenty of sun, hasn’t she?”
Later, when Jock and I were alone in our room dressing for dinner, I studied myself in the full-length looking glass. I wasn’t used to frocks and stockings, or the strapped high-heeled shoes that were the fashion then. My stocking seams wouldn’t line up straight. My new underthings, bought in Nairobi with Emma’s instructions, pinched at my waist and under my arms. I felt like an impostor.
“Don’t fret,” Jock said. He sat on the bed, tightening the elastic on his braces. “You look fine.”
I reached behind me to adjust the stockings again. “Your mother doesn’t like me.”
“She just doesn’t want to lose me. That’s how mothers are.” He’d spoken the words so lightly, but they stung. What would I know about it?
“She looks down her nose at me,” I said.
“Don’t be silly. You’re my wife.” He got up and came to take my hands, giving them a strong, reassuring squeeze—but as soon as he let go, his words clattered to the floor. I didn’t feel old enough to be anyone’s wife, or that I knew enough or had lived enough, or understood the essential things. I didn’t know how to say any of this to Jock, either. That I was afraid of the promises we’d made. That late at night as I lay beside him in bed I felt lonely and numb, as if some part of me had died.
“Please kiss me,” I said, and he did, and though I leaned against him and tried to meet the kiss and to take it in, I couldn’t quite feel it. I couldn’t feel
us.
—
I had never spent so much time by the sea, and hated the way the air thickened with salt and sat on my skin and made me always long for a bath. I was far more comfortable with dust. Here, moisture puddled on everything and seeped into the walls, swelling the windows shut. Black spores of mould grew on the walls of the houses, ageing them like a skin.
“It seems wrong,” I said to Jock.
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