reprehensible. Wasn’t there a saying about the end justifying the means? Chelsea had needed to come home.
With Kirti to take charge of Chelsea, Anna was left free to attack the worst of the neglect, with Ruby’s help. Great winged insects were swept from the house along with dust and stray leaves; bedding and window hangings were aired or replaced; floors and walls and windows were scrubbed. In the mysterious way that news always managed to spread about the island—Anna had never been sure whether it was clairvoyance or something more nearly resembling jungle drums—the rest of the household staff began to drift back by ones and twos.
A week after their arrival, Raja Singha, the imperturbable magician whom Paul had always referred to with enormous understatement as their house-boy, appeared on his elephant with all his worldly goods strapped behind him. Anna had rarely been so glad to see anyone in her life. Raja Singha was the Ceylonese equivalent of an English major domo, with a touch of black magic thrown in. As if it were the most natural thing in the world for him to appear out of nowhere, he responded to Anna’s joyous greeting with nothing more than a solemn nod. He then proceeded to transfer his belongings back into the mud-and-thatch hut beyond the garden that had been his home from the time Paul and Anna had first arrived in Ceylon. Within an hour of his arrival he had taken over the running of the house. In his own silent and inscrutable way Raja Singha drove the rest of the staff without mercy. As a result, the work was completed in half the time Anna had guessed it might take. It was certainly pleasant, she reflected, to be able to crawl into bed at night without having to worry about what kind of creature one’s toes might encounter between the sheets.
Sleeping alone in the bedroom she and Paul had shared proved impossible. At night Anna would fall into bed, exhausted, only to lie awake while images of Paul flickered through her mind. Although she hated to admit it even to herself, a smidgen of guilt might have been part of the reason she was so afflicted. Because sometimes, in the dead of night, Paul’s dear face and form grew blurry to her mind’s eye. Instead she saw a darkly handsome visage with wicked midnight-blue eyes; felt the strength of a tall, muscular, overwhelmingly masculine body clamped to hers; experienced again the devastation of a bold stranger’s kiss and touch. Then, to her secret mortification, her body would burn for more of the same. She would toss and turn, fighting the shameful feelings that grew stronger as time passed, refusing to allow herself to dream of a dark, impudent stranger who had dared to treat her as a woman, not a lady.
On more than one occasion, she rose from her bed before dawn and visited the solitary grave on the knoll behind the house, where she would keep a lonely vigil until the sun began to creep over the horizon. Then, like a thief in the night, she would creep back into the house.
Still the image of the housebreaker refused to be erased. At night his shade came to torment her at least as often as Paul’s, pushing aside her gentle husband’s smiling face with the memory of how his mouth had claimed hers, of how her flesh had grown hot under his hands. Where Paul’s ghost racked her heart, the housebreaker’s racked her body. Tormented and ashamed, Anna could find no surcease from the longings that plagued her. Quite disregarding her mind, her healthy young woman’s flesh hungered. Try as she might, she could not drive from her dreams the way the housebreaker had made her feel. That she could fantasize so about another man, and not just any man but a stranger, a criminal, with Paul not yet a year in his grave, appalled her.
Sick with guilt, she took what steps she could to alleviate her nightly suffering. To that end she moved into one of the other bedrooms, a large sunny room overlooking the rear instead of the front lawn. The bed was small and
With Kirti to take charge of Chelsea, Anna was left free to attack the worst of the neglect, with Ruby’s help. Great winged insects were swept from the house along with dust and stray leaves; bedding and window hangings were aired or replaced; floors and walls and windows were scrubbed. In the mysterious way that news always managed to spread about the island—Anna had never been sure whether it was clairvoyance or something more nearly resembling jungle drums—the rest of the household staff began to drift back by ones and twos.
A week after their arrival, Raja Singha, the imperturbable magician whom Paul had always referred to with enormous understatement as their house-boy, appeared on his elephant with all his worldly goods strapped behind him. Anna had rarely been so glad to see anyone in her life. Raja Singha was the Ceylonese equivalent of an English major domo, with a touch of black magic thrown in. As if it were the most natural thing in the world for him to appear out of nowhere, he responded to Anna’s joyous greeting with nothing more than a solemn nod. He then proceeded to transfer his belongings back into the mud-and-thatch hut beyond the garden that had been his home from the time Paul and Anna had first arrived in Ceylon. Within an hour of his arrival he had taken over the running of the house. In his own silent and inscrutable way Raja Singha drove the rest of the staff without mercy. As a result, the work was completed in half the time Anna had guessed it might take. It was certainly pleasant, she reflected, to be able to crawl into bed at night without having to worry about what kind of creature one’s toes might encounter between the sheets.
Sleeping alone in the bedroom she and Paul had shared proved impossible. At night Anna would fall into bed, exhausted, only to lie awake while images of Paul flickered through her mind. Although she hated to admit it even to herself, a smidgen of guilt might have been part of the reason she was so afflicted. Because sometimes, in the dead of night, Paul’s dear face and form grew blurry to her mind’s eye. Instead she saw a darkly handsome visage with wicked midnight-blue eyes; felt the strength of a tall, muscular, overwhelmingly masculine body clamped to hers; experienced again the devastation of a bold stranger’s kiss and touch. Then, to her secret mortification, her body would burn for more of the same. She would toss and turn, fighting the shameful feelings that grew stronger as time passed, refusing to allow herself to dream of a dark, impudent stranger who had dared to treat her as a woman, not a lady.
On more than one occasion, she rose from her bed before dawn and visited the solitary grave on the knoll behind the house, where she would keep a lonely vigil until the sun began to creep over the horizon. Then, like a thief in the night, she would creep back into the house.
Still the image of the housebreaker refused to be erased. At night his shade came to torment her at least as often as Paul’s, pushing aside her gentle husband’s smiling face with the memory of how his mouth had claimed hers, of how her flesh had grown hot under his hands. Where Paul’s ghost racked her heart, the housebreaker’s racked her body. Tormented and ashamed, Anna could find no surcease from the longings that plagued her. Quite disregarding her mind, her healthy young woman’s flesh hungered. Try as she might, she could not drive from her dreams the way the housebreaker had made her feel. That she could fantasize so about another man, and not just any man but a stranger, a criminal, with Paul not yet a year in his grave, appalled her.
Sick with guilt, she took what steps she could to alleviate her nightly suffering. To that end she moved into one of the other bedrooms, a large sunny room overlooking the rear instead of the front lawn. The bed was small and
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