Thursday's Child by Helen Forrester

the club, and walked with the flat-footed gait of a man used to loose sandals down the path, out of the gate and along the road. I stood on the steps as long as I could hear his footfalls on the pavement, and then, feeling intensely lonely, I went slowly up to bed.
    I lay sleepless for a long time, remembering how each time I had imagined I was to be happily married, the man concerned had been taken from me. Would Ajit, not wishing to harm me, voluntarily leave me?
    When I slept I saw in my dreams Shiva dancing his dance of death; and he was laughing at my puny efforts to escape him.

CHAPTER TEN
    On Monday, my hours of duty at the club were from ten in the morning until six in the evening, and when they had dragged to an end, I sat by the fire in the lounge, which was empty, and waited for Ajit. I had told Mother that I would take my dinner at the club, but the thought of food nauseated me; apprehension about the future filled me. Supposing Ajit backed out of his proposal, feeling that Father was right and I should marry amongst my ownpeople. Supposing we did marry and it was not a success. What should I do?
    A hand came over the back of my chair and lifted my chin. Ajit leaned over and kissed me. My fears left me; just by the assured touch of his fingers, I knew we would be married, and the rest would be what we made of it.
    We announced our engagement, and Mother had a fine time preparing for a wedding. Father was sadly silent; he barely spoke to me, although he expressed his pleasure at my joy over the first presents which Ajit gave me – a red silk sari embroidered in gold, and a thick, gold bracelet. With the exception of the two engagement rings which lay in cotton wool in my dressing-table drawer, they were the most beautiful gifts I had ever received, and it was with some pride that I exhibited them to my friends.
    The engagement announcement caused a fuss amongst Ajit’s Indian fellow students, and arguments for and against the union raged in many cheap digs, but Ajit went steadily on with his arrangements, despite the dismal prophecies of his friends. All he hoped was that no one would write and tell his father, before he could get home and tell him himself. It was not possible for me to fly with him to India as passages were hard to obtain and, furthermore, I wished to give the McShane Club a month’s notice of my intention to leave. It was, therefore, arranged that I should travel by sea, arriving in India about the middle of May.
    â€˜It will be very hot at that time,’ said Ajit.
    â€˜Never mind, the sea voyage will give me plenty of rest, so that I shall be better able to cope with the heat,’ I said cheerfully. ‘Besides, to come by plane with you would be so expensive.’
    â€˜Miser,’ he said, but he was pleased. Long afterwards he told me that he would not have dared to marry me, if it had not been apparent that I was careful with money. In India, he would not earn so much that he could risk having an extravagant wife.
    The question of guests at our wedding was a difficult one. Grandma – my mother’s mother – who was a product of a strict Victorian upbringing, thought it was a tremendouslark, she said she only wished she was young enough to kick over the traces too, and promptly spent hours putting fine stiches into petticoats for me. Her single daughters, Mother’s elder sisters, were horrified, and refused to associate themselves with the marriage at all, regarding Grandma as someone who had suddenly lost her senses. Father had one younger brother, living in London with his numerous family, and in reply to the invitation sent him, he wrote that he was sorry he could not come but he could not approve of such a union, to which his wife, Louise, had added a postscript that I should not take any notice of him – he just could not afford to come – but if things went wrong in India their home would always be open to me, and she and the children