He strolled up the front steps, across the entrance hall and into the lounge bar. It was quiet, but there were a couple of parties of older members playing bridge at the corner tables and one or two men drinking at the bar.
As they entered, the room fell silent. People turned to stare at them both.
‘Tom, I don’t think …’ Joy began nervously, hanging back.
‘Just sit down, Joy, please. We’ll order a drink.’
Reluctantly she sat down on an armchair, perching on the edge uneasily. The head waiter came over, looking immaculate in his white starched uniform and gloves. He wore an awkward, apologetic expression.
‘I’m sorry, Mr. Ellis, but the young lady is not a member.’
‘No, she is not a member, but she is my guest. I would like to buy her a drink.’
‘I’m sorry, sir, but I cannot serve her. I’m afraid it would be against club rules.’
‘What rules are those? I’m not aware of any such rule’
Joy broke in, ‘Tom, please, let’s go. It doesn’t matter.’
‘Yes. It does matter,’ said Tom, raising his voice. ‘Could you please bring us the cocktail menu, Abdul?’
‘I’m sorry, sir, but I cannot serve the young lady. Club rules say that only Europeans can drink in the bar.’
‘Could you please ask the manager to come and speak to me?’ said Tom, but the manager, an Italian with brilliantined black hair and moustache, was already bustling over.
‘Mr. Ellis, I’m sorry, but I am going to have to ask you to leave. It is against the club rules to serve a non-European.’ He was smiling and spoke smoothly as if he was explaining that a particular dish was not on the menu.
Tom was about to protest, but he saw that Joy had already got up and was hurrying away, pushing through the tables towards the door.
‘Joy! Joy! Don’t go.’
He ran after her, but as he reached the door of the bar she was disappearing out of the front entrance. As he crossed the hall after her, he caught sight of Millicent coming down the stairs. Her eyes lit up momentarily when she saw him, but then she realised that he was running after another woman and her expression changed. She narrowed her eyes and shot him a look laced with pure venom.
He caught up with Joy on the front path. He grabbed her arm, but she shook him off.
‘Leave me alone,’ she said. ‘How could you! Are you blind? You must have known what would happen. You’ve lived here for over two years. And I told you.’ She was furious. Her face was flushed and eyes bright with anger. It reminded him of the time she had flared up against her father in defence of Tom during dinner with her family.
‘I’m sorry, Joy. I’m so sorry. I should have listened to you. Please forgive me.’
‘No.’ Her eyes filled with tears of humiliation. ‘I’ve never been so insulted in all my life. And you! You made it worse. All those people staring, looking at me as if I were a piece of dirt.’
‘Look, I’m sorry. I’ll do anything to make it up to you. Shall I drive you home?’
‘No. I’m not going anywhere with you. I’ll get a rickshaw. I’ll go on my own. Please don’t try to contact me again, Tom. I never want to see you again.’
She shook her arm free from him and marched off down the street and towards the square where the rickshaw-wallahs hung about, waiting for passengers. He stood there helplessly and watched her go.
‘What a bloody fool I am,’ he said, his head in his hands. ‘What a bloody, bloody fool.’
For the next fortnight, Tom saw nothing of Joy. He went about his daily routines with a heavy heart. He was up at dawn to meet the workers at the plantation headquarters, inspecting their work and the trees on his patch all morning, and then going back to his house for lunch and a bath. All the colour and pleasure seemed to have vanished from his life. Even the view from his balcony had lost its charm. The sun seemed too hot, and the landscape too vibrant, too green. For the first time since he had arrived, he thought longingly of England, the gentle rain and the soft greens and browns of the countryside, so easy on the eye.
He drove up to Joy’s house in the Eurasian quarter twice to try to talk to her. Each time her mother had come out onto the porch.
‘I am sorry, Mr. Ellis, but she says that she cannot see you,’ Joy’s mother told him, unsmilingly. He remembered how welcoming she had been the time Joy had taken him home for dinner. Her discomfort now seemed to reinforce his own unhappiness.
The second time the message was the same, and he walked back to the car, disconsolate. He sat in the driver’s seat watching the little house for several minutes, waiting for the twitch of a lace curtain to show that Joy was watching him too. But there was no movement, and he drove away feeling numb and helpless.
A few days after the incident at the club he received a terse note from the chairman of the committee informing him that his membership had been withdrawn. When he went in to collect some belongings he had left in a locker, he went to see the man in his office. The chairman was immensely fat, with rolls of midriff flowing over the arms of his chair. He was perspiring profusely and kept mopping his red face with a handkerchief.
‘Is it because I brought Miss de Souza here?’ Tom asked.
‘Well, not directly, although that was a very foolish thing to do. You should have known what would happen. It’s an unwritten rule, but it is still a rule
