‘He said that?’
Arthur nodded. ‘He really loved you. He’s still full of shame about what he did with that woman. I told him you had forgiven him.’
‘I have.’ She voiced it with certainty. She had forgiven him. ‘I know he was remorseful. He just struggled to articulate it. He hurt me, but I believe if he’d known the consequences he’d never have done it.’ She squeezed her hands into tight fists. ‘Or am I being too generous? Just because he’s dying?’
‘We both know Doug’s a complex character – that’s why we both love him.’ Arthur gave her a thoughtful look.
Uncomfortable, Evie changed the subject. ‘How are things with Veronica?’
He looked down and sighed. ‘She’s in a place in Singapore. They’re trying to sort her out. She’d gone haywire. Drinking.’ He put his palms together and intertwined his fingers. ‘The doctors there are confident they can help her.’
‘And you? What do you think?’
‘She’s admitted she needs help. They say that’s half the battle.’
‘Good.’ Evie pushed away her plate and got up. ‘It must be twenty minutes now.’
Back in Doug’s room, Evie and Arthur drowsed, drifting in and out of half-sleep, unable to settle, unwilling to leave, sentinels either side of Doug’s bed.
At one point during the night, she awoke to see Doug had opened his eyes and was looking at her. She bent forward and took his hand. ‘I love you, darling,’ she whispered. Unable to reply, an oxygen mask clamped over his face, his mouth quivered into an approximation of a smile and his eyes sent back a silent message of love and sadness. He closed his eyes and there was no sound other than the slow rasp of his breathing.
She looked up to see if Arthur was awake, but he was dozing in his chair. She turned her gaze back to her husband. His face was grey, lined, haggard, the toll of the past days etched there. He was unrecognisable, helpless. She had already lost him. The man lying here was a shell, the remnants of what Doug Barrington had once been. A silent tear rolled down her cheek.
The hours passed. A nurse came in from time to time to monitor his vital signs, and night turned into early morning. Around the edges of the ill-fitting hospital curtains the pitch dark was softening into a grey dawn. In the distance she could hear voices, footsteps and the clatter of metal. The world was waking up. She yawned.
Something else had changed. She sat bolt upright and saw Arthur do the same. They exchanged a wordless look that indicated they both knew Doug was no longer there. No death rattle. No last gasp. Just a soft fading away. Arthur got up and went to fetch the nurse who confirmed Douglas Barrington was gone and offered her sympathies. Evie bent over her husband’s body, stroked the stray lock of hair back from his brow and dropped a kiss onto his cold lips.
It had happened so quickly. The previous morning, she had arrived at the hospital determined to convince Douglas of the need for amputation, and here she was, just a short time later, looking at the empty shell of his broken body.
She was a widow with an infant son and a little girl who had now become an orphan. How had it come to this?
Arthur Leighton took care of everything. He informed everyone who needed to know of Doug’s death, arranged the funeral, ensured the bank would release funds for wages to be paid at Batu Lembah, asked Mike Overton to act as estate manager until Evie could make a decision on the future of the estates. He even collected Badger from Batu Lembah and transported him into Reggie Hyde-Underwood’s care at Bellavista. Evie was particularly relieved about this last matter. Badger would have been a constant reminder of his master’s absence.
Veronica did not attend the funeral, presumably because of her treatment. Evie was grateful that she didn’t have to contend with her.
Afterwards, there was a small gathering back at the house. Evie could barely take in what was happening, sitting listlessly as a stream of people offered their condolences. She had cause to be grateful to Mary. Her friend ensured that Evie’s guests were all watered and fed and moved among them, acting as the hostess that Evie lacked the strength to be.
27
Jasmine was at school and Evie was sitting in the garden, staring into space. Now that Douglas had been laid to rest, the shock of his death and its manner was receding, to be replaced by a numbness and a feeling of being cast adrift. Even though Douglas had rarely been present at the George Town house, the knowledge that he would never return made her feel as if she no longer had any right to be there.
Before the funeral, Arthur had assured her that there was plenty of money in the bank, and the income from the two rubber estates, and from an inheritance from Douglas’s late mother, meant that she and the children would be well-provided for. Money was the last thing she needed to worry about.
Hugh was sleeping in a bassinet beside her, in a shaded part of the garden. She gazed at his perfectly formed face and wondered how she was going to manage to raise the child in a way that Doug would have approved. How was he to grow up without the guidance and support of a father? How was she going to make the right choices for her son – the choices that Douglas would have made?
And she missed Douglas. Yes, he had often been cold and distant, but he had cared for her in his own clumsy way. Her week no longer had a focus now he would no longer be returning to George Town for the weekends. In the big bed, she felt lonely and lost and longed to have
