Free The Peacock Spring by Rumer Godden

cupboards locked ?’ Una was shocked.
    ‘Always in India,’ said Alix. ‘Your servants would not respect you else. This big one holds UN’s stores for official entertaining. Sometimes there are business luncheons
or dinners, mostly stag ones, then we shall have to keep out of the way. This small cupboard is private for Edward, his drinks and cigars and so on.’ Alix praised the vegetables, eggs,
butter, meat and fish Christopher had bought fresh that morning; they were presented, invitingly arranged in a basket, for her to inspect. She praised last night’s dinner too, complimented
Dino on the table, smelled Ganesh’s roses. Why then, Una wondered, was there such stoniness in Dino’s, Ram’s and Ganesh’s faces, such a surly look on
Christopher’s?
    Alix ignored it. ‘Servants don’t matter,’ she said. Their mouths may be shut in front of us, was Una’s silent rejoinder, but they have eyes to see, ears to hear and minds
of their own – as have I, thought Una.
    All the same, Alix’s presence in the house made it different from any she and Hal had known before. You sing about the house, thought Una, sing quite softly, I know, but the song has a
lilt. You are a big woman but your step is quick and light, your hands deft and capable and your hair is so bright that, in the sun, it seems to be haloed. No wonder Edward likes to have you here
– but Una snatched that thought back. Miss Lamont is here for us, not Edward – but was she?
    She watched Alix go through his ties, picking some out to be dry-cleaned, heard her scolding the washerman for a broken button on one of his shirts, then she sewed on another. ‘We
didn’t think of touching his clothes,’ said Hal in wonder.
    ‘Well, it hardly came into your province, did it?’ asked Alix. Does it into yours? Una wanted to retort but, instead, ‘Edward likes to look after himself,’ she said.
    Alix calmly went on sewing. Then, ‘Don’t you think someone as burdened as Edward needs these little things done for him?’ she asked. She looked up and must have caught the
displeasure – or was it jealousy? – in Una’s eyes because, ‘Remember he doesn’t know I do this.’
    But he knows he is better looked after, more comfortable than he has ever been in his life. Una did not say it aloud but it was the unpalatable truth.
    They were to explore the Old City and, ‘Which shall it be?’ Alix asked them. ‘The Red Fort or the shops in the Chandni Chowk?’
    ‘The Chandni Chowk,’ said Hal, while Una said, ‘The Red Fort.’
    ‘Una is the eldest,’ Alix decided. ‘She shall have first choice,’ and, She’s placating me, thought Una. She doesn’t find me so easy, thought Una with pride.
‘Now you are here,’ said Alix with the same placation, ‘we must read some Indian history.’
    ‘Mrs Carrington gave me a book on Indian history as a parting present,’ said Una. She did not meant it snubbingly, but it sounded like a snub. ‘Then I am probably
superfluous,’ said Alix.
    ‘Alas, no water runs in the channels now,’ said the student guide in the Red Fort. ‘The fountains do not play.’
    ‘The Moghul Emperors all made water gardens,’ said Una. ‘Babur, the first Emperor, even made the melon beds along the Jumna river.’ She was standing on one of the lawns
of the Red Fort, looking at the shapes of fountains, domes and pillars against the blue Indian sky.
    ‘Here the Peacock Throne was kept . . . this roof used to be silver . . . look at this inlay in the marble.’ Una would have loved to linger, listening to the guide. One pavilion
ceiling had inlays of morning-glory flowers in lapis lazuli; a panel had carnations in cornelian. Everywhere were carvings; the soft sandstone had even been cut into delicate trellis screens. She
could almost smell the sandalwood, the attar of roses, and the sweat of bowmen, the stronger smell of horses, elephants, camels. Birds flew in and out of the buildings; some were ordinary birds but