Free Zemindar by Valerie Fitzgerald

believe. Mr Erskine has recently taken up the cultivation of indigo and I have been advising him on the matter over the last couple of years. Hence the invitation.’
    ‘And Mr Flood is also acquainted with him?’ Mrs Chalmers turned to me.
    ‘He is Mr Erskine’s half-brother, but they have never met. Charles hopes to get to know him when we go up to Lucknow.’
    ‘But how extraordinary. Never to have met—and Oliver Erskine, of all people!’
    ‘You know him then?’
    ‘Oh, no, certainly not! But all Calcutta knows of Oliver Erskine, I assure you, Miss Hewitt. Why, I can remember myself, in the old days of course, seeing old Mrs Erskine in her magnificent carriage, with matched greys and a whole horde of postillions, outriders, grooms and even guards, all in expensive livery, driving on the maidan. They used to come down to Calcutta every year to shop, and there wasn’t a tradesman in the place who had eyes for anyone else when the Erskines were in town. They always entertained the Governor General, as though they were the superior, you know. And often stayed at Government House too. She was a beautiful woman, French, y’know, and her husband treated her like a queen. They say Oliver did too, after the old man died. My—to think that the Floods are connected!’
    ‘Charles’s mother is Mr Erskine’s mother.’
    ‘My!’
    This intelligence was too much for Mrs Chalmers, who relapsed into round-eyed silence, thus allowing Mr Roberts to take his leave.
    He had not been long gone, and I was casting about in my mind for a suitable manner in which to again broach the subject of Mr Erskine to Mrs Chalmers, for I was sure she would be much more informative about this intriguing gentleman than Mr Roberts had been, when Emily and Charles returned from their visiting, very satisfied with their first glimpse of Calcutta society. Emily had lost the peaked and pouting expression she had worn for several days, and Charles was also happier.
    ‘Only think,’ exclaimed Emily as we sat down to tiffin , a meal of far too many highly flavoured courses to be enjoyed in such heat, ‘Calcutta lacks nothing that can make life pleasant: good shops and balls, a theatre, a racecourse and everything! Why, they have even opened a proper picture gallery! It will be very like London. I told Mrs Grimsby how skilled you were with your paints, Laura, and she promises to take us all to Thacker and Spink’s gallery as soon as she has returned our call. And we are to dine tomorrow night with the Frasers and take you (which was very kind), and I believe Mr Roberts is to be there too which will make it pleasant for you.’
    ‘It seems that everyone here knows everyone else, certainly,’ observed Charles. ‘Calcutta is a very close-knit society.’
    ‘Oh, wait until you get up-country for that!’ laughed Mrs Chalmers. ‘I assure you we are quite strangers to each other here compared to the smaller stations. When you live in a small community, the first thing you learn is the impossibility of keeping anything to yourself, for however discreet you might be, your servants will undo all by gossiping away with your neighbours’ servants about everything that passes in your house. And never delude yourself that they don’t understand you. They pick up every word, believe me!’
    ‘Then we must be very decorous,’ announced Emily firmly.
    ‘Or very uncaring,’ I suggested jokingly, but was taken up sternly by Mr Chalmers.
    ‘Indeed, Miss Hewitt,’ he said, fixing me with his bulging pale-blue eyes, ‘not one of us can afford to be uncaring here in India. You have to realize something of the awesome task we have: to bring the civilization of our country and, above all, the comfort of our faith, to these poor heathens wallowing in their evil and ignorance. You must always remember that our lives must present a pattern of Christian decorum and prudence, in public and in private. We have a duty to show the natives the advantages derived from