For a wild solitary moment she was desperately homesick for her own country, for home, even for her mother, and certainly for the streets of New York. What was she doing here in this lonely countryside, lifted upon these tiger-haunted hills above the valleys of India? She gripped his hand, clinging to it for all she had. There was no response, though no repulse. He let his hand be held.
And if she had been able to love David when he was the young boy who had thrown himself at her feet, begging her to love him, the boy who had seemed spoiled and childish, not a man worth loving for a strong girl like her, but if she had foreseen this man he now was and could have loved the boy in patience, would he then have loved her only and with his whole heart? Ah, but had she loved him, and let him so love her, he would never have grown into this man whom she adored because he did not bend to her. She had what she wanted, a strong self-contained man, intent upon his work, and perhaps such a man could never love only a woman, not even her, not at least when her rival was India.
“The air is getting damp,” she said.
“Shall we go in?” he asked.
“Yes, I am tired.”
They walked together into the big central room, a lamp was turned low and the light was dim. He put his arm about her and she leaned upon him.
“David, I am glad we are going to have the baby.”
“Tell me why.” He was suddenly tender. “I know, my darling, I feel it’s God’s blessing, but tell me why.”
She could not tell him the truth as suddenly it appeared to her. If she had a baby, if there were children whom she must tend, then she would not be free to give herself to India. She would not have time, she must put their children first as her duty.
“I want four children, at least,” she said, her face against his breast. “And while you do your work, I will take care of them. I won’t make demands of you, David. I will let you be free to do your work.”
“My perfect wife,” he murmured.
She felt his hand smoothing her hair, and she closed her eyes and pressed herself to him fiercely. Oh, she would live her life around him, her love would be his atmosphere, and though he might not know the air he breathed, he would never know, either, that his God was not hers, or that she needed no other god than love.
At the end of the week they went back to Poona and the mission house. She dismissed the Marathi teacher. Let the communication with India cease. She would be only David’s wife.
She sent word to Leilamani that she was not well and could not visit her, and when Darya came up on their return from the hills, she was distant with him and he did not reproach her because Leilamani had told him, and he knew that pregnant women were wilful and changeable.
“It tires me,” she told David when she found that he was displeased that she had sent away her teacher.
It was to be her weapon, this easy fatigue in a climate unnaturally hot, and he did not protest. How could a man protest? The woman carried the burden of the child as well as herself. She needed double energy, twice the amount of sleep, and her appetite had failed. He would not harass her, he would be more considerate of her, more tender toward her, remembering the immensity of the task that was only hers. He kissed her gently, and forgave her for the quick retort she made.
“I’m not made of glass, David! Don’t kiss me as if I were something breakable.”
She flung this at him and he was startled by the anger in her dark eyes. Then he laughed.
“You temptress,” he muttered and taking a step toward her he pulled her into his arms and kissed her hard and long.
“That better?”
“Yes — but again—” she whispered.
In the midst of their long embrace, standing in the middle of the floor, their bodies pressed together, the door opened and the ayah looked in, saw them and shut the door, horror upon her astonished face. They turned their heads, they saw the look, and he drew away from her.
“Oh, that ayah!” Olivia cried under her breath.
“After all, Olivia, it’s the middle of the afternoon and I ought to be at work.”
“You haven’t really kissed me for days, not since we came back from Poona.”
He laughed, embarrassed. “Ah, we’re married, my love. We’re together, aren’t we? And I must be off, now.”
“Oh well—”
He saw her pouting look, he caught her face in his two hands and tipping her chin upward, kissed her heartily, but without passion, smiled down into her rebellious eyes and went quickly away.
And she stood there alone in the middle of the room, and made a symbol out of what had happened. It was India that had interrupted them and would always disturb them and separate him from her. What could one woman do against that stealthy and eternal figure?
This was the year the monsoons failed. At first the anxious people told each other that the sacred winds were only late. Sometimes they delayed for a week or even a month. Delay was grave enough, for delayed monsoons meant a meager rainy season, and so much the less water for the fields and the year’s needs.
Week passed after week and hope gave way at last to certainty. The warm currents of air had swept aside, they had curved to other regions. The north had abundant rain and even the east had short but heavy rains. On the west of India, beyond the high central plateaus, no rains fell, and David foresaw inevitable famine and the people yielded themselves to hopelessness. Yes, there would be a famine. There was no possibility of avoiding it now. Food supplies, already at the lowest ebb, were hoarded still further and the poor prepared to die.
In the midst of this distress Olivia was delivered of her child. She had refused to go to Bombay and the English hospital for her confinement, and the local British doctor had tended her, and a pleasant Eurasian nurse had come in to stay for a month.
The child was a boy. He was born late in the afternoon while the dry heat shimmered over the city of his birth. The air was so dry, the doctor grumbled, that he could not sweat. He was grateful that his patient was young and strong. He disliked delivering white women and he always advised them to go to Bombay, but this one was stubborn against all advice. Had there been complications he would not have felt responsibility. But there were none. The mother was strong and controlled. She had asked that her husband be summoned and when it was found that he had gone into the native city, she had accepted the situation and had set herself to her task. He did not believe in using the fashionable modern anesthetics in childbirth and he had let her proceed, watching her constantly and encouraging her.
“Brave doing, Mrs. MacArd,” he murmured. “You’ll have a good baby.”
A few hours later, when it was over she lay gasping for a moment and then she drew a deep breath.
“Is it a good baby?” she asked.
“A fine son,” the doctor replied. “I congratulate you.”
The plump little nurse, eternally smiling, held up the tiny newborn boy, wrapped in a square of blue flannel, and Olivia looked at her son for a long instant. Then she laughed.
“Why, he’s the image of his old grandfather!” she said cheerfully, “He’ll have red hair and red eyebrows and a bad temper.”