Page 8 of The Girl from the Tea Garden
The hall was abuzz with excited whispers and shuffling in seats as the girls in the audience awaited the series of mini tableaux and dramas to be performed. Some of the most senior girls were commandeering the front rows. Sam had set up his camera on a tripod near the front, but to the side so that he wouldn’t block the view of the smaller girls at the back. Looking through the programme of four plays plus a mystery act, he groaned inwardly, hoping he could make his escape before dark.
‘We’ll have to put on the hall lights I’m afraid,’ he told the Blacks. ‘There isn’t enough natural light in here.’
‘Not a problem.’ Norman assured. ‘Got everything else you need?’
Sam nodded. ‘I won’t hang around afterwards– can’t leave Nelson for too long in the shed.’
The doctor said, ‘I quite understand. I’ll come and see you in a week or so on my way up to Tezpur. Will you have the cine film developed by then?’
‘I’ll have to send it off to Calcutta– probably two weeks.’
Norman clasped him on the arms. ‘Thank you for doing this, Sam. We’re most grateful.’
‘Let’s see how it turns out first.’ Sam gave a wry smile.
Suddenly there was a screech behind them, and the men turned to see Nelson swinging along the backs of the chairs towards them, an impish-faced girl with a thick, dark plait clutching on to his lead, grinning.
‘I found Nelson the Third in the games shed,’ she panted as the monkey dragged her quickly to Sam. Nelson leapt on to his master’s shoulder, licking his cheek in delight at being reunited. ‘Someone had tied him up.’
Sam blushed. ‘Well, yes, I did ... Thank you ... Er ... should I know you? I mean,how on earth do you know Nelson?’
Adela stared up at Sam Jackman; she should have known he’d be the man with the monkey. All the tea planters knew the steamboat captain with a flair for photography and a pet rhesus monkey. Not everyone knew that Sam had had three such pets, but Adela noticed these things.
‘I’m Adela Robson– Wesley and Clarrie’s daughter from Belgooree,’ she prompted. ‘Don’t you remember me? I last saw you over a year ago when I went to stay with Auntie Tilly on the Oxford Estates;she’s not my real auntie, just married to a Robson cousin.’
‘Of course I remember.’ Sam said with a quick smile.
Adela felt a kick of disappointment; she could tell that he hadn’t.
‘Well, Nelson remembered, didn’t you, boy?’ She tickled the monkey’s chin.
Nelson cackled and swung into her arms.
‘What are you doing with that creature?’ Miss Black came hurrying over. ‘He’s supposed to be outside.’
‘I’ll look after him, miss,’ Adela said at once. ‘He knows me.’
‘Aren’t you in your house play?’
‘No, miss.’
‘That surprises me,’ frowned Gertrude.
‘Well, if you wouldn’t mind keeping him under control,’ Sam intervened, ‘I’d be very grateful ... er ... Della?’
‘Adela,’ she corrected.
‘Adela,’ Sam said, smiling, ‘that would be very kind of you.’
She grinned back. ‘Pleasure.’ She swung Nelson on to her hip.
Sam watched her skip off to join another girl, who looked Anglo-Indian. The tall blonde pupil, who had spent the last half an hour flirting with him as he set up the camera and chatted to DrBlack, advanced on the two smaller girls. Sam couldn’t tell what was being said, but he saw the look of disdain on the blonde girl’s face as she flicked her hand at them. She was obviously telling them they couldn’t sit with her.
Adela Robson? No, he had no real memory of her, though he knew Wesley as an experienced planter who didn’t suffer fools. Clarrie Robson was a bit of a recluse at Belgooree, but he knew Tilly Robson better. He still remembered the first time Tilly had travelled aboard their boat, over ten years ago, garrulous with nerves at meeting her new husband. He had liked her instantly, which is more than he could say for her hard-drinking, ruthless planter husband, James.
Sam waited till Adela had settled in a seat near the back. She glanced at him with pretty dark eyes, laughing as Nelson nuzzled and nibbled her hair. Sam winked and then turned to the job of recording the plays.
Adela and Flowers slipped out halfway through the third performance, a re-enactment of Queen Victoria being made Empress of India and a group of girls dressed as milkmaids dancing around an imaginary maypole, which Adela thought quite bizarre.
