The Sapphire Child (The Raj Hotel #2) - Janet MacLeod Trotter Page 0,103

to spend the rest of my life with you. I cannot wait for us to be reunited – and plan to leave Singapore as soon as possible but it may not be for several weeks, maybe months.

Stella was winded by shock. She thought she would vomit. Pressing a hand over her mouth she read on in utter disbelief.

I know this might come as a blow to you, dear Stella, and it does not help your ‘delicate’ position at this point in time. I must thank the Lomaxes for taking care of you for me – perhaps they can advise you on what to do. I can’t help feeling that it might be for the best if you place your baby in the care of others. I’m sorry that this complicated situation has arisen. Please write back and assure me that you don’t hate me for this.

Someday soon, we will be together. I am still committed to marrying you, Stella, I promise. Perhaps in the meantime we could pretend we are married? After all, you told me that’s what the Lomaxes did for years. If you are as set on keeping the baby as you say you are, then I encourage you to wear a wedding band. I will put my name to it when it is born, no matter what happens.

Take care of yourself, my green-eyed girl.

With all my love,

Hugh xxx

Stella sat with the letter on her lap, stunned, her head spinning with what she had just read. She didn’t know what to think. The letter was a mass of contradictions. In one sentence Hugh was dropping the bombshell that he was married to a woman in Ireland and in another promising that he still loved her and wished to marry her. He advised her to give away the baby – her baby, he called it – and then backtracked and said if she wanted to keep it then to pretend they were married and he’d give it his name.

A part of Stella desperately latched onto this idea. Why not? As he said, the Lomaxes had lived with the pretence of being married. But just as quickly she dismissed it. The lies had eaten away at Tom and Esmie’s relationship and had shattered the trust of their beloved Andrew. She felt ashamed that she had ever told Hugh their secret. Besides, her mother and family would see through the ruse at once; a feeble attempt to cover up that she was having a child out of wedlock.

Panic overwhelmed her.

Esmie glanced over anxiously. She rose. ‘Stella?’

Stella stood, her legs nearly buckling underneath her. The airmail pages scattered to the floor as she hurried from the room, reaching the thunderbox just in time to vomit into it. She retched and retched. Gradually she became aware of Esmie standing over her, gently rubbing her back.

Without asking any questions, Esmie led her into the small bedroom that Stella was using and helped her under the covers.

‘I’ll get a hot water bottle and some tea with honey.’

Before she went, she stoked up the fire.

Stella lay – her throat and stomach sore from being sick – numbed to the core. Through the wall she could hear Tom’s raised voice asking anxiously after her. When she felt the baby kicking, her tears came. She buried her head under the covers and wept. Esmie returned and tried to comfort her, coaxing her to sip the hot sweet tea. Bit by bit, Stella told her what was in the letter.

‘What a cowardly man!’ Esmie said in contempt. ‘Even if he is estranged from his wife, he should have told you about her. You would never have got engaged if you’d known – and none of this would have happened.’

‘I don’t know what to believe,’ Stella said in distress. ‘How can I trust that he’ll come back and support me when he’s kept such a big secret from me?’

Esmie stroked the hair from Stella’s brow. ‘You can’t trust him. What do you really know about him?’

Stella was no longer sure. Long ago, on the ship from India, Hugh had told tales of daring deeds in Baluchistan that had captivated Andrew. Yet when Tom had questioned Hugh about Quetta, he had been vague about the tribal outpost and seemed to know little about the army cantonment.

Hugh had told her that he was a farmer’s son from somewhere outside Dublin and had stayed on in Ireland to help his mother and sister after his father died. But all the time he must