will send a chaperone,” Ah Long says when Ren scampers off to inform him of this exciting development. “They’re quite strict about these things, otherwise they can’t do business.”
“Why’s that?” Ren wipes a dish.
“They don’t want any trouble, at least the decent places don’t.”
“What about the not-decent places?” asks Ren.
“Those places you shouldn’t go to. Not even when you’re older.”
Ren would like to hear more about dance halls, but he has duties to perform. The furniture must be rearranged and the floor powdered for dancing. As he drags the furniture to the sides, there’s laughter and the clink of glasses from the dining room. Ren wonders whether there’ll be leftovers, but even as he considers this, his sharp ears catch a discordant note from the kitchen.
“Nanti, nanti! You cannot go in there!” That’s Ah Long’s voice. Then, more urgently, “Ren!”
Dropping the tin of talcum powder, Ren sprints back. Is it the dance-hall girls? If so, why are they in the kitchen? But there’s only one young woman—Nandani. She looks completely out of place as she tries to explain something to Ah Long. Furious, he’s barred the door with one arm, still clutching a wok chan, the steel spatula he uses for stir-frying.
“You cannot bother him now. Go home!”
Nandani’s eyes light up when she sees Ren. “I want to see your master.”
“Does your leg hurt?” Glancing down, Ren sees her leg is still bandaged.
“No, it’s better.”
Ren takes Nandani out through the kitchen door to the covered area outside.
“How did you get here?”
“My cousin gave me a ride on his bicycle. I need to talk to your master.”
She looks so sad and desperate that Ren is worried. Maybe she’s sick and needs medical help.
“My father is sending me away,” she says. “To my uncle in Seremban.”
Ren still doesn’t understand what this has to do with William but he sees the distress in her eyes. “I’ll tell him. Wait here.”
When Ah Long’s back is turned, Ren slips through to the dining room and quietly approaches William.
“Tuan, Nandani is here to see you.”
William doesn’t turn his head, but his face turns pale beneath his tan. “Where is she?”
“Outside. Behind the kitchen.”
William is silent for a moment. Then he pushes his chair back. “I’ll just be a moment,” he says cheerily to the gentleman on his left. To Ren, he murmurs, “Bring her round the veranda on the other side.”
As soon as William stands up, Ren feels a sharp tingle, a warning that an invisible clock has started to tick, running down the seconds and minutes that William is away from his guests. It’s rude to leave in the middle of dinner like this, and William doesn’t like loose ends and untidiness. So he hurries off to lead Nandani around the back of the house to the veranda.
She limps and stumbles on the uneven ground. “You can lean on me,” Ren says. They keep their voices low, although Ren doesn’t know why. The lights from the dining room cast warm shadows onto the grass; there’s a swell in the conversation and a burst of laughter.
“Who are they?” Nandani asks.
“Some doctors from the hospital. Are you hungry?”
She shakes her head, but Ren thinks that he’ll get her and her cousin a plate of food before they go. On the other side, William is already waiting, a dark shape on the veranda. Seeing him, Nandani hurries eagerly over.
Ren can’t hear what they’re saying at this distance, but William must be telling her something, because she nods from time to time. Then he puts an arm around her, or is it both arms? Ren is fascinated. Craning his neck, he can’t make out much in the gloom. Is Nandani crying? Ren takes a step sideways and bumps into someone. It’s Ah Long. He’s come padding around the corner in the darkness like an old, moth-eaten cat.
“Why did you tell him she was here?” he says sourly. “Best to let her go away.”
“I thought she might be ill.”
“Tch! It’s just lovesickness. But she’s the wrong kind of girl to be playing around with.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s the naïve type who’ll swallow all his sweet talk. How long has he been gone from dinner?”
The minutes are trickling away and the empty spot that William has created by disappearing from his own dinner party is beginning to collapse on itself. Ren can feel it yawing and vibrating: the faint alarm of dinner guests who wonder why their host is absent for so long.
A figure comes up to the dining-room window. It’s Lydia; she