Ellen was rather thoughtful as we walked back to the rectory.

“You seemed to soothe him,” she said.

“Yes. That sort of thing happened once before.” I told her about the boy in India. She listened in her kindly, rather absentminded way, and I guessed she was really thinking about what sort of house she would go to with Mr. Bonner for he had only just acquired it at that time.

But I remembered that incident; and I wondered what my ayah would have thought of it.

It was mentioned during the evening meal.

“He fell off the ladder,” said Aunt Grace.

“I don’t know why there are not more accidents. They can be rather careless.”

“Susanna was very good,” said Ellen.

“She stroked his broi while George Grieves did a little first aid. The doctor said i was the right thing and George is very proud of himself. But I must say he did seem to find Susanna comforting.”

“Ministering angel,” put in Uncle James, smiling at me.

I thought about the incident later. I looked at my hands. I was just comforting to have someone stroke one’s forehead when one was in pain.

Anyone would have done.

Living in this calm prosaic world, I was beginning to thin, like those about me. My dear ayah had been full of fancies. C course she was. She was a foreigner.

And then at last it was my seventeenth birthday.

It was all arranged. A Mrs. Emery was taking out ht daughter Constance to be married to one of the officers. Sh would be delighted to take me with them. My father was relieved and so were Aunt Grace and Uncle James. It would have been unseemly for a young girl of seventeen t travel alone.

The great day came. I said my goodbyes. I went down Tilbury in the company of the Emerys and at last I was setting sail for India.

It was a smooth voyage; the Emerys were pleasant companions, Constance was obsessed by her coming marriage and could talk of little else but the perfections of her fiance. I did not mind. I had my own obsession.

What an impressive sight Bombay harbour is with its mountainous island fringed with palm trees rising to the magnificent peaks of the Western Ghats.

My father was waiting for me. We embraced. Then he het me at arm’s length, looking at me.

“I wouldn’t have known you.”

“It’s been a long time. You look the same, Father.”

“Old men don’t change. It is only little girls who grow int beautiful ladies.”

“Are you in the same house?”

“Strangely enough, yes. We’ve had some troubled time since you’ve been away, and I have moved round a bit, as you know. But here I am now … just as you left me.”

My father thanked the Emerys when I introduced them. The fiance was waiting for them and he took them off after we had promised to see each other soon.

“You were happy at Humberston?” my father asked me.

“Oh yes. They were good to me. But it isn’t home.”

He nodded.

“And the Emerys, they were good too?”

“Very good.”

“We shall have to see more of them. I shall have to thank them properly.”

“And what of everyone here? Ayah?”

“Oh, she is with the Freelings now. There are two children quite young. Mrs. Freeling is a rather frivolous young woman … attractive, they say.”

“I’m longing to see my ayah.”

“You will.”

“And the Khansamah?”

“A family man. He has two boys. He is very proud of himself. But come along. We must get home.”

And there I was, feeling as though I had never left.

But of course there were changes. I was no longer a child. I had my duties, and as the first days passed, I discovered that these could be demanding. I had come back, ‘finished’ as they say a young English lady fitted to sit at the Colonel’s table and fulfill the duties expected of me.

In a very short time I was caught up in the army life. It was like living in a little world of its own, surrounded by the strangeness of a foreign country. It was not quite the same as it had been, or perhaps I had lived in the imagination too long. I was more bothered by unsavoury detail than I had been in my childhood. I was more conscious of the poverty and disease I was less enchanted; and there were times when I thought rather longingly of cool breezes which used to blow across the ancient church and the peace of the garden with the lavender and buddleia, tall sunflowers and hollyhocks; then I began to feel a nostalgia for the gentle rain, for the Easter and Harvest festivals. Of course my father was here; but I think that if I could have taken him with me I would have preferred to go to that place which had now become Home to me, as it was apparently to so many of those about me.

I took the first opportunity to go and see my ayah. Mrs. Freeling was delighted that I wished to call. I had quickly realized that my father’s position made everyone want to please him, and that meant pleasing his daughter also, and some of the wives were almost sycophantic, believing no doubt that to curry favour with the Colonel helped their husbands on the long road to higher rank.

The Freelings had a pleasant bungalow, surrounded by beautiful flowering shrubs whose names I did not know. Phyllis Freeling was young, very pretty, rather coquettish I thought, and I was sure I should not find her the most interesting of the wives. She fluttered round me as though I did her a great honour by visiting her. She gave me tea.

“We do try to keep up the English customs,” she told me.

“One must, mustn’t one. One doesn’t want to go native.”

I listened to her chatter, all the time wondering when I was going to see my ayah, which was the sole reason for my coming. She talked about the dance they were having soon.

“I dare say you will be on the committee. There are such preparations to be made. If you want a really good dressmaker, I can put you on to the very best.” She folded her hands and said in a voice with an Indian accent: ‘“The very best durzi in Bombay …” So he tells me and I have every reason to believe him. “

I accepted the tea and one of the little scented cakes.

“Khansamah is greatly honoured to make tea for the Colonel’s daughter,” I was told.

I asked about the children and the ayah.

“She is very good. The children are angels. They love Ayah and she is so good with them. Sometimes I wonder whether it is wise to leave them with a native … but what can one do? One has so many responsibilities … to one’s husband, to the regiment…”

At length I thought I could come to the reason for my visit. I reminded her that I wanted to see the ayah.

“But of course. She will be so honoured.”

I was taken to the nursery where the children were having their afternoon nap. She was sitting there waiting, for she knew I was coming.

We looked at each other; she had aged a little, which was natural in seven years.

I ran to her and threw my arms about her. I did not know what Mrs. Freeling thought and I did not care.

“Ayah,” I said.

“Missee Su-Su.”

I felt deeply moved to hear the baby version of my name. I said: “I have thought of you often.”

She nodded. A servant came up and said something in a quiet voice to Mrs. Freeling.

“Well, I’ll leave you,” she said.

“I expect you would like to have a little chat.”

I thought that was tactful of her.

We sat down still looking at each other. We talked in whispers because of the sleeping children in the next room. She told me how she had missed me. The babalog Freelings were nice but they were not Missee Su-Su. There would never be another like her.

I told her about life in England, but I could see she found it difficult to visualize. She said there had been troubles throughout India and dangers . and there was more to come. She shook her head.

“There are murmurings. There are dark secret things … not good.”

She saw changes in me. I was not the same as the little girl who had left Bombay all those years ago.

“Seven years is a long time,” I reminded her.

“It seems long when much happens, short when it does not. Time is in the head.”

It was wonderful to see her again. I said: “I wish I could take you home with me.”

Her face was illumined by a dazzling smile.

“How I wish it. But you do not need an ayah now like the Freeling babalog.”

“Are you happy here. Ayah dear?”

She was silent and I felt a twinge of alarm as I saw the shadow flit across her face. I was puzzled. Mrs. Freeling had not given me the impression that she would interfere in the nursery. I should have thought her ayah would have a free hand; more so than she had had with me, for then there had been Mrs. Fearnley to contend with.

She would be too loyal to tell tales of her mistress, I knew; but I did feel uneasy.

She sensed this and said: “Nowhere could I be content as I was with you.”

I was deeply touched, and surprised that she could feel thus when I remembered how difficult I had been at times. Perhaps time was playing its old tricks in making what was past seem more rosy than it had actually been.

“I shall see you often now that I am here,” I said.

“I am sure Mrs. Freeling won’t mind my coming.”

She shook her head.

“You should not come here, Missee Su-Su. Not too much.”

“Why ever not?”

“Better not. We meet. Perhaps I come to you.” She lifted her shoulders.

“I am just Old Ayah … not yours any more.”

“What nonsense! You will always be mine. And why shouldn’t I come to see you? I shall insist. I am the Colonel’s Lady now. I shall make the rules.”

“Not here,” she said.

“No … no … that not good.”

I did not pursue the subject because I thought there might be some absurd notion in her mind about the propriety of the Colonel’s daughter visiting her old nurse in another household.

Her dark eyes were soulful and prophetic.

“You will go away,” she said.

“I do not see you here … for long.”

“You’re wrong. I shall stay with my father. I have not come all this way to go home again almost immediately. Do you realize how far it is, dear Ayah, right across the seas? I shall stay here, and we shall meet often. It will be like the old days … or almost.”

She smiled.

“Yes … no sadness. Do not let us talk of partings. You have just come. It is a happy day.”

“That’s better,” I said; and I plunged into conversation which was punctuated with “Do you remember when …” And it was amazing how much of the past, which I thought I had forgotten, came back to me.

The children awoke and I was introduced to them. They were round-faced, chubby little creatures of about four and two, I guessed.

When I left them I went down to say goodbye to Mrs. Freeling.

She was sitting on a sofa and beside her was a young man. They rose as I entered.

“Oh, there you are,” said Mrs. Freeling.

“Miss Pleydell has been seeing her old ayah who happens to be mine now. Wasn’t that gracious of her!”

“It wasn’t,” I said.

“I happen to be very fond of her.”

“One is of one’s nanny. But I’m forgetting you don’t know each other.

This is Aubrey St. Clare. Aubrey, this is Miss Susanna Pleydell, the Colonel’s daughter. “

That was the first time I saw Aubrey, and I was immediately struck by his charm and good looks. He was about my height but then I was exceptionally tall. He had fair hair almost golden, vivid blue eyes, and his features were clear-cut.

He took my hand and pressed it firmly.

“What a pleasure to meet you!” he said.

“Do sit down. Miss Pleydell,” said Mrs. Freeling.

“You must have a drink. It’s a little early. But no matter. It is never really too early.”

I sat down beside him.

“You have just come back to India, I believe,” he said.

I explained.

“Fresh from school!” said Phyllis Freeling with a rather shrill, trilling laugh.

“Isn’t that exciting!”

“It must be,” he said, ‘to come back to India. Strange, exciting country, is it not. Miss Pleydell? “

I agreed that it was.

“Do you notice any changes?”

“I was so young when I went away ten years old, to be exact. I think I took a somewhat glamourized picture with me. Now I see it more as it really is.”

“Ah,” he said, ‘one of the penalties of growing up. “

I noticed that he was regarding me intently and I was pleasantly stimulated by his interest. I had known few young men only those who had lived in Humberston and friends of Uncle James and Aunt Grace. I had been very closely, though unobtrusively, guarded, I realized. Now I felt a certain freedom. Yes, I was now grown up. And it was exhilarating.