‘Daniel, dear boy, how do you feel about being my partner in a four ball against the One-Armed Golfers Association team? You’re reasonably good, aren’t you?’
‘I’m down to fourteen, sir.’
‘Perfectly acceptable. You can’t make any allowances for these one-armed fellows, you know. It’s going to be tough. One of them’s almost scratch. And how is it going at Henley’s?’
‘Very well, sir. The turnover is good, and all the new ideas are working out. The oil-cooled Bradshaw engine’s a big success, and we’ve got a supersport version with Blackburne engines and a sidecar. We win a great many races, and that’s how you sell.’
‘Still driving everywhere in a truck? Delivering?’
‘Yes, sir, but I do a lot more than that. We’re setting up in France.’
‘Um, well, my boy, I have cornered you in this manner because I am well aware that the situation cannot go on as it is.’
‘The situation, sir?’
‘Yes, the situation. The antagonism between you and Mrs McCosh is painful to all of us, including yourselves. Let me put this all in order, eh? Firstly, you have to keep coming here to be with your wife and daughter, and secondly, Rosie havers and dithers about leaving this house and going to live with you in Birmingham, even though you’ve got a lovely house in a pretty village.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And thirdly, you and Mrs McCosh have become mortal enemies, and fourthly, the occupation you currently have is somewhat below your natural level of ability.’
‘I wouldn’t say that, sir. It’s very interesting, and not at all easy. As you know, I’m very set on engineering. Engineering is the whole future of the world. And naturally one often has to start at the bottom and work up, and, as I said, I expect to be going to France quite a lot.’
‘Quite so, quite so, but how would you feel about the prospect of a job where the machinery is magnificent and enormous, and made in Birmingham to boot, and the climate exquisite, and where you can live like a king?’
‘Is one able to fly there?’
‘I’ve no idea. I’m talking about Ceylon, old boy. Ceylon!’
‘Ceylon, sir?’
‘Ceylon, Daniel! The Pearl of the East!’
‘I loved it in India.’
‘Well, I have a friend who is looking for a manager. It’s a long shot, but they lost an assistant manager who ran off with another planter’s wife, and there’s been no sight nor sound of him for months. I told him all about you, and he recognised the name. My dear boy, I knew you were distinguished, but I had no idea until now how famous an ace you actually were. Why on earth didn’t you tell us? How did that pass us by?’
‘Didn’t seem worth mentioning, sir. As far as aces go, I’d say I was in the first rank of the second-raters.’
‘You are altogether too modest. I asked him what he wanted exactly, and he said he would show you the ropes, and then expect you to manage mostly on your own. You’d have to be good with the natives, learn Tamil, and keep your hands off the wives. You also have to be good at sport, or you won’t have much fun.’
‘I am good at sport. There’s nothing I like better.’
‘I understand they even have a wonderful golf course and some trout streams, and plenty of tennis. Well, dear boy, it would be a huge adventure and a tremendous opportunity. Are you prepared to take the gamble?’
‘I’d be very sorry to leave Henley’s. But yes. I think so. I’d do it. The question is, would Rosie? I couldn’t possibly leave Esther for any length of time. It’s bad enough having to be away in the week.’
‘If Rosie is difficult, I will have to steel myself to order her out of the house. We are in a knot, Daniel, and someone has to cut it. First of all we have to see if you and Colonel Bassett get on, of course. I’ve invited him to Sunday lunch.’
‘Colonel? He was a soldier?’
‘Indian Army. One of the Sikh regiments, I believe.’
‘We’ll certainly get on then.’
And they did. No one else at lunch got a word in, because all the talk was of Sikh regiments and sepoys.
Because Daniel was thirty years old, much older than the average ‘creeper’ who came out to learn the ropes, and because he was bringing a wife and child, he was to be treated less harshly than the youngsters. He would have servants, and his bungalow would be a mere mile from the factory, but he would still have to muster at dawn, and he would have to spend six months in the company of a young assistant manager at his division. Colonel Bassett told him he would have to learn twenty new Tamil words every day, and be tested on them, and his pay would at first be a pittance.
The one thing that he would not tolerate, said the Colonel, was Daniel ever thinking that he had become an expert on anything to do with Ceylon and its people until he had been there for twenty years. Until that time, only honest bafflement would do.