Which it did as we continued south. Cabin trunks went down to the hold in exchange for those marked “Wanted on Voyage,” and the shipboard community traded its English hats for rigid solar topees, casting off a few of its inhibitions along with the woollens. Wanton conversation broke out all over the ship, as formerly aloof ladies unbent so far as to offer comments on the weather and rigid-spined gentlemen exchanged opinions on cricket and horse-racing. The men’s dark serge suits changed to pale drill or linen (or, for the hopelessly flamboyant merchants known as box-wallahs, tussore silk) and male dinner-wear began to take on variations of the tropics, with white jackets or trousers but, oddly, never both. Women’s arms appeared even during the day-time, and some of the more daring members played short-skirted games of tennis on the top deck in the early mornings, until all the balls had vanished into the sea, after which they changed to the more controllable badminton. Decks sprouted awnings, making it more difficult to find a patch of sun, and beds were made up there at night—men on one side, of course, ladies on the other. The exercise equipment in the stifling shipboard gym went unused after mid-morning, and vigorous deck games were replaced by the more sedate shovel-board and quoits. Holmes and I spent the mornings in our rooms, palming coins, renewing our juggling skills, repeating and refining common phrases in my new tongue, until we were driven out by the mid-day heat. In the open, even in our less attractive chosen corners, magic tricks were set aside in favour of bilingual conversation and the relief of books. I was still working my way through The Mahabharata when a familiar shape plopped down beside me where I sat in the shade of a large crate.

“There you are!” Sunny exclaimed. “What on earth are you reading?”

I showed her the book, half irritated at the interruption, but also glad for it. An unrelieved diet of Holmes, Hindi, and Hindu mythology surely couldn’t be good for one.

“Good heavens, look at those names!” she said. “I can’t even pronounce half of them. What is this, anyway?”

“The great Indian Hindu epic, the battle between their great gods and demons, the founding of the people.”

“I think I’d rather read one of Mama’s Ethel Dells,” she said, handing it back to me.

“At this point, I think I might as well.”

She sat for a rare moment of stillness, studying the distant shore. “Isn’t the Suez Canal just the superest thing? Tommy says it saves weeks and weeks of sailing all around Africa, with storms and all. You English were so clever to have built it.”