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The Missing Sister

Dinah Jefferies
Chapters (58)
  1. Cover
  2. About the Author
  3. By the same author
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  56. Author’s Note
  57. Acknowledgements
  58. THE BEGINNING

Cover

The Art of Life Admin
Penguin Books

About the Author

Dinah Jefferies was born in Malaysia and moved to England at the age of nine. Her idyllic childhood always held a special place in her imagination, and when she began writing novels in her sixties, she was able to return there - first in her fiction and then on annual research trips for each new novel. Dinah Jefferies is the author of five novels, The Separation, The Tea Planter’s Wife - a No.1 Sunday Times bestseller, The Silk Merchant’s Daughter, Before the Rains and The Sapphire Widow. She lives in Gloucestershire.

By the same author

The Separation

The Tea Planter’s Wife

The Silk Merchant’s Daughter

Before the Rains

The Sapphire Widow

Penguin Books

1.

Rangoon, Burma, 1936

Belle straightened her shoulders, flicked back her long red-gold hair and stared, her heart leaping with excitement as the ship began its steady approach to Rangoon harbour. Think of it. The city where dreams were made, still a mysterious outline in the distance but coming into focus as the ship cut through the water. The sky, a shockingly bright blue, seemed huger than a sky ever had business to be, and the sea, almost navy in its depths, reflected a molten surface so shiny she could almost see her face in it. Even the air shimmered as if the sun had formed minute swirling crystals from the moisture rising out of the sea. Small boats dotting the water dipped and rose and she laughed as screeching seabirds swooped and squabbled. Belle didn’t mind the noise, in fact it added to the feeling that this was something so achingly different. She had long craved the freedom to travel and now she was really doing it.

With buzzing in her ears, she inhaled deeply, as if to suck in every particle of this glorious moment, and for a few minutes she closed her eyes. When she opened them again she gasped in awe. It wasn’t the bustling harbour with its tall cranes, its freighters laden with teak, its lumbering oil tankers, its steamers and the small fishing boats gathering in the shadow of the larger vessels that had gripped her. Nor was it the impressive white colonial buildings coming into sight. For, rising behind all that, a huge golden edifice appeared to be floating over the city. Yes, floating, as if suspended, as if a section of some inconceivable paradise had descended to earth. Spellbound by the gold glittering against the cobalt sky, Belle couldn’t look away. Could there be anything more captivating? Without a shadow of a doubt, she knew she was going to fall in love with Burma.