‘I was shaking like a leaf, but I was jolly well determined not to skulk inside a lavatory cubicle while they performed a character assassination on me. But I wasn’t going to stay there and be forced to socialise with any of them. So I went home.’ Evie wasn’t ready to confess that she’d left alone. It would be too humiliating and personal to admit, even to Mary, that her husband had abandoned her on their wedding day.

‘Poor you. At least that got her out of your hair?’

‘Not a bit of it. Veronica’s far too brazen for that. She turned up at the house the following morning, bold as brass.’

Mary touched her lightly on the arm. ‘I’m going to tell you something that I never speak of to anyone. It’s very painful, but I want you to know the story so you’ll understand just exactly what Veronica Leighton is capable of.’

‘You can trust me.’

‘I was engaged to be married. His name was Ralph Fletcher and he worked for one of the big rubber companies on an estate on the mainland near Ipoh. We met when he was playing in a cricket match here in Penang. I fell for him immediately – he was handsome, funny, athletic, popular. I was thrilled to bits when he made it clear he was attracted to me too.’ Her voice wavered. ‘We were going together for about six months when he asked me to marry him. I didn’t hesitate.’

Evie listened in silence, conscious of Mary’s evident pain.

‘For me, the idea of marrying a planter was a dream come true. Ralph worked for one of the biggest rubber companies in the Straits and he was doing well. His job meant he had to move from time to time to a different estate, sometimes to cover for a chap on long leave, sometimes because he was promoted. Ralph was a rising star. He was in shared accommodation – so we agreed to wait until he became assistant manager somewhere and he’d get his own bungalow on an estate. There’s always been an expectation by the rubber companies that their male European employees should be bachelors and stay that way for at least two or three years. There are relatively few single European women out here and so the men, when they get their long leave at home, tend to spend their time in Britain hunting for a prospective wife willing to come out here.’

Mary’s words put Douglas’s offer of marriage into context for Evie.

Mary continued, ‘I hated the thought of a long engagement, but we didn’t really have a choice. We both agreed he’d give the job priority while he learned everything about rubber and climbed up the ladder.’ She touched the third finger of her left hand, evidently conscious of the absence of the ring which must once have been there.

‘At the weekends, Ralph played cricket and rugby, so he was over here on the island for matches at least once a month or I’d go over to the mainland and watch him play if it was reasonably close and someone could give me a lift. And we both loved to swim.’