The Cost of Sugar(25)

Elza sat on the bed. The conversation had taken a completely unexpected turn. Sarith an experienced woman, she thought. Rutger was right: she didn’t know her stepsister after all. She had thought that they knew everything about each other, but she knew nothing about her.

“Come now, my little one,” said Rutger. “This kind of thing blows over. Don’t be angry. Look – this doesn’t mean so much to a man. I don’t love Sarith, I love you. Believe me, this is nothing special. Be my loving wife again.”

Laughing, he took her in his arms and began to hug her lovingly and tenderly. Elza allowed her mind to be put at ease. With a bit of luck it would be over after this one time. Perhaps Sarith would be so ashamed about it that she would leave. And Elza told Rutger what she had wanted to tell him earlier: that she thought she was pregnant. Rutger was delighted. He kissed her and said that he hoped the child would be as sweet and sensible as the mother.

The next day there was nothing to suggest that Sarith was ashamed of anything. She laughed and hummed around the house. Indeed never alone with Elza, but when Rutger was around she would talk sweetly and amicably, also with Elza. For a whole week nothing further happened, and Elza began to hope that what had happened that afternoon really was the end.

One evening, Rutger had an important meeting. At the instigation of Mr van Omhoog he had been appointed a Master of the Orphan Chamber, that ensured that the rights of orphans and the mentally handicapped concerning any inheritance were respected, and the Annual Meeting was now to be held. When he was leaving, just after dinner, he said at table, “You mustn’t wait up for me: it will be a late evening.”

After Rutger had left, Sarith said that she would go straight to bed, as she had a slight headache. Elza also went upstairs early on. A few hours later she heard Rutger come home and heard how he said something to Alex downstairs. She then heard him stop at the head of the stairs and say, “Oh Sarith, aren’t you asleep?”

She heard nothing further after that, and understood that Sarith had been waiting for him. More than an hour passed before Rutger came into their room. Elza was angry. So it was not all over, it wasn’t just the one time. What a nasty situation. Oh Sarith, she thought, why on earth? Why all this? And Rutger? Why did he carry on despite everything? Yes, she had promised that she would not be a jealous wife, but had she really promised all this?

When Rutger had said that she should not be a jealous wife, she had thought in terms of a passing adventure with a half-breed girl, sleeping occasionally with a slave-girl, or a mulatto concubine if necessary. That was normal; every white man did it and all the ladies managed to live with it. But this? Sarith, of all people. Her stepsister, her bosom friend, the child she had grown up with, from whom from the age of seven she had been inseparable. How was this possible? Oh how she hated Sarith, yes, hated her, but even as she thought this, she saw in her mind’s eye Sarith and herself as children. Always together, giggling and laughing, in the same room in the evening, whispering in bed. And then she knew that she could not bring herself to hate Sarith. So, then she would be angry with Rutger. It was he who had brought about this miserable situation; it was all his fault. But then she heard how he assured her that such things were of little significance to him. Elza simply did not know how she should feel. She was angry. And when Rutger came into the room after an hour or so, she pretended to be asleep.

The following morning Elza intended to say nothing at all, but Rutger himself began to talk about it. He stretched his arm out to her, drew her towards him, and said, “You are so sweet, will you always be so? Do you know that Sarith was waiting for me late yesterday evening?”

Elza said nothing. What was there to say?

A few days later on the Sunday morning, Rutger and Elza decided not to go to church. Elza was not feeling too well and had been sick. When Sarith came downstairs and found them, to her amazement, sitting in the front room, Rutger said, “We’re just staying in. Elza isn’t feeling too well and she needs to take things easy for a while, don’t you, my little Elza?”

Sarith looked questioningly at Elza. When she saw a slight blush appear on Elza’s cheeks, she understood what Rutger meant. Elza looked up and saw Sarith’s gaze fixed on her. No bashful look, nor a gaze of understanding and sympathy, but two rock-hard, icy-green eyes looking at her. Elza saw this and realized with a shock: this is no little sister, but a rival, an enemy, that I have against me. And it was as if an ice-cold hand from inside had wrapped itself around her heart.

It was the end of May; June came along. Rain and still more rain. Hard rain; soft drizzly rain. Everything wet through. Now Sarith usually stayed in her room all morning. If the rain stopped she would go out after all. If not, she would come down again only when Rutger came home from the office. And it happened more often that Rutger failed to come for his siesta in the afternoon or that Elza was alone in the bedroom at night because he still had some matters to attend to. And then she knew that he was with Sarith. Elza sometimes felt like gouging her stepsister’s eyes out. That Sarith – she could happily have done something to her. If only she would leave. But apparently Sarith had no plans whatsoever to depart. At the end of the day Elza knew one thing for certain: she did not intend to carry on in this way. But she was also aware that she did not know how she could put an end to the situation.