Excerpt from Kenya Dawn During the next week he caught frequent glimpses of the same trio, the children, either fretful or quarrelsome, clinging to their governess 's hands. Women as a rule did not interest Grant, but as Mary's strained white face passed him, he wondered how much longer she would be able to hold out. They spoke for the first time in the dreary courtyard (by courtesy termed the lounge leading out of the dining-room, which at every wave of its grimy, dilapidated punkah exuded a mixed odour of curry, ghee and overripe mangoes. The lounge possessed one merit, it was the only place on the premises reached by an occasional breath of fresh air. Once gaudily painted wicker chairs, now chipped and peeling, were scattered over the tessellated floor amongst rickety tables and tubs contain ing dusty palms and limp begonias and crotons. In the centre of the courtyard amongst a clump of bamboo and Oleanders stood a stone fountain, which occasionally threw up a dejected spray. It was past nine in the evening when Mary Trevor dropped wearily into a chair opposite Grant, who glanced at her from time to time from behind the pages of The Times of India. She seemed to him, as she sat with her eyes lowered on the tessellated pavement, to grow whiter and frailer every time he set eyes on her. A gust of wind would blow her away, he thought to himself, and as a boy In a crumpled white suit and soiled turban brought him a whisky-soda, he wondered if he dared offer her a drink. At the clink of ice against his glass, Mary looked up involuntarily. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.