They would admit only to surnames. For the duration they were Mortimer and Phillips, or rather Mort and Phil, two strongly-built young females, their faces burnt by the sun and wind and worn down to a ruddy-brown similarity. Sitting together in the cabin of the lorry, they took it in turns to drive or sleep so they could keep going all day and all night.
Harriet, in the back among cases of ammunition, hardly slept at all. The road over the desert was little more than a track and full of pot-holes. Each time she drifted into sleep, she was jolted awake as the lorry bumped or skidded or swayed into the sandy verge. In the end, she sat up and stared into darkness, seeing waterfalls tumbling black through the black air, huge birds sweeping to and fro across the night, enormous animals that paused to stare back at her before lumbering away out of sight. When the dawn came, she saw none of these things, only the empty road stretching from her, away into the desert hills.
Soon after daybreak, they stopped at a frontier barrier, then the lorry moved on to tarmac and Harriet, exhausted by the uneasy night, fell into a heavy slumber. When she woke again, the lorry was standing on a rocky shoulder that overlooked the sea. There was no sign of Mort and Phil.
She had left Egypt and was in another country. In Egypt the sun shone every day in a cloudless sky. Here the sky was blotted over with patches of cloud and the wind had an unfamiliar smell, the smell of rain. Because of the rain, grass was coming up, a thin shadow of green over the pinkish hills. In Egypt there had been rain only once during her time there: a freak storm that hit Cairo like a portent and turned the roads to rivers. Winter in Egypt was like a fine English summer but here it was really winter, wet and cold. Revived by the freshness of the air, she stood up, stretched her stiff muscles, then jumped down to the road. She had been ill but now she felt well, and free in a new world.
The rocks hid the foreshore but she could see, rising above them, the bastion of a castle that breasted the water of a bay. The water, glassy smooth, reflected every stone and crevice in the wall so there seemed to be two castles, one inverted below the other.
Climbing up the rocks, she saw Mort and Phil barefoot by the edge of the sea. She was about to call out to them but was checked by the sense of intimacy between them. She realized how little she knew about them. Of Phil she knew nothing at all. Mortimer she had met only twice but each time there had come from her such a sense of warmth, that, seeing her on the quay at Suez, she had run to her, calling out: ‘Mortimer! Mortimer! God has sent you to save me.’
She walked away from them towards the other side of the bay. The sand was firm and brown, like baked clay, and her feet sank into it, leaving behind her a string of footprints. She took off her shoes and waded into the torpid water and walked until she came on a half-buried piece of fluted pilaster. Sitting down, she could observe Mort and Phil from a safe distance. They were standing close together, looking into each other’s faces and she began to suspect that they would have preferred to be alone. When she asked Mortimer to save her from the evacuation ship, she had not considered Phil as an obstacle. She had not considered Phil at all. That was a mistake. Turning away from them, she wondered what she would do if they decided to drive off without her. Some time passed, then she glanced back at them. As the sun came and went among clouds, the figures merged and wavered against the dazzle of the sea. They remained locked together for several minutes then began to walk back towards the lorry.
As she watched them go, she realized how precarious her position was. She had fifty pounds that was to have been her spending money on board the ship. Now she would have to live on it while she found herself a job of some sort. She had one friend in Syria, Aidan Pratt, who was a captain in the Pay Corps and might find her work. He was, in a way, responsible for her escapade because he had suggested she visit him in Damascus. He had hoped Guy would come with her. Now she would have to explain why she was alone and why she had to earn her own living.
She kept her face turned to the sea, giving Mort and Phil the chance to go without her, and was startled by Mortimer’s lively, baritone voice speaking behind her: ‘How d’you feel after that bumpy ride?’
Harriet rose, again caught up in Mortimer’s friendly warmth: ‘It wasn’t too bad.’
‘Come on, then.’ Contrite perhaps at having left her alone so long, Mortimer linked her arm and walked her back to the lorry: ‘I expect you’re hungry? We brought food with us. We’ll have a picnic.’
There were packets of sandwiches in the cabin and two flasks of canteen tea. They sat on the rocks to eat their meal. The sandwiches, slabs of corned beef between slabs of bread, were dry and roughly cut but Mort and Phil devoured them with the appetite of old campaigners. Harriet, who was recovering from amoebic dysentery, envied their vigour and wondered if she would ever feel well again.
After eating, they sat for a while, made sleepy by the food and sea air, until Phil started up: ‘Holy Mary, what’s that?’
A grunting and rustling was coming from behind the slopes on the other side of the road, then a large, dark, dirty pig swaggered towards them, followed pell-mell by a dozen other pigs and a swine-herd equally dirty and dark. Midges clouded about them and a strong smell of the sty filled the air.
The man’s eyes shone out from behind a fringe of black curls. Bold and curious, he stared at the three women. He was naked to the waist, his broad shoulders and chest burnt to a purple-red, his bare feet grey with dust.
Mort shouted: ‘Hello there. How are you and all the pigs?’
Hearing a strange language, the man grunted and hurried his herd down to the sea.
‘I say!’ Mort’s eyes opened in admiration: ‘What a splendid figure! He might be Ulysses on the island of the Phaeacians.’
Phil asked in her wondering Irish voice: ‘Did Ulysses keep pigs?’
‘Not exactly, but his followers were turned into pigs somewhere along the line. This is an heroic shore, isn’t it? I bet that castle was built by the Crusaders.’
Harriet said: ‘Have you ever been inside?’
‘Yes, but there’s not much to see. The Bedu have taken it over. They’ve burrowed into it like rabbits and live in holes in the wall, but there’s a café. Phil and I had coffee there once. We might go in again.’
They entered through a gateway. Large hinges showed where the gates had hung but the gates had gone and as Mortimer said, there was not much to see. A lane followed the outer wall, pitted with dark cells that served as dwelling places. At the sight of the strangers, children ran out to clamour for baksheesh and followed the women wherever they went. They came to a cavern that was no more than a hole in the original fabric. This was the café. Inside men in grimy galabiahs sat at grimy tables. The place depended for light on a break in the wall through which gleamed the motionless silver of the sea.
Mortimer led Harriet and Phil inside and ordered coffee. The men stared in silence, obviously confounded by this female presumption and Harriet felt proud of Mort and Phil and their confidence in the world.
On their way back to the lorry, a sharp burst of rain sent them running and Mortimer, climbing up among the cases of ammunition, pulled out a tarpaulin to shelter Harriet who was wearing only the blouse, skirt and cardigan that had been her winter wear in Egypt. Sitting with the tarpaulin over her hair, she looked out on wild and empty hill country patched light and dark by the sun and cloud. On one side the sea, disturbed by the wind, rolled in on a deserted shore. On the other were hills, rocky and bare except for the fur of grass. Black clouds and white clouds wound and unwound, sometimes revealing a stretch of clear blue sky. The rain slanted this way and that, cutting through broad rays of light, one moment pouring down, the next coming abruptly to a stop.
It was evening when they reached the Haifa headland and skirting the town by the coast road, drove up on to the downs before the Lebanon frontier. The officials, who saw Mort and Phil once a week, waved them on.
As the wet sunset faded into twilight, the lorry was stopped on the verge of the road and driv
er and co-driver, without a word to Harriet, jumped down and walked away among the shadowed hills. Some twenty minutes later they returned and, looking up at Harriet, Mortimer said: ‘How about some supper?’
Descending, Harriet took the tarpaulin with her, intending to spread it out for the three of them but Mort and Phil, whose slacks were already soaked by the wet ground, laughed at her precaution.
There was a tinkle of bells in the distance and Phil said: ‘More pigs?’ But this time the visitants were camels laden with bundles and decked out with fringes and tassels and camel bells. One after the other, tall and stately, they came swaying out of the twilight to cross the road. As their feet touched the tarmac, they grumbled and grunted then, catching sight of the women, they shied away and the drovers, shouting, pulled at the lofty heads. The men made a show of ignoring the women but came to a stop nearby. The camels, forced to kneel, gave indignant snorts as though even rest was a form of servitude.
While they ate corned-beef sandwiches and drank the second flask of tea, the three women watched the camp’s braziers being lit and skewers of meat being laid across the charcoal.
Phil said: ‘How about Arab hospitality? D’you think we’ll get an invite to supper?’
‘Heaven forbid,’ said Mortimer, ‘I’ve heard pretty hair-raising stories about these chaps. Some British officials stopped their car to watch a Bedu wedding party and were invited to join in. They said they were in a hurry and after they’d driven off, the Bedu got together and decided the refusal was an insult. They galloped after them, and slaughtered the lot.’
‘Women as well?’ Harriet asked.
‘There weren’t any women but if there had been they would have escaped.’
‘Why, I wonder?’
‘Apparently Lady Hester Stanhope so impressed the Arab world, English women have been treated as special ever since.’
Harriet laughed: ‘That’s a comfort. I’ll feel safer now.’
But alone in the back of the lorry, she did not feel very safe. The countryside was silent, the sky heavily clouded and there was no light but their own head-lights. There were few houses and those were in darkness. The villages seemed to be deserted yet twice, passing through a village street, there were conflagrations, produced by lighted petrol poured into the gutters of some main building. If these displays marked an occasion, there were no witnesses, no one to rejoice. Each time, after the raw brilliance of the flames, they returned to dense and silent darkness. Harriet became nervous at the thought of leaving Mort and Phil, and wished she could keep the comfort of their company.
Perhaps they, too, were unnerved by the black, endless road to Damascus for they began to sing together, loudly and aggressively:
Sing high, sing low,
Wherever we go,
We’re Artillery ladies,
We never say ‘No’.
There was another verse that ended:
At night on the boat deck
We always say ‘Yes’.
They sang the two verses over and over again, their blended voices conveying to Harriet a union she could never hope to share.
Damascus appeared at last, a map of lights spread high on the darkness. As the road rose up among gardens and orchards, a scent of foliage came to her and her fears faded. Here she was in the oldest of the world’s inhabited cities. The oasis on which it was built was said to be the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve were created here and here Cain killed Abel. Damascus had been a city before Abraham was born and had been one of the wonders of the Ancient world. Who knew what pleasures awaited her in such a magical place?
A sound of rifle fire came to them. As they drove into the main square, they saw through the yellowish haze of the street lights that men were rushing about, screaming and firing pistols into the air. The large buildings on either side looked ominous and unwelcoming.
The lorry stopped at the kerb. Harriet could go no farther and perhaps Mort and Phil would not want her to go farther. Whether she liked it or not, she had arrived.
They were outside a shabby, flat-fronted building that had the word ‘Hotel’ above the door. Mortimer jumped down and lifted Harriet’s suitcase to the pavement. She said: ‘I know it doesn’t look very encouraging, but it’s the only hotel I know. I expect it will do till you find something better.’
Harriet nervously asked: ‘Is there revolution here?’
‘Oh no, this usually goes on at night. It’s a demonstration against the Free French but it’s harmless.’
Harriet was not so sure. She remembered Aidan Pratt telling her that his friend had been killed by a stray bullet during one of these demonstrations. She appealed to Mortimer: ‘Couldn’t you stay here just for one night?’
Mort and Phil shook their heads. Standing together, smiling their farewells, they said they must press on to Aleppo where they planned to stay at the Armenian hospital. For a moment she thought of asking them to take her with them, but wherever she went she had to leave them sometime. Here at least she had Aidan Pratt.
Seeing her trying to lift her heavy case, Mortimer took it from her and carried it easily into the hotel hallway. There was a small night-light on the desk but no one behind the desk.
Mortimer said: ‘The clerk will come when you ring. You’ll be all right here, won’t you?’
Eager to be back on the road, she took a quick step forward and kissed Harriet’s cheek: ‘You’re not staying here long, are you? We’ll meet again back in Cairo. Take care of yourself.’
Harriet watched through the glass of the door till the lorry was out of sight, then she struck the bell on the desk. There was a long interval before the clerk appeared, looking aggrieved as though the bell were not there for use. He seemed disconcerted by the sight of a solitary young woman with a suitcase and he shook his head: ‘You wan’ hotel? This not hotel.’ He pointed to a notice in French that said the building had been requisitioned by the occupying force. It was now a hostel for French officers.
Dismayed, Harriet asked: ‘But where can I go? It’s late. Where else is there?’
The clerk looked sympathetic but unhelpful: ‘Things very bad. Army take everything.’
Having nothing to offer, he waited for her to go and she, having nowhere to go, went out and stood on the pavement. There must be someone, somewhere, who could direct her to an hotel. Eventually a British soldier sauntered by with the appearance of abstracted boredom she had seen often enough in Cairo. She stopped him and asked if he knew where she could stay. He gave a laugh, as though he could scarcely believe his luck, and lifting her bag, said, ‘You a service woman?’
‘More or less.’
‘That’s all right then. There’s a hostel over here.’
He led her across the square and into a side street. There was more rifle fire and she asked what the trouble was.
‘Just the wogs. They’re always ticking.’
‘What’s it like here in Damascus?’
‘Same as everywhere else. Lot of bloody foreigners.’
They came to another shabby, flat-fronted building, this one distinguished by a Union Jack hanging over the main door.
When Harriet thanked him, the soldier said: ‘Don’t thank me. It’s a treat seeing an English bint.’
Harriet thought she had found a refuge until she was stopped in the hall by an Englishwoman with scrappy red hair and foxy red eyes. She looked Harriet up and down before she said accusingly: ‘This hostel’s for ORs.’
‘Does it matter? I’ve come a long way and I’m very tired.’
‘I don’t know. Suppose it doesn’t matter if you aren’t staying long. I’ve got to keep my beds for them as they’re meant for.’
Harriet followed the woman through a canteen, a stark place shut for the night, to a large dormitory with some thirty narrow, iron bedsteads.
‘Which can I have?’
‘Any one you like. There’s a shower in there if you care to use it.’
The beds had no sheets but a thin army blanket was folded on
each. The shower was cold, but at least she had the place to herself; or so it seemed until the early hours of the morning when she was wakened by a party of ATS, all drunk, who kept up a ribald criticism of the men who had taken them out. They finally subsided into sleep but at six a.m. a loudspeaker was switched on in the canteen.
Raucous music bellowed through the dormitory. Harriet, giving up hope of sleep, rose and went to the shower. As she passed the ATS, one of them lifted a bleared, blood-shot eye over the edge of the blanket, and observed her reproachfully.
The person in the canteen was a half-Negro sweeper who seemed as baleful as the red-haired woman. When Harriet asked about breakfast, he mumbled, ‘Blekfest eight o’clock,’ and went on sweeping.
With an hour and a half in which to do nothing, Harriet set out to look at Damascus. Independence had not begun well for her and she was inclined to blame herself. If she had taken the woman into her confidence, charmed her, flattered her, she might have been set up as the hostel’s favourite inmate. But she had no gift for ingratiating herself with strangers. And she was sure that if she tried it, it would not work.
The square, ill-lit and sinister the previous night, was at peace now in the early sunlight. The ominous buildings were no longer ominous. There were towers and domes and minarets, sights to be seen, a new city to be explored. She could imagine Aidan escorting her round and helping her to find employment and lodgings. She would warn him to keep her presence a secret. She could not have Guy coming here out of pity to rescue her and take her back to Cairo. Later, perhaps, she would contact him but while the evacuation ship was at sea — the voyage around the Cape would take at least two months — no one would expect to hear from her.
She sat for a while in a garden beside a mosque, watching the traffic increase and the day’s work beginning. The city was set among hills as in the hollow of a crown. The highest range, to the west, was covered in snow and a cold wind blew towards her. She was not dressed for this climate. Shivering, she rose and found a café where she could drink coffee at a counter among businessmen to whom she was an object of curiosity. Cairo had become conditioned to the self-sufficiency of western women but she was now in Syria, a country dominated by Moslem prejudice. In spite of the bold gaze of the men, she remained on her café stool until the military offices were likely to start work.
Fortunes of War Page 45
