by Isobel Chace
Who couldn’t? she thought, and stumbled on blindly up the hill.
“Well, that’s that. Not much damage done after all,” Jacob Dane said with satisfaction. “Only the one tank gone.” He threw himself down on the sand and lay spread-eagled, staring up at the black sky.
“The damage,” Rosamund said wearily, “has been done to my back!”
Her stepfather chuckled.
“You shouldn’t have been here at all!” he rebuked her gently. “In trousers too! No wonder Rupert thought you were one of the boys.”
“Somebody had to bring the beer,” Rosamund reminded him.
“I’ll grant you that that wasn’t a bad idea,” he admitted. “Whose was it? Yours or Harringford’s?”
“Rupert’s—of course!” she added bitterly.
Jacob twisted his head so that he was looking at her, though he couldn’t see her at all clearly in the darkness.
“What’s wrong with that?” he asked.
She thought about it for a moment.
“Nothing,” she said at last.
He was troubled.
“It was like him to think about afterwards as well as the emergency in hand, don’t you think?”
She admired his generosity and wished she could match it.
“He’s a paragon of all the virtues!” she said lightly, and sat up groaning. “Let’s go and see if there’s any left for us,” she suggested.
Muhammed was in his element, serving beer to everybody. He made it seem a natural and almost everyday event, gravely opening the bottles and handing them round to all and sundry. Rupert watched him and grinned.
“Who brought him?” he asked.
“I did,” Rosamund said quietly.
“It was a good idea,” he commended her. He looked at her closely. “You’re out on your feet, aren’t you? Jacob, take her back to the hotel and make her go straight to bed.”
But Rosamund shook her head.
“I’m going to have my quota of beer first,” she said determinedly.
Jacob laughed.
“But you don’t even like the stuff!”
“No,” Rosamund agreed bleakly, “but I think I’ve earned it!”
She took the thick, squat bottle that Muhammed offered her and poured the liquid down her throat. It was every bit as nasty as she remembered it, but so cold that she forgave it its taste and almost enjoyed it. Only afterwards did she feel slightly sick, and that she knew was because of the black fumes that still hung on the night air.
“Have some more?” Rupert suggested quietly.
“Yes, I will.”
She regretted it the moment Muhammed gave her the second bottle. Such bravado! she taunted herself. And why? Simply because Rupert hadn’t been as grateful as she thought he might have been! She was dotty, there was no other word for it!
She drank the beer bravely, well aware of the amusement in Rupert’s eyes. She felt sicker than ever.
“Are you ready now?” Jacob asked her. She could tell he was laughing by the way his voice trembled.
“Yes,” she said meekly.
It was Rupert who opened the door of the truck for her and Rupert who helped her in. She held her breath and tried to look very dignified all the way, but of course it was impossible. Who could look dignified clambering up into a vehicle like that? She settled herself carefully on the seat and found that at last she had the advantage—she could look down on him! But all she could think of was how thickly his hair grew, she could see it in the faint light, springing out of his scalp in virile profusion. Just like the rest of him, she thought with irritation. He gave her knee a short, sharp slap and slammed the door on her.
“Goodnight!” he called up to her.
“Goodnight,” she replied automatically.
She watched him climb back up the hill to the other men, his strong form silhouetted against the pale sand. It was ridiculous to mind so much.
“How do you start this thing?” Jacob asked, impatiently searching the dashboard with his free hand.
“It’s on the floor—somewhere.” She brought her attention back to the truck with an effort. “Here,” she said. She pushed at the semi-concealed knob and the engine sprang to life.
Jacob grunted. He switched on the headlights and grunted again.
“Strewth,” he said, “I can’t see a darned thing!”
Rosamund chuckled.
“They got us here,” she said.
“I don’t know how! No wonder Muhammed said he’d never set foot in the truck again!”
Rosamund was hurt. She had thought she had driven rather well, considering.
“There’s gratitude for you!” she exclaimed. “I didn’t even ask him to come!”
Jacob laughed.
“It wasn’t your driving he minded, it was the dark! I can see what he meant!”
Slightly mollified, Rosamund lay back against her seat. Her muscles were already painfully stiff and she could still feel her tears, heavy and as yet unshed, at the back of her eyes and in her throat.
“It was horrible, wasn’t it?” she said shakily.
Her stepfather put out a hand and patted hers with real affection.
“Try and forget about it,” he suggested gently. “And don’t let Rupert put your back up so! He really appreciated what you did, you know.”
Rosamund clenched her fists until they hurt.
“No, he didn’t,” she said tautly. “He merely thought I was in the way. Why pretend, Dad?”
Jacob was silent.
“It’s just that no matter what I do, I can’t please him,” she went on desperately.
“And do you really want to?” he asked her slowly.
In the darkness she could be very brave. She could even face the truth herself.
“Yes, I want to,” she said. “I want to very much.”
The lights were still on at the hotel. The deserted dancing area was gay with many colours and behind it was the hotel, floodlit and with the doors standing wide open. Rosamund swung herself out of the truck and dropped on to the ground below. The action jarred her legs and her back and she felt sick again.
“I think I’ll go straight on up to bed,” she said weakly.
Jacob nodded to her briefly.
“I should, my dear,” he said.
The reception hall seemed gloriously cool and fresh. Someone had switched on the air-conditioning and had tidied up the clutter that the men had dropped there as they had hurried out. Rosamund looked wearily about her and she saw that Félicité had not gone to bed at all. The Frenchwoman was fully dressed now, and she looked very clean and feminine. On the table beside her was an enormous pile of sandwiches and a number of old and battered thermoses stood filled and at the ready beside them.
“Had a happy time?” she asked Rosamund sweetly.
Rosamund shook her head.
“I’m going up to bed,” she said.
Félicité’s pale green eyes hardened.
“I should,” she advised. “You look as though you have been in the fire yourself.”
Rosamund didn’t say anything. She walked as quickly as she could to the staircase and began to mount the hard marble stairs.
“By the way, will the men be long?” Félicité’s voice came up to her.
“I don’t think so,” she replied. It was all very silly, she thought, and she was sillier still to care. Félicité had told her that next time she would choose her field more carefully, and she had obviously done just that! She looked very pleasant and welcoming, though she hadn’t troubled to offer Rosamund anything. Perhaps she would get some appreciation out of Rupert. And why not? Anyone, anyone at all, was welcome to get whatever they could from him!
She sat on the edge of the bed and wondered as her tears began to flow. Downstairs she could hear the men arriving and their exuberant pleasure at being given something to eat. She could see, as clearly as if she had been there, Rupert’s warm smile of satisfaction and Félicité’s answering simper. With a t
ired gesture of abandon, Rosamund flung off her clothes, crept into bed and wept bitterly.
The day dawned cloudy and overcast. Rosamund looked moodily at the sky and thought it was a pretty exact reflection of her mood. When it began to drizzle it was no more than she had expected, and she couldn’t even pretend to be surprised. She heaved herself out of bed and dressed herself with the movements of an old woman. She had been stiff before, stiff as a poker, but she had never known this wrenching, searing pain all down her back and forearms. It was so bad that she could hear herself gasping, and that made her laugh. She was still smiling when she went downstairs to breakfast.
Félicité was already in the dining-room. She looked very smooth and sleek and thoroughly satisfied with life. The smooth china-like facade she presented to the world was very much in evidence, and Rosamund, sitting down opposite her at the table, found herself wondering why she always had a perverse desire to shatter it. Félicité had a right to her triumph, she reminded herself bleakly, she had planned it carefully enough. She ordered her coffee and rolls in a voice that shook slightly, shocked by her own thoughts, and set herself to being very nice to Félicité to make up for them.
“We had quite a nice little party last night when the men finally came in,” the Frenchwoman told her brightly. “It was a pity you didn’t stay up for it, but I must say you looked tired enough for two.”
“I felt it!” Rosamund said briefly.
Félicité eyed her carefully.
“You still look a little worn, dear.”
Rosamund summoned up a smile.
“I’m a little stiff, that’s all. Where are all the men? Sleeping it off?”
Felicity studied her cup reflectively.
“I think they must be,” she said dreamily. “Some of us stayed up until goodness knows when!”
Rosamund thought she could guess who the ‘some of them’ had been. Jacob had gone to bed when she had, for he had knocked on her door to say goodnight and she had lain as still as she could, holding her breath so that he wouldn’t know she had been crying. When he had gone, she had heard him going into his room and the door shutting behind him. Nothing would have got him up after that. He had been very tired too and he needed his sleep more than the younger men did.
“How nice,” Rosamund said out loud.
Félicité frankly grinned.
“You mustn’t think you were left out of anything,” she said in a would-be kind voice. “You had your party earlier.”
Rosamund flushed. She took a deep sip of coffee and painfully returned her cup to its saucer.
“I wouldn’t have called it a party,” she said quietly. “I was more scared than anything else, I think.”
“Really?” Felicity sounded quite smug. “Didn’t Rupert look after you?”
No, he hadn’t! Rosamund admitted miserably to herself. He hadn’t, and that was what had hurt so much. That and the fact that he hadn’t even been grateful for her efforts to help him.
“I think he had other things on his mind,” she said.
Félicité’s eyes were bland.
“I expect he had,” she agreed easily.
It was something of a relief when Jacob came in to join them, fussing over his cheek where he had cut himself shaving.
“Why don’t you use an electric razor?” Rosamund asked him, exasperated. It was an old argument between the two of them.
“Because I’m a vain old man,” Jacob replied heatedly. “You can’t get the same sort of a shave at all with those modern machines!”
Félicité blinked at him.
“Oh, not old, Mr. Dane!” she objected.
Jacob gave her an impatient look, completely unaware that any flattery had been intended.
“Well, middle-aged, if you like,” he conceded. “But the point is—”
Rosamund hid a smile, loving him very much at that moment.
“Darling, are you going to have tea or coffee?” she interrupted him, and they exchanged one of their old intimate glances and she felt considerably better. At least he was on her side. And then she wondered why there had to be sides at all—it all seemed so very undignified. She looked resentfully at Félicité who had succeeded in putting her in such a position and was met by a cold stare of dislike. It’s only that I’m tired, she told herself, tired and stiff and very much the worse for wear.
“Will you be able to do very much today?” she asked Jacob as he finished his meal.
He shrugged his shoulders.
“I don’t think there’s much we can do here at the moment,” he replied. “Harringford may well decide to take us all back to Tunis. His work doesn’t begin and end here, you know. He has all the day-to-day stuff of the company to cope with as well.” He put a hand out and patted Rosamund’s thoughtfully. “Will you mind going back to Sidi-Bou-Said?” he asked.
She shook her head listlessly.
“No,” she said.
Félicité gave a little chuckle in her throat.
“You forget, Mr. Dane, that Rosamund has Louis waiting for her in Tunis! Of course she’s anxious to get back to him! Aren’t you, dear?”
And Rosamund, who hadn’t given Louis a single thought since she had got to Tabarka, smiled eagerly and agreed that it would be very nice to see him again. Rupert, she thought, was very late for breakfast, and she started to worry about him, hoping that he was not as tired as she was and that he had managed to get some sleep during that broken night, with Félicité tempting him with sandwiches and probably with kisses as well!
But when she did see Rupert he looked devastatingly and completely normal.
“Cheer up,” he greeted her gaily, “it wasn’t as bad a loss as all that! Are you coming out with me to survey the damage?”
Rosamund shook her head, completely unable to utter a single word.
“It will be your last chance,” he told her. “We’ll be going home this afternoon.”
“No, thank you,” she said at last. “I’d rather not.”
Surprisingly it didn’t even hurt when she saw that he had taken Félicité instead. In a way it was a relief, for it meant that she had the whole hotel to herself without being afraid of finding the Frenchwoman glowering at her from some corner. Félicité, that morning, was more than she could take.
Muhammed brought the luggage down straight after lunch and put it in a pile in the reception hall.
“Which car shall I put yours in, madame?” he asked Rosamund.
Rosamund looked doubtfully at Rupert, but it was Félicité who answered.
“Monsieur Harringford is coming in my car with me,” she said sweetly, “so that Rosamund and her stepfather can travel together. You’ll like that, won’t you, cherie?” she smiled, but her eyes were hard and dared Rosamund to contradict her.
Jacob hugged his stepdaughter’s shoulders and she almost cried out with pain.
“Don’t, Dad,” she gasped. “That hurt!”
Rupert’s eyes flickered over her and she flushed, ashamed of herself for making such a fuss.
“Come on, Jacob,” she said quickly. “Let’s get a start on them and go first.” She smiled up at him, noticing automatically that he hadn’t bothered to change his shirt and that she should have put a clean one out for him. “It seems ages since we went anywhere together, just the two of us,” she said.
Jacob laughed.
“The old firm?” His lips trembled, and Rosamund knew he was thinking of her mother as well. “Come on, Jacob!” she said again, and they went out to the car together.
CHAPTER TEN
SOMEHOW Rosamund had persuaded herself that as soon as they returned to the Arab house in Sidi-Bou-Said her stiffness would leave her and so would that gnawing unhappiness that she could only half understand. In actual fact neither happened. The long car ride only served to set her strained muscles harder than ever and, as soon as she was alone, the house mocked her just as effectively as Félicité had done. She had forgotten how long the day could seem, after the men had gone
off to work and before they came home in the evening.
The drizzle of the day before had stopped and it was now stuffy with a damp heat that made her think it would not be long before they had the thunder-storms in Tunis also. Sleeping had been almost impossible during the night and she had woken unrefreshed and with her skin pricking with the perspiration. Deliberately she had avoided Rupert, for she had felt quite unable to withstand the inspection of his observant eyes, knowing herself to look both tired and unhappy.
But once he had gone the day seemed to weigh no lighter on her shoulders.
“I can’t think how you can face going into those hot, narrow streets today,” she told her stepfather irritably.
He remained unconcernedly cheerful.
“A little bit of heat never hurt anyone!” he said blithely.
“Oh, didn’t it? What about people going down with heat-stroke in an English summer?”
Jacob laughed.
“It’s never worried you before,” he said. “Why the concern now?”
She almost told him. It would have been a relief to have told someone how she felt, how stiff and weary, and—how jealous she felt of Félicité. But that wasn’t why she was there, she reminded herself sharply. She was there to look after her stepfather, not to add her burdens to his!
“Have a pleasant day, anyway,” she bade him as she saw him to the door.
He kissed her on the top of her head.
“And you, my dear?” It was a question rather than an idle wish. Rosamund flushed slightly.
“I shall be just fine, Dad,” she assured him. “Busy too,” she added, “I’m going to whitewash the patio!”
Jacob smiled vaguely, his mind already far away.
“That’s right, dear.”
But when he had gone she made no effort to get on with her self-appointed task. She helped the maid wash up and clean the kitchen and then she took her protesting muscles to the only comfortable chair in the salon and read a paperback that someone, probably Rupert, had left on the small glass-topped table. The oppressive heat made her sleepy and she scarcely heard the banging on the front door until she became aware that Yamina had let whoever it was in. She looked up from her book and saw Louis at the top of the stairs.
