The Woman on the Orient Express

by Lindsay Jayne Ashford

  “Are you sure?” Agatha frowned.

  “Quite sure. Better get a move on—we won’t be stopping for long. Believe me, it’s a sight not to be missed.”

  The sun was just rising over the eastern ridge of the mountains as Nancy and Agatha climbed out. They couldn’t see much at first, but as they joined the group of passengers who were gathering a few yards away, both women caught their breath.

  “It’s like standing on the rim of the world!” Nancy took Agatha’s arm. The rock beneath their feet dropped almost vertically. They were looking out at a vast plain, hazy with mist in the early sunshine.

  “It’s incredible!” Agatha’s voice was an awed whisper. “Like looking down on the promised land.”

  The words triggered a feeling in Nancy that she couldn’t describe. A feeling that transcended all the fear, despair, and loneliness of the past few days. A feeling of . . . well, she would almost call it joy. She felt the warmth of the sun on her body as it climbed higher. The scent of cedar, juniper, and wild iris filled the air. As she gazed at the vast plain below, the colors changed before her eyes, from a milky violet blue to smoky gray to a pale yellow green.

  “It makes you glad to be . . .” Agatha checked herself with an apologetic sideways glance.

  “It’s all right.” Nancy squeezed her arm. She wanted to say that yes, she did feel thankful to be alive. But the memory of her lover’s face slipped between her eyes and the horizon, like a cloud over the sun.

  CHAPTER 11

  Adana to Damascus

  At the next station a gaggle of hawkers crowded the platform. Agatha’s stomach rumbled as she leaned out of the window. The aroma of spiced meat competed with the sulfurous smell of the engine. A wild-looking man ran toward her, bearing a tray of stuffed leaves, marinated meat on skewers, and a bowl of brightly painted eggs.

  “Are you hungry?” Agatha looked over her shoulder at the others.

  “Not me,” Katharine called. “I can’t face anything but grapes.”

  “What is there?” Nancy sounded doubtful.

  “Come and see!” Agatha laughed. “I’ve no idea what it is, but it smells delicious!”

  Katharine made them eat their Turkish breakfast in Nancy’s compartment, saying the smell made her feel sick.

  “Is it lamb, do you think?” Nancy slid a chunk of meat off the skewer with her teeth.

  “Mutton, more likely,” Agatha said. “And I think these must be vine leaves.”

  “I’d forgotten how good spicy food can be.” Nancy smiled. “I used to love the curry we had in Ceylon.”

  “Well, this is a hundred times better than that stew they came round with last night.” Agatha nodded. “There’s not much I can’t eat, but that was nothing but lumps of gristle swimming in grease.”

  “This should keep us going until we get to Damascus, shouldn’t it?” Nancy picked up one of the cigar-shaped vine leaves and bit into it. “Do you think we should save some for Katharine in case she’s hungry later?”

  Agatha nodded. “It’s a relief to see her looking so much better. I was beginning to wonder how on earth she was going to make it across the desert.”

  “Those things she said last night . . .” Nancy stared at the food still left on the brown paper bag that served as a plate. “I know it’s none of my business, but . . .” She picked at a corner of the paper, twisting it between her finger and thumb. “Did her husband . . . Did he commit suicide?”

  “I don’t know,” Agatha said. “She told me they met during the war, when she was nursing in France, and that they’d only been married six months when he died. I assumed he’d been killed in action.”

  “She was talking about a pyramid, wasn’t she?” Nancy glanced up, her fingers still working away at the paper. “Was that delirium, do you think?”

  “She did tell me she lived in Egypt after the war,” Agatha said. “Perhaps she went there with her husband. She didn’t say.”

  “If it’s true—if he really did take his life—I . . . well, I feel awful. She’s been so friendly toward me and I . . . What I did . . . It must have been a horrible reminder.”

  “You mustn’t think like that. We don’t know if it’s true—and even if you did trigger memories she prefers to suppress, well, I’m certain she won’t remember anything she said last night.”

  Nancy nodded, looking out of the window. The train was taking them through a mountain gorge. Stunted bushes clung to steep-sided cliffs with a river glinting far below.

  “What you’re doing is very brave, you know,” Agatha said. “It takes guts to strike out on your own, to make a new life halfway across the world.”

  Nancy blinked as the sun caught her eyes. Brave. How she wished that was true.

  The Taurus Express wound its way southeast through Turkey and into Syria at Aleppo, and from Aleppo to Beirut, where the Mediterranean lapped along a curving bay. Agatha found it strange to think that this was the same stretch of water she had looked out on in Venice. It was even lovelier than the coast of northern Italy, an endless chain of sandy coves with a backdrop of hazy blue mountains.

  Nancy was catching up on her sleep in the next-door compartment, and Katharine had dozed off after managing to eat a hard-boiled egg and a couple of peaches. Agatha was sitting by the window, too captivated by the changing landscape to want to close her eyes. After an hour or so, the open view of the ocean gave way to large flat-roofed houses with lush gardens full of tumbling white jasmine and scarlet poinsettia. They were on the outskirts of Damascus—the final destination for the train.

  “You’d think it’d be a bit more civilized, wouldn’t you?” Katharine rolled her eyes as she emerged, a little unsteadily, onto the platform. “It’s supposed to be the oldest capital city in the world.”

  The women’s baggage was seized by a gang of porters, all screaming and yelling at each other. Others ran up behind them, trying to grab the cases off them. What looked like a wrestling match ensued, until a representative of the travel agent, Cook’s, intervened. Once the baggage had been satisfactorily dispatched to the coach depot, he offered to organize a sightseeing tour, but Katharine shooed him away.

  “They never take you to the best places,” she said. “I’ll be your tour guide this afternoon.”

  “But you’ve only just left your sickbed,” Agatha protested. “You mustn’t overtax yourself.”

  “I don’t plan to.” Katharine smiled. “The first port of call is the most relaxing place on earth—and we can get a lift all the way.”

  When Agatha and Nancy saw the transport she had in mind, their mouths fell open. A row of camels, saddled up with pommel seats, stood outside the station. Katharine went up to one of the men standing next to them and addressed him in Arabic. A short conversation followed, during which she placed her hands on her hips and shook her head several times before dipping her hand into her bag and pulling out a five-franc note.

  “Daylight robbery,” she huffed as she returned to the others. “Never mind—it’s an experience not to be missed!”

  Agatha watched, aghast, as Katharine demonstrated the art of mounting a camel in a ladylike fashion. The beast was first brought to its knees by its master. Katharine then stood sideways to its flank and eased herself onto the saddle. As the camel raised itself back up, it lurched forward. For a moment it looked as though Katharine would be catapulted over its head. But she clung on, laughing as the animal righted itself.

  “Come on,” she called from on high, “you’ll love it once you’re on—and it’s the best way to see the city!”

  Agatha and Nancy exchanged glances. “I don’t know if I can do it,” Agatha said. “Did you see how it swayed when it got up? It looked just like being on a boat on a stormy ocean—and I get terribly seasick . . .”

  “I’m not keen either.” Nancy shook her head. “I’ve never been much of a rider: I was thrown by a horse once and it really put me off.”

  “What are you waiting for?” Katharine shouted over her shoulder.
“We haven’t got all day!”

  “I suppose if Katharine can do it after being laid up in bed for twenty-four hours, we shouldn’t be so lily-livered.” Agatha gave a wry smile. “I’ll try it if you will.”

  “Well, I . . . er . . .” Nancy’s face had gone very pale. But before she could say another word, the camel driver scooped her up in his arms and set her on the saddle of the smallest animal, which knelt as he approached.

  “Hold on tight and lean back!” Katharine shouted.

  Nancy shut her eyes as it rose up from the ground. More graceful than its stablemate, it managed to stand up without tipping her forward. She opened her eyes with a look of wonder. “Oh! I’m still on!”

  “Of course you are!” Katharine laughed. “It’s only a camel—not an elephant! Come on, Mary: your turn now!”

  As Agatha got close to her camel, it made a guttural groaning sound and spat at her. “Ugh!” She dodged sideways to avoid its dribbling mouth. “I don’t think it likes me!”

  “Pat his flank firmly,” Katharine called. “Show him who’s boss!”

  “I’m not sure I want to touch him.” Agatha raised her hand tentatively, just as the camel twisted its neck, snakelike, to spit at her a second time. She felt a pair of hands grasp her from behind, and suddenly she was up on the animal’s back, protected from any further liquid bombardment by the front of the saddle, which looked like the upturned leg of a stool.

  She held on for dear life as the camel staggered to its feet. It reminded her of a fairground ride on the promenade at Torquay. A wooden horse on a pole that had lurched in time to the music. Her mother had made the mistake of buying her an ice cream a few minutes earlier. She wasn’t sure who had been most angry: the owner of the ride, who’d had to clean up the resulting mess, or her sister, who was sitting in front of her on the horse and had to walk home with vomit in her hair.

  To her relief, when the camel began walking, the motion was slow and steady—nothing like a rocky boat—and she could see right down the street, over the tops of the market stalls, to an ancient-looking stone archway.

  “That’s the Bab Sharqi,” Katharine said as her camel came alongside Agatha’s. “The Eastern Gate: it’s the one Saint Paul came through when he entered Damascus. The Romans built it. They dedicated it to the sun.” She turned to look over her shoulder. “Are you all right, Nancy?”

  The driver took the reins of Nancy’s camel, bringing it level with the others. “It’s not as bad as I thought it would be,” she said. “It’s quite pleasant, isn’t it, when you get used to it?”

  “This is Straight Street,” Katharine said. “Remember it from the Bible? The Arabs call it Midhat Pasha Souk. In a minute you’ll smell the spice stalls. We’re going to the hammam on the other side of the city.”

  “What’s that?” Agatha grabbed the front of the saddle as her camel lowered its head to investigate a tomato squashed on the cobbles.

  “It’s a bathhouse,” Katharine replied. “Just what we need after five days on a train: an attendant will scrub you cleaner than you’ve ever been in your life and then massage you with scented oil. It’s absolute heaven! When we’re done there, we’ll walk back through the Khan Al-Harir—the silk souk—and do some shopping if you like. There’ll just be time for something to eat then, before we board the coach.”

  “That sounds wonderful.” Nancy smiled. “Oh, what’s that smell? It’s really lovely. Like . . . some sort of perfume. What is it?”

  “Rose petals.” Katharine swept her arm toward a huddle of stalls farther up the street. “Can you see the sacks? They’re full of dried petals and rosebuds. They use them to flavor the food here as well as for perfume. You can get rose-tasting water and ice cream if you fancy it.”

  As the camels ambled through the spice souk, the air filled with more exotic scents. Sacks of cardamom, turmeric, and cinnamon were stacked on the cobblestones alongside baskets of nuts and juniper berries. Bunches of garlic and fresh mint hung from hooks, above bowls of frankincense and dried lemons. The walls on either side of the street echoed with the sound of Arab voices calling out their wares, haggling over sales and greeting passersby.

  Agatha’s mouth watered as they passed a stall on which meat roasted on a spit above a charcoal fire. The vendor was cutting off chunks and placing them on little triangles of bread, then pouring on a thick dark-red sauce. “What’s that?” she asked Katharine.

  “Cherry kebabs,” she replied. “Damascus is famous for black cherries: they grow all over Syria. They make a savory sauce with cinnamon and pistachio nuts: it’s delicious. We can have some later if you like.”

  The route to the bathhouse took them through streets selling carpets, copper pots, brass plates, and wooden furniture inlaid with intricate marquetry. Veiled women with laden baskets bustled past huddles of ragged beggars squatting on the cobbles.

  “We couldn’t come this way last year,” Katharine said. “Syria was a battleground. There was an uprising against the French. It left thousands homeless—that’s why there are so many beggars.”

  A little boy, half-naked, ran up to them, reaching up to where Agatha’s feet dangled from the saddle. He looked about the same age as Rosalind. His dark eyes, framed with thick lashes, had a look of desperate defiance. Agatha fumbled in her pocket for the change from the food she had bought on the train. Would Turkish lira be any good? She wasn’t sure. But she had to give him something.

  “Oh! Don’t do that!” Katharine saw her drop the coins into the boy’s outstretched hand. “They’ll all be after us!” She kicked her camel so it lurched forward. “Hurry up,” she called over her shoulder.

  The bathhouse was at the end of a long narrow alley. Katharine reached it first and had already dismounted when the others got there.

  “How do we get down?” Nancy gripped the saddle with both hands.

  “Don’t worry—he’ll do it.” Katharine jerked her head at the camel driver, who was sauntering up the street in their wake.

  With a single word and a flick of his stick, the camel driver brought the camels to their knees. Getting down was much easier than getting up, Agatha thought as she stepped sideways onto the ground. She glanced at Nancy, whose face showed obvious relief at being back on terra firma.

  “Well done, you two!” Katharine beamed. “Now, let’s go and indulge ourselves!” She led the way into the dark, cool interior, whose roof was pierced with beams of sunlight. “It’s women only, in case you’re wondering,” she said. “The men’s is on another street. This is the only place you’ll see the women without their veils.”

  The three women were shown to individual cubicles, where they undressed and left their clothes.

  “Are you ready?” Katharine’s voice floated over the dividing wall.

  “What happens now?” Nancy sounded nervous.

  “You lie on a table while they soap you and scrub you down,” Katharine called back. “Then you get the massage.”

  “Where is it? The table, I mean?”

  “In the main room. You’re not shy, are you? It’s all just women together.”

  Agatha emerged still wearing a silk camisole and knickers. Nancy had managed to just about cover the middle part of her body with a strip of towel she found hanging in the changing room.

  “I felt like you the first time.” Katharine pinned up her hair, her breasts shifting as she raised her arms. “The Arab women have a different attitude to nudity: they’re far less prudish than us Brits when they’re away from men.”

  Agatha tried not to stare. Katharine stood, unabashed, a feather of pale brown pubic hair standing out against the milky skin of her belly. She beckoned the others to follow her. Bare feet padded on rush mats as they made their way to the shampooing room. There was a sharp, fresh scent of lemons and rosemary, and they could hear the distant, echoing chatter of voices.

  Attendants greeted them as they entered a room full of naked Arab women, all of whom stared with unbridled curiosity at the pale-skinned newcomers. Ka
tharine said something in Arabic, waving her hand toward Agatha and Nancy as she did so. The attendants nodded. One of them opened a cupboard and produced a towel the size of a bedsheet, which she pegged up on a sort of washing line hanging over a table. She repeated the process with a second towel, creating a tent around the table.

  “There!” Katharine smiled at Nancy. “No need to be embarrassed, now—you’ll be out of sight of prying eyes.” She turned to Agatha. “Would you like one, too?”

  Agatha nodded. In her time as a nurse she had seen plenty of naked men, but there were never any female patients. Apart from her sister, she had never seen a woman without clothes on. She felt uncomfortably self-conscious, well aware that her stomach and breasts, after childbirth, bore no comparison to Katharine’s taut, voluptuous body.

  Out of the corner of her eye she saw Nancy duck behind the hanging towels. Agatha wondered why she was so self-conscious. Nancy was at least ten years younger than she and Katharine, and there was hardly an ounce of fat on her. Perhaps growing up as an only child had made her inhibited. Then it occurred to Agatha that there might be another reason. How long did Nancy say she’d been married? Was it five months or six? Long enough, at any rate, for her to be pregnant and know it. This possibility cast a new, cold light on the events of Thursday night. How desperate Nancy would have felt, receiving that telegram, if she had also just discovered she was pregnant.

  Putting herself in Nancy’s shoes was a sharp reminder of the day she had broken the news of her own pregnancy to Archie. They had been in a taxi, coming home after a night out at the Palais de Danse in Hammersmith. She had felt queasy and Archie had shouted at the driver for going too fast. “No, it’s not that,” she said. His face had frozen as she whispered in his ear. For what seemed like an eternity he sat there in silence, the yellow beams of street lamps glancing off his skin like arrows. When he spoke, the words cut her to the heart. I don’t want a baby. You’ll think of it all the time and not of me.

  Agatha felt a hand on her arm. The attendant gestured toward the table, and Agatha obediently lay down. She felt very tense as she waited to be washed. The concept of a complete stranger soaping every crevice was not her idea of relaxation. She closed her eyes, bracing herself for an ordeal. But to her surprise, the moment when the warm, fragrant flannel made contact with her skin was intensely pleasurable. The attendant worked methodically up her body with deft, firm strokes, beginning with her feet. By the time she reached her knees, Agatha had fallen into a delicious state of drowsiness. It was almost a shame to be bundled into a steaming bath to soak after that, but the massage that followed was even more soporific. Lying on her front this time, she felt warm oil being poured onto the small of her back. Then the strong, purposeful hands were at work again, kneading away all the tension in her body. She was barely conscious when it came to an end.