Margaret Pargeter

by Sanja

As she tried to focus her sore eyes he forced her to take a little more brandy. He had removed his thick burnous to wrap around her and his thin shirt lay open at the neck, but he did not seem to feel the cold. He considered her urgently worded plea no more than briefly, and his answer brought no comfort.

  'The main fault was probably mine,' he said grimly. 'Mine for trusting you. I would perhaps be well advised to give you a taste of the same punishment as Salem received. Why should I forgive you?'

  'You wouldn't dare!' she gasped, all thoughts of reconciliation smothered immediately with indignation. Wildly she stared up at him, 'You wouldn't be so uncouth as to—as to. . .'

  'Take a whip to a woman?' he supplied the words she could not bring herself to utter. 'I could, and I yet might, my girl, so you have good reason to cringe. Don't imagine you are going to escape so lightly. Don't you think you deserve to be punished for what you have done this day? I have lost two good horses, and a man, who while not up to much, was useful. What can you offer to put in their place?'

  Ross, completely exhausted, was not able to reply. Her heavy lashes fell despairingly on her cold cheeks and stayed there. She slept until the moon had risen sufficiently to allow them to travel. Armel ben Yussef carried her to his horse, reclaiming his burnous which, once he was mounted, was entirely adequate to cover them both.

  His huge Arab stallion would have terrified Ross on any other occasion, feeling as it did about ten foot tall. 'Where are we going?' she protested feebly, in no way eager to leave her warm bed by the fire. She had been comfortable and her body still ached too much to appreciate being disturbed.

  'Back to camp,' Armel replied shortly, giving the necessary commands to his men before drawing her closer and tightening the reins. 'We are not so far away and my men are weary. They will be happier in their own beds.'

  Not one word about her comfort, not one note of tenderness in his low but perfectly audible voice. Wearily Ross rested against him, sliding her arm around his wide waist to balance herself as the horse broke into a swift canter. She took a strange comfort from the hard beat of his heart beneath her cheek, but her own heart burned with a kind of hopeless resentment. What use to be so near to him physically if they were miles apart in spirit? Remembering how he had threatened before she had fallen asleep, Ross shivered. Surely he could not have meant what he said? Yet what did she really know of him, or the way that women were treated, here in the East? She and Armel might appear to have much in common, but they were from different parts of the universe. There must be plenty of truth still in the old saying of East being East and West being West, otherwise it would never have survived so long. Armel and she were from entirely different cultures and it would be crazy, because of some strange magnetism between them, to pretend otherwise.

  Unhappily she stirred. Close up to him like this, her nostrils were assailed by the clean, masculine scent of his warm skin, her senses by every slight movement of his powerful body. Feeling her tremble, he said roughly, 'We will be home in a very short time, girl. Then you will soon feel quite yourself. Or almost!'

  Would she, ever again? Although her mind shied away from the two enigmatical words he had tacked on at the end, she doubted she would ever feel herself, not even if she lived for another thousand years. 'How can we be so near the camp?' she asked fretfully. 'Salem and I travelled all day."

  'After your horse went lame Salem must have realised he could never make the oasis he originally intended, so he simply circled back to the one where we found you. His intentions were obvious. He would have left you there and gone on alone in the morning.'

  Unhappily Ross sighed, her mind shying away from such a possibility. Instead she pondered slowly, 'So you just stumbled across us accidentally?'

  'Not exactly.'

  'Then—how?'

  'This curiosity of yours, girl, will land you in real trouble one day! I will just say that for once I allowed myself to be persuaded by my instincts. I felt there was something wrong, if not directly connected with you. It was an impression so strong that instead of making for my next place of call, I decided to return. If I had gone all the way back to camp I doubt if I would have been in time to save you. But by the will of Allah it seems we were meant to cross the track of your two horses. One being lame, I decided, in spite of my men's obvious disapproval, to follow my hunch. You are aware of the rest.'

  'You were only just in time.' Ross's voice shook. 'Or perhaps it would have been better to have left me to my fate.'

  'And spend the rest of my life, mademoiselle, remembering your white body lying crushed and broken !'

  'Yet you seem to regret having saved me?'

  His smile above her head was grim. 'You want me to assure you I couldn't live without you?'

  'No !' her voice was wild.

  'I would like to tell you to put this incident from your mind, but it could prevent you from committing the same folly again.'

  Why did he leave her with no argument, nothing to say? A sob caught in her throat and as he heard it his arms tightened cruelly.

  'I've had just about all I can take, girl, for one day. Don't push your luck too far, or worry too much about being in my debt. Your tears will only enrage me at this stage. I should advise you to keep them for later !'

  His words ringing, another threat in her ears, Ross subsided, thinking it almost funny that they should be quarrelling so sharply while so close to each other. He asked her to be quiet, yet his nearness, acting as it did like an intolerable stimulant, would not allow her to relax. She tried to sleep again, but could not. In the end she rested silently against him, her eyes closed but every nerve on edge, until they reached the oasis.

  Hours later she was conscious of being lifted from the horse's back and that Armel ben Yussef was carrying her into her tent. There were many excited, chattering voices, and she thought she heard Jamila's among them, but suddenly not able to face them, she kept her cheek turned against Armel's broad chest, pretending she didn't hear.

  With relief she heard him dismissing them all curtly, and the tent flap dropping behind him. He carried her swiftly through to the inner room, laying her on the bed. Her eyes fluttered open and she managed to look at him. She felt so stiff and sore and miserable it was a real effort, but she did not want him to think she pretended to be asleep. He knew well, because she had kept gazing at him during their long journey, that she was not.

  'If you can manage to undress,' he frowned, staring down at her disreputable trousers, her torn shirt, 'I'll bring you a drink. Then I shall collect my own things and sleep in the outer tent, so as to be near if you need me.'

  Ross woke the next morning with the same sense of fear she had known after Armel had rescued her the first time, and again she felt exhausted, scarcely able to move. Whatever he had given her had certainly removed the persistent ache from her limbs, but she still felt weary. As if since yesterday she had lived through a hundred experiences and come through none of them very well.

  So much for die success of her little ventures! Bitterly Ross reflected. Did disaster have to follow her wherever she went? Never, she vowed, would she try anything out of the ordinary again. There were Freddy and the boys who might have done better without her, even if none of that episode had been exactly her fault. If she had not allowed herself to be persuaded in the first place none of that might have happened. As to this second, equally infamous event—well, there could never be any doubt that she had been entirely to blame for this. Overcome by remorse at the thought of her poor horse, Ross buried her fair head in her pillow and began to weep. Salem, for all his wickedness, she felt too ashamed to think about.

  Without warning the flap of her room opened and Armel walked in. She knew who it was right away because she recognised his firm tread. Or was it simply that her senses were coming instinctively to know when he was around? He seemed to move like a tiger in the night. Probably because of his devious career he had trained himself to approach on quiet, cat-like feet.

  He spoke softl
y too, if there was still a thread of steel in his lowered voice. Twice he murmured her name and, when she made no< immediate reply as she was trying desperately to stem her regrettable flow of tears, he put a hand on her hunched shoulder and far from gently turned her round.

  Staring down at her, he regarded her tumbled hair, the tears streaming wildly down pale cheeks. 'Aren't you feeling any better?' he asked, so coolly that, in spite of realising what she owed him, she felt infinitely worse.

  She could only look at him helplessly, her blue eyes filling unconsciously with a nervous apprehension at the sight of his hard self-assurance. 'I don't know why I'm crying,' she confessed, on a far from elegant little sniff. 'I can't seem to stop. I expect it's just reaction.'

  He merely nodded as he picked up her wrist, frowning at the suddenly accelerated pulse rate. Ross, terrified that he should guess it was because he had touched her, let him assume she was frightened that he might punish her for what she had done. Her faltering speech to this effect obviously did not impress him.

  'Like all women you are not prepared to pay for your crimes,' he taunted, his face hardening. 'This time I think you have been punished enough, but if there is to be a next time, be warned! I will not show you the same leniency twice. I will personally see that you suffer.'

  Ross lowered her fair head again, his coldness drying her tears as nothing else could. Furtively she rubbed the last of them away, childishly, with the back of her hand. She deserved what he said, but the implications of it made her shiver. 'I suppose you are barely civilised,' she mumbled recklessly.

  'That you might well find out,' he retorted laconically enough, but she could feel his gaze stabbing her downbent head.

  It was like a fight, a battle all the way, and he didn't believe in sparing her. Why did she have to feel so hopelessly drawn to a man who could only hurt her? Yet his attraction was such that she had to steel herself against him, to strive to be cool and detached when she secretly only wanted to be in his arms.

  'Aren't you going off on your travels again?' she inquired impulsively, trying to isolate such an alarming thought. 'My behaviour yesterday must have ruined your chances of— er—doing what you set out to do.' She hesitated to mention outright his questionable career—the spoils he might have gathered if he had not come to her rescue.

  A slight smile quirked his wide lips as if he understood quite well what she had tactfully not referred to, but he merely said, 'No, Rosalind, I am not going anywhere. Not until you are ready to come with me.'

  It was obvious he didn't trust her any more. 'What about your men?'

  'My men don't expect to travel today.' His glittering eyes taunted her. 'They know I have my woman to see to.'

  'Your woman?' she gasped.

  'That is how they regard you.' His gaze rested with interest on the colour that came and went hotly in her pale cheeks. 'Ill-gotten gain doesn't come into it. They consider I came by you honourably.'

  So he was back at that again! It was just as probable he had no business to take him away. He would never, she felt sure, stay here specially because of her, but had he any idea, when he talked like this, what he did to her? He wore his white headdress this morning, bound around with the usual rope cords, but his burnous was missing and his light shirt was open to the waist. He was handsome and arrogant enough to take any girl's eye, but he had something beyond mere good looks which would bind a woman to him irrevocably.

  Feeling a whole lot like a fly caught in a web, Ross tried desperately to fight such an attraction. 'There were men with you when you first found me. They must know quite well the true facts.'

  His dark brows rose mockingly. 'So?'

  'Well,' she floundered, 'in the circumstances, if they have the wrong impression, isn't it up to you to tell them the truth?'

  He said, very soberly indeed, 'The truth, Miss Lindsay, is something you're often wary of speaking yourself, but should you concentrate on it a little it might surprise you. Any day now you're going to have to come to terms with yourself and you will find that nothing but your heart has anything to do with the final reckoning. As for my men, it is better they believe you belong to me, otherwise they might be tempted to take the same liberties as did Salem.'

  A pulse beat heavily against the white skin of her throat. She did not follow everything he said, but his words tormented her curiously. 'Salem was my fault, I told you.'

  'He had taken to following you around.'

  'How did you know that?'

  'I know everything that goes on here. Unfortunately, in this case, I didn't learn quick enough. I was only given this information, along with two very interesting sheets of paper, this morning.'

  'Oh,' Ross couldn't prevent the guilty flush, nor wonder at his sardonic tones.

  'You're quite an artist, mademoiselle. In fact it is obvious you have much natural talent. Your sketch, which must undoubtedly have been executed in haste, I find incredible.'

  Distrusting his compliment, she mumbled ungraciously, 'I've done a lot.'

  'No doubt. What I am more curious to learn is how you managed to get hold of the necessary material. You asked Jamila?'

  'No, she knew nothing,' Ross confessed.

  'You went to my tent?' he drawled.

  It was more of a statement than a question and she knew it would be little use prevaricating. Armel had a knack of discovering that which she would rather he didn't know. She realised she had trespassed and that he waited for an apology, but if she had to do penance for everything he considered a crime she would never be off her knees. 'Yes,' she muttered defiantly, refusing to look at him.

  'And did you discover nothing else besides two pieces of paper on your small tour of exploration?' he asked cynically.

  Beneath his wary gaze she felt herself go tense. 'I didn't explore, if that's what you mean. I merely took what I went for and ran.'

  Strangely enough this seemed almost to satisfy him. As he stood contemplating her thoughtfully, she rushed on, saying impulsively what she hadn't meant to a moment ago. 'I'm sorry, Armel, but I couldn't think of another way to make Salem understand. I didn't know where else to go. But you can see now that your other men can be told the truth. I promise not to approach any of them again.'

  His dark eyes never left her but gave nothing away. 'I spent the night in this tent, girl, in the other room. How do I explain that?'

  Ross felt startled surprise go right through her and something else she could not name. Nervously unsure, she bit her lip. 'You did?'

  He nodded with a kind of grim humour. 'I told you I was going to before you went to sleep.'

  'And,' she gulped, 'what did I say?'

  'You didn't say anything, but when I mentioned it you visibly relaxed. I took your approval for granted.'

  'Probably it was because of what I had been through. I think I was still afraid.'

  'Perhaps of the wrong man, mademoiselle .' He shrugged, his eyes on the pure curve of her throat. 'Once you screamed out and I came and held you in my arms until you slept again.'

  Her blue eyes dilated as they were drawn helplessly to his. She tried to remember, but could not. A fire began to throb through her veins, the same subtle excitement she had known before. He had held her and it seemed suddenly a deprivation that she hadn't known. It could never happen again. Despair tore through her and it didn't seem to matter that his eyes told her quite plainly he was aware of all she was thinking. Finding some sense, she murmured at last, her fair head drooping, 'I couldn't have known.'

  'Maybe not, but you put your own arms around me and begged me not to let you go. Almost I didn't, mademoiselle.

  Having you close to me like that is not something I could endure twice and keep a cool head. You melted against me, Rosalind, and clung.'

  'I must have been delirious 1'

  'But it still leaves you breathless?' Armel regarded her parted lips coolly. 'No, cherie, I chose to think it was more than delirium, but I will leave you to work it out for yourself.'

  Sudd
enly, for no reason other than to escape the tumult inside her, the feelings she must endeavour to hide from him, she cried wildly, 'I ran away 1 Doesn't that speak for itself?'

  His glance taunted her again. 'And I was almost believing you wanted to stay 1 To share a tent forever with a rough desert man.'

  'You know that wouldn't be possible 1'

  'I know it is said that anything is possible if one wants something enough. Now, I should advise you to rest.'

  Ross gazed after him as the tent flap closed behind him and she felt tears come again into her eyes. If only he had been a rough desert man—but she knew instinctively he would never be that.

  To her surprise, during the following days Ross saw quite a lot of Armel. She had not thought he was serious when he had talked of not going away again until she was ready to go with him, but when he began to teach her to ride properly she began to suspect he meant what he had said. After the first week he took her daily on short excursions into the desert and when they went alone Ross treasured these outings against the time when she would only have memories to ease the loneliness of her heart.

  It was on these excursions that he talked to her about the desert, the Moroccan people, their way of life, their Moslem religion. Once he told her that throughout the Koran, which is the Islam equivalent of the Christian New Testament and about the same length, the emphasis is laid on charity and justice. Above all it taught that Allah is a forgiver. The good Moslem prayed five times a day and fasted during the month of Ramadan. Armel could explain such things so clearly that

  Ross often marvelled, never having even the slightest difficulty in understanding what he tried to tell her.

  He talked of other things, too. Of how progress, and in some cases the lack of it, had affected them. He could go back for centuries, quoting reams from history, to the time when Morocco became independent in March 1956 and Mohammed V took the style of King until he died in 1961 and his son Hassan II succeeded.