A Canopy of Rose Leaves

by Isobel Chace

  ‘You make him sound a complete idiot!’ she shot at him.

  He nodded his head solemnly. ‘That says it all,’ he agreed.

  Deborah nursed her anger all the way back through the hotel gardens. She cast several furious glances in his direction, but as he showed no signs of noticing her displeasure, it seemed rather a wasted effort on her part.

  ‘I think you’re a fraud,’ she announced at last. ‘You don’t like anyone to argue with you any more than Ian does. If they do, you look down your nose at them and make them feel small. Well, it won’t work with me! I don’t care if you do think I’m stupid!’

  ‘Not stupid,’ he denied, pausing to admire a rose that was just burgeoning into life close to the path. ‘Young, and as green as grass, but not stupid!’

  ‘Nor am I as green as I’m cabbage-looking!’ Deborah retorted, quoting a much-favoured phrase of the lady who helped her mother with the housework at home. When he didn’t answer she was irritated beyond endurance. ‘Am I?’ she challenged him.

  ‘Greener, if possible.’

  ‘Oh, you’re abominable!’ Deborah was very much afraid she was going to laugh. ‘I’m not as inexperienced as you think. One can’t help acquiring a certain savoir faire in a shop, especially in one like ours which attracts some of the oddest customers.’

  ‘Tell me about it,’ he invited her.

  She was happy to do so. She told him how they had decided to sell only things that had their origin in the East, hoping that it would give them a gloss of mystery and pull the customers in. ‘It worked very well!’ she assured him. ‘We were lucky too, for there’s a great vogue for our sort of thing at the moment. We’ll make a bomb with our Persian stuff if I do a good job out here. We’ve never been able to get reliable suppliers in Iran, and yet all their things are simply marvellous! Ceramics, miniatures, printed cottons, carpets, they have the best of everything, if I can only get in touch with the right people.’

  ‘That shouldn’t be too difficult,’ he encouraged her. ‘No,’ she sighed. ‘But I don’t really know where to begin.’

  He opened the door into the hotel for her with a mocking smile. ‘A green, callow maiden with beguiling ways, who sounds very much as though she’s about to ask me to do her work for her,’ he taunted her.

  She tossed her head as she went past him. ‘You’d be the very last person I should ask! You don’t have to worry that I shall involve you in anything I do! I’m not as callow as that!’

  ‘I’m glad you recognise the dangers of arousing my interest,’ he replied, unperturbed.

  ‘Your interest lies in perfection,’ she reminded him. ‘Have you forgotten?’

  ‘Perfection, like beauty, lies in the eye of the beholder. Perhaps I’m more easily pleased than you imagine.’

  Deborah was conscious of the same breathless feeling of excitement that she had experienced the evening before. She didn’t like the sensation. It made her vulnerable in a way that she would not have believed possible. It was as if he didn’t see her as a person at all, but only as a female being who was strictly not to be taken seriously. Not even Ian had made her as conscious of her sex as Roger Derwent did when he looked at her in a certain way and uttered those throwaway remarks that confused rather than informed her. What did he mean now, for instance? Did he mean that he liked her a little after all?

  She sat opposite him at the table, convinced that she was on the point of making a fool of herself. He was bound to ask her to make up her mind about where she wanted to live, and at that moment she couldn’t even decide how she wanted to have her eggs.

  ‘We’ll have them scrambled,’ Mr. Derwent told the waiter, ‘and some hot local bread. And coffee for both of us.’

  ‘I prefer tea,’ Deborah found herself saying.

  He leaned back, looking at her down his nose, his eyes amused. ‘You should have spoken up earlier. However, I don’t suppose the waiter will mind bringing you tea if you really want it.’

  But when the waiter came back with their eggs, Deborah said nothing at all. She told herself it wasn’t worth making a fuss about nothing, but the glint in Roger Derwent’s eyes told her he was not deceived. She had chosen the wrong issue on which to assert herself and they both knew it. She hurried into speech before the incident attained an importance it didn’t deserve, inhibiting her fund of small talk still further.

  ‘I don’t want to live just anywhere,’ she said firmly.

  ‘I want to live right in the city or on a bus route—’

  ‘You’ve got it all worked out, I see.’ He felt in his pocket and produced a piece of paper setting it down on the table before him. ‘I think both these addresses are fairly get-atable. The choice is between a Persian family who will probably want you to conform more or less to their way of life, or a young American couple who won’t be shocked at anything you do, but who won’t be able to give you the same insight into the country. Which would you prefer?’

  Deborah opened her mouth to speak. The Persian family sounded just right to her. It would be exciting to see how Iranians lived when they were at home. But if their ways were very different would she be free to find her own way round the city, making her new contacts? She hesitated, unsure of herself, and was lost. ‘Which do you think best?’ she asked him.

  ‘Reinhardts—the Americans. They’re a brother and sister from California. He’s on an exchange from Harvard and is finding things a bit tough. His sister is an artist of sorts and came along to be inspired by one of the oldest civilisations in the world. She has more life in her little finger than most people have in their whole bodies. If you could keep her out of the worst kinds of trouble while you’re with her, both her brother and I will be eternally grateful to you!’

  ‘Me?’ she said, startled.

  ‘Maxine gets bored easily. It will give her something to do to help you find what you need for your shop. You’ll find her useful too. She has an eye for that sort of thing.’

  It was easy to see that he liked Maxine all right! Deborah doubted she would share his enthusiasm, but perhaps her brother would be more to her taste.

  ‘What’s he like?’ she asked.

  ‘Howard? He’s not for you,’ he declared. ‘He’s large, plays golf whenever he can and has a fiancée back home who has enough money to buy them both the best things in life. As an academic he’s second-rate.’

  Deborah put her fork down on her plate, not looking at him. ‘Your judgments are too harsh for comfort. I’d hate to know what you think of me.’

  ‘You know already,’ he told her.

  ‘Only the inessentials,’ she said grandly. ‘I’m sure Maxine is much more your cup of tea!’ She gave him a curious look. ‘Does she give you an academic argument of the required standard before you kiss her goodnight?’

  He didn’t look angry at all, which was something of a disappointment to her. She had wanted to make him angry. She had wanted to know if he would apply reason and objectivity to his snub if he were fighting mad, or whether he would lose his temper just like any other man and hit out with the first thing that came into his head.

  ‘I wouldn’t describe Maxine as academic. She has other attributes.’ He smiled reflectively. ‘They’re more physical than intellectual, but none the worse for that!’

  ‘I can’t wait to meet her!’ Deborah declared.

  ‘Mm,’ he agreed, ‘I think you’ll like her. You have a great deal in common!’

  ‘Oh, surely not!’ she exclaimed. ‘How could we have?’

  His eyes swept over her as he rose languidly to his feet. ‘I should have thought Ian would have told you that!’ he retorted.

  Deborah signed for his breakfast with a hand that trembled. Did he mean that he found her physically attractive? She couldn’t believe it! Besides, Ian had always played down that side of their relationship. He had had all sorts of reasons for doing so; how often had he told her that they had to work together and that it was a mistake to make too much about how much they felt for each other? It
hadn’t stopped him wanting to anticipate their marriage, but he had said that that was because it was a normal thing to do, whereas she had built it up into something strange and wonderful and was bound to be disappointed.

  ‘Why bother to get married at all?’ she had asked him, made miserable by his insistence.

  ‘Oh, grow up, Debbie!’ he had flung back at her. ‘We suit one another and we have the shop to consider, but this is something else. Surely you know better than to suppose that it always leads to a respectable, settled relationship? One likes a bit of variety, and why not? I shan’t ask you any questions about your past, if that’s what’s worrying you!’

  ‘I don’t want to!’ was all she had been able to say. She had never thought that Ian and she could be such strangers to each other’s deepest feelings and she had felt quite cold with shock.

  ‘Then don’t complain when I go out by myself!’ he had shouted at her. ‘I was trying to be kind! You haven’t got what it takes, if you want to know!’

  It hadn’t been long after that that he had gone to Spain and had come home with Anne. That had been the lesser hurt of the two. That had dealt a wound over which the clean scar tissue had already begun to grow; the other still festered and hadn’t begun to heal. It was there at the back of her mind all the time, as hurtful now as it had been then.

  Roger Derwent had already left the dining-room when Deborah rose to follow him. It took all her resolution to force herself to precede him out of the door of the hotel and she turned blindly towards the roses so that he wouldn’t see the tears in her eyes.

  ‘You’ll have to get used to people mentioning Ian,’ he said behind her shoulder. ‘Does it still upset you so much?’

  She shook her head. Please God, he wasn’t going to be kind to her. If he said anything more she wouldn’t be able to stop from crying, and men, she knew, were always embarrassed by women’s tears.

  ‘It isn’t Ian,’ she said.

  ‘No?’ He turned her face to his, cupping her chin in the palm of his hand. ‘If it isn’t Ian, who is it?’

  She jerked her head to be free of him, but he would not allow her to escape. ‘It isn’t anyone!’ she said. ‘At least, it was Ian, but not in the way you mean. This happened before—before he went away. I don’t want to talk about it!’

  ‘Not all men are as clumsy as that brother of mine,’ he told her.

  ‘But he wasn’t! It was I who failed him!’

  He touched her lightly on the shoulder. ‘You make a bad liar, Deborah Day. You’ll have to do better than that if you want to deceive me!’ He bent down to pick a small pink rose that he threaded through the buttonhole at her neck, putting his whole mind to the simple task. Then he touched her face with a masterful hand. ‘Hafez said it all: “Oh, weep no more! For once again Life’s Spring Shall throne her in the meadows green, and o’er Her head the minstrel of the night shall fling A canopy of rose leaves, score on score.” ’

  Was he the minstrel of the night? She put up her hand to the rose he had given her, but he shook his head at her.

  ‘I haven’t the right romantic touch,’ he said at once. ‘A woman is more likely to receive a bed of nails than one of rose petals from me. I lead my own life and follow my own desires. I’m not prepared to load myself up with the responsibility for the needs of anyone else.’

  ‘It sounds lonely to me,’ Deborah commented.

  His mouth twisted into a cynical smile. ‘Companionship is cheap. I have all of it I need. Better a lonely night or two than being constantly torn in two by irreconcilable demands on one’s time.’

  ‘Perhaps she wouldn’t want to compete with your other interests,’ Deborah suggested. ‘She might be content just to be there when you need her.’

  ‘Like my father expected my mother to be?’ he countered roughly. ‘What kind of a woman would she be to be content with that? No, my dear, marriage is for other people, not for me!’

  ‘Perhaps it isn’t for me either,’ she said.

  ‘It would be a pity if you came to that conclusion. You were made to make some man happy and be loved to distraction by him. He’ll be a lucky man!’

  ‘I don’t think I’d love a man like that,’ she said positively. ‘If he were too predictable, he’d probably bore me to death.’ She turned to him, bright-eyed. ‘I expect that’s why your mother parted company with your father, if the truth were known. It probably wasn’t him at all, but she who was bored stiff with living with him. I’ve never thought about it before, but Ian’s mother has a sort of glassy-eyed look as though she hasn’t allowed a new thought to enter her head for at least ten years!’

  ‘And you accuse me of harsh judgments!’ he admonished her. ‘How my mother would love you!’

  ‘Would she?’ Deborah’s moment of confidence vanished and she beat a swift retreat. ‘I’ve known Ian’s mother ever since I can remember. She’s very nice really.’

  ‘A charming woman,’ he agreed.

  She eyed him suspiciously. ‘Your mother had few friends,’ she ventured. ‘My parents were rather scared of her.’

  ‘Does she frighten you?’

  The thought of her did. She had only heard her mentioned once or twice and had hardly connected her with the Derwent family at all. The Mrs. Derwent she knew had been in full possession of her husband long before Deborah had been born.

  ‘I’ll probably never meet her,’ she said.

  Roger Derwent smiled a slow, cool smile. ‘I hope you don’t. I have a feeling you’d form an alliance that would be impregnable even to one of my calibre. I’ll be much safer if you become fast friends with Maxine and play around with her and her dozens of young men who always surround her wherever she goes.’

  Deborah thought his mother sounded more interesting. ‘Where does your mother live?’ she asked him.

  ‘She’s in Canada at the moment—’

  ‘But she’s coming to Iran?’

  ‘You’ll have gone home by then!’ he assured her. He looked meaningly at his watch. ‘If we don’t go now, I won’t be able to take you to Maxine’s before lunch. I have to work for my living, even if you don’t.’

  ‘But I do!’ she said quickly, and then, seeing his mocking look, ‘I think I’d like your mother after all. I’m not afraid of her son, so why should I be afraid of meeting her?’

  CHAPTER THREE

  Shiraz looked different from the way it had the day before. The shadows that had brooded over the streets were gone, cleared away by the magic of the sun and the company she was keeping. Walking beside Roger Derwent, it would have been poor-spirited indeed to have been nervous of anything.

  ‘Do you mind going through the bazaar?’ he asked her.

  She would have minded last night, today it was a glorious adventure. ‘Is that the quickest way?’

  He nodded. ‘Maxine found this place behind the bazaar and made Howard rent it for her. It’s some way from the university, but he has to put up with that. Maxine is really enjoying herself there, and why not? I envy them a little being in such a Persian district. We’re more cosmopolitan where I’m living.’

  ‘Where’s that?’

  ‘Near the new university buildings.’

  Deborah wondered if he would ever invite her there. Probably not. He would see her settled in with his American friends and then he would leave her severely alone. He had already made it plain that he didn’t want to get involved with her, not in any way at all. She would be a fool if she didn’t take the hint and leave him alone—and she was not a complete fool, not yet she wasn’t!

  The bazaar was fun. At first Deborah had eyes only for the crowded humanity that rushed to and fro past the tiny shops and stalls, many of them lit by strip-lights fashioned in a complete circle. They sold hand printed materials and shopping bags, silks and satins, delicate miniature paintings on ivory and camel-bones, nuts, fruits and spices, hideous furniture, and more beautiful carpets of every description than Deborah had seen in her life before. Porters, carrying huge loads on their ba
cks, rushed hither and yon, shouting a warning to the innocent shoppers who were likely to be knocked down by them. Here and there, a small boy, scenting a possible sale, would advance and beg her to enter this or that shop, claiming that only there would she find exactly what she wanted at a reasonable price.

  Roger Derwent hurried her past even the best-looking bargains. ‘You can come back later,’ he said again and again. ‘Come on, Deborah! I have a lecture to give before lunch and I’m not going to be late for it. Stop dawdling and come along!’

  It was at that moment that Deborah looked up and saw the covered roof, made entirely of brick, culminating in a series of domes that were quite beautiful. She stood stock still and stared upwards, pleased by the intricate patterns that the bricks made.

  ‘You didn’t tell me about that!’ she complained.

  ‘I hoped you weren’t going to notice,’ he confessed. ‘This is known as the Regent’s Bazaar. It was put up by Karim Khan Zand, who also built the Regent’s Mosque, the Masjid-e Vakil, which is just by the entrance. Maxine will take you there if you want to see it.’

  Maxine again! It was useless to want to be taken everywhere by Roger, but he might have been a little more forthcoming. She suspected that he had a love for Persian architecture that Maxine had not and she would have liked to have benefited from his knowledge, if nothing else.

  She sighed. ‘What is your lecture about?’ she asked.

  ‘English Literature.’

  So he wasn’t going to tell her about that either. She sighed again. ‘I haven’t any degrees to prove it,’ she said, ‘but I am thought to be quite well read by my friends.’

  She had his full attention then. ‘My dear girl, I never doubted it!’ he mocked her. ‘But I’m no Ian to enjoy your adulation. I don’t like being quoted, and I don’t like secondhand opinions of any kind.’

  ‘I suppose you’d prefer it if I didn’t have any opinions at all?’ she retorted, hurt.

  ‘It might be more honest,’ he said drily. He smiled a little at her woebegone face. ‘Cheer up, my dear, there are plenty of others who will be only too willing to be impressed by your erudition, if that’s what you want.’