Jasmine Nights

by Julia Gregson

  ‘Yes.’

  She gave him the strangest look.

  ‘I’m happy for you,’ she said at last, ‘because I . . .’ When she swallowed hard, he thought, I’ve never seen her cry before, how odd that today it should happen twice.

  ‘Because I . . . think . . . I sort of know that . . . well I think that everyone should die knowing they’ve had one great passion.’

  ‘Mother . . .’ He wanted to stop her right there. She was jinxing him; stepping into his dream.

  ‘It may sound silly and schoolgirlish, but I believe it. It gives you a tremendous confidence, a sense that you haven’t been cheated even if it does go wrong, and you mustn’t let anyone talk you out of it,’ she added fiercely. ‘If you get it wrong, at least it’s your mistake.’

  She’d squeezed his hand so hard, he’d felt some great secret iced up inside her, and hoped profoundly that she wouldn’t tell him what it was. He knew her well enough to know she would regret it later.

  ‘It’s nothing yet,’ he muttered to himself.

  ‘Is she really good?’ she asked again. ‘As a singer, I mean.’

  He smiled sardonically to himself at the sharpness of her tone. She liked people with a centre to them, and had treated one or two of the pretty girls he’d brought home before Annabel not exactly coldly, but with a certain drawing aside of skirts that had infuriated him at the time.

  ‘She’s very good,’ he couldn’t stop himself, ‘It’s so impressive.’

  ‘Well now listen!’ she warned. ‘Don’t get all foolish and romantic about her. If she’s like that, her life will be as important as yours. You will have to understand this and it will be very, very hard for you. I’m afraid you’re rather used to being the centre of attention yourself.’

  ‘Oh thanks, Ma,’ he mocked her. ‘A fascinating bighead, is that it? Anyway, I like her passion. I’m not frightened of it.’ It was too late now, an act of cruelty almost, to tell his mother about how badly that first and last date had ended.

  And looking at her son, Alys Benson had a piercing sense of how much war had already taken from him: his youth, his two best friends. She told herself to remember him like this, tonight, his dark hair wet with dew, his eyes so bright.

  ‘Anyway,’ he helped himself to one of her cigarettes and lit it, ‘North Africa is where everything’s happening at the moment, and I’m,’ he shook his head, ‘I’m a fighter boy now.’ He bunched his fists and struck a Tarzan pose – her silly schoolboy again. ‘And we’re not getting enough of it at the moment. I can’t stay doing nothing for ever. It will drive me mad.’

  ‘I can imagine,’ she’d said, thinking, I hate flying, I wish your father had never told you about it.

  And he thought, No you can’t. Only another fighter pilot could know how shockingly addictive the whole thing was. It was the way he formed friendships with other men far deeper than anything he’d ever experienced before; the way he frightened himself, defined himself as a man. Could any woman possibly understand this? He had no way of knowing, although he’d thought about it recently in connection with Saba. He’d written one more letter to her but heard nothing back. With her, he would have to fly blind.

  Chapter 15

  As the morning progressed, Arleta’s hair grew greener and her mood darkened until it was positively dangerous and it was imperative to get her to the hairdresser’s before they left town.

  Willie, desperate to help, had dashed over to Cicurel’s, the so-called Harrods of Cairo, to see if they stocked Tahitian Sunset, or, failing that, any other cure for green hair, and drawn a blank with the smart French woman who ran their cosmetic department. He’d fared no better with the snooty, heavily powdered English girl behind the make-up counter at Chemla’s, another fancy emporium, who told him in a fake Home Counties drawl it was madness to try and dye your own hair, particularly out here. In desperation he ran back to the barber’s shop in the bazaar and came back with a pot of black goo that the proprietor highly recommended, and which Arleta looked at dubiously, particularly when she learned its source. When she snapped, ‘He sounds like the same idiot that sold me this,’ Willie slunk off to the corner like a dog that had been badly beaten but still longed to please.

  Then Arleta had a brainwave. Why on earth hadn’t she thought of it before?

  Scrabbling through her knapsack, she said a friend of hers on the last Cairo tour with the Merrybelles had highly recommended a hairdressing shop on Sharia Kasr-el-Nil, not far from the office. Where in the hell was it? She thumbed through her address book; here it was: The Salon Vogue, number 37, proprietor Mitzie Duhring.

  ‘Go with her,’ Willie softly pleaded with Saba. ‘I’d offer, but she’d bite my head off. You could have your own done there.’

  Saba needed no persuading. She felt sorry for Arleta, who suddenly seemed so vulnerable, and besides, her own hair had grown remarkably in the heat and had had no attention since her last cut at Pam’s of Pomeroy Street. Willie said there was plenty of time between now and leaving.

  An hour and ten minutes later, they both sat wrapped in towels, sipping tea in a discreetly furnished, softly lit salon that felt like a private sitting room. The owner of the salon, a severely dressed, quietly spoken woman, more doctor than hairdresser, unwrapped Arleta’s turban, and was closely examining the damage. She rubbed the hair between her fingers; as she held it for inspection under the light she murmured in a guttural voice, ‘Gott in Himmel, Good God! What have they done to you?’

  Saba and Arleta glanced quickly at each other. She couldn’t be . . . surely not – even in the topsy-turvy world of Cairo. But her name was Mitzie Duhring, which sounded pretty German. Saba’s heart started to pound. If she told Cleeve about this so early in her employment, he might think her ridiculous, like an overeager schoolgirl on her first day at school pumping her hand in the air. But surely she should say something.

  In a silence conspicuously lacking in the usual going anywhere nice tonight? and where have you come from? Mitzie ordered her assistant to wash Arleta’s hair thoroughly four times. Next, she silently cut Saba’s hair – her efficient, bony hands winking with diamonds, her face in partial shadow in the mirror.

  Saba, pretending to read an old copy of Vogue, watched her carefully when it was safe to do so. She estimated that if she left the salon by four o’clock, there would be time to get a taxi to Cleeve’s and be back at the flat to get her packing done.

  Arleta, visibly relaxing in Madame Duhring’s calmly professional hands, winked at Saba when she caught her eye. She was in the middle of telling Saba that Mitzie had just told her she could so easily have gone bald again, just like in Malta, when a small brass bell over the salon door jingled, and a stunning young Egyptian woman walked in – pale-complexioned, with almond-shaped eyes and dressed in high heels, silk stockings and a beautifully tailored blue silk suit. The two long braids that hung to her waist swung as she walked and so did her hips, giving the impression of a knowing and provocative schoolgirl.

  The assistant, who was washing Arleta’s hair, let out a gasp when she saw her. This was someone of importance. She excused herself, rinsed her hands and ushered the highly scented stranger to the chair beside Saba’s.

  Saba watched Mitzie’s reflection in the glass. She heard her greet the woman, first in French then in English The braids were released, the thick black hair combed and discussed with the same muted seriousness with which Arleta’s problems had been addressed. Five minutes later, the woman sat down again – her hair wet and wound in a turban. When Saba caught her eye in the mirror, the exotic stranger smiled at her.

  ‘Do you mind if I smoke?’ she asked. She took out a mother-of-pearl cigarette holder.

  ‘Not one bit.’ Saba pushed the ashtray towards her.

  Saba’s ears were on stalks as the assistant wound the woman’s hair into an elaborate series of pin curls. Mitzie addressed the woman formally as Madame Hekmet. When she complimented her on how well her skin was looking, the woman dimpled prettily and s
aid she had her own mother to thank for that. She had been very fussy with her ever since she was a child. Lots of fresh vegetables and fruit and nuts and seeds. ‘And of course the dancing helps,’ she added. ‘It keeps me healthy.’

  So Egyptian. A dancer. A successful one, judging by the impeccable handbag, the pale suede shoes. Saba wondered if she was a belly dancer – the ones Willie called gippy tummies.

  Mitzie was combing out the woman’s heavy cloud of hair now – it came almost to her waist.

  ‘So, cut it all off?’ Mitzie smiled at what was obviously an old joke between them.

  ‘We’ll keep it for now.’ The woman’s voice was husky and self-satisfied. ‘I’m giving a party, for some of your people.’

  Mitzie’s scissors stopped snipping.

  ‘Ah.’ She raised her eyebrows and glanced quickly at Saba.

  The dancer looked older in her turban and with her hair scraped back. She moved her finger along her eyebrow. ‘So, I want something special.’

  ‘One second.’

  Mitzie walked over to Saba, and with an automatic smile, tested the dryness of her hair with a finger; she put her under a hairdryer, and flicked the switch.

  Saba, inside its deafening hum, wondered if her own imagination was overheating. If this German-sounding person was really German, was she allowed to run a business here when the rest had gone? And if she was German, why had the dancer said a party for some of your people, so openly and in English. It made no sense.

  Half an hour later, Mitzie turned off the hairdryer and again, without conversation, combed her out. Saba was delighted: Her hair fell in a brilliantly shiny, sophisticated Veronica Lake-ish swoop over her right eye. Mitzie definitely knew her stuff.

  Arleta did a mock double-take and put her two thumbs in the air.

  ‘How long are you going to be?’ Saba mouthed, tapping her watch.

  ‘One hour,’ said Arleta. There was a tray of coffee beside her and some petits fours.

  ‘I’m going back to pack.’ Saba pointed towards the clock on the wall.

  Arleta beckoned her over. ‘What’s the verdict?’ She lifted the corner of her hairnet. ‘Still a gremlin?’

  Saba peeped under the hood. Arleta’s new hair was a hot white-blonde – much blonder than she’d been before.

  ‘Sensational,’ she said. ‘You’re going to love it.’

  ‘Listen.’ Half an hour later, Saba was sitting on Cleeve’s sofa. His lift had broken down; she was breathless from the stairs. ‘I have no idea whether this is important or not, but I thought I should tell you anyway.’

  She told him about the green hair, the Salon Vogue, the possibly German proprietor. ‘At least I’m almost certain she was, although she spoke mostly in English.’

  Cleeve sprawled and clasped his hands behind his head. He looked at her approvingly.

  ‘Full marks,’ he said, ‘for picking up on that one. I know Mitzie well – everybody does – she’s a fixture on the Cairo social scene.’

  Saba flushed with embarrassment – she’d made a twit of herself thinking this was hot news.

  ‘No, your instincts were spot on,’ Cleeve said. ‘And she is an interesting anomaly. Lady Lampson, the Ambassador’s wife, is one of her clients, also, or so I’ve heard, Freya Stark the explorer when she’s not off on some donkey somewhere, but her most famous client, and the one she owes her liberty to, is Queen Farida, the wife of the Egyptian king.’

  Saba was totally confused – the wife of the English ambassador having her hair cut by a German? It made no sense at all.

  ‘Here’s the thing,’ Cleeve said. ‘The Embassy would love to see Frau Duhring interned with the rest of the Germans in Cairo, but they dare not come between a woman and her hair because Queen Farida adores her. Funny when you think of it, the fate of a nation resting on the queen’s curls.’

  ‘But is she a Nazi?’ Saba felt a crawling up her spine.

  ‘No, because she and her husband refused to join the Nazi party – they’ve been cast out by the German community, but her situation is precarious. Her husband has already been interned and Sir Miles Lampson, an awful twit, would love to send her away; he doesn’t like the idea of a German national snooping on all that juicy hairdressing-salon gossip. But he can’t afford to – we’re desperately unpopular with the Egyptians at the moment, and this, silly as it may sound, could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. We simply can’t afford to upset Farida – the King adores her, he’s said to buy her a new jewel every month.

  ‘Any other good nuggets while you were there?’ he threw out casually while he was making tea.

  ‘Well maybe . . . I don’t know. Probably nothing.’

  ‘Say it.’

  ‘Well only this, there was another woman there, very beautiful, a dancer, Madame Hekmet they called her; she’s giving a party for German people. It sounded as if she thought Mitzie knew who was going to be there, but I couldn’t hear all of it – Mitzie put me under the dryer.’

  ‘Hmm . . .’ Cleeve drummed his fingers against his lip. ‘Nothing else?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Could be a hole in one, could be straight into the rough – you simply never know.’

  She had no idea what he was talking about.

  ‘Did she say where the party was?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Almost certainly in Imbaba, where the Cairo houseboats are moored – it’s near the Kit Kat Club where she probably dances. Anyway,’ he added briskly, ‘we can easily check that out.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘That’s for me to know and you to find out.’ He smiled at her playfully. ‘Tea?’

  ‘No thanks; I’ve got to run. We leave tomorrow. I’ll get a rocket from Bagley if I’m late.’

  The lift was working again, clanking and complaining, its filthy yellow ceiling light stacked with more dead flies.

  ‘You’re quite the girl, aren’t you?’ Cleeve remarked softly before he shut the cage door behind her. He peered through the bars at her and smiled. ‘I had a feeling you’d be rather good at this, and if you are, we have something quite important coming up.’

  He pressed the button and, as the lift cranked down, she saw his face, his knees, his desert boots disappearing and then heard only his echoing voice coming down the dark shaft, saying something valedictory like farewell, or good luck, or break a leg, and hearing this, she got a great rush of almost unbearable excitement thinking that at last her life was truly taking off. They were leaving. Tomorrow.

  Chapter 16

  There was a mad dash the next day to pack up the flat, and get their kit in order before their truck picked them up at 1600 hours. They were going, Furness had finally told them, to Abu Sueir, an airbase in the Canal Zone, about seventy-five miles north-east of Cairo.

  Before they left, Saba wrote to her father.

  Dear Baba,

  We’re leaving Cairo today to go on the road and start our proper work. I want you to know that if anything happens to me – which it won’t! – I have done what I felt I was meant to do here, and that I am sorry that what has made me happy has hurt you so. I hope one day we will understand each other better. Where is your ship now? Please tell me, and please write. You can send a letter to me here at ENSA, Sharia Kasr-el-Nil. The posts are terribly slow but it would be good to hear from you.

  Saba

  There were other things she wanted to tell him, both trivial and large: how it had felt that night singing ‘Mazi’ in front of the Pyramids at the Mena House; how magical Cairo could be with its lurid sunsets, its feluccas sailing like giant moths down the Nile; the amazing shops – some far posher than any she’d seen in Cardiff; how awful too, with its heat and blare and noise and stinks – the drains and camel dung, the spices from the markets, the jasmine ropes sold at restaurants at night, the indefinable smell of dust. She wanted to say that she feared for him. (Janine, whose brother-in-law was in the merchant navy, had spelled out for her in grisly detail the carnage in the shipping lanes a
t home.) She wanted to say that she missed him, that she hated him too for being so childish. Such a muddle in her head about him, such a stupid waste of love.

  Her sweaty fingers made the letters of the address run. Pomeroy Street, Butetown, Cardiff felt like a million miles away from here. Searching for moisture in her dry mouth, she licked the edges of a yellow aerogramme and wondered if she’d ever see him again.

  They left Cairo a few hours later in a battle-scarred bus and headed north-east to Abu Sueir. Bagley and some soldiers had gone ahead of them to set up the portable stage.

  Saba sat by herself – in this heat a body next to you felt like a furnace, and there were enough empty seats for them to have a row each. Arleta and Janine – still no-speakies – were at opposite ends of the bus; the acrobats at the back; Willie, dead to the world, snored percussively under a copy of the NAAFI newspaper and Captain Furness sat tensely behind the driver, his swagger stick on the seat beside him, ham-like knees stretched out in the aisle.

  She made a pillow of her khaki jacket – it was too hot to rest your head against the glass – and though she already felt car sick from the fumes, tried to tell herself the adventure was beginning. Outside the window there was precious little to see but miles and miles of crinkled sand, a few dead trees, a heap of animal bones.

  She was half asleep when Willie staggered towards her and dropped some paper in her lap.

  ‘For you, my love. They came from the NAAFI earlier but you was asleep.’

  Two letters. For her! She woke up immediately. One was written in her mother’s slapdash hand, and postmarked South Wales. The other’s unfamiliar handwriting made her stomach clench. She turned it around in her hand and stuffed it in the canvas bag under her feet.

  Dear Saba, her mother wrote,

  Everyone is fine on Pomeroy Street, apart from Mrs Prentice who went to Swansea to see her sister two weeks ago and got bombed. I’m still working all the hours God sends at you know where. Tansu was a bit mopey for a while without you but now is part of a knitting group at the Sailors’ Hall, which has cheered her up no end. Little Lou has started a new school in Ponty and she is happy there and still comes home at the weekends. Did you get her letter yet? Your father is away again, working for . . . a crudely cut hole from the censor’s scissors here, but I think he has written to you. I don’t know what to say about that, so I will leave it to him, but if he hasn’t written know that the posts are terrible and try not to worry too much, it may not mean anything.