‘And Miss Latimer?’ Mark Lane asked tentatively.
The black brows met satanically. ‘Miss Latimer is Sebastian’s problem, not mine,’ he said and wheeled on his heel, leaving Mark Lane alone as the deserted mission church of Gondokoro came into view.
Harriet shivered as they stepped ashore. There was something eerie about the desolate, crumbling church. Only a giant cross remained intact. What kind of men had forged their way through the swamp of the Sudd to settle here in the hope of converting the heathen? Whoever they had been, they had not survived.
It took three days for the provisions that were to be taken with them to be sorted and packed ready for transport on the camels. The horses were for Raoul, Sebastian and Harriet to ride. The mules had been Wilfred and Reverend Lane’s personal choice of transport. Narinda, to her inner fury, had also been allocated a mule and her hatred of Harriet grew. The English girl would ride a horse, as would her master. She, Narinda, would not be accorded such an honour.
As scientific books and instruments were separated from spices and oils, she saw her master’s eyes return again and again to the English girl. The English girl pretended not to notice, working feverishly, but Narinda was not deceived. She knew that Harriet was as aware of Raoul’s burning glances as she herself was.
Though the church was deserted, Gondokoro was not. There was a handful of slave traders, men so bestial that Harriet felt physically sick at the sight of them. On the day before they were to leave, a convoy of slaves was brought in for shipment to Khartoum. Their chief had sold them willingly and accompanied the heavily-bearded traders as they rode into the collection of miserable dwellings that had arisen around the church.
‘If I were a man,’ Harriet said passionately to Sebastian, ‘I’d shoot those traders myself!’
Sebastian shifted uncomfortably, in no doubt that she would. As in Khartoum she had demanded that he intervene and set the hapless captives free. Sebastian, knowing that any such attempt on his part would result in his death, had refused with as good a grace as possible. Harriet had not been understanding.
‘If you will not free them then I will!’
The slaves stood by the river bank, wooden yokes around their necks, their hands and feet cruelly shackled.
‘Harriet, please be reasonable.’
Harriet had no intention of being reasonable. To Sebastian’s alarm she marched furiously to where the half-drunk and blaspheming traders sat on up-turned water casks, congratulating themselves on their human acquisitions.
Sebastian was not a fool. He knew his limitations. He alone could not rescue her from her headstrong folly. He ran to where the dahabiah was berthed, shouting frantically to Raoul as he checked stocks of quinine and morphia. Raoul raised his head, regarding him without interest.
‘Harriet is intent on freeing the slaves,’ Sebastian yelled from the bank. Raoul’s disinterest fled. He slammed down the lid of the medicine chest and vaulted over the side of the dahabiah, wading through the water and reeds. As he marched across the wilderness that separated him from Harriet and the traders he checked his pistol. The men Harriet had gone to do battle with were men who regarded rape as a mere diversion and murder as a sport. On their arrival he had silently thanked his Maker that no slaves had been present and on this, their last day, when more traders had entered Gondokoro with their victims, he had ordered that none of his party should have anything to do with them. It was a warning that everyone had heeded. Even Mark Lane had thought only to pray for the souls of those who had perpetrated such crimes and for their abject victims. He should have known, he thought grimly, as he approached the odour of stale sweat and brandy, that Harriet would not be content with mere prayers.
The traders surrounded her, huge bull-necked men with bristly beards and rhino whips at their hips. Harriet’s pale gold hair barely reached their chests. Her eyes were blazing, her small body consumed with a fury that freed her from fear.
‘There are women and children over there who are being kept shackled, unable to move for hours! They have had no food, no water, no shade! I demand that you free them!’
The roar of laughter was deafening as she stamped her foot, her meaning clear, her eyes brilliant with tears of anger and frustration.
‘Have you no Christian conscience? Half of those you intend to sell in Khartoum will never survive the voyage. They are half dead already! Free them. You have ivory in plenty.’ She gestured towards the huge pile of tusks that lay a little way from them.
The men were Dutch and their salacious remarks as they ignored her protests, their eyes roving her body, were lost on Harriet. They were not lost on Raoul.
‘Return to the boat,’ he said tersely to her.
A dozen pairs of blood-red eyes and a pair of flashing gold-green ones swung in his direction.
‘I will not! Not until those slaves are freed!’
‘No one demands of us,’ a guttural voice said in broken English. ‘Especially not a woman.’
‘Then I ask you,’ she said vehemently. ‘Free the women and children at least!’
‘The women bring in as much money as the men,’ the Dutchman said lazily. There were warts on his lips and flies crawled unheedingly across his giant bull-head.
Harriet struggled to control her breaking voice. ‘I beg you! Free the women and children, please!’
‘You must forgive my wife,’ Raoul said easily, taking out cigars from his shirt pocket and handing them around. ‘She is the daughter of a missionary and her ideals make life tedious.’
Harriet gasped. ‘How dare you …’
He seized her wrist, silencing her in mid-sentence. ‘ Return to the boat,’ he said, and at the menace in his voice, the ferocious expression in his eyes, Harriet felt sick.
‘I hate you!’ she hurled at him. ‘ You are no better than the traders! And you …!’ She whirled to face the amused men, ‘… you are scum! Lower than the lowest animal!’
Wrenching her wrist away from Raoul’s grasp, she treated him to such a look of contempt that even the hardened traders flinched and then she marched back towards the dahabiah, her skirts whipping around her ankles, her head held high.
‘My wife,’ Raoul said carelessly, sitting down and accepting the brandy bottle that was offered to him, ‘is as hot in temper as she is in sex.’
The ensuing laughter succeeded in diffusing the situation. Raoul discussed ivory tusks and his own hopes of procuring a large shipment to take back to Khartoum. The traders complained of the lack of cooperation from local chiefs, apart from the one who stood silently in their midst, regarding Harriet’s retreating back with speculative eyes.
‘I lost over half my crew in the Sudd,’ Raoul lied, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and passing the bottle to the man beside him. The eyes around him sharpened. ‘ I’ll take some of the slaves off your hands, if you are agreeable.’
‘They are fit and strong,’ the Dutchman lied. ‘They will sell well in Khartoum.’
Raoul regarded the semi-conscious negroes disbelievingly. ‘They are dying on their feet.’ He leaned forward, his face speculative. ‘I’ll give you thirty Maria Theresa sovereigns for the lot.’
‘What use are the women and children to you?’ a voice asked suspiciously.
Raoul shrugged. ‘I have a wife. The men in my party do not. Of what use do you think they should be?’
There was more laughter.
‘As for the children, it’s not worth your while to ship them to Khartoum alone. Your time would be better spent gathering a fresh shipment.’
‘A hundred sovereigns.’
‘Fifty.’
‘Seventy-five.’
‘No.’ Raoul rose to his feet. ‘They’re most likely ridden with disease anyway.’
‘Sixty,’ the wart-faced man said.
Raoul nodded, and shook the outstretched hand. The bargain was sealed. It had cost him a fortune and even as the bewildered negroes were herded on to the provision barges, he was not sure why he
had done it. Certainly he had to silence Harriet before the situation grew ugly, but he could have done that and still spared himself the expense of buying every last one of the abject human beings who regarded him from frightened eyes.
‘It’s unspeakable of him,’ Harriet said chokingly to Mark Lane.
Mark Lane laid a restraining hand on her arm. ‘Raoul has bought them only to free them.’
She stared up at him.
He smiled. ‘Surely you did not think otherwise? What use would three score men, women and children be? When the traders have left Gondokoro the boats will sail the few miles from Gondokoro to the rapids and then they will be set ashore. As for the other calumny that you refer to, he called you his wife in order to afford you protection. As such you would be far less likely to be molested than if you were a single woman with no legal protector.’
Harriet continued to stare. Mark Lane laughed. ‘I do not understand you, Harriet. You think only the worst of Mr Beauvais. His intentions are always honourable.’
The lovely line of her jaw tightened. ‘On that subject, Reverend Lane, I beg to differ.’ She turned away from him, walking rapidly to a grove of lemon trees.
Wilfred and Sebastian had long been in conversation with one another and were now approaching Raoul. Mark Lane bowed his head and said a private prayer for the slaves aboard the barges and for the dead priests who had once inhabited the ruined church.
Occasionally Harriet raised her head from her task and saw that Narinda was standing once more like a shadow at Raoul’s side. Her attention was caught as she heard Sebastian’s voice rise in anger.
‘We none of us realised what the climate would be like before we set off! We shall none of us survive if we travel further!’
‘Then return,’ Raoul was saying in a bored voice. ‘The boats can continue no more. There are cataracts in little over a mile. From now on our journey is overland.’
‘Miss Latimer would not survive such hardships!’
‘Miss Latimer was not invited.’
Slowly Harriet approached, baskets of lemons in either hand. ‘Invited or not, Miss Latimer is continuing,’ she said, her face pale, her eyes determined.
Raoul quenched his surge of admiration and said to Sebastian, ‘If you wish to return the boats are at your disposal. I ask only that you send fresh vessels through to wait for us here.’
Sebastian struggled inwardly for several moments and then said with bad grace, ‘I’ll continue,’ adding defensively, ‘ but only for the sake of Miss Latimer.’
Later, when the stores from the vessels had all been landed and the horses and mules exercised, Raoul went in search of Harriet.
She was alone, her head raised, the long, lovely line of her throat clearly defined as she gazed up at the giant cross that hung above the mission church.
‘I think,’ he said curtly, ‘that Crale is right. It would be better for you to return.’
She turned to face him, fighting to keep her voice steady. ‘But I have no wish to do so.’
There was a strange note in his voice. ‘And I have no wish to have your death on my hands.’
She was about to flash a quick retort but her anger had deserted her, leaving her defenceless. He stood before her, straight and tall, and she was overcome by the desire to reach out and touch him. She said hesitantly, her voice barely audible,
‘Would my death matter very greatly, Mr Beauvais?’
His eyes lingered on her lips. He longed to seize her, kissing her until he lost his breath in the sweetness of her mouth. Instead, he said, aware of the harsh edge to his voice,
‘It would be an inconvenience, Miss Latimer.’
Harriet clenched her hands at her side, her nails digging painfully into her palms. ‘I will do my best not to inconvenience you, Mr Beauvais,’ she said stiffly, returning her gaze once again to the cross, blinking back the tears that threatened.
He hesitated. It would be so easy to reach out for her; feel the softness of her body; the sweet smell of her hair. He stepped forward and slowly lowered his hand to her shoulder. Harriet stifled an inarticulate cry. His touch seemed to flame through the lawn of her blouse, burning her body like fire. She felt shameless, her whole being crying out in a need that was primeval. Gently he turned her to face him and she could see the heat at the back of his dark eyes as he studied her face and then he was drawing her into the circle of his arms and she was going as unprotestingly as a dove into the cote.
‘Mr Frome is looking for you. His map of the stars has been lost.’ Narinda’s bell-like voice broke in on them, shattering the private world they had entered.
Momentarily his hands tightened their grasp on her and then released her. His anger at the untimely interruption was too violent to be given expression to. Eyes brilliant with suppressed fury, he swung on his heels and marched through the long grass to where Wilfred floundered amongst a maze of packing cases.
Harriet folded her arms across her breast in an effort to still the trembling that seized her body. One touch, one look of burning desire and all her anger had fled. She had been helpless. As ready to enter his arms as she had been before she had known of Narinda’s existence. She pressed her hands to her throbbing temple. Where had all her resolutions gone? Her common sense?
Across the wilderness Narinda stood motionless, her gossamer-light robes falling in soft folds to her feet. Her hands were lowered and clasped in front of her in the manner she often adopted. To the gentlemen of the party, it was a pose that was modest and becoming and, when accompanied by a gentle lowering of her head, a pose that brought protective instincts to the fore. It did not do so in Harriet. So Narinda had stood after trying to drown her. So she stood now – to an onlooker quietly respectful in Harriet’s presence. No onlooker saw the gleam of malevolent hate in the lustrous dark eyes as Harriet once more gained control of herself and became aware of Narinda’s continuing presence.
The eyes of the two girls met. Harriet’s anguished and tormented at her inability to sustain her anger and contempt of Raoul Beauvais; Narinda’s feral in their malignancy.
‘You shall not have him!’ she spat. ‘You shall never have him!’
Harriet’s heart began to beat fast and light. They were words she had heard before from Narinda. Words spoken before the unsuccessful attempt on her life.
‘I have no desire for him,’ she lied through parched lips and walked with pounding heart towards the dahabiah and the litter of straw.
‘You should rest,’ Sebastian said assiduously as he checked his rifle. ‘You look all in.’
Harriet did not reply. Outwardly composed, her inner emotions were in turmoil. Was this what she had descended to? Squabbling with Narinda over a man faithful to neither of them. When Raoul’s powerful figure left Wilfred Frome’s side and began to stride in her direction, she swung around so swiftly that the lemons she had been sorting tumbled to the ground. Blindly she hurried in the direction of Mark Lane. Behind her she heard Raoul call her name, and she broke into a run. She could not face him again. Her upbringing, her commonsense, were no protection against the power he exercised over her. Her only salvation lay in avoiding his presence and not allowing her eyes to meet his. Somehow she had to regain her anger. It was her only defence against her true feelings.
Mark Lane slipped a band around the papers he had been rolling and noted her discomposure. Swiftly he looked beyond her and saw the reason for it. Raoul Beauvais stood panting, arms akimbo, his white shirt gashed to the waist, his eyes fixed tormentedly on Harriet’s firmly turned back.
He frowned. The hostility between Harriet and Raoul was occasioned by more than her uninvited presence. He wondered, not for the first time, what was its true source.
‘Is something disturbing you, Harriet?’ he asked quietly, selecting books that could not be left behind.
‘Yes … no …’ She hesitated. Mark Lane was a man of the cloth. A man accustomed to hearing and easing emotional burdens. Her cheeks warmed. She could not say that she
was in love with a man who openly flaunted his mistress. A man who had taken disrespectful advantage of her. She said stiffly,
‘It is the heat. Nothing more.’
Mark Lane’s frown deepened. Harriet Latimer was not a very accomplished liar. A dozen yards away Raoul’s brows met satanically and then he pivoted on his heel, berating the natives for their inefficiency in unloading the stores.
Amidst much clamour and shouting from the Sudanese, the horses and mules were finally packed with all the provisions and equipment that they were to take with them. Harriet’s heart faltered as she listened to Raoul checking aloud from the list he held in his hands.
‘Rifles, revolvers, Colts carbine, ammunition for two years, swords, chronometers …’
Ammunition to last two years! She felt giddy and faint. Was that how long their expedition would last? Was that how long they would have to live in each other’s company, Narinda perpetually between them?
‘Prismatic compasses, thermometers, sundial, sextants …’
Hashim was returning to Khartoum on one of the barges. She could, if she wanted, return with him.
‘Telescope, boxes of mathematical instruments, tents, camp beds, mosquito nets …’
Raoul’s voice continued as Sebastian chalked crosses on all the appropriate boxes.
‘Cooking utensils, camp chairs, blankets, fishing tackle, lanterns …’
Her fate lay in her own hands. She could continue into the unknown or she could board the barge.
‘Medicine supplies, brandy, tea, soaps …’
Her father’s dream was within her reach. If she returned his death would have been in vain.
‘Spices, oil, sugar …’
At last the interminable list came to an end. Earlier she had said that she wished to continue. She was not going to go back on that decision. Hashim bade them goodbye with a face-splitting smile. The porters picked up their bundles and carried them on their heads. Narinda mounted her mule and Sebastian led Harriet to her horse.
‘Is your mind quite made up, Harriet? We could return to Khartoum. Marry …’
African Enchantment Page 15
