Evil in a Mask rb-9

by Dennis Wheatley

  The very thought inflamed Roger to fever pitch. There could have been no clearer declaration that Lisala was not a virgin, and was longing for him to take her.

  'I will, my sweet!' he exclaimed, kissing her avidly again. 'This very afternoon I'll secure that apartment, and it shall be our heaven. But what of now? It would take us at least half an hour to get up to the Temple and down again.'

  'So be it,' she breathed. 'I have been too long starved of love; and, with you, near dying for want of it.'

  He drew her further into the cave, where they came upon a bed of leaves left there by some past hermit. Stripping off his coat, Roger laid it on the leaves. Then, with a delighted laugh, he picked up Lisala, kissed her again and lowered her gently to their primitive couch.

  Unashamedly, with shining eyes and fast-drawn breath, she undid her girdle and pulled her full skirts up to her waist, while he unloosed his breeches. Swiftly, but gently, he slid between her wide-open thighs. Gasping, she threw her arms round him and clasped him to her. A moment later she heaved beneath him and cried aloud with rapture.

  Twice more within the next half-hour they repeated the act, at greater leisure and with still greater enjoyment. Tem­porarily satiated, but madly enamoured of each other, they reluctantly drew apart, carefully brushed off old leaves that had adhered to their hair and clothes; then, in silent, blissful communion, made their way down the hill.

  Dona Christina greeted them with a worried look but, evidently fearful that she might be subjected to another out­burst of Lisala's violent temper, she refrained from asking any questions. She need not have worried. The girl's lovely face showed no sign that she had ever revolted against her usual demure acceptance of her duenna's authority. Getting into the carriage, she patted the old lady's hand affection­ately, and with wide-eyed innocence invented a description of the Fire Temple she had never seen. Not for the first time, Roger marvelled at the convincing duplicity displayed by women to guard their secrets, and conceded that it matched his own.

  When they got back to the Portuguese Embassy, Lisala said brightly, as he formally kissed her hand on taking leave of her, 'I look forward, Colonel, to seeing you again tonight.'

  For a moment he was flabbergasted, thinking that she had been imbecile enough to refer to a roof-top meeting which, in any case, he might not have the time to prepare for. To his intense relief she added, as he raised his eyes to hers. 'At the dinner to which my father has invited General Gardane, you and several other officers.'

  Releasing his indrawn breath, he replied. 'As I left the mission early this morning, the General had not informed me of it; but, naturally, I am delighted to accept.'

  Having seen the ladies into the hall and thanked Mesrop for the morning's interesting expedition, he immediately hur­ried round to the house at the back of the Embassy. By good fortune, the owner was at home, and spoke a little Turkish; so, together with the smattering of Persian that Roger had picked up during the past three weeks, they were able to grasp one another's meaning. Fortunately, too, the last tenant of the top-floor flat had left some weeks earlier, so it was again to let. After pretending to make a thorough inspection of the apartment, which he found sparsely furnished but at least clean, Roger went up on to the roof.

  There in one corner he saw, to his delight, the means used for bridging the gap across to the Embassy roof, of which Lisala had told him. It was a twelve-foot-long canvas tube containing a ladder which appeared to be comparatively light, as the sides were made of thick, bamboo poles. From them rose low hoops, supporting the canvas covering, so that any­one crawling along the ladder while crossing the gap should not see the alley below and be overcome by vertigo.

  Having told the landlord that he would be occupying the apartment only to sleep in, so would be little bother to him, Roger asked the price. The man named an outrageous sum. When Roger protested, the fellow gave an impudent grin, jerked his thumb towards the ladder and said:

  'I had that made a year or so ago for a Russian Prince who was having an affair with one of the young women ser­vants in the Portuguese Embassy across the way. Since my lord is coming here only at night, I'd wager a Kashan rug against a string of onions that he means to play naughty games with the same little strumpet, or one of the companions; and a gentleman should pay for his pleasures.'

  Roger stoutly denied the implication and offered half the sum asked; but was happy enough to settle for two-thirds, took the apartment for a month, gave the landlord a gold tomaun—equivalent to about fifteen shillings—in advance, and left with a key to the house in his pocket.

  A party of sixteen sat down to dinner that evening at the Embassy: de Pombal and his ladies, de Queircoz and another secretary, two obviously rich Portuguese merchants, a Dutch couple, Gardane, Roger and* four other French officers. It followed that the conversation was carried on in a jumble of languages, but all of them were at least bi-lingual and some, like Roger, could talk in several languages; so the party proved a gay one, particularly for the French officers who had been deprived of such social evenings for many months.

  Lisala was seated between Roger and dc Queircoz, who obviously regarded him as his rival, and made a malicious remark about gentlemen who had so little work that they could give every morning to taking ladies out sightseeing. Recalling one ravishing sight he had seen that morning, Roger could afford to ignore this offensiveness and Lisala, instead of re­primanding Alfonso for his rudeness to a guest, tactfully praised him for the valuable assistance he gave her father.

  Later during the meal, Alfonso casually asked Roger if he liked shooting. When Roger replied that he did, the Portu­guese said, 'Then some time you must go up to the forests on the far side of the mountains north of Tehran. There is the finest sport in the world to be had there, and I could easily arrange it for you as I speak Persian fluently and have many friends at Court.'

  Before they left the table, Roger succeeded in passing into Lisala's hand a note he had written. It read:

  I adore you to distraction. Tomorrow morning J cannot come for you because General Gardane told me this after­noon that we are to offer our presents to the Shah. But the apartment you told me of is now mine, and the ladder-bridge still up on the roof. I shall await you there tomorrow night with more eagerness than had I been promised a magic carpet to carry me to Paradise.

  The following morning everyone at the mission was up early, preparing for the ceremony that Gardane had waited for with such impatience. To wear at the audience, the Shah had sent each officer of the mission a garment of honour, called a calaat, and they chaffed one another about their ap­pearance when they had put on these strange, but costly, silk robes. The presentation was to take place at the Chehel Souton Palace, which was situated in the midst of spacious, well-wooded grounds. Accompanied by the Mahemander Bachi, the Peskis Nuviez and a gorgeously-clad guard of archers mounted upon curvetting chargers, they rode the half mile to the gates. There, they were told to dismount, as no one was permitted to approach the Shah on horseback.

  Roger had learned from Mesrop earlier that the Chehel Souton was also called the Palace of the Forty Pillars, al­though in fact it had only twenty. This anomaly was made apparent as their procession advanced towards it along an avenue of sycamores and cypresses. The Palace stood at the far end of a great stone-surrounded pool, some three hundred feet long and fifty wide. The frontage consisted of a terrace raised on several steps, above which was a roof supported by thirty-foot-high pillars. There were only twenty of them, but their reflection on the mirror-like sheet of water made up the forty.

  Centrally, beneath the lofty canopy, rose a graceful arch decorated with innumerable small squares of looking-glass and, in front of k, a fountain. The Shah was seated cross-legged upon a throne that blazed with jewels, and on cither side of him were ranged his Viziers, his twenty-four gendc-mcn and many other functionaries. Mounting the steps, Gar­dane knelt and, as he had been informed by the Superior of the Capuchins was strictly necessary, kissed the Shah's foot.
He then recited in Persian a brief speech he had been taught, calling down blessings on the King of Kings, the Centre of the Universe, and praying him to deign to give his unrivalled brain to considering the message sent him by his admiring brother sovereign, the Emperor of the French and Monarch Supreme of the Western World.

  The Shah graciously inclined his head then, for half an hour, bearer after bearer laid the presents sent by Napoleon on the steps below the throne. When this had been done, the Shah said, through his chief Armenian interpreter, that he thanked his brother sovereign, of whose great prowess in war he had heard, and that his Ministers would report to him upon the communication the General had brought. Rising from his throne, he turned and, followed by his courtiers, withdrew into the interior of the Palace. The audience over, the French retired and, mounting their horses at the gate, rode back to their quarters.

  That night, by ten o'clock, Roger was on the roof of the house behind the Embassy. He doubted whether Lisala would be able to join him before eleven at the earliest, but would not for worlds have chanced her keeping the assignation and not finding him there to meet her. As he paced back and forth, the time seemed to drag interminably and by midnight he began to fear that something had prevented her from keep­ing their tryst.

  Another twenty minutes elapsed, then his heart gave a sud­den lurch, as he caught sight of a shadowy figure coming to­wards the parapet of the opposite roof. Restraining himself for a moment, to make certain that it was Lisala, he remained still. Then in a low voice she called across to him.

  Picking up the hooded ladder, he swiftly thrust it across the ten-foot gap. On the far end were large iron hooks that would secure it to the opposite parapet. Lisala disappeared into the canvas tunnel. Two minutes later, he drew her from it and clasped her in his arms.

  Avidly they smothered each other with kisses, then he picked her up and carried her down to the room below. She had on only a light silk robe. Joyfully, she threw it off. For the first time, by the light of the single oil lamp he had left burning, he saw her naked. She had small, upstanding breasts, a narrow waist, big hips and, for a woman of her medium height, long, slender legs. Enraptured to find her body equalled her face in beauty, he cast aside the chamber robe he had been wearing, again took her in his arms and, mur­muring endearments, gently lowered her to the broad divan.

  As an expert in amorous delights, Lisala could not have rivalled Naksh; but the passion with which she gave herself was almost unsurpassed in Roger's experience. He had always heard that red-headed women were physically more inflam­mable than others, and Lisala became positively distraught during her erotic paroxysms. She moaned, cried aloud and once bit him so fiercely in the neck that he wrenched himself free of her with a gasp of pain.

  When at length his big, turnip watch, which he had laid on a low table beside the divan, chimed the hour of four, she prepared to leave him only with the greatest reluctance; and when he began to thank her for the pleasure she had given him, she stopped his mouth with her hand, declaring that it was the woman who should thank the man capable of carrying her to such heights of ecstasy.

  After seeing her safely back to the roof of the Embassy and drawing in the ladder, he was terribly tempted to flop down again on the divan and sleep. But he knew that if he did, he would probably not wake until midday; so he slowly dressed and made his way back to the quarters of the mission where he could be certain of being woken at half past seven.

  At nine o'clock, he called as usual for Lisala and her duenna. Mesrop told them that, as the Shah did not live at the Chehel Souton Palace but used it only to give formal audiences, he had secured permission to take them there to see some of the royal treasures.

  Except for patrolling guards here and there, the Palace was now deserted. Passing through the high, mirror-covered arch, they entered a long, lofty hall, on the walls of which were painted battle scenes. Ranged in cases about it were many precious objects, ancient Qur'ans beautifully illuminated in gold and gay coloured arabesques, fine examples of Ming china, jewel-hilted scimitars and a collection of paintings on ivory.

  The majority of the latter dated from the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries when, under Shah Abbas, the Safavid Dynasty had reached its zenith and Persia entered on her great Renaissance. The fame of her artists, poets and architects had spread to the West and, as Roger knew, Sophy was the English corruption of Safavi. It was thus that Persia had become known as 'The Land of the Great Sophy'.

  Many of the paintings were of hunting scenes; others illus­trated the classic work of Ferdusi, Hafiz and Sa'adi, showing turbaned lovers with sloe-eyed maidens picnicking beneath graceful, flowering trees. The workmanship was exquisite and Roger, who had a small gift for painting himself, de­cided to search the Bazaar and see if he could not find a few of the same period to buy and take back with him.

  That night, soon after midnight, Lisala again joined him on his roof-top. The passion with which they came together was less ferocious than it had been the previous night, but when they parted in the early hours, their delight in each other had not lessened.

  Next morning there could be no expedition, because the officers of the French mission had been invited by the Shah to witness a polo match. For this they went to the Ali Qapa Palace in the huge Maidan Square. The Shah of Shahs re­ceived them on the lofty balcony which formed a perfect grandstand. The extreme formality he had observed when they had been presented to him was now considerably re­laxed. Through his chief interpreter, he spoke pleasantly to the senior officers, expressing the hope that they were enjoy­ing their visit to his capital, and telling them that if there was anything they lacked for their comfort, they must not hesi­tate to ask his Mahemander Bachi for it.

  Before the match, a display of wrestling and javelin-throwing took place below the big balcony; then the square was cleared and the players rode out from either end of it. There were twenty a side, but there was ample space for them to gallop in. None of the French had ever seen the game be­fore, and they found it most exciting.

  For the third night running, Lisala came to Roger on his roof. By then he would have welcomed a respite of a night or two. Yet he found her so bewitching that, no sooner had she unrobed herself, than he again rose to the occasion and met her embraces with renewed fervour. Again they parted with lingering kisses, vowing that neither of them could ever meet anyone who compared with the other.

  Five hours later Mesrop took them to a small mansion in which there was an exhibition of waxworks. Roger had seen that of Madame Tussaud, who had come as a refugee to London during the French Revolution; but decided that her work was of poor quality when compared with that of the Persian artists. The figures were clad in garments representa­tive of every class, from the highest to the lowest, and there were groups wearing the traditional costume of every tribe in the King of Kings' vast dominions. But the striking thing about them was that they resembled human beings so closely that one could have expected them to speak at any moment, or walk out of their cases.

  In a place of honour, at the head of a staircase, there was a figure of the great Shah Abbas, and it greatly intrigued Roger to see what this remarkable monarch had looked like. He was portrayed as on the tallish side, with powerful limbs and a handsome head of Aryan cast. His cheeks and chin were clean-shaven, but he had an enormous, handlebar moustache, the points of which stuck out well beyond his ears.

  Afterwards Mesrop took them to a quarter of the city where Dervishes were wont to congregate. It was a piece of semi-waste ground, and the buildings on it were little more than heaps of tumbled ruins. The heads of the Dervishes, like those of all Persian men, were shaved; but otherwise, unlike the bulk of the male population who favoured long whiskers but only short beards, their beards were long and tangled. Most of them were wearing only a single garment of animal skin, and the majority appeared strong-limbed, well fed and healthy. The few genuine fanatics, wasted by fasting, sat alone in contemplation, obviously oblivious of their sur­roundings; but
by far the greater number of Dervishes were sitting smoking their narghiles and talking animatedly.

  Mesrop explained that, with few exceptions, protected by the cloak of religion, they were an utterly unprincipled sect of rogues. Some earned a living at snake-charming or by giving displays with dangerous beasts. Others were profes­sional story-tellers who could recite Ferdusi by heart and knew all the tales told by Shahrazade to her Arab Caliph. But a far greater number of them battened on the super­stitions of the ignorant masses. Witchcraft was rife through­out Persia. Everyone carried charms against the Evil Eye, and for many other reasons. The Dervishes made a fat living by selling bits of parchment with cryptic symbols scrawled on them, and parts of animals which, when carried on a person, were said to work wonders.

  The knuckle-bones of a wolf would give courage; its gall rubbed on a woman's belly would cause her to conceive; the skin of an ape's nose was a preventive against poison; the cunning and speed of the animal could be acquired by swal­lowing its ashes after it had been burned; the tail of a horse placed under a child's pillow would ensure sound sleep, and horses dosed with the blood of a hare would increase their speed. However, most of the talismans concerned love. The skin of a hyena worn next to a woman's skin would keep her husband faithful, and the liver of an ape would bring back the affections of one who had become enamoured of another woman.

  When, in mid-morning, Roger got back to the mission, he found the big house in a ferment. The royal astrologers had informed the Shah that it would be propitious for him to honour the French visitors by dining with them that night. Soon after Roger had left to collect Lisala and Dona Chris­tina, the Mirzatahcr—as the Comptroller of the King's Household was called—had arrived with a letter from the Grand Vizier, declaring His Imperial Majesty's intention. Three sizes of wax seals were used for such communications, and this had the largest so, even before opening it, Gardane realised that it must be urgent and important.