Court of Veils Page 16

  All the same she didn’t care for the injections that were part of her treatment and after each thrust of the needle she would have a small grumble. ‘Soon I shall look like a pincushion,’ she said to Dr. Suleiman one morning, as he dabbed antiseptic on her upper arm.

  ‘Come now, you know you are enjoying the way we are all fussing over you,’ the doctor smiled. ‘My injections are a beauty tonic. Look how they have put the sparkle back into your eyes.’

  ‘Yes, you are a clever rogue of an Arab,’ she retorted. ‘Why are you working out here in the Sahara when you could be making a fortune elsewhere ?’

  ‘Because I am an Arab, madame. A lot needs to be done, and men can’t do it if they are sick.’

  ‘Another pioneer,’ she groaned. ‘Has Duane told you of the funds for a clinic which we wish to put at your disposal?’

  He inclined his head.

  ‘Will you accept them?’ she asked.

  ‘Will a dog turn its tail on a pound of meat?’ he said with dry humour. ‘I am profoundly grateful to both of you. I know the gift is made out of understanding and not charity.’

  ‘Duane has too much pride himself to offer anyone charity, Ben Suleiman. I can understand why you two are friends. You have each chosen what you want to do with your lives, and you are both strong enough to put your work before other desires. Such men are always a little frightening - do you not agree, Roslyn?’

  Roslyn was tidying up after the doctor. ‘It isn’t for a nurse to pass judgment on a super being such as a doctor,’ she said with a smile.

  ‘Am I alarming, Miss Brant?’ he asked.

  ‘Alarming in the sense that you carry life in your hands,’ she replied. ‘All laymen are in awe of a doctor’s knowledge and skill.’

  ‘You, cannot be called a layman, Nurse.’ He smiled in his grave way. ‘You are very able in a sickroom.’

  ‘Thank you, Doctor.’ She wore a white overall which he had acquired for her, and she looked quite efficient in it. ‘Nanette has been so good to me that I’m very glad I am able to do something for her.’

  ‘Mon dieu, how independent the British are!’ Nanette raised her hands in Gallic exasperation. ‘The child is happy now, you see. She is repaying me for indulging myself by having her with me in this bam of a house.’ ‘Now don’t get excited, Nanette.’ Roslyn grinned and plumped her patient’s pillows. ‘You’ll overtire yourself and won’t be nice and fresh to receive visitors.’

  Even in her sickbed Nanette liked to look at her best, and after Dr. Suleiman had gone, she had Roslyn arrange her hair and lightly make up her face. ‘If I look pale and wan I worry those grandsons of mine.’ She studied her reflection in the hand-mirror which Roslyn held for her. ‘This bedjacket is quite chic, no? I was married in a blue silk suit. It was my husband’s favourite colour. He used to say that my eyes outshone the desert skies.’

  ‘They are a wonderful colour,’ Roslyn assured her. ‘Men like women to have nice eyes,’ Nanette smiled. ‘Yours are huge and fascinating, ma petite. Your best feature, incidentally.’

  ‘They’re the grey eyes of a witch,’ Roslyn said lightly. ‘I have to be careful not to cast spells with them.’

  A brisk rap on the door followed her words, and in walked the man who had called her a grey-eyed witch.

  Though Nanette’s room was already bright with flowers, he carried a potted plant that was breaking out into mauve flower, and also something bulky in a carrier bag. He came striding to Nanette’s bedside and bent his tall head to kiss her cheek. ‘You look very elegant and smell very enticing,’ he said fondly.

  ‘Thank you for the plant, Duane, and do sit down. You give me a crick in my neck, you are so tall, mon chéri.’

  He folded his long limbs down into a pastel wicker chair, which creaked alarmingly. ‘I feel like a bull in a boudoir.’ He shot his rather fierce smile at Roslyn as she took the potted plant from him. ‘How is your patient behaving, Nurse? Is she giving you any trouble?’

  ‘None that I can’t cope with.’ Roslyn put her nose to the mauve flowers, hiding the amusement he induced, so big and clumsy in that chair, in this room with its French furniture. He was far more at home among the barbaric trappings of his own tree-secluded house.

  ‘Each day I can see an improvement in you, Nanette,’ he said. ‘Ben Suleiman knows his job all right.’

  ‘I like him very much, except when he is jabbing needles in my arm.’ His grandmother cocked an eye at the carrier bag Duane was still holding. ‘What have you got in there, another present for me?’ she asked.

  ‘You are every inch a Frenchwoman,’ he teased. ‘I could have my laundry in the bag, but right away you assume it is something for you.’

  ‘Of course it is - ah, but then again it could be something for my nurse. A tin of toffees, perhaps?’ she added wickedly.

  He quirked an eyebrow at Roslyn, then drew out of the carrier the enchanting musical-box that had looked so out of place in his very masculine sitting-room.

  He placed it on his grandmother’s bed. ‘For you, belle femme,’ he said quietly. ‘I thought it might amuse you.’

  Nanette touched the figure of the dancing girl, and sudden tears sprang into her eyes. ‘But no, Duane, you have always been so fond of cette boite à musique. It belonged to Celeste - to your dear mother. I would not dream of taking it from you—’

  ‘I want you to have it, Nanette. You gave it to - maman. Still it plays, and the girl still dances. Look, I’ll wind it up for you.’ He did so and as the music tinkled out, the tiny figure on the lid began to pirouette.

  Roslyn was fascinated by the dancing figure, but when she looked at Duane she was struck by the expression in his eyes ... it could only be described as angry pain ... pain he hated to feel. He got to this feet and went over to the latticed window guarding the balcony. A shaft of sunlight fired his hair as he stood there, tall and tough, hardened against pain ... so Roslyn had always thought.

  When the tinkling music died away, he swung to face his grandmother. ‘It’s a woman’s toy,’ he said. ‘I want you to have it.’

  ‘But, chéri, I know how much this memento of your dear mother means to you—’ then, seeing how set his face was, Nanette added that she would love to have the musical-box and he was a dear to give it to her.

  ‘Come,’ she patted the bedside, ‘come and talk to me. Tell me about the plantation and how big a harvest we can expect.’

  Roslyn left them talking together. She went downstairs, passing the salon where Isabela and Tristan were going over the last act of his opera. The music followed her out to the Court of the Veils, haunting and oriental, with slumbering notes of fire in it. She listened as she sat under the pepper-tree.

  When Nanette was well again, Roslyn knew that she would pack her bag and leave this desert house for England. Somehow the time had almost come for her to go ...

  To run away, cried a small voice inside her. Yes, you’ll be running away, and you know it.

  She wanted to deny it, but it was true. She would be running away from Dar al Amra because she knew she was emerging out of the mists of her amnesia as a girl who had never loved Armand Gerard. Instinct had told her from the beginning that she had never loved him ... and when she recovered her memory she wouldn’t be able to face Nanette, who trusted her, who had wanted her here because she was a link with her grandson Armand.

  Roslyn’s gaze wandered round the Court of the Veils... here, for the first time in her life, she had been part of a real family, and it would break her heart to leave. To hear no more the workers chanting their Eastern songs in the depths of the plantation. To see no more the sunsets that flared like harlequin opals, and the moon that hung among the stars like a great rose-gold ball...

  Suddenly her thoughts had become unbearable and she jumped to her feet and was on the verge of flight when there was a footfall behind her. She swung round and her grey-clouded eyes looked straight up into Duane Hunter’s.

  Their magnetic green held her, though she wanted m
ore than ever to run away. ‘I want to thank you for the very good care you are taking of Nanette,’ he said.

  That’s all right, Mr. Hunter.’ She was backing away from him and couldn’t stop. Suddenly she was brought up short against the trunk of a juniper-tree.

  ‘Has something frightened you?’ he asked.

  She shook her head, framed slim and white-clad by the foliage of the juniper.

  ‘I saw you jump up as though a snake had just slithered across your shoe.’ He came a stride closer, towering over her. ‘You’ve done a lot for Nanette in the past two weeks. Perhaps your nerves are a trifle shot?’

  ‘No - I was sitting and thinking, then I suddenly realized that I had to go and see about Nanette’s lunch tray.’ She moved, but he was blocking her path, so she drew back against the juniper once more.

  ‘You can’t wait to dash off indoors, can you?’ he mocked. ‘Ever since our little adventure at Lake Temcina you get rattled each time I come up here to the house. What are you afraid of? That it’s going to come out sooner or later that we spent a night by the lake - in a boat-shed?’

  ‘Don’t!’ The word broke from her, then because she sounded a trifle desperate, she forced a smile to her lips and gestured at the juniper-tree. ‘Never tell a secret by the juniper, Mr. Hunter. It’s asking for trouble.’

  ‘Really?’ His mouth quirked into a smile, and suddenly his desert-brown hands were against the trunk of the tree, one either side of her fair head, and she was his captive as she had been down on the shore at Lake Temcina.

  ‘You walk into trouble too easily, Miss Brant,’ he drawled.

  ‘It certainly looks like it,’ she agreed, but without the spirit she usually brought to a sparring match with him. The air this morning was sultry, leaden, and that was how she felt. Too passive to resist, even if those mocking lips had come hunting for a fight.

  ‘What’s up?’ Suddenly his green eyes narrowed. ‘Have you been eating any desert fruit without first giving it a good wash?’

  She smiled faintly. Trust Duane to think it was her tummy that ached!

  ‘The air this morning is rather close,’ she said. ‘Talking about fruit, you might pluck me a couple of oranges so I can give your grandmother some juice with her lunch.’ He turned away at once, plucked the required oranges and tossed them to her. ‘We may be in for a sandstorm,’ he said. ‘The air is always a bit mucky when one is due.’

  ‘When will it come?c she asked anxiously. ‘They’re rather terrible, aren’t they?’

  ‘When a sandstorm is at its height, nothing can be seen for yards,’ he told her. ‘The desert afterwards can be quite featureless - but you’ll be perfectly safe here at Dar al Amra, and the storm shouldn’t break for hours yet.’

  ‘I hope it won’t upset Nanette,’ she said, looking troubled.

  ‘I’ll come back later,’ he had reached the slave door and was opening it, ‘and we’ll all do our bit to keep her mind off the storm. By the way, I shouldn’t go out if I were you.’

  ‘No,’ she said absently, and watched him duck through the slave door. It clanged shut behind him, leaving a silence that was strangely acute, until Roslyn realized that the music from the salon had ceased. She turned to go indoors ... where under the archway facing the salon she came face to face with Isabela.

  ‘How busy you are these days, Roslyn.’ The singer was standing with her back to one of the columns, her hands at either side of her slowly clenched and unclenched against the marble. ‘I see you have been plucking oranges for your patient.’

  ‘Yes.’ Roslyn could feel her heart beating nervously as she faced the other girl. If Isabela had been standing here for some time, then she would surely have heard all that Duane had said in that carrying voice of his!

  ‘I am useless at nursing people,’ Isabela’s voice was mellow as honey. ‘But I have been wondering what small thing I could do to be of use - you look so worn out, poor dear. I know! I could take you for a drive this afternoon. Some air would do you good.’

  Roslyn gazed at the singer in sheer amazement. She had expected anything but an overture of friendship. ‘It’s kind of you to suggest a drive, Isabela,’ she said, ‘but Nanette gets restless if I leave her too long.’

  ‘You take your duties too seriously,’ Isabela said with a shrug. ‘Very well, if you don’t want to come for a drive with me, then we will say no more about it. Tristan, by the way, expects to be working most of the day. He has hit a musical snag which will evidently take some hours to unravel.’

  Roslyn had been looking forward to a gallop that afternoon, despite the coming storm, and now on impulse she said she wouldn’t mind going out for a short drive. ‘I have a slight headache,’ she admitted.

  Isabela’s dark brows lifted. ‘Perhaps the injury to your head is troubling you, eh?’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Roslyn forced a smile to her lips. ‘A half hour’s spin through the desert might blow away the cobwebs, but we mustn’t be out too long because—’

  ‘Because of Nanette, I know.’ The next moment Isabela was hurrying away, calling over her shoulder. ‘I am looking forward to our drive - so very much.’

  She was gone and Roslyn was alone in the corridor ... remembering the danger-green of Duane’s eyes when he had warned her not to go out that afternoon. But she felt so restless, and the air was so sultry that it was even an effort to walk as far as the kitchen. ‘Yousef,’ she said at once, ‘when will the storm come ?’

  He stood very still, as if listening to the far-off shuffling of the sand. ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘Maybe this evening.’

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  SERVANTS were going round the house securing doors and window shutters by the time Roslyn ran downstairs to join Isabela. She had not told Nanette that they were going for a drive. With the sandstorm coming on, Nanette would worry about them and not get her proper amount of rest.

  Isabela was already seated in the car, wearing a shantung suit and a brimmed hat with spotted chiffon tied round the high crown. She opened the passenger door for Roslyn, who slid in beside her, clad in a youthful blue cotton dress, her eyes shaded also by a brimmed hat.

  ‘How sultry the air has become.’ Isabela started up the car and they drove out under the high Moorish arch on to the cool green track that ran through the plantation and joined the desert highway. As they passed Duane’s secluded house, Isabela glanced back as though searching the veranda for a tall, drill-clad figure. But the only figure that Roslyn glimpsed was a boyish one in a white gan-dourah. Da-ud the houseboy, no doubt.

  ‘I really don’t know how Duane can bear to live among all those trees,’ Isabela remarked. ‘At night they must be alive with the noise of cicadas and frogs.’

  ‘I expect he’s used to trees,’ Roslyn said. ‘Think of all the years he spent in Amazonian forests.’

  ‘Living in the wilds is just a habit he has got into.’ Isabela blared the horn as one of the plantation workers crossed the track along which they were driving. ‘Habits can be broken. Also a man with his drive could make far more money directing a business from a desk rather than spending his life as a planter.’

  ‘Perhaps he’s one of those people who get satisfaction out of being among things that grow. I can’t imagine Mr. Hunter behind a desk,’ Roslyn spoke firmly. ‘I should think such a life would stifle him.’

  Isabela made no reply to that until they were out on the highway and the needle of the speedometer had moved forward into the seventies. The car sped along past the sandy wastes where chalk-green scrub and thorn bushes made dabs of colour. The sky was a hot blue and could not be looked at with the naked eye.

  ‘Why do you refer to Duane in such a formal manner?’ Isabela drawled. ‘I am sure there has not always been such formality between you.’

  ‘Indeed there has,’ Roslyn said at once. ‘Somehow we have never hit it off as friends.’

  ‘How did you hit it off as lovers ?’

  For a moment Roslyn couldn’t believe that she had heard correctly.
Her glance flew to Isabela, whose profile was carved ivory beneath the brim of her hat, encircled by the streaming chiffon.

  ‘You heard me,’ Isabela snapped. ‘Just as I heard Duane out on the patio this morning. You were afraid, he said, of it coming to light that you and he had spent a night together at Lake Temcina. Why afraid? Because Tristan thinks you a little innocent, and Nanette believes you loved her darling Armand?’

  ‘Stop it!’ Roslyn ordered. ‘None of it is true, what you’re thinking. Duane and I were trapped down on the lake-shore by a landslide. We had to stay in a boat-shed until the morning, but I can assure you that he did not make love to me.’

  ‘Why were you down on the shore together?’ Isabela’s hands were gripping the wheel of the car, which was hurtling along over the round-headed stones of the road.

  ‘We were not together - not right away.’ Roslyn had to raise her voice above the rush of the wind, one hand holding on to her hat to keep it from flying off her head. ‘I felt like a walk, and he must have had the same idea as me, that the lake looked mysterious and inviting in the moonlight. But I no more wanted to run into him than he wanted to have the responsibility of me for the night. The path back to the hotel was all but swept away - we couldn’t do anything else but wait for daylight to come.’

  ‘Why did you keep your little adventure such a big secret?’

  It was a pertinent question, but Roslyn was in no mood for the sparing of feelings ... hers were not being spared by this inquisition.

  ‘Duane wanted it that way,’ she said. ‘It was his idea that we say nothing. I think he must have known that you would jump to the wrong conclusion.’

  ‘Or that I would jump to the right one,’ Isabela said sharply. ‘Most cats look alike in the dark - and I presume the boat-shed was pretty dark - and they all purr when they are stroked.’