African Enchantment (10 page)

Hashim sat beside her, glowering ferociously at those who had the temerity to stare at the slender English girl with the sun-gold hair.

Harriet was oblivious of the stares of the curious. As their horse-drawn carriage trundled rapidly away from the riverside and towards the centre of the city, she looked behind her, waving until his tall, powerful figure could no longer be seen.

Close to the hot bustling streets were not as attractive as they had seemed. The city smelt of dust and dung and the air was heavy with the strange sounds of muezzins calling the faithful to prayer and the barking of pi-dogs and the ceaseless thud of camel hooves.

Why had he not come with her? What business could be so important that he would entrust the supervision of her meeting with Lady Crale to the hands of Hashim? Oddly deflated, Harriet tried to summon some enthusiasm for the coming interview. At least, thanks to her father, she was expected. She would be in the home of a fellow countrywoman and not exposed to the likes of the Pasha.

The carriage jolted uncomfortably to a halt before an imposing white-walled residence. Picking up her skirts, she stepped cautiously down and waited with increasing nervousness as Hashim rang at the gateway for admittance.

A sleekly groomed Arab answered the summons. Angry words were exchanged between them. Harriet's anxiety grew. Surely Raoul should have foreseen such difficulties? Why, oh why, could he not have accompanied her? With Raoul at her side she would not have been apprehensive. She could have faced a dozen Lady Crales with impunity.

Eyes flashing dangerously, Hashim turned to her. ‘This son of a dog will not permit me to enter with you until he has spoken to his mistress.'

The iron gate closed against them. The heat was stifling, Harriet wiped her brow, feeling both humiliated and undignified. The Arab returned and sulkily admitted them. Hashim crowed triumphantly over him and then surveyed the splendid inner courtyard with admiration. There was a pond and a fountain that far exceeded in size and grandeur the residence of the Pasha.

White and blue water lilies floated gently on the surface. Coral-red aloes and bright orange ambatch plants filled the square with brilliant colour. Giant fig trees and wild-date palms gave shade. Hot stone gave way to cool tiles. Hashim had dropped a respectful distance behind her. There was no sign of braceleted, dark-eyed girls as there had been at the Pasha's. Lady Crale's servants were attired in uniform, a silk sash crossing their breasts, turbans on their head. One set of folded doors opened after another. The furnishings were entirely English. There was no hint of Africa in the plush upholstered armchairs and glass cabinets of books.

‘My dear child!' A statuesque woman with kind eyes and warm smile was hurrying towards her, petticoats rustling beneath a blue gown. ‘How unexpected your arrival is! I have had no word from your father for months. Do sit down and take tea.' A cool hand clasped Harriet's and guided her towards a velvet-upholstered chair. ‘What an ordeal your journey must have been! I warned your father as to the wisdom of it, but he would not be dissuaded. He was insistent that you were strong enough for the rigours of the desert and so you have proved. Nevertheless, I shall take him to task for worrying me so.' She gazed expectantly at the still-open door.

‘My father is not with me, Lady Crale.'

‘Not with you!' Lady Crale swung round aghast. ‘My dear child, what do you mean?'

Tears filled Harriet's eyes. ‘ I am afraid that my father is dead, Lady Crale.'

Lady Crale's face paled. She reached out her hand, grasping the back of a chair to steady herself. ‘Dead! But where? How?' Dazedly she walked across the room and sat down.

‘In the desert. Tribesmen stole our baggage camels and we were left without provisions.'

‘But this is terrible, terrible.' Lady Crale stared across at Harriet horrified. ‘Your father was such a good man. He accomplished so much in Cairo and was eager to do the same here. Oh, it does not bear thinking of!'

Harriet's eyes were bright with tears. ‘I do not think he suffered much pain in the end. He was overcome with exhaustion and death came swiftly.'

‘Poor, dear child.' Lady Crale reached out and clasped Harriet's hand in her own. ‘What agonies you have suffered.' Her eyes changed expression. ‘But how did you cross the desert without companions or stores?' she asked curiously. ‘How have your reached Khartoum?'

Harriet remembered the lie Raoul had told the Pasha in order to protect her reputation. That she was his cousin. It was a lie that could be dispensed with now. In another few days she would be his wife and that would surely silence any unkind tongue.

‘I was rescued by a naturalist and a geographer travelling south.'

Relief and horror fought for mastery on Lady Crale's finely-drawn features. ‘ My dear child. Are you telling me you have travelled from the Nubian Desert accompanied only by two gentlemen?'

‘By one gentleman,' Harriet corrected, a smile curving her lips. Lady Crale pressed a hand against her palpitating heart. ‘But this is dreadful! Why, anything could have happened to you! You could have been … Have been …'

‘Mr Beauvais is a Frenchman and a gentleman of much standing in Cairo and Alexandria,' Harriet said, attempting to set Lady Crale's fears at rest.

‘Beauvais?' Lady Crale murmured, a travesty of the cool, assured woman who had greeted her only moments before. ‘Did you say Beauvais?'

‘Yes. Mr Raoul Beauvais. He has a house in Khartoum. Are you acquainted with him?'

Lady Crale's face was deathly. ‘Smelling salts,' she gasped weakly, gesturing in the direction of a rosewood secretaire.

Hastily Harriet rose and sought out the smelling salts. It had not occurred to her that Lady Crale would be so overcome by the news of her father's death.

‘There is no reason to distress yourself, Lady Crale,' she said solicitously, as she pressed the salts into a trembling hand. ‘My father died in the country he loved and would have preferred that to dying in his bed at Cheltenham.'

‘Yes. Of course.' Lady Crale attempted to rally herself.

‘As for myself, I have been most fortunate and am very grateful for the fact.'

Slight colour had returned to Lady Crale's cheeks. ‘You are, of course, welcome to stay here for as long as you desire, Harriet. However, it may be best if arrangements are put in hand for you to return to Cairo and thence to England,
suitably
escorted of course. Such arrangements can be difficult to make and can take time. Unfortunately, the consul is absent at the moment.'

‘Please don't worry about me, Lady Crale. I am sure that things will sort themselves out most satisfactorily.'

Prudence warned her against telling Lady Crale that she would be marrying Raoul Beauvais and would no longer need her protection. Such news would best come from Raoul himself.

Lady Crale summoned the strength to ring the bell at her side. ‘My maid will show you to the room that has been set aside for you. No doubt you will need a rest after your … your trials.'

Harriet turned to say ‘goodbye' to Hashim but the large room was empty except for themselves.

‘Is something amiss, Harriet? You don't mind me calling you Harriet, do you? “Miss Latimer” sounds so cold and formal and in all my correspondence with your dear father you were referred to as “Harriet” and so I have come to know you.'

‘I much prefer “Harriet” to “ Miss Latimer”,' Harriet said truthfully. ‘ I was looking for Hashim.'

‘Beauvais' servant? Don't worry about him. He will be given a cooling drink before returning to his master.'

It seemed strange to hear Hashim referred to as a servant and not a friend. Disappointedly, she waited for the arrival of the maid and then followed her up a shallow flight of stone stairs to a simply, but comfortably, furnished bedroom. Only later, when she had washed and changed into fresh clothes provided by Lady Crale, did it occur to her that it was stranger still that Lady Crale should refer to Raoul as simply ‘Beauvais'. No doubt she had misheard. Such rudeness would be uncharacteristic of a lady who was obviously both kind and thoughtful.

From the balcony of her room Harriet could see the Nile, pelicans and great maribou storks thronging the dun-coloured water. Beyond the banks there was nothing but desert stretching to the horizon on either side.

She wondered where Raoul was: if his Khartoum house was similar to Lady Crale's; if it was nearby. Perhaps, even now, he was only a short distance from her.

She stepped inside and closed the shutters, lying on the bed and watching the motes of dust dance in the fierce shafts of sunlight that slanted through the wooden slats. Tomorrow they would be able to talk without Hashim or the sailors overhearing. Tomorrow he would make his intentions clear. He would inform Lady Crale that he wished to marry her and from then on their courtship would be regularised. She smiled and closed her eyes. He had still to ask her to marry him. No doubt he thought such a question irrelevant: her arms and lips had already told him of her answer.

Lady Crale had changed into a dinner dress of emerald silk. Diamonds sparkled at her wrist and throat. A thousand miles from civilisation, she looked as if she was entertaining in her London home in Bloomsbury Square.

‘There will be five of us for dinner, Harriet. Dr Walther, a German and a most interesting gentleman. His daughter, Magdalene – she is a year or two your senior, but will be very pleased at having you for a companion; and my son, Sebastian.' She patted her elaborate coiffure, once more poised and in control of the situation. ‘I think it best, Harriet, if you do not mention the manner in which you arrived in Khartoum. The European population here is small and it may be … misunderstood.'

The gown that the maid had laid out for Harriet was a deep rose-pink with a nipped-in waist and a fashionable décolleté neckline. Over hoops, the crinoline skirt surged and billowed and Harriet found it hard to believe that she was in Africa and not at a smart evening party in Cheltenham. Only the daring plunge of the neckline assured her that it was not so. Modesty overcame fashion in Cheltenham. Such a neckline on a girl of eighteen would never have been countenanced.

Lady Crale's kindness had been overwhelming and if her unchaperoned journey to Khartoum was likely to cause embarrassment, then Harriet saw no reason to talk of it. All such difficulties would be resolved with Raoul's arrival.

In the dining room silver gleamed on white napery. Small negro boys wafted the air with long ostrich feathers. Dr Walther and his daughter were introduced to Harriet, the Doctor's eyes warmly welcoming and incurious, his daughter's sharply feline. With the arrival of Sebastian Crale Harriet understood the reason for her cold reception from the other girl. Sebastian Crale was in his mid-twenties and undeniably dashing. His fair hair shone sleekly, his moustaches impeccably trimmed. His eyes were an arresting grey and his well-shaped mouth smiled easily and often.

Magdalene's eyes followed his every move and Harriet was disconcerted as Sebastian Crale gave her his undivided attention throughout dinner, his manner blatantly appraising. She wanted to tell Magdalene that she had no cause for concern; that she had no intention of ensnaring Sebastian Crale; that her heart was given elsewhere and that in another few hours she would be affiancéed.

A slight frown furrowed Lady Crale's brow but otherwise she gave no indication that she found her son's open admiration of Henry Latimer's daughter disturbing. She had smoothly explained to her guests that Harriet had been escorted by friends to Khartoum and would be staying at the consulate.

‘It is an amazing journey from the coast to Khartoum, do you not think so, Miss Latimer?' the little German asked, wiping his rimless spectacles on his table napkin.

‘It is extremely boring,' Magdalene said before Harriet could reply. ‘Why Papa insists on remaining here I cannot imagine. We have a large establishment in Stuttgart and a magnificent summer house in the Bavarian Alps. Do you like Bavaria?' she asked, turning to Sebastian as the servants placed iced soup before the guests.

‘A lovely city,' Sebastian replied, gazing at sleekly coiled gold braids.

‘
Bavaria!
' Magdalene hissed, her cat eyes feral as she failed to gain his attention.

‘Oh yes, of course.' He did not trouble to turn towards her.

Where on earth had his mother's guest sprung from? His mother had told him that she was a missionary's daughter but he found it hard to believe. Her grace and poise were effortless. His mother was no doubt trying to dissuade him from another emotional entanglement. He tried to think who was in Cairo and Alexandria. The Duke and Duchess of Stathlone had been there recently. Had they any adventurous daughters? He didn't recall that they had. Fish followed the soup. Whoever she was, she was captivating. He drank his chilled wine thoughtfully. Beauvais would know; Beauvais knew everything.

‘Did you know Raoul Beauvais arrived this afternoon?' he asked the table at large. ‘ Things should move pretty fast now.'

‘I am surprised to hear you speak his name,' Magdalene said viciously. ‘ The man is a dissolute renegade.'

‘Dissolute, certainly,' her father said, ‘but he does not deserve the name of renegade.'

Harriet could hardly believe her ears. Her eyes flashed fire. ‘He does not deserve any such names!' she said furiously, setting down her knife and fork and glaring at them. ‘He is a courageous man: a gentleman. He has been very kind to me and I will not allow him to be vilified in such a wicked manner.'

Lady Crale closed her eyes and sank visibly in her chair. Dr Walther, Magdalene and Sebastian regarded her with astonishment.

‘Beauvais has never been kind to a woman in his life,' Sebastian managed at last. ‘He wouldn't know how.'

‘They say he's kind to his little slave girl,' Dr Walther chuckled.