Bonds of Matrimony (7 page)

'Bob can come too,' she said. 'If you can get leave. Can you, Bob?'

Betsy actually yawned. 'We've already decided all that!' she said.

'Have we?' asked Hero.

Benedict smoothed the situation. 'She's been in a dream ever since we spotted a pair of leopards out in the Park this afternoon,' he told them. 'I gather it's rather rare to get such a good sighting.' Then Hero was conscious of a mocking look in his own eyes as he added deadpan, 'The leopards got a good sighting too!'

It took a minute to remember where she was. Hero slipped out of bed and went to look out of the window. A long trail of cars were locked into a queue waiting to get into the centre of the city. It was the same every day now as they flooded in in the mornings and out again in the afternoons. People had told Hero that it was far worse in London these days, but despite being able to talk knowledgeably about Oxford Street, St. Paul's Cathedral, and a hundred other landmarks well known to all Londoners, Hero had never been there and she couldn't really imagine any city being very much larger than the ones she knew.

She glanced at her watch, a little reluctant to get dressed just yet. The jacarandas that lined the road caught at her imagination. Since the rains had failed the last time, nothing had flowered on the farm. The last few weeks she had spent at home she had felt starved of any colour. There had been nothing but dust and the sight of dying trees, and skinny animals eking out their existence with the help of the river that ran at times through the property, but which had been practically dry for nearly two years now. When she had come back to Nairobi, she had been devastated by the colour that had met her eyes. The jacarandas hadn't been out then, but the bougainvillea, frangipani and hibiscus had been everywhere, lending their glory to the wide streets of the town that had come into being almost by accident with the building of the railway.

A knock on her door sent her scuttling back to bed. A second later an African entered in response to her call and laid her early morning tea tray on the table beside her.

'Hujambo?' he said formally.

'Sijamb of' Hero replied, watching him fiddle with the cup and saucer to make sure that the handle was facing her.

'U mzima?' he went on with the caution of one who had been surprised to get an answer the first time. Hero supposed there were not many people who stayed in the hotel who spoke anything else but English.

She suppressed a smile. 'Ni mzima/

She was rewarded by a broad grin. 'The bwana says he is eating breakfast in half an hour,' he told her. 'He will be at the same table you had last night.'

‘Asante/ Hero murmured.

The African gone, she swallowed down the orange juice that came automatically with the tea, and went back to the window. It was then that she remembered

Benedict's book. She hunted in her suitcase, hoping that Betsy had remembered to put it away there, and came up triumphantly with it still wrapped in the paper from the shop. Unwrapped, she thought it looked impressive. There was even a picture of Benedict on the back of the cover, a list of his degrees, and a short piece about a series of lectures he had given on land reclamation in desert lands, and a few facts about his past life: that he had been born in London thirty-four years before; the school he had gone to; and finally a list of the universities where he had either studied or taught at one time or another.

Hero thrust the book back into the bottom of her suitcase. She felt unsettled by the unexpected knowledge she had acquired about him. She felt she would have to get to know him all over again. This wasn't the work of the Benedict that she knew. This came from a man who was an expert in his own field and who, for some reason best known to himself, had said nothing about his own achievements in any of the conversations she had had with him. And she hadn't asked him about himself either! She hadn't been sufficiently interested, she told herself with unwonted humility, and he had known it.

It was with a subdued air that Hero went down to breakfast. She helped herself to a slice of paw-paw from the laden table of cereals and fruits in the centre of the room and slipped into her seat opposite Benedict. He stood up as she approached the table.

'Sleep well?' he asked her.

'Yes,' she said. 'Did you?'

'Well enough.' He sat down again. 'I've ordered eggs and bacon and coffee for us both,' he went on. 'I hope that's all right with you?'

She nodded, not liking to tell him that she seldom ate breakfast. 'I didn't mean to keep you waiting. I couldn't make up my mind what to wear.'

He looked her over, that detached look of amusement again in his eyes. 'I'll back you for Miss World.'

'Oh!' The colour fled up her cheeks again. 'I wasn't fishing.'

'I guess you weren't,' he replied dryly, deliberately misunderstanding and looking out of the window at the arid wastes beyond. 'Water does seem in short supply around these parts.'

Hero swallowed and, looking at his colourful shirt, instinctively said the first thing which came into her head. 'Were - are you fond of the person who gave you that shirt?'

'Who said that anyone gave it me, Liebling?'

'Is she the girl you're in love with?'

He raised an eyebrow. 'I didn't say it was a girl—' 'No, you didn't,' she admitted. 'Was it - was it Betsy who gave it to you?'

'Now I wonder what makes you think that?' he drawled.

'It - it just occurred to me,' she tried to explain. To her relief, the waiter arrived with their bacon and eggs, but even when such an easy let-out had been presented to her she couldn't resist pressing him for an answer. 'Was it?'

He laughed easily. 'Your interest is most flattering.' Hero shook her head. He was quite at liberty to accept presents from anyone he wanted to - anyone at all! But she couldn't help it if she didn't like the idea of his exchanging presents with Betsy. It gave her a lowering feeling that she couldn't explain. And when had Betsy had the time to get to know him well enough to give him shirts and - and what else had she given him ?

'If she gave it to you, I suppose you'd better keep it!' she said shortly.

He smiled at her. 'Thank you,' he said. 'Will this be enough marmalade for you?'

She recognized that the subject was now closed and accepted his lead willingly enough. She simply couldn't think what was the matter with her, making scenes about nothing in particular, and taking him to task about something that was absolutely no business of hers! She watched him across the table as he poured himself another cup of coffee. He drank it black, piling in the sugar with a liberal hand, and drinking it with a vague, abstracted air that probably meant that he was thinking about something quite different. She wondered what it was.

'What time do we have to be at the airport?' she asked him.

He stared at her as though she were a stranger. 'I'm sorry. What did you say?'

'Nothing,' she said. 'I think I'll go and pack my things. Does it matter how much I take with me?'

'I shouldn't think so!' His eyes focused on her face. 'How much do you want to take?'

'Well, she said, 'a couple of suitcases. Only the books weigh rather heavily and one can't take much on a plane, can one?'

'I don't think you need worry about that,' he reassured her.

'But I do.'

'So I get the impression. Can't you leave it to me, Liebling, to see you safely home?'

To her surprise, she found she could. It was a comfortable feeling to know that she had someone behind her. She had been alone for so long. But how odd that that someone should be anyone remotely like Benedict Carmichael!

Sitting beside Benedict in the car on the way out to the airport, Hero tried not to think about the approaching flight. She amused herself instead by wondering about her husband and what it was going to be like to have him about the house, in the rooms that still bore the stamp of her parents' presence. He would have her parents' bedroom, she decided, because it was much bigger and airier than any of the others, and it had its own bathroom which he would probably appreciate when it came to shaving and so on. There wouldn't be much bathing at the moment, the water shortage was far too grave for that.

They left the industrial suburbs behind and crossed over the Kampala-Mombasa road, turning into the road that led to the airport. Hero stiffened as she caught sight of the planes on the runway. They were so small, so impractical in all those miles of space they were expected to traverse, and the one that Benedict was expecting her to travel in was smaller by far than any of these.

'You can still go by train.' His voice broke across her thoughts.

'No,' she said. 'I'd rather go with you.'

'Are you beginning to get some confidence in your husband?' His tone was again deadpan.

When the car came to a stop, she stepped out on to the tarmac as cool as a cucumber. She even managed a smile in the direction of the tiny plane that Benedict pointed out to her as being his. It had some mysterious letters down either side which meant nothing to her, and a badge which meant even less.

It was bigger inside than she had expected, fitted with six comfortable seats, three down each side; a minute galley; and two more seats up in the cockpit, which was separated from the cabin by a heavy curtain.

'You'd better sit up front with me,' Benedict advised her.

Hero presented him with a white face. 'Are you going to drive?' she demanded.

'It's usually called flying.' His tone was easy. 'Sit down and I'll strap you in. You'll see better from up here and I'll be able to keep an eye on you.'

'Is that necessary?'

'I think so,' he said. He clicked the heavy buckle in place, shortening the straps to fit her slender form. 'There's not much of you, is there?'

'Enough.' She didn't dare look up at him. Besides, she was too busy watching his scarred hands as they worked around her, adjusting the various straps. They fascinated her. She felt a little shiver of pleasure when they touched her. She was glad when he took a step away from her, satisfied that her belt now fitted, and took his place in what she still thought of as the driving seat, fastening himself in with neat, efficient movements.

A few minutes later he had obtained clearance to take off and the engine sprang into life. Hero didn't have time to be afraid. All she could do was stare at his hands while they moved about the controls, taxiing the plane across the apron and down the runway ready to turn round and take the final run up to the moment of flight. They were up before she was aware, climbing steadily upwards into the clear blue sky.

'It's beautiful!' Hero remarked.

'It'll get better as we go round Mount Kenya,' he said.

'Why don't you make us some coffee?'

'Perhaps I'll feel more like it in a little while, if - if you don't mind waiting?'

He turned towards her and looked into her eyes deliberately. 'I can wait,' he said, and Hero was very conscious that he intended a double meaning.

CHAPTER FIVE

The sunburned, almost blackened, tough grass of the plains gave way to the majesty of Mount Kenya, that most beautiful of mountains, where the old gods of Africa took up their residence and promised the highlands to the tribes of their choice, only to be defeated at the hands of the white man despite the rumours that their time was still to come. Perhaps it was, Hero thought, as she stared down at the changing land below, and she could not entirely regret it. The land made its own demands on the people who worked it, forming them to its requirements as much as they did it, and who were the gods if they were not the personification of the land and its most prominent features?

'There's Embu down there,' she said aloud. 'We must be about half-way there.' 'Feel like that coffee yet?'

Hero wished now that she had got it when he had first suggested it. Near the mountain, there were spirals of air and frequent pockets that made the plane rise and fall without warning, doing disastrous things to her stomach. She unbuckled her seat-belt and stood up uncertainly, pausing to see if she could detect any difference in the plane's performance when she moved about. It didn't seem to make the slightest difference after all, but that didn't stop her being infuriated by Benedict's grin as she slipped past him, thrusting the curtain aside to go into the tiny galley.

When she came back with the coffee, he was studying the map.

'Lost the way?' she asked.

'I was looking for Nanyuki,' he answered.

'It's on the other side of the mountain,' she said. The aeroplane flew through another pocket and dropped several feet, making her fall into her seat with more haste than grace. 'Must you do that?' she demanded.

'It must be your added weight up here in the nose.'

'I thought you said it didn't matter!' she exclaimed.

'It doesn't. Did your mother teach you to cook as well as make coffee?'

'Of course,' she said, re-fastening her seat-belt just in case he should be wrong and it was she who had caused the sudden fall in height.

'There's no of course about it. I know many girls out here who can't boil an egg for themselves!'

He would! He certainly hadn't wasted his time in Kenya, she thought, darkly. But then he knew Betsy, and one didn't have to look any further if one wanted a girl who couldn't cook or do anything but enjoy herself. Betsy had been waited on, hand and foot, all her life.

'My mother had other ideas,' she said. 'She didn't approve of asking anyone else to do what one can't do oneself.'

'And her daughter?'

Hero strove to keep the note of reproof out of her voice. It wouldn't do to criticise Betsy. 'I agree with her. I prefer to do things for myself.' 'And for your husband?'

Hero took a hurried sip of coffee. 'When I have a husband - a proper one, I mean - naturally I'll cook for him and—' She broke off, not liking to think what else she might do for him.

'And?' he went on.

'And—' she began. 'Well, naturally, I'll serve him as best I may. Wouldn't you expect that from your wife?'

'Possibly. You're an intriguing mixture, Hero Carmichael. Mostly, you're as English as I am, but then you come out with something delightfully old-fashioned and Greek like that.'