Sandstorm (12 page)

'Yes.'

Abby nodded, but inside she was still less than convinced. What if it was all a ghastly mistake? she hazarded anxiously. What if she was only suffering from some awful psychological complaint, that described all the symptoms of pregnancy, without any of the substance? She had heard of cases like that. Could she conceivably have willed herself into a state of mock-pregnancy?

Even after seeing the doctor that afternoon, she found it incredibly difficult to believe what he had told her. It was like a dream, or perhaps a nightmare, she acknowledged, with all the inbuilt fears that waking up might bring. For so long she had longed for this day, but now it was here she was too stunned to feel anything but apprehension.

For the first time she allowed herself to wonder what Rachid's reaction might be. It wasn't easy to speculate on his feelings. After the way he had spoken about their divorce, it was always possible that he might deny all responsibility for it. Like her father, he already suspected Brad's affection for her, and that night at his hotel seemed such an unlikely explanation.

Then she hunched her shoulders and mentally shook herself. Who was she fooling? Whatever his faults, Rachid was not a man to shirk his responsibilities, and when he learned she was carrying his child, she doubted any force on earth would prevent him from taking what was his. He had wanted this child, just as much as she did—but for different reasons.

She returned to work the following morning, much to her father's disapproval.

'I really think you should give up your job now, Abby,' he told her brusquely the night before, but Abby was determined not to be intimidated.

'I still have my own life to lead, Dad,' she insisted firmly, and Professor Gillespie shook his head in anxious exasperation.

'What about Rachid?' he persisted, voicing the problem Abby had been trying to avoid, and she managed to divert his tenacity only with difficulty. Eventually she succeeded in placating him by promising to write to Rachid at the weekend, but as she seated herself behind her desk that morning, she realised she might well be in Scotland by then.

Brad was delighted to see her, though he commented on her pale complexion, a hangover from the nausea she had suffered again that morning. 'Are you sure you're well enough to be back at work?' he asked doubtfully. 'You still look-very peaky. Have you seen a doctor?'

Abby hesitated. She knew she owed him nothing less than the truth, but she was stupidly loath to share her secret with anyone else. 'I have seen a doctor,' she admitted now, and at Brad's enquiring glance: 'He said it was nothing to—to worry about. I'll be fine, honestly.'

'Well, if you're sure ...' Brad shook his head. 'It seems to me you could do with a holiday. You haven't looked yourself since—well, since Rachid was here, if you must know. I think you need a change of scene.'

'Oh, Brad!' Abby bent her head to the papers on her desk. 'It's kind of you to care about me, but it's really not necessary. I'm just a little under the weather, that's all. Everyone gets a bit depressed at this time of year.'

'What? With Christmas only weeks away?' Brad shook his head. 'Abby, stop making excuses. You don't have to. I can guess what's wrong with you.'

'You can?' Abby looked up at him, half in apprehension.

'Yes.' Brad made an impatient gesture. 'It's this divorce that's getdng you down, isn't it? I read the papers, too, you know.'

Abby gulped. 'The papers?'

'That article in the evening press, the day Rachid was here. I saw that he wanted a divorce. That was why he was in London, wasn't it?'

Abby closed her eyes for a moment, and then opened them again. 'I don't think I can discuss it, Brad,' she murmured, despising her own duplicity. 'Do you mind? It—it is rather—personal.'

'Of course.' Brad was all understanding now he thought he had discovered the truth. 'Anyway, what I was about to say, regarding this fixation I have about you needing a holiday ...' He grinned. 'How about spending Christmas with me in Mexico? The weather is ideal at this time of year, and the meetings I have to attend wouldn't take up more than half our time. We could divide our time between Mexico City and Acapulco, and we might even get to see some of those Mayan sites Bob Morris is always talking about.'

'I can't.' Abby's refusal was immediate, but she hastily qualified it by adding: 'I couldn't leave Dad at Christmas, Brad. It wouldn't be fair.'

She could also have added that the idea of leaving England at this time filled her with alarm, and she realised she wasn't going to be able to keep her condition from him for long.

'All right.' He shrugged now, obviously disappointed, but willing to make a compromise. 'After Christmas, then. We'll go in January. It will be something to look forward to while everyone here is trying to keep warm. I'll make the arrangements as soon as I can.'

Abby's head sank on to her upturned palm as soon as Brad disappeared into his own office. With her elbow propped upon the desk, she stared unseeingly through the window on to the rooftops of London. It she hadn't known better, she could almost have believed her father was at the bottom of Brad's proposition. It certainly made telling Rachid of paramount importance, unless she intended the staff to know before the child's father.

The trip to Aberdeen was postponed until the following week, and on Saturday Abby knew she had to knuckle down to writing to her husband. But what to say, and how to say it, made its composition formidable, and she was making her umpteenth attempt when the telephone rang.

Professor Gillespie was in his study, and as he didn't like to be interrupted when he was working, Abby went downstairs to answer it. But her mind was still active with the letter she had been composing, and her tone was absent as sha picked up the receiver.

'Yes?'

There was an ominous crackling on the wire, and then a voice she had never expected to hear said: 'Abby? Abby, is that you?'

'Rachid!' she almost dropped the Biro she had been tapping against her teeth. 'I—where are you?'

'Where do you suppose?' he enquired, his voice, more real than her own voice, echoing in her ears. 'I am calling from Xanthia. I understand you wished to speak to me.'

Abby sought the padded bench, mentally berating her father for his interference. It had to be him. No one else knew of her condition, and she felt aggravated that he had not even thought to warn her.

, 'Abby!' Rachid spoke again, his voice mirroring his impatience. 'You did wish to speak to me, did you not? I have not been misinformed?'

'No. No. That is‑' Abby moistened her dry lips. 'Oh, Rachid, I was just writing you a letter.'

'You—were writing to me?' He sounded as surprised as she might have expected. 'In what connection?' He paused. 'Ah, I comprehend.' His voice hardened. 'You have spoken to a lawyer?'

'No.' Abby was finding this twice as difficult as the written communication. 'Oh, honestly, this is very hard for me.'

'Indeed?' Rachid seemed sceptical now. 'However, as I do not know why you wished to speak with me, I am unable to help you.'

'Yes.' Abby expelled her breath on a sigh. 'I'm sorry. But I didn't expect—that is—how are you? Are you fully recovered? I expect you were glad to get home to‑'

'Abby!' There was a grimness to his voice now. 'I did not place this call to discuss the state of my health. Nor, I hazard, did you.'

'I didn't place the call,' Abby retorted swiftly, indignation making it easier. 'My father must have asked you to ring me. I—I knew nothing about it.'

There was silence for a few seconds, and then, when she was beginning to wonder if he had rung off, he said: 'Then it is your father who wishes to speak with me? I regret—I was given the wrong message.'

'No. Oh, no.' Abby cast about desperately for the right words. 'You're right, I—I did want to—to get in contact with you. It's just—oh‑'

'In the name of Mohammed, Abby, say what must be said,' he overrode her savagely, and taking a deep breath, she faltered:

'I—I'm pregnant, Rachid. I'm going to have a baby!'

The word he used she recognised as a crude blasphemy, but she could hardly blame him. She had been shocked herself, and she at least had the physical evidence of her condition to prove it. All he had was her distant word, and the unmistakable reluctance with which she had given him the news.

'Pregnant?' he said at last, the word still a question on his tongue. Then: 'I will fly to London tomorrow. This is not something I care to discuss by any other means than a personal one.'

'Oh, but‑'

Abby didn't know whether she could face Rachid so soon, nor indeed was she sure of her intentions. She needed more, .time to assimilate what this was going to mean to her, and she silently reprimanded her father again for precipitating the situation.

However, Rachid was not prepared to discuss it. 'Tomorrow,' he said, with finality in his tones, and rang off before she could say anything further.

Her father emerged from his study to find her still sitting by the phone, and he had the grace to look a little shamefaced when she raised reproachful eyes to his.

'All right, all right,' he said. 'I know what you're thinking. But I only did it for the best.'

'You should have told me,' she declared, getting to her feet rather uncertainly. 'If I'd known that it might be Rachid‑'

'—you'd have refused to answer the phone,' retorted her father dryly. 'And that was why I chose not to tell you.'

Abby shook her head. 'But what did you say? Who did you speak to?'

'I don't know. Some servant or other. I didn't ask to speak to Rachid, if that's what you mean. I just left a message for him to call you, and happily, that's what he's done.'

'Happily?' Abby shivered, and walked down the hall into the kitchen, warming her cold hands on the radiator. 'He's coming to England to see me. What do you think about that? And all because you told him to ring me.'

Professor Gillespie had followed her, and now he picked up the kettle and carried it to fill at the tap. 'You must have told him about the baby,' he remarked reasonably, carrying the kettle back to the power point and plugging it in. 'I hoped you would. It's much better than writing a letter. Letters are such—impersonal things.' He turned to smile at her. 'How did he take it?'

Abby rested her back against the draining unit. 'I don't know,' she murmured uneasily. 'He was shocked, naturally, but—I don't know.'

'You did tell him that it was his, didn't you?' her father prompted briskly. 'You explained.'

'Explained?' Abby looked at him blankly. 'I—why—what was there to explain?'

'Abby!' Her father stared at her impatiently. 'For heaven's sake! You must have reminded him about that night at the hotel. Oh, lord! You didn't let him go without knowing he was the father!'

'Dad!' Abby was affronted. 'What do you think I am?'

'It's not what I think that matters,' retorted her father shortly. 'Abby, you've been asking Rachid for a divorce. What would you think, given the same circumstances?'

Abby's pale cheeks flushed with colour. 'You don't think he imagines there's someone else?'

'Why not?' Her father's tone was irritated. 'Honestly, Abby, you must have known how ambiguous a statement like that can be, particularly right now. Didn't you tell me he accused Daley of having a more than fatherly interest in you?'

Abby's shoulders sagged. 'Oh, well, if that's what he chooses to think, let him.' She moved away from the sink. 'I'm going up to my room. I feel a bit dizzy.'

'Don't you want a cup of tea?' exclaimed her father, as the kettle began to boil, but Abby shook her head.

'No, thanks,' she refused flatly, and walked wearily out of the room.

Upstairs, she flung herself on her bed, with an intense feeling of frustration. If was ridiculous to care what Rachid thought, but the fact remained, in spite of what she had told her father, she did. She felt depressed and bewildered, and dangerously near to tears, and no matter how she tried, she couldn't escape the consequences of her own foolishness.

What was she going to do? she asked herself despairingly. When Rachid came, as he surely would, what was she going to tell him? If he asked her to go back to Abarein with him, how would she respond? And ultimately, after the child was born, where did she propose to live?

It was useless to pretend that these questions would not have to be answered. Whatever happened she would be expected to hand the child over, providing Rachid believed it was his, and that would mean abandoning either her motherhood or her self-respect. But living in Xanthia meant living near Farah again, and that was something she had sworn she would never do.

Abby spent the following day in a state of high tension. Every car door that slammed in the Mews outside brought a chill of anticipation to her spine, and when the telephone rang she froze at whatever task she was tackling, standing in numbed apprehension until her father called that it was for him.

She didn't know what time Rachid was likely to arrive. Flights from Abarein to London invariably left in the morning, but the length of the flight and the possibility of delays meant that it was impossible to correcdy gauge his landing. Sunday was not the easiest day to travel, but as the afternoon drew to its close Abby felt the first pangs of troubled anxiety. What if his flight was overdue? What if it had been hijacked? The craziest notions spun round in her head so that when she served their evening meal, her appetite was practically gone.

Her father studied the untouched plate of roast beef in front of her, and laid down his own knife and fork. 'Now what's wrong?' he asked, his own concern evident, and Abby shook her head helplessly.

'It's nothing. Just apprehension, I suppose.' She glanced surreptitiously at the clock on the wall. 'Eat your dinner. Don't take any notice of me.'

Professor Gillespie's eyes followed hers. 'He's late, is that what you're thinking?' he suggested quietly. 'What do you want me to do? Phone the airport?'

'Heavens, no!' Abby was insistent. 'I was just checking the time, that's all. Do—er—do you think he will have eaten?'