He Shall Thunder in the Sky (50 page)

     “You could beat him senseless with one hand.”

     Ramses let out an odd sound that might have been a muffled laugh. “Your confidence is flattering, Mother, if somewhat exaggerated. I might have to use both hands. That wasn’t what I meant, though.”

     “He can never deceive us again, Ramses. We know his real nature too well. Surely you don’t believe Nefret has succumbed to his flattery and his advances?”

     “No.” The word was too quick and too vehement.

     “No,” I insisted. “He is everything she loathes and despises. Perhaps . . . Yes, it can only be because she thinks Percy has some new villainy in mind, and that she is helping to protect you.”

     “That’s what I’m afraid of,” Ramses said. “Time to retreat, Mother, she’s standing up.”

     We returned to the ballroom. Nefret was not far behind us. Had she seen us? I hoped not; she had some cause for resentment if she believed I had been spying on her.

     Emerson had been prowling round the room, looking for me, as he explained accusingly.

     “Hand her over, Ramses,” he ordered. “The waltzes are all mine, you know.”

     “Yes, sir.”

     Emerson took my arm, and I turned to see Nefret beside us. Except for being a trifle flushed, she displayed no evidence of self-consciousness. She put her hand on Ramses’s sleeve. “Will you dance with me?”

     “Aren’t you engaged for this one?”

     “I have disengaged myself. Please?”

     He could not in courtesy refuse. With a formal bow he offered her his arm.

     The music was a waltz, a piece with which I was not familiar, sweet and rather slow. Instead of leading me onto the floor Emerson stood watching our son and daughter.

     “This is the first time they have danced together in a long while,” he said.

     “Yes.”

     “They look well.”

     “Yes.”

     They had always looked well together, but that night there was a kind of enchantment about the way they waltzed, every movement so perfectly matched, they might have been directed by a single mind. She moved lightly as a bird in flight, their clasped hands barely touching, her other hand brushing his shoulder. They were not looking at one another; Nefret’s face was averted and his was the usual impassive mask; but as I gazed, the forms of the other dancers seemed to fade away, leaving the two alone, like figures captured and held forever in a globe of clear glass.

     With an effort I shook off this somewhat unnerving fantasy. As I glanced about I realized Emerson and I were not the only ones watching the pair. Percy’s eyes followed their every moment. His arms were folded and his face bore a complacent smile.

     When the dance ended he turned and withdrew. Nefret had not seen him; her hand still on Ramses’s shoulder, she looked up into his face and spoke. Composed and unresponsive, he shook his head. Then another gentleman approached Nefret; she would have refused him, I think, had not Ramses stepped back, bowed, and walked away.

     Emerson took hold of me. My eyes on the retreating form of my son, I said absently, “It is not a waltz, Emerson, it is a schottische.”

     “Oh,” said Emerson.

     Threading his way through the whirling forms, Ramses reached the door of the ballroom. Not until that moment, when he stepped aside to allow a party to enter, did I catch a glimpse of his face.

     “Excuse me, Emerson,” I said.

     Ramses was not in the lounge or the Long Bar or the Moorish Hall or on the terrace. Unless he had left the hotel altogether, there was only one other refuge he would have sought. I went round the hotel into the garden. I heard their voices before I saw them. She must have left her partner and followed him, as I had done, but a surer instinct even than mine had led her to the right spot, a little dell where a circle of white rosebushes surrounded a curved stone bench. The flowers glimmered like mother-of-pearl in the moonlight and their scent hung heavy in the still air.

     They must have been talking for some little time, for the first words I made out, from Nefret, were obviously a response to something he had said.

     “Don’t be so damned polite!”

     “Would you rather I called you rude names? Or knocked you about? That is, I am told, a demonstration of affection in some circles.”

     “Yes! Anything but this — this —”

     “Keep your voice down,” Ramses said.

     I moved slowly and carefully along the graveled path until I reached a spot from which I could see them. They stood facing one another; all I could see of Ramses was the white of his shirtfront. Her back was to me; her robe shone with the same pearly luster as the roses that formed a frame round her, and the gems on her wrist twinkled as she raised a gloved hand and placed it on his shoulder. Her touch was not heavy, but he flinched away and Nefret’s hand fell to her side.

     “I’m sorry!”

     “Sorry for what?”

     “We were friends once. Before . . .”

     “And still are, I hope. Really, Nefret, must you make a scene? I find this very fatiguing.”

     I did not hear what she said, but it had the effect of finally breaking through his icy and infuriating self-control. He took her by her arm. She twisted neatly away and stood glaring at him, her breast rising and falling.

     “You taught me that one,” she said.

     “So I did. Here is one I did not teach you.”

     His movement was so quick I saw only the result. One arm held her pressed to his side, her body arched like a bow in his hard grasp. Putting his hand under her chin, he tilted her head back and brought his mouth down on hers.

     He went on kissing her for quite a long time. When at last he left off, they were both exceedingly short of breath. Naturally Ramses was the first to recover himself. He released her and stepped back.

     “My turn to apologize, I believe, but you really oughn’t trust anyone to behave like a gentleman when you are alone with him in the moonlight. No doubt Percy has better manners.”

     Nefret’s hand went to her throat. She started to speak, but he cut her off.

     “However, he’s not much of a gentleman if he skulks in the shrubbery looking on while a lady is being kissed against her will. He’s a little slow, perhaps. Shall we give it another try?”

     I could hardly blame her for striking at him. It was not a genteel ladylike slap, but a hard swing with her clenched fist (learned from him, I did not doubt) that would have staggered him if it had landed. It did not. As his hand went up to block the blow she caught herself; and for a long moment they stood like statues, her curled fingers resting in the cradle of his palm. Then she turned and walked away.

     Ramses sat down on the bench and covered his face with his hands.

     Naturally, if I had happened upon such a scene that involved mere acquaintances I would have discreetly retired without making my presence known. Under these circumstances I did not hesitate to intrude. To be honest, I was not myself in a proper state to think coolly. How could I have missed seeing it — I, who prided myself on my awareness of the human heart?

     He must have heard the rustle of my skirts; he had had time to compose himself. When I emerged from the shrubbery he rose and tossed away the cigarette he had been smoking.

     “Continue smoking if it will calm your mind,” I said, seating myself.

     “You too?” Ramses inquired. “I might have known. Perhaps in another ten or twenty years you will consider me mature enough to go about without a chaperone.”

     “Oh, my dear, don’t pretend,” I said. My voice was unsteady; the cool, mocking tone jarred on me as never before. “I am so sorry, Ramses. How long have you . . .”

     “Since the moment I set eyes on her. Fidelity,” Ramses said, in the same cool voice, “seems to be a fatal flaw of our family.”

     “Oh, come,” I said, accepting the cigarette he offered and allowing him to light it for me. “Are you telling me you have never — er . . .”

     “No, Mother dear, I am not telling you — er — that. I discovered years ago that lying to you is a waste of breath. How the devil do you do it? Look at you — ruffles trailing, gloves spotless — blowing out smoke like a little lady dragon and prying into the most intimate secrets of a fellow’s life. Spare me the lecture, I beg. My moments of aberration — and there were, I confess, a number of them — were attempts to break the spell. They failed.”

     “But you were only a child when you saw her for the first time.”

     “It sounds like one of the wilder romances, doesn’t it? Most authors would throw in hints of reincarnation and souls destined for one another down the long centuries. . . . It wasn’t so simple as I have made it sound, you know, or as tragic. A weakness for melodrama is another of our family failings.”

     “Tell me,” I urged. “It is unhealthy to keep one’s feelings to oneself. How often you must have yearned to confide in a sympathetic listener!”

     “Er — quite,” said Ramses.

     “Does David know?”

     “Some of it.” Glancing at me, Ramses added, “It wasn’t the same, naturally, as confiding in one’s mother.”

     “Naturally.”

     I said no more. I could feel his need to unburden himself; experienced as I am in such matters, I knew that sympathetic silence was the best means of inducing his confidences. Sure enough, after a few moments, he began.

     “It was only a child’s infatuation at first; how could it be anything more? But then came that summer I spent with Sheikh Mohammed. I thought that being away from her for months, with the sheikh providing interesting distractions . . .” Catching himself, he added hastily, “Riding and exploring and strenuous physical exercise —”

     “Of all varieties,” I muttered. “Shameful old man! I ought never have allowed you to go.”

     “Never mind, Mother. I would apologize for referring, however obliquely, to a subject unsuitable for female contemplation, if I weren’t certain that you are thoroughly conversant with it. When David and I came back to Cairo, I thought I’d got over it. But when I saw her on the terrace at Shepheard’s that afternoon, and she ran to meet me, laughing, and threw her arms round me . . .” He plucked one of the drooping roses. Twirling the stem between his fingers, he went on, “I knew that day I loved her and always would, but I couldn’t tell anyone how I felt; a declaration of undying passion from a sixteen-year-old boy would have provoked laughter or pity, and I couldn’t have stood either. So I waited, and worked and hoped, and lost her to a man whose death came close to destroying her. She had begun to forgive me for my part in that, I think —”

     “Forgive you!” I exclaimed. “What had
she
to forgive? You were the soul of honor throughout that horrible business. It is for her to ask
your
forgiveness. She ought to have had faith in you.”

     “And I ought to have gone after her and shaken some sense into her. I realize now that that was what she wanted me to do — that perhaps she had the right to expect it of me, especially after —”

     He checked himself. I said helpfully, “After having been such good friends for so long. That is what your father always did.”

     “To you? But surely you never gave Father cause to —”

     “Shake some sense into me?” My laughter was brief and rueful. “I am ashamed to admit that I did, more than once. There was one occasion — one woman in particular . . . I need not say that my suspicions were completely unfounded, but if love has an adverse effect on common sense, jealousy destroys it completely. Of course the cases are not entirely parallel.”

     “No.” I could tell that he was trying to picture Emerson shaking me as I shouted accusations of infidelity at him. He was obviously having some difficulty doing so. He shook his head. “Unfortunately, I’m not like Father. I have never found it easy to express my feelings. When I’m angry or — or offended — I pull back into my shell. That’s my weakness, Mother, just as impulsiveness is Nefret’s. I know it’s stupid, infuriating, and selfish; one ought at least give the other fellow the satisfaction of losing one’s temper.”

     “I’ve seen you lose it a few times.”

     “I’ve been practicing,” Ramses said with a wry smile. “Last year I thought that she was beginning to care a little, but then this other business came up and I didn’t dare confide in her. I hoped that one day, when this is over, I could explain and start again; but what I did tonight was the worst mistake I could have made. One doesn’t force oneself on a woman like Nefret.”

     “In my opinion it was a distinctly positive step,” I said. “Faint heart never won fair lady, my dear, and, without wishing in any way to condone the employment of physical force, there are times when a woman may secretly wish . . . Hmmm. Let me think how to put this. She may hope that the strength of a gentleman’s affection for her will cause him to forget his manners.”

     Ramses opened his mouth and closed it again. I was pleased to see that my sympathetic conversation had comforted him; he sounded quite his normal self when he finally found his voice. “Mother, you never cease to amaze me. Are you seriously suggesting I should —”

     “Why, Ramses, you know I would never venture to urge a course of action on another individual, particularly in affairs of the heart.” Ramses had lit another cigarette. He must have inhaled the wrong way, for he began to cough. I patted him on the back. “However, a demonstration of an attachment so powerful it cannot be controlled, particularly by a gentleman who has controlled it only too well, would, I believe, affect most women favorably. I trust you follow me?”

     “I think I do,” Ramses said in a choked voice.

     Rising, he offered me his hand. “Will you come back to the ball now? They will be serving supper soon, and —”

     “I know. You can depend on me. But I believe I will sit here a few minutes longer. Do you go on, my dear.”

     He hesitated for a moment. Then he said softly, “I love you, Mother.” He took my hand and kissed it, and folded my fingers round the stem of the rose. He had stripped it of its thorns.