Hotel Mirador (6 page)

“All right, if you insist.”

“I do. The car will wait at the house each time to bring you back.”

“I see.” With her hand ready to open the door, she said, “About my room; I don’t need a luxury suite. In fact, I’d be happier on the next floor in a bed-sitter.”

“You’ll keep Suite Seven,” he said briefly. “That’s an order.”

He gave Sally no time to make an exasperated reply, but came round and opened the door. They entered the
Mirador together; he led her to a seat in the lounge and called a waiter.

“Serve mademoiselle,” he said. Then bowed to Sally as if she were a guest. “I’ve things to attend to. Excuse me?”

He was gone, striding carelessly out into the vestibule to greet a couple of French businessmen in white who sported huge cigars. Sally relaxed and ordered iced grenadilla. She could feel sand in her shoes and heat at the back of her neck, but so far she had not found the climate enervating. Which was just as well, when one had to contend with a man like Dane Ryland.

It had not been a very rewarding morning, she thought. Mike Ritchie didn’t want to be helped, and Dane Ryland was sceptical of her powers of persuasion. Sally wasn’t too confident about them herself, but she meant to use them for all she was worth. She would have to be careful and dogged.

After which decision she felt calm and cheerful.

* * *

Just before dinner that evening, Sally decided to take a walk in the hotel grounds. Beyond die lighted terrace were the usual star-shot darkness, the black spikes of the palms, the scents released by coolness, and she ran down the steps to enjoy the breeze which rustled through the trees. But on the driveway she almost collapsed with fright as someone stepped from behind a sizeable bush and caught her arm.

“It’s Tony,” he said in conspiratorial tones. “I’ve been hoping you’d come out for the traditional breath of air. What about going somewhere else for dinner?”

“Like this?” she said blankly, indicating the striped glazed cotton she wore.

“You look heavenly to me,” he said. “I know a place where we can relax. Game?”

“Well
...
yes.”

“Good. We’ll use the old man’s car.”

He took her hand and led her swiftly round to the side of the hotel. He put her into a biggish limousine, which had seen many years but only a few thousand miles. It moved well, even under Tony’s impatient hands. He drove down the esplanade and turned along one of the innumerable narrow lanes of the town, which at this hour was crowded with Moors and Berbers in white and striped djellabahs, a few beggars and water-carriers, and vendors of the syrupy concoctions beloved by the population.

When they entered a wider thoroughfare which showed a white mosque against the skyline. Tony’s graceful dark head turned towards her for a moment.

“Dane squelched my idea about the date plantation. My father’s willing to whittle his bankroll down to nothing to buy it, but Dane won’t put up the capital to develop the thing. He’s sure I have an ulterior motive.”

“And have you?”

“That’s hard,” he said in hurt tones. “I want to settle down.”

“Perhaps Mr. Ryland finds you a little too sudden. With a man like him you have to prove yourself before he’ll believe in you.”

“Have you found that out, too?”

“Yes, but I’m not worried.” She paused. “You used to be friendly with Michael Ritchie, didn’t you?”

He lost the little-boy lightness and nodded. “We had some good times together. He’d get an assignment and we’d both chase up to Algiers or Tunis and wade into whatever was going on. That was a peach of a car he smashed up.”

“It was a good physical specimen he damaged, too.” There was a silence. Then Tony said, “It was worse for Mike than you or anyone else can know. There was a girl he wanted; the minute she knew he’d lost the use of his leg she dropped out.”

“That was a terrible thing to do,” she said soberly. “I knew there must be something more than just the paralysis of the leg
.
When I saw him this morning. As if that weren’t bad enough, he has to lose faith in himself as a man. Who was the girl?”

Tony shrugged. “Her people had a villa for a while and she drifted about the Mirador. I’m not sure that it would have lasted with Mike, but the crash came just as the affair was near the climax. I suppose the idiot came out of the ether convinced that he would never attract another girl in his life. He didn’t help the doctors at all. All the rest of the injuries cleared up simply because he was one of those disgustingly healthy types, like Dane.”

“Didn’t Mr. Ryland guess anything about this girl?”

“Why should he? Mike always had a sweetie in tow, and this one was no more remarkable than the others.” He waved a hand towards a stretch of colored neon. “The bright lights of Shiran. You may have your choice between Le Perroquet and the Chapeau Vert. Both are semi-night clubs with a distinctly French flavor, though they’re completely harmless at this time of the evening. Le Perroquet is the prettier, isn’t it?”

It was indeed, with its tubs of flowers in the entrance and the nodding parrot in neon tubing overhead. Tony led Sally into the vestibule, where they were taken in hand by a smiling steward. They were conducted into a dining room, where gaudy murals depicted a human-looking bird in many postures, and given a table which was half screened by pot plants.

The dinner was not of Mirador standard, but it was adequate, and the floor-show which began at nine was astonishingly modest. Tony explained that the atmosphere did not “hot up” till midnight.

“And what happens then?” asked Sally ingenuously. Tony grinned charmingly. “Another floor show, different wines,” he said. “I first came to Le Perroquet on my sixteenth birthday. In some ways we were very French, you see. I was educated in England and spent all my holidays here. I used to take hair-raising tales back to school, and because my home was in Morocco they were believed. In fa
c
t, though, Shiran is no more evil than Brighton. It’s just a lot more attractive!”

Sally was enjoying herself, but she had not forgotten the reason she was here in Shiran. That was why, a little later, she asked him casually, “Why aren’t you friends any longer with Mike Ritchie?”

Obviously, Tony heartily disliked controversial topics. He looked uneasy, and smiled. “I went to see him in the hospital and he told me to clear out—said he never wanted to see me again.”

“Seems to be a habit he has. He said the same to me this morning.”

“I hope that doesn’t mean you’ll soon be returning to England!”

“Of course not. I’m going up to his house tomorrow.”

“Lord, you’ve got pluck. I wouldn’t go near Mike again till he invited me.”

“That’s wrong,” she said severely. “You should have gone to see him again and again, till he grew tired of kicking you out.”

“Is that what you’re going to do?”

“It is. Are you staying long in Shiran?”

“A week or two, perhaps.” He looked apprehensive. “Not going to make me call on Mike, are you?”

“Not yet. I still have to get to know him.” She squashed out her cigarette. “We ought to go now, I think. May we drive a little way before we go back to the Mirador?”

Tony’s expression was a comic blend of surprise and alacrity. “I never expected that sort of invitation from you, Sally. Of course we may!”

She said firmly, “I mean exactly what I said—a short drive and then back to the hotel.”

“Oh, well, that’s better than an early night. Let’s move.” They left the dining room, came into the vestibule once more, and were bowed on to a crowded pavement. There were French officers, an Arab in a white burnous, a few small boys, all of them interested in the long silver and blue car which had pulled up outside Le Perroquet. Sally watched, wide-eyed, felt queer little feathers along her skin as Dane came round from the driver’s seat and helped his companion from the car. She was a pale honey-blonde with dark eyes and a form-fitting gown in silvery blue. About her shoulders she wore a blue mink cape, and the hand with whi
c
h she held on to it glittered under the weight of a magnificent sapphire and several diamonds. She wore no other jewellery, but her whole personality sparkled from highly-colored lips and eyes that must have been touched by belladonna.

For a long moment Sally looked up into Dane’s eyes. Then his cool, arrogant glance shifted quickly to Tony, and he nodded to the two of them. That was all. The jewelled hand slipped into the crook of his arm and they passed into Le Perroquet.

Feeling slightly stunned, Sally walked a few yards with
Tony and took her seat in Monsieur de Chalain’s car. They were drawing away from the lights when she asked, “Who was the creature in glorious Technicolor?”

“She’s some baby, isn’t she?” he said. “Her name is
Cécile
Vaugard and she sings love songs in a husky voice; I believe she also sings opera in a rather better voice. Every year, for a few weeks, she appears at Le Perroquet.”

“A flame of Dane Ryland’s?”

“You might call her that. He’s always her escort while she’s in Shiran.”

“I thought he didn’t care about women.”

“He’s almost human sometimes.” Tony gave a laugh. “
Cécile
’s got up like that for the public. Between times she puts on the homely a
c
t. She’s half owner with Dane of the phosphate mine.”

“She doesn’t look like a business woman.”

“Not phosphates, anyway,” said Tony with an engaging leer. “Actually, she found herself owner of the mine when her father died, but it was losing so much money that she closed it down. Then she met Dane and told him about it; he took it on, put in new equipment and a couple of mine experts, and now it’s so prosperous that
Cécile
sings only for fun and glory.”

Sally was quiet for some time. She looked out at the trees and the glimpses of the sea, saw in the distance the undulating walls of the medina. Then she realized that they were speeding into darkness.

She said suddenly, “I don’t think I want a drive after all, Tony. This is only my second night here and I find myself a bit tired. Do you mind taking me back?”

“Of course I mind,” he said ruefully. “Will you go out with me again?”

She promised she would, and said no more. At the Hotel Mirador she said goodnight to him almost abruptly and walked quickly to the lift. In her room, Sally did not pause and think. With an oddly stubborn smile on her lips, she sat down at the beautiful little writing table and began a letter. And presently she was back in the farmhouse in Cumberland, with her mild-mannered father and spare, tweedy mother, and the boys. Yet even with those dear familiar people brought close, she knew a sense of strain. Sally straightened in her chair, still holding her pen.
Hollowly, she wondered if Shiran were already working some queer and irrevocable change within her.

CHAPTER THREE

SALLY had always lived
very much in the present, and w
hen she awoke next morning it was with the usual sensation of this being another day for her to use as best she could. But when she had slipped out of bed and on to the balcony, she remembered last night and her own extraordinary feelings. For there below, dropping a bathrobe and taking a header into the swimming pool, was the muscular figure of Dane Ryland. No idling for him by the poolside, no delicious floating with the sun warming his body. A dive, several lengths of powerful overarm stuff and then a leap up on to the marble. His morning swim was as much of a business, apparently, as the hotel or his other interests.

Determinedly, Sally backed into the bedroom and hummed to herself while she took a shower and dressed. She ate the usual light breakfast which was brought to the suite, and went down to the esplanade for a walk. She found some colonnaded shopping streets, covered souks which were crammed with men in robes and women who were only distinguishable from the men by their yashmaks. A little shy of buying from people who did not understand English, she returned to the Mirador and entered its emporium, a splendid store whose plate glass windows walled a tiled corridor on the ground floor. She bought white shorts and was politely warned by the assistant to wear them only in the hotel grounds, and she acquired several sports shirts in gay colors, a sun-frock, harlequin sun glasses, plaited straw slippers and a floppy straw hat. Extravagant for the first time in her life, she bought pretty white ear clips and a multicolored linen jacket she could easily have done without
.

The assistant promised to send the goods to her suite. “Number Seven?” he said with a bow. “I will charge them, mademoiselle.”

“I don’t have an account with the hotel,” she told him. “I’d better pay you now.”

The dark eyes looked comprehending. “You are the young lady from England? I have orders from Mr. Ryland that you are to buy what you wish, at no cost.”

“But that’s impossible. I could send you bankrupt.”

He smiled, lifted his shoulders. “I doubt that, mademoiselle. Mr. Ryland was emphatic.”

For a moment Sally was tempted to tell him to return the things she had chosen to their shelves and hangers, and then she grew vexed again. Bother Dane Ryland!

“Just give me a note of what I’ve selected and their prices,” she said. “I’ll deal with it later.”

When her purchases were delivered to her room, Sally was enchanted with the effect of continental wear on her long-limbed English figure. The prices were steep, but the things were worth it; she would certainly pay for them herself.

She put the goods away, took a long glance at her neat blue reflection in the mirror and picked up the lavender
-
colored telephone.

“Reception? This is Miss Yorke. Will you arrange for me to have the car, please? Thank you.”

Ten minutes later, hatless and carrying nothing at all, she got into the car and gave instructions. They were moving round the drive when she noticed the silver and blue creation parked in the middle of a line of more ordinary vehicles. She leaned forward and spoke to the driver. “Does the big car belong to Mademoiselle Vaugard?”

“But no,” he answered politely. “It is the private ear of Monsieur Ryland.”

“And this one, that you’re driving?”

“It is also monsieur’s.”

Sally sat back. One for weekdays and one for best, it seemed. Or had Dane bought the silver and blue affair because it happened to combine
Cécile
Vaugard’s favorite colors? Maybe if she wore pink he’d turn up in a pink one! Strange to think that the woman lived here in the hotel but was seldom seen, though possibly Dane saw her fairly often. It appeared that, even if he wasn’t the marrying kind, he was as conscious as the rest of a beautiful woman. There were not so very many different kinds of man, after all!

Determinedly, she took a lively interest in the tortuous streets and the hillside, which lay glittering under the sun. She saw a shrine that she hadn’t noticed yesterday, and a beautiful Moorish house, which must belong to some notability, possibly the Caid. Even speeding past it in a car, she could see pillars of bright mosaic tiles, and an expanse of sculptured stone above an elegant doorway. One day, perhaps, she would have an opportunity of looking over such a house. She hoped so.

But as they turned on to the small drive outside Mike Ritchie’s house, Sally brought all her mind to bear on the present. She told the driver to park in the shade and wait, walked lightly up into the little terrace and reached in to knock at the open door. Then she took a step into the small hall and stood there in its coolness, waiting for something to happen.

The thin youth who had yesterday been clipping the shrubs came into view from a corridor. He bowed, said nothing and walked away, to return within a minute.

“Monsieur is sorry, but he cannot see you, mademoiselle. Please be seated and I will bring some tea.”

Sally shook her head. “No tea, thank you. Tell Mr. Ritchie I’ll wait till he’s free.”

The servant looked uncertain, but disappeared. Again he materialized, bearing a tray which held the glass of mint tea which is indispensable even to the poorest hospitality in Morocco. Sally accepted it and placed the glass on a dark carved table. She sat in a chair which was uncomfortably but cleverly thonged in many-colored leather, crossed her ankles and relaxed as if she had all the time in the world. The servant hovered, swung his tray and vanished once more. Sally tried the mint tea and wondered if she would ever come to find it refreshing, as others did. She picked up an inlaid cigarette box and examined it, admired the panel of Moorish embroidery which hung on the wall above the table.

Ten minutes ticked by, fifteen, twenty. Twice the servant’s head appeared round the corner of the corridor, and twice he stared at her perplexedly and withdrew. Then, finally, came the sound for which Sally’s ear had been waiting; a faint' rumble and squeak on the tiled floor. The invalid chair rolled into view and Mike Ritchie, a red lock drooping over his brow, came to a halt about a yard from Sally’s chair, and glared at her.

“What do you want?” he demanded.

She smiled, as if totally unaware of his anger. “Oh, good morning, Mr. Ritchie. I’m so glad you could see me. I’m alone today, and thought we might have a talk.”

“I don’t want your pity.”

“Good heavens,” she said with a show of surprise. “I don’t pity you. You pity yourself so much that there’s no need for anyone else to waste any on you. I came to correct a little misunderstanding. I’m not a nurse.”

“No? Then what are you!”

“A physiotherapist. You must have met one before, at (the hospital.”

“There was a muscular creature of about fifty—no one like you.” He lifted his head and gazed through the doorway at the hot greens and reds of the garden. “All right. Say what you came to say.”

“Right here in the hall?” He didn’t answer, so she went on casually, “Well, it was like this. Mr. Ryland was very worried about you because you wouldn’t go back to hospital for further treatment. He consulted the specialist who set your various bones, and was told you needed physiotherapy; but there was no one here in Morocco who could help you. So Mr. Ryland advertised in England, and eventually engaged me. I may not look it, but I’ve had quite a lot of experience.”

“Not with my sort of trouble.”

“You mean the mental part—no, perhaps not.”

He looked at her fleetingly. “What do you mean—mental part?”

She gave him her most disarming smile. “You see, I deal mostly with children, and they don’t have mental troubles over their condition. They’ve had polio, accidents, diseases of the bone and nerves, but in the hands of someone wearing a white overall they’re thoroughly contented and relaxed. It’s so much easier to help someone who believes in everything.”

“I’m not a child.”

“Yet you’re behaving like a certain type of child—the
pampered type. We got a few of them at the Orthopaedic Home, but they’d mostly been tamed in hospital before we dealt with them. You’re older, and therefore more stubborn.”

“Is that all?”

“Well, no, it’s only the beginning, but I didn’t come to deliver a lecture, only to point out that with patience you’ll probably be able to walk with one stick in less than six months. It seems so silly to refuse even to try it out.”

“I know that whatever I go through I’ll always be a cripple.”

“At least you have your own leg, not an artificial one.” She paused, her glance on his prematurely lined face. “You wouldn’t want to be an emotional cripple as well, would you?”

There was a brief silence. Mike had tensed suddenly, as if startled and wary,
but after a moment he spoke a li
ttle unevenly.

“I sensed yesterday that you see a little farther than most girls, and that’s why I wanted you to stay away. Just leave me alone with it!”

She answered in reasoning tones, “
I c
an’t really. Mr. Ryland brought me here by air and he’s given me a magnificent suite in the hotel. It’s a costly business for him, and the least I can do is peg away at you till you give me a chance of doing all I can for you.” Ostentatiously, she opened the cigarette box and showed him it was empty. “May I have one?”

He took a box of fifty from his pocket, automatically flipped it open. She waited while he thumbed his lighter, leaned forward just a little so that he could light her cigarette, and stayed there, smiling at him. Mike drew back and lit his own cigarette, and she saw the fingers of his left hand curl rather tightly over the curved wooden arm of the wheel chair.

“What has Dane told you about me?” he asked offhandedly.

“That you’re twenty-six, a journalist, were keen on fast cars and attractive girls. I think he was rather disappointed that I’m not prettier.”

“You might have been forty and tough.”

“Oh, no, he took care of that. His advertisement insisted on a photograph. I happened to be the least ugly.”

Mike ignored the unintended cue. “It’s my fault you’re here. If you want to leave, I’ll offer Dane what it cost him to bring you.”

Sally was vexed, but determined not to show it. “I don’t want to leave; I simply want to do the job I’m engaged for. Tell me, do you always stay indoors?”

“Pretty well.”

“How do you spend the time?”

“Reading and playing chess with an old chap who lives down the road.”

“I play chess too, but not very well.” She tapped ash into a tiny bowl, and then held the bowl near him so that he could do the same. “This is a lovely little house. I suppose the Frenchwoman who made the garden furnished the place as well?”

“I believe so. Dane bough
t it more or less as it stands.”

“For you?”

“For himself, probably.”

“But he told me he wants nothing better than to live at the Mirador without domestic ties.”

He shrugged. “Have you met
Cécile
Vaugard?”

Queerly, Sally’s breath caught for a second in her throat. “No, but I’ve seen her. She’s ravishing.”

“She’s also a magnetic singer—and pure French. She’s the only woman Dane ever bothers with, so one day
—
seeing that he always tries everything once—he’ll take a wife, probably
Cécile
. When she’s in Shiran, they’ll live in this house, and for the rest of the year Dane will let a friend live here and go back to his suite at the Mirador.”

“It doesn’t sound much like marriage.”

“But it will be as much as Dane will want.” He gave
a
swift, irritable tug at the wheels of the chair and slipped back a yard or so. “Is there anything else you want to know?”

“Am I too inquisitive? I was quite enjoying the gossip.” She squashed out her cigarette, dusted grains of ash from her skirt. “Don’t you get lonely?”

“No.” The thin line of his jaw tightened, emphasizing a
c
hin which was narrow and a little obstinate. “In the course of several months one can evolve a new way of living.”

“I suppose so, if it’s necessary. But with you it isn’t. You’re just a mule, and unfortunately you’re hurting yourself most.”

“You don’t say it the way Dane does, but then you’re
a
girl and you haven’t his colorful vocabulary.”

“It doesn’t matter how it’s said, if it’s true.” She paused, and added clearly, “I’d like to come and see you with the doctor. Is that all right?”

“No.”

“Will you allow me to give you some ordinary hand massage?”

“What’s the good? I’ve tried it myself and it doesn’t to a thing.”

Sally sat very still. This was die first indication that he really wanted to help himself and she knew, intuitively, that he had never mentioned it to anyone else. One had to be casual with him, casual to the point of uncaringness.

“I’ll send you some massage oil and you can try again. And, if you like, I’ll show you some exercises to keep the rest of you in trim.”

He sounded quite nasty as he said, ‘Trying to earn your keep?”

She stood up. “Don’t blame me, do you? As a matter of fact, you aren’t the only reason I came to Morocco. I’m trying to get in touch with an old friend of mine, and when I do, I shall probably fade out of Shiran. I only wish I knew more about die country.”

Mike said morosely, “I’ve been around. What part of it interests you?”