The Levant Trilogy (59 page)

Losing patience, Jackman bawled: 'I don't want
the bloody servants. Open the door.'

'No. I'm just looking after things while she's
away.' The girl began to back towards the stairs and Jackman became more
persuasive:

'Look, it's important. I've something to deliver
to Mrs Rutter. I'll leave it with you.'

The girl returned and opening the door a couple
of inches, asked: 'What is it?'

The two inches allowed Jackman to force his foot
in, then, using his shoulder, he flung the door open, sending the girl staggering
back. Jackman was inside.

The destruction, Cookson said, began there and
then. A six-foot-high Chinese ornament stood in the hall. Jackman overturned
it with the decisive competence of a cinema stuntman and it crashed and
splintered on the stone floor. He then marched into the drawing-room ('A
treasure house' according to Cookson) and here he went to work as though
carrying out a plan that had been burning in him for months.

Cookson and Tootsie had followed him, making
weak protests, while the girl sobbed and asked: 'Why are you doing this? Why
are you doing this?' Getting no reply, she tried to reach the telephone but
Jake flung her away and then pulled the wire from the wall.

'Then,' said Cookson, 'he just went on smashing
the place up.'

When everything breakable had been broken, he
took a pair of cutting-out scissors the girl had been using and tried to cut up
the velvet curtains. The scissors were not strong enough and, said Cookson:
'Raging around, he found a diplomat's sword, a valuable piece, the hilt and
sheath covered with brilliants, and pulling it out, he slashed the curtains,
the upholstery and the furniture. Fine Venetian furniture, too. I kept saying:
"For God's sake, stop it, Jake," but it was like trying to stop a
tornado. For some reason the girl was more frightened by the sword than the
general destruction. She started to scream for help and ran out of the house,
but you know what Gezira's like at that time of night! There should have been a
boab on duty but he'd cleared off somewhere. And even if she'd found a
policeman, he'd simply have taken to his heels at the idea of tackling a
lunatic'

The girl reached the Anglo-Egyptian Union. The
gates were shut but the safragis were still inside. She persuaded the head
saf-ragi to telephone the British Embassy and so, eventually, a posse of
embassy servants arrived in a car and took charge of Jackman who by that time
had fallen asleep, exhausted by his own activity.

Guy asked Dobson: 'Is it true Jackman's a
prisoner at the Embassy?'

'Not any longer.'

'Then where is he?'

'At the moment in a military aircraft. If you
must know, but keep it under your hat, he's been sent to Bizerta HQ for
questioning.'

'To Bizerta HQ on a military aircraft! Why
should the military concern themselves with Jackman? You don't mean he really
was doing undercover work?'

'My dear fellow,' said Dobson, 'Who knows? Anybody
could be doing anything in times like these.'

During the three weeks that Harriet had spent
working for Dr Beltado, Halal had come to the pension five times. These were
social visits. He would arrive just as supper was ending and bowing to the
doctor and the two women, would say: 'I hope I see you well!'

Dr Beltado always responded with a weary effort
at good-fellowship, saying: 'Hi, there, Halal, how's tricks?' or, 'How's the
world treating you?' and push forward a chair: 'Take the weight off your feet,
Halal.'

Protesting that he had no wish to intrude, no
wish to impose himself, Halal would sit down and Miss Dora would be sent to
order coffee for him. While Beltado went on talking, Halal would give Harriet
furtive glances, transmitting the fact that there he still was, patiently
waiting, in case she had need of him.

Now, if she did not need Halal himself, she
needed help of some sort. She was nearly penniless and, walking up and down the
souk, she longed for circumstance to befriend her. She loitered at each stall,
with the crowd pushing about her, and when she came to the Roman arcade, she
turned and walked all the way back again. No one took much notice of her now.
She had become a familiar figure, an English eccentric with endless time and no
money to spend.

Three days after Beltado's departure, when she
was nearing desperation, Halal came to the pension. She had finished breakfast
and was wondering what to do with herself, when he edged round the dining-room
door and without approaching further, began at once to explain and excuse his
presence. Jamil had heard of Beltado's departure and had seen her walking in
the souk, apparently with nothing to do.

'I asked myself "Could Mrs Pringle be
bored? Would she care to look over the silk factory?"'

'That would be nice.' Harriet's manner was so
subdued that Halal crossed to her, saying with concern: 'I hope, Mrs Pringle,
you are not ill.'

'Sit down, Halal. No, I'm not ill, but I'm very
worried. Have you any idea where Dr Beltado has gone?'

'I know nothing, but I see all is not well with
you. Please, if I can help, what can I do?'

'I'd be glad of anyone's help but I don't know
what you can do. Dr Beltado went without paying me for the work I did.'

'No?' Aghast, Halal declared in fierce tones:
'Such a thing is not heard of in our world.'

'You mean the Arab world? But Beltado isn't an
Arab. Madame Vigo thinks he just forgot.'

'To forget one who has worked for three weeks!
It is not possible.' Frowning, he considered the matter for some moments then
said: 'This should be told to Jamil. He will be in his café at this time,
discussing business. May I take you to see him?'

'Would it do any good?'

'Perhaps. He has known Dr Beltado longer than I
have. He may know where to find him.'

Jamil's café was not, as Harriet supposed, one
of the bazaar cafés where men sat all day over a cup of coffee. It was in the
new city, a large modern establishment with marble table-tops and tubular
chrome chairs. Jamil, as proprietor, sat among an admiring crowd of young men,
one of them the guitarist who had sung 'Who is Romeo?' They all shouted Halal's
name and Jamil, springing to his feet, placed a chair for Harriet, making it
clear to the others that he was already acquainted with her. She realized that
if they had not actually seen her with Halal, they had heard of her. Their
welcoming laughter was not for Halal alone, it was for Halal accompanied by a
lady. She might have a husband somewhere but if so, the fact merely enriched
the drama of Halal's relationship with a foreign woman, and the courtesy bestowed
on her was all the more courteous.

Halal's manner was serious but that did not
affect the humour of his friends and several minutes passed before he could
tell them of Beltado's perfidy. Even then, from habit, Jamil went on laughing,
saying: 'That Beltado! It is like him, isn't it? You remember last time he was
here he had long treatment for his stomach from Dr Amin, then one day he was
gone and Amin was not paid?'

One of them prompted him: 'Tell us again what
Amin said.'

'Yes, what he said!' This was so funny that
Jamil could hardly speak for laughing: 'He said of Beltado: "Pale, bulky
and offensive like a sprue patient's shit."'

'Jamil!'
Halal raised his voice
in anger: 'To tell such before a lady!'

Jamil collapsed in shame, red faced and abashed
to the point of speechlessness. Harriet pretended that Dr Amin's remark had
been beyond her comprehension and so Jamil gradually recovered and was able to
discuss Beltado's departure. But the discussion did not help Harriet. Beltado
with his large, powerful car might have gone anywhere. He might even have
returned to Turkey and, as he had done in the past, disappeared into Axis
territory. Soon the talk ceased to relate to Harriet's predicament and became
an acclamation of Beltado's mysterious, almost supernatural, ability to cross
frontiers closed to the subjects of the Allied powers.

'How is it done?' they asked each other. 'Is he
British or American? If not, what is he?'

Harriet told them that Beltado had an Eire
passport.

'But what is it, this Eire passport? How does it
give him such powers?'

'It means he has Irish citizenship and as
Ireland is not at war with the Axis, he can enter occupied countries, but he
doesn't find it easy. The Axis officials can't believe that Ireland, being part
of the British Isles, isn't an enemy country.'

This explanation merely puzzled them further and
led them a long way from Harriet's problem. Halal, seeing that there was no
help from Jamil, said: 'I am taking Mrs Pringle to see my father's silk
factory.' They left amid regrets and good wishes.

Alone with her in the street, Halal said sadly:
'I fear now you will return to Cairo.'

'I don't know what I'll do. To tell you the
truth, I can't return to Cairo. My husband thinks I'm on a ship going to
England. I was supposed to go but instead of boarding the ship, I came here.'

Halal, baffled by this confession, stopped and
stared at her:

'What you tell me is very strange, is it not? Do
I mistake your meaning? Did you say you were to go in a ship to England but did
not go? Ah, I understand! You could not bear to travel so far from Mr Pringle
and yet, afraid to go back, you came here. Was that what happened?'

'That may have been the reason.'

The indecision of this reply puzzled him still
further but sensing there was a rift between the Pringles, he walked on, staring
down at his feet as though pondering what he had been told. He said at last:
'Do you wish to come to the silk factory?'

'Yes.'

The factory was in a series of sheds behind the
souk. For a while she was distracted by the young workmen - very like Halal's
friends except that the friends were idle while these men had to work - and the
large spools of brilliantly coloured silks. She was shown rolls of the finished
materials in ancient patterns, some enhanced with gold and silver. She forgot
Beltado but Halal did not forget his concern for her. Walking with her back to
the pension, he said earnestly:

'Mrs Pringle, my friends do not understand why I
seek your company. They say: "Halal, you are foolish. We know such English
ladies. They seem free but there will be nothing for you. All you do is waste
your money." But I know better. I have in me ideals they do not know of.
They talk much of romance but they are afraid. In the end they marry within the
family. It is usual with them to marry a cousin.'

'And does it work out?'

'Oh yes, well enough.-The girls do not expect
much. There is something simple and good in these women. They have the childish
outlook of nuns. And what criteria have they? What do they know of men? They
know only a father or a brother. A cousin is the nearest thing; he is safe. And
the female relatives are tactful. When the bridegroom is seen, they are full of
admiration, or pretend to be, so the girl is content.'

'I suppose it is the criticism of the world that
spoils things.'

'Well, for me, I don't fear criticism. I know
what I want. I know what I am doing. I say to Jamil and the others: "If I
spend money on this lady, I shall make a friend. One day I think she will
reward me.'"

He looked into Harriet's face, expecting her to
applaud him and perhaps give him hope, but she had no hope to give. The rain
started as they reached the pension garden and they stood for a few minutes
under the mulberry tree. Halal put his hand out to her but she would not take
it.

He said again: 'May I offer you my protection?'

She looked away, wondering how to escape him.
When he tried to touch her arm, she said 'I'm sorry,' and hurried into the
pension. Reaching her room she locked the door, not from fear that he would
follow her but because she had to isolate herself. She had to face her own
situation. She lay on the bed and closing her eyes, she projected her thoughts
into space. With the resolution of despair, she cried to such powers as might
be there: 'Tell me what to do now.' After a while she sank into a drowsy
inertia, stupefied by her own failure.

In London, she had earned her own living and had
told herself that any girl who could survive there, could survive anywhere in
the world. Now she knew she had been wrong. Here her attempt at an independent
life had reduced her to penury. She slept and woke with a name in her mind:
Angela.

She knew only one Angela, her friend in Cairo
who had gone off with the poet Castlebar. Remembering her with affection, she
thought: 'Dear Angela, I know if you were here you would help me. But you're
not here and I must help myself.' She jumped up and packed her suitcase. When
she went to the dining-room, she told Madame Vigo she was leaving next day.

Unperturbed, Madame Vigo said: 'You want taxi?'

'No. I'll go to Beirut by train.'

'Not good train. Better taxi.'

Harriet could not afford a taxi to Beirut but
she had to take one to the station. Driving through the main square, she saw
Halal at the kerb, his case under his arm, his sallow, vulnerable face grave,
waiting to cross the road. Safely past him, she said to herself: 'Goodbye,
Halal. I'm afraid your friends were right.'

At the station, she spoke to the stationmaster
who knew a little English. When was the next train to Beirut? He shrugged,
putting out his hands: 'Mam'zell, who knows? Trains very bad. All stolen by
army, better take taxi.'

'I can't. It would cost too much.'

'Then go Riyak and then go Baalbek. In Baalbek
many tourists, some English. They take you Beirut.'

Here was a solution of a sort. She felt pleased,
even excited, at the thought of seeing Baalbek. There was a local train to
Riyak at one p.m. and she waited on the platform, fearful of missing it. There
was no buffet, nowhere to sit, but she was getting away from Halal.

The train arrived at two o'clock and stood for
an hour in the station before setting out again. As it climbed the foothills of
the Anti-Lebanon, she could see through the dirty windows the foliage of the
Ghuta and the golden crescents of the mosque, and she said again: 'Goodbye.
Goodbye, Halal.' The oasis, a thick green carpet, was sliced off abruptly and
then they were in the desert, grey under a grey sky. The train, like a mule
unwilling to go farther, jerked and jolted and stopped every few miles.

Two old countrywomen shared Harriet's carriage,
speaking a language that was strange to her. Halal had told her that in some
outlying villages the people still spoke Aramaic and she listened intently,
wondering if she were hearing the language of Christ.

When at last the train dragged itself into
Riyak, the sky had cleared and a small tourists' shuttle marked 'Baalbek' stood
at the next platform. The ease of this transfer brightened everything for her.
As the shuttle ran between orchards burgeoning in the sunlight, she felt sure
that succour awaited her in this brilliant and fruitful land.