The Levant Trilogy (42 page)

'And they were all alive: Kirkbride, the old man
and the lascars?'

'Yes, I was the only one who died. And I should
have stayed dead like the poor little brats we threw overboard. Some of them
too light to sink. It was ghastly, seeing them floating after us. I should have
died. Instead I woke up, safe and warm, in a bunk on board an American
destroyer. The very smell of peach juice makes me sick ...' Aidan pushed
himself away from the wall and said in disgust: 'Now, you've heard it. That's
the whole story.' He had told it in a flat voice with none of the dramatic
force of his profession. The story itself was enough.

Harriet said, 'And you ceased to be a
conscientious objector?'

'God, yes. One experience of that sort and I
realized I'd be safer in the Pay Corps.'

His bitterness kept her silent and she told
herself she would never laugh at him again.

As they walked on to Harriet's hotel, he
regained his composure and saying' goodnight', he took her hand and
persuasively asked, 'Why not come to Assuan tomorrow?'

'I'm afraid it's impossible.'

'Then what about Damascus? You thought you might
visit me there.'

'I would if I could persuade Guy to come with
me.'

'Yes,
do
persuade him!' In his eagerness
for Guy's company, he took a step towards her: 'And don't forget to remember me
to him.'

'I'll give him your love,' Harriet said as she
went into the hotel, and she realized she was laughing at him again.

Harriet's money ran out. There was nothing left
for her to see in Luxor so she returned to Cairo a day earlier than expected.
When she reached the flat, it was pervaded by an empty silence and she went to
Angela's room in the hope of finding her there. Angela, too, was out but her
suitcases were there, piled so high under the window they partly hid the mango
tree that stared into the room.

Harriet went to her room and, lying on her bed,
listened for someone to come in. She did not expect Guy, who seldom ate
luncheon, but Angela, Edwina and Dobson were likely to arrive. She could
imagine Angela laughing at the folly of her flight back to Cairo, or perhaps
rejoicing because Castlebar had discovered he needed her. As for Harriet: all
she wanted was a sense of welcome and an assurance that she was not as ill as
she felt.

The bedrooms, barely tolerable in summer, were
now cool but the wood that had been baked and rebaked during the hot weather,
still gave out a smell like ancient bone. From the garden outside the window
came the herbal smell of dried foliage and the hiss of the hoses. She had been
repeatedly wakened during the night by the railway servants who were under
orders to spray the berths with disinfectant. She had argued that this was no
way to prevent the spread of cholera but that did not stop them rapping on her
door until she opened it. Half asleep on her bed, she heard a sound of sobbing
and knew it came from the room of that other suffering lover: Edwina. She sat
up with the intention of going to her, then realized she was not alone. Peter Lisdoonvarna,
with joking gruffness, was telling her to 'shut up'. The sobbing grew louder
and gave rise to a slap and scuffle and Peter's voice, contused with sexual
intent, spoke hoarsely: 'Come on, you little bitch. Turn over.'

Harriet pushed her bedside chair so it crashed
against the door, but the noise did not interrupt the lovers who, with squeaks,
grunts and a rhythmic clicking of the bed, were locked together until Peter
gave out a final groan and there was an interval of quiet before Edwina, in
honeyed appeal, said 'Teddy-bear,
darling,
you don't really mean to go
back to the desert?'

'Fear so, old girl. Damned lucky to get back.
Thought I was stuck in that God-damn office for the rest of the war.'

'Oh, Peter!' Edwina's wail was anguished but it
was also resigned. She knew she could not prevent Peter going back to the
desert but behind her appeals there was covert intention. She changed her tone
as she said: 'When I passed the Cathedral yesterday, there was a military
wedding and I waited to see them come out. The bridegroom was a major and the
bride looked gorgeous. Her dress must have come from Cicurel's. I
did
envy
her. I'd love to be married in the Cathedral.'

'In that yellow edifice beside Bulacq Bridge?
You must be right off your rocker.'

'Well, where else is there?'

'I don't know. I've never thought about it.'

Peter's indifference to the subject was evident
and Harriet wished she, too, could tell Edwina to 'shut up'. But time was short
and Edwina was desperate. However unwise it was, she had to force the pace: 'Teddy-bear
_;
darling, before you go ...' she paused then rushed her proposal: '
Do
let's
get married!'

There was a creaking noise as Peter got off the
bed. Abrupt with embarrassment, he said, "Fraid I can't do that. Sorry.
Blame m'self. Know I should have told you sooner, but didn't want to spoil
things. Been a brute. Not fair to you. Didn't realize you cared in that way.'

'Peter!
You're not married already?'

"Fraid so, old girl. Married m'cousin,
Pamela. Great girl. Childhood sweethearts.'

'But how could you be married? People would
know. Dobson would have told me.'

'Oh, I see. You think it was a big affair: St
Margaret's, fully choral, dozen bridesmaids and pictures in the
Tatler?
Well,
it was nothing like that. Didn't tell a soul. Just slipped into the Bloomsbury
Registry Office and then had a week-end at Brown's. Only the family knew. With
a war on, who cared, anyway?'

'But, Peter, there were dozens of marriages like
that and they're breaking up all the time.'

'Perhaps, but I'm not breaking up this one.
Pamela and I always knew we would marry. It's the real thing. So, be sensible.
No reason why we shouldn't go on being friends.'

Edwina began to sob again, no doubt thinking
that with Peter at the front and the British advancing towards Libya, there
would not be much scope for friendship. Touched by her tears, Peter became
impatient.

'Oh, come on, old girl! We've had a lot of fun,
haven't we? Don't make a fuss now it's over.'

At the words 'it's over', Edwina broke down
completely. Peter, unable to bear her violent weeping, opened the bedroom door
and Harriet heard him mumbling as he went: 'Got to go, old girl. Sorry and all
that. See you some time. 'Bye, 'bye.' He made off, his steps heavy in the
corridor, then was gone, banging the front door after him. The departure was conclusive
and Edwina was left to cry herself sick.

Knowing no way to comfort her, Harriet took
herself out of hearing. When Dobson came in, he found her lying on the sofa in
the living-room and said, 'Hello, you safely back?'

'Not really. I feel worse than usual. Dobbie, it
couldn't be cholera, could it?'

He had, of course, heard about the cholera from
Angela. Harriet felt, rather than saw, his movement away from her and felt his
fear that she had brought the disease into the flat. Still, he did his best to reassure
her.

'When I heard there was an epidemic down there,
I made enquiries and was told there was no cholera anywhere in Egypt.

The minister said there had been an outbreak of
food poisoning in the south.'

'That's absurd. There were miles of graves and
the funerals were passing the hotel all day.'

'You were nowhere near them, I hope?'

She was alarmed, remembering the corpse she had
viewed from the gharry: 'Why, are the bodies infectious?'

'I don't think so, but I don't know much about
it. You'd better have a drink.'

With matter-of-fact kindliness, he gave her a
half-tumbler of brandy which she gulped down. Becoming more cheerful, she said,
'If I have to die, I might as well die drunk.'

Dobson went out to the telephone. When he came
back, he told her there was a taxi waiting for her at the door. He was sending
her to the American Hospital for a check-up. He expected her to go at once and
she did not blame him. The flat was an embassy flat and the last thing he
wanted was to be responsible for spreading the epidemic in Cairo.

It was mid-day with the crowds pushing through
the streets. On the bridge to Zamalek, she saw that soldiers were on duty
directing people going east to walk on one pavement and the westward stream on
the other. The taxi driver told her that this had been the king's own idea and
was being enforced on his orders.

She thought, 'Silly, fat king.'

Coming in sight of the long, white hospital
building, she felt she would be thankful to hand herself over to anyone who
would accept responsibility for her tired and constantly ailing body.

The camp was on the move again. Allied forces
had broken through the enemy front and Rommel was retreating.

Dawson told Simon: 'When we catch up with the
old fox, we'll finish him for good and all.'

'It's been a great battle.'

'And a killing battle. The Jocks and the Aussies
have had the worst of it.'

Simon told Dawson how one night, when he was lost
among the forward troops, he heard bagpipes playing as a Scottish regiment
advanced under enemy fire. He felt a catch in his throat as he remembered the thin
wail of music but Dawson was not impressed.

'Foolhardy lot! That piper you heard was a boy
with no more idea of modern warfare than his ancestors at Culloden. He walked
at the head of the advance, unarmed, playing for dear life.'

'But did he get through?'

'Get through? Of course he didn't get through.
He was down in the first ten minutes with his pipes dying out under him. A kid,
a mere boy! His CO should've known better. Hopeless, these heroics!'

'Still, it was a pretty good show!'

'Good enough, but who paid the price? D'you know
that one division reached Kidney Ridge led by a corporal? Every officer and NCO
killed and no one left to lead except a ruddy corporal1 But they got there.'

'Didn't the Jocks?'

'They got there all right, but not because they
had a kid blowing bagpipes at the front.'

The forward troops advanced on Matruh and the
camp followed them. Now there were only allied aircraft overhead, all
travelling westwards to bomb the retreating enemy and the coast road jammed
with Italian vehicles. Vast dust clouds on the horizon marked daily skirmishes
but there was no major battle to finish Rommel for good and all'.

Simon asked, 'Where do you think the jerries
are?'

Dawson could not say but it was his belief that
8th Army intended to cut the road ahead of the Afrika Korps. 'And then we'll
have 'em all in the bag.'

Simon admired Dawson's prediction but nothing
came of it. The Germans were retreating too rapidly to be overtaken and
trapped.

Torrents of rain blotted out the ruins of Mersa
Matruh and the yellow Matruh sand was spongy with yellow water. To make matters
worse, the advance British tanks ran out of petrol and the reconnaissance
planes reported: 'No sign of Rommel in the next eighty miles.'

Simon asked Dawson, 'Where do you think he's got
to?'

'Seems like the desert fox has gone away.'

The rain stopped and the tarmac coast road
gleamed and steamed in the afternoon sun. The sea, that had been leaden,
regained colour and brilliance, and Simon, driving beside it, felt the
excitement of the chase. During all his time in Egypt, the regions beyond the
frontier had been enemy territory. Now he felt the whole of North Africa was
opening to him.

The wire, great barbed rolls of it, put up by
the Italians to keep the Senussi tribesmen out of Libya, was blasted with holes
through which the allied armour and transports followed the defeated enemy out
of Egypt. Simon, pursuing the pursuers, came to Solium and Crosbie drove them
up the escarpment through Halfaya Pass amidst a jam of military vehicles. This
was the famous pass that the troops called Hellfire. The story was that a
grounded airman was likely to be seized and held for ransom by the Bedu who
would send his testicles to GHQ in proof of his sex and colour. Now it seemed
petrol fumes rather than the risk of castration justified the nickname. At the
top, they came on the white crenellated fortress of Capuzzo, much shot about,
its ornamental gateway declaring itself to be: 'The Gateway of the Italian
Army'.

The camp leaguered behind the mud-brick remains
of Upper Solium and Simon, with nothing to do till supper-time, walked down the
escarpment to the lower village. From the distance, it looked a pretty place. A
collection of small villas had been built on pink rocks beside a curving bay of
pink sand. It was early evening and a mist, like fine powder, overhung the
translucent green of the sea.

Coming down into it, he saw that the place was
deserted and in ruins. The villas were collapsing into heaps of raw clay but
plant life had sprung up after the rain. Bougainvillaea mantled the broken walk
and the garden areas were furred over with new grass. During the five months'
lull, while the contestants faced each other at Alamein, the splintered trees
had regained themselves and the bougainvillaea had flowered. In one pit, that
had once held a house, poinsettias covered the ground so thickly, they formed a
counterpane of scarlet lace.

The town was a small, seaside town and the fact
made Simon think of Crosbie. He was beginning to like Crosbie better and had
even learnt something about him. Crosbie's parents kept a shop in a small
seaside town on the Lincolnshire coast. It was some time before Crosbie was
brought to reveal that the shop was a fish shop and when the war started, he
was just beginning to learn the trade.

'Did you like being a fishmonger?' Simon asked.

'Well, it's a job, isn't it?'

'You wouldn't rather do something else?'

'I did do something else. Sometimes, I drove the
van.'

That, so far, was all Simon had learnt about
Crosbie but it had roused his curiosity. Somewhere behind his blunt, blank face
Crosbie had memories of another life lived before the war brought him here. In
spite of his determination to avoid emotional relationships, Simon was
becoming attached to Crosbie because, like Ridley, he felt the need for an
attachment of some sort.

He wandered down to a small central square where
a jacaranda, earliest of flowering trees, had covered itself with blue rosettes
as though to hide its own desecration. He came to a cafe where a single chair
had been left standing on a mosaic floor. The mosaic surprised him, then he
realized this must have been an Italian town, an Italian seaside town.

He tried to imagine Crosbie's small town
shattered as this place was shattered, and he said to himself, 'Lord, the
things we do to other people's countries!'