Dreamers of the Day (13 page)

It was like seeing an opal turn to diamond.

Massive and austere, Colonel Wilson continued to pile denunciation upon indictment with a measured cadence that revealed how often he had rehearsed this litany in his mind. Miss Bell, who had no love for Wilson, grew increasingly agitated and seemed to blame Lawrence for provoking the assault. Certainly his lack of response was driving Colonel Wilson to barely contained fury. Finally, Wilson seemed to remember that they were equals in military rank and changed his tack. “If you commanded an army of Arabs and I had so much as a division of Gurkhas—”

Lawrence spoke at last. “You would be my prisoner,” he said simply, “within three days.”

This was evidently the last straw for Miss Bell. “Lawrence!” she hissed through unmoving lips.
“You little imp!”

Lawrence blanched, then flushed, the sudden pink startling against his yellow hair. You cannot imagine how ruthlessly insulting the remark was, especially in that company. It was the sort of thing a kindergarten teacher might say to a naughty child, and the patronizing scorn with which it was delivered silenced even Colonel Wilson.

An instant later, Lawrence had mastered his reaction. Fixing Miss Bell with a steady blue gaze beneath raised eyebrows and above a small skewed smile, he sat still, letting the silent awkwardness gain weight and solidity.

“It’s getting late,” he observed at last, “and if this is the best we can do for political discourse…” He shrugged as if to say,
There’s no point waiting around for brandy and cigars.

With that, he stood. Inclined his head to our dinner companions. Bowed slightly to the other guests in a general sort of way. Then he put his hands in his pockets, and sauntered out of the room.

I was there at Colonel Lawrence’s invitation and, in any case, I had no wish to remain at that table. Without apology or farewell, I picked up my handbag and followed him out of the dining room, through the lobby, and into the midnight moonlight beyond.

By the time I caught up to him, he’d come to rest across the street and stood with one hand against the thick cylindrical trunk of a palm tree, talking to himself and looking almost nauseated by anger. “The sheer arrogance of the lies!” he was snarling, evidently halfway into a topic. “The relentless concealment! The British public were tricked into this adventure in Mesopotamia by a steady withholding of information,” he told me when I arrived at his side. “They have no idea how bloody and inefficient the occupation has been, or how many have been killed. The whole business is a disgrace to our imperial record. And those people”—he jabbed a finger in the direction of the hotel—“those people are determined to make it all worse!”

Too agitated to keep still, he set off along the boulevard. I hurried to keep up as he went on vilifying the bureaucrats and diplomats he had to work with here and back in London. Like Wilson’s, this diatribe seemed to have been accumulating for some time, and I felt honored to be of use to him, if only as a sounding board. For a while I simply listened, but I knew something about self-consciousness and injured pride, and waited to address that which I suspected had truly wounded him.
Little imp…

When Lawrence’s anger began to circle toward the personal, I saw my opening. “Wilson and Cox are the worst kind of India Office bureaucrats,” he muttered as he strode along. “And Gertrude—sitting there with Cox, agreeing with his nonsense. That’s her flaw—she always gravitates to the man in power!”

Arms crossed, I stood my ground, as though I myself were furious. “And all three of them are entirely too tall!” I declared, matching his emotion but trying to make him see the funny side of the situation. “It’s very disagreeable, and really quite unnecessary.”

Lawrence turned to stare at me. For an uncomfortable moment, I wondered if he understood that he was being joshed and worried that I’d misread him. Then he slumped, and laughed a little, and nodded. Some of the tension went out of him, and we walked on, though not quite as quickly.

“It’s the condescension I can’t abide,” he continued, calmer now but still needing to talk it out. “The self-satisfied presumption of supremacy! ‘Silly wogs,’” he said, mimicking Colonel Wilson’s clotted tones. “‘How improvident not to be born into the British aristocracy and how perverse to stay that way! We’ll soon sort them out. White man’s burden, don’t you know!’ Who, exactly, is carrying that burden? Arnold Wilson never lifted anything heavier than a polo mallet in India. I just wanted him to say it all aloud, to reveal it for what it is—”

“So you did provoke him.” I had stopped again, and he looked back. “And you
knew
I was going to say all that about the Philippines as well.”

Caught out, he let a guilty giggle escape. “I certainly hoped so,” he admitted, and we walked on.

“You let me make a complete fool of myself,” I accused, “and in front of all those lords and ladies.”

“The toffs at that table needed to hear what you told them. I’ve said the same, but…” He grew serious once more. “Perhaps it will carry more weight coming from a citizen of a
former
colony—” He looked down and came to a halt so suddenly that my own momentum carried me a few steps beyond him. “Your poor feet!” he cried. “I’m sorry! Would you like a taxi? I should have thought!”

My buckle shoes were going to punish me, but it was too late to change that now. “It’s not far,” I said. “After a meal like that, the exercise will do us good.”

As we approached the Nile, the air was rippled by fluttering bats swooping through invisible clouds of insects. What at first seemed silence was actually filled with the rhythmic trilling of crickets and cicadas—surprising, there in the middle of the city. A large, pale bird swept past us on powerful wings, passing so near that I clearly saw its heart-shaped face and bright brown eyes. “A barn owl,” I said, amazed. “We have them in Ohio, too.”

Standing on the Gazirah Bridge, we paused to watch the majestic bird gliding out along the riverbank, head cocked, searching for rodents.

“How,” I asked, “could you be sure that I would say what you wanted the ‘toffs’ to hear? What if I’d been what Miss Bell assumed I was? Some superannuated flapper, too featherbrained to vote.”

“I knew your sister,” Lawrence reminded me, resting his forearms on the stone balustrade. “She knew your politics. You were intelligent and argumentative, she said. You’d follow an idea and get lost in the journey. And when you forgot yourself and spoke your mind, it was…
wonderful
,” he whispered with Lillie’s own dear emphasis. “She admired that in you.”

I turned away, pretending to study the black water moving sluggishly beneath the bridge. With quiet kindness Lawrence asked, “Would you like to visit Jebail, Miss Shanklin? To see where Lillie and Douglas lived? I could arrange it. After the conference.”

I cleared my throat and blinked into the darkness. “Yes. I would like that very much. That would be lovely. If it’s no trouble.”

We started again toward Gazirah. “So!” I said briskly. “Miss Bell wants to rule the Arabs, but sneakily. Colonel Wilson wants to rule right out in the open. Mr. Churchill wants to save money and rule on the cheap. What do you want, Colonel Lawrence?”

He took a deep breath and let it out, glancing at the moon riding low over the deep blue geometry of Cairo’s cityscape. “A state for the Kurds,” he said, “and one for the Armenians. Separate kingdoms for Basra and Baghdad. A national home for the Jews in Palestine. And biff the French out of Syria!” Embarrassed, he sniggered in recognition of the absurdity: big ambitions, little me.

“And what do the Arabs want for themselves?” I asked, since no one else seemed to have.

“Independence,” Lawrence said. “A single caliphate: a single state encompassing all the tribes and all the territory that was unified under the Ottoman Empire.”

“Well, then!”

“Miss Shanklin, there are at present nine men claiming to be caliph. None of them can unify Shi’a and Sunni Muslims, let alone hold the lands ruled by the Sultan.”

“I—I’m sorry. Sunny Moslems?”

He corrected my pronunciation and explained that after Muhammad died, the question arose as to who would lead the Muslim community. The Shi’a believed that Muhammad had named as his successor his cousin Ali—who was also the husband of the Prophet’s daughter Fatima. The Sunni denied that any such appointment had been made. They believed the Prophet desired that Muslims be guided by a caliph: a leader who arises from within the community and who lives according to the precepts and example of the Prophet.

There was more about tribes and emirs and sherifs, but it was late and my feet hurt. This has nothing to do with me, I decided, feeling very American and far removed from the fine points of impenetrable foreign customs. Before long, Lawrence saw that I was lost and waved it all off.

“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “France will never agree to Arab rule in the Middle East. They want Syria and the Lebanon for themselves, and they’re bargaining hard to annex the Mosul oil fields. The India Office will fight me as well. So one must focus on the possible,” he said decisively. “Tomorrow I hope to convince His Majesty’s Government—in the person of Winston Churchill—that our Middle Eastern protectorates should not be our last brown colony. They should be the British Empire’s first brown dominion.”

We turned a corner. Karl was out in front of the Continental, lounging against a huge potted plant, smoking an evening pipe. Rosie noticed me at the same moment and gave a strangled little whine of joy. Karl let slip her leash. She sprinted down the quiet street. For the next two minutes, I was wholly occupied by her exuberant, wiggling greeting.

When at last I could return my attention to the two gentlemen, my broad smile faltered. From this distance, Karl seemed relaxed and amused; Lawrence was motionless as a snake. Their eyes were locked. Lawrence seemed absorbed in some sort of mental calculation.

Rosie struggled to be let down, and I bent to put her on the pavement. “No harm done,” I heard Lawrence say breezily. When I straightened and looked around, he was no longer at my side. Mouth open, I watched him disappear into the darkness.

“An Arab dominion,” Karl said. “Like Canada. Or Australia…Self-governing for internal affairs, but without a separate foreign policy. It’s an interesting solution. The Arabs might be less offended than by the notion of being ‘protected’ by the British, but Lawrence is correct: the India Office will oppose him.”

We had already chatted for nearly half an hour by then, sitting in the club chairs of the Continental’s quiet lobby. To be honest, I wanted to go to bed, but Karl had been waiting all evening to hear about the dinner party and I couldn’t disappoint him.

“Why would the India Office care?” I asked.

“Great Britain rules India, and India has the largest Islamic population on earth. An Arab dominion in the Middle East would give dangerous ideas to millions of Indian Muslims.”

You’re probably thinking,
Agnes, India is mostly Hindu, not Muslim!
But, remember, this was back in 1921, before India became independent and before Pakistan became a separate country.

India was the primary source of British prosperity, Karl continued. “It is governed by bureaucrats who live like royalty with palaces and servants,” he said. “Who among them would give up wealth and privilege for such airy ideals as liberty and equality for brown people?” He puffed on his pipe for a time before shaking his head. “No. It cannot happen. And in any case, Lawrence is right about the French, as well. They’d never agree.”

“What have the French got to do with anything?” I asked—a little irritably, I’m afraid. Lawrence’s abrupt departure had thrown me off balance. Rosie was shedding all over my dress. My feet were killing me.

There was nobody else around, so I kicked off my shoes. To my astonishment, Karl lifted my feet to his lap and began to knead the soles. Like so much of what Karl did, the gesture seemed equal parts caring and casual, merely a small physical favor done for a friend. I shouldn’t have allowed it, but it felt so good! Frankly, I’m amazed I remember anything he said after that, but the gist of it was that France had lost an entire generation of young men to the war. Their politicians had begun to debate polygamy as a way to repopulate the nation! Having paid such a price, the French believed themselves entitled to the greatest spoils.

“They want real colonies, not self-governing members of some international gentleman’s club,” Karl said. “If the British give self-rule to their protectorates, it will stir up trouble in French possessions. Just a few months ago, the French had to crush a revolt in Syria that was led by Lawrence’s friend Feisal. They won’t want to risk that again.”

His voice trailed off and Karl sat silently, the glow of his pipe going dark while his mind was far away. His hands had stopped moving, too, just as I had sunk into the sensation of his fingers on my feet and had almost begun to imagine…well, more.

A few minutes passed. Feeling invisible and let down, I lifted my feet out of his lap and slid to the edge of the chair.

Karl noticed the movement and shook off his thoughts. “Agnes, forgive me,” he said, his face showing genuine concern. He reached toward my hair and lifted it slightly away from my temple. My eye must have been wandering, because he said, “You are exhausted. I can see this. And perhaps bored. Yes! Don’t deny it! Let me walk you to your room.”

The concierge nodded as we passed and wished us a good night. It felt cozy and intimate: to be sleepy and on the way up to bed, to laugh quietly together at Rosie’s comic leaping progress up the stairs.

Her short little legs reminded me of Lawrence’s sensitivity about his height, and I asked Karl about that. “Yes,” he told me, “Ned’s brothers were quite tall, but he broke his leg as a boy and never grew after that. Here’s irony: if he’d been drafted instead of volunteering for intelligence work, the Uncrowned King of Arabia would have been relegated to a ‘bantam brigade’ filled with malnourished little men from the countryside! For anyone to be underestimated seems a personal affront to him, I think. He is drawn to the underdog.”