by Isobel Chace
CHAPTER VII
Amber was unashamedly appreciative of good food and she made no secret of the fact that she had come to lunch only because Cas had told her that Stephanie was an extremely good cook.
‘You don’t mind, Stephanie, but I have always been greedy. Food is the great love of my life—as Cas will tell you!’
Stephanie hid her surprise behind a casual smile. ‘I thought singers and dancers were always dieting. Not that you have to worry,’ she went on hastily.
‘She means,’ Cas drawled, ‘that you look a million dollars as always!’
‘No thanks to me,’ Amber said, somewhat smugly. ‘All my family are the same. We stay thin until we are thirty and then we look comfortable for the rest of our lives.’ She smiled, but at herself, not at them. ‘When I am thirty I shall retire and go home. It is not long now!’
‘Will you be able to manage?’ Cas asked her.
She shrugged. ‘Yes, I shall manage. My people look after their own, so we shan’t starve. I can hardly wait!
Stephanie blinked. Who were her people? ‘Where is home?’ she asked aloud, trying not to sound too curious.
Amber smiled across the table at her, not at all put out. ‘I am Armenian. Didn’t Cas tell you? I live in the Lebanon, in Beirut, but we have no real home any more. That’s why I come to Isfahan often, because of the Armenians who live here. They are not entirely sure that they approve of the way I dance, but they welcome me to their homes, and there is the Cathedral in New Julfa. I like to follow the old customs whenever I can.’
‘The Armenian Church is Orthodox, isn’t it?’ said Stephanie, bringing out the only thing she knew about Armenians, except that they were one of those nations whom all others seem to persecute from time to time. Hadn’t they been driven out of Armenia at one time? And the Soviet Union? And Turkey? She was ashamed to think that until this moment their history had really passed her by.
‘Yes, Orthodox. But our liturgy and ritual is in our own language. You must visit the Cathedral and see it for yourself.’
‘I’d like to,’ Stephanie said, and wondered why the other two should exchange glances as though they shared some private joke at her expense.
‘What is your religion?’ Amber asked her, as though it were the most natural question in the world.
‘Church of England—’
‘Episcopalian!’ Cas exclaimed. ‘I thought as much!’
‘Does it matter?’ Stephanie demanded.
‘Not to me, honey. It might have been easier if you had been Catholic, but I’m not complaining.’
‘Easier? What’s easier about it?’
Amber laughed. ‘Didn’t he tell you? Cas is a Catholic. What else would he be with a Polish mother? They are all Catholics, I think.’
‘We sound like the World Council of Churches.’ Stephanie said faintly.
‘Don’t we just?’ Cas agreed. ‘But we can all go to Amber’s church, which is a very satisfactory answer to the problem.’
‘What problem?’ said Stephanie.
‘I’ll tell you later,’ he promised. And with that she had to be content. He really was the most maddening person sometimes! He would stop her questions with a remark like that, turning his attention away from her with a decisiveness that made it impossible for her to persevere. It was awesome how easily he managed to get his own way as far as she was concerned!
‘Have a little more wine?’ he tempted her. ‘It’s very pleasant, isn’t it? Amber’s people do most of the winegrowing in Persia. I bought it from some friends of hers this morning.’
‘You went to New Julfa?’ Stephanie accused him.
He grinned. ‘I told you I had a busy morning!’
Amber put her knife and fork together with a sigh of content. ‘When I am at home all the time, I shall spend all my time cooking,’ she announced. ‘I am making my own cookery book, with all my favourite recipes in it. The only trouble is, I never have time to try any of them out. It will be bliss to be in my own home and do it all myself!’
‘If last night’s meal is anything to go by, I’d say you deserved it,’ Cas said forcibly.
‘Yes, but this is nice—thanks to Stephanie,’ Amber answered him. She picked up her glass and played with the stem, idly turning it round in her exquisite fingers. She looked up suddenly, her eyes deliberately meeting Stephanie’s and holding them. ‘You mustn’t mind that Cas and I are old friends. I did not understand yesterday when he had been cutting your hair, but now he has told me everything and I am pleased. I think he stole more than pieces of hair from you, no? And that is very good. It is time he had someone to make a home for him, and that is good too. But you will not expect him to give up all his old friends, will you?’ Her eyes moved away from Stephanie and slid lovingly over Cas. ‘We love him too!
Stephanie didn’t need to be told that. She had known it from the first moment she had seen them together. What confused her, though, was that Amber should suppose that she meant anything to Cas! Oh yes, he had cut her hair, and he had kissed her too, but he wasn’t likely to get further involved with her. He’d be a fool if he did! He had his own career to think about and she knew him to be ambitious, more ambitious, for instance, than her father had ever been. He wasn’t the kind to let his heart rule his head! Worse, there were so many to share his heart that if he were to take them seriously, he’d need a harem to keep them all in. What was more, she had a nasty suspicion that while she might gain entry, it would be Amber who would be his acknowledged favourite, and who could be surprised, with her dusky beauty and charming ways?
Cas’s hand closed over hers and he poured her out some more wine whether she wanted it or not. ‘Drink up, little one! I’m going to make the coffee while you two chatter. It takes an expert to make real coffee and the English in my experience just haven’t got the knack!’
She was indignant, as he had known she would be. ‘You’ve never tasted my coffee!’
‘Right, so you’ll have to show me what you can do some other time. It’s my turn to dazzle you with my accomplishments and, believe me, coffee-making is one of them! I don’t want you to think that I’m helpless when it comes to doing the chores. I was brought up to do my share, let me tell you, and I wouldn’t have it any other way!’
‘I’m dazzled already,’ she said, still grumpy at the high-handed way he had taken over what she considered was her job.
‘That’s what I’d hoped!’ he shot back at her, as imperturbable as ever. ‘But I’m happy to have you confirm it!’
Amber laughed her very feminine laugh. ‘Cas never lets one have the last word. It’s no good arguing with him. He’ll do what he wishes to do, so why not let him do it?’
‘He doesn’t argue, that’s the trouble!’ Stephanie complained. ‘He just concludes that his way is best!’
Amber laughed again. ‘Do you want him to argue with you?’
‘No, I suppose not.’ But Stephanie still felt aggrieved and it showed.
‘The wisest woman I know once said to me that I should always suspect a man who allowed me to argue too much with him. Either it would be because he didn’t care, or because he was not worth caring about.’
‘We look at things differently in the west,’ Stephanie insisted, ruffled.
‘How dull,’ Amber responded, still amused. ‘Me, I want to be consulted, sometimes to advise, but to rule—never! If you want that, Cas will only make you unhappy, because he is not the man to allow a woman to run his life for him.’
The idea was laughable! Nor did she want to rule Cas— she knew she would be a fool to try!—but even less did she want Amber’s advice on the subject. She could not forget the look that had passed between Amber and Cas and, if it hadn’t hurt so much, she would have been horrified to recognise that it was only her jealousy of Amber that prevented her from liking the other woman.
‘I think everyone should have a certain measure of independence,’ she said austerely. ‘Both men and women.’
Amber was as placi
d as ever, though the glint of laughter stayed in her dark eyes. ‘Independence can be too dearly bought. I would give mine up tomorrow, if I could, but it is not yet possible, and I must wait a little longer to be truly happy as I want to be.’
With Cas? Stephanie could hardly bear the thought. She hunched her shoulders miserably, trying not to look at Amber at all.
‘Don’t you want me to be happy?’ the Armenian’s soft voice asked her, almost as though she were trying not to laugh.
Yes, but not with Casimir Ruddock! ‘Have you ever been to West Virginia?’ Stephanie countered.
Amber’s eyebrows rose in bewilderment. ‘My dear girl, what a question! I’m a city girl! You only have to show me the country for me to wilt. What would I do with myself in a place like West Virginia?’
‘Cas’s home is there.’
‘And mine is in Beirut. That’s where my family is. I could never live happily anywhere else!’
Stephanie was glad when Cas came back from the kitchen, carrying three cups of coffee on a tray. She took the cup he handed her and sipped at the brew inside, more than willing to find fault with it. She felt Cas’s eyes on her and coloured guiltily.
‘Too hot? Too strong? Too bitter?’ he taunted her.
She cast him a winning smile. ‘Just right!’
His eyes crinkled at the corners, and she blushed in earnest. The mocking look in his bright blue eyes increased her discomfort and she refused to look his way again, afraid of how easily he could completely demoralise her.
To her surprise, Amber rose to go as soon as she had finished her coffee. ‘It was a delightful lunch, Stephanie. Thank you for inviting me. You will forgive me, I know, for dashing away, but the afternoon is when I sleep best. At night I am too strung up and it is then that I most hate being away from home.’
Stephanie went with her to the door, and she was even more surprised when Amber gave her a warm hug of farewell, whispering in her ear, ‘You do as Cas says, my dear. You’re in love with him, aren’t you?’
Did the whole world know? First Fatemeh and then Amber—how long would it be before Cas knew too? ‘Goodbye, Amber.’
‘Au revoir,’ Amber contradicted with a smile. ‘We shall surely be seeing each other again. I have my reputation to live up to as Casimir’s dreamboat!’
Stephanie thought she would never forgive Cas for telling her that. ‘Do you like being called such a thing?’ she asked, her eyes wide.
‘Of course. I have too few compliments these days. Sometimes I don’t feel like a woman at all, but a moneymaking machine. See you later, honey.’
Bitterly resentful that anyone else should use what she considered to be Cas’s own name for her, Stephanie took a deep breath to steady herself before she went back into the room where he was waiting for her. He stood up as she came in, thus robbing her of the advantage of being able to look down on him.
‘Thanks, love,’ he said. ‘Amber doesn’t get many treats, but I knew you’d come up trumps with something that would give her pleasure.’
Stephanie found that very difficult to believe, but she said nothing. Instinct warned her that Amber was always going to be a bone of contention between them and that, as she couldn’t hide her envy of the other woman, she would do better to pretend to be complacent about her, and she could only do that by ignoring her altogether. ‘I’d better clear away,’ she said.
He caught her hands in his, cornering her against the edge of the table. ‘Mina is going to do that. You, little one, are coming with me! Do you want to take anything with you?’
‘My bag—’
'You’d better take a sun-hat and some dark glasses as well,’ he commanded her. ‘Is this your bag here?’
She accepted her handbag from him and fished her dark glasses out, waving them in front of his nose. ‘And I don’t need a hat! I can cover my head in the mosque with my scarf. I never wear hats!’
‘Don’t you? I think you’d look rather fetching in a wide-brimmed straw hat, with a great floppy bow over one eye.’
She looked up at him and felt the rigid control she had kept over the attraction he had for her slipping away from her. She couldn’t even remember what it was that he had just said to her.
‘Cas, I don’t think I want to go after all!’
‘My, my,’ he teased her, ‘I never thought I’d see the well-organised Miss Black looking as scatty as a schoolgirl on her first date!’
She sniffed reproachfully, hoping that she didn’t disgrace herself entirely by bursting into tears. ‘Please, Cas, she whispered.
‘You’ll be all right with me, Stephanie, and you know it. Surely you trust me enough to see that nothing awful happens to you while I’m looking after you?’
‘But I don’t know why you should want to look after me?’
He cupped her chin in his hand, making her look up and meet the full force of his blue eyes. ‘I’ll say one thing for you, honey, you don’t suffer from conceit! Don’t you know how pretty you are?’
‘But not in the same league as Amber—’
‘It depends what you’re looking for,’ he murmured, a muscle pulling at the corner of his mouth. ‘In some leagues I reckon you might have the edge even on the luscious Amber!’
‘What league?’
‘Which league would you like to be top of?’
There was no mistaking the amusement in his voice, or the urgent need she discovered in herself for him to take her seriously. She wanted to be top of his league! Who could possibly want anything else?
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘I keep telling myself that beauty is only skin deep, but she’s nice too, isn’t she?’
‘Very nice!’
She swallowed, more miserable than ever. ‘I think she’s in love with you too!’ she blurted out.
‘If she is, it’s a very sisterly affair,’ he answered, smiling, and she wondered how it was that men could be so blind in their dealings with women. ‘Not to be taken too seriously, I think!’ he added. ‘But I’ve told you that before. You ought to listen more, Stephanie, and jump to conclusions less, but I suspect you’re too feminine to do much logical thinking, and I wouldn’t really have you any other way!’ He patted her cheek and released her, giving a gentle tug to the scarf round her neck. ‘This afternoon, honey, the stage is all yours, and you alone will be the leading lady, so you might look as though you’re going to enjoy it!’
It was a masterly touch, she thought ruefully, for there was no doubt as to whom the director of the piece was to be. She might be cast as star, but the production would be kept firmly in his own hands—as ever!
‘Yes, but, Cas, supposing I don’t get my lines right?’ she asked in a sudden panic.
‘You’ll manage,’ he said. ‘All you have to do is repeat them after me!’
It was too far to walk, he decreed, so they would take a taxi to the Friday Mosque, and what was more he succeeded in finding one with a minimum of trouble, which was slightly unfair when Stephanie thought of the difficulties she had had in getting herself a taxi on innumerable occasions. Either they were of the kind that you shared with other passengers going the same way, and she could never understand where they were going at all, or else they were non-existent whenever they were needed.
Stephanie stepped into the cab first, sliding across the seat to make room for Cas. Her powers of conversation had deserted her and she could think of nothing to say to him at all as they made their way round the huge central square and northwards towards the old part of the town where the Friday Mosque had dominated the surrounding life for a thousand years.
At last inspiration came to her. ‘I hope you won’t be disappointed,’ she said politely, ‘the Friday Mosque isn’t as colourful as some of the others. But the brickwork is fantastic—and the arches! I find it beautiful.’
‘Top of the league?’ he suggested.
She nodded. ‘But you may not think it as beautiful as the Royal Mosque. Some people don’t.’
‘What makes yo
u think I haven’t the same discernment as yourself?’ he asked, tongue in cheek.
She mumbled something, not knowing how to answer him, and was considerably put out when he laughed at her, taking firm possession of her hand that was nearest to him. ‘I like colour, but I share some of your passion for order and line too,’ he told her. ‘It can be more satisfying in the long run—and not only in buildings!’
She didn’t know what he meant by that and she was too shy to enquire. She heaved a sigh of relief as they arrived in the rather poor street from which the entrance to the Mosque was visible.
‘Over there,’ she said vaguely, because she was still turning his last remark over in her mind, ‘is the Jewish quarter. The best jewellery shops are there.’
‘Is that a hint?’ he teased her.
‘Certainly not!’ she retorted, shocked. But, even so, she couldn’t resist a sidelong glance towards one of her favourite shops that stood on the left side of the entrance and was stuffed full of gold and silver objects of every kind, together with a few less valuable ornaments such as a bracelet made from old British halfpennies and one of half-sovereigns that she had looked at long and lovingly only a few days before.
She became aware that he was watching her and hurried through the narrow entrance into the vaulted passage that led the way into the great court of the Mosque. As always the drama of the building built up the excitement within her and her face shone with a personal pride as she felt the big man beside her respond to the beauty of the endless line of arches in a like manner.
The bright sunlight in the main court hit them like a sledge-hammer. Stephanie pulled her hand free of Cas’s and arranged her scarf over her head. A crowd of schoolgirls came surging into the area around them, intent on trying out their few words of English on the foreign visitors. Stephanie would have indulged them if she had been alone, but Cas soon tired of their chatter and led her firmly away towards the iwan which covered the entrance into the main prayer hall.
His silence in the face of the enormous domed chamber, flanked by arcades built of bricks in an astonishing variety of pattern, made her look up at him. Only then did she really believe him that he felt as she did about these things. The huge dome towered above them, edged with the praises of Allah written in the picturesque Kufic Arabic script that lent itself so well to the chaste ornamentation that was all that was necessary to complete the marvellous concept of the architect.