The Colonel shook his head. ‘Not what the Doc says, I’m afraid.’
‘But, Sir!’
‘You speak French, I understand, Harry?’
The conversational interruption took the other man by surprise. His eyes flickered to the colonel. ‘Er – yes, Sir. Of a kind.’
Heavy brows lifted. ‘Might I ask what kind?’
Harry grinned a little. ‘The gutter kind, Sir.’
The Colonel nodded; he had expected as much. Among the most believable of the regimental rumours that had gathered about Harry Sherwood over the years was the notion that he had started his military career at an early age in that toughest of schools, the French Foreign Legion. Given his known exploits since, to say nothing of unsubstantiated rumours of the wilder sort, Colonel Standish did not find that too hard to credit. The Legion was a crucible that toughened or destroyed the men who passed through it; it also fostered a certain reckless, intransigent defiance of the world and its conventions, and upon that evidence alone the colonel was inclined to believe the story. He studied for a moment the proper, disciplined stance of the man before him, which somehow was at odds with the unconscious arrogance of the lifted chin, the spare, defiant line of cheek and jaw. No doubt about it, the man was an enigma; a role he himself, the colonel was aware, appeared quite happy to perpetuate. At a time when a man’s family connections were of paramount importance in the army, as in society at large, Harry Sherwood apparently had no family. Rumour, again, had obligingly furnished him with many backgrounds, each more exotic than the one before. He was the illegitimate sprig of an ancient aristocratic family. He was a disgraced younger son driven into the army to escape prison and a vengeful husband. He was the offspring of a forbidden liaison between a great lady and her gypsy lover; this last fantasy well born out by his dark good looks, his flamboyant skill on a horse and the excessive grace of his carriage, all of which so endeared him to the ladies. Whatever the truth, Harry Sherwood had proved convincingly and more than once that he was not a man to challenge on the matter of his privacy; he kept his own counsel and his own secrets.
At least most of the time.
The colonel was not in a position to know that just the night before, faced with a woman more determined than most and with a head for liquor stronger than any man’s he had ever met, as Harry’s own head this morning bore graphic witness, more of the truth of his background had come out than he was happy to remember – indeed, than he actually could remember. He pushed away the unease. God, he felt like hell!
‘– mischief brewing in the south. We suspect the supplying of arms, and we suspect the French –’
‘I’m sorry, Sir?’ This time Harry did turn his head, looking directly at the other man, his bright, dark eyes suddenly sharp. By God, the colonel thought wryly with a startled touch of envy, with looks like those no wonder the man’s learned to defend himself so well; he’s probably needed to, in many a Mess and for more than one reason.
‘At ease, Harry.’
Harry moved his feet, relaxed a little, but warily. ‘I’m sorry, Sir, you were saying?’
Colonel Standish took his time. He reached into the box on his desk for a cigar, cut and lit it, sucked on it for a moment. ‘The French, Harry. The bastard French again. It’s the old story. As you know, they have their own designs on the Sudan, their own reasons for seeing General Kitchener and our lads stopped in their tracks by the Dervishes. They want us held up before we can push further south: and to do it we suspect – we’re almost certain – they’re illegally running arms to the Khalifa and his followers. It’s more than likely that they’re coming overland – from Ethiopia, perhaps. The Emperor had a fine array of French guns to use against the Italians at Adowa, remember? And he’s the wiliest bugger on this benighted continent, he’ll have his fingers in anything he can. But there are other rumours. Rumours that some of the arms may be going upriver under our very noses. It’s unlikely. But it isn’t impossible.’ The blue eyes had narrowed, peering through the pale haze of the smoke. ‘I thought, if you should keep your eyes and ears open, on this trip upriver – well, who knows? You may hear something, see something, significant. This country’s the very devil for intrigue and gossip, as you know. Where there’s one faction doing one thing there’s usually another that’s ready to sell them for a couple of piastres, or betray a friend for a half inch of advantage. Didn’t I hear some story about your passing yourself off as a fellah for a bet?’ He paused, waiting.
Harry winced a little. There were no flies on the Old Man, that was for sure. He hoped his information did not include the purpose of the deception; the pleasures of the Cairo bazaars did not begin and end with the joys of shopping. ‘Er – yes, Sir.’
‘Quite. Well. You see what I mean, then.’ The older man drew again on his cigar. ‘Not that I’m advocating any daft cloak and dagger stuff, you understand. And nothing – absolutely nothing! – that would in any way endanger Miss Standish’s comfort or security. I just thought you might keep an ear to the ground.’
Harry had visibly brightened. Here was something a good deal more interesting than playing nursemaid to the colonel’s strong-minded niece. ‘Do we have any solid information, Sir?’
The colonel shook his head. ‘Unfortunately not.’ He toyed with the idea of telling the other man about the two bodies, scarcely recognizable, found floating in the Nile that very morning, and decided against it. There was little evidence to connect the torture and murder of two native scouts with this business. In his honest opinion, the likelihood that Harry might pick up any information on this trip was almost nil, but anything was worth a try, and Abdo had been insistent that Harry, French-speaking and after a few months of Egyptian sun as dark as many a native, was the man for the job. ‘Look, your main job will be to look after Miss Standish, smooth the way, handle the natives, get her where she wants to go, make sure she doesn’t get herself into any difficulties –’ Ye gods, what an assignment! French gun runners would be a tea party beside it! ‘– that sort of thing. I’m simply suggesting you stay alert. If the arms are going up the river then someone knows who’s involved. You’ll meet people on your way. Talk, gossip, just see if you can ferret anything out. My man Abdo will be with you –’ the colonel raised pained, bushy eyebrows, ‘– seems his father was on the expedition with Miss Nightingale more than forty years ago, would you believe it? Once Hannah discovered that, you may be sure that no-one else would do!’ He breathed a gusty sigh. He had had to balance the loss of Abdo and the consequent lapse of comfort and efficiency in his small household against the stress of standing in Hannah’s way once she had made up her mind, and the peace and quiet that must ensue once she left. He had capitulated with a quite shameful lack of argument. ‘You can trust him absolutely, of course. As a matter of fact he’s rather astute for a native. You may find him helpful – use him as a runner if needs be. The river – you know what the river is to this country – you may pick something up, however small. You’ll be in mufti, of course – better that way.’
‘Yes, Sir.’
‘You’ll leave within the week. The weather is warming nicely, and the winds are steadying. We’ll talk again in a day or so, before you leave. Oh, and Harry –’
‘Yes, Sir?’
‘Mum’s the word, eh? You’re just escorting Miss Standish upriver, understood?’
‘Yes, Sir.’
Smartly Harry about turned and left.
Colonel Standish looked after him with something close to sympathy. In truth the bait of the arms being run to the Khalifa was a little less than fair; there were other eyes and ears seeking the source of the guns that were undoubtedly trickling through to the Dervishes, and despite Abdo’s usually sound instincts the colonel felt that the chances of Harry Sherwood finding anything on his trip with Hannah Standish up the river were minimal. But at least it had salved the man’s pride and perhaps made up for his being appointed to what he no doubt saw as the post of nursemaid to Hannah; at the same time the embarra
ssing, even dangerous, possibility of Harry’s affair with the Major’s wife becoming even more noticeable than it already was had been headed off. Colonel Standish was well aware that some eyebrows might be raised at the idea of his sending a well-known womanizer, however good a soldier and despite being officially convalescent, to escort his niece, unmarried though long betrothed, on a several-hundred-mile journey up the Nile; but only, he thought, relighting his cigar, eyebrows belonging to those who had no acquaintance with that niece. No, on the whole he was rather pleased with himself. This was as good a solution to a couple of thorny problems as he could possibly have devised. If he could not yet be sent back on active service, Harry Sherwood was at least put under Hannah’s eye, where assuredly he could do little harm, and cause less scandal, and Hannah could set off on her tiresome Odyssey. And, it had to be said, in as much affection as he held her, the sooner the better. Her firm and well-intentioned attentions were driving him, a middle-aged and determined bachelor, to distraction. Its was self-evidently true that Harry Sherwood was not inexperienced when it came to the ladies. That meant, presumably, that he knew how to deal with a lady, even such a one as Hannah.
The colonel settled behind his desk with his cigar, reached once more for the matches and, quite sincerely, wished his captain luck.
* * *
Harry stepped with relief from the blinding sunshine into the cool shadows of the building which housed the quarters he shared with Archie Douglas. His head now was thumping so hard that it almost defeated thought altogether.
Archie, booted and spurred and dressed for riding, his feet resting, ankles crossed, upon a small table, was reading a letter. ‘Mail’s in.’ He glanced up, grinned. ‘Lord, you look like God’s gift to a mortician! Where the hell were you last night?’
Harry shook his head, the effort of speech too much for him. He reached for the single letter that rested on the table near his friend’s shining boots, glanced at it and tucked it into his pocket. Archie watched, curiosity in his eyes, but said nothing. No amount of probing had ever elicited from Harry who it was that wrote to him with such regularity each month; the only certainty, from the delicacy of the envelope and the femininity of the decorative writing, was that the faithful correspondence came from a woman. Archie sometimes wondered if Harry did not, after all, have a wife and family tucked safely away somewhere in England. Experience, however, had taught him that speculation was as far as he would ever get in the matter. ‘What did the Old Man want?’
Harry dropped onto his narrow bed, right leg propped straight before him, sank his head into his hands for a moment, long fingers buried in his thick black hair.
Archie, sensing fun, swung his long legs from the table and sat forward, forearms resting upon his knees, watching the other man with interest. ‘Well?’
Harry flung himself backwards on the bed, one arm shielding his eyes. ‘I’m off on a trip, Archie. Off on a trip.’
‘What sort of trip?’
There was a short silence, then, resignedly: ‘A trip that traces the footsteps of Miss Florence Nightingale over forty blasted years ago up the River Nile in company with a student of that same Miss Nightingale –’
‘Hannah Standish!’
Harry sat up, face sober. ‘Laugh,’ he said, ‘and I’ll flatten you.’
The other man was already all but choking. ‘You?’ he managed. ‘The Old Man’s landed you with it? Serves you right, Harry! Serves you bloody right!’ He flung back his fair head and let out a roar of mirth. ‘Oh, serves you bloody right!’
Harry glowered. ‘What’s so funny?’
Archie did not feel the need to reply.
Later, when the other man, still chuckling, had left to ride to the pyramids of Ghiza with the latest impressionable and starry-eyed young female tourist to arrive via Mr Thomas Cook’s good offices, Harry read his letter. The weather was cold in England, Mattie reported, but unseasonably dry. The latest Jake was a roamer; the countryside was being populated with shaggy golden puppies, to the outrage of the neighbours. The roof had been all but blown off in a gale in September, but had been secured in time for the winter. She hoped that he was enjoying this posting better than the last; the glories of Egypt must be amongst the most exotic sights in the world. She signed, as always, restrainedly, ‘your loving mother’.
Harry folded the letter haphazardly, shoved it into a small box crammed full of similar notes that had found him, in the past fifteen years or so, in almost every outpost of an Empire that had established itself firmly in every continent of the world. He answered, briefly and impersonally, perhaps once or twice a year; the only thing he had done meticulously since his flight from the Legion into the more respectable arms of the British army was to let his mother know where he was from posting to posting, and thus ensured that the cheerful and undemanding letters kept coming. He had never brought himself openly to admit the reason; it had, he always told himself, simply become a habit. He moved to the window, looking out into the bright and dusty world beyond. For one moment, his mother’s words in his mind, he could see her. He could see Coombe House, smell the crisp, sharp smell of a chill December morning, see a shaggy golden dog bounding towards him, coat burr-covered and wet from the frosted grass –
‘Sir?’ A huge man, sweating in his scarlet uniform, had appeared at the door.
Pained, Harry turned his head.
The man grinned unsympathetically. ‘They’re ready for you, Sir. As ready, that is, as they ever are for anythin’.’ Sergeant Thomas never attempted to disguise his contempt for the native troops he tried day in and day out to lick into something approximating British Army shape.
Harry took a breath, steadied his brain and his stomach against his hangover. ‘Very well, Sergeant. I’m coming.’
* * *
‘You did what?’ Colonel Standish bellowed, glaring at his niece in the manner that was, after years of practice, guaranteed to reduce the bravest of men to doubt and confusion.
Hannah was unimpressed. ‘I invited her to join me. Really, Uncle, you should be careful, you know. It’s terribly bad for you to get into a state about every little thing.’
The colonel gritted his teeth. ‘I am not, as you choose to put it, getting into a state. I simply want to know how it is that every time I make arrangements – any arrangements – you effortlessly and without thought manage to –’ he fought against the words he would have used to a male subordinate, and ground out, finally ‘– change them.’
Hannah shrugged briskly. ‘For goodness’ sake, I haven’t changed them – I’ve simply added to them. It’s hardly the end of the world, is it? Laila wants to go upriver to join her father in the Winter House. She’s bored with Cairo and would like to come with me. What on earth is wrong with that? I think it’s a perfectly splendid idea. I like the child, and it seems she likes me. The company will be pleasant for both of us, and her father seems quite happy about it. Really, Uncle, I can’t see why you should make such a fuss.’
The colonel reached for his cigars. ‘Hannah, you really do have a lot to learn about this country.’
Hannah, tall, lean as a whippet, as always immaculately clad in neat pale grey trimmed with white that seemed to defy the heat, the startling, wiry hair that was so much at odds with the austerity of her features confined beneath a severe scarf and an untrimmed straw hat, frowned a little, questioningly.
Her uncle breathed an overtly patient sigh. ‘You, at the last minute, invite Ayman el Akad’s only daughter to accompany you on this trip –’
‘She invited herself, actually.’
‘That makes it worse, if anything. For it indicates she may have known something you didn’t –’
‘Which is?’ Hannah was wary.
‘Your escort on this benighted trip is to be Captain Harry Sherwood.’
There was a very long moment’s silence. Then, ‘Ah,’ said Hannah.
‘Ah, indeed.’ The colonel took his usual stance by the window, chewing furiously on his cigar.
‘Can she have known?’ Hannah asked.
Her uncle shrugged. ‘I don’t see how. But that doesn’t mean she didn’t. In this place it seems to me that you can’t –’ the colonel battled again against his natural choice of words. God in heaven, he simply wasn’t used to addressing females! ‘– can’t breathe without someone hearing you and passing comment to his neighbour! She may have done.’
‘To Captain Sherwood’s credit, he seems not to have encouraged the girl’s attentions. As I understand it, he rode with her a couple of times, simply as a member of a party – to the Pyramids, and to the Sphinx – but I believe he declined gracefully any further contact when it was pointed out to him that the child was becoming – interested. I’m sure the captain is quite capable of fending off such attentions. Quite apart from anything else he may be, the captain is no cradle-snatcher. His tastes, I understand, actually run to something a little more –’ she raised well-defined eyebrows with something disconcertingly close to dry amusement ‘– shall we say a little more mature? And certainly very much more attached.’
Her outspokenness, as always, left him floundering.
Hannah smiled coolly. ‘Really, Uncle, I don’t think you need to worry. We have Mary for protection.’ The glint of humour was back; it could not be denied that Hannah had spent a good deal more time protecting her timid maid than Mary had spent safeguarding her mistress, and the girl’s nervous terror at the prospect of setting sail upon the swirling, crocodile-infested waters of the Nile with nothing but a bunch of wild Dervishes for company would have been funny had it not been so exasperating. ‘And Laila has Abdo’s and my protection against any dastardly designs the convalescent Captain Sherwood might have.’ Her grey eyes twinkled with laughter.
The colonel detested being teased, was aware that his dislike of it always made him pompous, and consequently, in Hannah’s case, tempted her to further lengths. ‘Hannah, you don’t understand. Ayman el Akad is one of the richest, most powerful and certainly most influential men in Egypt. He’s no run-of-the-mill merchant! He’s connected by birth to every important family on the Nile, and there isn’t an influential man in the country – up to the very top! – who doesn’t owe him money, or a favour, or both! He’s the piper who calls the tune, however far behind the scenes he stays. It’s essential that we keep his goodwill. The slightest breath of scandal concerning his daughter –’
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