by Isobel Chace
When she stepped out of the bath she heard a female voice calling out below, and her heart sank within her. She would have to hurry, she thought, and go and greet the Frenchwoman. Félicité would be tired after driving all that way by herself—tired, but determined! She sighed and glanced at herself in the looking-glass on the wall. The hot water had curled up the short hair that framed her face and the new sun-tan was really very becoming. She dressed rapidly and sailed out of the bathroom in an aura of steam and bath-salts and went lightly down the stairs, going straight into the bar. And sure enough, there was Félicité sitting in acute discomfort on one of the Arab seats with a gin and vermouth in her hand.
“My dear, you’re burnt!” she greeted Rosamund with a wry smile. “Are you sure your skin will recover?”
“I think so,” she said quietly.
“Well, you know what fair skin is!” Félicité went on without much interest. “I mean, I know you don’t care about these things because everyone says your looks are perfect anyway, but for lesser mortals—”
Rosamund sat down on one of the square, cushioned seats and drew up her legs under her.
“Do you suffer from the sun?” she asked sympathetically. “What a pity! Because there’s very little shade where the men are working.”
Félicité looked across the room with malice in her eyes.
“You’re not going to keep me away so easily!” she said sharply. “But I suppose you may as well tell me the other attractions you have lined up for me.”
Rosamund leaned forward eagerly.
“I’ve had the most marvellous idea!” she exclaimed. “That is if you’re not too tired. I’ve been meaning to go down to the fishing harbour ever since we got here. Do come with me. Perhaps we could buy some fresh fish for dinner this evening and get the hotel to cook it for us. Wouldn’t it be fun?”
Félicité got slowly and languidly to her feet.
“It sounds deadly,” she said candidly, “but I suppose that anything is better than sitting here waiting around. I’ll take a quick look at the room they’ve given me upstairs and then I’ll come back.”
Rosamund wondered briefly if she ought to volunteer to go up with her, but decided against it. Félicité was obviously in no mood to be girls together in an alien world—in fact Rosamund couldn’t think of any occasion when Felicity would welcome a feminine friend! But perhaps she was just being catty. Félicité was there, and it would be as well to make the best of her presence.
It was all of half an hour before Félicité came downstairs again, and it was obvious that something had displeased her.
“I gather,” she said coldly, “that the only room left is facing the back, without a single breath of air! However, I’ve changed all that! I’ve had one of the men moved out and myself moved in! I really can’t understand why Rupert didn’t have it all arranged—or you, for that matter. You both knew I was coming!”
Rosamund raised her eyebrows slightly.
“I’m afraid I didn’t think,” she said smoothly, “or you could have had my room.”
Félicité twisted her face into a smile.
“Beauty and thoughtfulness seldom go together,” she stated positively. “Don’t you agree? Everybody always tries to spoil the lovely—so bad for them!”
Rosamund didn’t answer. Her eyes had been caught by a man’s figure in the doorway and she smiled as Rupert approached them. He nodded casually at Félicité.
“Arrived all right, I see,” he said.
It was very extraordinary, Rosamund thought, but then Rupert wasn’t the sort of man to wear his heart on his sleeve. He would wait until he had the Frenchwoman on her own before he would really make her welcome. The thought was unaccountably distressing.
“Is everyone knocking off now?” she asked him in order to change the subject.
He didn’t answer immediately. Instead he leaned forward and stared at her.
“You’ve had a bath!” he accused her. “How did you manage that?”
She put a finger to her mouth and hushed him.
“It’s on the secret list,” she told him.
“It’s downright unfair!” he said. “And no, everyone has not knocked off yet. I came back early in case Félicité had arrived, but if baths are on the agenda—”
“They’re not! It was a special concession,” Rosamund insisted, laughing up at him.
“My God, are we that primitive?” Félicité asked, her voice tinged with desperation.
Rupert and Rosamund laughed.
“That primitive!” they agreed in chorus, and laughed again. But Félicité was not laughing.
“I think somebody might have told me,” she complained. “I saw a perfectly good bathroom upstairs!”
“Yes,” said Rupert, “but unfortunately, for some reason, there never seems to be sufficient water to have a bath.”
“Nonsense!” Félicité contradicted him flatly. “They’ve had inches of rain round here in the last day or so. I know, because I had to ask all the way along whether the road would still be there when I got to it!”
“It largely wasn’t when we came along,” Rupert agreed humorously. “But it doesn’t seem to make the faintest difference to the water level. I don’t profess to understand it, but, try as Muhammed undoubtedly does, the water just gives out!”
Rosamund saw Félicité’s eyes harden and said hastily:
“We were going down to the harbour to see if we could get some fresh fish for dinner. Do you want to come?”
Rupert’s eyes creased at the corners.
“No, thanks,” he said lightly. “I’m hunting a bath, say what you will!”
He went off immediately leaving the two girls together. Félicité stood up lazily.
“I suppose we’d better go,” she said wryly. “I must say this all seems to be having a very bad effect on Rupert. I have seldom been made to feel less welcome!”
Rosamund could almost feel sorry for her. She too thought Rupert had been surprisingly indifferent in his greeting, but she knew better than to read too much into that. Rupert would do his own courting in his own time and not even Félicité would be able to rush him.
There was a magnificent orange light flooding the harbour. The green of the grass on the island looked almost theatrical, an effect that was heightened by the fort that stood on its summit, gaunt and romantic. Beneath the sea was as still as glass, a mother-of-pearl sea, tinged with green, broken only by the black of the wooden apron to which the smaller fishing boats tied up to when they brought in their catches.
Rosamund got out the light truck and, with a slight gesture of distaste, Félicité climbed in beside her.
“I suppose one can get out of this thing without tearing one’s skirt?” she asked dismally.
Rosamund grinned.
“It’s quite easy really,” she said. “You just swing your legs out and allow yourself to drop to the ground.”
Félicité gave her a look of acute dislike.
“Quite the little tomboy, aren’t you?” she said.
Rosamund drove rapidly down the steep hill and turned left sharply at the bottom into the main street of the little town. A mixed flock of sheep and goats straggled along in front of them, skipping from side to side in nervous haste as they tried to get out of each other’s way. Rosamund slowed and moved gently through them, while their shepherd flew about, this way and that, trying to get them out of the way. Rosamund thanked him with a wave of her hand and he responded with a grave bow from the waist, staring after these two strange women with a delighted interest, his smile reaching from ear to ear.
They swept round by the Customs buildings (for this was the last town in Tunisia before the Algerian frontier) and set off down the narrow causeway that led to the little fishing harbour itself and joined the island to the mainland.
“I suppose Rupert said you could borrow the truck?” Felicity asked as they got out and walked slowly over to the slatted platform where some boys were sitting, waiting for t
he catch to come in.
Rosamund was immediately flustered.
“I didn’t think to ask him,” she admitted. “I’ve used it to take the beer out to the men these last two days and I suppose I just concluded that nobody would mind my taking it.”
“I don’t suppose anyone minds, dear, but you do take a lot for granted, don’t you?”
Rosamund bit her lip. Did she, she wondered, take too much for granted? She sighed, dismissing the possibility from her mind. She would not let Felicity have the satisfaction of disturbing her. She had come to buy fish, and buy fish she would! And if she secretly hoped that Félicité’s would turn bad in the cooking, she wouldn’t dwell on that prospect either! She squared her shoulders, put a smile on her face and went over to greet the boys.
As she walked right to the edge of the platform the sea seemed darker, jade green, beneath her feet, slapping softly against the wooden struts and against the bottoms of the two boats that were already tied up alongside. It looked deep and pleasant and was probably full of fish, for the water was warm from the endless sun. She sat down on the edge of the platform, taking off her shoes and dabbling her feet in the water.
“What time will the boats come in?” she asked the boys.
They crowded about her, pointing out to her the swarms of tiny fish that were sporting themselves in the water beside her, laughing at her dismay when some of them brushed against her feet.
“They will come soon,” they assured her. “They will come soon to take up the nets too.” They pointed to a line of corks that reached across the mouth of the harbour. “Who knows what they will have caught there?” they said proudly. “Sometimes there are even lobsters clinging to the bottom of the net.”
Rosamund was as enthusiastic as they were.
“Do you go out in the boats?” she asked them.
They drew themselves up proudly.
“Sometimes,” they said grandly. “But sometimes we have to go to school.”
They said it so gravely that it was easy to see in what awe they held their new opportunities. It seemed strange to think that these youngsters could probably read and write while their parents probably could not.
“That is very important too,” she said equally gravely, and they nodded their heads soberly at her.
“Tunisia is a very fine country, don’t you think?” they said finally.
“Very fine,” she agreed, and they were pleased.
Félicité came slowly over towards the little group and, for once, she looked calm and pleasant.
“I’d forgotten it was so lovely here,” she said softly.
“It is, isn’t it? How long have you been living here?”
Félicité sat down also on the wooden struts, poking her fingers into the spaces between the wood and pulling them out again in time to some tune of her own making in her head.
“Long enough,” she said shortly. “I came here with my husband.”
“I see,” Rosamund said, though she didn’t really see at all. “I’m sorry.”
Felicity cast her a look of malicious amusement out of her pale green eyes.
“Sorry?” she repeated. “Well, don’t be! The best thing he ever did was to die.” She laughed briefly. “Oh dear, now I will have shocked you, and I didn’t mean to. Enough said, my dear! Besides, I think I can see the first of the boats coming in.” She jumped to her feet and pointed into the distance, and the boys shouted their agreement. The fishing fleet was coming home.
Rosamund watched the boats coming nearer and nearer and began to count them automatically, though her mind wasn’t really on it at all. So that was why Félicité was so unpleasant, she was saying to herself. She’s bitterly unhappy, that’s what it is. She’s had years and years of unhappiness with her husband! Of course there had to be a reason. People weren’t like that for no reason at all. It was difficult to like her any better, but it was more possible to come to terms with her now that it wasn’t so senseless!
The first of the boats came riding in towards the wooden platform, sailing full tilt for it. The man in charge of the single large sail watched grimly for his moment and, only feet away from his objective, slipped it down into a huddled mass in the bottom of the boat on top of the fish. Eagerly they grasped the edge of the pontoon and bounded ashore.
Rosamund turned and glanced at Félicité. She thought the Frenchwoman had never looked so well as she did now, with her hair blowing in the wind and freed from the iron-clad chic that she usually affected. She looked much less like a doll and more of a human being.
“Are you going to haggle, or am I?” she asked her.
Félicité’s eyes hardened.
“If we’re going to get them cheaply, I suppose I’d better. They’d eat you on toast before breakfast!”
Rosamund was hurt, but she said nothing. If Félicité wanted to do the business part of the expedition she would be the last person to stop her. She stood, proudly erect, to one side and watched the proceedings. It was not the first time that Felicity had done her own marketing. She waited patiently as one after the other the boats came in, carefully examining the fish that they offered her, choosing one here and one there, always the very best. Then the pricing began. Insults were hurled and the men became quieter and quieter. They gave way, but they didn’t like it; they were at a disadvantage and they knew it. They couldn’t hurl any insults back, not to a woman, and certainly not to a European woman.
“Well, we got those cheaply enough!” she exclaimed, flushed with triumph, as they turned away with the fish.
“Too cheaply,” Rosamund said briefly. “Let’s throw in a little extra. They make their living from the fish they bring in, after all.”
Félicité laughed.
“They haven’t much need of money,” she said casually. “What would they spend it on? They don’t need the things we do.”
Rosamund could only hope she was right, though she didn’t believe it for a moment. Truth to tell, she felt rather uncomfortable about the whole affair.
“I hope you like red mullet,” Félicité went on exultantly. “Did you ever see such beauties! And the other ones too! What do you call them in English?”
Rosamund shook her head.
“I haven’t the faintest idea!” she admitted, and they both laughed.
The men had come out into the street when they returned to the hotel. They thronged the pavements, spilling out on to the roadway, filling the cafes and the small Arab shops, soberly discussing the affairs of the nation, or their womenfolk, with occasional bursts of full-blooded laughter that echoed down the whole length of the long street.
Rosamund wove her way in and out of them, smiling at them as they gravely moved over the necessary inches to allow her to pass. It took care and concentration and they went almost the whole way in silence. Indeed it was only when she had swung off the main street and on to the gravel of the hotel drive that she said:
“What was your husband doing in Tunisia?”
“Why do you ask?” she demanded.
Rosamund didn’t really know herself.
“I wondered whether he also had had something to do with the company,” she said meekly.
Félicité laughed shortly.
“No. We came out on a prolonged holiday when we knew that he was ill. When he died I found I was stuck with the lease of the flat we had hired in Tunis for another six months. They’ll be up reasonably soon and then I can go back to France—or whatever else takes my fancy. My husband,” she added briefly, “had one great advantage: he was a very rich man.”
He must have been, Rosamund thought. It cost money to be always as beautifully turned out as Félicité invariably was. She wondered briefly what he had been like and then dismissed the matter from her mind. There was no doubt as to what, or rather whom, had taken the Frenchwoman’s fancy now, and that thought depressed her as it always seemed to nowadays. She could tell herself and tell herself that it was none of her business, but she always came back to the same shar
p dislike for the situation and the same sense of personal deprivation.
She took the truck straight round to the garage and parked it neatly. Muhammed came running out of the kitchens and the two girls gave him the fish with detailed instructions as to how it was to be cooked. Muhammed exclaimed happily over them and promised faithfully that it would be grilled absolutely perfectly. He would supervise the cooking himself; they need have no further fears on the subject at all.
“I hope he’s right!” Félicité said moodily.
Rosamund reassured her with a smile.
“The food here is excellent,” she said, and then broke off, remembering that they didn’t always agree about that either.
Félicité’s pale green eyes mocked her.
“It’s a mistake to be always so easily pleased,” she said on a final, bitter note, and went into the hotel to find the men.
Rosamund took the trouble to change for dinner. It was true, as Félicité had said, that the sun had caught her skin, but she didn’t mind the tan, contrasting as it did with her fair hair. In fact she thought it looked rather fine, and by using rather more eye-shadow and rather less of the power (that was really too pale now for her skin) she thought she had an extra beauty and couldn’t help wondering if Rupert would notice.
Rupert did. She could tell by the slight upward tilt to his brows and the twinkle in his eyes. She took a deep breath and crossed the room taking the seat that one of the young men offered her. It hadn’t been at all her intention to amuse him and she was a little hurt.
Jacob looked up and smiled at her.
“Lovelier than ever, my dear,” he said automatically, and she in her turn was amused. Her stepfather had such gentle ways and he always tried to say the thing that was expected of him. But she knew that his mind was really on other things. He was far too busy calculating how many more trees they would need for the experiment and how many gallons of the waste product they were using.