She looked up into the enigmatic dark face, her smile wry. 'You'll lie anyway, no doubt. After all, what do I know about you? I don't even know your name. I only know you're some sort of kidnapper. You saved my life just then and I'm grateful, but it was you who put me in danger in the first place.'
'My dear Miss Brinton,' he murmured mockingly.
'Don't keep calling me that!'
'What shall I call you?' he asked at once. 'Marie…' He said the name with soft pleasure, dwelling on it in a musical voice which sent shivers down her spine.
'If you wish,' she shrugged with a pretence of indifference. 'What shall I call you?'
He looked into her eyes thoughtfully. 'The Arabs call me Khalid.'
Her curiosity was aroused. 'What do other people call you? Or wouldn't it be polite to ask?'
He grinned. 'The desert Bedouin have a saying… a woman stabs with her tongue or with her eyes… It fits you well, Marie.'
'If I had anything else to stab with I would use it,' she said tauntingly.
He laughed. 'I believe you.' He released her and moved a hand down his white clothes, producing a curved damascene dagger which glittered wickedly in the firelight. Offering it to her gravely, he bowed.
She took the weapon, feeling a helpless rage. He knew she would not use it. It was useless to her out here in the desert. If she did kill him she would never find her own way back to safety; she would die out here of exposure or be captured by nomad Bedouin.
She threw the weapon away, watching the bright arc of light as it fell. 'You know I can't use it. You were quite safe to give it to me.'
'True,' he agreed smoothly. 'Now find it and bring it here to me.'
'Find it yourself!'
He gripped her shoulders with two hard hands, staring down into her uplifted face with compelling eyes. 'Find it.'
Fear leapt up inside her. She knew that stony, commanding face. When he released her she angrily moved away to pick up the dagger and bring it back to him. He took it from her and slid it back into concealment among his clothes.
'Now, sleep,' he said calmly.
Marie lay down, facing the fire, and curled round to sleep again. Gradually her nerves stopped jumping and she felt a deep sleep dragging her down to oblivion. Just on the point of submersion, she became aware of him settling down beside her on the rug. Her eyes warily flicked open and found his face close beside hers, the dark eyes watching her.
'Go to sleep, Marie,' he ordered with dry amusement. 'I have no interest in a forced lovemaking.'
She felt hot colour run into her cheeks. Slowly her eyes closed again, but she lay listening to the regular sound of his breathing, aware of every move he made, every breath he drew. She wondered what it would feel like if… then she jerked herself away from that thought, hating herself for entertaining it for a second. Despite herself, she risked another look at him. He was still watching her as attentively as before.
'What now?' he demanded instantly. 'Are you disappointed that I've made no attack upon your virtue, Miss Brinton? Of course, if you insist…' The dark eyes mocked her. 'I can force myself to make love to you if you cannot sleep until I have…'
'Can't you sleep on the other side of the fire?' she demanded. 'You make me nervous.'
He rose suddenly and began to kick out the fire. She watched him, baffled and alarmed.
Then he turned and jerked her to her feet, pulled back the long golden strands of her hair until her face was exposed to him and bent his head. Marie gasped helplessly as the hard mouth silenced her, parting her lips and filling her with a totally new realisation of her own femininity. The hands holding her were fierce and remorselessly compelled her submission, bending her backward so that her head spun and she was dizzily forced to cling on to him or fall. The kiss deepened, grew hot and demanding. Her closed eyes seemed dazzled by an explosion of brilliant light. She knew she was kissing him back, she felt the hot response of her own senses, but she was too helpless to fight, overwhelmed by new sensations. No man had ever made her feel so weak, so female, so much at the mercy of a superior strength. One part of her was furiously angry, scornful at herself for weakly submitting, the other was almost rapturous, glorying in the way he made her feel.
Suddenly she was free. He moved away. Dizzily she stared after him as he collected up the various objects strewn about the sand. He packed them all away into the saddlebags, then returned and lifted her on to the back of her horse.
'Where are we going now?' she asked despairingly. 'I'm too tired to ride any further.'
'We're going back,' he said tersely, mounting. 'We should be there soon after dawn.' She was incredulous. 'Back?'
'To your hotel,' he said grimly, wheeling his mount away and galloping towards the sandy ridge behind the oasis.
Marie stared after him, disbelief freezing her for a moment, then she followed. When she caught up with him she stared sideways at the enigmatic hawk-like profile.
'Why?' she asked very quietly. 'Why have you changed your mind?' Was it because of their lovemaking just now? she wondered. Had he softened towards her? Or was he sorry for her? Why had he changed his mind?
He didn't answer, riding hard, his gaze fixed on the sky. She rode in silence beside him, hardly conscious of the ache of her back, the weariness in every limb.
'I won't tell anyone about this,' she offered meekly a little while later. 'I won't tell the police anything. I'll say I went out riding alone and got lost.'
He glanced at her briefly then, his face unreadable. 'Perhaps we both got lost,' he said ambiguously.
'What do you mean?' she asked, her face doubtful.
He shrugged. 'It doesn't matter.'
They rode on, across the moonlit sand, and then in the growing greyness of dawn they came in sight of the little seaside resort, with its palm trees and outlying mud-walled houses whitewashed by the sun. They passed into the outskirts, skirted a palm grove and were back outside the little stable. The same Arab boy sat sleeping beside the wall. He got up, rubbing his eyes, held the horses while Khalid lifted her down.
Her legs collapsed beneath her, she sagged against him, so cramped and tired that she could not stand.
He lifted her into his arms again, and she cradled her head against his strong chest with a thankful sigh. For a second or two he looked down into her pale face.
'Allah knows why I am giving away the prize of a lifetime,' he said softly. 'You are as beautiful as the sunrise.'
She flushed, touched by the compliment. 'Thank you.'
He carried her down through the palms to the beach, where the small boat lay beached out of the curling waves. Marie lay sleepily watching him as he rowed along to the other end of the bay, marvelling at his ability to look as if he had just got out of a bed after eight hours' sleep whereas in fact he had been physically working all night, riding across the desert.
When they reached the beach below the modern, palm-fringed hotel, she said quickly, 'Leave me now. I can get into my room without being seen, perhaps, and it would be better if you weren't seen.'
He nodded and watched her clamber out, lifting her skirts clear of the water, then walking slowly up on to the sand.
She glanced back, half reluctant to leave him. He had pulled his headdress down around his dark face, and the dark eyes glinted at her from the shelter of the headdress's shadow.
'If you need money, Khalid, I might be able to help,' she said nervously.
The hard mouth straightened and an angry redness came up into his face. He looked at her furiously. 'Goodbye, Miss Brinton,' he spat bitterly. 'When I first saw you I thought you a typical product of a decadent society; idle, vain and silly. It seems I was right.' His hands moved on the oars and the boat began to pull away. Marie watched, hating herself for having made such a tactless and stupid remark. Then she turned and walked into the hotel.
She met no one as she padded softy along her corridor. She slid into her own room and sank down on the bed. Presumably Mrs Brown
had concluded that she had turned in early because of her headache. There was no sign that anyone had missed her. She guessed that if she had been missed the hotel would be swarming with police.
She took off the loose white garment Khalid had given her and laid it carefully over a chair, then slid out of her white evening gown and went into the shower. The warm water fell on her like desert rain, refreshing and reviving her. She put on a brief, transparent lacy nightgown and dropped into bed.
As sleep overcame her she briefly wondered if the events of the night had been a dream. They faded into sleep, a sleep in which she lay once more beside a desert campfire in Khalid's arms and sank into the delirium of his kiss without a second's hesitation, unshackled by the barriers of class or race, moving to claim him with the freedom and certainty a dream confers upon the human mind.
She did not want to wake up.
CHAPTER TWO
IT was raining as they drove away from Heathrow. Cold, grey spears lashed down around the car with a relentless ferocity which made Marie shiver. After the heat of the Arabian sun England seemed unbearably chilly, a colourless land of leaden skies and mournful landscapes. She thought of the oasis at Wadi Aquida; the flame-lit palm trees and glimmering moon-reflecting water, and a curious pain began to ache around her heart.
'Something wrong?' James Brinton asked gently, looking sidelong at her, one hand touching hers as it rested on her lap.
She smiled at him. 'No, just the weather…'
'Good old English weather,' he grinned. 'It always comes up trumps! Every continental holiday I've ever had I've come back to find weather like this—laid on specially, I suspect.' He was a small man, his silver hair brushed to cover the balding spot at the front of his head, his grey eyes quietly reflective. He had built up his firm from a small affair started by his father between the two world wars to a giant which was spreading across Europe at an alarming rate. Sometimes his harassed expression made his daughter afraid that James Brinton was a man who had lost touch with reality—his firm was growing too fast, beyond the grasp of one mind.
'You look tired, Dad,' she said, her expression anxious as she surveyed him.
'I've just been to see your mother,' he replied grimly, his eyes on the rain-wet windows.
'Oh.' She bit her lip. Her parents had been divorced when she was in her teens. Her beautiful blonde mother had eloped without warning with a South American millionaire, leaving a brief note for her husband. Marie had cried in secret, but in public had affected an indifference which had gradually become second nature to her. From time to time her mother reappeared in London, always looking incredibly young and beautiful, draped in expensive furs and dripping with diamonds, her eyelashes fluttering madly every time an attractive male passed by, bringing armfuls of ludicrously inappropriate presents for Marie. Once it had been a large doll which talked in three languages. Another time it had been a party dress four sizes too small. Her mother persisted in believing that she was still a little girl long after she had grown up. Marie had protested about this to her father, only to see him smile a little sadly and say 'My dear, your mother is terrified of growing old. While she can believe that you're still a little girl, she can believe that she's still young. Once she's forced to admit that you're a young woman she'll age mentally, and that will destroy her.'
She thought of this conversation now, watching her father's face. Did he still love her mother? He seemed to have a sensitive insight into the workings of her mind, anyway, and he had never betrayed any bitterness or hatred towards her in Marie's memory. He always saw his ex-wife when she came to England, but he gave no indication of his feelings normally, and she had no idea how he felt about her.
'She wants to see you tonight,' James Brinton added quietly without looking at her.
Marie grimaced. 'Must I?'
'She's your mother,' her father said gently.
'Whenever she remembers the fact,' Marie said with bitterness and clarity.
'All the same I think you must see her,' said James Brinton with a loving glance. 'Try to be kind to her, Marie.'
Something in his tone made Marie stare at him. 'Why? What do you mean?'
'Her husband is dead,' said James Brinton carefully.
'I see.' Marie remembered the large, perspiring cheerful South American without fondness.
'His sons have inherited everything,' James Brinton added without expression.
She almost laughed. 'Oh, no! So that's why she needs some kindness? She's lost the fortune she expected to inherit!'
'I don't like to hear you talking like that,' her father said at once. 'I want you to be kind to her. She's very upset.'
'Upset? Not because her husband is dead but because she doesn't get the money after all!' Marie said bitterly. 'How long is it since I last saw her? A year! And since then I haven't had a letter, not even a postcard. Did she remember my birthday? Did she send me a Christmas present? You know she didn't. Dad, why on earth should I feel anything for her?'
'I don't know any reason why you should,' he said gravely. 'It's harder for you to forgive her than it is for me, I realise that. A child always feels more strongly about such a desertion. But she's still your mother and she's unhappy, whether you recognise the validity of her reason for being unhappy or not. Marie, you're old enough to know that no human being is perfect. Your mother was never a maternal woman. She was terrified of having babies. She was always terrified of growing old. You were a sort of index by which others could calculate her age. After all, a young woman who has a twenty-year-old daughter can't be thirty-five, can she? She was never a real mother to you, I know, but if you can be adult enough to forget that, she could still be your friend. And she needs a friend at the moment.'
'Oh, Dad! Why are you so saintly?' Marie laughed, close to tears.
'Perhaps because I realise that I should never have married Clare in the first place,' he said. 'I was always older than she was, not just in years but in mind. She wanted parties, dancing, a host of admirers. I was engrossed in the business, building it up and expanding everywhere. I had no time to squire her around every night. So I just ignored the problem and let her do as she pleased. Of course, we drifted apart. When she left me it was only the inevitable outcome of our incompatibility. I felt responsible, in a way. I talked her into marrying me. Clare always had doubts, but I steamrollered her into marriage.'
'You must have loved her very much, Dad.' Marie felt half embarrassed at these revelations.
'I was crazy about her,' he admitted with a little grimace of self-derision. 'I couldn't rest until I'd persuaded her to marry me. Then, of course, I turned back to my work and left her to get on with a life she had never really wanted. She just wasn't cut out to be a dutiful wife and mother. She wanted the glamour of high society, and she got it in the end.'
'And now she's lost it,' Marie said thoughtfully.
'That's why she needs your help,' he said, patting her hand. 'Be a good child. Go to her tonight—have dinner with her at her hotel. Listen to her troubles and try to be sympathetic. Try to see her, not as your runaway mother, but as a complete stranger. If you do, I think you'll find her charming and pathetic, a lost little girl in a hostile world.'
'Dad, you're still… fond of her,' she said in a smothered tone of wonder.
He smiled faintly. 'You sound surprised. Perhaps you're not as grown-up as you think, my dear.'
The car drew up at their block of flats. While the chauffeur struggled with the luggage, Marie and James went up in the lift to their penthouse, talking now about Marie's holiday. James laughed at her confession of boredom.
'I'm afraid you're spoilt. Tired of luxury hotels indeed! What would your reaction have been if you'd arrived to find you were expected to sleep in a filthy little room with dirty sheets and no sanitation? Which is probably how many of your romantic Arabs live in those little mud-walled houses they build.'
'I saw someone building one of them,' she said. 'It was quite fascinating. He
was so deft! He made the bricks out of damp mud, patted, then cut the mud into bricks with the aid of a special little piece of apparatus made out of wood and string. It was so quick and simple. They leave them to dry in the sun which bakes them as hard as iron—a cheap method of building houses.'
'Would you want to live in one, though?' he teased her.
She laughed, recognising the justice of his irony. 'No, I suppose not.'
'I don't suppose you ever even went into one!' he said with amusement.
Marie thought of the little house behind the bazaar, remembering the yellow candlelight which had illumined it for her, and a slight shiver ran down her spine. She did not reply. Her dreams had been haunted since that night. A dark face, eyes that mocked, hands that were hard and yet unbelievably gentle… his image remorselessly filled her mind whenever she let the barriers down. She might have said to her father, 'I did meet an Arab. An Arab called Khalid…' and the words would be threadbare, unable to convey a hundredth of the truth.
She looked around the muted luxury of the sitting-room, with its pale blue carpet, white walls, modern paintings, and deep, comfortable brocade-covered chairs. It was all a thousand miles away from the palm-fringed oasis and the firelight beside which she had experienced the most traumatic moment of her life. The two worlds could never meet. In a strange way, this world was the more unreal of the two.
She was still conscious of a feeling of being isolated, cut off from her old life, as though she had been away for many years instead of a mere fortnight. Everything looked strange.
'Mrs Abbot will look after you,' her father said abstractedly, glancing at his watch. 'I have an urgent meeting at three o'clock, so I must rush. I ordered lunch for you. You didn't eat on the plane, did you?'
'No,' she said. 'It was the usual salad and plastic ham. I suppose you haven't got time to have lunch with me?'
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