After the Dream

by Stan Mason

  But I’m no good at remembering lines, Greg,’ she bleated. ‘You know I lost my memory way back. I can’t make word stick in my mind.’

  ‘Look,’ he told her sternly. ‘You only have to remember them one time You can read the lines during make-up. After you’ve done each scene you can forget the words.’

  She shook her head boldly determined to stick to her guns. ‘No....I can’t do it! I can’t do it!’

  ‘Come on, sweetie!’ he urged, unwilling to lose her from the cast. ‘Stick with it. I’ll get you through!’

  ‘I’ve never acted before,’ she smarted. She was now becoming angry at his unqualified insistence.

  He huffed and puffed at the rejection. ‘Think about it. Sleep on it. That’s all I ask.’

  ‘I’ve thought about it,’ she rebuffed without a tinge of conscience. ‘I’d rather tell you now before you start shooting, than when you were halfway through. You don’t need someone like me putting a spanner in the works.’

  He sat back to think about her words, trying to reconcile the situation in his mind. ‘I knew something like this would happen,’ he moaned bitterly, so I advanced the situation by hiring a substitute in case you didn’t want the part. It seems that I was right.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Greg,, but you kind of thrust it upon me.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it, honey,’ her returned amorously. ‘I thought you’d jump at the chance. You’re a sure thing to become a star with a photogenic face like yours.’

  She accepted the compliment gratefully breathing a sigh of relief that she had relinquished her right to the film role. She was so delighted she felt that she could kiss her dining companion and then thought better in case he misread the signal. No doubt Greg would have believed that she had changed her mind about him. In that case the action was simply a figment of her imagination.

  Three months passed by and Diana saw very little of her American friend. She was surprised at the way he tackled his work. He was a lion in the fight, working from seven o’clock in the morning until ten o’clock each night. Towards the end of the filming, he had lost almost a stone in weight and looked a very worried man. Yet the film was completed on schedule and within the budget but Greg was never satisfied with the final cut. Whether it would make any money at the box office was an unknown quantity. He needed to earn enough to pay for all the purchases made by his current wife before the divorce took place.

  The advantage that lay with Diana was the fact that Greg was missing all the day, every day, and every evening. He was so tired when he came back that romance was non-existent. She had expected him at some time to enter her bedroom in order to make advances towards her but he was too tired to do anything but sleep. The man was a perfectionist in film-making and he had taken on a lot of responsibility borrowing a large amount from banks and investors in order to produce it. And he was the sole producer and director.

  When the filming was over, he came down one morning with the holdall in his grasp and hugged Diana as she emerged from the lounge.

  ‘We’ll honey,’ he said with a sad expression on his face. ‘I reckon we have to part, but you can still change your mind about me at any time. The offer to marry you is still on the table. I mean it. It’s there any time you want.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she returned calmly. ‘It’s been a pleasure having ou here even though I haven’t see much of you.’

  ‘We cab always put that right,’ he advanced as she moved away from him.

  ‘Why don’t you come to LA. You can stay with your sister.’

  ‘I’ll take a rain check on that,’ she laughed. ‘Good luck with your film...and good luck with your divorce.’

  He shook his head slowly. ‘It’s different in the States. We change partners like you change cars. It’s easier to do that than be fettered with the wrong partner. All you have to do is go to Reno. It’s over in one day.’

  She took him to the front door, waving to him as he climbed into a taxi. There was one thing to say about Greg....he was an interesting eccentric person to say the least. She closed the door shutting her eyes as she thought of the horror of being married to him. It was too terrifying to contemplate. Far too terrifying!

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Although she was unaware of it, Diana’s journeys to Agadir were coming to an end. This would be the last one to see the scientist. Over the years, he had always been there for her, supplying tablets and giving advice. On this occasion, she sauntered into his office, her eyes opening widely as she saw Hamid Arran sitting in the chair with his feet up on the desk. As in the past, he was reading a comic book.

  ‘Where’s Dr. Mahmoud?’ she cried worriedly.

  The man’s face turned sour and he removed his legs from the top of the desk slowly indicating from his expression that she was going to hear some bad news.

  ‘It’s not good,’ he told her, trying to ease the pain of what he was about to tell her.

  ‘What do you mean? What’s happened to him?’ Alarm bells began to ring in her head. Arran’s attitude was completely different to the last time she came to see the scientist. Last time he was in North Borneo...this time it was clearly more serious.

  ‘He’s dead!’ muttered the man sombrely. ‘We received a panther to be used for experimentation. He injected it with a new serum and it turned vicious. It savaged him severing his jugular vein and he died within seconds.

  Diana put her hand to her mouth in anguish. ‘Oh, my God!’ she uttered almost in a whisper.

  ‘I’ve been working with him for four years. Now I’m in charge,’ boasted Arran, putting the comic book down on the desk.

  ‘You trained under Dr. Mahmoud?’ she returned in disbelief.

  ‘He taught me all I know,’ confided the man. ‘I’m quite capable you know.’ He saw her eyes drift to the comic book on the desk. ‘I do read medical books!’

  ‘What do you know about Beotag and ferradil-x?’

  ‘All there is to know,’ he rebounded. ‘They help one to retain their looks and physique and extends their lives. We’ve been working on animals here.’

  ‘He thought he was immortal,’ mused Diana sadly. ‘He was a great scientist who cured many people. What happens about the tablets in the future?’

  ‘I’ve been making them for him for the last four year. I’m a qualified pharmacist. You need not concern yourself. We have the plants here.’

  ‘He was going to write a paper on the experiment and send it to all the major medical authorities in the world.,’ she went on heartbroken. ‘I don’t suppose he had the chance to do it.’

  ‘He started but only got about a quarter of the way through. I’m no capable of carrying it on so the secret of the experiment rests between me and you.’

  Diana sat down heavily in a chair trying to make sense of it all. ‘Okay, Mr. Arran,’ she ventured. ‘You say you make ferradil-x tablets?’

  ‘Yes I do,’ he replied naively not expecting the request from the woman.

  ‘I want you to make twenty years of supply for me. Do you hear? Twenty years at four tablets a day. You can work it out.’’ Her attitude was completely commanding.

  He stared at her coldly starting to work out the figures in his mind. ‘That’s an awful lot of tablets,’ he said eventually. ‘I’m not certain whether ferradil-x tablets have a sell-by date. Whew! That’s a lot of tablets to produce.’

  ‘Dr. Mahmoud told me that he already had ten years supply. All you need to do is to double that. I’ll give you two months to make them,’ she told him like a Commander talking to one of his subordinates. ‘I’ll pay you for them. Is that a deal?’

  ‘How much will you pay for them?’

  ‘How much do you want?’

  ‘Let’s say ten thousand pounds and no haggling.’

  ‘Done...it’s a deal. Two months!’

&
nbsp; ‘The impossible can be done instantly,’ he responded delighted at the thought of making so much money. ‘Miracles take a little longer.’

  ‘Two months!’ she repeated adamantly. ‘I want them packaged and sent to my home in England. As soon as they’re received I’ll arrange for an immediate bank transfer to your account in Agadir. Is that understood?’ She took a calling card from her handbag and gave it to him. ‘Don’t lose it or I’ll come looking for you and you’ll be in a heap of trouble. Just don’t let me down!’

  He took the card, staring at her like a schoolboy who had been caught stealing and nodded. ‘Two months,’ he repeated. ‘I really see no difficulty.’

  Diana left the office extremely unsettled in mind. What a thing to happen? Killed by a panther. Poor Dr. Mahmoud. She had like him so much and he was always so helpful. They had built up a kind of business relationship and he was a friend to her. In her mind she envisage him staring at her stroking his goatee beard.....he always did that, it was a habit. He thought he would live for eternity and it had ended so tragically....so quickly. Destiny certainly had other ideas sending death to him so sharply. She had no doubt that Arran would comply with the order supplying her with enough tablets to last her twenty years. She would be almost eighty years old by then. There ws another matter that disturbed her.....Dr. Valerie Martin! What could she say to her except to explain that the experiment had ended with the death of Dr. Mahmoud? The physician would be desolate at not having the opportunity to become involved. Unfortunately, due to the events that had taken place the doctor would be left wanting.

  Diana took a taxi to Ahmed’s office and he greeted her warmly, kissing the fingers of her hand gently. She realised that she was falling in love with the man slowly and she looked for more than a simple kiss on the hand from him. There was a world of romance waiting for her in the near future.

  ‘I’m glad you lost the moustache, she began easily.

  ‘It disappeared overnight.’

  ‘How are things, Ahmed?’

  ‘It’s all happening,’ he informed her excitedly. ‘My partner’s willing to buy me out. He‘s getting a loan from the bank and I’ve arranged for the papers to be signed on completion.’

  ‘And your family?

  ‘They’re already with my uncle. I shall make arrangement for them to have sufficient money to keep them going but they are now searching for employment. The problem is the dowry to be paid when my sister gets married.’

  ‘I thought it was the men who paid the dowry,’ she said slowly.

  ‘Not in this country,’ he went on unhappily. ‘The father of the bride is expected to pay.’

  ‘How much is a dowry going to cost?

  ‘A lesser price for a pretty woman...a much higher price for an ugly one. My sister’s in between. She takes after my father.’

  ‘I could pay it,’ Diana told him willingly.

  ‘I’m not sure I can accept that from you,’ he told her.

  ‘I could give it to you and you could pretend that it was yours.’ she suggested.

  ‘The wedding won’t be for some time so we can deal with the matter when it happens.’ He paused to stare directly into her eyes. ‘I do love you,’ he went on, moving into an amorous mode. ‘Your eyes are so beautiful. I can’t wait to marry you.’

  She bridled at the comment. ‘Marry you!’ she spat. ‘Did I ever say I’d marry you? If I did I must have been out of my mind.

  He ignored the fact that she objected so fiercely. He thought that it was a done deal. He would go and live in England with her, Suddenly she had changed her mind. ‘Well it doesn’t really matter,‘ he uttered after a short hesitation. ‘We don’t have to actually get married. I mean what’s a piece of paper between two people who love each other?’

  ‘We’ve already been through all this,’ she reproached. ‘Marriage would cause us all kinds of problems. In a church...in a mosque....in a Registry Office! I really don’t think that’s a good idea! What I would dearly love to do is to stand in front of a tend at the edge of the Sahara Desert staring at the sunset....just you and me. You carry me into the tent and we make mad passionate love together. That’s my dream and that’s what I really want. After that you can come and live with me in England.’ ‘But how can I stay in England without the statutory immigration papers?’

  ‘We’ll have to work through that one,’ she told him carelessly.

  ‘It’s going to take a lot of thinking if you won’t marry me.’

  ‘Kiss me...properly,’ she said, waiting for him to come around the desk, taking her hands and kissing her on the lips.

  She responded warmly returning the affection. It was the first time she had done so other than in her dream. She suddenly realised that she was falling in love with the man. The chemistry between them was coming together very fast.

  A short while later, she left to catch the aircraft, sitting quietly in her seat after she had boarded.. She mused over the conversation with Ahmed. Marriage! What was she thinking of? Although she had started for feel differently about him it was the furthest thing from her mind. Living a life in illicit sin was far more to her liking. They were both free agents so it didn’t harm anyone else. In that way, if either of them tired of each other, the could go their own separate ways. She realised that if she was true to herself, she wanted him only for romance and love...the touch of his body...the erotic feelings of sensuality. At that moment in time, anything else was beyond the pale!

  * * *

  From then on, her dreams became nebulous....more mystifying and difficult to determine. Ahmed appeared in all of them bu they were never the same as the highly sexual dream she loved to experience so much. One night she found herself riding on a horse in a carousel which revolved round and round in a circular motion. She could see Ahmed riding a pony on the opposite side and was desperate to reach him. Yet despite her best efforts she failed to get any nearer. He remained on the other side of the carousel laughing at her. After a while, she ignored the danger and alighted, trying to get to him by walking across but, however hard she tried, the carousel kept spinning at a faster rate and she was unable to keep up with it. A week later, in another dream, she found herself with Greg in a large ballroom with many other dancers. She could see Ahmed dancing with another woman but try as she could she was unable to get near him. She could hear him shouting to Greg but the American took no notice of him, taking her in the opposite direction. She began to shout back at him and suddenly sat up in bed with her eyes wide open realising that she was screaming at the top of her voice. Such dreams were, in effect, mini nightmares and she had no idea why they kept forming in her sleep. Was she, in some strange way, resisting the love of Ahmed? She had been so uncertain of her feelings towards him for so long and now the tide had turned. Perhaps it was a bridge too far. She though about Mohammed, the interpreter of dreams, introduce to her by Ahmed, No doubt he would have definite views on what was going on in her mind.

  Two months later, almost to the day, a huge package was delivered to her home. It contained numerous canisters of ferradil-x tablets that Hamid Arran had promised to send. She wondered how hard he had worked to achieve such a massive production....most probably day and night for the whole two months. Nonetheless he had worked the oracle and she had twenty years supply to hand. She shuddered to think that he had probably drained all the exotic plants to fulfil the task. She went directly to her bank to send him the money she had promised him for the tablets. It was necessary to keep in touch with Arran as she was paying for heating the room which housed the plants. The jury was still out on him. He had told her that he was a qualified pharmacist but that was a far cry from being a brilliant scientist. He was a man who read comic books and he certainly didn’t have the dedication of Dr. Mahmoud. Her mind went back to the time she had been told about the hamster living until it was twelve years old. Four hundred and fifty years i
t had lived in terms of man-years. How would she fare if she lived that long? Her mind flashed back a hundred-and-fifty years to the Victorian age. There had been no motor cars, no planes, no television or proper telephones, no computers, let alone all the electronic equipment currently available and modern kitchen appliances.....nothing, only railways and steamships. How far would the world progress in, say, three hundred years time? Shrugging her shoulders to help rid of such thoughts, she went to the utility room to store the tablets in a cool dry place.

  After pouring herself a dry martini, she went to the conservatory at the back of the house taking with her the letters which the postman had delivered that morning. There was a small packet from the United States which she opened quickly and her face broke into a smile as she removed a video disc from it bubble-covered wrapping. She read the letter that accompanied it from the ever-amorous Greg..

  Hi, Di,

  You gorgeous dame whom I can’t get out of my mind.

  I enclose a copy of the remake I made of I Remember

  Mama which we shot at Pinewood. . Hope you like it.

  You would have been great in the part I offered you.

  I got divorced in Reno. I’m single now but I’ve met

  this brunette who I think I’ll marry. I still want to be

  with you for ever so what I’m saying is, give me a call

  to say you’re mine and we can get married right away.

  I love you dearly, you good-looking woman. Come to

  Greg now! My arms are dying to hold you. Godammit!

  Pick up the phone and call me!

  All my love and kisses......Greg.

  He was an Incorrigible character....a love-lorn fool. So he had got divorced and was about to marry again. Why was he so obsessed with women? He would have been a real catch for a psychiatrist who would reach back in his mind to his childhood to find the answer. She played the video highly delighted that she hadn’t taken the part. It was far too major...far too large. The actress playing the role did so with finesse and sensitivity, far beyond the capabilities of a lady of leisure. Taking a major part in a film required a special talent....a degree of confidence and professionalism after a great deal of training as well as an aptitude for learning dialogue. Diana was forced to admit to herself that such technicalities were far beyond her.