The Long Road to Baghdad (2011) Page 7

  ‘This is John’s wedding you’ll be missing,’ Harry said. ‘He won’t be having another one.’

  ‘I sincerely hope not,’ John commented.

  ‘I grant you this place looks bloody awful,’ Harry coaxed, refusing to be placated by John’s good humour, ‘but it’s not that bad, and you’ll have me as your guide. Come on, Charles, the fleshpots of London can wait; we’ll sail home together. Get drunk every night on the boat.’

  Charles made a great show of settling his helmet on his head. He wanted to tell Harry the real reason that lay behind his flight, but not in an open carriage travelling through a public street.

  ‘Six months’ home leave will soon fly, Harry,’ John defended Charles.

  ‘You’re only talking about a week …’

  ‘If there’s trouble in the Med, who knows how long we could be stuck here,’ John pointed out. ‘I always hoped one of you would be around to be my best man when the time came but it’s a lot to ask either of you right now. So, if you want to sail with Charles, I’ll understand. I’m sure to find someone here who’ll be prepared to fill in.’

  ‘What do you say, Harry?’ Charles demanded. ‘England on the Egra with me, or best man here?’

  ‘I’m staying.’

  ‘But you could lose a lot more than a week’s leave.’ Charles suddenly realised he faced a long, lonely voyage home.

  ‘Oh what the hell, I may as well tell you. I’m thinking of resigning my commission. The army and me – well, we aren’t exactly cut out for one another.’

  ‘Have you discussed this with your CO?’ John asked.

  ‘Perry? Not bloody likely.’

  ‘Is this one of your spur of the moment things, Harry?’

  ‘It’s been at the back of my mind for a while. But seeing you two made me realise I haven’t been too happy here.’

  ‘I’m not surprised,’ Charles observed.

  ‘Harry, you’re 25, hardly a young man on the threshold of life,’ John reminded. ‘What will you do with yourself?’

  ‘Go into Father’s bank. He’s always wanted me there.’

  ‘But you hated the idea.’

  ‘The army changed my mind.’

  ‘Harry.’ John adopted the paternalistic approach he’d developed to deal with recalcitrant patients. ‘Are you sure you’re doing the right thing?’

  ‘No. But whatever else, you can’t accuse me of not trying to find my niche. A year in medical school. Two in Sandhurst. India. Here.’

  ‘And, if you and the bank don’t work out –’ John ventured.

  ‘I’ll dig a canal somewhere, or breed chickens on one of my father’s farms. Write poetry; sing comic songs in the music halls. I’ll think of something. I always have.’

  ‘That’s your problem, Harry,’ Charles interposed. ‘You think of everything, but stick at nothing. You can’t carry on drifting, doing whatever the mood dictates.’

  ‘That’s a bit strong, Charles,’ John admonished him.

  ‘Look at it this way.’ Harry exhaled a thin stream of smoke. Despite the movement of the carriage, the grey fug hovered in the air between them. ‘You two were lucky. You hit on the right thing straight away. You couldn’t have possibly been anything other than a doctor, John – and you, Charles, just look at that uniform. I couldn’t get mine to look like that if I had a battalion of bearers pressing and polishing in my quarters.’

  ‘I agree, you would have made a poor doctor,’ John concurred. ‘But a bank clerk, sitting in an office all day, simply isn’t you.’

  ‘We won’t know whether it’s me or not until I try. But that’s enough about me. Tell me about Maud and yourself. Where did you meet?’

  Knowing better than to try to get any sense out of Harry when he was in one of his evasive moods, John looked to Charles for support. When Charles turned aside, he answered Harry’s question. There wasn’t anything else he could do.

  Basra , Friday 3rd July 1914

  Reed shutters had been pulled over the unglazed, stone lattice windows, dulling the glare of the mid-afternoon sun to sepia shadows that were kind to the faded hangings and simple furnishings. Harry and Furja lay side by side, naked beneath the gauze mosquito net that tented their couch, but neither slept. The only movement was that of Harry’s right arm as he lifted a cigarette to his mouth. He smoked mechanically, without enjoyment, while mulling over his conversation with John and Charles.

  ‘You are worrying of something, my husband.’

  ‘Thinking, not worrying.’ He rolled from his back on to his stomach. Keeping his cigarette clenched between his teeth, he pushed his palms against the roughcast wall at the head of the bed, tightening the aching muscles in his shoulders.

  Furja watched him for a moment before rolling beside him. They lay there in silence, broiling in the oppressive heat.

  ‘What is it that you are thinking of?’

  ‘My leave.’

  ‘It is time for you to go back to your country.’ She ran her fingers from the base of his spine, finally burying them in the thick curls at the nape of his neck.

  ‘I’m not going back to England.’ Reaching down the side of the bed, he extinguished his cigarette on a clay tablet. ‘Not immediately, and possibly not for some time.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’ Furja moved closer, wrapping her arms and legs around his body. ‘You said after our wedding that you’d be leaving soon.’

  He pulled away from her and rummaged in the folds of the abba he’d flung to the floor when he’d undressed. Extracting his cigarette case, he rolled on his side and stared at her. Long, slim, olive-brown body; thick black hair streaming over the tarnished gold silk of the pillows. Rounded, and considering the rest of her, surprisingly full breasts, crowned with coffee-coloured nipples. The inward curve of her stomach leading to the henna-dyed triangle between her thighs. And her eyes: enormous, liquid pools, watching him, accepting his admiration without any false modesty, or puritanical shame. So beautiful, and his – for the moment.

  He kissed her lips. She responded, pushing her knee between his legs and stroking his back with quick, sensuous movements.

  He wanted to tell her he was staying because of her. It was the truth, but the knowledge that she loved a tall Sherif with a black moustache, not him, silenced him. She’d married him because her father had forced her to; it was simply his bad luck that he’d grown fond of her.

  ‘You don’t mind if I stay on for a while?’ Releasing her, he opened his cigarette case.

  ‘No, I don’t mind. Do you want me to return to my father, or remain here?’

  He dropped the cigarette he’d extracted. ‘Don’t you want to stay with me?’ His mouth was dry at the thought of her disappearing from his life, possibly for ever.

  ‘You are my husband. It is for you to tell me what I must do. I thought our marriage would have ended by now. My father …’

  ‘To hell with your father. Do you want it to be over?’

  ‘You will never, never, say that again!’ Her temper flared. ‘My father …’

  Catching her hands, he pinned her to the bed. ‘Your father was only interested in his precious guns. He didn’t give a damn about you. I was the idiot who supplied them. You the price he paid. The price I had to take, whether I wanted it, or not.’

  ‘You gave my father the guns to guard your beloved pipeline. He paid the debt with my body because that was all he had to give. You’ve used it. If you no longer want it, divorce me and the affair will be forgotten except for the men of my tribe who will die wielding your guns, guarding your property. But their deaths won’t matter to you, will they, Harry? What’s one more dead Arab to a Ferenghi?’

  ‘They matter to me. You matter. Damn it all, woman, I’m asking you to stay with me. I want to spend my leave with you. But you won’t tell me what you feel. What you think. To hell with it, Furja, what do you want from me?’

  ‘Nothing. I married you because I had no choice. Now I am your wife, I am yours to do with as you wish. You own m
e, so it is for you to make the decisions. For both of us.’ She stared at him, wide-eyed, defiant.

  He looked into her face, searching for something. When he didn’t find it, he released her. Retrieving his cigarette, he lit it, lay on his back, and studied the pattern of stick shadows the shades were making on the ceiling, while waiting for the fury she’d kindled in him to cool.

  She’d reinforced Charles’s observations. He had never made a conscious decision in his life. He’d drifted, consistently taking the easiest, most attractive options as they presented themselves. If anything threatened his comfort, he simply ignored it. He’d refused to heed the warnings John and his tutors had given him in medical college because knuckling down to work would have interfered with his social life. As a result, he’d been asked to leave at the end of the first year. He couldn’t even be proud of passing out of Sandhurst. He’d succeeded only because he was his father’s son and General Reid’s godson. And, after Sandhurst, he hadn’t worked. Not like Charles. The polo- and mess-centred life at Regimental Headquarters had swallowed him whole, barely allowing him time to make the odd sortie into native low life. He’d listened politely enough to the high-minded lectures the senior officers had given on work, duty, and setting an example to the men, but he’d gone his own sweet way once the pep talks were finished.

  And it had been a sweet way until the Christina incident had broken the delightful, thoughtless thread of his social life (he’d had no life other than social in India). Even after he’d been exiled to Basra he’d disregarded Perry’s advice to seek career redemption through hard work. Instead, he’d flung himself wholeheartedly, and profitably, into gambling with the natives in the bazaars. He’d done nothing worthwhile, nothing he could be proud of. And now where was he going – back to England as he’d told Charles and John? To a boring office in a bank he didn’t give a damn for and a claustrophobic, tightly governed social life, which meant an endless, tedious circle of balls and house parties. And all the while, he would be searching for a soulmate – a more sympathetic, less frigid version of Lucy, or another Christina who slept with any and every man who winked at her. Was that really what he wanted, when he had Furja?

  He felt her fingers massaging his thighs. Her hand crept upwards, slipping between his legs, cupping his testicles. Moving quickly, he caught it.

  ‘You are tired?’ she enquired innocently.

  ‘No, you little devil, I’m not tired. I want a straight answer from you. Do you want me to stay, here, in this house, married to you?’

  She looked at him without answering.

  ‘Well?’ he demanded hotly.

  ‘You have to learn, Harry, the Bedawi have more ways of answering a question than with words.’ Closing her mouth over his she kissed him, deeply, thoroughly, her tongue probing between his lips, her hands fluttering confidently, assuredly over his skin. He plunged headlong into the private world of eroticism she’d created, and could now conjure at will. Thoughts, problems, worries, slid – so much superfluous baggage – from his mind.

  Later – he’d sort out his future later. When the present didn’t demand all of his attention.

  American Mission, Basra, Friday 3rd July 1914

  Angela Wallace had no illusions about her looks. She deplored her lack of height (she was barely four foot ten), her figure tended to a plumpness she only managed to keep in check by abstaining from the cake and biscuits she adored, and her features, although regular, were undeniably plain. She lifted the candle and peered in the mirror, hoping to see more. But the same oval face, brown eyes, medium-sized nose, medium-sized mouth, and fair skin spattered with a dash of freckles stared back at her as they’d done that morning. Only her hair had any pretensions to beauty, and she spent a wicked amount of time styling it into the fashionable coiffures she copied from the illustrated magazines Mrs Butler’s sister sent out every month from New York.

  Dressed in her underclothes and a coarse linen wrap that covered her from throat to ankle, she sat at the dressing table in the cramped box room that served as her bedroom and pinned one shimmering chestnut wave after another on to the crown of her head.

  Lieutenant Smythe had called that morning. She’d glimpsed his uniformed figure from the window of the classroom where she taught the native Christian, Jewish, and Persian children who attended the mission school. Tonight she would see, talk to, and, she hoped, dance with Peter Smythe. She spent far more time thinking about him than she should. The sketches she used to illustrate her drawing class bore more than a passing resemblance to his lean, raw-boned figure. Whenever she drew a face, his high forehead, wide eyes, and full mouth smiled up at her from her pad.

  She glanced at the invitation he’d brought. It was a pity she had nothing grander to wear than her white cotton afternoon dress. She suppressed an unchristian pang of envy for Maud Perry’s wardrobe. She should count her blessings, not covet Maud’s good fortune. She’d had loving parents and an idyllic childhood in the small town of Fairfield in Connecticut. There’d never been much money, but somehow that hadn’t mattered. Her father’s parish had encompassed a scattered but tightly knit farming community and although silk dresses and mahogany furniture had been in short supply, food, books, and necessities had not. She hadn’t seen real poverty until she was 15, when her father had left Connecticut to found a Presbyterian mission in Kuwait.

  The only tears she’d shed on leaving America had been for her brother, Theo, who’d stayed to finish his medical studies at Harvard. For two years, she’d worked alongside her parents. They’d set up a school and a children’s clinic; all had progressed well until an outbreak of cholera had decimated the mission. The natives who worked for them succumbed first, then, three months before her 17th birthday, her parents died within 24 hours of one another.

  Sick, tired, alone for the first time in her life, she’d wanted to die with them. Not even knowing how to withdraw money from her father’s slender bank account, she had thrown herself on the mercy of a bachelor German merchant in the town. He’d telegraphed Theodore in America, the Reverend Butler in Basra, and, mindful of her reputation, found her a room in the house of one his married subordinates.

  The Reverend Butler reached her first. He closed the mission, withdrew the money from her father’s account, packed her few belongings, and bundled her on to a ship bound for Basra where Mrs Butler had welcomed her into their home as if she’d been their own child. They’d offered her a teaching post and when Theo arrived, six months later, persuaded Doctor Picard to take him on as his assistant in the LansingMemorialHospital, which the Church also financed.

  She and Theo missed their parents, but they had one another, and although they might wish the bank account the Reverend Butler had opened for them were larger, they were content. Theo was a good doctor. In a year or two, when they both had more experience and enough savings to finance the setting up of a practice for Theo, they intended to return to America and pick up the threads of their life in Connecticut.

  She jabbed a hairpin into the palm of her hand. Usually she liked daydreaming about Connecticut, its green, sunlit summers and crisp, snow-filled winters, but with the invitation lying next to her elbow all she could think of was Lieutenant Smythe. If she returned to America, she would never see him again …

  ‘Angela, can I come in?’

  ‘Of course, Theo.’ She faced her brother with her mouth full of hairgrips.

  ‘Mrs Butler helped me to pick this out for your birthday. I know it’s not for ten days, but the chances are we won’t be invited to another party for months, so I thought you’d like to wear it tonight.’ He opened a large, flat box and pulled out an ostrich feather fan and a green silk gown, beaded at the hem and bodice.

  ‘Oh, Theo!’ She released the wave she’d been securing, and pulled the grips from her mouth. Her hair cascaded halfway down her back as she rushed across the room to hug him. ‘It’s the most beautiful dress I’ve ever seen. You shouldn’t have. It must have cost a fortune.’

 
‘It didn’t.’ He flicked his dark hair out of his eyes. ‘Mrs Butler bought the silk at the bazaar and asked the Jewish tailor to copy that brown dress of hers you’ve always admired.’

  ‘But the size …’

  ‘We stole one of your work dresses from the laundry.’

  Holding up the dress, she pranced before the mirror, dancing backwards and forwards, trying to view as much of herself as possible in such a small glass. She saw him laughing at her, stopped dancing, and kissed his cheek.

  ‘You’d better get dressed, or we’ll be late.’

  She laid the dress gently on the bed and retrieved her hairpins.

  He hovered in the doorway. ‘Sis, about tonight. I know how you feel about Peter Smythe – don’t look at me like that.’ He parried her mute glare of reproach. ‘Everyone’s noticed how you blush and stammer whenever he’s around.’

  ‘I don’t …’

  ‘Sis, I like him.’

  ‘But?’ she demanded defensively.

  ‘There’s no future for you with him. You do know that?’

  ‘If it’s money you’re worried about, Theo, he knows I have none.’

  ‘Peter Smythe has talked to you about money?’

  ‘No, but we talk about books. He loves art, particularly the Italian masters, and we have the same taste in poetry. Peter admires the English Romantics, Shelley and Keats and –’ She fell silent, realising she’d said too much.

  ‘Reverend Butler told me that Peter has no private means either, sis, and before you say anything, we weren’t talking behind your back. We’re concerned for you.’

  ‘I don’t mind how long it takes. If he asks …’

  ‘He won’t, sis. He’s a British officer, and like marries like. When the time comes he’ll marry the daughter or sister of a fellow officer.’