Curse of the Kings (29 page)

First from Dorcas and Alison. How I loved their letters! They usually took weeks to write them and there was a little added each day so that it read like a diary. I could imagine the etter to Judithlying on the desk in the sitting room and whenever anything worth recording happened either Dorcas or Alison would take up her pen.

Such weather. There going to be a good harvest this year. Wee all hoping the rain keeps off. Jack Polgrey is hiring men from as far afield as Devon for he anticipates a bumper crop.

The apples are going well and so are the pears. It to be hoped the wasps don get at the plums. You know full well what they are!

Sabina looks very well. She in and out a good deal and Dorcas is helping her make the layettehough it months off yet. My word, I never saw such a cobble. And her knitting. Dorcas unravels what she does every day and then sets it right and I say why not let Dorcas do the whole thing except that Sabina likes to feel she preparing for the baby.

Dorcas wrote:

It seems so long since we saw you. Do you know this is the first time in our lives that wee been separated like this. Wee wondering when youe coming home. We do miss you.

Old Mr. Pegger died last week. A happy release for Mrs. Pegger, I think. He has been a hard husband and father although we mustn speak ill of the dead. They had a fine funeral and Matthew the new sexton. He dug his own father grave and some think that not right. They should have got someone else to do it.

Oliver is thinking of getting a curate. There so much work, and of course in Father day he had Oliver. He never seems to stop and it a pleasure to see him holding the parish together.

And so on; the harvest had come in and was up to expectation. Jack Polgrey, who was an extravagant man compared with his cheeseparing father, had given a harvest dance afterwards and there had been fiddlers in the big barn. They had made corn dollies to hang in the kitchen and keep till next year to ensure as good a harvest.

The letter brought it all back clearly to me and I felt the desire to be there sweeping over me. After all it was home, and I felt so far away.

There was a letter from Sabinane of her inconsequential scrawls, mostly about the help the aunts were giving her and how she was looking forward to the baby and wasn it odd that Theodosia should be in the same condition not odd really but natural and what about me? Surely I wasn going to be left out. I was to tell her as soon as I was sure because the aunts were very wistful and wished I would come home and be pregnant and give them a chance of having a new baby in the family for although they were angels and treated her as though she was their niece there would never be anyone who could take the place of their Judith.

I was reading this when there was a knock on the door. Tabitha came in. She was holding a letter in her hand.

She looked at me as though she were scarcely aware of me.

ybalt she began.

e at the dig, of course.

thought perhaps

s anything wrong, Tabitha?

She did not answer.

I jumped up and went to her. I noticed that her hands were trembling.

s it bad news?

ad I don know whether one would call it that. Good perhaps.

o you want to talk?

was hoping Tybalt

ou could go down to the site if it all that important.

She looked at me. udith,she said, t has happened at last.

hat has happened?

e dead.

ho? Oh, is it your husband? Come and sit down. Youe had a shock.

I led her to a chair.

She said: his is a letter from the home where they kept him. He was very ill before we came here. You remember I went to see him. Now he dead.

suppose,I said, t what they call happy release.

e could never have recovered. Oh, Judith, you don know what this means. At last I free.

I said gently: can understand it. Let me get you something. Perhaps a little brandy?

o, thank you.

hen Il send for some mint tea.

She did not answer and I rang the bell.

Mustapha appeared. I asked him to bring the tea, and in a very short time it came. We sat there sipping the refreshing beverage and she told me of the long and weary years when she had been a wife and no wife. t is more than ten years ago that he had to be put away, Judith,she said. nd now Her beautiful eyes were luminous. ow,she added, free.

She was longing to talk to Tybalt. He was the one whom she wanted to tell. There was no opportunity for that when they came in, for Tybalt and the others had stayed late at the site and dinner was ready when they arrived, and immediately the meal was over Tybalt wanted to go back to the site. I watched Tabitha. She wanted to break the news to him when they were alone.

She was waiting for him when he came home that night.

It was past midnight. I watched him come in but he did not come up to our room at once. I guessed Tabitha had waylaid him.

I waited. An hour passed and still he did not come.

I asked myself why it should take so long for her to tell him what had happened. Insidious little thoughts like niggling wormsnd as obnoxiousrept in and out of my mind. I kept thinking of Nanny Tester ominous words. She had been rambling in her mind but they had come back together on that occasion. I remembered seeing them at the piano. They had looked like lovers then, I had thought. No, that was my imagination. If Tybalt had been in love with Tabitha why had he married me? Because Tabitha was not free?

And now she was free.

The letter from the aunts had brought them back vividly to my mind. I seemed to see Alison standing there: ou speak without thinking, Judith. That way a lot of harm can be done. When youe going to burst out with something, it a good idea to stop and count ten.

I could count ten now but that would not help. I had to watch my tongue. I must not say anything I would regret. I wondered how Tybalt would react to a jealous wife.

Why should he be with her so long? Were they celebrating her freedom?

A wild rage rose within me. He had married me because he had known that I was Sir Ralph daughter. Had he? How could he have known? He had married me because he knew that I would inherit money. Had he known? He had married me because Tabitha was not free. That he knew.

I had proved nothing, yet why were these thoughts in my mind? Because his proposal had been so sudden? Because I had always known that there was some special relationship between him and Tabitha? Because he was dedicated to his profession and this expedition in particular, and he had needed money to finance it?

I loved Tybalt absolutely. My life had no meaning without him. I was unsure of him; I suspected he loved another woman who until now had been tied by a cruel marriage. And now she was free.

There was a step outside the door. Tybalt was coming in. I closed my eyes because I could not trust myself to speak. I was afraid that I might give voice to all the suspicions which crowded into my mind. I was afraid that if I confronted him with my doubts and fears I might find them confirmed.

I lay still, feigning sleep.

He sat down in a chair and remained deep in thought. I knew he was thinking: Tabitha is free.

It must have been an hour that he sat there. And I still pretended to be asleep.

Why does everything seem different with the rising of the sun? Here it was a white blazing light in the sky which one could not look at. At home it was benign and if it could not be relied on to show itself every day it was all the more appreciated when it did. But it only had to appear, and fears which had seemed overpowering by night began to evaporate.

How foolish I was! Tybalt loved me. He had made that clear. But at the same time it was possible for him to have affection for others and this he undoubtedly had for Tabitha. She had been a member of his household before I had, a friend of the family, so naturally her affairs would be of deep concern to him. Nanny Tester was feebleminded. That was obvious. She had taken an unreasoning dislike to Tabitha, and I had built up these suspicions on that.

I could see it all clearly in daylight.

I laughed at myself. I was as bad as Theodosia.

I began to realize that I had felt uneasy ever since the Feast of the Nile. If I could see Yasmin and talk to her as we used to I would feel differently. I did not like mystery.

Theodosia was not feeling well and Tabitha offered to walk with me into the souk.

Naturally we talked about her news.

t seems wrong to feel this relief, but I can help it,she said. t was no life for him in any case, Judith. He was unaware of who he was for the greater part of the time.

don think you should blame yourself for being relieved,I assured her.

ne does nevertheless. One wonders if there was anything one could have done.

hat could you have done?

don know. But I was only happy when I could forget his existence, and that seems wrong.

I glanced at her. But she did look differentoungerand there was a shine about her beauty which made it more obvious.

We passed the shop where Yasmin used to sit. The old man was in her place. He looked up and saw me. I knew that he was about to murmur the usual llah be with you!but he changed his mind. He appeared to be intent on his work.

We went on. As we passed the soothsayer he spoke to us.

Tabitha sat down on the mat beside him.

great burden has been lifted,he said. ou are happy as not for a long time.

He looked up at me and touched the mat on the other side of him.

ou are loved,he said to Tabitha. ou should go away, far away to the land of the rain. You should go, and live in great joy, for you are loved and the burden has dropped from your shoulders.

Tabitha color had deepened.

I thought: He means Tybalt. Tybalt loves her and she loves Tybalt and she is free though he is no longer so.

Why didn they wait a while? He should not have hurried into marriage for the sake of

The soothsayer eyes were on me. o back, lady,he said, he bat hovers over you. He hovers like the great hawk, lady. He is there waiting.

hank you,I said. y future is always the same. One of these days I hope I shall have a batless one.

He did not understand; and we put our money in the bowl and walked away.

f course,said Tabitha, e is just the same as the gypsies at home. They give the fortune they think will make the most impression.

ell, I am no longer impressed by these premonitions of gloom. And they quite upset Theodosia.

hese people have a different outlook from us, you know. They rather like the fatalistic approach. They like to visualize danger which is avoided by wisdom. That is what he is giving you.

t most inhospitable. He always telling me to go home. I do wonder why when I have been quite a good customer. He miss that, wouldn he, if I took this death talk seriously.

admit that a bit odd.

t least he was right about the burden dropping from your shoulders. I believe that information about us is passed on to him and he uses it in his prognostications.

hat would not surprise me,said Tabitha.

Evan came to me while I was sitting on the terrace late that afternoon. I always enjoyed sitting there and watching the sun set. It fascinated me how it would be there one moment and then gone and the darkness would descend almost immediately. It would make me remember nostalgically the long twilight of home when it grew darker gradually and the evening came almost reluctantly.

Evan said: glad I found you alone, Judith. I wanted to talk to you about Theodosia.

ow is she today?I asked.

he very depressed.

o you think she ought to go home?

hate for her to and yet I begin to think it might be for the best.

he wouldn want to leave you. Couldn you go with her?

doubt whether Tybalt would be prepared to release me.

h I see.

suppose if it were imperative he would but it hardly that. The climate doesn agree with Theodosia and now that she is going to have a child

know, but we shall have left here before that happens.

ndoubtedly, but she doesn seem to get any better worse in fact. There is something about the place that has a strange effect on her.

ould she perhaps then go home and wait for you to come back?

don think she would want to go back to our university quarters. She could go to her mother, but you know how things are there. Lady Bodrean never really approved of our marriage. I think Theodosia wouldn be very happy at Keverall.

erhaps she could go and stay at Rainbow Cottage. The aunts would love to coddle her. Or to Sabina at the rectory.

hat an idea; but I know she doesn want to leave me nor do I want her to.

ou could ask her anyway.

will,he said, and he seemed a little more cheerful.

The next day I was in the courtyard when a voice whispered: ady.

I looked round and at first could see no one and then a figure slowly emerged from a bush in the corner of the courtyard. It was a young Arab whom I could not remember having seen before.

ady,he said, ou have magic in jar.

He held out his hand, which was bleeding slightly.

hy certainly, Il dress it,I said. ut the first thing is to clean it. Come inside.

I took him into a little room which Tabitha used a good deal and which opened onto the courtyard. Here she arranged flowers when we could get them. She had put a spirit lamp there so that it was possible to boil water. I took some from a jar which was kept on a bench and boiled it in a pan. I told the young man to sit down and went up to my room to get Dorcas ointment.

He watched me as I bathed the wound, which was very slight; and while I was drying it he whispered: ady, I come because I want talk with you.

I looked intently into his bright dark eyes; I could see that he was frightened.

hat do you want to say?

want to speak of Yasmin. You very kind to Yasmin.

here is she?

he is gone. I pray to Allah to bless her soul.

ou mean she is dead?

He nodded and a look of infinite sorrow passed over his face.