The Lighthearted Quest (16 page)

“What were they doing?”

“Oh, smuggling, of course. I am sure you know that already”—with a fine glance.

“Well, I guessed it.”

“Yes, that was it. But after a time I imagine they made the place too hot to hold them; probably the Zone police got busy, or Interpol—they combine, you know—anyhow those young men seem to have cleared out altogether. I haven't seen anything of them for the last year—well, say ten or eleven months.”

The last four words clicked in Julia's head like a bolt into its slot. Ten or eleven months—ten fitting in exactly with the transfer of Colin's account from Duntroon to Casablanca. But another thing struck her about Purcell's words. There was a lot of information, but all made somehow indefinite: “I imagine”, “probably”, “they seem”. In her turn she studied Purcell curiously, with a long slow look, in silence.

“May I ask, if it is not indiscreet, why you are interested in Mr. Monro?” the man asked.

“Of course. He's my cousin, and we've had no news of him now for ages. I hoped you might know something. Do you know the name of the yacht, for instance?”

“No, I have no idea. Those sort of people do not talk much about themselves.”

His face still puzzled her.
Sabe todo,
Reeder had said—and might be reluctant to say what he knew. She determined to fire all her batteries, now at last.

“Look, Mr. Purcell dear,” she said with the eyes of a mourning dove—“you've simply
got
to help me about this! I'm desperate. I must find him.”

“Why are you desperate? Why must you find him?”

“I must find him because he's wanted at home, badly. Listen—please listen.” She poured out the story of Glentoran; Purcell did listen, in silence. “Anyhow his mother is frantic—he's her only son,” Julia ended. “Surely you see?”

“Why do you not consult your friend Lady Tracy?” Purcell asked.

At this instance of Purcell's all-knowingness Julia laughed; she couldn't help it. She had a very pretty laugh, deep and gurgling, and slow, like her speech, as if she were chewing and tasting her amusement—it made Purcell smile.

“Why is that funny?” he asked, with genuine curiosity.

“Oh, a private joke. Anyhow, I did ask Lady Tracy, and, she promised to help, and she hasn't been able to. Her nephew, who it seems
sabe todo,”
—Julia grinned again, privately, at the phrase—“and might have been able to find out, has gone jaunting off after wild flowers, so he's no use.”

Purcell's face, so mobile and expressive, once more seemed to Julia to register some impression which she could not fathom at the mention of the nephew and the wild flowers, but he said nothing.

“So there's no one to help me but you—don't for goodness sake suggest that I try Mme La Besse! I know there's no reason why you should help me; but I am really in trouble, and I ask you to.”

He looked at her for some moments in silence when she said that; there was an expression, almost of compassion, on his queer face.

“It is
really
urgent, serious, that you get in touch with him?” he asked at last.

“Yes.”

Still he studied her, as if trying to come to a decision.

“Yes”
Julia said again, nodding her head.

He smiled.

“You are very persuasive, and I assume that you have some good reason for thinking that I can help you; I am curious
about this, but I shall not ask what it is. I will do what I can, if you for your part will promise not to say
to anyone
that it is I who have told you what I now tell you.”

“I promise that,” said Julia quietly, though she was tremendously excited. Was she really going to learn something at last?

“Good. Well, if I were you I should go up to Fez—you have not been to Fez yet, have you?” Julia shook her head. “While you are there, simply
en touriste,
go to the shop of a very well-known dealer in curios called Bathyadis: any of the guides will take you to him. He may be able to tell you something—but speak to him alone, out of earshot of other people. If he cannot, or will not, tell you himself, he may at least put you in touch with a compatriot of yours, a Mr. St John.”

Julia was all ears—this was quite unexpected. But another of those clicks took place in her head, and after thanking Purcell she said, quite lightheartedly and casually—

“Is Bathyadis one of the ones whose sons have started shops in Casablanca and Agadir and places?”

The effect on Purcell of this innocent question was electric—he started in his seat, for a moment he looked almost angry—or was it almost frightened?

“How do you know that?” he asked sharply.

“What, that they've started curio-shops down on the coast—the sons of the dealers in Fez and Marrakesh, I mean? Oh, someone was telling me about it in Casa, when I was asking who made money, how, out here.”

“Who was this person, may I know?” He spoke with a curious urgency.

“A rather dumb bank-manager, to be exact,” said Julia. “At a cocktail party. Why? Is it important? I just thought it was fun that the sons and nephews had got so rich in two or three years that they could buy Papa out, now,” she said, tranquillisingly.

Purcell appeared to be tranquillised; his expression relaxed.

“No, it is not important,” he said, “And it is, as you say, an amusing development.” He paused for a moment. “But it is a very recent one, which few people, even those living out here, know about—so naturally I was surprised that you, so newly arrived, had heard of it.”

“Yes, of course,” said Julia smoothly; but to herself—“Covering-up” she said.

“You have many contacts in Casa?” Purcell asked, now with all his usual blandness.

“Oh, no—just one friend, in a bank. His wife and I were at school together,” said Julia. “My boat put in there for twenty-four hours, so I looked them up. Horrible place, Casa, don't you think? I like this so much better.”

“Ah, who would not?” said Purcell. “Tangier is unique.”

At that moment the door opened to admit the young men whom Julia had now come to call “the bunch”. At the first shadow on the muslin veiling, even before the tiny click of the latch, quick and silent as a cat Purcell was on his feet; before the door opened he was the other side of the table; and when the bunch entered, giggling and calling to one another, he was bending across assiduously and saying, for all to hear—“You are
sure
you will not have another, Mademoiselle?”

“Quite sure, thank you,” said Julia, rising and taking a note from her purse. In fact the pansies could not have arrived more opportunely: she had got a line out of Purcell, and to continue to sit exchanging elegant cover-talk with him about the uniqueness of Tangier and the horribleness of Casablanca was the last thing she wanted. She had plenty to think about, and wanted time for that.

But thought, though amusing and exciting—
why
the fuss about the curio-dealing sons in the Atlantic ports?—it seemed quite inexplicable—did not take her very far. What was obvious was that she must go to Fez as soon as possible, and follow up this clue, faint and mysterious as it was. Next day she told Mme La Besse as she drove her out to the site, spinning
along the blue-grey tarmac between the blue fields of irises, that she wanted to take a week's leave at once. The old lady was rather cross.

“What, already? But you have only just begun! Does my work bore you so soon?”

“No,
aucunément
—I adore the work,” said Julia, heartily and truly. “But I must go now. I told you I might have to, dear Madame, as you will remember.”

Mme La Besse grunted. “And where ‘must' you go, now?”

“To Fez.”

“Fez?
Tiens.
If you go to Fez you might do something useful to me,” said the old Belgian, suddenly mollified and with a return to her usual childish eagerness.

“I should have the utmost pleasure in doing this, if it is within my power,” said Julia, turning on some of her more elegant and formal French—she had already learned that this had a subduing effect on Mme La Besse when she became irritable. “Pray tell me, dear Madame, what it is that you desire of me.”

Tame as a lamb, ardent as a little girl, Mme La Besse told her.

“I wish that you would go to Volubilis, the ruined Roman city near Fez. I am told that there is there a very good example of a Roman oil-mill, and I should like you to examine this with the greatest care, and write down a description on the spot, so that I may compare it with our little
huilerie
here. Perhaps,” said Mme La Besse, peering hopefully sideways at Julia, “you could make a sketch?”

No, Julia could not sketch, and she had no camera; but she promised to take a tape-measure and bring back accurate measurements of the
huilerie.

“And please observe closely, how it resembles or differs from ours here. Volubilis is said to have been built on the site of a Berber city, the name is derived from a Berber name. The Phoenicians were there also. I have a theory, though as yet I
cannot prove it, that it was the Phoenicians who began the cultivation of the olive and oil-production in l'Afrique du Nord, long before the Romans; all information is therefore valuable.”

Julia promised to do her best. Then she put a practical question.

“How far is Volubilis from Fez?”

“Oh, a nothing—sixty or seventy kilometres, perhaps.”

“Is there a bus?”

“Chère enfant,
how should I know? But in any case you could not travel in an autobus in le Maroc! You must take a car.”

“Um,” said Julia, wondering what this would be likely to cost. The trip to Fez would be pretty expensive, anyhow. But just then they arrived at the site, and the moment the Chrysler had been turned and parked near the shed, the old lady, glowing with enthusiasm over this new project, led Julia up to look at that so unconvincing oil-mill again. They stared together at the round block of yellow stone, the circular cemented channel, and at some other squarish blocks about whose use the old lady confessed herself at a loss—Julia for her part had no intuitions on this occasion. They stood speculating for some moments; a chilly wind had sprung up suddenly, and dark clouds were looming over the bronze-coloured mass of the headland which protected the bay on the south-west—Julia shivered.

“I think I'll go and fetch my coat,” she said.

“Let us just go up to the wine-press enclosure, and see if Achmet and Abdul have got all the sand out of the big wine-tank,” said Mme La Besse. “This wind will blow it in again, and I want to see the bottom.”

The wine enclosure was the next above the one where they stood; they went into it and looked down into the deep tank. Abdul and Achmet had cleared out all the sand and were wheeling the last of it away in barrows; the bottom seemed to be covered with dark mud. Mme La Besse drew Julia's
attention to some discoloration on the cemented sides, observing that to her it had a purplish look, like the stains of wine——Julia felt that to see this required the eye of faith, but did not say so. The two Berbers had carried away the short ladder they used for getting in and out of the pit; Mme La Besse lamented this, she wanted to climb down and examine the stained cement with the magnifying glass which, like her trowel, she invariably carried stuck in her belt. Julia volunteered to go for the ladder if she could be told the Berber word for it; Mme La Besse could not remember this for the moment, and while they stood undecided, on a sharp gust of wind down came the rain. Julia had only a cardigan—damn, if only she had fetched her coat.

“Here, under the wall—we shall get some shelter there,” exclaimed the old lady, as she spoke unbuttoning her rather aged burberry; she drew it off and threw part over Julia's shoulders as they crouched together immediately above the tank under the low wall, which did afford a certain amount of shelter from the wind-driven rain. Julia thought she had never seen such a heavy downpour; the silver rods rebounded from the earth like hail, causing a white mist a foot high to rise above the surface of the ground; the rain hissed among the stones, and drummed—a different note—on the floor of the tank at their feet. Watching all this idly, and still rather cross at having been prevented from fetching her coat in time, the girl presently saw a sight which filled her with something like awe. The rain was so heavy that small runnels of water were soon streaming away downhill on all sides, and in a matter of minutes there was water all over the floor of the ancient wine-vat; the rain, hammering into this, brought it up in foam—and the foam was
red!

“Look!” Julia almost gasped. “Mme La Besse, look at the tank!”

“Ah! You
see,”
the Belgian said, in slow triumph. That was all. The old woman was awestruck too, as well she might be;
in silence, together, they watched a twentieth-century rainstorm stirring up lees of wine nearly two thousand years old.

Julia lost no time about setting off for Fez, though the more she thought about it, the more dubious the adventure seemed. Would Bathyadis tell her anything?—even how to find Mr. St John? On him, at least, she determined to try to secure a second string to her bow; she went up to the pink house on the cliff to consult Lady Tracy.

“Mr. St John? Oh, yes, of course I know him,” said the old lady. “He comes down here sometimes, though not as often as one could wish. Such an interesting man—he has lived in Fez for ages, fifteen years at least, and quite
among
the Moors; he has a house in the Medina. My dear child, if you could get him to take you about a little, he is the most perfect cicerone; he knows everything and everybody. Shall I give you a letter to him?”

“Oh, yes,
do.
Do you think he would take me about to please you?”

“My dear child, once you have met I am confident that he will take you about to please
you
—or indeed to please himself,” said Lady Tracy, bending her beautiful old eyes on the girl with a sweet aged archness. “I will write at once—“ She rang her little brass bell as she spoke. “Feridah shall find my pad for me.” Julia could see the pad on the table, poking out from under some knitting and
Life,
but refrained from mentioning the fact; she could never see enough of the lovely Feridah, who slid in, smiled through her veils at the visitor, stroked her mistress, and produced what was required. “When do you go?” Lady Tracy asked, pausing in her careful deliberate writing.