The Pirate (24 page)

“They’re right.” She laughed suddenly. “You know, I think I’m high already. I’m not tired anymore.”

“Neither am I.” Baydr sat down in the chair opposite her, put his cigarette into an ashtray and leaning forward took her hand. “What would you like to do?”

She looked into his face. Suddenly her eyes filled with tears. “I would like to go back,” she said, “back to the time we first met and begin all over again.”

He was silent for a moment, then he spoke. “So would I,” he said gently. “But we can’t.”

She stared at him, the tears running down her cheeks. Then she hid her face in her hands. “Baydr, Baydr,” she cried. “What has happened to us? What went wrong? We were so in love then.”

He drew her head to his chest and stared somberly into space. His voice was a low rumble in her ears. “I don’t know,” he said quietly, thinking how beautiful she had been the first time he saw her.

***

He remembered the cold and the white blinding light reflected from the snow and the white buildings surrounding the inaugural stands. It was January 1961. The greatest country in the world was inaugurating its new President, a young man by the name of John F. Kennedy.

Six months ago no one in the Middle East had even known the young man’s name. Then, suddenly, he was the candidate of the Democratic Party and there was a telegram from the Prince on his desk. “What is Kennedy’s policy on the Middle East?”

His reply had been terse. “Pro Israel. Not much else known.”

The telephone call he had received the next day was equally terse. The Prince himself had called. “Find a way to contribute one million dollars to the Nixon campaign,” the Prince had said.

“It will not be easy,” he had replied. “The United States has peculiar rules about campaign contributions.”

The Prince chuckled slyly. “Politicians are the same everywhere. I am sure you will find a way. Mr. Nixon and Mr. Eisenhower were very good to us when the British and French tried to take over the Suez in fifty-six. We should at least show we are grateful.”

“I’ll work it out,” Baydr replied. “But I would like to suggest that we also make a token contribution to the Kennedy campaign, just in case.”

“Why?” the Prince asked. “Do you think he has a chance?”

“Not according to the polls, but this is America. One never knows.”

“I will leave it in your hands,” the Prince said. “I’m beginning to think you’re more American than Arab.”

Baydr laughed. “The Americans don’t think so.”

“How are your wife and daughters?” the Prince asked.

“They’re fine,” he answered. “I spoke to them last night. They’re in Beirut.”

“You had better make a visit home,” the Prince said. “I am still waiting for that heir you promised me. I would like to see him before too long. I am not growing any younger.”

“Allah will preserve you,” Baydr said. “You will live forever.”

“In paradise I hope.” The Prince’s whispery laugh echoed in the telephone. “But not on this earth.”

Baydr had put down the telephone thoughtfully. The Prince never said anything casually. He wondered if he had heard that Maryam could not bear any more children after the birth of the last girl. But if he had heard he would not have asked about an heir.

He would have insisted that Baydr get a divorce and marry another. Barrenness was a valid reason for divorce under Muslim law. But Baydr was reluctant. It was not that he was in love with Maryam. There never had been that between them and the longer they were married the less they seemed to have in common. She was too provincial; she really disliked Europe and America. She was only truly happy when she was in her own environment, in a world she understood. That was the real problem, Baydr thought. She was too much an Arab. And the thought of having to marry another Arab woman just didn’t appeal to him.

Maybe the Prince had been right. Maybe he was too American. For he definitely preferred Western women to his own. There was a life about them, a style, a look, a freedom that Arab women didn’t have.

Baydr found a way to make the contributions. Both of them. They had many friends among the businessmen in both parties. The token contribution had paid off and the Prince had received a special invitation from the inaugural committee. The Prince declined on the grounds of poor health and appointed Baydr to be his special representative at the inauguration.

Baydr was in the section reserved for the representatives of foreign countries, fairly close to the inaugural platform itself. He was uncomfortable in the freezing cold, despite the thermal underwear under his formal swallow-tail suit, pearl gray vest and trousers. The top hat, pressed down on his head to prevent it from being blown off by the gusts of wind didn’t help very much in keeping his head warm.

He looked around. Some of the other diplomats and their wives were better prepared than he was. They were older and probably had been through this before. He could see them nipping from small silver flasks and there were more than a few thermos bottles in evidence.

He glanced at his watch. It was almost a quarter past twelve. They were running late. The ceremony was due to start at noon. He reached into his pocket for the dark glasses. His eyes were weary with squinting against the sun and snow, but he changed his mind. None of the others were wearing them. There was a flurry on the stands. He looked up as the applause began. The President-elect was coming onto the platform.

There was something young and very vulnerable about him as he walked forward with firm strides, the wind ruffling his hair. The cold seemed not to bother him. He alone of all on the platform wore no hat or coat.

A moment later a priest came forward and delivered the invocation. His voice was singsong and monotonous like all priests’ voices no matter what their faith, but the young President stood quietly, hands clasped, his head respectfully inclined. Allah would not have insisted on so long a prayer in such cold weather, Baydr thought.

When the priest had finished, another man was led forward. He was old and white-haired and his face seemed carved out of the same granite as the building behind him. Baydr heard the whispers around him. The man was Robert Frost, one of America’s great poets.

The old man began to speak, his breath smoky in the winter air. Baydr could not distinguish the words. A moment later he stopped. There seemed to be a problem.

Another man stepped forward and held a hat over the lectern. Apparently the sun had blinded the old man so that he could not read what was on the sheet in front of him. Another whisper ran through the stand. The man who held his hat was Lyndon Johnson, the future Vice-President. The old man said something, the Vice-President elect stepped back and the old man began to recite a poem from memory. His voice rang through the public address system but Baydr had stopped listening. He had noticed a girl on the platform about three rows behind the President.

She seemed tall but he could not really tell. The platform was tiered so that all could see and be seen. She was bareheaded with long, straight blond hair, framing a golden tanned face. Her bright blue eyes were set above high cheekbones that fell into planed lines to an almost square chin. Her lips, as she listened intently to the poet, parted, revealing white even teeth. When the poet finished, she smiled and laughed and clapped her hands enthusiastically. For some reason Baydr thought, She’s a California girl.

Then the President was being sworn in. The ceremony itself only seemed to take a moment, after which he turned to the lectern to begin his speech. Baydr listened carefully.

There was one line that made him wonder if the President had read the Koran. It could have been taken from the Holy Book. “Civility is not a sign of weakness, and sincerely is always subject to proof.”

When the President had finished speaking, Baydr looked for the girl but she had already gone. He tried to find her in the crowds that were moving away from the platform but she was nowhere to be seen.

Still her face kept appearing before his eyes all through the afternoon as he rested in his suite in the hotel. He watched several replays of the inauguration ceremony on television, hoping to catch another glimpse of her, but the angle of the camera was always wrong.

There was only one other chance. Spread across Baydr’s desk were invitations to four inaugural balls, each of which promised an appearance by the President. She would have to be at one of them, he thought. But which one? That was the question.

The answer was simple. He would go to all of them. If the President could do it, so could he.

CHAPTER 10

Baydr allowed himself no more than an hour at each ball. One was very much like another, crowded and noisy, the floor covered with people, drunk and sober, dancing, talking or just walking about aimlessly. The one thing they had in common was that they were all Democrats, glad to be back in the sun after eight years in the dark. After a while, Baydr began to wonder if there were any Republicans left in the country.

He arrived at the first ball just after the President had left for the second. Carefully, his eyes swept the room. He never realized before just how many blondes there were in Washington, but none of them was the one he sought. He went to the bar and ordered a glass of champagne.

A man came up to him and grabbed him by the arm. “Did you see him?” he asked excitedly.

“Who?” Baydr asked.

“The President, that’s who,” the man answered in an aggrieved voice. “Who else would I be asking about?”

Baydr smile. “I saw him.”

“Great, wasn’t he?” The man smiled and walked off without waiting for an answer.

Baydr put his drink down and decided to go on to the next ball. It was a good thing it wasn’t far because the streets were still icy. Again, the President had come and gone by the time he arrived. Baydr screened the room and when he saw that the girl wasn’t there, he didn’t even stay for a drink.

He got to the third ball in the middle of a dance. People were crowded around the periphery of the door, trying to peer through the crowds.

Baydr pushed his way through. He tapped a man on the shoulder. “What’s happening?”

“The President’s dancing with some girl out there,” the man said without turning around.

On the far side of the floor the flashbulbs were popping. Baydr made his way toward them. As he passed, he heard a woman ask in disapproving tones, “Why doesn’t he dance with Jackie?”

He heard her husband’s disgusted reply: “He has to do those things, Mary. It’s politics.”

“Then why does it always have to be a pretty girl?” the wife retorted. “I don’t see him dancing with any of us who worked so hard on this campaign.”

Baydr was at the edge of the floor. The photographers and cameramen were climbing over each other to get pictures of the President. For a moment, he was pinned against a post, then he managed to slip past them.

There was a small clear space around the President and his partner. The other dancers didn’t really move; they just shuffled in a semicircle, staring at the President. Baydr stared too. The President was dancing with his girl.

He had a sick feeling of disappointment. From the way they were laughing and talking, they seemed to know each other fairly well. His hopes of finding someone they both knew to introduce them were dashed. One couldn’t very well ask the President of the United States to introduce one to a girl. Besides, he too had heard some of the stories about the President. It seemed he was quite a man with the ladies.

As he watched, the music ended and they started from the floor. Immediately, they were surrounded by throngs of people. Photographers were taking more pictures. Then the President turned to the girl. Smiling, he said something to her. She nodded and the President turned and started away. The crowd followed him and a moment later the girl was standing almost alone.

He took a deep breath and went up to her. “Miss?”

She was even more beautiful up close than she had been from a distance. “Yes?” she asked politely. Her voice was low and slightly Western in intonation.

“How did it feel to dance with the President of the United States?”

“That’s a strange question.”

“What’s your name?”

“Are you a reporter?”

“No,” he answered. “Do you know the President well?”

“You ask a lot of questions for a man who says he’s not a reporter.”

He smiled. “I guess I do. But I can’t think of any other way to keep you from walking away.”

For the first time she looked directly at him. “I can,” she said. “Why don’t you ask me to dance?”

CHAPTER 11

Her name was Jordana Mason and she had been born and raised in San Francisco. So he’d been right about one thing. She was a California girl. Her father and mother had been divorced when she was a child. Both parents had since remarried but relations were good between them, and Jordana was in close touch with her father even though she lived with her mother. She was nineteen years old, a junior at Berkeley and one of the organizers of the Students for Kennedy Movement, which was the reason she’d been invited to the inaugural.

She had caught the candidate’s eye at a rally in San Francisco. His press people had made a big thing of getting photographs of him with the students and he had promised her that if he won she would receive an invitation.

She was not naïve enough to believe that he would remember the promise. She was sure that there were more important things on his mind. So she was surprised when invitation arrived in the mail one morning.

Excitedly, she called her mother. “Isn’t it wonderful?”

Her mother was cool. The whole family was solidly Republican.

“I hope they have provided a chaperon,” her mother said.

“Mother,” Jordana said. “This is 1960, not 1900. I’m a grown girl. I can take care of myself.”

“I’m sure you can, dear,” her mother said smoothly. “But have they arranged for a good place for you to stay? And who is paying for your airfare?”

“I’m supposed to take care of all that myself. The invitation is only for the inauguration. And it says I’m to have a place on the same stand with the President.”