Palace Circle (37 page)

Her vivacity was always contagious and, keeping his thoughts to himself, Darius said mildly, “It's rumored Hitler is sending General Rommel to Libya.”

It was early evening and the terrace was crowded with military personnel. Darius had seen Delia quite by accident—she had been sitting with a friend, waiting for Ivor. When her husband failed to appear on time, the friend, having an engagement of her own, was happy to leave Delia in Darius's company. “It's a rumor I've heard as well,” said Delia, “but not one we should be chattering about here.”

“Why not? I'm pretty sure every soldier in the city is aware of it.”

“Maybe so,” she said equably, “but it doesn't do to take risks. According to General Wavell, the city is chock-full of German informers.”

Below the terrace, in the crowded street, a black chauffeured
Rolls-Royce came to a halt. Recognizing it, Delia reached for her white muslin gloves and began pulling them on. She was wearing a broad-brimmed picture hat in pewter-blue, a color he had never seen her wear before. It suited her, but then he had seldom seen her in anything that didn't. The brim of the hat, decorated by a single white rose, dipped low over her eyes, shading them from the sun.

Half a dozen commissionaires hurried down the hotel steps to escort her husband up to them. Dressed impeccably in a dark-gray suit and a silver, gray-spotted bow tie, he cut through them like a knife through butter.

“I'm sorry I'm late, Delia,” he said when he reached their table. “There is opposition to Lampson's attempts to expel the Hungarian and Romanian legations. Ah! Darius. How unexpected. Still, I'm glad that you've been able to keep my wife company.”

Darius, who fiercely wanted more information, knew it would be fatal to make a direct inquiry. Ivor Conisborough was far too shrewd not to find such interest suspicious. It was equally obvious that as far as Ivor was concerned Darius was now de trop and should take his leave.

A week later, when he was making Turkish coffee for Constantin aboard the
Egyptian Queen
, Constantin said, “There's someone I want you to meet. Have you heard of a group of Egyptian army officers who go by the name the Free Officers Movement?”

Darius added sugar to coffee grounds and water in a small copper pot. “No,” he said, stirring the grounds until they sank to the bottom of the pot and the sugar dissolved. “Who are they?”

As he put the pot on the stove to boil Constantin came and stood in the galley's doorway. “It's good you haven't heard of
them. It means their security is watertight. The Free Officers Movement is a subversive organization within the army that is waiting for the right moment to rise up and trigger a revolution. I've arranged for you to meet with one of the leaders. His name is Anwar Sadat.”

His first meeting with Sadat took place just after Delia's Christmas party. By the time Darius arrived at Nile House the long curving drive was thick with parked cars, as were the nearby streets. Adjo opened the door, resplendent in a royal-blue galabia lavishly embroidered in gold. One glance over Adjo's shoulder was enough to tell him that everyone who was anyone had arrived before him.

Sir Miles and Lady Lampson were clearly in evidence, as were the heads of all the foreign legations, except for Romania and Hungary, and the room was crowded with bemedaled high-ranking military men and their bejeweled wives.

Prince Muhammad Ali, Farouk's extremely pro-British uncle, was there, dapper in a velvet dinner jacket. Only his tarboosh and ostentatious cabochon ruby ring singled him out as an Egyptian.

Princess Shevekiar was holding court in a far corner of the room. Avoiding her as well as his father—who was deep in conversation with a broad-shouldered American Darius had never seen before—he sought out Davina.

Her face lit up at the sight of him and he felt, as he always did when she looked at him in such a way, as if he had been punched in the chest and all the breath had been knocked out of him.

“Darling, isn't this wonderful?” she said, sliding her hand into his. “Have you seen the Christmas tree? It's fake, of course, but it's even bigger than the one at the embassy. We only finished decorating it seconds before the first guests arrived.”

Her pale gold hair waved softly to shoulders that were naked. It wasn't often she wore a strapless evening gown—strapless evening gowns were far more Petra's style than hers—but the rose-pink shot-taffeta gown looked magical on her.

“I want us to introduce ourselves to Petra's friend, Boudicca Pytchley,” she said, leading the way to where a fair, plump young woman with beautiful hands was talking with Kate Gunn. “She's with the Motorized Transport Corps and has only just arrived. All the new ambulance drivers in her medical unit are women which has caused quite a flap at Hilmiya Camp.”

“… thirty thousand Eyeties taken prisoner is rather a good Christmas present, what?” Darius heard a staff officer saying to Sholto as they squeezed past him. “And with Sidi Barrani back in our hands it looks as if it's going to be victory all the way.”

Sidi Barrani was one of the villages on the Egyptian side of the border with Libya. The Italians had hoped to make it a base for further operations. Darius would have liked to have listened a little longer, but Davina was saying, “And this is Boo. She's been Petra's friend for years and years and years.”

The first thing Boo Pytchley said was, “If Kate and Darius don't mind, I need to have a quiet word with you, Davina. Jack's father asked me to pass on some Toynbee Hall news.”

Her eyes had become very troubled, her voice grave, but Davina and Kate didn't sense her change in mood.

“Oh, good.” Davina put her hand in his again. “News from Uncle Jerome is always welcome.”

From the room beyond there came the sound of a jazz band launching into “Jingle Bells” and Kate Gunn clapped her hands in delight. “Jazzed-up Christmas songs! How typical of Delia.”

All around them chatter and laughter competed with the efforts of a brilliant saxophonist.

“Boo has been telling us how absolutely ghastly life is in
London,” Kate said, raising her voice in order to be heard. “The Christmas food rations are measly. Sugar has been reduced to only four ounces and tea to two ounces. I can't imagine how people are managing. It makes me feel very guilty when food is so plentiful here. I bought a whole armful of oranges this morning. Boo says Londoners have forgotten what an orange looks like.”

Not wanting to continue with the conversation, he looked across the room to where Ivor was chuckling with Lady Wavell and wondered how Ivor could possibly prefer Kate's company to Delia's.

On cue Delia descended, arms outstretched, a radiant welcome on her face. “Where have the two of you been? I thought you were never goin' to arrive. Isn't the band grand? They've begun to play every Thursday night at the Continental and the minute I heard them I just knew I had to have them.”

She was wearing turquoise chiffon and there were diamonds at her neck and her wrists and threaded in her upswept hair.

Kate, at least a decade younger, looked colorless in comparison. Her mauve silk evening gown had a narrow fluted skirt embroidered with tiny purple flowers. It was a pretty dress and should have flattered her peaches-and-cream complexion, but it merely made her look a little faded.

Delia slipped a hand affectionately through her arm and said, “It's been so good, Kate, getting really up-to-the-minute gossip from London. Jerome took Boudicca out to lunch only days before she and all the other girls in the medical unit set sail and said to tell us that Shibden Hall is packed to the rafters with refugees. Toynbee Hall have re-homed an entire East End orphanage there. And now,” she added, looking around at them, fizzing with vitality, “y'all understand if I shanghai my daughter for a few minutes. Bruno was an early supporter of
the Old War Horse Memorial Hospital and as he's so rarely in Cairo, he's eager for an update on what is happening there.”

Davina squeezed Darius's hand and allowed herself to be whirled off in her mother's wake.

“Bruno?” he asked, raising an eyebrow questioningly.

“Bruno Lautens,” Kate said as he watched Delia making a beeline for the man his father had been talking to a little earlier. “He's an American archaeologist based near the Sudanese border. Before the war he was an experienced desert traveler.”

“Golly.” Boo Pytchley was impressed. “Where did that little nugget of information come from?”

“Lord Conisborough.” As she said his name a faint flush of color touched Kate Gunn's cheeks. She took another sip of her champagne. “He thinks Mr. Lautens will be very useful to some of the people in special ops.”

That social talk was often so careless never ceased to amaze Darius. Any hope of further indiscretions on Kate's part was, however, dashed, as Petra approached and kissed Kate, and then Boo, on the cheek.

“So glad you two have made friends,” she said, paying Darius not the slightest attention. “And Archie has just arrived,” she said to Boo. “If only Rupert was here as well it would be just like old times.”

“Rupert's my brother,” Boo explained. “He's in the RAF.”

“Darius wouldn't know about the RAF—or any other branch of the British military.” Petra's voice was blatantly caustic. “He's not even in the Egyptian army. But then Egypt isn't officially at war with Germany—something it's always best to bear in mind, Boo.”

The inference was so obvious that he knew she'd had far too much to drink.

“Oh golly.” Startled and bewildered Boo looked around for a way out of the suddenly sticky situation and, seeing Archie,
she said, “Excuse me for a moment, Petra. I'm just going to catch up on old times.”

The minute she'd left, Darius said in a low voice, “Let's talk in the garden. Delia wouldn't thank either of us if we had a shouting match in here.”

For a second he thought she was going to refuse to leave the room with him, but then she gave a careless shrug. Her nearly backless gown was of silver lame and clung sensuously to her every curve.

If Sholto Monck saw her leave the room with him, he gave no sign of it. It was an indifference no Egyptian husband would display.

The garden was lit with fairy lights and there were almost as many couples outside as there were in. He strode onto the darkened lawn and then across the lawn toward the Nile. Only when they had reached the foot of the garden did he turn to face her.

“Just what the
hell,”
he said through gritted teeth, “was that little scene about in front of your friend? You might just as well have said I'm not to be trusted!”

“Are you? I don't know. I'm not even sure if you know.”

The silver of her dress shimmered in the moonlight as she folded her arms tightly across her chest.

“I've never much liked you, Darius. You come with too many complications. And I don't like your affair with Davvy.”

“My affair with Davina hasn't anything to do with you.”

“She's my sister. It has everything to do with me.” For the first time he noticed that she was barefoot. “What is going to come of it? Are you going to marry her?”

It was a question he asked himself almost every single day, and because he couldn't answer it Petra pushed her glorious hair away from her face and said explosively, “Yet you won't give her up so that she can find someone who not only loves
her but will also marry her!” Her voice shook with passion. “The last thing Davvy needs in her life is you, Darius. You've always been trouble. And you're trouble now on a monumental scale.”

Yanking up her tight fish-tail skirt she whirled away from him and stormed back to the lights and the music.

He stared grimly at the black-silk surface of the river and didn't walk back to the house until he'd smoked his cigarette down to a stub.

Back inside a fishing-fleet girl was singing “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square” and nearly everyone was dancing. There was no sign of Davina, and taking a glass of champagne from a passing tray he went in search of her.

He found her in the den. She was laughing at something Bruno Lautens was saying. Archie Somerset was running a finger across the many books on the bookshelves, a paper party hat on his head. A girl who had arrived at the party with one of Archie's friends had her arm hooked proprietarily over Lautens's shoulder.

Davina's eyes lit up at the sight of him. “We're taking a breather. Bruno's got some very funny stories. The fellahin south of Aswan believe Hitler is a Muslim!”

He gave a polite smile, not at all liking the admiring expression in Lautens's eyes when he looked at Davina.

He was just about to suggest that they return to the crush when Boudicca Pytchley pushed past him into the room.

“Oh goodness, what a party! Your mother has just promised she'll sing ‘Dixie.’ Look, I must have a few words with you, Davina, and it's as quiet here as anywhere.” She drew in a deep breath. “Jack's father asked me to tell you that a doctor and his wife you used to know … Dr. and Mrs. Sinclair … were killed in a car accident. It was dreadful. They were both killed outright and there's a child … a boy …”

That Boo obviously didn't realize just how close Davina and the Sinclairs had been only added to the hideousness of the moment.

Davina gave a low cry, and as her legs gave way Bruno caught her and lowered her into the nearest chair.

“Where …?” she croaked, her face chalk white. “How …?”

“A place called Dunbeath, in Sutherland. I hadn't realized the Sinclairs were such close friends, Davina.” Boo's voice was full of remorse.

“I think Davina needs a little time to get over the shock,” Darius said brusquely.

Davina said, as if he hadn't spoken: “How, Boo?”

“It happened at night on a coast road, and from what Sir Jerome said, the road was steep and there was a sharp bend. The crash was head-on. The driver of the other car was drunk.”

Davina shuddered so violently, Darius thought she was going to collapse completely.

“Fetch her a brandy,” he said abruptly to Bruno. “And a shawl, or a blanket of some kind.”

No one had ever had the nerve—or been so foolish—as to speak to Bruno in such a way before, but at the sight of Davina's ashen face Bruno merely said, “Sure. Will do.”