Rose of the Desert (10 page)

"I can only say," she wiped her mouth with a shaking hand, "that from this moment I am without a job."

"But
I'm
not," Alan grinned savagely. Incensed by the kiss, he followed her as she backed away, the hazel eyes ablaze.

Julie didn't know how she came to be in a corner. White-faced, she retreated on trembling legs, and as if to demonstrate his supreme strength Alan picked up the chair blocking his way and tossed it to one side, with a harsh laugh.

For a fraction of a second Julie's heart leapt, for Mohammed had come into the room apparently to investigate the noise. His black eyes wide, he took one look at the situation and fled.

In watching Mohammed's reaction Julie had laid herself wide open to Alan's advances. Before she could stop him, he had taken her and was raining her face and throat with kisses. Behind her was a small alcove and on the shelf a drinking glass filled with desert flowers. Remembering almost hysterically that she had put the flowers there only a day or two before, she grabbed the glass and poured the contents over Alan's head. The effect was rather like beating an elephant with a blade of grass, but when the water started trickling down his neck he raised his head in angry surprise. Rivulets appeared through the waves in his hair and started to trickle down his forehead and into his eyes.

Julie saw her chance and thrust herself away from him. He groped blindly and lunged, making a grab for her blouse. As she strained away she felt the buttons go from the front. One .. . two ... Not caring, she kept her eyes on the door, knowing that she could make it before him. With her last ounce of breath she reached it as it was flung wide. Clay stepped inside. Behind him was Mohammed, staring anxiously at her, and then at the disordered room.

Clay blocked her path, his face a mask of suppressed fury. He saw the blue eyes brilliant with tears, the torn blouse, and the lace underslip barely hiding the cleft of her bosom.

"Is
this
what you wanted?" He spat the words, and with
a
sob Julie pleaded,

"Please! Let me by ..."

"Stay where you are."

His voice sounded queer and strangled with some kind of emotion. He walked into the room, his eyes roaming over the broken bottles. He picked up a chair and placed it in its proper position, and stood the glass unsteadily on the alcove shelf. Mohammed disappeared. Alan was mopping his face and shoulders with a handkerchief. He smirked at no one in particular. Clay said softly,

"You've got half an hour to get off the camp."

"You're in no position to give
me
orders, old man!"

"Half an hour." Clay's eyes glinted. "Mohammed has instructions to pack your bag."

Alan stuffed the handkerchief into his pocket, the smirk sliding from his face.

"Maybe you've forgotten who I am." And then seeing that this had no effect, he shot a morose glance towards Julie. "If I go Julie goes too."

"She stays."

"Oh, I get it! Two's company and all that.... Funny, that's just what I had in mind."

Clay took his time straightening a rug with the toe of his shoe. He flicked a glance upwards.

"Miss Lambert is here to do a job. She has another week before her tour is up."

"My foot!" Alan sneered. He fastened a button of his jacket and thrust his tie in with shaking hands. His breath was coming quickly, and with the suffused colour of temper he looked about to burn up. "A unique idea of yours, wasn't it? Bringing a girl out here. Especially as the company doesn't allow female labour on the camps. Oh, I can go along with it, being a man of the world ..." the full lips were drawn back into a tight smile, "... but I wish to hell you'd do your own shopping around."

Clay lifted his head with a jerk. His face was grim, but he spoke with studied casualness, the tones underlined with sarcasm.

'I know it's difficult for you to visualise work in the sense of the word, but a lot of us have it to do, you know. Miss Lambert is doing a useful job until someone in your offices can come up with a replacement. She is a member of the staff here. No more, no less."

"Is that so? Then why, tell me, didn't she fly out in the company plane as all staff do? Why did you find it necessary to drive her the three hundred-odd miles yourself?"

"How and by what means I get personnel to my camp is none of your damn business!"

There was a moment when it looked like the two men would come to blows, and as Alan stepped angrily forward Julie held her breath. Clay stood rock still, his face a study in controlled anger. Suddenly a door opened and Mohammed shuffled sheepishly by, depositing Alan's bag discreetly at his feet. Clay lowered his gaze pointedly to the bag and Alan swept it up.

"I shall tell my father!"

"Go ahead."

He went through the door, slamming it with terrific force behind him. They heard him rev up the jeep he had driven over from the airstrip, and the next second he had roared away.

Julie relaxed with an inaudible sigh. She would have crumpled into a chair but for Clay's inflexible jaw. Pouring himself a drink, he tossed an offhanded glance in her direction.

"As I said once before tonight, it's time you were turning in."

Julie fled without a word.

She didn't see Clay at breakfast the next morning. Mohammed waited on her in his faultless smiling manner, and she was given to understand that the master had gone off to the oilfields early. And so it was for the rest of the week. She breakfasted alone, worked a full day in the office, with Hans' useful assistance, and mostly ate alone in the evenings. Sometimes she was invited up to the club veranda. There was a group of unattached males there who always welcomed her company.

The last day came, and towards evening Julie packed her belongings, suppressing all emotion. She took a last look around her bungalow, a section of air-conditioned comfort in the heart of the desert, to which she had grown ridiculously attached.

The men due to go on leave were in high spirits and several offered Julie a seat next to them to drive to the , airstrip. At the last minute Clay roared up in a cloud of dust and opened the door of his Land Rover. For one heart- leaping second Julie thought that he was going too, but one glance at his oil-spattered overalls showed he had come straight from the oilfields and was merely offering her a lift.

They drove to the airstrip in silence.

The men swarmed towards the plane like prisoners suddenly let loose, and Clay found her a seat next to a middle- aged, jovial-looking man. She later learned he was Ted Warner, a pipe fitter.

The propellors spun into action, and the men in boisterous mood let out a cheer. Clay came past her seat again. This time he dropped a hand lightly on her shoulder. The brown eyes lingered.

"So long, young Julie. Watch out for yourself!"

Julie forced a bright smile and nodded her goodbye. An ache had come into her throat so solid that no word could push past it.

So this was it. He was bidding her a polite farewell. He hadn't even bothered to put out tentative feelers as to whether they might meet again in Tripoli. But why should he? He was boss of an expanding oil camp. She had been merely an office assistant. He was grateful for her help in sorting out the chaos in the oil camp office, but he certainly wouldn't want to take it any further.

Being one hundred per cent oil man Clay Whitman would take care not to become too attached to any one woman.

The plane took off in a thunder of engines and loud guffaws from the men. Julie gazed down at the lion- coloured sand and the gas jets shooting flames into the sky.

Eternal fires, Clay had called them. Burning endlessly, day and night, week after week, year after year. A pain stirred in her heart. Was love like that? An unquenchable flame, burning ceaselessly on. The pain increased as the airstrip receded, and with a determined effort to stifle it Julie struck up a bright conversation with Ted Warner.

Resolutely she told her heart there was no point in it starting its own private eternal flame.

It was dark as the plane approached the lights of Tripoli bay. Like twinkling jewels they adorned the chest of the coast; a necklace of haphazard stones. Behind, as Julie looked back, was the vast inky blackness of the desert. The desert, with its metallic skies and blistering heat. The Tuareg encampments, the oases; the locusts and desert flowers, and camel rides at night. The wild music.

She strained her eyes for a last glimpse of the black expanse. The desert, a closed chapter in her life.

The plane circled and landed, and in a dream Julie made her way towards the Hotel Gerard. The hired car bumped along the dusty highway that separates the airport from the city of Tripoli, its ageing springs creaking painfully at every rise and fall. The night air was warm and clung like a gossamer shawl about her shoulders. Every now and then she saw the moon peeping through the wide fronds of the date-palms casting its fluorescent light on the squat dwellings that sailed by.

Soon the Hotel Gerard came into view, and at the sight of the neat white building, with its rising lawns and terraces overlooking the bay, her heart lightened. Here at least was civilisation. Her apartments were the last word in luxury, and though later she would have to go in search of more modest accommodation, why shouldn't she take advantage just for tonight? Paying off the driver, she visualised her evening's relaxation. A tepid bath, and then she would slip into one of the delightfully frilly housecoats that had been taboo at Guchani. She would eat privately on her own balcony and gaze down on the wide promenade that led to the harbour.

Suitcase in hand, she climbed the steps to the subdued lighting of the foyer.

The olive-skinned young man at the desk she recognised as the one who had received her on her arrival from England.

"Hello, Cesare! I'm back."

She smiled a greeting and dumped the suitcase down at her feet. The young man turned abruptly, his smile appeared slightly tremulous. Jerkily he reached for her key, but before his hand reached it he turned again and beckoned a page. A whispered conversation followed with Cesare tossing her an apologetic smile at intervals, and then the page boy was sent scurrying off.

Julie waited patiently for her key, but Cesare had returned to fiddling with the end of his pen. She heard the click of a door and sensed rather than heard the manager's footfall on the sumptuous carpeting.

He was like an older edition of Cesare with a twitching smile and an uncomfortable stance. As he stood facing her he seemed at a loss for words and then burst forth in a flood of meticulous English.

"Ah, Miss Lambert! So you have returned to us, hah? We did not expect you would be gone so long. A month, is it not? A thousand pities we have had to let your apartments to another party."

Julie smiled a little in relief.

"Well, of course I couldn't expect you to keep them vacant all this time. When I left we had an understanding that I could book in again when I arrived back from Dawah, and I'll be only too glad to take other accommodation."

"I don't think you understand, Miss Lambert." The manager's smile was set. Coming down the stairs she saw her travelling bags in the hands of a porter. "We simply don't have any other vacancies."

"Are you really full up?"

Julie's grey eyes were wide and incredulous, and they must have searched the manager's face just a little too intently, for he turned quickly away.

"Mr. Moore instructed us that you would wish to settle your account at the earliest possible convenience, so if you would follow me to my office ..."

"Why yes, I'll straighten up now with you if you like, but ..." The mention of Alan's name had set Julie's mind racing. What had he been up to? She had told him she would want to pay the hotel bill herself, but there was something else here. She was quite prepared to bet that there were a dozen or more apartments vacant, yet the manager had told her they were full up.

Why? Was that on Mr. Moore's instructions too? How petty could you get? He must have known that she would easily find alternative accommodation, but had considered it worth it to know she would suffer the humiliation of being literally turned out of a reputable hotel.

The oil company had obviously strong connections in the city. No doubt Alan had traded on this to hint to the manager the mysterious absence of clientele at the hotel if he failed to conform.

Leaving the manager's office, she was convinced that the most of her surmisings had been correct. The man in there fidgeted with a peevish embarrassment and seemed not a little relieved to see the back of her.

Julie stepped out into the night and found her suitcases on the pavement. So this was yet another side of Alan she had been unaware of—a childish desire to play tit for tat. Gazing along the dimly lit road, she knew an uneasiness at being deserted without accommodation so late at night, and a realisation that it had been foolish to come to these strange shores of North Africa purely on the strength of Alan's friendship.

A horse-drawn cab turned the corner and ambled towards her, and Julie stepped forward eagerly to catch the driver's attention. Thank heaven for transport, no matter how dated! Her spirits sank, however, when she saw the cabby already had a fare, and the next second she was surprised to see the stocky figure of Ted Warner stepping down. He gave her a harassed smile.

"You disappeared from the airport so fast I lost track of you." He turned a disgusted glance on the cab. "This was all I could get, but I guess I could have walked quicker."

"Well, I don't know why you're here," Julie marvelled, not bothering to keep the relief out of her voice, "but am I glad to see you! Can you give me the name of a reasonably priced hotel? I'm afraid I'm ... slightly stranded."

Ted let his eyes wander slowly over the batch of suitcases, and then pushed his linen trilby to the back of his head.

"I don't know what goes on, but Clay anticipated something like this. Good job he told me to see you fixed up before I left." He began to push the suitcases towards the cabby. "It's too late to do anything about a hotel now, but you're welcome out at our place if you care to. It's a goodish way out of town, near the American air base, but I know May will be glad to have you. Janet, that's our youngest, is away at school, so we've got a spare room. You can stay as long as you like."