The Sheik Retold(8)

I rose with a scornful laugh, flinging over my shoulder as I stormed back to my tent, "Then heaven help him who tries!"

***

The next morning I was almost aggressively cheerful. At breakfast I ate heartily, as I had not supped the night before, but Aubrey was unusually silent, and Jim appeared equally morose. Nevertheless, I was determined not to let them dampen my spirits.

"I don't think there's any use waiting any longer," I said. The camels had departed long ago with my equipment, and I was eager to depart. "You will want to be in Biskra in time for dinner."

"Diana, it's still not too late to change your mind," Jim said. "For heaven's sake, please give up this folly. It's tempting Providence."

"Don't be ridiculous," I snapped. "You can't expect me to change my mind at the eleventh hour. It's perfectly safe. Mustafa Ali will take care that everything goes smoothly. He has his reputation in Biskra to think of. He is not likely to throw that away. In any case, I can take care of myself. I don't mind owning to conceit about that. Even my brother admits I am a credit to his teaching." Determined to prove my skill, I whipped out my ivory-mounted revolver and aimed at a low, flat rock some distance away. I fired.

And missed! There was not even a mark on the stone. I was dumbfounded. I looked to my revolver and then glared at the rock.

Aubrey swore. "What a senseless piece of bravado that was!"

"I don't understand it. It's as big as a house." I raised the weapon again, but Jim caught my wrist.

"Pray do not," he insisted in a low voice, casting a sidelong glance at the group of watching Arabs. "It could be dangerous should you miss again. You do not wish to lower your prestige any further."

With a mumbled curse, I jammed the little weapon back into its holster. "I don't understand it. It must be the light."

"Diana, can you not now see the true danger?" Jim asked. "Is there nothing I can say to convince you to go back?"

"I'm sorry, Jim. I know you mean well, but this is a lifelong dream of mine. I assure you, there is nothing that will alter my determination to go on this trip."

The ten men who were to accompany me had already mounted. My servant brought my own horse, a gorgeous but excitable bay mare.

"A skittish beast if ever I saw one," Jim mumbled.

"You fret without cause." I laughed. "I am accustomed to spirited mounts."

He gave me a leg up and then mounted his own horse. I wheeled alongside of Aubrey, who seemed unusually edgy pulling at his mustache as he exchanged some private words with the guide. Anxious to be on my way, I paid little heed.

"Goodbye, Aubrey." I extended my hand to him. "You may expect me a month after you arrive. I will cable to you from Cherbourg." I added with a chuckle, "With any luck, I shall roll up in time to be best man."

He regarded me with a strange look. "And if you don't return at all?"

I returned a slow smile and replied flippantly, "Tant pis pour moi. Tant mieux pour toi. All the better for you, dear brother, as I have left you all that I have in the world. Could devotion go any further?"

I gave a parting nod to Jim Arbuthnot, who returned a sad smile. I then signaled Mustafa Ali and turned my horse's head southward without a single backward glance.

***

I rode in silence. Although I had parted on a smile, the quarrels with Aubrey and Jim had left a nasty taste in my mouth. I knew that what I was doing was unconventional, but I'd been brought up to be unconventional. At first I'd been amazed, and later amused, by the sensation I'd created, but now it just annoyed me—immensely.

Why couldn't people occupy themselves with their own affairs and let me deal with mine? Jim's objections, I halfway understood, given his profession of the other night, but Aubrey's complete volte-face was beyond my comprehension. It angered me, and contempt was mingled with that anger. If Aubrey really thought there was danger in this expedition, he could have sacrificed himself for once in his life to come with me. This was the desert, my lifelong dream! It was the expedition I had longed for and planned for years. I could not and would not give it up. How could anything in the desert hurt me when it had been calling to me always?

There was nothing strange about the scene that lay all around. On the contrary, my surroundings seemed oddly familiar—the burning sun in the cloudless sky, the shimmering haze rising from the hot, dry ground, the feathery outline of some clustering palm trees in a tiny distant oasis. They were all like remembrances of another time and place, filling me with a gladness that was deeper and more profound than anything I had ever known.

I was radiantly happy—joyful in the sense of my youth and strength, my perfect physical fitness, blissful in my capacity to enjoy it. I was delighted with the touch of the keen, nervous horse between my knees and exhilarated beyond description with my newfound freedom. My reality was proving infinitely greater than anticipation—and for a whole month this perfection of pleasure was mine.

I considered my promise to Aubrey with impatience and regret. I thought of the weeks in New York with dread. Newport would be a little less bad, for there were alleviations, but my hope was that Aubrey would find the wife he was looking for quickly and release me from such a tedious obligation. I wondered what the future Lady Mayo would be like but did not expend much pity on her. American girls, as a rule, were well able to care for themselves.