‘Uncle Raschid will not be joining us tonight—he is entertaining business acquaintances,’ Zahra explained as they sat down.
Felicia relaxed with relief. So at least one of her wishes had been granted. Now all she needed was for her good fairy to wave her wand twice more—once to bring Faisal home and a second time to dissipate Raschid’s dislike—but such wishes were hardly likely to be granted, not if Raschid had anything to do with it.
‘Did your sightseeing tire you?’ Zahra asked solicitously. ‘You look very pale.’
‘A little.’ But it wasn’t her tour of the shops and town that had left her feeling so drained, it was her clash with Raschid and the disturbing thoughts it had aroused. Now wasn’t the time to question the strength of her feelings for Faisal, but for some reason she was finding it increasingly difficult not to compare Faisal to his uncle. Raschid would never allow anyone to dictate his way of life! She was being unfair, she reminded herself. Faisal had very little choice in the matter. Raschid had the whip hand!
‘Has Zahra told you that my elder daughter and her family are to pay us a visit shortly?’ Umm Faisal asked, as Selina heaped Felicia’s plate with savoury saffron rice.
Felicia shook her head and looked enquiringly at Zahra.
‘Yes, it is true,’ the younger girl acknowledged. ‘Nadia is to join us at the oasis. You will like her, Felicia, she looks very much like Faisal.’ She smiled understandingly when Felicia flushed; which only increased her own feelings of guilt, for it had been of Raschid’s darkly sardonic features of which she had been thinking and not Faisal’s.
She toyed listlessly with her food while Umm Faisal and Zahra discussed the arrangements which had to be made for the trip to the oasis. Was the memory of this afternoon’s unpleasantness destroying Raschid’s appetite? Did a mental image of her face torment him? Somehow she doubted it.
Refusing coffee, Felicia excused herself. Her small white lie that she had a headache was not entirely untrue. The beginnings of tension in the back of her neck had spread to her temples and she was glad to lie down on her bed and let her mind wander at will, relaxing under the hypnotic hum of the air-conditioning and the perfumed velvet of the Eastern night.
A tap on the door roused her, and she sat up and smiled reassuringly at Selina when she poked her head round the door.
‘The Sitt is wanted downstairs in Sheikh Raschid’s study.’
At first Felicia thought the girl had made a mistake, and knowing that her English could not always be relied upon, she shook her head kindly. ‘Sheikh Raschid is entertaining some friends, Selina, I do not think he would want me to join him.’
‘Friends all gone,’ Selina replied firmly. ‘Sheikh alone now. Everything quite proper. If the Sitt will come.’
It was obvious that she intended to wait and escort her downstairs, Felicia realised in exasperation. Her dress was slightly creased where she had been lying on it, but there was no time to worry about that now, nor to drag a comb through her unruly curls and wish that tiredness did not give her face such a look of soft vulnerability.
What could Raschid want? A further reiteration of his disapproval? She hesitated, and Selina paused enquiringly at the bottom of the stairs. Giving herself a mental shake, Felicia followed. After all, what could Raschid do? Eat her?
Raschid’s apartments were reached by a corridor linking them with the harem quarters of the house. They had their own private entrance and a large square hall furnished with soft Persian carpets and an intricately carved brassbound chest, plainly of great antiquity. Old-fashioned oil lamps threw a soft glow across the well polished floor.
There was richness here, and simplicity too, the one harmoniously blending with the other to give a feeling of timeless serenity which had the immediate effect of soothing her ragged nerves. The tall, narrow windows were open to the night, and the sharp scent of the lime trees stole in with the dusk.
‘This is the Sheikh’s study, sitt,’ Selina said respectfully, motioning her towards an iron-studded wooden door. Felicia gave her a wan smile, uncertain as to whether she should go straight in or knock. The decision was made for her when the door opened abruptly.
In the half light Raschid seemed to tower above her, and Felicia bit back a gasp. She would never have recognised him. He was wearing a dishdasha—the traditional white flowing robe of the Kuwaitis—his headdress hiding the night-black hair, a dark cloak lavishly embroidered with gold thread worn casually across his broad shoulders.
‘What is the matter, Miss Gordon?’ he asked urbanely as he ushered her into the room.
‘N-nothing,’ Felicia stammered, but her eyes remained glued to the undeniably impressive figure he made, outlined against the starkness of the white walls.
‘When dealing with my compatriots I find it better to wear the traditional garb of our country. In point of fact the dishdasha is more comfortable by far than Western-style suits.’
‘And far more impressive.’ She could have bitten her tongue out, when he turned and stared coolly at her. A frisson of awareness tingled across her skin, and she shivered slightly, despite the warmth of the night.
‘And what, I wonder, does that remark imply? That you think me a posturing fool, practising for a part in The Desert Song?’
Anger underwrote the cold words. Horrified, Felicia stammered a denial. No European could ever have worn the flowing garment with the grace of his Arab counterpart, and her surprise had sprung merely from the fact that this was the first time she had seen Raschid dressed in the traditional manner. Although she would not have admitted it to a soul, when he opened the door to her, for a moment he had embodied every single one of her romantic teenage dreams.
And now to crown all her other follies she had offended Raschid’s pride, touching the most sensitive spot of his personality. She bit her lip, wishing they were on good enough terms for her to explain that he had misunderstood.
‘What? Nothing to say for yourself?’ he asked harshly, surprising her with the raw anger she sensed beneath the words. He moved with the stealth of the desert fox and the sureness of an Arab stallion, coming to stand at her side and spinning her round to face him.
Felicia moistened her lips, wetting them with a nervous tongue, the movement instantly stilled as Raschid’s gaze pounced on the betraying gesture.
‘Why did you send for me?’
He released her, and she could feel her nerve ends quivering with relief as the tension eased.
‘Merely to give you this,’ he replied, handing her an envelope bearing an airmail stamp.
Her heart lurched. It was from Faisal; it must be! With eager fingers she reached for the envelope, and her hand brushed against Raschid’s as she did so. It was like receiving an electric shock. She shrank back, recoiling from the contact, her face pale as she gripped her letter.
‘You may cease the charade, Miss Gordon,’ Raschid mocked. ‘The ordeal is over. You have your letter, which you can take to your lonely bed to read and perhaps remember the nights you have spent in my nephew’s arms. Faisal is no stranger to the delights of the flesh, but then I have no need to remind you of that, have I?’
‘No, you have not,’ Felicia agreed, suppressing her instinctive denial of his accusations. For some reason allowing Raschid to believe that she and Faisal were lovers made her feel safer, although why she could not have said.
She saw his face darken, tightening with anger and contempt. No doubt she had just confirmed his initial impression of her, but she no longer cared. Secretly in the hidden recesses of her heart she was beginning to doubt her own ability to make Faisal happy, but her pride would not allow her to admit her discovery to Raschid. Time enough to know that he had been right