Justice Hall - Laurie R. King [9]
Ten years earlier, my cry might have been more serious: Before wartime shortages had changed both fashion and social mores, even a three-day country house visit would have required a dozen changes of clothing, and more if one intended to venture out for a day’s shooting or to sit a horse. With the relaxed standards of 1923, however, I thought I might be allowed to appear in the same skirt from breakfast until it was time to dress for dinner. Thus, two or three suit-cases instead of that same number of trunks.
I piled a selection of clothing on my bed and, since I knew she would repack them anyway as soon as my back was turned, left Mrs Hudson to it. I found Holmes just closing up his single case, which I knew would contain everything from evening wear to heavy boots.
“You don’t imagine dinner will be white tie, do you, Holmes?”
“If the possibility presents itself, we can have Mrs Hudson send a gown and your mother’s emeralds.”
“I cannot imagine Mahmoud in white tie. But then, I can’t imagine Mahmoud in anything but Arab skirts and khufiyyah.”
“The revelations have been thought-provoking,” he agreed, surveying the contents of his travelling-razor case and then slipping it into the bag’s outer pocket. “Although you may remember, I said at the time they were not native Arabs.”
“True, but I believe you identified their diphthongs as originating in Clapham.”
He raised his eyes from the trio of books he had taken up, and cocked one eyebrow at me. “Surely you understood that to be a jest.”
“Oh, surely.”
He discarded two of the volumes and pushed the survivor in after the razors. “By the way, Russell, our guest seemed anxious that we wipe those names from our tongues. Our Arab guides are now, I take it, Alistair and Maurice. Or possibly ‘Marsh.’ ”
“Not Mr Hughenfort and the Duke of Beauville—or would it be Lord Maurice? Or, not Maurice, what was his first given name? William? What is the proper form of address for a duke who is refusing his title, anyway?”
“I believe the matter will be simplified when we are presented as old acquaintances.”
“Well, if he’s changed as much in appearance as Ali has, it won’t be difficult to call him by another name. You do realise, by the way, what his name means?”
“A pleasant irony, is it not?”
Maurice, which one might translate as “The Dark-Skinned One,” has its origins in the word “Moor.” Maurice: The Arab.
Patrick brought the motor to our door in time for the afternoon train. We loaded our cases in the boot and settled an ill-looking Alistair into the back, well swathed in furs and with two heated bricks at his feet. At the station, we had to help him up into the train carriage—his bruises had now stiffened, and the blood loss he had sustained made him quite vulnerable to the cold November air. We retained the heaviest travelling rug and wrapped him in it against the inadequate heat of the compartment; he was asleep before the train pulled out of Eastbourne.
I nestled down into my own fur-lined coat and, while I watched Alistair Hughenfort sleep, meditated on that peculiar human drive, loyalty.
On entering Palestine in the closing days of 1918, Holmes and I had been pushed into the vehemently unwilling arms of two apparently Arab agents for the British government intelligence service—that is, Holmes’ elder brother, Mycroft. We had begun on a note—an entire chorus—of mistrust, resentment, and dislike, and only slowly had those abrasive feelings softened beneath the continuous rub of shared tribulation and danger. When I had proved that I would, if pushed to the extremity, kill to protect our band of four, Ali’s eyes had finally held a degree of respect. When later we demonstrated our willingness to die for each other, we were forever bound, like it or not.
Five years or fifty, when people have sweated, suffered, and shed blood together, there can be no hesitation: If one calls, the other