O Jerusalem - Laurie R. King [114]
The American Colony, north of the Old City, was precisely what it sounded like: a family of Americans who had come over in the 1880s and stayed to do good work through increasingly evil times. Their main house, originally built by a Turkish pasha for his several wives, was a two-storey stone block surrounding a private courtyard garden, strongly Eastern in its character. The night was cold; nonetheless I surrendered my cloak and followed a young man, who despite his accent and skin tone seemed more family than servant, through rooms that combined the high, airy arches of the Orient with the heavy furniture and grass-plumes-in-brass-pots motif of Victorian decorating, into the courtyard that sparkled with hanging lamps and glowing braziers, made even more festive by the delicate play of a fountain. My hostess quite obviously had no idea who I was, but received me graciously and introduced me to all the men nearby. And most of the people in the garden were men, many of them officers with red tags marking them as being on the staff of General Allenby, with a very few wives and not one unattached woman other than the daughters of the house and myself. Holmes was nowhere to be seen. I wondered if he would appear at all, or if I was to be abandoned here to my own resources, having no idea whatsoever why I was here or what I was to do, and feeling fairly certain that my hosts were asking each other the same questions about this unescorted and slightly dubious young woman they had in their midst. I had to pull myself together and make a good show of it, but it was impossible not to feel uncomfortable. I cursed to myself, and resolved to give Holmes hell when he finally appeared to rescue me.
My sour reflections were broken into by a handsome young cavalry officer who came to stand in front of me and ask, “May I refresh your glass, Miss Russell?”
“I beg your pardon?”
His confident moustache seemed to droop a bit at my response. “Er, your glass? I wondered if you might not care for another drop. Perhaps, well, there are other things to drink. If you like, that is.”
I took a deep breath, exhaled, put my problems to one side, lowered my chin, and raised my eyes to his. “I’d adore another refreshment,” I purred at him, and watched his pink face turn pinker and his moustache positively bristle with pleasure.
The glass he brought back might not have qualified as strong drink, precisely, but at least it was neither sweet nor fruity. I swallowed, and decided that if I had to play the rôle dictated by this dress and the extreme earrings Holmes had left for me, I was going to do it with all my heart. If Holmes wanted a nineteen-year-old not-quite-a-lady, that is exactly what he would get.
When Holmes finally arrived, ten minutes before the dinner bell, it would have been difficult to say which of us was the more taken aback at the other’s companions: Holmes took in my collection of handsome and attentive young officers with a sharply raised eyebrow, and I finally felt myself blush under the glance of the man at his side. Neither of the new arrivals greeted me, which on Holmes’ part I took to mean that I was not supposed to know him. His companion simply did not recognise me.
The two newcomers were taken the rounds by our pleased hostess, introduced by rank to those they did not know (of course, Holmes knew very few of them, and none knew him) until they made it to my circle of junior officers, who stood so rigidly to attention that they might have been made of stone. The general’s permission to be at ease had little effect on their spines, or their tongues. The introductions finally came around to me.
“And this is Miss Mary Russell, General, a visitor here. Miss Russell, General Allenby.” On hearing my name the