They came to Baghdad - Agatha Christie [36]
Out of the dimness a young woman came up to Victoria and said in careful English:
‘What can I do for you, yes, please?’
Victoria looked at her. She wore corduroy trousers and an orange flannel shirt and had black dank hair cut in a kind of depressed bob. So far she would have looked more suited to Bloomsbury, but her face was not Bloomsbury. It was a melancholy Levantine face with great sad dark eyes and a heavy nose.
‘This is – is this – is – is Dr Rathbone here?’
Maddening still not to know Edward’s surname! Even Mrs Cardew Trench had called him Edward Thingummy.
‘Yes. Dr Rathbone. The Olive Branch. You wish to join us? Yes? That will be very nice.’
‘Well, perhaps. I’d – can I see Dr Rathbone, please?’
The young woman smiled in a tired way.
‘We do not disturb. I have a form. I tell you all about everything. Then you sign your name. It is two dinars, please.’
‘I’m not sure yet that I want to join,’ said Victoria, alarmed at the mention of two dinars. ‘I’d like to see Dr Rathbone – or his secretary. His secretary would do.’
‘I explain. I explain to you everything. We all are friends here, friends together, friends for the future – reading very fine educational books – reciting poems each to other.’
‘Dr Rathbone’s secretary,’ said Victoria loudly and clearly. ‘He particularly told me to ask for him.’
A kind of mulish sullenness came into the young woman’s face.
‘Not today,’ she said. ‘I explain –’
‘Why not today? Isn’t he here? Isn’t Dr Rathbone here?’
‘Yais, Dr Rathbone is here. He is upstairs. We do not disturb.’
A kind of Anglo-Saxon intolerance of foreigners swept over Victoria. Regrettably, instead of the Olive Branch creating friendly international feelings, it seemed to be having the opposite effect as far as she was concerned.
‘I have just arrived from England,’ she said – and her accents were almost those of Mrs Cardew Trench herself – ‘and I have a very important message for Dr Rathbone which I must deliver to him personally. Please take me to him at once! I am sorry to disturb him, but I have got to see him.
‘At once! ’ she added, to clinch matters.
Before an imperious Briton who means to get his or her own way, barriers nearly always fall. The young woman turned at once and led the way to the back of the room and up a staircase and along a gallery overlooking the courtyard. Here she stopped before a door and knocked. A man’s voice said, ‘Come in.’
Victoria’s guide opened the door and motioned to Victoria to pass in.
‘It is a lady from England for you.’
Victoria walked in.
From behind a large desk covered with papers, a man got up to greet her.
He was an imposing-looking elderly man of about sixty with a high domed forehead and white hair. Benevolence, kindliness and charm were the most apparent qualities of his personality. A producer of plays would have cast him without hesitation for the role of the great philanthropist.
He greeted Victoria with a warm smile and an outstretched hand.
‘So you’ve just come out from England,’ he said. ‘First visit East, eh?’
‘Yes.’
‘I wonder what you think of it all…You must tell me sometime. Now let me see, have I met you before or not? I’m so short-sighted and you didn’t give your name.’
‘You don’t know me,’ said Victoria, ‘but I’m a friend of Edward’s.’
‘A friend of Edward’s,’ said Dr Rathbone. ‘Why, that’s splendid. Does Edward know you’re in Baghdad?’
‘Not yet,’ said Victoria.
‘Well, that will be a pleasant surprise for him when he gets back.’
‘Back?’ said Victoria, her voice falling.
‘Yes, Edward’s at Basrah at the moment. I had to send him down there to see about some crates of books that have come out for us. There have been most vexatious delays in the Customs – we simply have not been able to get them cleared. The personal touch is the only thing, and Edward’s good at that sort of thing. He knows just when to charm and when to bully, and he won’t rest till he’s got the thing through. He’s a sticker. A fine quality in a young man. I think a