Herewith The Opening ~~ Section 1 and the first paragraph of Section 2 ~~ for the Short Story "Black Heart", third in the collection Sailing with Mystery, featuring artist Isabella Newcombe Tarrant.
1
“Come to Cairo. See the pyramids,” her friend Nedda had urged. “I will
run mad if I have no one reasonable to talk with.”
Isabella agreed with excitement. Nine days in a hotel in Port Said with
nothing to do didn’t appeal.
She never expected to stand on the desert road for an hour, waiting for
the following truck to arrive and rescue them.
Everything around was dry desert, peaked dunes to one side of the
half-burned road and ridges of mixed sienna and umber rising as a buttress
against the drifting sand. Deep shadows in the ridges looked like the eyepits
of a skull. The shadow-black rocks crumbled from heat and time. To her, the
whole landscape looked alien, stark and intriguing.
The Egyptian desert looked nothing like Crete, where she had met her
husband Madoc. The darker sandy rocks reminded her of the American southwest,
where Aunt Letitia and Uncle Roger had lived, all red rock canyons or endless
stretches of barren plains. Yet the desert southwest had scrubby pines, knotted
junipers, and creosote bushes. Wildlife abounded: pinyon jays and wrens and
thrashers, jackrabbits and coyote and deer.
Here, she only saw a distant falcon soaring on the updrafts. Nothing
appeared to move in the landscape. Isabella had wanted to sketch a long-eared
fennec or the precious-looking gerbil or a sleek gazelle. She’d only heard the zit-zit-dweedle
of the scrub warbler once, as their truck jounced through the outskirts of
Cairo.
Fanning herself with her wide-brimmed straw hat, she turned to watch the
men standing at the road, a few yards behind the truck that had caused their
halt a half-hour ago. Arms emphasizing his points, the Egyptian driver talked
with Col. Werthy, Richard Owen, and Neal Gallagher. The four men had changed
the first punctured tyre. It lay beside them, useless, for a tyre on the other
side had also gone flat.
No one had apparently considered a second tyre blown, yet here they all
stood, driver and the fifteen passengers who had crowded into the truck’s cargo
box. And they all watched the shimmering distance towards Cairo, hoping the
second truck would arrive soon.
Nedda dropped the hand shading her eyes and turned to Isabella. She
looked cool and crisp in her khaki traveling suit. Isabella, in blue cotton,
felt a wrinkled lump melting in the rising heat. The ends of the green scarf
tied about her dark hair fluttered in the breeze. “I’m going back into the
truck before I’m burned to a crisp.”
A tarp for shade was fixed above the truck box. While driving, the wind
blew under the tarp and cooled them. Without movement, the dark canvas would
trap the heat.
“The canopy will block the breeze,” she warned.
“I can tolerate heat. I cannot stand being fried. I think my nose is
burned.” Nedda touched the tip gingerly.
“You should have crowded into the motorcar with the Ingrams.”
Nedda rolled her eyes at the suggestion and headed for the truck.
The motorcar had paused when the truck ground to a halt. The second truck
to Giza, with luggage and supplies, was supposed to be close behind, yet after
a quarter-hour, it still hadn’t arrived. Mr. Ingram, Nedda’s employer, had
given the signal to drive on. His chauffeur had consulted their truck’s driver
before he obeyed the order. Nedda had declined the offer to squeeze between
Sheridan Ingram and the teenaged Colfax. None of the Ingrams had looked back as
the Vauxhall touring car drove away.
Mrs. Gallagher and her daughter Shirley had clambered back into the truck
after it was lowered from the jack. The Fremonts had joined them, complaining
loudly about their discomfort. They would still be blaming the driver if Col.
Werthy hadn’t warned them to stop. Their daughter Savina lurked near the four
men, no doubt waiting for the colonel to abandon the conversation so she could
hang upon his arm.
Isabella sighed. Catching a whiff of cigarette smoke, carried from behind
her, she turned to see Mrs. Phoebe Drake standing alone. Still out of the truck
were four men and one woman, clustered in its shade. Only the precise Clive
Rexford was unrumpled by the morning’s drive. He had ridden in the cab with the
driver rather than on the benches attached around the cargo box. Older than the
others, he didn’t slouch against the truck, unlike the two young men whose
names Isabella couldn’t remember.
They had pushed back their straw boaters, revealing one blond head and
one ginger. Hands shoved in their jacket pockets, they scowled at the empty
road.
Padgett Michaels talked with the woman he was trying to impress. Chloe
Ladwick, with her soft brown curls and China blue eyes, had curves that rivaled
Savina Fremont. The young men usually danced attendance on her, and Mr.
Michaels appeared to have fallen into the same snare. No ingenue, she viewed
her fellow passengers with jaded boredom that she didn’t try to hide.
“Have you recovered from those wooden benches?” Mrs. Drake asked, coming
the last few steps to stand beside Isabella. She waved her cigarette holder,
lacquered red, a bit of modern chic at odds with the barren desert. “I admit to
gratitude for the punctured tyres.”
She smiled, sharing the sentiment. “And our hand-luggage knocking into our
knees while we rattle along.”
“What do you think of our fellow travelers in distress?” Although her
cerulean linen dress had wrinkled, Phoebe Drake still kept her svelte poise,
her dark hair in a sleek chignon and her pale skin unflushed. The widow wasn’t
a great beauty, but her dramatic appearance rivaled Savina and Chloe.
She judged the ten feet to the others. They chatted loudly. As she
looked, Padgett Michaels passed a cigarette to the bored young woman. Lowering
her voice, she said, “I wish they would not complain so loudly. We’re driving
across a desert. We shouldn’t expect the paved roads of London.”
The woman chuckled. “Is that not the behavior of the tourist abroad? To
expect English roads and a green landscape, comfortable accommodations and
bland food, the rain and chill of our summers? I will say that accommodations
in Cairo and Port Said surprised me. Our hotel in Port Said is lovely.”
“It reminds me of a house on Crete, with balcony rooms overlooking an
inner garden and a fountain.”
“The classic Mediterranean structure.” Her bright green eyes scanned the
landscape while she drew on her cigarette. The lacquered cigarette holder
matched the shade of her lipstick. “I could wish our hotel in Cairo had a
lovely garden.”
“I believe we stay in tents at Giza. That is what Mr. Ingram told Nedda.”
Isabella fanned her hat.
“Tents?” Painted eyebrows lifted. Those red lips compressed, a break in
her elegant mask. “We are living rough.”
The conversation dried, arid as the desert. Phoebe smoked while Isabella
watched the falcon soaring through the updrafts from the endless sands. The
intense sunlight hurt her eyes. The heat sucked moisture from the air, refusing
to let her melt.
The conversation by the road continued. Clive Rexford abandoned his group
and strolled to them. The sand, shifting underfoot, prevented his usual
determined stride.
At the truck, the two young men had found a point of contention. They had
straightened away from the truck as they argued. One gestured, his hand cutting
down. The dispute didn’t yet equal the day’s heat, but the Fremonts and the
Gallaghers looked over the side of the truck.
Cigarette hanging from his mouth, Padget Michaels described something
with minute gestures, shaping it with his hands then pointing to imaginary
parts in his palm. Miss Ladwick nodded, but her gaze remained on the two men a
couple of yards away.
“A pendant or a brooch?” Phoebe asked.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Our antiquities hunter. He has to be describing jewelry. Only gemstones
or gold would hold Miss Ladwick’s attention.”
Mr. Rexford reached them. “Ladies.”
“You abandoned your group just in time.” Phoebe pointed with the thin red
holder.
He didn’t look around. “The argument would have brewed whether I stoked
it or not.”
Nedda had joined the watchers peering from the truck box. Her green scarf
was bright against the dark tarp. Mr. Fremont called down, trying to silence
the rising argument. Mr. Michaels left off his description and drew Miss
Ladwick toward the rear of the truck.
Isabella looked for Werthy and Owen. They still talked to the driver
although the raised voices had caught Mr. Gallagher’s attention. “What is the
dispute, Mr. Rexford?”
“Who knows? The heat. The dryness of the day. A wink from Miss Ladwick.
Who will escort her to dinner. I have more interesting things to consider.”
“Such as?” Phoebe prompted.
He scowled at the cigarette smoke wafting his way and turned to Isabella.
“I find it interesting, don’t you, that two tyres gave out simultaneously? Slow
punctures, that’s what Mr. Gallagher said. Not holes, not tears or ruptures.”
His precise tone clipped the words. “As if an icepick were thrust into the
tyres. And here we are, stranded in the middle of the desert.”
“Not quite the middle of the desert,” Phoebe drawled.
“Not quite stranded,” Isabella added. “The other truck will be here
soon.”
“Yet it is considerably delayed. I thought our driver said that we were
traveling together. A curious circumstance, is it not?”
Isabella didn’t want to talk about the tyres. She had avoided it with
Nedda, and she didn’t intend to have that conversation now. When she had a cool
drink with refreshing mint, maybe then. Talking about it now only borrowed
trouble.
A shout from the road drew their attention.
The driver pointed toward Cairo. Werthy and Owen shaded their eyes to
peer along the road. Isabella tried to see, but the shimmering desert defeated
her.
“Ah, the other truck,” Rexford said.
Phoebe tossed the cigarette from the holder. “Do you see it?”
“Not yet, but what else would give our driver such joy?”
A second set of shouts came from the stopped truck. A woman screamed,
brief, sharper than a raptor.
“I expected this.” Rexford sounded pleased.
Beside the truck the two young men faced off, fists raised in classic
boxing stance. They circled each other. They had taken the time to shed their
jackets which Miss Ladwick held. She watched avidly, too avidly in Isabella’s
mind. Is she the thirty that I think she is? And still acting the silly
girl, impressed by boys fighting over her?
Mr. Michaels climbed into the truck, avoiding Shirley Gallagher’s escape
onto the sand. Her mother’s demand that she “come back this minute” added to
the noise.
Col. Werthy and Richard Owen pounded past, Mr. Gallagher steps behind
them. Before they arrived, a flurry of punches were thrown. Fists smacked
flesh. Both men staggered back. Then they lunged forward to grapple together.
One man’s nose bled red onto their white shirts.
“Oh, a fight.” Savina Fremont stopped beside them. “Chloe must be so
pleased.”
Owen grabbed one man’s punching arm and forced it back.
Werthy seized the other man and flung him back. He thudded into the
driver’s door. Bouncing back, he met a solid punch to his jaw. That cast him
back into the truck. He must have hit his head, for he slid down to the running
board and slumped.
Owen held the other young man at arm’s length against the side of the
truck.
The shouts died. Shirley peeked around the back corner of the truck then
minced over to Chloe Ladwick. The movement caught her father’s attention. He
rounded on her. Whatever he said, low and vehement, caused both women to
exchange glances then sidle toward Isabella’s group.
“He’s amazing,” Savina gushed. No one asked who she meant. Her attraction
to the colonel was well known.
Isabella started for the truck.
Werthy whipped around. His glass-grey eyes flashed with inner fire. “Stay
back. All of you. Stand over there with Rexford. The other truck is coming, and
we’ll have to jack this one again to change the other tyre. You two,” he turned
on the young men. His orders were low and curt.
They straightened and headed for the back of the truck to help the women
down, one of them wiping at his bloody nose with a handkerchief.
Nedda offered him another handkerchief after he steadied her climb down. He cast the soaked one into the sand then turned to help the buxom Mrs. Fremont.
2
“Well,” Nedda said when she joined Isabella, “that relieved the tedium.”
The chugging diesel of the other truck heralded its steady approach. Their
driver waved his arms and jumped up and down.
Dabbing at his nose, the young man stopped beside them. Except for the
blood on his shirt and a cut on his cheek, he looked like any other young man,
athletic and sun-touched, attractive with health. His cheerful smile seemed at
odds with the fight only minutes before. Freckles dotted his face, and the wind
lifted his ginger hair. He thrust the reddened handkerchief at Nedda.
“Keep it, please. I have others.”
“My apologies, ladies. I shouldn’t have—well.” He gestured. “That will
not happen again.”
“See that it doesn’t,” Nedda said crisply, for all the world like a
maiden aunt decades older rather than a few years. “We’ll speak no more of it. Should
you assist with the other tyre?”
“The colonel has it in hand.”
The other truck rumbled and rattled in, stopping behind their truck. The
driver stepped down and surveyed the problem while their driver explained. Then
they two with Werthy, Owen, and Mr. Gallagher set to work. The second truck’s
spare replaced the second punctured tyre. The drivers rolled the discarded
tyres to stow in the back of the second truck with the supplies and luggage.
Jacket over his shoulder, Werthy came to them, rolling down the sleeves
of his shirt. His eyes had lost their lightning ferocity. The wind ruffled his
dark hair, grown longer in the three weeks that Isabella had known him. Behind
him, Owen herded the other passengers to the first truck. “I want you two
riding in the cab with me. Owen will drive the other truck.”
“What?” Nedda protested, but Isabella merely nodded. “First truck or
second?”
“Second. Owen will drive the first one. He’ll take Caveley in the cab
with him. Hetteridge can ride in cargo with both drivers, in with the luggage.
I think it wise that we keep them separated for the rest of the drive.”
“Why were they fighting?”
He shrugged into his jacket. “Caveley said that Hetteridge hit him for no
reason.”
“They were arguing,” Nedda pointed out. “They had a reason.”
“You were there. What did you hear?”
“Nothing that made sense.”
“Then we’ll find out at camp, when we’ve all had time to cool down.”
“Are we far from camp?” Isabella asked, wishing this day and its fraught
events laid to rest. The sun rode high in the sky. Hours would have to pass
before her wish came true.
“Another half-hour, Khalil says. Over the next rise we should see the
pyramids. You’ll have time for photographs with the great Sphinx and to walk
around. Try a few sketches,” he added, knowing Isabella had her sketchbook. He
searched out his cigarette case and matches.
“And take yet more dictation from Mr. Ingram.” Nedda sighed heavily.
Lighting his cigarillo, Werthy paused long enough to give a broad grin.
When the thin cigar was going, he nodded to the second truck. “I’m driving. Get
your things and put them in the cab.”
Even enclosed and cramped with three on the seat, the truck cab was more
comfortable than the wooden benches in the cargo box. The wind gusted through
the open windows and swirled around. The pyramids soon appeared in the cracked
windshield, dominant but hazy in the midday heat. The nine pyramids filled the
sandy plain, called the Giza Necropolis. The tallest loomed over the others.
They didn’t look like any other structure Isabella had seen. They were alien as
the arid desert, intriguing in their difference.
Dust streamed away from the wheels of the truck ahead. The canopy
flopped, admitting flashes of light into the cargo box. The others jounced on
the wooden benches, fixed around the two sides and against the cab’s back. With
Werthy’s rearrangement, they were less crowded. Talkative Shirley Gallagher
squeezed between her parents. Savina and Chloe chatted. Mr. Fremont had his
arms folded, not talking to his wife, who dabbed her brow and neck with a white
handkerchief. Rexford and Michaels sat across from each other, also not talking.
Nedda drew the green scarf from her dark head. “Tell us, colonel, the
reason you wanted a private conversation before we reached camp.”
He glanced over then directed his gaze to the sand-sifted road. “It’s
what the other driver told us while we changed the tyre.”
“About this delay?”
“He had to change trucks. The first one refused to run. He drove it with
no trouble this morning, all the way from the garage to the hotel, but the
motor sputtered then quit before he managed fifty feet from the hotel. Sand in
the petro tank.”
“Sand? How does—?” Isabella stopped.
“Sabotage,” he answered. “While this truck had two punctured tyres. Owen
thought an icepick.”
“Mr. Rexford told us that. Mr. Gallagher told him.”
“Sabotage,” Nedda mused. “With an icepick from the hotel? And sand from
the streets. Easy enough, I suppose. It’s simply another prank. Like the
latches that broke on Miss Harlow’s suitcase. Every dock worker had a view of
her unmentionables.”
“She was mortified.” Isabella remembered the older woman’s profuse
apologies and tears. “We think she was targeted because she was a missionary.”
“Harmless pranks,” Nedda added. “Like the fountain pen exploding all over
that girl’s dimity dress in the Reading Salon.”
“And salt switched for sugar when the hotel served breakfast before we
left Cairo.”
“The deck chairs that came unscrewed. Colfax told his grandfather about
that. It’s the one time that young man exhibited any interest in what happened
aboard ship.”
“I saw him around the trucks this morning,” Isabella quietly inserted,
“while we gathered.”
Werthy ground his teeth. “That’s not good. Sherry assured me the boy
wouldn’t be a problem.”
“For your secret mission?”
He leaned forward to glare around Isabella at Nedda. “Just what do you
know, Miss Cortland?”
“Isabella shared an interesting bit of information about you and Richard
Owen and Sheridan Ingram.”
“Nedda! You had already guessed!” she protested.
“How much do you know, Miss Cortland?”
“A better question would ask what I don’t know,” she drawled, “but we
shan’t speak of that. Better to talk about all of those shipboard pranks.” Her
dark eyes opened wide as she looked at Isabella. She nudged with her elbow. “Like
gluing the discs to the shuffleboard deck.”
“And the marbles that escaped from the basket of dinner rolls and rolled
around the dining room. That poor steward’s face.”
“The pranks aren’t so harmless,” he retorted. “Milton Tavistock broke a
leg falling down the stairs yesterday morning. His wife nearly fell as well,
hurrying to reach him. A wire was stretched across the stair.”
“Poor Mr. Tavistock. I wondered the reason he and his wife didn’t come on
this excursion. I thought they had changed to go to Alexandria. I didn’t hear
about his fall.”
“Nor I,” Nedda said. “Nor did I know about the salt and sugar.”
Isabella patted her friend’s knee. “Not all the salt cellars and sugar
bowls were switched. You left early, remember? Mr. Ingram had a telegram to
send.”
“But the switched salt and sugar and the tyres means the prankster came
on this excursion. He didn’t stay on the Nomadic or in Port Said. He’s
with us.”
“Or she,” Werthy inserted.
The camp came into view through the cracked windshield. The Giza
Necropolis was an active archaeological site. The diggings were a busy hive,
with tarps placed near the excavations, reminding Isabella of the dig on Crete.
Cold dread worked down her spine and prickled the hair on her arms.
The story continues ....
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