I stared at the letter. The words seemed to dance a mad dance like the dervishes in the market place.
"A daughter of mine and a son of yours." He had meant Theodosia at the time. Tybalt knew the terms of the will. And, of course, when Sir Ralph had become so taken with me and Theodosia had wished to marry Evan, he had offered me as the bride. It was for this reason that he had sent for Tybalt. He would have explained to him. "Judith is my daughter. The will stands if you take her." And Sir Ralph who had loved me had known that I wanted Tybalt. He had given Tybalt to me even though Tybalt had had to be bribed to take me.
It was all becoming clear, heartbreakingly clear.
Theodosia had married for love. Poor Theodosia who had enjoyed married bliss so briefly! And I had married Tybalt and the settlement had been made.
And now that the money was safe in the coffers of the "Profession," Tabitha was free.
Tabitha had always been a strange woman, full of secrets. And Tybalt, what did I know of Tybalt?
I had loved him for years. Yes, as a symbol. I had loved him from the moment I saw him in my foolish, impetuous way. I loved him no less now. But I had had to learn that he was ruthless where his profession was concerned. And where his marriage was concerned too?
What had come over me?
I went to the window and opened the shutters. I could look out beyond the terrace to the river. White-robed men; black-robed women; a train of camels coming into the town; a shepherd leading three sheep, carrying a crook, looking like a picture I had seen in Dorcas's Bible. The river dazzling in the bright sunshine; up in the sky a white blazing light on which none dared gaze; the hot air filling the room.
Then from the minaret the muezzin's cry. The sudden cessation of movement and noise as though everyone and everything down there had been turned to stone.
It is this place, I thought. This land of mystery. Here anything could happen. And I longed then for the green fields of home, the golden gorse, the soft caressing southwest wind; the gentle rain. I wanted to throw myself into the arms of Dorcas and Alison and ask for comfort.
I felt alone here, unprotected; and an ominous shadow was creeping closer.
I was passionate in my emotion. Hadn't Dorcas always said I was too impulsive? "You jump to conclusions." I could hear Alison's voice. "You imagine some dramatic situation and then try to make everything fit it. You should stop that."
Alison was right.
"Look at it squarely," Alison again. "Look it right in the face. See the worst as it really is, not as you're trying to make it and then see what is best to do."
Well, I am jealous, I said. I love Tybalt with a mad possessiveness. I want him all to myself. I do not want to share him even with his profession. I have tried to be proficient in that profession. Ever since I was a child and loved him I have been interested. But I am an amateur and I can't expect to be taken into the confidence of these people who are at the head of their profession. I am jealous because he is at the site more than with me.
That was logical and reasonable. But I was forgetting something.
I had heard Tabitha's voice: "It's too late, Tybalt, too late."
And I had read Sir Ralph's letter to Sir Edward. A bribe to marry his daughter. A quarter of a million pounds for the cause if he did so.
The money had been passed over. It was safe in the hands of people who would use it to further the cause. And now Tabitha was free. I had served my purpose.
Oh no. I was being ridiculous. Many people married for money; loving one woman they married another.
But they did not murder.
There. I had faced it. Could I really suspect Tybalt and Tabitha of such a criminal deed? Of course I could not. Tabitha had been so kind to me. I remembered how sorry she had been because I had had to work for the disagreeable Lady Bodrean; she had lent me books; she had helped me improve my knowledge. How could I suspect her? And Tybalt? I thought of our marriage, our love, our passion. He could not have feigned that, could he? True, he had never been so eager, so fervent, so completely in love as I and I had accepted that as a difference in our natures.
But was it so?
What did I know of Tabitha? What did I know of Tybalt?
And here I was, with evil thoughts chasing themselves round and round in my head. I had inherited Theodosia's fear. I knew how she had felt when she had listened to the soothsayer. I understood the terror that had gripped her.
We had come to a strange land. A land of mystery, of strange beliefs, where the gods seemed to live on wreaking their vengeance, offering their rewards. That which would have seemed ridiculous at home was plausible here.
Theodosia's premonitions of disaster had proved to have substance. What of mine?
I could not stay in my room. I would go and sit on the balcony.
On the way down I met Tabitha, going up to her room.
"Oh hello, Judith," she said, "where have you been? I was looking for you."
"I took a little walk in the market and then came back. It was so hot."
"I must just have missed you. I was out there too. What do you think the soothsayer told me this time: 'You will have your bridegroom,' he said. 'It will not be long now.' So you see I'm fortunate."
"No black bat for you then?"
"No, a husband no less."
"Should I congratulate you . . . both. Who is the bridegroom to be?"
Tabitha laughed; she lowered her eyes; then she said: "It is a little premature to say. No one has asked me. Perhaps that's to come."
She was smiling secretly as she passed on upstairs.
I had begun to shiver as I had in the Temple. I went out into the hot air but I felt cold and could not stop the shivering.
I did not tell Tybalt about the letter. I hid it in a little box of embossed leather which I had bought from Yasmin some time before. I had mended the case and filed the letters in order.
Leopold Harding came to say goodbye. He said he had already stayed longer than he intended to. "Meeting you all and talking to you made it so fascinating. Even now I find it hard to tear myself away."
Tybalt told him that he must visit us in England.
"I shall take you up on that," was the reply.
There was to be a conference which would be held at the hotel. I gathered that the funds which had been set aside for this expedition were getting low and it had to be decided whether work could be continued.
Tybalt was anxious. He was afraid it would be voted to discontinue, something which he could not accept.
"To stop now at this stage would be the utmost folly," he said. "It was what happened to my father. There has been a fatal accident but that could have happened anywhere. It's these absurd rumors."
He went off with Terence, Hadrian, and other members of the party to the hotel. The palace seemed very quiet without them.
It was during the morning that one of the servants came to tell me that a worker from the site had come to see me.
He had hurt himself and wanted me to dress his wound with my now famous salve.
When I went down to the courtyard I found the young man whose wound I had dressed before and whom I knew as Yasmin's lover.
"Lady," he said, and held out his hand. It was grazed and bleeding a little. I told him to come in and I would boil some water and wash it before anointing it with my salve and bandaging it.