Part 7 (1/2)

of the long narrow corridor much like her own. Each was numbered like hers and all the doors were shut. Which one was Serena's? She stood there frantically, racking her brains. Had Serena told her the number of her cabin? She couldn't remember.

A door opened suddenly, almost beside her, and Toby appeared. She stared at him, startled, then forced herself to take a deep breath. Relaxing her face into a smile she greeted him. 'Ah, a friendly face at last!' Perhaps not the most appropriate thing to say, but the first that came into her head. 'I was beginning to think it was a bit like the Marie Celeste down here. You don't happen to know which is Serena's room, do you?'

He shrugged. 'I'm sorry. I think she's up at the end somewhere, but I'm not sure which one.' Closing his own door after him, he locked it and edging past her with a nod he made for the stairs.

She stared after him for a moment acutely aware with some part of her brain that he was still annoyed with her and that for the sake of her own peace of mind and probably his she was going to have to make amends somehow - probably by showing him the diary. She turned and made her way to the end of the corridor, listening cautiously for a moment at one of the doors where she thought she had heard a movement. There was only silence, as there was at the next. Then from the opposite side of the pa.s.sage she heard the quiet murmur of a female voice. Raising her hand she knocked. The voice fell silent then she heard the clack of wooden sandals on the floor and the door opened. It was Charley.

'Well, well.' She looked Anna up and down as though she were some particularly odd form of low life. 'To what do we owe this pleasure?' Her voice was heavy with sarcasm.

'Is Serena there?'

Charley shrugged. She stepped away from the door and went to sit at the dressing table, leaving Anna in the doorway. 'It's for you,' she called.

The cabin was exactly like Anna's except that there were two beds and two cupboards crammed into a s.p.a.ce barely larger than that of her own. The shower room door, an exact replica of the one in Anna's cabin, opened and Serena appeared, wrapped in a towel. Her short wet hair was pushed back off her face and her shoulders were covered in droplets of water.

'Sorry, I was in the shower.' She stated the obvious with a smile. 'What is it, Anna? Is something wrong?' Her smile faded.

104.

'Something's happened,' Anna blurted out. 'I needed to talk to someone-'

Charley swung round on the stool and stared at her curiously. 'What sort of someone? Someone else's boyfriend, perhaps?'

'Charley!' Serena's voice was sharp. 'Don't be stupid.' She looked back at Anna. 'Give me five minutes. Wait in the lounge. Then we can talk.'

Numbly Anna nodded. She turned away from the door and made her way slowly back to the stairs and began to climb.

The lounge was empty. She stared out of the double doors towards the shaded deck with its awning and tables. It looked pleasant out there - cool out of the direct sunlight. The elderly clergyman and his wife were sitting beneath the awning, cold drinks in front of them, and near them a couple who had told her they came from Aberdeen. At one table she could see Ben. He appeared to be asleep. Toby was seated alone at one of the tables near the door, a beer in front of him beside the open sketchbook. He was working away at a drawing, his back towards her.

She watched him for a while, studying his profile as he reached forward, picked up his gla.s.s, drank and bent back over his sketch- book, his slim brown fingers moving swiftly over the page. From the direction of his gaze she a.s.sumed he must be drawing the graceful minaret she could see above the waving fronds of the palm trees on the opposite bank.

A large tourist cruiser was heading downstream past them. She could hear the beat of music over the pulse of the engines. Judging by the numbers of these huge noisy boats, she thought wryly, a large proportion of visitors to Egypt must be allergic to silence; probably allergic to history too. They were the ones who jostled and laughed at the monuments and listened to no one and looked at nothing. She felt a sudden quick surge of resentment. How was it they could all be so carefree? Many of them had probably come here on a whim, could have gone anywhere, probably had been on package tours all over Europe if not the world, already, whilst she, who had so pa.s.sionately wanted to come to Egypt for so long, was feeling nervous and worried and very lonely.

'Why not come out here and join me?'

She realised that Toby had put down his pencil and was leaning back in his chair. He must have sensed that she was there. Reluctantly she stepped out through the doors. 'Thank you.'

105.

He half rose. 'Can I get you a beer?' It seemed to be a gesture of appeas.e.m.e.nt. 'No. No, thank you.' She tried to modify her refusal by smiling. 'I just came out for a breath of air.'

'Noisy b.a.s.t.a.r.ds, aren't they.' It was as though he had read her thoughts as he nodded towards the cruiser disappearing around the long shallow bend behind them.

'They do rather spoil the silence.'

'It's their way of enjoying themselves. I suppose we mustn't be judgemental.' He glanced at her, the trace of a smile on his lips. 'The birds take no notice. You see the egrets over there, on the trees at the water's edge? They just sit and stare and look enigmatic.'

'They're used to the boats. There must be hundreds of them every day, and I suppose they know the people never get off. Not just here, anyway.' Anna pulled out a chair and sat down at his table. His sketch showed the minaret as she had guessed, together with the palms and a group of flat-roofed mud-brick houses. Since leaving Kom Ombo the boat had been travelling through Nubia and there was a distinct change in the landscape. For one thing the houses were painted bright colours.

'You're lucky to be able to record the trip like this.' She indicated the sketchbook. 'I have to resort to the camera.'

'Are you not a good photographer then?' He was drawing again, cross-hatching a shadow on the page and did not look up.

She felt a quick flash of resentment. 'Why a.s.sume that?'

'I didn't. Your own doubt in the merits of your photography implied it. After all, this must be the most photogenic country on earth. You would have to be singularly inept not to be able to take a pa.s.sable clutch of snaps home for your alb.u.m.'

'My G.o.d, that sounds patronising!' She exploded, unable to stop herself.

'Does it?' His pencil hovered for a moment as though he were considering the matter. 'If so, I'm sorry.' He didn't look it. He merely raised an eyebrow. 'I see you are no longer trundling all your possessions around with you.'

'My possessions?' She stared at him, puzzled for a moment. Then she understood. 'oh, you mean the diary.'

He gave an almost imperceptible shrug. 'Women seem to need to carry huge sacks of stuff with them wherever they go.'

'Unlike men we do not have voluminous pockets.'

106.

He looked up at last and eyed her dress with, she felt, rather more than necessary care. 'I suppose not,' he conceded.

'Anna?' Serena's voice behind her made her look round in considerable relief. The woman was standing looking down at Toby's drawing. 'I don't want to intrude,' she said with a smile.

'No. No, you're not.' Anna stood up hastily. 'I'll leave you to your creative processes,' she said to Toby with some asperity. She did not wait to hear whatever retort he came up with next. Heading for the stairs to the upper deck she led the way up.

Serena followed her to the rail. Companionably she leant on it, watching the pa.s.sing scene for a few minutes. At last she spoke. 'So, aren't you going to tell me what is wrong?'

'Do you think I'm mad?' Anna stared down into the water.

'I doubt it. Unless Toby Hayward has pushed you over the edge. You don't like him, do you?'

There was a long pause. 'He's too acerbic for me. I don't want to spend the holiday duelling. I don't see the need for it. He seems to have a ma.s.sive chip on his shoulder!' She changed the subject abruptly. 'Serena, there is something in my cabin. It's weird. Horrible. I want you to come and look at it.' She shuddered. 'And the bottle has gone.

'Gone?' Serena swung to face her. 'Are you sure?'

'Quite sure. I left it in the make-up bag, in the shower. The bag was open, emptied on the floor.'

'Then it has been stolen. One of the crew perhaps -'

'No. I think it was something - someone - else.' Serena eyed her. 'Anna, sometimes when we're overwrought,' she said gently, 'we start to imagine things. It's easy to do.'

'No.' Anna's voice was bleak. 'Please come with me and see. I'm not overwrought. I'm not suffering from sunstroke. I'm not hallucinating.'

'OK. OK. This is me, remember?' Serena leant across and laid her hand on Anna's arm for a moment. She thought for a second then she went and sat down sideways on one of the sunloungers. 'Tell me exactly what you have seen.

'Our libation to the G.o.ds didn't work,' Anna murmured sadly. She bit her lip.

'It seems not. But tell me what you've seen.'

Anna shrugged. 'Dust. Incense - in my cabin. I don't know what it is, or how it got in there - I can feel them close, Serena. Louisa's 107.