Agatha Christie - Appointment with Death

"I suppose you're right," said Sarah gloomily. "What a horribly accurate mind reader you are. I keep trying to humbug myself and you won't let me."

At this moment the others returned. The guide seemed the most exhausted of the three. He was quite subdued and hardly exuded any information on the way to Amman. He did not even mention the Jews. For which everyone was profoundly grateful. His voluble and frenzied account of their iniquities had done much to try everyone's temper on the journey from Jerusalem.

Now the road wound upward from the Jordan, twisting and turning with clumps of oleanders showing rose-colored flowers.

They reached Amman late in the afternoon and after a short visit to the Graeco-Roman theatre, went to bed early. They were to make an early start the next morning as it was a full day's motor run across the desert to Ma'an.

They left soon after eight o'clock. The party was inclined to be silent. It was a hot airless day and by noon when a halt was made for a picnic lunch to be eaten, it was really, stiflingly hot. The irritation on a hot day of being boxed up closely with four other human beings had got a little on everyone's nerves.

Lady Westholme and Dr. Gerard had a somewhat irritable argument over the League of Nations. Lady Westholme was a fervent supporter of the League. The Frenchman, on the other hand, chose to be witty at the League's expense. From the attitude of the League concerning Abyssinia and Spain they passed to the Lithuania boundary dispute of which Sarah had never heard and from there to the activities of the League in suppressing dope gangs.

"You must admit they have done wonderful work. Wonderful!" snapped Lady Westholme.

Dr. Gerard shrugged his shoulders. "Perhaps. And at wonderful expense, too!"

"The matter is a very serious one. Under the Dangerous Drugs Act-" The argument waged on.

Miss Pierce twittered to Sarah: "It is really most interesting traveling with Lady Westholme."

Sarah said acidly: "Is it?" but Miss Pierce did not notice the acerbity and twittered happily on: "I've so often seen her name in the papers. So clever of women to go into public life and hold their own. I'm always so glad when a woman accomplishes something!"

"Why?" demanded Sarah ferociously.

Miss Pierce's mouth fell open and she stammered a little. "Oh, because-I mean-just because-well-it's so nice that women are able to do things!"

"I don't agree," said Sarah. "It's nice when any human being is able to accomplish something worthwhile! It doesn't matter a bit whether it's a man or a woman. Why should it?"

"Well, of course-" said Miss Pierce. "Yes-I confess-of course, looking at it in that light-" But she looked slightly wistful. Sarah said more gently: "I'm sorry, but I do hate this differentiation between the sexes. 'The modern girl has a thoroughly businesslike attitude to life!' That sort of thing. It's not a bit true! Some girls are businesslike and some aren't. Some men are sentimental and muddle-headed, others are clear-headed and logical. There are just different types of brains. Sex only matters where sex is directly concerned."

Miss Pierce flushed a little at the word sex and adroitly changed the subject. "One can't help wishing that there were a little shade," she murmured. "But I do think all this emptiness is so wonderful, don't you?"

Sarah nodded. Yes, she thought, the emptiness was marvelous… Healing… Peaceful… No human beings to agitate one with their tiresome inter-relationships… No burning personal problems! Now, at last, she felt, she was free of the Boyntons. Free of that strange compelling wish to interfere in the lives of people whose orbit did not remotely touch her own. She felt soothed and at peace. Here was loneliness, emptiness, spaciousness… In fact, peace… Only, of course, one wasn't alone to enjoy it. Lady Westholme and Dr. Gerard had finished with drugs and were now arguing about guileless young women who were exported in a sinister manner to Argentinean cabarets. Dr. Gerard had displayed throughout the conversation a levity which Lady Westholme, who, being a true politician, had no sense of humor, found definitely deplorable.

"We go on now, yes?" announced the tar-bushed dragoman and began to talk about the iniquities of Jews again.

It was about an hour off sunset when they reached Ma'an at last. Strange wild-faced men crowded around the car. After a short halt they went on. Looking over the flat desert country Sarah was at a loss as to where the rocky stronghold of Petra could be. Surely they could see for miles and miles all around them? There were no mountains, no hills anywhere. Were they then still many miles from their journey's end?

They reached the village of Am Musa where the cars were to be left. Here horses were waiting for them-sorry looking thin beasts. The inadequacy of her striped wash frock disturbed Miss Pierce greatly. Lady Westholme was sensibly attired in riding breeches, not perhaps a particularly becoming style to her type of figure, but certainly practical.

The horses were led out of the village along a slippery path with loose stones. The ground fell away and the horses zigzagged down. The sun was close on setting.

Sarah was very tired with the long hot journey in the car. Her senses felt dazed. The ride was like a dream. It seemed to her afterwards that it was like the pit of Hell opening at one's feet. The way wound down-down into the ground. The shapes of rock rose up around them, down, down into the bowels of the earth, through a labyrinth of red cliffs. They towered now on either side. Sarah felt stifled, menaced by the ever-narrowing gorge. She thought confusedly to herself: "Down into the valley of death-down into the valley of death…"

On and on. It grew dark, the vivid red of the walls faded, and still on, winding in and out, imprisoned, lost in the bowels of the earth.

She thought: "It's fantastic and unbelievable… a dead city."

And again like a refrain came the words: "The valley of death…"

Lanterns were lit now. The horses wound along through the narrow ways. Suddenly they came out into a wide space-the cliffs receded. Far ahead of them was a cluster of lights.

"That is camp!" said the guide.

The horses quickened their pace a little-not very much-they were too starved and dispirited for that, but they showed just a shade of enthusiasm. Now the way ran along a gravelly waterbed. The lights grew nearer. They could see a cluster of tents, a higher row up against the face of a cliff. Caves, too, hollowed out in the rock.

They were arriving. Bedouin servants came running out.

Sarah stared up at one of the caves. It held a sitting figure. What was it? An idol? A gigantic squatting image?

No, that was the flickering lights that made it loom so large. But it must be an idol of some kind, sitting there immovable, brooding over the place… And then, suddenly, her heart gave a leap of recognition.

Gone was the feeling of peace-of escape-that the desert had given her. She had been led from freedom back into captivity. She had ridden down into this dark winding valley and here, like an arch priestess of some forgotten cult, like a monstrous swollen female Buddha, sat Mrs. Boynton…

Mrs. Boynton was here, at Petra!

Sarah answered mechanically questions that were addressed to her. Would she have dinner straight away-it was ready-or would she like to wash first? Would she prefer to sleep in a tent or a cave?

Her answer to that came quickly. A tent. She flinched at the thought of a cave; the vision of that monstrous squatting figure recurred to her. (Why was it that something about the woman seemed hardly human?) Finally she followed one of the native servants. He wore khaki breeches much patched and untidy puttees and a ragged coat very much the worse for wear. On his head the native headdress, the cheffiyah, its long folds protecting the neck and secured in place with a black silk twist fitting tightly to the crown of his head. Sarah admired the easy swing with which he walked, the careless proud carriage of his head. Only the European part of his costume seemed tawdry and wrong. She thought: "Civilization's all wrong-all wrong! But for civilization there wouldn't be a Mrs. Boynton! In savage tribes they'd probably have killed and eaten her years ago!"