Edward Whittemore - Nile Shadows

Maud laughed.

Can I get you something to eat? she asked. You must be starved.

I must be, but I don't feel it. I think I might have a drink though.

Have it then. Do you want me to get it?

No, don't bother yourself, I can manage. Where do you keep it?

In the kitchen. In the cabinet over the broom closet.

Swept away, said Joe, and disappeared inside.

Maud heard the cabinet door bang in the kitchen. It swelled and stuck sometimes in the heat, and then flew back against the wall unless you were expecting it. She heard Joe muttering to himself. Glass clinked and there was the sound of ice being broken out of an ice tray.

I forgot to mention the cabinet door, she said when he came back.

Joe smiled.

It makes a racket all right when there's somebody as clumsy as me around. It just goes to show I'm not cut out for this kind of work. The moment I feel a little safe I go crashing around as if I didn't have a care in the world.

He took a long drink from his glass and sat down on the low wall of the balcony. Maud was bent over her knitting. She spoke without looking up.

You seem to drink a lot.

I do, yes.

Does it help?

Yes, I'm afraid it does.

Well that's good then, I guess.

No it isn't, Maudie, it's a kind of weakness surely, but it eases things. So often the world seems such a dark and unyielding place that anything that stills the whispers inside seems to have its uses, even when you know it's a false quiet.

Could you stop, do you think?

If I had to. Human beings seem to be able to do about anything if they have to. Even those things they're doing right now out in the desert.

Maud bent her head, a sudden uneasiness coming over her. She was trying not to let him see her concern, but he felt it anyway.

Are you really sure Bletchley's going to let you leave?

Not sure, no, but it seems likely. If it were going to be otherwise I don't think he'd be handling it like this, giving me the afternoon off and telling your Colonel to give you the afternoon off, too.

But you said he's having you followed again.

Just company, Maudie. I suppose Bletchley doesn't want anything to happen to me between now and tonight. Besides, I was the one who gave him the opportunity by going back near Menelik's crypt, which I knew he'd be having watched. I didn't have to do that.

Why did you then?

So he'd know where I was today and know there was nothing to worry about.

But why didn't you just stay out of sight until tonight?

Well for one thing, I wouldn't have been able to see you then. And anyway, it seemed like the time had come to get some things out in the open. After the way the Major went on last night about Stern and Colly, Colly in particular, it just didn't seem that Bletchley would have gone to all the trouble it must have taken to get me over here, just to do me in in the end.

But does the Major's opinion count? Does it really matter that he happens to have such a high regard for Colly's memory? Bletchley may feel very differently about it. About everything.

He may, but I doubt it.

But how can you be sure?

I can't.

Well I don't like it, Joe. It frightens me. Bletchley has a reputation for being very single-minded.

As well he should be, in a job like that.

But people say he'll stop at nothing to get what he wants.

I know, he told me so himself once. He said he'd do anything to defeat the Germans. Anything, and he meant it.

But couldn't that mean you're still in danger?

I don't think so. Bletchley has always treated me in a certain way, which I can respect, and besides, there comes a time when you have to trust somebody. You play it alone as best you can for as long as you can, and then finally you have to come out and say, Look, this is all there is. This is all I am and I can't do anymore. Eventually that time comes, and I know it and Bletchley knows it and it's just that simple in the end.

It doesn't sound simple, said Maud in a low voice. Nothing about it sounds simple to me.

Joe watched her affectionately as she bent over her knitting needles. It was the second or third time she had brought it up. . Was it going to be all right? Was he going to be able to leave Cairo? Why would Bletchley let him go after all the things that had happened?

And of course Joe understood her concern. He knew she couldn't share the relief he felt, because she hadn't been through what he had experienced since his arrival in Cairo. For him, something was coming to an end and there was a finality about it, and the inevitable calm that brought. But not so for Maud.

Stern was dead and that was final, but the other parts of her life were still the same. It was all just as precarious for her as it had been a day or a month or a year ago, and their son Bernini was still in America and none of that had changed, and there was no finality, no ending. It looked now as if Joe would be able to escape and that was wonderful, a blessing, but everything else was still the same for her.

Except that the British might not be able to hold the line at El Alamein, which would mean packing up and leaving for Palestine and leaving the little place she had made for herself here… moving again, returning to Palestine again after all these years. After all, she had only gone there once in her life and that was long ago when she had first met Joe in the crypt of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. So long ago now, when her dreams had still been young. .

Her hands came to rest in her lap, her head bowed. All at once she felt utterly exhausted. To move again? Couldn't anything ever stay the way it was for just a little while?. . But then all at once Joe was standing behind her and she felt his hands on her shoulders, and even now, despite the years. .

Joe? There's one thing you don't have to worry about, at least. The Major's feelings are every bit as strong as you think they are. I've heard him talk about Colly and all the rest and. . well you see the Major, Harry and I, we're. . close.

Are you? Well that's good, Maudie, I'm glad to hear it. It makes it so much better when there's someone to share with. . And I liked him too, for what that's worth.

He's not just the way he appears sometimes, she said. There are other sides to him. It's just that he's young and sometimes he romanticizes things and. . well, he's young.

Joe smiled warmly.

And a good thing, too, for a man to be. As I recall, I moved along those lines once myself.

He nodded, smiling, then turned serious.

So you mustn't worry, my love. It's going to be all right, I know it. . And what were you thinking about just now, I wonder? Besides this good piece of news about Harry?

Oh. Oh I was thinking about Jerusalem. A friend there has written, asking if he can help in any way. He doesn't know what I do here, what I really do, but he said he could always find me a place in Jerusalem if I needed one.

Ah and that's just fine, Maudie. You have some very good friends who think of you.

I'm fortunate.

You are, but it's not by chance, you know that. People do such things because they know how much you've always cared, because you've taken the time to show them and it means a lot to them. It helps them. To them you're a still point, a touch of sureness and certainty in all the flux and turmoil.

She frowned.

A still point? I don't feel that way at all. I don't feel there's anything certain about my life. It's all been just one wrenching experience after another, and I haven't handled any of them very well.

Oh yes you have, Maudie, better than most of us ever do. You've worked hard to understand people and it shows. Just look at that little table inside the door. There are letters from all over the world there, people you've befriended through the years in one place or another, people who remember and want to stay in touch, because it helps them to do that.