The impropriety of asking a perfect stranger to escort her to a foreign land obviously hadn't occurred to her. Yet Nicholas hesitated to correct her. The plea in her voice, in those huge gray eyes, made him suddenly wish he could do what she asked.
Slowly he lifted his hand to her face. Tenderly, with his thumb, he wiped away a tear she had missed. "I'm afraid I can't," he said softly.
Just then the bay stallion which had been standing obediently lifted its head to sniff the wind. Nicholas turned to watch as a small, dark-skinned man appeared from behind the willows. He wore the native dress of India, a white cotton tunic and loose trousers, and a plain turban wrapped around his head.
Seeing him, the girl sat down abruptly, smoothing her rumpled skirts and wiping at her red eyes again with the handkerchief.
The small man approached with a soft tread and bowed low before the girl, his dark forehead nearly touching his knees. "You gave me great fright, missy-sahib. You should not have strayed so far in this strange place. The Erwin Sahib will say I do not take care of you. He will beat me and cast me out—may Allah protect me."
Nicholas expected the giri to take exception to the servant's scolding, but instead her tone was one of fond exasperation, not defiancé.
"Uncle Oliver will not beat you, Chand. He never blames you when I misbehave."
"You have been hiding yourself from me again." The Indian raised his eyes heavenward. "What have I done to deserve such ingratitude?"
She actually looked contrite. "I am sorry. But you needn't have worried, Chand. I've come to no harm. This gentleman—" She gave Nicholas a quick glance that carried a hint of shyness, "—has been kind enough to lend me his handkerchief."
Protectively, the servant scrutinized Nicholas and his manner of dress, but the dark little man must have been reassured, for he tendered another bow before addressing the girl again. "The Erwin Sahib has requested your presence. May I say you will come, yes?"
She sighed. "Yes, Chand, tell my uncle I shall be there in a moment.''
The servant did not appear pleased with her response, but he bowed again and withdrew, muttering under his breath. Nicholas was left alone with the girl.
"My Uncle Oliver," she said by way of explanation. "He is paying a call on the duke. Uncle Oliver brought me here to England because he feels responsible for me, but I know he will be happy to wash his hands of me."
Nicholas smiled, gently. "Then you had best begin at once to change his mind."
The faint smile she gave in return was tentative, shy, but a smile nonetheless. "Thank you for not telling Chand . . . about the acorns. He would have been ashamed of me." She hesitated, twisting the handkerchief in her fingers. "I owe him my life, you see. In India, when I was a child, he pushed me from the path of a rogue elephant and saved me from being trampled. That was why my papa engaged him— to watch over me and keep me out of mischief."
"Is he ever successful?"
Her eyes widening, she stared at Nicholas a moment before apparently realizing he was teasing her. The rueful smile she gave him this time was genuine. "I suppose I am a sore trial to him sometimes."
Nicholas could well believe it. "Just promise me you won't throw any more acorns. You are dangerous with those things."
"Well . . . all right, I promise."
He rose then, dusting off his buff trousers. Looking down at the girl, he felt strangely lighthearted; she had quit weeping, and the grief had faded from her eyes.
Without another word, he mounted the Barb. But as he rode away, he gave a final glance over his shoulder. The girl was sitting with her arms wrapped around her knees as she stared at the lake—contemplating her future, he guessed.
Satisfied, Nicholas turned his attention to his own future, to the bitter score that needed settling. Today he had turned twenty-one. He was celebrating not his birthday, but his freedom; today he had received the duke's reluctant blessing to return to his country, the land the French had named Algeria.
Freedom! For himself and his father's people. He would return, with but two purposes filling his heart: to drive the French from his homeland, and to seek vengeance against the man who so brutally had claimed the lives of his beloved parents.
Freedom! How sweet it would feel to set foot once more in his native land. To gallop across the hot desert plains, to slake his thirst at a well, to find refuge from the heat in the rugged mountains. How glad he would be to give his back to this cold, damp country with its hypocritical morals and twisted notions of civilization.
A moment later, when he passed his silk hat where it had fallen, he left it lying in the dust. No longer would he have need for that or any other English thing. Not his fashionable clothing, not his name of Nicholas Sterling.
Henceforth he would resume the noble Berber name he had been given at birth. Henceforth he would be known as Jafar el-Saleh.
Part One
Her passion is quite African; her desires are like a tornado in the desert—the desert, whose burning vastness is mirrored in her eyes—the desert, all azure and love, with its unchanging sky and its fresh, starry nights.
HonorÉ de Balzac
Chapter 1