City of Jasmine Read Online Free PDF Page A

with a wide veranda and comfortable sitting room linking our bedrooms. The bedrooms had modern furniture, but the sitting room was fitted with traditional Eastern divans, long and low and thick with tasselled silk cushions.
    The maids bustled, unpacking and hissing at one another in French and Arabic, occasionally breaking into giggles when they discovered something unexpected like my leather aviatrix suit or Aunt Dove’s French underwear. But I merely stood and surveyed the surroundings while Aunt Dove flipped through the post that had been waiting for us.
    I gave her a suspicious look. “Do you know the manager? From before I mean?”
    Her expression was determinedly innocent. “Who? Étienne? Oh, our paths have crossed from time to time.” Before I could ask more, she took me in hand. “We’re travel-fatigued,” Aunt Dove pronounced. “It happens when one passes too quickly from one culture into another. I’ve always said trains were uncivilized. One ought only ever to travel by steamship or camel.”
    “So sayeth the woman who has learned to fly my aeroplane,” I remarked. A large bowl of orchids had been placed upon a low table between the cushion-strewn divans and I bent to sniff it.
    Aunt Dove waved off my remark. “That is entirely different. Aeroplanes are novelties, not real travel. No one would ever want to use them for anything other than publicity. Now, I want a beefsteak and a cigarette and a stiff whisky, not necessarily in that order. Go and wash for dinner, child. It’s time to see Damascus.”
    * * *
    Thanks to a broken strap, I was ten minutes later than Aunt Dove in getting ready and found her in the crowded lobby. She was wearing a gold turban with her great paste emerald brooch and an armful of enamelled bangles that clattered and clinked as she gestured. The lobby was one of the many courtyards of the hotel, this one furnished with the usual divans and endless pots of flowering plants and palms. Soft-footed servants trotted back and forth with trays of cocktails and little dishes of nuts while a discreet orchestra played in the corner. The place was thronged with international visitors, most of whom were craning to get a look at Aunt Dove. She was chatting animatedly with the handsomest man in the room. There was nothing unusual about either of those things. She often dressed with originality, and one of her greatest skills was finding the most attractive and charming men to do her bidding. She caught sight of me just as I descended the stairs and waved an elegant hand.
    “Evie, darling, come and meet Mr. Halliday. He’s a British diplomat posted here to keep an eye on those wily French.”
    I extended my hand and he took it, staring at me intently with a pair of delightfully intelligent grey eyes. “How do you do, Mr. Halliday? Evangeline Starke.”
    “Miss Starke,” he said, shaking my hand slowly and holding it for an instant longer than he ought.
    “Mrs.,” I corrected gently. “I am a widow.”
    A fleeting expression of sympathy touched his features. “Of course. The war took a lot of good men.”
    I didn’t bother to correct him. Gabriel had died during the war—just not doing anything useful like actually fighting.
    He glanced to Aunt Dove. “Lady Lavinia was just telling me about your Seven Seas Tour, but she needn’t have. I’ve been following your exploits in the newspapers. It’s dashed thrilling. Will you be doing any flying here?”
    “Not just yet. My plane is still in Italy. Aunt Dove and I are here for pleasure. We mean to relax and revive before we move on to the Caspian for the next leg of our tour.”
    “Damascus is the place for that,” he assured me. “Lots of picturesque sights and loads of delicious gossip, but it’s just the spot for shopping or lounging in a bathhouse or lying by a fountain and letting the world pass you by.”
    Those pursuits would interest me for about a day, but I smiled. “I’m very interested in how the interim government