Donkey-Vous Read Online Free PDF Page B

it.”
    “And you’re sure about that? About him being there, I mean?”
    Lucy thought again. “Yes, I’m pretty sure.” She tossed her head. “No, I’m definitely sure.”
    “And that would have been about fourish. You’re not able to place the time more precisely?”
    “About five to four. We’re always
on
the terrace by four.”
    “And then you had tea. Was Monsieur Moulin having tea?”
    “No, I don’t think so.”
    “He was just sitting at the table?”
    “Yes.”
    “Looking around for someone? As if he was expecting them?”
    “Yes. Of course, now I think about it, it might have been her.”
    “And then what?”
    “Well, then we finished our tea.”
    “And did you notice Monsieur Moulin any more? Did you see him leave his table, for instance?”
    “No.”
    “Go down the steps?”
    “He might have been ogling me,” said Lucy with a toss of her curls, “but I wasn’t ogling him.”
    “You stayed on the terrace for about how long?”
    “About an hour.”
    “And when you left, was Monsieur Moulin still at his table?”
    “No,” said Lucy.
    “That’s definite, is it?”
    “Yes, because I can remember seeing the tea things on the table and wondering why the waiters hadn’t cleared them. They’re very good here, you know.”
    “One last question, Miss Colthorpe Hartley,” said Mahmoud. “You said your father joined you later?”
    “A bit later.”
    “Thank you. In fact, thank you very much for being so helpful.”
    “I’m glad I’ve been helpful,” said Lucy. “I’m not usually. Daddy says I’m scatterbrained, but I’m not really. I just sometimes
choose
to be scatterbrained.”
    She got up to go. Mahmoud rose too.
    “You’re very nice, aren’t you?” she said to him. “You’ve got such sweet brown eyes. But such a sad face!”
     
    “I haven’t got a sad face, have I?” asked Mahmoud.
    They were having lunch ’round the corner. By the time they had finished with Miss Colthorpe Hartley, it was nearly noon. The heat had driven everyone off the terrace and back into the cool of the hotel, first to lunch and then to the darkness of their bedrooms.
    Owen normally worked till one-thirty and then went to lunch at the Sporting Club, but today it was too hot even to do that, so he and Mahmoud found a small Turkish café in one of the side streets near the hotel. Even that was nearly deserted. Although there were one or two tables outside, none of them was taken. The few customers had retreated with the proprietor into the dark depths of the interior where the sun never penetrated. A small boy served them with cups of Turkish coffee and glasses of iced water. They would eat later.
    “No, I don’t think so.” Owen considered him. “No, I don’t think so at all.”
    Mahmoud if anything looked very bright and alert. Miss Colthorpe Hartley must have been misled by his Arab looks.
    “Sometimes I feel depressed,” said Mahmoud. “I felt depressed this morning when I was talking to the old lady and the man.”
    “Don’t take any notice of him. He’s just a stupid bastard.”
    Mahmoud shrugged. “He’s just Army, that’s all. I’m used to people like him. But the old lady was different. She was very polite but she made me more depressed, if anything. She reminded me of Nuri.”
    Nuri Pasha was a common acquaintance and the father of what might have been called, if anyone had dared risk the description since there was nothing petite about Zeinab and she was a forceful person, Owen’s own
petite amie
.
    “It’s because they’re the same generation and have similar social backgrounds,” said Owen. “She put my back up too.”
    “She’s rich, of course. She must be, to be at the hotel.”
    “It’s not just that.”
    “It’s the way they look down on you.”
    “I wouldn’t let it bother you.”
    “It’s easier for you.”
    “Not much.”
    “Being British, I mean.”
    “We escape some things, but don’t escape others.”
    “You feel about her the way I