The Desert Castle Read Online Free PDF Page B

to a tiny spider that she knew wouldn ’ t do her any harm, let alone a scorpion!
    ‘ Do you get many scorpions in your castle ? ’ she asked him in a voice that trembled. ‘ Or any other creepy-crawlies ? ’
    ‘ I ’ ve learned to cope with them, ’ he answered. ‘ No doubt it ’ s been good for me to have to fend for myself. Insects are no respecters of persons. ’
    ‘ I don ’ t think I could, ’ Marion confessed, swallowing hard. She suspected he was getting his own back, but she couldn ’ t be quite sure. He couldn ’ t have known that the mere sight of a spider was enough to reduce her to jelly.
    ‘ Well, you only have to call and I ’ ll come, ’ he said, and his mouth relaxed into a blinding smile that caught her well below the ribs and made her wonder if it was only the thought of scorpions and their like that could knock the stuffing out of her.
    Marion had to admit that Gregory Randall had looked after their comfort pretty well. She couldn ’ t fault the standard of their rooms, or the appetising dinner that was s erved to them in the dining-room downstairs. He had even waited patiently while she and Lucasta had exclaimed over the souvenirs that were on sale in the small boutique at the foot of the stairs. Lucasta had wanted to buy everything in sight, including an elaborate model of the Golden Mosque in Jerusalem, the Dome of the Rock, where Abraham is believed to have made his sacrifice to the Lord, and the place from which the Prophet Mohammed made is nocturnal ascent into Paradise. Marion gently dissuaded her, turning her attention to the carved figures in olive wood made by the Christian Arabs of Bethlehem.
    ‘ But I want something from Amman, ’ Lucasta had protested. ‘ I ’ ve quite made up my mind ! ’
    ‘ Then you ’ d better think what it is going to be over dinner, ’ Gregory had insisted. And it had been he, in the end, who had chosen a small piece of Bedouin jewellery for them both, and who had paid for them too.
    Indeed, Marion was quite sorry in the morning when Gregory brought his T o yota Landcruiser round to the front of the hotel, telling his niece to wipe the sleep out of her eyes as, while it did feel like six o ’ clock to her, in his book it was already gone eight and it was time for them to be away.
    By daylight, Amman looked even more untidy than the night before. Small specialised shops lined the fantastically steep streets that climbed up and down the seven main hills of the city. In places there were breaks in the houses to reveal a sandy cliff which had not yet been built up, and everywhere there were television aerials; receiving not only Jordanian programmes, but from Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Saudi Arabia as well. Marion thought the disordered charm of the place was an elusive quality that she would never be able to describe to her mother when she wrote to her. What could one say? That here one could still look into the crowded shops and see tailors making bespoke suits, and shoemakers actually making shoes by hand in their doorways. It lent an old-fashioned note to streets that were as remote from the supermarkets and department stores of the West, as was the almost complete absence of women from the scene.
    It didn ’ t take them long to leave Amman and Zerqa, the only industrial town in the country, behind them. Ahead stretched the desert turned to gold in the early sunlight, though the soil was more pink than brown or yellow in colour, and this was intensified in the distant hills, Slashed by blue and purple shadows which gave away how far away they really were. It seemed one could see for miles in any direction. Mile upon endless mile of wilderness: no wonder the desert was supposed to be so satisfying to the spirit .
    ‘ One day I ’ ll show you the more famous Desert castles, ’ Gregory told them. ‘ Qasr Amra, and Qasr el Azraq, where Lawrence of Arabia had his headquarters for a while, while he was waiting to go on to Damascus. But today I