Arabesque Read Online Free

moment of merriment.
    “Yes?”
    “I was only reminded of them. Intelligence tests. The doc says
curiosity
and you say
cats
, and then he makes a note on your card: ‘Will be fit for brigadier in
later stages of war if beard not too long’.”
    “What are you thinking of now?” she asked invitingly.
    “You know.”
    Casually, abominably, he waved his hand in a gesture that included her room, her bed, herself, as if the disposal of the lot were a mere convenience.
    Such coarseness produced, always, a cold anger in Armande. Her normal reaction was to shut up and be conscious of good breeding. She might lose a shade of colour, but indifference,
untouchability, were as obvious to the offender as to her. She was therefore horrified to feel herself blushing.
    The sergeant watched her gravely. His attitude was more exasperating than ever. He had the impudence to look protective—the sort of swine, she thought, who fails to make physical contact
and then starts a sort of mental pawing.
    “You know, you go all luscious and motherly,” he said, ignoring her embarrassment as if it were of no importance, “and then are surprised at the trouble it causes.”
    “I do not!” snapped Armande, angry with herself for answering at all.
    “Damn you!”
    “Are you mad?”
    “No, no,” he explained. “I was only helping. ‘I do not, damn you’, was what you wanted to say.”
    “I never thought of it.”
    “Then you should have thought of it.”
    Armande rose.
    “Tell your commanding officer,” she said, “that I shall be very pleased to give him any information he wants.”
    “We only discuss such matters with the firm’s principals,” murmured Prayle. “Now pack up your little Hoover, and the office boy will see you safely past the
hatstand.”
    Armande smiled faintly and politely, and then found that the corners of her mouth were quivering. The smile would not contract.
    “I’ve tired you,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
    She hesitated, and then answered simply:
    “I am very tired. None of you leave me alone.”
    “I suppose not. Well,
we
shan’t bother you any more.”
    “Oh, come again if it’s your duty,” she said with weary courtesy.
    “No need. I told you I hadn’t got my idea any more.”
    “Good-bye then.”
    “Tr
è
s bien!”
he exclaimed in an execrable French accent.
    It was annoying to be patronised, but she did want to know why he had come.
    “Tell me,” she said.
    “It was just that all your men—no, not fair, that!—all these young men will have it that you belong to the British Secret Service as they call it.”
    “I have never said or implied—” she began indignantly.
    “I know you didn’t.”
    “How do you know?”
    “Because I’ve talked to you. You haven’t that kind of vanity. And you aren’t interested in money.”
    “And suppose I wanted to get information out of them?” she suggested.
    “Then a security sergeant would be a very useful friend. My approach was abrupt of course. And beastly true. Still, if you had been expecting something of the kind … As it was, your
gentle response—seven wise virgins with seven large lamps. Bang, bang! Crash, crash! All on your uncle’s noggin!”
    “You are a vulgar beast,” said Armande with a half laugh.
    “Yes. It’s a pity.”
    “Stop it, then.”
    “Stop it? Why should I stop it?” he answered with sudden bitterness. “What else is there?”
    When Sergeant Prayle had left, Armande settled her aching head on the pillows and lay still, staring at the ceiling. She was exhausted by Prayle and the military in general. These men all gave
her a sense of being on the defensive, morally and sexually. Yet what on earth had she done? Stayed in Beirut when she should have left. That was all. Loujon thought she was a British agent. Prayle
thought—God knew what he thought! This ridiculous Prayle did not think at all. He jumped from one intuition to another.
    Loujon was right. It was certainly time to do something. But