At last Corinne, the dancer, asked her what her plans were for the future, and when told Corinne raised her eyebrows a little.
‘A restaurant of your own? That’s rather ambitious of you, isn’t it? I always had the impression that you were one of those girls who would marry early. In fact I’m surprised you aren’t engaged already, especially in view of your background.’
When Danielle looked puzzled she explained lightly, ‘Your stepfather, Dan. Don’t tell me he doesn’t have some eligible man waiting in the wings for you. I mean, in the Middle East the arranged marriage is still very much the thing, isn’t it, especially among the wealthy upper classes? A friend of mine was involved with one of them several months ago. She’s a girl who’s in the show with me, and it’s taken her simply ages to get over him. Apparently some of these men are really dynamite, if you’re prepared to accept that you’ll never be anything to them but something on the side.’
Danielle grimaced, not liking Corinne’s expression, descriptive though it was.
‘He loaded Vanessa down with jewels and expensive clothes,’ Corinne continued, unaware of Danielle’s distaste, ‘but when it came to the crunch—marriage,’ she elucidated when Danielle looked puzzled, ‘he told her quite categorically that there was simply no way he was going to marry her. Apparently there was some dutiful little bride already lined up waiting for him. Vanessa was simply furious, and she told him so, but he just laughed at her, apparently. Told her she’d been paid well for the pleasure her body afforded him, but it was over.’
‘At least she got something out of it,’ Linda observed cynically. ‘You hear some pretty unpleasant tales about what can happen to girls who get involved with Muslims in my business. The days are gone when rich Arabs were swept off their feet by fair skin and blonde hair. They’ve realised that everything has its price, and as everyone ought to know by now, when it comes to bartering they’re impossible to beat. Still, if a girl’s sensible she can still do quite well—jewellery, holidays, clothes that sort of thing.’
Feeling faintly sickened, Danielle said it was time for her to leave. It was hard to know who offended her innate sense of chastity most—the girl who so cynically sold her body for jewels, or the man who bought it. On balance she thought the man, because he was using the woman for nothing more than momentary satisfaction and thus completely debasing the very foundations of a mutually caring relationship between the two sexes.
‘Oh, Vanessa didn’t do too badly out of it in that respect,’ Corinne agreed carelessly, ‘but according to her this Jourdan was quite something, and what she really had in mind was marriage.’
Jourdan! The moment she heard the name Danielle went hot and cold all over. Perhaps it was silly of her to leap immediately to the conclusion that the ‘Jourdan’ Corinne spoke of was her stepfather’s nephew, and yet surely there could not be two wealthy Arabs with that same unusual name.
‘Are you okay, Dan?’ Corinne asked her with some concern. ‘You’ve gone quite pale.’
‘I’m fine,’ she lied, collecting her bag and standing up. ‘But I ought to be going. I promised my parents I’d be in for dinner tonight.’ It was a lie, but all at once it had become imperative to learn more about her stepfather’s family, and the only person she could ask was her mother, or failing that, her stepfather himself. On the way home she wondered why she had never thought to question the lack of contact with her stepfather’s relatives before; perhaps because she had been away at school so much, so involved in her own life and her own contentment.
She broached the subject over coffee after dinner. Her parents employed a live-in couple, Mr and Mrs Bennett, who acted as chauffeur and cook respectively, and once Mrs Bennett had removed the remains of their meal and they had retired to the drawing room, Danielle merely waited until her mother had poured the rich, sweet coffee her stepfather adored before asking her questions.
‘Danielle!’ her mother protested when Danielle asked why it was that they had no contact with her stepfather’s family.
‘No, Helen, she is right to ask,’ her husband responded, smiling at Danielle. ‘In fact I am surprised that she has not done so before now.’
‘I think I was probably too immature, too wrapped up in my own affairs,’ Danielle admitted honestly.
‘So, and what has prompted this sudden maturity?’ Sheikh Hassan queried, his eyes suddenly sharpening. ‘Could it have been Philippe Sancerre?’
‘Partially,’ Danielle admitted, mindful of her stepfather’s business relationship with Philippe’s family and not wishing to prejudice it by making him angry with Philippe. ‘But I think that living at home as I’m doing now has made me realise how isolated we are.’
‘Well, I can tell you the main reason,’ Danielle’s mother began. ‘Ahmed’s family did not approve of his marriage to me. Oh, they were quite within their rights,’ she added before Danielle could object. ‘After all, what did they know of me? Your stepfather has had to give up a great deal to be with us, Danny.’
The reversion to her baby name made Danielle smile a little, her own eyes misting over as she saw the tears in her mother’s as she turned to her husband.
‘My family were wilfully and blindly prejudiced,’ he said softly. ‘And never for a moment doubt that I have not treasured every second of my life with you, Helen.’ His free arm came out to encircle Danielle. ‘The happiness the two of you have brought to my life has enriched it like rain to the parched desert.’
‘And now we shall be even happier,’ Danielle’s mother said with a smile. She turned to Danielle. ‘Hassan’s family want a reconciliation.’
‘Even Jourdan?’ Danielle could not resist saying a little bitterly.
Her stepfather’s protective arm dropped and it seemed to her that her parents exchanged a look which excluded her totally; a look which made her blood run cold with a nameless fear.
‘What do you know of Jourdan?’ her stepfather asked her quietly.
‘Only that he didn’t want you to marry my mother; that he considers women to be animated toys designed specifically for his pleasure, and that when he’s finished with them he throws them aside like so many unwanted empty cartons.’
‘Jourdan is of the desert,’ her stepfather said, without making any attempt to deny her words. ‘He has its strength and endurance, and perhaps a little of its cruelty, but there is another side to him. No man can live as the hawk for all his life; there comes a time always when he needs the softness of the dove; when even the fiercest heart cries out for the tranquillity of the oasis. In Jourdan, it is true that this side is well hidden. I will not ask where you learned so much of my nephew,’ Sheikh Hassan added, ‘for I believe I already know the answer. It is not always wise to allow the hawk and the sparrow to grow up together, for the sparrow will always seek to taint the nobility of his fellow, knowing its lack in himself.’
‘Philippe is not a sparrow,’ Danielle protested, shocked by the cynical twist of her stepfather’s lips.
‘No? Were you aware that his father had approached me for your hand in marriage on Philippe’s behalf?’
Even as she absorbed the formally old-fashioned words Danielle’s shocked face betrayed that she had not.
‘Danielle.’ Her stepfather’s arm round her shoulders comforted her distress. ‘You must not blame him too much. Philippe is a young man with expensive tastes, and as the daughter of an extremely wealthy man—and a very, very beautiful daughter, of course, Philippe has the sybarite’s love of beauty as well as wealth—a man who already has business connections with his father, what could be more natural than that his practical French mind should turn towards marriage?’
‘I thought he liked me,’ Danielle murmured bleakly. ‘I had no idea…’
‘But you did not love him? There had been no intimacy between you?’
Danielle heard her mother’s small protest above the sharpness in her stepfather’s voice and regained enough of her normal calm independence to say sardonically,
‘Fortunately, no.’ She turned to her mother with a bleak smile. ‘How lucky you’ve been, darling. Two men have loved you—if all the men I meet are going to turn out like Philippe and Jourdan, I doubt if I’ll ever find one to love me.’
‘Jourdan? Why do you mention him?’ her stepfather demanded, while Danielle was still trying to come to terms with her own admission to herself. She did want someone to love her, and to love them in return. She was obviously not as independent as she thought, and not for the first time she wished that her parents’ care of her had not been quite so protective. She might feel just the same as other girls her age, but in many ways she was not, and she was forced to admit that her view of love had probably been too coloured by her stepfather’s obvious adoration of her mother. She knew that he was probably unique among his own race, but she was now beginning to wonder if he was not also unique among men in general.