Sweet Roots and Honey

  SWEET ROOTS AND HONEY

  Gwen Westwood

  Perry was somewhat taken aback when she discovered that Fabian Sinclair, whose expedition to the Kalahari desert she proposed to join, did not expect a female to come along. "I see you have plenty of spirit," he said, "and you'll need it."

  What was she to do to win the respect of such a man - and to win his love?

  CHAPTER ONE

  'Are you turning me out into that icy blast so soon?' Denis asked Perry.

  During the short walk across the pavement from the car to the entrance of the block of flats, the cold Johannesburg winter wind had pierced through the clothes they had worn for the evening's dining and dancing, but here in the foyer the air was warm and scented with the clovelike smell of carnations from the big arrangement at the reception desk where the night porter nodded over his cowboy yarn.

  'Sorry, Denis, it has been a long day and tomorrow will be worse. I still have to tie up some ends with Mike. He's catching the train tomorrow morning for that Kalahari expedition and I'm to be left in charge of the studio.'

  'I suppose that means you'll have even less time for seeing me.'

  'I expect I shall be busy,' Perry admitted. 'He's going to be away for at least six weeks.'

  She turned her face at the last moment to avoid his kiss on her lips. With her this was an automatic gesture and, feeling rather ashamed of it, she gave him a swift soft kiss and started to walk towards the elevator.

  He followed her and waited as she pressed the bell.

  'I never knew anyone could look so alluring and be so sisterly. Are you never tempted to forget that cool career girl reputation?'

  Perry smiled and left the question unanswered as she stepped in. As the door closed, she thought she heard Denis saying something about phoning next week.

  There was a mirror in the elevator that was taking her swiftly upwards to the small penthouse on the twentieth floor of this luxury block above the city. It showed a woman, young but no longer a girl, taller than usual with a strong slender figure. Tawny eyes gazed gravely from the oval face with its creamy skin and level mouth, but the startling feature in the mirror was the long beautiful hair that hung in a fall of shining chestnut giving off sparks of bright fire even in this dim light.

  She breathed a sigh of relief as she unlocked the door of her apartment. The large room with its gold and cream furnishings seemed to welcome her and thankfully she changed into a warm dark green velvet house gown and strolled into the small neat kitchen to make herself some hot chocolate.

  She felt restless and somehow dissatisfied tonight. She thought briefly of the past evening. It had been pleasant enough. Denis was her current escort on the Johannesburg scene, agreeable, well-dressed and an amusing companion and like most young men in Johannesburg! obsessed with making money. He seemed to Perry to be one of a long succession of men who had shown interest in her since she had made a success of her career in photography. Over and over again she met the same kind of person from the advertising world.

  But why did she seem to attract men who seemed to require someone stronger-minded than themselves? She supposed it was because she was an independent type herself and invariably made it clear that she was not interested in romance or marriage, so therefore she attracted young men who wanted to steer clear of entanglements but were grateful to find a woman who looked well to take about and who ran a small car and did not expect expensive presents and was always willing to pay her share but liked to go to glamorous places for dining out.

  Inside the flat the air was warm and still faintly fragrant with the scent she had used before going out, an expensive one that was co-ordinated with her bath essence, talc and cologne. It was made in Paris and had a flowerlike yet sophisticated quality.

  Sipping the hot chocolate, she sat curled up on the deep cushions of the tweedy cream settee that was placed so that she could look out upon the wonderful view seen through the plate-glass window. The thousand lights of the city of gold sparkled and twinkled in the bright cold air. The room was warmed by the air-conditioner that gave her coolness in summer, but tonight she regretted even the mock log heater that she had discarded when she had been able to afford this more sophisticated method of heating. She could not remember when she had last sat in front of a real fire. Doubtless Mike would be getting plenty of experience of that kind of thing when he set out on his expedition tomorrow.

  'Men have all the luck,' she had grumbled. 'I'd give anything to go on an expedition like that, deep into the heart of the desert to photograph game and Bushmen.'

  'As a matter of fact,' Mike had said, 'there is a woman coming. My wife wasn't too pleased when she heard about it, but I assured her I wasn't interested in spoiled young rich girls.'

  'I didn't know that Fabian Sinclair ever took women on these expeditions. I'd imagined it was an all-man affair.'

  'They usually are. But this time he's been persuaded to take Paul Curtis along you know, the well-known television personality, and his daughter, Samantha. My guess is that they're paying a large sum for the privilege of joining Fabian. And he needs the money to finance the expedition. He's certainly not keen to take women on this kind of jaunt. Anyhow, Perry love, I need you to bold the fort while I'm gone and to keep an eye on Faith as well. You know she's expecting a baby and hasn't been awfully well. But I'll only be away for six weeks.'

  Perry envied Mike his opportunity and yet she thought to herself she could not have joined this particular expedition. She had not told Mike, for he was so full of admiration for its leader, Fabian Sinclair, but although he did not know it and in fact she had never met him, it was he, this well-known wild life personality, who was the cause of her feeling of dissatisfaction almost amounting to despondency that she was experiencing in her life in Johannesburg.

  She was aroused from these thoughts by a sudden sharp knock on the door. Whoever could this be? In Johannesburg one did not open one's door after dark and it was almost midnight. There was a heavy chain upon it, but first Perry applied her eye to the small round peephole let into the wood. Eerie and disembodied, the face of Mike swam into her vision and she quickly undid the chain.

  'Mike, what are you doing here at this hour? Whatever's wrong?'

  'It's Faith. I've had to take her to hospital with a threatened miscarriage. I can't leave her like this. Perry, you'll have to take my place.'

  'Me? But, Mike, you must be crazy! How can I?'

  Mike sat down on the couch and put his head in his hands. 'I couldn't get you on the phone. I'm just about all in. I've been at the hospital for three hours. She was ill and all alone when I got home and I had to get the doctor and then rush her in. Poor Faith, one moment she was telling me I must go and then she would implore me to stay. She's so fragile, Perry. I was mad to think I could leave her for six weeks. The logical solution is that you should go. You know you've always said you would love it.'

  'Yes, but Mike...'

  'I've thought about it. It's no use trying to get anyone else at this late hour. You're the only one, who understands the complicated foreign camera we use. If you're thinking you haven't the right clothes, you won't need much, and when you join Fabian in Mafeking you'll be able to take his advice and get anything you need before flying on in the chartered plane.'

  Fabian Sinclair. For the moment she had forgotten this complication.

  'Mike, I'm dreadfully sorry. You know I'd do anything to help, anything within my power. But this is impossible. I can't do it.'

  Mike's eyes were shadowed. He looked ten years older since she had seen him this afternoon.

  'But, Perry, I don't understand. I thought you would jump at the chance, even if it is at the last minute. I thought I could rely on you.'

>   Perry walked towards the window. What was she to do?

  'I can't go with Fabian Sinclair. Please don't ask me.'

  'But I don't get this. What have you against Fabian? I didn't know you'd ever met him.'

  'I haven't.'

  'Then why? Oh, for heaven's sake, Perry! His reputation as a Casanova has been exaggerated. He isn't so interested in women, especially when he's on an expedition. It's only when he's relaxing in civilization that he, shall we say, enjoys women's company. On a trip of this nature he wouldn't care if you were a robot, so long as you were a robot who could take photographs superbly... and you can.'

  'It isn't that at all. At least, it's just that long ago, about eight years, in fact, he did something that affected my life very badly, or so I thought.'

  'Good God, Perry, this isn't like you, to hold a grudge against a man you've never met for some imagined slight. Well, I can tell you he doesn't have any feeling of this nature against you. He welcomed the suggestion that you should substitute for me quite agreeably if not with wild enthusiasm.'

  'What? You told him I would come?'

  'I was desperate. I phoned to suggest you should come. The line was bad, but he assured me that I mustn't leave Faith and that he was quite prepared that you should join his expedition if I could vouch for your skill in photography.'

  Perry walked backwards and forwards like a restless lioness, shaking the mane of her bright hair.

  'Mike, I just don't know what to say. I'd do anything for you but this...'

  Mike wore a puzzled frown.

  'I'm sorry if I've upset you. You were the least of my worries. You've always seemed like a tower of strength to me. That's why, when I was going, I didn't mind the idea of leaving Faith. I knew you'd keep an eye on her. God knows what I'm to do. I should phone the hospital now. Do you mind?'

  'No, of course not. Go ahead.'

  Perry paced across to the window as Mike dialled the number. What a dilemma! But perhaps Mike was exaggerating Faith's illness. She thought briefly but without bitterness how Mike was the only man who had interested her since her ill-fated love affair when she was eighteen. Although there was nothing thrilling or romantic in their association, they seemed to have so much in common, and she was just beginning to wonder whether it would lead to marriage when her mother wrote to ask her if she would put up an old school friend in her flat, while she found her feet in her new job in Johannesburg.

  'You remember Faith,' she had written. 'Her mother is worried about her coming to a big city because she's always been so helpless.'

  So she had come, and Perry had taken her under her wing, introduced her to her friends and, with her large blue eyes and fragile delicate prettiness, she had found plenty of men attracted to her. But it was Mike who had been completely bowled over from the start, Mike, who had always vowed he liked independent women who were competent and talented. And so Perry had disguised her hurt and been bridesmaid at the wedding and had promised to care for Faith during the six weeks when Mike was to be away. But with her illness the situation had changed.

  She gazed unseeingly at the dark blue sky and the outline of the mine dumps in the distance. I simply can't do it, she thought. I disliked the idea of him so much in those days long ago. It would bring all the useless wasted heartbreak back again if I were to meet him. It was he who advised Mark that he shouldn't marry me. How can I be unaffected by something that seemed to alter my whole existence at the time?

  Mike put the receiver down and she came to herself.

  'What news?'

  His colour was ashen. 'She's very ill. I must go, Perry. I feel completely at sea. I don't know which way to turn. I never dreamed you would object to going in my place.

  I thought you'd jump at it.'

  I can't do this to him. I'm just being selfish. Mike is probably right. How can a thing that happened eight years ago be allowed to interfere with the present?

  Before she had time to regret it she held out her hand and said, 'Don't worry any more, Mike. Of course I'll go. I guess I was being childish. I'm a big girl now. Tell me what I must take and what arrangements you've made.'

  Mike breathed a gusty sigh of relief.

  'I was leaving on the evening train. You'll have the morning to get some togs for yourself. But not too much. It's best to travel light.'

  That she was certainly doing, she reflected as she tried in vain to settle down to sleep on the hard couch in the train compartment that was bearing her inexorably through the black night. On the rack there was one small twenty-four-inch suitcase. That was all she was taking besides the considerable bulk of her photographic equipment. The arrangement was that she was to travel by train to a town on the border and be flown by private plane to meet the other members of the party who had assembled at a small village on the edge of the desert. She was to be met by Fabian Sinclair on the station and fly with him in a small twin-engined plane.

  'You must be mad... you must be mad... you must be mad...' the turning wheels of the train told her as it raced forward in to the blackness of an African night... 'What have you done ... what have you done ... what have you done ...' If she was to face up to meeting this man she had always considered as her enemy, she must think things over calmly and bring herself to some kind of calmness. Otherwise the situation would be impossible. She cast her mind back to the past and the incidents that had made her the cool careful person she now was.

  There was nothing very dramatic about it. When she was seventeen, she had gone with a school expedition to a mountain reserve and had there met a young student with whom she had fallen in love deeply and, she thought, finally. She had always been a reserved young girl, orphaned very young add brought up by different relatives who handed her around from one to the other and were rich but not very demonstrative. She had spent most of her time at boarding school and this sudden affection and warmth she felt for Mark Winthrop was a revelation to her. He confided to her that he hoped to make a career as a wild life expert when he had finished his science degree. He was at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg and they were able to meet sometimes when the opportunity arose.

  Their love for each other made him impatient of studying and one day he told her he had made up his mind to ask Fabian Sinclair for a job so that they could marry. Already Perry had heard of Fabian, who was making his name as an authority on African wild life, and she was glad and eager that he should be consulted. At that time she had no other idea in her head but the desire to marry Mark, make a home for him and bear his children. She did not want to think of any other way of life. She, who had always been used to every luxury, was quite prepared to live in poverty if they could only marry.

  It was an appalling shock therefore when Mark came back to her after the interview with Fabian to find that the older man had succeeded in persuading him to change his ideas.

  'He says it's useless to hope to get ahead without some kind of proper qualification.'

  'But, darling Mark, you could study after we've married.'

  The young boy took her eager arms away from himself.

  'Don't make it harder still for me, Perry. You know I love you, but there's sense in what Fabian says. You have never been used to a difficult life and it would be hard living out in the wilds with not much money. I can't make you face that.'

  'But I want to face it. I can endure anything so long as we have each other.'

  Mark shook his head.

  'Fabian says it's madness to marry so soon, especially in this kind of career.'

  Perry tossed her red-gold mane and stamped her foot childishly.

  'Fabian ... Fabian ... I wish you'd never heard of the man! You think more of him than me, that's certain.'

  'Now, Perry, you know that isn't true. But he has made me see that it's only sensible to wait for a few years.'

  'A few years!' He might as well have said a lifetime. Her flashing redheaded temper increased. 'Very well. If you think this Fabian's advice is so wonderful, take it,
but don't expect me to wait for you!'

  And so after more bitter scenes they had parted, and for the rest of her life up to now she had been extremely cautious about giving her love in the swift warm-hearted fashion she had known when she met Mark. She had become cool, reserved, and she had discovered a flair for photography that had led her to an interesting career. A relative had died, leaving her a certain amount of money. It was ironical that if she had had it when she was younger she need not have lost Mark. Now she used it together with her earnings to live in a luxurious fashion, spending lavishly on beautiful furniture and clothes. But her heart remained empty.

  She recognized Fabian at once when she saw him on the station, for she had seen films and photographs of him and he was often featured in magazine articles. But of course he did not know her. She took her time instructing the porter on the loading of her equipment, but every few seconds stole a glance in his direction. Even here, in these ordinary surroundings and not glamorized by the photographers, he had a distinctive appearance. His height and his broad shoulders made him stand out above the crowded throng on the station platform and his finely shaped dark head turned this way and that as he searched amongst the descending passengers. At last she relented and went slowly towards him, extending her hand.

  'Mr. Sinclair? I'm Perry Maitland.'

  The grey eyes that looked down into hers showed a startled amazement and a swift frown marred the handsome features.

  'But there must be some mistake.'

  'What do you mean? Mike gave me to understand that he'd phoned you and that you knew of the change of plan.'

  She spoke more sharply than she had intended, for she had dreaded meeting this man and was now annoyed and confused by the haughty displeasure in those icy grey eyes.

  'He didn't tell me he was sending a woman.'

  So that was it! Somehow in the confusion and owing to the bad line Fabian had not understood that Mike's partner was female.

  'I hadn't the slightest idea that Mike's partner was a woman. And your name ... Perry ... could belong to either sex. But Mike must have been mad to think I would consent to take a woman into the Kalahari.'