Master of the Desert

‘You won’t have to. And, before you accuse me of fiendish plots and insurmountable character-flaws, let me reassure you that I do understand love. I also understand that love takes many forms and that sometimes fate doesn’t allow enough time for love to be proven.’

‘You’re not defending your father, I hope?’

‘He gave your mother land. People show their love in different ways, Antonia, and though I think my father loved himself best of all I also think he finally discovered a conscience.’

‘But he abandoned his son, Razi, for reasons of self-interest.’

‘I can’t argue with you on that point, but neither can I continue to believe that your mother didn’t care for you.’

‘What?’ Antonia turned to him in surprise.

‘She must have done.’

‘Or wanted to cause the maximum upheaval in Sinnebar as some sort of revenge.’

‘Isn’t it time to give her the benefit of the doubt?’

‘I never thought I’d hear you defending her.’ This was the pivotal moment, Antonia felt, when Ra’id would make sense of her past as she was beginning to understand his.

‘Helena must have known her life in Sinnebar would end some day.’

‘And in such a terrible way—locked up, incarcerated, forgotten. No wonder she bolted into the arms of my father.’

Ra’id nodded ‘Your mother escaped, as she saw it. And went on to make your father very happy, I believe. And when your mother wrote her will she wanted to be sure her children had something significant to remember her by.’

‘Her land in Sinnebar? But in leaving it to her children she must have known how much trouble that would cause.’

‘In Sinnebar when a parent dies their property is divided equally between their surviving children, so Helena had no choice in the matter. And, maybe, the country meant more to Helena than we know. She had that friendship with her maidservant, remember? Maybe Helena was just starting to grow up when my father decided he was tired of her.’

‘I can’t believe you’re taking her side,’ Antonia said, feeling as if a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders.

‘Why should you find it so hard to believe? You’re Helena’s daughter. I have to believe there was some good in her—unexplored possibilities.’

They remained quiet for a while, and then she said softly, ‘Thank you, Ra’id. I understand now why you wanted to be with me when I read that page from my mother’s diary.’ But she was thanking Ra’id for more than that, Antonia realised; she was thanking him for his ability to see through the muddle of the past to a place from where they could both move forward.

‘Don’t forget this when you put that page away safely, will you?’

Antonia gasped when she saw the necklace Ra’id was holding out to her. ‘Where did you find that?’

‘It dropped into my hand,’ he said, tongue in cheek.

She blushed. ‘I hope you don’t think…’

‘That you stole it?’ With a wry smile, he shook his head and then handed her the slender chain with the diamond-studded heart dangling from it. ‘This has always belonged to you, along with the rest of your mother’s possessions. I can only apologise that, like anything else that was left behind, it wasn’t found earlier and sent to you in Rome.’

‘I’m rather glad it wasn’t,’ Antonia admitted, knowing this was a much better way to receive it. ‘And you’ve mended it!’ she exclaimed.

Reaching behind her neck as Ra’id fastened the clasp for her, she rested her hand on his. ‘Do you think your father gave this to my mother?’

‘Who knows? And does it matter?’ he said. ‘All that matters is that you have it now. I believe your mother would have wanted that.’

‘You really are turning into a romantic.’

‘Let’s not get carried away,’ Ra’id cautioned. ‘A few romantic minutes a day are the most I can manage.’

‘So, not long enough—’ She had been about to say ‘for a wedding’, and only just managed to stop herself in time.

But Ra’id would not be distracted. ‘Not long enough for what?’ he said. ‘What were you about to say to me, Antonia?’

‘Nothing,’ she said, but her blazing cheeks gave her away. ‘Do I expect too much?’

Antonia’s face was as serious as he had ever seen it; this was the closest they had ever been, and she needed him to be absolutely honest with her. ‘You’ve certainly tested me to the limits of my endurance.’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’