The Sign of Love Read online

  There was a woman on the bridge who she recognised as the Empress Eugénie of France and beside her an elderly man in a black frock coat, Monsieur Ferdinand de Lesseps.

  They steamed through the rest of the ships and cannons sounded from the shore batteries and from all the Warships lying at anchor.

  The Empress smiled and waved her handkerchief and the vast crowd roared out their applause.

  Shielding her eyes from the bright Egyptian sun, the Empress looked ashore to see the excited crowd.

  There were Egyptian workers and soldiers, Bedouins and Turkish Noblemen. There were black men from the Sudan and white men from all the countries of Europe.

  Greek sailors and French engineers mixed with the merchants of Syria, veiled Tuaregs from the desert, Ukrainians, men in kaftans and Sheiks with green turbans.

  Then suddenly the air was filled with the whistling of steam-whistles and a wailing of sirens.

  The cannons sounded again and again and the Naval bands on the Warships began to play military marches.

  L’Aigle moved ahead and passed through the entrance to the Suez Canal.

  Bettina felt her heart beating with the drama and spectacle of it all.

  In front of the flotilla, which was beginning to follow L’Aigle, lay a hundred miles of silent desert, which covered the Isthmus of Suez, but a new door was about to be opened that led to India and the riches of the Far East.

  At fifteen minute intervals the other ships in the Harbour entered the canal. They had been ordered to keep to a speed of five knots an hour and the distance between them was to be three quarters of a mile.

  In single file behind the Empress came The Greif, which carried the Emperor Franz Josef of Austria-Hungary, next there was a frigate with the Crown Prince of Prussia and following it a Dutch yacht with the Prince and Princess of Holland.

  The Duke, standing on the bridge of The Jupiter knew every ship by sight and who was aboard them.

  He pointed out the Russian ship of the Grand Duke Michael, who had come as a representative of the Czar and rather scathingly The Psyche in which was Mr. Henry Elliott, the British Ambassador to Constantinople.

  Soon after this The Jupiter joined the procession and now at last Bettina could see the entrancing scene that she had expected.

  It was like some fantastic mirage, she thought, the silent ships that seemed almost to be travelling over the desert watched by the white-robed Bedouins on the banks of the Canal.

  It was difficult to put into words what she felt and she was glad that everyone else was so busy chattering amongst themselves that she was left alone.

  Just before six o’clock in the evening the yacht containing the Empress of France and Monsieur Ferdinand de Lesseps steamed into Lake Timsah.

  While the Suez Canal was being dug, the Duke told his party, the workmen had built a town on the lakes of the Northwest shore. They called it ‘Ismailia’ in honour of the Khedive of Egypt and there was no doubt that it was an ideal place for him to throw a huge party of celebration.

  Looking at it from the yacht, Bettina could see silhouetted against the sunset the brilliant colours of ornate buildings, flowers and flags.

  The lights that glittered in the town like falling stars made it really appear like a fantasy from The Arabian Nights.

  “This has cost the Khedive a fortune!” Lord Milthorpe exclaimed.

  “I believe the cost of his party alone will come to over one and a half million pounds!” the Duke replied.

  Bettina heard Lord Eustace give an exclamation of disgust and quickly moved away from him.

  It was all so lovely and she did not want it to be spoilt by calculating the cost. She knew that Lord Eustace was going to tell her that thousands of the Egyptians were starving and that the money that was being spent on this enormous festivity should have been spent on them.

  That night the ships that had moved down the Canal were all anchored in the lake.

  It was hard for Bettina to leave the beautiful sight they made and not to stay up all night listening to the music and the noise of the crowds on shore.

  Finally she forced herself to retire to bed because she knew that tomorrow was going to be a very busy day.

  As the Duke’s party had not left England in time to arrive at Port Said before the 17th the day when the ships and yachts were to pass through the Suez Canal they had, she found, missed the Religious Service which had taken place the previous day on the beach in the presence of the Empress Eugénie.

  “It was a Religious Service,” a friend of the Duke’s who had come aboard told them, “that had never before been held in any Oriental country.”

  On one platform, he explained, to the accompaniment of gunfire the Grand Ulema read a simple discourse followed by a Moslem prayer.

  “He must have looked most impressive,” the Duke remarked.

  “He did,” his friend agreed. “On a similar platform on the right the mitred Bishop of Alexandria officiated in a Christian Te Deum.”

  “I am sorry we missed it,” the Duke said, “but I really only made up my mind to come to Egypt when I learnt that the Prince of Wales had been refused permission to do so.”

  “The Khedive was exceedingly disappointed,” his friend answered, “but he is looking forward most enthusiastically to greeting you.”

  “I am glad to hear that and at least we are in time for his party.”

  Once again the sky was bright and clear and, as Bettina hurried up on deck, the Harbour of Ismailia presented an even more spectacular sight than that of Port Said the day before.

  The Khedive’s new Palace had been built by the lake and dominated the town.

  The Warships had begun firing their cannons and the noise of sirens and whistles filled the air.

  The Duke had told his party to be ready to go ashore soon after breakfast and they embarked to find flowers everywhere, triumphal arches and endless trees in blossom.

  The Duke was received by the Khedive and just before noon a launch brought Ferdinand de Lesseps and the Empress Eugénie ashore for luncheon and afterwards they made a tour of the town.

  Bettina thought that the Empress, dressed in yellow and wearing a large straw hat with a flowing veil, looked very lovely.

  There was a long procession of carriages to drive through the tree-lined boulevards between two rows of Egyptian Cavalry, one mounted on white horses and the other on bays.

  They passed through the town and reached the desert plain outside Ismailia.

  Here to Bettina’s delight there was an enormous Arab encampment since the Khedive had invited, in addition to his European guests, thirty thousand Arabs.

  They had put up their gaily striped tents in the desert, and had brought with them their wives, their children, their camels and their flocks of sheep.

  The Duke’s party joined the Empress, Ferdinand de Lesseps and the Emperor Franz Josef, who sat with the other Royals under the awning of a sumptuous tent.

  The Duke seemed to know everybody intimately and the Empress in particular had a very special greeting for him.

  Bettina thought that there was a soft expression in her dark eyes when he kissed her hand.

  “I had a feeling that Your Grace might be here,” she remarked with her charming smile.

  “How could I stay away when I learnt that Your Majesty was to be the Guest of Honour?” the Duke replied gallantly.

  She laughed at him and then he joined his party, which had been allocated a place near to the Princess Sophia of Holland and the Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia.

  They all chatted with the Duke and her father, but Bettina was content to look around her at the luxurious rugs that lay on the sand under their feet and at the brass trays on wooden stands that held coffee, dates and other delicacies.

  She loved watching the Arab Chieftains, who were all dressed in flowing robes of white wool and carried jewelled daggers at their waists.

  Suddenly one of the Chieftains raised his arm as a signal and the front of the
tent was filled with Arab horsemen.

  They galloped past, their robes flowing like wings in the wind, firing their carbines in the air as they went. They threw up great clouds of dust, which had not settled before there was a six mile race of dromedaries with screaming Arabs on their humps.

  Then there were wild Dervishes from the Sudan to entertain the Khedive’s guests.

  Some held red-hot coals between their teeth, others swallowed live scorpions.

  Next fakirs took their turn with tricks of magic and it made Bettina feel breathless at the wonders they produced.

  It was hard to tear themselves away and return to the yacht, but they had to change for the party that was to take place in the Khedive’s Palace.

  By the time they reached the Harbour, fireworks were being let off over the town and rockets rose in the air while stars exploded in the sky.

  Rose was waiting to help Bettina into her white gown after her bath.

  She certainly needed one for the dust of the desert had covered them all with a thin golden film.

  Bettina looked with a sigh at the pretty comparatively simple gown that she had bought in London.

  She was sure that Lady Daisy and the other ladies would look like Birds of Paradise and she felt that in contrast her father and perhaps the Duke would think that she was not smart enough.

  “I suppose all the ladies are wearing jewels,” she said to Rose.

  “Yes, indeed, miss,” Rose answered. “His Grace has lent Lady Daisy the Alveston tiara, which is almost like a crown.”

  She paused and then she added with a little smile,

  “And Lady Tatham is wearin’ the Alveston emeralds.”

  ‘And I have not even Mama’s little star to wear,’ Bettina thought to herself wistfully.

  There was a knock at the door and, when Rose opened it, she came back with something in her hand.

  Bettina looked and saw that she held a cluster of the same star orchids that she had worn on her first night at sea.

  “Are these for me?” she asked.

  “With His Grace’s compliments, miss.”

  “How marvellous!” Bettina exclaimed. “They are just what I need. Could you, Rose, arrange them in my hair?”

  There were enough orchids not only for her hair but also for a cluster to be pinned to the front of her gown and she felt that they were more effective than any jewel and gave her a glamour that she had not shown previously.

  When she walked into the Saloon where they were all gathering before they went ashore, she saw that the Duke’s eyes were on her and she went to his side.

  “Thank you very much for the orchids, Your Grace. It was so kind of you to think of me and I know it has made all the difference to my appearance.”

  “They are like you,” he said quietly, “but you hardly need them when your eyes are like the stars that we were gazing at the other night.”

  She stared at him in astonishment, finding it hard to comprehend that he should pay her such a compliment. Then Lady Daisy came into the Saloon blazing with diamonds and Bettina moved to stand beside her father.

  “Enjoying yourself, my poppet?” he asked her.

  There was no need for her to answer him. In fact she could not find the words, but he knew exactly what she was feeling.

  The Palace, which the Khedive had built in less than six months, was surrounded by flower-filled gardens and there was a Pavilion where nearly a thousand people could sit down to dinner.

  Palm trees were hung with Chinese lanterns and crystal chandeliers, ordered from Paris, dazzled the eye in every room.

  There were gilt chairs and marble-topped tables and costly paintings on the walls also from France.

  There were a thousand waiters in scarlet livery and powdered wigs and Sir Charles told Bettina that in the kitchens five hundred cooks were preparing the feast.

  It was difficult to reach the Palace in their carriages because of the crowds in the streets watching dancers, jugglers and musicians.

  In The Palace itself there was confusion. The rooms were crowded to the point of suffocation and it was almost impossible to breathe let alone to move.

  Bettina had thought that the decorations the Duke was wearing on his evening coat were dazzling until she saw those worn by the Diplomats and Chieftains with the jewelled handles of their scimitars.

  It was nearly midnight before the Empress Eugénie arrived looking lovelier than ever in a gown of cerise satin covered in diamonds and a glittering coronet on her dark hair.

  Fortunately the Duke’s party was in the Royal Dining Room, otherwise, because of the crowd in the Pavilion it was doubtful if they would have had anything to eat or drink.

  Undoubtedly the most important person present was the man everyone wished to meet, Ferdinand de Lesseps himself.

  Bettina thought how thrilled Madame de Vesarie would have been if she had had the chance of shaking him by the hand and congratulating him as everyone else was doing on his great achievement.

  “Merci, merci,” he kept saying. “Merci, mille fois.”

  And, because at sixty-four he looked more like a kindly grandfather with his snow-white hair, it was difficult to realise how much he had suffered and endured to bring his dreams to fruition.

  “He has given almost his entire life to the creation of the Suez Canal,” Bettina said.

  She was speaking to herself and so it gave her a start when Lord Eustace answered,

  “It is certainly an achievement but ruined, in my opinion, by all this extravagance. Do you realise that there have been twenty-four courses served at the banquet tonight and at least a quarter of the Khedive’s subjects are suffering from malnutrition?”

  “I know and it’s terrible!” Bettina agreed. “But please, my Lord, don’t tell me about it tonight. I want to remember how beautiful all this is, to look at the huge candelabra on the tables, the jewels, the flowers and the happiness on Monsieur de Lesseps’s face.”

  “The Khedive will not be smiling when he realises that he has bankrupted his country,” Lord Eustace remarked harshly.

  Because she could not bear to hear anymore, Bettina turned to the gentleman on her other side who was paying her some fulsome compliments and was prepared to agree with everything she said.

  All too soon for Bettina the evening was over and, when they returned to the yacht, the Duke said that they would begin their journey back to England and not join the convoy that was to travel on as far as the Red Sea.

  “We shall see this route very often in the future,” he told them. “Do you realise that it will now be possible to reach India in seventeen days from England instead of taking four months?”

  “It’s fantastic!” Lord Milthorpe grinned. “Equally perhaps the world will become too small and we shall all become bored with it far too quickly.”

  “You are a pessimist, George,” the Duke teased him, “or it is merely because you are lazy and prefer to take things slowly?”

  They had laughed at this, but, as the Duke’s yacht moved back towards Port Said, Bettina gazed out at the desert and prayed that one day she would be able to return.

  *

  Everybody was rather tired the next day, having not retired to bed until after dawn.

  This undoubtedly was responsible for Lady Daisy and Lady Tatham being once again at each other’s throats.

  A row had blown up over some trivial remark, which afterwards it was impossible to remember and they had snarled at each other like two tiger cats.

  Bettina slipped away after dinner to stand on deck and admire the Harbour of Suez where they were now anchored.

  It was not as crowded as it had been before the Opening of the Canal, but there were still five British iron-clad ships of war, which had fired a salute at the appearance of L’Aigle.

  They looked very attractive with their lights reflected in the still water beneath them, but theirs and the lights ashore were eclipsed by the stars overhead and a young moon creeping up the sky.

  It w
as very romantic and Bettina found herself wondering what it would be like to be in such a setting with someone she loved.

  What was love like? she wondered. The love that her mother had had for her father and the love that she had dreamt she would one day find herself?

  Then she gave a little shiver.

  She knew if she married Lord Eustace, as her father wanted her to do, she would never know the rapturous spiritual love she sought or the ecstasy that she felt a man and a woman should feel before they married each other.

  ‘How could I ever feel that – with him?’ she asked herself.

  She knew that when he sat near her to read his pamphlets to her she instinctively wished to draw away.

  And, if ever his hand touched hers by accident, she felt a repugnance that she tried to stifle but which, if she was truthful, she knew was very much there.

  ‘How can I marry him? Oh, Mama, how can I?’ she asked the stars.

  Now they seemed very far away and she felt cold despite the warmth of the night.

  She went below feeling a little despondent.

  ‘I am tired,’ she thought. ‘That is all. Tomorrow I shall feel different.’

  But the words were singularly uncomforting.

  She went into her cabin and a moment later Rose came in to undo her gown.

  One glance at the maid told Bettina that she had been crying. Her eyes were red and swollen and there was an expression of abject misery on her usually smiling face.

  “What is the matter, Rose?” Bettina asked.

  “Nothin’, miss.”

  “That is not true,” Bettina said. “You are unhappy and I want to know why.”

  “I can’t tell you, miss,” Rose answered.

  Then she burst into tears and pulled out a handkerchief from her apron pocket to hide her face.

  “I hate to see you like this,” Bettina said. “Please, Rose, tell me what the matter is? Have you heard that someone you love is dead?”

  “They might – as well be,” Rose muttered.

  “But we have had no letters from England,” Bettina went on. “The Duke was saying so only this morning, so you cannot have had bad news from home.”