eyes direct; her body was slow, deliberate, pachydermatous; soon she might bellow. There was a fringe of hair on her upper lip; and her arms were bare to the elbow, as if for combat.
“I’ll call later,” Frances said.
But later there was a banging at the door, and Yasmin hurtled in, her pointed nose reddened at the tip, a square of lace handkerchief scrunched in her hand. “Oh, she will kill me, she will kill me,” she said. “She has called thirty people for dinner tomorrow night. She finds fault with everything, everything. She says Selim is stunted.”
“He looks all right to me,” Frances said.
“She says I am not feeding him. She is holding his nose and forcing things down his throat. Tell me, Frances, please find out from one of your friends—there must be some drug I can give him, to make him grow?”
“That doesn’t sound a good idea.”
“She watches me every minute. And Shams is sulking because she is turned out of her room.”
“Where’s she sleeping then?”
“Well of course, on the dining room floor.”
“But your guests don’t go till three, these mornings.”
Yasmin shrugged, crossly. “It is me who is suffering, not Shams, I can tell you. Everything in my life is wrong for that woman. Everything I do.”
“How long’s she staying?”
“How can I know? Raji says, it is my mother, as long as she likes. Really, Frances, she is blind to him. Blind to his faults—”
“Let’s hope the singing doesn’t keep her awake at night.”
Yasmin looked at her, directly, then brought her palms together, secreting the handkerchief between them. She dropped her eyes. “I am interrupting you,” she said. “I had forgotten it was Christmas Eve.”
“Send Shams across tomorrow night, and I’ll give her some pudding for you.”
At the door, Yasmin said quietly, her eyes on the floor, “Frances, I do not see why I should have to live with shame.”
“But they didn’t, did they?” Jeff Pollard said. “They couldn’t, could they? Spoil our Christmas.”
It was the festive day now, 3 Rabi al-thani. Marion sat slumped at the other end of the table. “I miss the Queen,” she said.
Carla looked up. “I beg your pardon?”
“Her speech. She makes a speech.” Marion sighed heavily. “Somebody ought to watch those kids in the pool.”
Somebody. But not me. Marion rubbed her forehead with a dazed, sweaty, gravy-stained hand. “There’s a huge lot of everything left.”
“Give it to the gatekeeper,” Russel said, lolling back in his chair. “He can have his pals round.”
“Will he want cold sprouts?” Frances asked.
“He wants anything.”
“Onions and rice, that’s what he eats,” Marion said. “He’s saving up to go back to India.”
It was four in the afternoon. The children had opened their presents, and were outside trying to drown each other. Christmas was the same everywhere, Marion thought. But hot, it was so hot here, and the drink was so poisonous and giddying. And she had worked so hard, what with this year’s mysterious tinsel shortage, and the dearth of good potatoes for roasting. Dust lay already on the spines of the plastic tree; before I pack it away, she thought vaguely, I could just put it under the shower.
“At Ramadhan,” Jeff said, “they make life a misery for us. They make sure we take account of
Frances said, hopelessly, “It’s their country.”
“I can’t understand you,” Jeff said. He propped his elbow on the table, and fingered his Credit Suisse token; a purple streamer half detached itself from the ceiling, and swung gently over his head. “I can’t make you out. First you attack these people, then you defend them.”
“Look, I don’t have any theories. I just go issue by issue. I just speak as I find.”
“As long,” Jeff said, “as you don’t take them seriously. As long as you remember that, basically, you’re dealing with nignogs.”
Frances rose from her place, dabbing her mouth with her napkin and taking off her paper hat. “Excuse me,” she said. She was not going to make a scene, but she meant to keep her promise. She dropped her napkin on her chair and looked across the table at Marion. Marion looked back at her, stupidly. Frances walked out of the room. She stood in the hall, trying not to listen to the conversation, and wondering if Marion would follow her. No one came; neither Marion to join her protest, nor Jeff to apologize, nor even her husband, to persuade her back to the table and give her a chance to state her objections.
After a few minutes, she realized that no one was ever going to come. They didn’t know she had walked out in protest. They just thought she had gone to the lavatory. She went back in and sat down at the table, and put her paper hat back on.
Half an hour later, when the women were clearing up, the Parsons arrived. They were doing a round of the Turadup parties; they were anxious to assuage the uncaring impression of Eric’s very necessary circular. So that he himself could drink, Eric had requisitioned Hasan for the day. “Hello there, everybody, compliments of the season,” Eric called, walking in through the open door; his footprints left dust upon the carpet. Hasan sat outside, his car door wedged open, his sandaled feet in the dust; speaking a pidgin Arabic with the gatekeeper, and flicking his fingers at passing flies.
“Well?” Russel demanded. “Been stopped, have you?”
