Gift For A Lion

She never knew what woke her. She only knew that when she eventually turned her head, feeling the sand gritty under her cheek, her eyes focused suddenly on a pair of highly polished boots only a foot or two away from her recumbent form. And behind them, another pair. And just to the left, yet another pair.

For a moment, she lay frozen, staring in disbelief, then with fingers made clumsy by shock and embarrassment, she snatched up her towelling shift and held it defensively in front of her as she sat up.

It was worse than any nightmare. There were at least half a dozen of them, all wearing some kind of dark green uniform with polished kneeboots. There were no guns actually being pointed at her, but each man wore a holster at his hip, she recognised, her stomach hollow with fear.

She wanted to speak, but to her humiliation words would not come. Her throat was too dry. The silence seemed to go on for ever. The man nearest to her seemed to be in authority. He was wearing a peaked cap, and carried a cane. When at last he addressed her, to her shock it was in heavily accented but correct English.

‘Be good enough to dress yourself, signorina, and come with us.'

‘Come where?’ she managed huskily.

‘That is not for me to say or you to know. I have my orders. Please be quick. We shall not observe you.'

He signalled to the other men, who obediently turned their backs, although Joanna caught two of the younger ones exchanging knowing and regretful grins. She was blushing to the roots of her hair by the time she had struggled back into her bikini top and dragged the shift on over it, but at least she was covered again, and a good measure of her assurance returned with the knowledge.

She picked up her towel and shook it free of sand before folding it and stuffing it back into her straw bag. She knew the man in charge was watching her, and hoped he could not see that she was shaking, although whether fear or anger was the paramount emotion possessing her she could not be sure.

‘Come, signorina.’ He put his hand on her arm.

‘You won't get away with this,’ she protested, hating herself for the involuntary tremor in her voice. ‘My boatman will be returning for me soon and …’ Her voice tailed away as she saw him slowly shake his head.

‘It would be foolish to expect him, signorina,’ he said.

‘But I gave him instructions,’ she began.

‘So did we,’ he said gently. ‘When we stopped friend Pietro not long after he left you here.'

‘You haven't killed him?’ she cried.

‘But no,’ he sounded almost reassuring. ‘We are not savages.'

‘Then let me go,’ she said, despising herself for the pleading note in her voice.

‘But where would you go, signorina?’ His tone was quite reasonable. ‘You have no way of leaving the island, after all.'

Suddenly Joanna moved, thrusting at him with her bag so that he involuntarily staggered back as it hit him on the chest. She ran then, twisting madly to evade the clutching hands of the others as they stumbled in the soft sand, straight towards the sea a few yards away. She had no rational idea of what she was going to do, but she was quite a strong swimmer and that headland was not all that far away. If she could only reach those rocks just beyond it, there was always a chance that Tony and Luana would come in search of her and rescue her before her would-be captors could reach her by way of the rocky coves. She could see no sign of a boat and guessed they must have come down the cliff to reach her.

She was already waist-deep in water when the first man reached her. She fought him off furiously, striking him with her fists and nails, but he held her long enough for one of the others to reach them and then a third. She was carried, kicking and struggling, dripping wet out of the water, and dumped unceremoniously on the beach. This time they held her tightly by both arms and she knew with a sinking heart that her only chance of immediate escape had gone.

Joanna felt cold and sick. She was out of her depth and she knew it. Reality was here in these hands which were bruising the soft flesh of her arms and in the dark, jeering faces of the men surrounding her. She closed her eyes to shut them out and as she stood silently, she heard someone make a low-voiced remark in his own language that was greeted with a shout of laughter. There was an indefinable note in that laughter that somehow alarmed her even more than anything that had gone before, and she swung to the man who spoke English.

‘What did he say?’ she asked, still breathless.

‘Calm yourself, signorina. It was nothing.’ His voice was grave, but she could see amusement flickering in his slanting dark eyes.

‘I insist on knowing.’ This time it wasn't a frightened forlorn girl who spoke, but Sir Bernard Leighton's daughter with a lifetime of demanding her own way behind her.

For a moment he hesitated, then shrugged. ‘And why should you not know, signorina? It was an idle joke, nothing more.'

‘And it referred to me?'

‘Si.' He paused again, his lips twitched slightly. ‘He spoke the truth, signorina. He said that such a wildcat would make a fine gift for the lion.'

Again she felt that chill. The imprisoning hands and the crowding men were suddenly a threat almost too great to be borne. What did they mean—a gift for the lion?

Her mind ran wildly on childhood legends, forgotten long ago, she had thought, but now surfacing in her consciousness to torment her. Stories she had read of human sacrifice to wild animals in arenas not so very far from this spot; of Theseus waiting in the dark of the Cretan labyrinth for the bull-man Minotaur.

In spite of herself, she shuddered. Whatever hidden secret Saracina held, she wanted no part of it. She could bear anything—Tony's anger, Paul and Mary's recriminations—if only she was safely out of this.

She told herself she was being ridiculous—letting her imagination run riot to feed her fear. And yet wasn't the fact that she was here, a prisoner in the hands of these men, equally ridiculous?

‘Come, signorina.’ She was being urged not altogether gently towards the cliff path, stumbling in the sodden ruin of her expensive sandals which she hadn't had time to kick off before her abortive escape bid. Her dress clung to her in clammy discomfort, and water dripped from her hair down her face and neck. How far were they expecting her to walk in this state? she wondered numbly. At the top of the cliff, she was answered. A small jeep stood waiting, the driver at the wheel.

‘Get in, signorina.’ The leader, his lips slightly compressed, spread her own towel on the seat for her to sit on.

Joanna silently complied. She had no choice. The only cheering thought was that the men who had dragged her back from the sea were equally wet and uncomfortable as their uniforms steamed in the sun. One of them sat on either side of her and the leader climbed into the front beside the driver, giving some orders in his own language to the remaining men who presumably had to walk to wherever she was being taken.

The jeep set off with a jerk which threw her sideways. She recovered her balance with as much dignity as she could. She still had no idea where they were going, she realised in dismay, but guessed it had to be the town of Saracina itself.

She gazed around as they drove along the narrow road, white with dust that led away from the sea. In many ways it was little better than a track, she thought, gritting her teeth as the jeep jolted over a particularly deep rut. But it seemed as if she was to see something of the island after all, which had an irony all of its own.

What she could see was rather as the guide book had described, rocky and rather arid, but the lower slopes were thickly covered in a bushy undergrowth, growing almost to the height of a man's waist in parts. Numerous flowering plants were to be seen amongst the greenery and a warm, pungent smell wafted into the jeep as it sped along. There were few really memorable landmarks to guide her, however, even supposing she did manage to escape again. And if she did, was this necessarily the best way to come? Presumably the town of Saracina itself had a harbour. She tried to reckon how much money she had left after her payment to Pietro. Supposing she could get her hands on it, would it be enough to bribe someone to take her back to Calista?

The scenery was gradually becoming more rugged, and the hills on each side were becoming steeper and developing a kind of grandeur. One of them, lying ahead of them slightly blurred by distance and heat haze, was almost tall enough to qualify as a mountain, Joanna thought, shading her eyes to look at it.

But there were no people about, and not even any real houses, just a few tumbledown stone shacks with empty sheep pens attached to the side of them.

She turned to one of the men sitting beside her.

‘Dove tutti? Where is everybody?’ she asked haltingly.

The man shrugged and burst into a long excited speech in which the only really comprehensible word seemed to be ‘palazzo'.

Wasn't that a palace? Joanna wondered dazedly. Did a tiny island like this really warrant such a place, or had she misunderstood? But before she could inquire further, the leader had turned angrily from the front seat.

‘Silenzio!' he barked, and her informant subsided, looking hot under the collar to add to his discomfort.

The leader appeared to be feeling the heat too, for he was unfastening the jacket of his uniform and removing it, before handing it back to one of Joanna's escorts with a muttered instruction. The jeep was climbing steeply now and the mountain was looming over them. Joanna could see the white slash of a waterfall cascading down its side and she craned her neck for a better view. Perhaps when they reached the summit of this hill they were climbing, they would see the town and she would find out if the palazzo existed or not.

The jeep breasted the hill and Joanna leaned forward eagerly, peeping round the driver's rather portly frame. But before she had more than a fleeting glimpse of clustering red roofs somewhere below them, and the vivid gleam of the sea again beyond, something dark and muffling was thrown over her head. She cried out hysterically, trying to fight herself away from the hot, smothering folds.

From a long way off, the leader's voice said, ‘I regret, signorina, this necessity, but you are neither to see nor to be seen. Those are my orders. You will be more comfortable if you stop this useless struggle.'

She slumped in the seat, limp and wretched, conscious only of trying to breathe through the thick folds. It was his uniform jacket, she thought, and hoped vindictively that the seawater would ruin it.

She lost all count of time, all idea of distance as they drove. Every jolt seemed somehow worse now that she could not see, and she was flung about at every bend because she was unable to brace herself beforehand. She felt as helpless as a baby.

The motion changed. Everything was suddenly much bumpier. A cobbled street? she wondered. The jeep swung sharply to the left and began to climb again. Then it halted abruptly and Joanna could hear men's voices talking. They were laughing again too. At her? In spite of the stifling heat of the jacket and her fear, she was suddenly searingly angry. How dared they treat her like this? When she discovered who was responsible, she would make them sorry they were born. ‘Or perhaps they will do the same to you,’ an insidious inner voice whispered, and anger gave way again to a shudder of fear.

An order was shouted and they were moving forward again. More cobbles. An odd sound somewhere close at hand—water splashing. Could it be a fountain? The jeep stopped.

‘Please to alight, signorina.’ The request was as courteous as ever.

It was good to be on her feet again, even if her legs did threaten to betray her if she took a step.

‘There are some steps to climb. Giuseppe will help you.'

She put out her hand and felt the sun-warmed stone of a wide balustrade. She lifted her foot, feeling for the edge of the step, and began to climb with Giuseppe making encouraging noises behind her.

‘Only one more,’ said the leader's voice. ‘We have arrived, signorina. Soon you can be comfortable again.’ He laughed. ‘There is a reception committee waiting for you.'

And then she heard it—the sound that lifted the hair on the back of her neck as it penetrated her blind, stifling helplessness. The long low, rumbling growl of a large animal.

The sound seemed to fill her head, pressing down on her as the blackness dipped and swooped, and Joanna heard herself scream as, for the first time in her life, she fainted.

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