Kidnapped by the Sheikh (4 page)

“Drink,” Fatima ordered. “It will help you.” Fatima shifted herself unsteadily on her cushions. Onnab went to her side to help her, but Fatima ushered her away.

“Are you okay?” Sarah asked. “You seem a little uncomfortable.” The woman was clearly in a lot of pain, but Sarah knew that a cautious approach was often best.

“I’m an old woman. I’ve had three sons and already buried two. How can I be happy?”

“I am very sorry for your loss,” Sarah replied. However, she felt that the woman’s pain was a lot more than psychological. “Sometimes the body can also be afflicted, as well as the heart.”

“My body is old. What can I do?”

“Maybe I can help. I’m a…” Like before, Sarah was about to say, “I’m a doctor,” a phrase she’d said hundreds of times in her career, but managed to stop just in time. “I know a little bit about medicine,” she corrected herself.

Fatima eyed her warily and then looked down at her leg. Very slowly, she lifted the hem of her dress. Underneath was a patterned skirt of bright pinks, blues, and greens. However, most of the pattern was indiscernible due to the stains on it. Sarah moved forward and asked whether she could lift the skirt. Fatima nodded. Sarah carefully pushed the fabric out of the way. The smell of rotten flesh wafted up to her nostrils. Sarah did her best not to gag and looked down at the source of the stench.

Just below the knee was a large open wound. It looked like it had happened several weeks before and was now badly infected. Sarah called out to Onnab for a clean, wet cloth. After she had wiped away as much of the blood and pus as she could, she was able to see that the wound was in a strange, oval shape.

“What happened?” she asked.

“It was when my oldest son, Sheikh Omar, died. His death was a terrible shock. I was very upset. Suddenly, one of the camels started running around as if it had gone mad. The jinn must’ve attacked it. The animal just went crazy. My other son, Sheikh Akbar, shot it, but not before the possessed creature stamped on my leg and did this.”

Sarah could imagine the scene. The leader has a heart attack and dies unexpectedly during a meal. There would have been commotion amongst his men and the women would have been wailing. No wonder one of the animals tried to bolt. Fatima was lucky that the camel didn’t stamp on her body or break her leg. However, the wound that she did receive was now serious and if it wasn’t treated quickly, Fatima was at risk of getting sepsis, which, out here in the desert, would probably kill her. She urgently needed the wound cleaned up and a strong course of antibiotics.

Sarah explained to Fatima that she could help her, but that she must let her thoroughly clean the wound and that she needed medicine. Fatima looked sceptical, but agreed, so Sarah told Onnab to get her some more clean cloth and to boil a pot of water. She then left the tent to find Sheikh Akbar.

“I need to go back to the capital straight away to get some antibiotics for your mother,” Sarah said in a loud, clear voice across the sheikh’s tent. She did her best to ignore that fact that he was inspecting a large collection of guns spread out in front of him and his men.

“Here you are again demanding something.” Sheikh Akbar laughed. “You go to my niece’s tent and come out demanding that I cancel her wedding. I send you to my mother’s tent and you come out demanding a trip to the capital. If I sent you to stay with the camels, would you come in here demanding more food for them?” All of his men laughed along with him.

“Your mother is very sick. Her leg’s infected.”

“I’m not going to talk about such intimate matters in front of other people,” the sheikh replied.

Sarah remembered that in the local culture it was deemed highly inappropriate to discuss female relatives in front of non-family members. “Tell your men to go away then.”

“And be alone with you again? Twice in one day? It would, of course, be a pleasure, but my men will talk.”

“I don’t care what they think. I have to get some medicine for your mother.”

“Go. Leave us,” the sheikh ordered.

His men picked up some of the guns and made their way out. Sarah heard several of them snigger and the word “whore” was muttered by more than one of them. An Arab woman would never willingly put herself in a situation where she was alone with a man who wasn’t her relative or husband, unless she was a slave or a prostitute. However, Sarah had no choice. If the sheikh wouldn’t discuss his mother in front of others, then he would have to discuss it with her alone.

“Please, make yourself comfortable.” The sheikh reclined against some bolsters along the far side of the tent in one of the darker corners.

“I’m fine, thank you. We must drive back to the capital, now, and get some medicine.”

“You must think I’m stupid. Do you really think I’ll take you back, so that as soon as we arrive, you can jump out and run off, leaving me empty-handed? No, you’re staying here. And as you’re here, please, sit.”

Sarah remained standing. “Your mother is very sick. It seems that a camel trod on her leg. It’s now very infected. If she doesn’t get the right medicine, the infection will spread and the sepsis, blood poisoning, will kill her.”

The sheikh stopped smiling and spent a few minutes thinking. “Stay here. I’m going to see if what you’re saying is true.” He walked out of the tent, leaving Sarah staring at a pile of guns.

She wondered whether she should grab a gun and try to force her way out. However, she had no idea how to use one and she had absolutely no intention of killing anybody. Her job as a doctor was to save lives, not to impair or take them away. Even if she got past the sheikh and his men, how would she get back to the city? They had travelled along unmarked dirt paths to get to the camp and there would be no signs showing her the way back.

She looked again at the assorted guns on the floor. She wondered whether maybe she should take one of the smaller ones for protection. She picked up what looked like a pistol. Sarah had never touched a gun before. She held it up in front of her to see what it felt like, only to find herself pointing it directly at the sheikh.

“First you’re demanding things and next you’re pointing guns at me,” the sheikh said, more amused than surprised to be in such a situation. “But please, don’t aim that pistol at me. For a start, it isn’t loaded; none of them are. Do you think I would leave you alone with a bunch of loaded guns? And also, what you said about my mother is true.”

Sarah put the gun down, and couldn’t help but feel slightly disappointed that it wasn’t full of bullets. “Did you see your mother’s leg?”

“Of course not!” The sheikh looked horrified at the suggestion that he would look at his mother’s naked flesh. “I asked the girl who waits on the women. She told me.”

Sarah guessed that he was referring to Onnab. “So we’re going to get the medicine then?”

“No, we’re not.” The sheikh sat on the floor as if to prove the point that he wasn’t going anywhere.

“But your mother is sick. Onnab confirmed it.”

“How do I know that your medicine will help? How do I know that you won’t try to poison her?”

Sarah sighed in exasperation. “I promise you. I’m only trying to help. Why would I want to kill your mother?”

“Will you take the medicine first to prove it?”

“Yes, of course.” It was a ridiculous thing to demand, but she agreed to do it. “So, can we go now?”

“No, not now. It’ll be dark soon and it’s not safe to travel through the desert at night. I’ll go first thing in the morning with some of my men.”

“And me?”

“You don’t need to go. Just write down what we need to buy and where we can get it.”

Sarah knew of a pharmacist that would sell them over-the-counter antibiotics. She wrote down the details in both English and Arabic on a piece of paper that the sheikh brought her.

Sheikh Akbar looked at the paper and seemed puzzled. “You not only speak Arabic, you write it as well. Sit down and tell me how you learnt my language.”

Sarah was clearly not going anywhere soon, so she accepted his offer and sat on the floor next to the sheikh. Once she was comfortable, she told him all about her childhood friend, Amira, who was from the Middle East. Amira had taught her Arabic so that they could use it as a type of secret language, because no one else at school could understand it, including the teachers.

“So you were strong and wilful even as a child.” The sheikh smiled at her.

Sarah smiled back as she thought about the times that she and Amira had annoyed their teachers and upset the other students.

“I hope your husband cherishes you,” Akbar said.

Sarah was so busy thinking about her childhood that she was surprised by what he said. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

The sheikh moved nearer to her. “If I were the British ambassador, I wouldn’t let my wife travel on her own to the airport where she could get abducted and taken away by another man.”

Sarah felt the colour rise in her face, though she wasn’t sure whether it was because she was nervous about the fact that she was an imposter, or because the man who sat next to her seemed to be strongly attracted to her. Deep down, Sarah couldn’t deny that fact that she found him very attractive, too.

“My husband wouldn’t approve of you saying such things,” Sarah lied.

“But your husband isn’t here, is he?”

“No, I guess he isn’t.” Sarah felt her body rise up towards the sheikh.

“If he were, what would he do?”

Sarah felt his hand brush against her knee. A strong burning sensation rose to the top of her legs. “He would kiss me,” she whispered.

“Like this?” The sheikh moved forward and put his lips lightly on her own.

Sarah closed her eyes and breathed in the smell of mint tea and incense. “No, more like this.” She put her hands around his head and pulled him towards her until she could feel the weight of his body on top of hers.

He reciprocated by wrapping his arms around her and clasping her tightly to him. He was unbelievably strong, so strong that he was able to lift her up from the cushions. He was on top of her, but she was lying on nothing more than the hot desert air. It was as if she were floating underneath him.

Suddenly, he dropped her and she fell with a thud onto the cushions below. He stood, straightened his clothes and walked to the other side of the tent.

“Go! Go!”

“What’s the matter? What have I done?” Sarah was completely confused.

“I have behaved dishonourably. You are my guest, Lady Bolton, and I have taken advantage of the weakness of women.”

“Hang on a minute. I’m not weak. It wasn’t that long ago that you were going on about how strong I was.”

“All women are weak. That’s why they need the protection of men.”

“How ridiculous! What a stupid thing to say!”

“Get out! Go back to where the women are and take care of my sick mother.”

Sheikh Akbar and two of his men finally returned to the camp late the next morning with the medicine that Sarah had asked them to get. She had spent the previous day and most of the night thinking about what happened between her and Akbar. No matter which way she looked at it, she was confused. As she lay on the floor of Fatima’s tent, staring into the darkness, all she could see was the sheikh’s face looking back at her, kissing her, pressing himself against her. However, he was also the man who had kidnapped her, had archaic ideas about the role of women, and lived in a remote desert camp in the middle of a group of warring tribes.

By the time Akbar returned from the capital, she had decided that she should forget all about it. It was just a moment of madness that she would laugh about with her friends in years to come. She could hear the conversation now: “There I was in the middle of nowhere being seduced by a sexy sheikh!” And someone would ask, “What did you do?” and she would reply, “I gave him a passionate kiss that he would never forget and walked out.” Then all her friends would laugh and order another bottle of Chardonnay from a cute waiter in a London wine bar. However, she had to get out of the desert first.

She went outside the tent to see whether they’d bought the right medicine and also to get away from the smell of Fatima’s wound. Although Sarah had done her best to clean it, it still wept pus and blood, and there was little she could do to mask the smell other than to let Onnab burn incense incessantly so the cloying smoke could shroud the sickly stench underneath it.

“Here’s the medicine. Now take some yourself as you agreed,” the sheikh ordered, thrusting a bag of white capsules in her face.

She hadn’t seen the sheikh before he set off, but his attitude towards her was distinctly chilly now. However, she opened up the packet, relieved that he’d bought the correct antibiotics and in sufficient quantity. She popped out one of the white tablets from its foil casing and swallowed it, gulping it back without water.

“Okay? Now, can I give some to your mother?”

“No,” the sheikh replied. “Watch her,” he said to two of his men. “Wait an hour and see if anything happens. If she’s still alright, she can give the medicine to my mother, but not before.”