Laura Kinsale (7 page)

His grip tightened, her hand bound in the strength of it. “By God and my honor, Selim,” he said soberly, “you are under my protection. I will guard you with my own life.”

CHAPTER FOUR

“I do not wish for a wife,” Zenia repeated firmly, by no means for the first time.

“So does the camel not wish for a saddle, but that is its fate, by Allah,” Haj Hasan the Moor responded, sitting Arab-like on the ground with his coffee cup in his hand.

The little ring of Bedouin men laughed intemperately at that. Ranged about the fire at dusk, they called out variations on the theme. Zenia did not recognize any of these Beni Sakkr tribesmen that they traveled with, but she kept her kuffiyah up to her face for prudence, in the day and in the night, for any one of them might know her, though it had been seven years since she had left the desert.

“I am poor, excellency,” she insisted, “I have nothing for a wife.”

“And have I not said I will give you the camel and kill a sheep, by my eyes? And make you a present of your rifle? How do you say you have nothing?”

“Haj Hasan speaks well,” a Bedui said. “It is much, by Allah.”

Zenia kept her face down. “It is not well,” she protested unhappily.

“Yallah,
and is it well that I have no beard?” Haj Hasan demanded grandiloquently. “I, who am as a father to you! It was a splendid beard I cut off for your sake. Behold me now a bare-chinned girl!”

‘Then you may grow it again,
el-Muhafeh!”
she exclaimed, naming him warden and protector in Arabic. “I am too young for a wife.”

“Too shy!” one of the men proposed.

“Ay billah,
too ungrateful,” another said sourly.

‘Too modest!”

“Too ugly, by Allah!” a fourth cried. ‘That’s why he hides his face. No maid will have him!”

“Let us see!” They leaned toward Zenia, eager fingers threatening her kuffiyah, but it would have been outrageous rudeness to lay hands upon her. She pulled back from them unmolested, moving out to the edge of the light.

“Nay, don’t chase him from the fire,” Haj Hasan said complacently. “Allah sends that Selim is comely enough. You’re mistaken there.”

Zenia did not mind withdrawing from the fire. The mountains were twelve days behind them, and the memory of their icy coldness had now become a pleasant one in the hot desert twilight. She stood up and walked away, busying herself with pretended work among the baggage.

“Yallah,
little wolf! Come back,” the Bedouin voices urged, but Zenia sat where she was. This was an oft repeated scene, for blue-eyed Haj Hasan the Irrepressible missed no opportunity to tell anyone how he had cut off his beard and vowed that he would not grow it again until he had seen his little blood brother Selim wed. He had embarked upon this fabulous tale at the first Bedu tents, without warning Zenia, and already it had spread so far that it came back to meet them in their path. She supposed half the tribes of the desert must know of it, for interesting news traveled like a high wind among the Bedouin.

Every night, he made the shaving of his face a ceremony, but would not under the most persistent questioning reveal more of the matter, so that it had turned into a game with the Bedu, their curious and excited natures raised to a fever pitch. Obtaining no satisfaction in the mystery of what had driven Haj Hasan to make such a strange vow, they pounced now on the enigma of Selim.

“The boy is a Persian,” guessed one of the men.
 

“He is Arab,” Haj Hasan said. “He is an emir. A prince!”

“Wellah,
a prince in rags,” the dour one scoffed. “He’s a poor Bedu like us, he only tries to make an intrigue by hiding his face.”

“Nay, he is of Andaluz, like Haj Hasan,” another ventured. “By my beard!”

“No, he’s not tall enough to be a
Mogreby.
Look at Haj Hasan—the Lord lead you, Selim will never grow to such a giant.”

Lord Winter rose, impressive in his white burnous, with the rifle always on his shoulder, and swept a European-style bow that made Zenia quake inside. None doubted his mother, the beautiful white Andalusian dove, or disbelieved him when he swore by the glossy beard of his father, a turbulent Algerian sheik of vague but noble estate, who for some motive Zenia had never quite got straight seemed to have abandoned his son to be raised in at least three different places in the south of Spain—no doubt because young Hasan had shown fair to become a prodigious lying rogue, she thought tartly. Lord Winter’s tales of Cordoba and Seville and Granada struck the Bedouin with a fascination, for they dreamed of Andalusia and the old empire, centuries lost, and wept to hear that the courts and graceful fountains of the Moslemin were now made into Christian churches and palaces for the infidels.

All gathered about him whenever he called to Selim to bring his kit. They sat watching raptly as he shaved the day’s growth from his jaw, his motions far too skillful for Zenia’s peace of mind. She dreaded some small revealing misstep, feared that someone would wonder at a man who carried a fine razor and a mirror in a folding case, but Abu Haj Hasan the
Mogreby,
with his black hair and blue eyes and intriguing rifle, was altogether so uncommon that such things seemed to pass as beneath comment, at least in his presence. She dared not contemplate what tales were spreading beyond this camp into the desert.

She rode a fine strong camel that he had bought from the Beni Sakkr, and thought that she should steal away with it in the night to Damascus, sell it there for the money to go to England. But she had sworn to be his
rafik
—and besides, she had no strength of character, or courage for such a thing, and so instead she slept close beside him under his tent cloth, for safety and for shelter.

They left the Beni Sakkr now. Haj Hasan had already hired another young
rafik
from the Rowalla tribe, to serve as passport and guide as far as Jof at the edge of the red sands. Zenia felt he had chosen poorly and paid too much, but she held her tongue, unwilling to draw attention to herself by disputing openly with her master. It was impossible among the black tents of the Bedu to hold a private conversation—if anyone went aside to whisper, everyone else would follow to see what was said.

In the early morning they set out with the Rowalla, a small party of three while in his own tribe’s territory. The young Bedui beleaguered her with curious questions. “Why do you not wish for a wife?” he asked, riding his camel close to hers. “Do you prefer boys?”

“Nay, I prefer my own company, the Lord give thee peace!” she said irritably.

He did not appear to fathom the hint, tapping his camel to keep it well up with hers. “By Allah, you have a wonderful gun. It is the best I’ve ever seen.”

This was a broad hint of another sort. “And if that is so?”

The Rowalla sighed. “I have nothing.”

“Haj Hasan has paid you a riyal, and another when we come to Jof.”

“But I have no gun. Will you give me your gun?”

“It is not my gun. It belongs to
el-Muhafeh.”

The Rowalla struck his skinny camel, urging it forward. For awhile, he pestered Lord Winter to give him the rifle, but Haj Hasan evaded his begging deftly, turning it aside with a question about how far the Rowalla had been to the south. The boy answered readily. As they rode in the hot sun, traversing a rocky plain, the Rowalla admitted that he had not crossed the red sands, but he had been as far east as Baghdad. He boasted on his travels for a few leagues, declaring that Andaluz could have nothing to match the mosque of Baghdad. Haj Hasan merely said that he had not been to Baghdad, and so could not say. Zenia, who had, and knew it to be a shabby enough place, finally grew impatient with the Rowalla’s ever-increasing exaggerations and said that he knew nothing of the matter.

“You are only an ignorant Bedu,” she said disdainfully. “You’ve never been anywhere important.”

The Rowalla immediately dropped back beside her. “And where have you been, by Allah?”

“Baghdad and Damascus and Beyrout,” she said. “You think those are the greatest places in the world, but they’re like a little stone to that mountain, compared to the cities of the Franks and the Englezys!”

“The Lord lead you, that’s not true. The sultan would never allow
kqffirs
to have greater cities than his!”

Zenia would have liked to appeal to Lord Winter on this point, but it was too dangerous. The Rowalla, however, had no such scruples.

“Abu Haj Hasan!” he cried, “say the truth of this. Have you been to the Frankish tribes?”

“Wellah,
so I have,” Lord Winter said, riding before them without turning his head.

“Then, O wise
Muhafeh,
what is the name of their greatest city?”

“London,” he said promptly. “Where lives the queen of the Englezys, who sends her ships of war to aid the sultan in his need.”

“The queen, by Allah! She aids the sultan to crush Ibrahim Pasha and the Egyptians!
Wellah,
this is good, but wherefore is a great tribe ruled by a woman?”

“Such is Allah’s will,” Haj Hasan said.

“But what of her husband the king?”

“She is young, and yet unwed. But her name is Victory, and a lion and a greyhound guard her bed.”

“Nay, the Lord give thee peace,” the boy snorted. “It is not so.”

“By my life, it is true. And her city is greater than Damascus and Baghdad and Stamboul together, with fifty times ten thousand men, all armed with guns, to fight at her command.”

The Rowalla’s eyes were like saucers. “God is great!” he uttered.

“Yallah,
God is great,” Haj Hasan murmured.

“Such is the queen of the Englezys.”

“So she is, by Allah.”

“And you have seen her, O
el-Muhafeh.”

“I have seen her, by Allah.”

“Is she beautiful? Will she marry the sultan?”

“She is a queen. Is not every queen beautiful? She will not marry the sultan, for she is no foolish
bint
to be shut up with the harem, but she searches even now all the world for a husband worthy of her.”

“Ay billah,
she should come to the Rowalla and seek! I am the son of my father a sheik, and if you will give me a rifle,
I
will marry her, even if she is a Christian!”

Haj Hasan threw back his head and laughed.
“Subbak,
you are a forward child!”

“Nay, but Selim does not wish to marry, though you provide him everything in your kindness! Give me his rifle, so that I may grow rich and take a bride.
Yallah,
leave him here in his poor spirits! I’ll ride with you in his stead, O Haj Hasan, into the red sands. Your enemies shall be my enemies. I will never desert you!”

Lord Winter turned, looking over his shoulder at Zenia. “What say you to that?”

She felt a bolt of fear, that he would abandon her in the midst of the desert for this boasting simpleton of a Rowalla. But she would not let her fear show in her face or voice, lest the Rowalla pounce upon it. “I say,
el-Muhafeh,”
she answered bluntly, “that he only wants a rifle of you.”

Lord Winter gave her a slantwise look, the white drape of his kuffiyah hiding his face from the Rowalla boy. “But every morning you tell me you don’t wish to go south.”

“I do not,
el-Muhafeh.
It is a foolish thing to do.”

“This young Bedu says that he will go willingly, by Allah. Come, how do I know that you will not abandon me in the sands, Selim?”

“We are
rafik.
I have sworn I will not.”

Lord Winter gazed at her, what thoughts he had in his head unreadable on his face. “So is this Rowalla my
rafik.”

“Then let us come to the red sands, O
Muhafeh,”
she said, “and see which of us goes with you.”

He smiled slightly.
“Inshallah,”
he said. “As God wills.”

“Inshallah,”
the Rowalla repeated piously. “We will hire a hundred camels, and cross the nefud, and go to see the emir at ar-Riyadh.”

“What is this, a hundred camels, by Allah’s beard?” Zenia said.
“El-Muhafeh
has no need of a hundred camels. He travels under the protection of an evil demon, and needs only myself to serve him.”