Sultan's Wife (37 page)

When I leave, he presses a note into my hand. On it, in his firm hand, is written a name and an address in London.

‘Whether he will help you, I know not. I did not much care for him myself when we did business together, but that may have been a cultural misunderstanding, and we must trust to his better nature.' He folds my fingers over the note, then embraces me warmly. ‘Go with God, Nus-Nus. I will see to it that the box and its precious contents are delivered to the palace gate first thing in the morning, to join the rest of the embassy's cargo. I will pray for your success, and, God willing, we shall meet again.'

I never did get to say farewell to Alys.

Deciding against involving little Mamass in our dangerous plot, I sought out Doctor Friedrich and asked him to get word to the White Swan that her son was well and on his way to England. He grimaced. ‘I have already risked my neck once in this affair,' he said unhappily. ‘I think I have ridden my luck in this place as far as it will go.' I cajoled him, but he just shook his head and paced out into the corridor, leaving me standing in his grisly laboratory, surrounded by jars of organs, racks of flayed skins and the boiled bones of a myriad unidentifiable creatures.

On the long ride to Tangier, I think of her, tearing her hair and her clothes, acting mad with grief, not knowing whether her charade may not yet turn out to be a cruel mirror of the truth.

As we make our way across the Gharb, we are set upon by optimistic bandits, who have underestimated our firepower. They are soon made aware of their error of judgement, but even so manage to make off with four of the mules at the back of the baggage train, and that is when I see the wagon bearing my travelling box is missing and spur my horse after
them, yelling like the King of Djinns. Poor Amadou, who has accompanied me, and whose leash is wrapped securely around the pommel of my saddle, screeches with outrage at this unexpected change of pace. He turns his head to me, all gnashing teeth and rolling eyes. He gets in the way of my first attempt to level my gun at our attackers and I have to push him to one side. Terror concentrates the mind and adds steel to the arm: it also makes me a better shot with a musket than I have ever been before. One man goes down with a bullet through the back of his head that clean tears his face off: I see the red ruin of it as he cartwheels off his mount in front of me. My lance takes another through the thigh and pins him, wailing, to his saddle. Amadou echoes his unearthly howl and chatters like a demon. Seeing that I am merely the vanguard of a battalion of imperial troops, the rest of the bandits ride off at speed, abandoning the stolen wagons.

Ben Hadou surveys the scene with a raised eyebrow. ‘Good work, Nus-Nus. Such fervour to guard the sultan's gifts to the English king! I don't ever recall you going after the Berbers with such a vengeance.'

I hang my head and mumble something about duty, and he laughs.

‘You're an example to the rest. I'm going to promote you to deputy ambassador for the course of the visit – though you'll still be called on in the role of secretary. Agreed?'

Words fail me; I simply nod. Amadou capers on the horse's withers as if it is all his doing and ben Hadou laughs. He reaches across and claps me on the back. ‘Good man. I need someone I can trust. They've already saddled me with some wretched English renegade, a man well known as a troublemaker, and there are other vipers amongst the embassy too. Watch and listen and report anything suspicious back to me. If anyone else makes you an offer, tell me at once. I shall make it worth your while.'

The Tinker is not universally liked, I know, so none of this much surprises me. He has an imperious manner that can offend, a certain impatience with the slow-witted that he allows to show a little too readily. And there are tribal feuds as well – there are always tribal feuds amongst the Moroccans. I agree to be his eyes and ears: it is always better to be ranged with ben Hadou than against him. But I am not fool enough
to vouchsafe my own secret to him, because, for all his trickiness, he is loyal to the sultan and, for all his apparent amity, I know he would have no compunction in sending the little prince back to Meknes, under guard and with my head in a sack.

The city of Tangier lies in a state of uneasy truce: you can tell as soon as you see its high white walls pitted by shot and blackened by fire. All around lie ruined forts, testament to the long bombardment the colony has been under these past years. There are peasant women foraging amid the churned earth for feed for the animals that they will overwinter; as our motley cavalcade passes they straighten up and ululate a greeting from behind the veils they draw across their faces. Riders come out from the city gates to see who we are, and when ben Hadou announces himself word is sent swiftly back and soon there are English troops everywhere standing to attention in their smartest uniforms, and cannons are booming out a welcome. Relations seem so cordial you would hardly think we were at war over this port, this finger of land sticking out into the sea, almost touching the coast of Spain, dividing Mediterranean from Atlantic. Sir James Leslie comes out to welcome us. Despite his difficult reception with the emperor, he is most cordial: we are treated to a great feast and volleys of musketfire, then fireworks, which explode in great bursts of colour, fizzing over the sea. I wish Momo could see them. When festivities are at their height, I slip away and go to check on him. He has been in the box for four days with nothing but bread and dates and a little flask of water to sustain him. But the cargo is under heavy guard, and I have no authority to exert here: I am turned away firmly but politely. It is impossible to sleep that night in my comfortable quarters knowing that the little boy lies cramped and filthy in his prison. The enormity of what we undertake overwhelms me again: to separate a child from his mother, perhaps forever, to risk everything …

Stop it, Nus-Nus, I tell myself fiercely. Be a man.

The ship that will carry us to England rides at anchor in the blue embrace of the bay. The vessel's sails are furled and it bobs gently on the tidal swell: a functional-looking craft. Ben Hadou is disappointed. ‘Two decks and no more than fifty guns. I was expecting better from the English, who think themselves such masters of the seas. At best that's a third-rate ship of the line. We shall look like beggars, arriving in such a thing. Already, I have a far smaller retinue than I could wish.' He frets over the poor impression we are likely to make all the way through the city and out through the gate that leads down to the water. On the dock, he says grimly, ‘We are of the nation which raised the Koutoubia Mosque and Hassan's Tower, the descendants of Al-Mansour, the richest man in the world; courtiers of the most powerful ruler in Africa. It reflects badly on the sultan if we arrive without more of a flourish.'

What he means, I know, is that it reflects badly on him. Ben Hadou's pride is legendary. But at least the ship looks stout and seaworthy. When I start to say this, the Tinker waves the explanation away impatiently, and rides off to shout at one of his lieutenants.

He is still in a poor temper as we load the cargo on board. At last, exasperated, he turns to me. ‘Oversee the rest, Nus-Nus: make sure nothing is spoiled or spilled. I'll be back before sundown.' He runs across the strand, grabs his horse's reins from the hands of the boy to whom he had entrusted it but moments before, vaults athletically into the saddle (impressive for a man over forty) and makes off at speed back towards the city.

One by one, the crates or cargo are stowed in the hold, and I ensure that Momo's box is stowed in such a position that air can circulate well and it can be easily accessed once we are under way.

The sun has started to redden the clouds low on the horizon by the time ben Hadou returns, at the head of a bizarre procession. A dozen men
stagger beneath the weight of two huge crates, through the bars of which fraught movement can be glimpsed. Behind them come a host of men leading … I frown. Surely not? But as they come closer my suspicions are confirmed: it seems that somewhere amongst the merchants who ship their goods out of Tangier ben Hadou has managed to locate and buy a pair of Barbary lions and a great flock of ostriches. The lions stare out morosely from their prisons as the ostriches (thirty! I count them) pick their way past them down to the shore, lifting their large-jointed knees high, placing clawed feet with care, their bald heads weaving comically on their long necks, ostentatious tail feathers furling and unfurling neurotically. On the savannahs the relationship between cat and bird would be as predator and prey, but here they are reduced to mere cargo – cargo that we are ill equipped to carry.

‘Where on earth are we to put them all?' My question comes out almost as a wail.

‘I'm sure you'll find somewhere suitable.' He is inordinately pleased with his purchases. ‘The English king will never have seen anything like them,' he declares, all good humour now that he has augmented the ambassadorial gifts to his satisfaction.

The Kaid Mohammed Sharif and I exchange glances, which obviates the need for words, while ben Hadou heads off to make his cabin comfortable.

The tide turns with the rise of the full moon. I stand on deck as the crew weighs anchor and we sail out past the white walls of the kasbah, into the prowling seas beyond. I watch the moon's serene face glow palely between the clouds, silvering their edges and the inrushing waters, and think of Alys.

Soon we are out on the open sea, and ben Hadou and the embassy staff seek their beds. I linger, feigning an unsettled stomach, then go below decks to release Momo from his captivity. My plan is to stow him in my small cabin, barely more than a cupboard in the officers' quarters, but a blessing that has come with my fortuitously elevated status. There, I have made a space beneath the bunk wherein a small boy may conceal himself with rather greater comfort, and in it I have placed not only some bedding but
also some toys with which he may distract himself. And of course there is Amadou to keep him company, whose chattering should mask any sound the child may make while I am elsewhere on the ship, and whose presence will enable me to explain the need for me to bring food to my cabin.

I am congratulating myself on my fortune and forward thinking as I make my way back below; until, in the cramped companionway above the orlop-hatch, I am forced to step aside to let another pass. In the golden light of my little candle-lantern, his eyes gleam, then narrow. For a second we stare at one another, then he is gone.

I watch him depart, bemused and alarmed, until the darkness swallows him. What business had Samir Rafik in the hold? He cannot know anything about Momo, so he must have been spying, or in search of treasure.

My pulse racing now, I go down the ladder hand over hand with the lantern in my teeth, fearing what I may find. One of the lions, disturbed by the light, raises a half-hearted growl and thrusts a paw through the bars as I pass (and I note that someone has pared its claws, and wonder which poor wretch was given that task). The ostriches, meanwhile, have been stowed in the gun deck, the only space large enough to accommodate them, despite the displeasure of the crew, whose berths are near by; they complain bitterly of the noise and smell and snapping beaks.

It is decided that if we are stopped by corsairs, ben Hadou will show his colours, and if by the English navy, then Sir James will see them off, and there will be no need for guns.

I locate my travelling box and peer at the lock. Has it been tampered with? There are bright scratches on the brass, but that could be down to rough handling. Inside, though, it looks as if the contents have been rummaged through by determined hands, for they appear untidy and disordered. Seized by terror, I pull the bags of spices out convulsively, cast the cones of salt and sugar down upon them with no care as to whether or not they break, gifts for King Charles or no. ‘Momo!' My urgent whisper sounds as loud as a shout in the confined space.

There is no response. At the bottom of the trunk, above its false base, one of the bags of turmeric has split. Golden powder spills everywhere. Cursing, I sweep it up and set it down with the rest, then lever the base up and
out of the box with as much care as my shaking hands can manage. ‘Momo?' I raise the candle-lantern, terrified of what I may find.

For a moment I am sure he is dead and that the valerian on top of the datura has been fatal, for his eyes stare unblinking at me out of his gaunt and shadowed little face. Then he sneezes violently and turmeric flies everywhere.

‘Nus-Nus!' He raises his arms to me.

Bending double over the box's sides, I lift him gently from his cramped and stinking hiding place. ‘What a brave boy you are. How your mother would be proud if she could see you now!' I hug him to me, for he is all I have of her; and he hugs me back, for I am all he has in the world now.

Only then does he start to cry, this stoic child. I feel his sobs as a shuddering of his tiny frame and tears start in my own eyes. What are we doing? But it is too late to turn back: there is nothing for it but to grit our teeth and carry on.

At last I set him down and pile everything back into the trunk. Turning the key in the violated lock, I feel how it moves raggedly, rather than with the precision it once had, and my mind slides back to the shifty, narrow gaze of Samir Rafik. What was he searching for? What does he know? I had thought the task of getting Momo safely on to the ship was our greatest challenge, but now I see our trials have just begun.

The next day I seek out ben Hadou and discover him confined to his cabin suffering from seasickness. Usually the Tinker is a dapper man who pays a great deal of attention to his appearance; but today his hair, released from its swathes of turban silk, lies lank on his shoulders and his skin is grey and sweaty. A sour-smelling bucket sits beside his bed; a plate of uneaten food congeals on the low table. His eyes flick over me with complete uninterest. ‘Go away, Nus-Nus, you look far too healthy.'