The Heat of Betrayal (31 page)

I pitched forward. Gone from this world.

No white light greeted me. No heavenly way station. No cognisance of anything. Just blackness. I remained there until . . .

Until I felt a hand touching me. And whispering in a language foreign to me. The whispering became louder, as if the voice was now right up against my ear.

‘
Salaam, salaam . . . es-hy, es-hy . . .
'

I opened one eye. My vision was clouded, indistinct.

‘
Es-hy . . . es-hy.
'

I tried to open my mouth but it was seared closed. I had no energy, no will to do anything, let alone to respond to the hand shoving my shoulder, her little voice louder:

‘
Salaam, salaam . . . es-hy, es-hy . . .
'

Her little voice.

What I could discern from my one befogged eye was a small figure, in a robe, her face obscured by a flowing headscarf that covered everything but her eyes and mouth. From the sound of the voice emitting those words, and the lack of force behind the hand trying to rouse me, there was a young girl crouched beside me.

Was she some intermediary figure sent to guide me to the afterlife?

But why was she speaking to me in Arabic?

‘
Salaam, salaam . . . es-hy, es-hy . . .
'

Hello, hello.

And I knew what ‘
es-hy
'
meant because one of the cleaners in Essaouira used it when trying to rouse the man always asleep behind the hotel front desk.

Wake up, wake up.

But I couldn't do anything beyond half-open that one eye. And wish myself back in the darkness again.

Suddenly I felt liquid against my lips.

The little voice intoned:

‘
Ma'a . . . ma'a . . . shreb
.'

More liquid against my lips. I opened my mouth wide and let her pour in . . .

‘
Ma'a . . . ma'a
.'

Water.

Within moments my throat opened again.

Water.

With it came the knowledge that I was still here. Prostrated in the Sahara. Alive, albeit barely. But still here. With water flowing into my mouth. And the little voice then saying:

‘
Bellati . . . bellati.
'

Then I felt a cloth being put over my face.

And I was alone again.

Within moments, the darkness enveloped me once more.

Until I heard the little voice yet again. Accompanied by two other voices. Older. Male. Shouting to each other. Then to me.

‘
Shreb . . . shreb
.'

Now someone pulled the cloth off my face and was holding up my head, while someone else was filling my mouth with water. At first I gagged it up. The man supporting my head gripped me tightly as I heaved, used something to clean my mouth, then gently pushed the bottle back between my lips. This time I could hold it down. And drank and drank and drank, the water surging through me. At another point I started choking on it again. The man cleaned me off, then made me drink more. He was not going to stop feeding me water until he was certain I was somewhat hydrated again. I have no idea how long this process took. What I do know is that the water brought back enough consciousness for me to see two men – both with hard, wizened faces – engaged in the act of saving my life. I also heard the one who seemed to be doing all the talking shouting orders. Then I was lifted and put on a mattress. The smell of animal dung nearby. Then someone climbing in beside me. Opening one eye I saw the young girl who had found me now seated beside me, smiling shyly before covering my head again with a cloth, then taking my hand and holding it. I felt some movement in front of us, and the slope on which I had been placed righting itself, and heard the crack of a whip and the bray of a donkey, and I passed out again as the cart upon which I was travelling began its slow trudge along the desert track.

I have no idea how long I descended back into the darkness. When I awoke I was in a very different place. As my eyes opened, I saw candles and two gas lanterns lighting what seemed to be the walls of a tent. The fact that I could open both eyes was surprising. So too was the fact that there was an elderly woman – her face like a bas-relief, with only four or five teeth – gazing down at me, and exclaiming as I stared up at her:

‘
Allahu akbar!
'

I tried to sit up. I was too weak to do so. The elderly woman spoke quietly to me, gently pressing my head down on what seemed to be a cot of some sort. Another woman came over: much younger, pretty, all smiles.

‘
Hamdilli-la!
'

She touched my face with her fingers. I flinched. Even the light pressure she'd placed on my cheek set off wild nerve endings of pain. She was immediately contrite, especially as the elderly woman shouted at her to do something. Moments later, some sort of balming oil was being lightly rubbed into my face. It was at this juncture that I realised I was virtually naked from the waist down. Lain out on this bier-like cot, my legs and thighs covered with assorted cloths; my crotch encased in a white bandage that was covered in dried blood.

As soon as I saw the blood I was back in that truck, my assailant thrusting into me, tearing me apart.

I began to shudder. Immediately the young woman was holding me, whispering to me in Arabic, calming me, once even gesticulating to the bloodied bandage, then spouting out a long array of reassuring words, as if to say:
I know what happened, and it is terrible. But you will be better.

Meanwhile the elderly woman approached us holding a mug of something steaming and strangely aromatic. She motioned for the young woman to help me up, and then encouraged me to drink this highly herbal, bittersweet brew. It had an immediate soporific effect. Within moments I was elsewhere again.

When I woke it was daylight. I still felt desperately weak, concussed, with a ringing in my ears that wouldn't go away. I also urgently needed to pee. But as soon as I tried to sit up I lost my equilibrium, and fell back against the cot. At which point I saw the young girl who'd found me scramble up from a mattress in the corner of the tent and hurry over. Though still half-awake she smiled broadly at me. I managed a fogged smile back.

‘
Parlez-vous français?
' I asked.

She shook her head, then raised her finger telling me to wait and ran outside. I could hear her shouting to someone. Within a few minutes she returned with the very pretty young woman whom I'd seen – when? – was it yesterday? How much time had evaporated around me from the moment I had found myself dying in the desert to the place and moment I found myself now? I only knew it was that same young woman when she removed her burqa.

‘
Salaam alaikum
,' she said to me. The little girl was by her side, holding onto her djellaba.

‘
Mema
,' she said.

‘Your mother?' I asked. A baffled look from them both. I tried a more phonetic word: ‘Mama?'

That worked. They both smiled and nodded.

I asked the young woman if she spoke French. She seemed a little embarrassed by this and shook her head.

‘No problem,' I said, trying to smile back, but suddenly feeling woozy. The young woman told her daughter to run outside. My need to pee was now immense. From my French lessons with Soraya I remembered that she would occasionally drop Arabic words into our conversation to help me negotiate the Essaouira streets. She taught me a few phrases. Such as:

‘
Aynal hammam?
'

Where is the toilet?

The fact that I had asked this question in Arabic had her beaming. She answered back in a stream of words, none of which I managed to follow. But she did indicate to me that I should wait a moment as she raced over to the far side of the tent and returned with a long black djellaba. As she started helping me into it the elderly woman returned, shouting orders to the young woman, who in turn explained that I needed the toilet (or, at least, I heard the word
al-hammam
in her onslaught of words).

With the elderly woman in charge of things, I was helped into the djellaba. The weakness I'd felt lying down on the cot was exacerbated when I tried to stand up. But the elderly woman had hands as rough and reinforced as a vice. She forced me up vertically. When I attempted to look down at the condition of my crotch and legs she held her hand under my chin and moved my gaze, while the young woman and her daughter removed all the bandages and dressings. Then they helped me slowly into the djellaba, keeping me upright throughout. The elderly woman held up a burqa and started explaining – with a lot of hand gestures – that I needed to put it on, as she pointed to the flap in the tent, letting me know that the
al-hammam
was outside. I nodded agreement. With the help of the young woman, she organised the burqa around my face. Within moments I felt like a blinkered horse. All peripheral vision had been cut off and I was looking at the world from a narrow horizontal slit. I was very conscious that my legs felt raw. Just as my face seemed somewhat out of place. Walking was an arduous business. All three women had to support me as I took my first tentative steps forward.

Once outside the tent the heat and the harshness of the light made me snap my eyes shut. From what I could take in, we were in some sort of encampment – several tents, shaded by a few sparse trees. Was this an oasis? The burqa cut off any view to either side. All I could see were the meagre trees, the tents, the sand beyond.

The women led me to a small tent. As the little girl opened the flap, the elderly woman told the others to halt for a moment. Disappearing inside she returned moments later, tucking a mirror into the folds of her djellaba. That got my attention and heightened my sense of fear. She didn't want me to see myself.

When I motioned to the mirror the elderly woman became very maternal, shaking her finger vehemently at me as if I was a child who had been caught seeing something she shouldn't. Then she motioned for the mother and daughter to bring me inside, giving instructions along the way.

The toilet was a bucket, with a pail of water nearby. The young girl pulled up my djellaba. But when I attempted to inspect what I suspected was severe sun damage to my legs, her mother repeated the same procedure as the elderly woman. She placed her hand under my chin to keep my gaze upwards.

They settled me on the bucket, and I let go. The stinging that accompanied the urination was frightful. The young woman gripped my shoulder, helping me through the pain. When I was finished the little girl went over to the pail, dipped a rag into the water, and handed it to me. When I touched myself it was agony. The mother saw this and gripped my shoulder again, her hand gestures indicating that I needed to be patient, not to be afraid, to give it time.

They got me back to the tent. The elderly woman helped me off with the burqa and the djellaba. Once I was naked they lay me down again on the cot, the little girl keeping my gaze upwards by standing over me and touching my chin with her index finger any time I looked away. I felt oils being rubbed into my legs; then some sort of balm was applied to my cheekbones and the areas around my eyes. I smelled that strange herbal beverage being brewed again – one which ensured that I fell into a deep slumber. They were knocking me out again. The elderly woman raised my head, putting the mug between my lips. I drank down the scalding brew in several gulps. Moments later, as the darkness recaptured me, I wondered:
Will I ever leave this place . . . and do I even care?

I SLOWLY BECAME
aware of minutes, hours, days – whenever I was awake. Which wasn't very often, as my rehabilitation involved drinking that herbal concoction twice a day and sleeping almost nine hours each time.

The curious thing about this ‘tisane' was that it was ferociously potent, but also left me feeling peculiarly clear-headed when I re-emerged into the world.

Not that I was in any way clear-headed. On the contrary, the battering that my head and eardrum had received meant that I was suffering from some sort of serious concussion and inner-ear damage. Only some time later did I realise why the elderly woman who took charge of my recovery had insisted on having me knocked out. This was her way of keeping me sedated and allowing the brain to heal.

The elderly woman was named Maika. Her daughter – the beautiful young woman who had been at my side throughout – was called Titrit. And the little girl who came upon me and saved my life was Naima.

I discovered their names on the day that Maika decided I was ready to come off the eighteen-hour sleep cure. Before then the herbal medicine had kept me so drugged that only the basic sort of information seeped through. But on the morning when Maika did not give me another dose of the tisane, a certain fog had lifted by the early afternoon. Gesturing to myself I explained that my name was Robin.

‘And your names?'

It was Naima who understood immediately and pointed to her grandmother and mother, informing me of their names before pointing to herself and saying, in a wonderfully bold and forthright voice: ‘Naima!'

Her grandmother rolled her eyes, as if to indicate that such exuberance would be tolerated only for a certain number of years. But when I gave Naima the thumbs-up she mimicked the gesture, delighting in it, showing her mother and grandmother with amused pride how well she could do it. Though Titrit encouraged her, clapping and laughing as her daughter marched around, Maika called time on this little escapade when she gestured for me to stand up, indicating that I should walk towards her unaided. For the first time since Naima had found me in the desert I was being permitted to take steps without the three women to help me. I was uncertain at first, wondering if I could actually make it across the floor of the tent – which wasn't more than six feet – without stumbling. When I tried to rush it at first Maika held up her hands and indicated that slowness was key here. I followed her advice, carefully putting one foot in front of the other, testing my balance, acutely conscious of my fragile state. But I did actually make it over to the far side of the tent, and was rewarded with applause from Titrit and Naima and a curt nod from Maika.