The Sleeping Sands (39 page)

The Khanum made him repeat every detail. She wanted to know exactly how her husband had been dressed; how he was being fed; every detail of the room. Layard repeated his account, careful to leave nothing out.

One detail in particular caught the Khanum’s attention.

‘Wai! A mirror!’ she spat. ‘That pox-ridden abomination has given my husband a mirror. His cruelty has not an atom of respite. Every time my Lord reaches for the basin, he will feel its hateful cold glass. I pray to Allah that he finds the strength to smash it and sever the fiend’s fat ugly throat with the shards.’

Khatun-Jan clutched at her breast in rage. Khanumi embraced her soothingly. Layard offered the Khanum another drink of arak. When she had composed herself, he questioned her.

‘Where do you plan to go now, My Lady? We shall escort you wherever you wish.’

‘I do not know, Henry,’ said the Khanum sadly. ‘We perhaps should continue to the safety of Abd’ullah Khan or else seek out my brothers in law or my son. I don’t know where to turn nor whom to trust. We are un-homed. The Matamet has turned the mountains against us.’

‘That dog is the only one we can trust,’ said Khanumi grimly. ‘We can trust him to offer nothing but lies and treachery.’

‘That is why he is the One upon whom the State relies,’ muttered Saleh. ‘If you want Effendi, I shall creep back into Shuster and cut his throat for the Khanum.’

‘What did you call him?’ demanded Layard.

‘He is the Mu’temedi-Dowla – the One upon whom the State relies, Effendi – it is why the people call him the Matamet.’

‘Of course,’ murmured Layard. ‘I remember.’

He lapsed back into silence, taking up the bundle of papers and beginning to leaf through them once more.

Saleh drew his curved knife.

‘I mean it, Effendi,’ he hissed. ‘Say the word and I will slaughter him like a goat.’

‘You are a good friend,’ said Layard, ‘but I could not ask you to do that. No matter what kind of monster he is, I cannot send you to murder him. Nor do I believe you would be able to get near him. He is surrounded by his ferrashes night and day.’

‘I am a Lur, Effendi. We are resourceful.’

‘I don’t doubt it,’ replied Layard. ‘Nevertheless, I will not commission murder, however just it might seem.

‘No,’ he continued, hugging the wallet of papers to his chest, ‘I believe there may be another way.’

After a night’s sleep, during which Saleh and Layard took turns to keep watch, the women were feeling stronger. They even laughed at the spectacle of the Englishman attempting to make coffee, while Saleh used his knife to fashion crude sandals for them from sections of saddle and strips of bridle leather.

After breakfast, they conferred. After a discussion, it was agreed that the women would take Layard’s horse and continue to the Boheramedi, under the protection of Saleh.

‘And you, Mr Layard?’ asked Khanumi.

‘I think I know now what I have to do,’ said Layard. He held up his bundle of papers.

‘These were saved for a reason,’ he said. ‘You saved them for a reason.’

He looked into Khanumi’s deep brown eyes, which were welling with tears.

‘I don’t quite know why,’ he continued, ‘but I have to finish the search I started. It’s tied up with everything that has happened here, in a way I don’t fully understand. All I know is that I have to try to make an end to it.’

‘And will you come back to us, when your search is ended?’ whispered Khanumi.

Layard thought back to Lackland’s words; to the warning of the price that had to be paid for his search.

‘I don’t know,’ he said.

*                      *                      *

The countryside to the south-west of the mountains was strangely quiet. From the few, frightened travellers that Layard encountered he learned that a mix of terror of the plague and rumours of raiding bands of Beni Lam Arabs had almost emptied the land. Sometimes the travellers would mutter darkly about some other fell force at work in the land before hurrying on, casting suspicious looks at the tall pale-eyed stranger with his thick foreign accent. It was only with difficulty that Layard succeeded in finding someone to sell him a mount and then the best he could secure was a mule. So it was that, two weeks after a tearful parting with Khatun-Jan Khanum, Khanumi and Saleh, Layard came at length to the settlement of Dizful, some thirty miles west of Shuster.

The old town of Dizful was the seat of the local governor and still retained some population and commercial life. After enquiring, Layard was told by locals that one of the city’s district chiefs, a Mustafa Kuli Khan was happy to host visits from strangers. Tired and travel-stained, Layard found Mustafa Kuli Khan’s house, after several hours of searching Dizful’s narrow streets. Upon presenting himself, he was made welcome by the district chief and invited into a large communal area where a number of guests were already present. As he entered the room full of a group of the usual travelling Persian officials, itinerant holy men and merchants that he might expect to find at such a gathering, a voice called out.

‘Mr Layard, what a pleasure to see you. I was just about despairing of finding someone with whom I could discuss poetry.’

‘Seyyid Kerim,’ said Layard, recognizing his poetry-loving companion from Kala Tul, ‘have you travelled here from Shuster?’

‘Ah, yes, I often do,’ replied the seyyid, ‘and I always make a point of enjoying our host’s excellent hospitality. You always meet such interesting people. Why there is a dervish here, one Abd’ul Nebi, who is taking refuge from the Beni Lam Arabs.’

The seyyid leant close to Layard and whispered in his ear.

‘He happened to tell me over a few glasses of Shiraz that he is the custodian of a certain tomb.’

The seyyid straightened and beamed at Layard, his eyes twinkling in the lamplight.

‘Perhaps you would like me to introduce him to you?’

*                      *                      *

‘No!’ shouted the dervish angrily, ‘I will not permit it. I refuse to lead an infidel to the holy site.’

The three men had withdrawn to a quiet corner of the courtyard of Mustafa Kuli Khan’s house, where they were now conducting a heated argument.

‘The Frank is no ordinary infidel,’ said Seyyid Kerim, in a placatory manner, ‘he is a very learned man. He wishes solely to verify the authenticity of the tomb for his records.’

‘I will not,’ insisted Abd’ul Nebi.

‘Why will you not do this?’ asked the seyyid.

‘I refuse to tell you any more,’ replied the dervish, ‘now, let me return to the company within.’

‘Brother Abd’ul Nebi,’ said Seyyid Kerim, his voice shifting in tone, ‘need I remind you that I am a direct descendant of the Prophet – peace be upon him – and you are bound by duty to answer me. Tell me, why will you not take Mr Layard to inspect the tomb?’

‘I don’t need an infidel to authenticate the tomb,’ snapped back the dervish. ‘I have watched the grave for years, as my brothers have before me, in an unbroken line thousands of years long - to the time when Caliph Umar commanded us to do so.’

‘But if the tomb is indeed that of the prophet Daniel,’ urged Layard, ‘I will need to inspect it. I have already found several false tombs that were wrongly attributed to him.’

‘Bah’ spat the dervish, ‘that only shows the wisdom of Umar. He made thirteen tombs and guarded them with powerful incantations so that the true tomb could never be found. Our brethren he instructed to keep watch down the years over each.’

‘Be careful what you say,’ said the seyyid, a note of tension in his voice. ‘The Shia believe that Umar Ibn al-Khattab was an usurper – an enemy of Ali. Ali is venerated in Dizful. It would not do for the people here to find out that a follower of Umar is among them.’

‘It makes no difference to me,’ said the dervish, ‘I and my brethren are free-thinkers. We know what we know. Whether Caliph Umar knew right from wrong is up to the Shiites and Sunnis to fight over. We remember. We hold the secrets that others have clouded with their dogma and fanaticism.’

‘You are a Sufi?’ asked Layard.

‘What of it,’ said the dervish scowling at him.

‘It’s just that I don’t understand how such a free-thinker as you could conspire to hide the truth,’ replied Layard.

‘That’s right,’ interjected Seyyid Kerim, ‘if you do not know whether Umar was a good or bad man, why carry out his orders over all these years?’

‘Twelve hundred years ago, when the Caliph’s forces took the Castle of Tastar, they found a tomb containing a perfectly preserved body,’ answered the dervish. ‘They also found writings carved in strange letters on a black stone. They could not read the writing, so they took it to the Caliph. Umar was a learned and wise man – he was the only man alive who could read the scriptures. He read that the man was the prophet Daniel and saw that the writings contained many prophecies of things yet to come. The knowledge made him powerful but he feared that, in time others may learn to read them. He knew that he could not destroy such a sacred text nor could he risk copying the words down in Arabic as others may come to read them. Instead, the Caliph ordered the stone buried with the prophet, set into a rock in a new tomb. He had twelve other graves created so that men might be confounded should they wish to desecrate the prophet’s tomb and read the scriptures. He ordered my brotherhood to watch over the tomb to keep it safe and left instructions so that, in time of need, the prophet’s writings could help his descendants.

‘Over the years, some of the tombs were discovered and destroyed. Others were engulfed by floods when rivers changed their course or torn asunder by earthquakes. Now only three remain.’

‘I have been to the others,’ said Layard. ‘None is genuine. Is yours then the real tomb?’

The dervish was silent.

‘Abd’ul Nebi, answer,’ commanded the seyyid.

The dervish nodded and looked at the floor.

‘And what of the black stone?’ asked Layard.

‘Almost ten years ago,’ replied the dervish, ‘in the year of the Mamesenni rebellion, I encountered another infidel – a European like you –‘ he gestured at Layard, ‘snooping around the tomb with a gang of Arabs. I chased him and his ruffians away. The next morning, I found that the rock where the black stone had been set was scorched and split asunder and the rock was shattered.’

The dervish paused, glowering at Layard.

‘I can only assume that the Frank and his thieves used naphtha to break the rock in an attempt to steal the black stone,’ he said. ‘I reburied the fragments of the black stone in the tomb but from that day things have never been the same.’

‘In the tomb, do you mean?’ asked Layard.

‘In the world,’ said the dervish, sadly.

‘From the day the stone was broken,’ he continued, ‘the plague has raged across the land. Bandits have come into our land. Dams have broken and roads washed away. The crops have failed and the livestock have died. People have disappeared. Slowly the land has emptied save for the Beni Lam marauders. All of our misfortunes stem from that time. Do you see now why I will not have an infidel at the tomb?’

‘I will touch nothing,’ promised Layard. ‘I only wish to make some notes and some drawings.’

‘I can vouch for the Frank,’ said the seyyid. ‘He is a good man.’

‘I can pay, too,’ said Layard, taking out his purse and handing it to the dervish. ‘Take it – it’s all I have.’

Abd’ul Nebi weighed the purse in his hand, looking from Seyyid Kerim to Layard.

‘Take Mr Layard to the tomb and I will see to it that no-one in Dizful discovers your sympathies for Caliph Umar,’ added the seyyid.

‘Even should I wish to take him there, the Beni Lam Arabs are at large. It is too dangerous.’

‘Abd’ul Nebi,’ said the Englishman quietly, ‘in my quest for this tomb, I have abandoned comfort, security and all that I knew and loved. I have been assaulted, chased, robbed, cheated and abducted. I have endured wild beasts and terrors beyond your imagining. I have seen my friends and companions killed and lost the closest thing I have known to a family. For the sake of this tomb, I have turned my back on that which I hold most dear in all the world.’

Abd’ul Nebi began to speak, but something in Layard’s eye caused the words to stick in his mouth. He cowered slightly before the tall European.

‘Now, ask yourself this,’ continued Layard, stepping closer to the dervish, and carefully enunciating each word, ‘which do you consider to be the greater danger; facing the Beni Lam Arabs or being the last man in the world who stands between me and finding the object of my quest?’

*                      *                      *

Layard and the dervish rode silently together through the desert.

After a lengthy argument and the repeated representations of Seyyid Kerim, Abd’ul Nebi had reluctantly agreed to take Layard to the tomb. He had stipulated a number of conditions, however. Layard was to accompany the dervish alone, both so that a smaller party might escape detection by the Beni Lam and so that the Foreigner might not work any violence on the tomb and attempt to carry off any treasures. He was to dress in Arab costume – little problem for Layard, who possessed nothing else – and the two were to stay only a short while at the tomb.

‘If the Beni Lam catch us,’ said the dervish, ‘we will be stripped to the skin without a word. They know me, however and, out of respect for the tomb, they might stop with our clothes and let us keep our skins. It depends very much on their mood.’

The first night out from Dizful, Abd’ul Nebi found shelter for the travellers in the house of the headman of Kala Nasr, a small village belonging to the tomb. The village was almost deserted, save for the headman and his family. He told them fearfully that roving bands of Beni Lam had been seen on the plain that lay between the village and the tomb. He and the dervish prevailed on Layard to return to Dizful, but to no avail. Less than a day’s ride remained between him and the tomb. He felt that he could face a hundred bands of Beni Lam for a chance to bring his quest to an end.

He sat late into the night, his journal spread across his lap, quizzing the dervish over and over about the history of the tomb and his stories of Tastar, Caliph Umar and the false tombs. He made the dervish repeat the story from beginning to end – interrupting him to clarify details and the correct spellings of names. Leafing through his notes, he asked the dervish about stories of other tombs and shrines that he had heard on his travels and showed him sketches of monuments and ruins that he had visited; demanding the dervish comment on a particular inscription here or a figure there.