290
THE
LONG ROAD TO BAGHDAD
CATRIN COLLIER
Published by Catrin Collier Productions 2011
Copyright © 2011 Catrin Collier
The right of Catrin Collier to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, without prior written permission from the publisher: nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent buyer.
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Before the Great War, the campaign in Mesopotamia would have been considered a vast undertaking. In the immensity of a world struggle, it was a mere drop in the ocean - a "side show."
In spite of this; in spite of mistakes made by civilian and soldier alike; in spite of the horrors after Ctesiphon, the miseries of the wounded after Hanneh, the heat, the sickness, the desolation of the empty desert, and the ninety seven thousand casualties that the campaign cost, the troops that fought in Mesopotamia can rest secure in the knowledge that they added imperishable glory to the record of the Imperial Army.
Major (Temp. Lt.-Col.) R. Evans, M.C., P.S.C. Royal Horse Guards
"A Brief Outline of the Campaign in Mesopotamia," 1926.
This book is dedicated to the 97,000. And to Christopher Marley who came back and lived to tell me about it.
When Allah had made hell he found out it was not enough. So he made Iraq and then he added flies.
Arab Proverb.
CHAPTER ONE
The desert North East of Basra, Saturday May 30th 1914
Even if protocol had permitted Harry Downe to rise from the flat-footed, squatting position desert courtesy dictated, he doubted he’d be able to do so. Certainly he wouldn’t have been able to move with dignity, and to his host dignity was paramount. Sheikh Aziz Ibn Shalan, leader, as much as anyone could ever be of the volatile tribal band of Bedouin who lived by grazing their flocks and raiding their neighbours along the valley of the Karun river bed, was judging the entire British tribe on Harry’s performance. And he, Henry Robert Edward Anderson Downe, Second Lieutenant, Indian Army, by virtue of his father’s influence, and seconded to service with the Frontier Commission in the Persian Gulf, for his many, and varied sins, had cramp - mind-blinding, body-burning cramp.
Making a supreme effort he continued to crouch immobile, facing Shalan’s hooked nose and hooded eyes across the magnificent Persian rug. The staring match was not only painful. A full year in Mesopotamia hadn’t accustomed him to the heat, the Arabs ignored so disdainfully. They might pay token homage to the climate - three sides of the Sheikh’s tent had been rolled up to catch the non-existent afternoon breeze - but he alone of the hundred or so men crowded beneath the canopy was visibly suffering as the moisture laden, desert air seared around them like scalding steam in a Turkish bath.
‘You ask much of us, Ferenghi.’ Shalan’s softly spoken Arabic, cut through the atmosphere like a whiplash, dispelling Harry’s preoccupation with pain. Harry curled his lip; Ferenghi – foreigner. The word stung his pride. He had learned to respect both the Arabs and their lifestyle, long before he had spent two weeks with Shalan’s tribe. He would have liked to think that he, in his turn, had earned their respect.
‘I ask for your friendship in the name of my King and the British Empire.’ Harry spoke slowly, in painstakingly perfect Arabic. ‘For myself, who is as the dust beneath Ibn Shalan’s feet, the hospitality of this tent has been more than I dared hope for.’
‘You speak like a son of the desert, yet you ask me, and my people to stand against all, even our overlords, should they threaten your precious pipeline.’
‘The pipeline is not mine, nor even my King’s. It is, as its name, Anglo Persian. It belongs to Arab and English alike.’
‘The line is English,’ Shalan agreed. ‘Sheikh Muhammerah’s and the Bakhtairi Khans also perhaps, but it is not mine, nor that of my people.’ His dark eyes gazed unflinchingly into Harry’s grey ones but his dismissal of Harry’s request hung between them like acrid dung-fire smoke on a windless day.
‘The Anglo Persian Oil Company will pay you. Gold, guns, whatever you wish.’ Harry desperately played his last card.
‘We are not mercenaries to be bought like goats in a bazaar,’ Shalan railed, holding out his arms to the warriors silently encircling the divan. ‘We are Bedouin - but Bedouin in bondage to our Turkish lords. Like you, Ferenghi, we are part of an Empire.’
‘Since when has Ibn Shalan or any man of his tribe bowed his head to a Turk,’ Harry countered, allowing his pain to give rise to irritation.
Ibn Shalan’s anger abated as swiftly as it had surfaced. He stroked his small, thin beard. ‘You speak the truth, Ferenghi,’ he murmured in softer tones. ‘No man of this tribe bows his head to Turk, or - British.’
The silence shattered in one deafening, whooping instant. Shalan’s warriors’ agreement rang; a noisy foreboding of failure in Harry’s ears.
‘We ask only for friendship,’ Harry emphasised, shouting to make himself heard above the din.
‘The British have asked for the friendship of others. Where it was freely given, more was taken. Your Empire, like that of the Turks, is built on the lands of those you have befriended.’
Lowering his eyes, Harry studied the blue and red abstract pattern on the rug that stretched between him and Shalan. It wasn’t difficult for him or Shalan to predict the long-term policy of the British Government towards Mesopotamia.
The Turkish Empire was foundering, its subject peoples straining to revolt - the Arabs with their secret “Jihad” societies amongst them; but the great European powers were circling the rotting Ottoman corpse like vultures. Thanks to Churchill, an ambitious, speculative first Sea Lord at the Admiralty, the British Government had bought a controlling interest in the Anglo Persian Oil Company and with it, a foothold in Iraq. But the Arabs knew it wouldn’t take many Indian Regiments to turn the foothold into a seat of power if the Ottoman Empire collapsed. And then, instead of the free Arab State the Bedouin prayed for, Iraq would be dovetailed into a polished road that led overland from the Gulf to India. Given a few years of efficient British rule, the Gulf and the desert might well become no more than a distant suburb of Calcutta. Shalan had obviously considered the prospect, but Harry’s CO’s brief had been explicit.
‘Our problem doesn’t lie with Muhammerah and the Bakhtairi Khans, Downe,’ he’d barked after a formal dinner in the officers’ mess. ‘Their share in the Anglo Oil Company ensures their loyalty to us. It’s this Ibn Shalan chap. God knows what he’d do if he found one of our patrols pushed into a tight corner. Intelligence says he’s as likely to slit our throats as those of the Turks. He travels in Muhammerah’s territory but recognises no overlord. Not Muhammerah and certainly not the Turks.’
‘I take it he’s an independent customer, sir.’ Harry’s voice drawled back at him from the safe, comparatively comfortable world of European compound and Basra. Despite the “formal” aspect of the dinner he’d succeeded in getting drunk and hadn’t bothered to conceal his boredom with his colonel’s warnings of possible catastrophe. Bloody-minded Arabs were legion in Mesopotamia.
‘Independent isn’t the word I’d chose,’ Perry had interrupted testily. ‘Three of Shalan’s sons were hung by the Turks last year. They were embroiled in one of the pro-Arab, anti-Turkish groups. Shalan blamed a tribeless band of Bedouin for the betrayal. He attacked, slaughtered every male over twelve, enslaved the women and children and turned his attention to the Turks. They’ve lost five patrols in his territory in the past six months. And when I say lost, I mean lost. Gone. Disappeared from the face of the desert. If the Arabs ever stop fighting among themselves long enough to get this Jihad of theirs off the ground, the Moslems in India could get infected with the fever, and our entire Empire in the East jeopardised. Shalan’s tribe will become the scavenging hyenas that pick the bones on all sides, including the Anglo Persian Oil Company. If we sit back and allow that to happen, we will have failed in our duty as officers.’ Perry had paused for breath long enough to allow the sepoy orderly to serve his brandy and cigars. ‘One hundred and forty miles of pipeline runs through Shalan’s territory and we haven’t the resources to police a fraction of it. Someone has to go up into the Karun Valley, find Shalan and persuade him to come down on our side.’ He’d looked at Harry. It was a look Harry recognised. He was the only officer in the Basra Compound who’d taken the trouble to learn Arabic. ‘You’re free to offer whatever it takes, Downe. I’ll get it through the budget.’
‘Sir,’ he’d muttered, mentally cursing the addiction to gambling that had prompted him to learn the language.
‘We need Shalan. Without him there won’t be a pipeline or an Anglo Persian Oil Company much longer. And that means no fuel for our navy. Disaster, Downe!’
Harry had looked across the mess to where his fellow officers were drinking around the piano. His closest friend in Basra, Peter Smythe smiled sympathetically but didn’t come near. Bored by Perry’s pontificating the others were well past the port stage and on to the brandy.
‘Take that Arab orderly with you. What’s his name?’
‘Mitkhal, sir.’
‘Damned fellow looks like a brigand. Don’t trust him and I don’t want him creeping around the barracks without you here to supervise him. I’ll talk to you again before you leave. Brandy?’
He’d left Basra the following morning. The place wasn’t wonderful, but it was the Piccadilly of the desert. A year of “volunteering” for mapping patrols had given him a closer acquaintance with the baking mud flats than he’d desired and a greater respect for the town than it deserved. And here he was one month later. The most expendable pawn in the Indian Army about to be swept off the board by the Arab, Perry in his arrogance, had believed could be bought. But while Colonel Perry was safe in Basra, he faced Sheikh Aziz Ibn Shalan alone.
‘You say nothing, Ferenghi.’
Harry raised his eyes. ‘You believe the British want to govern your territory and your people.’
‘You don’t?’
‘Not at this moment in time. For the future I can’t say.’ He realised he was probably botching his mission, but he couldn’t lie with those hooded eyes watching and evaluating everything he said. He glimpsed Mitkhal sitting at the edge of the divan, rolling his eyes heavenwards.
‘Why not at this moment in time?’ Shalan demanded.
‘Because the British are concerned only for the safety of their pipeline, it is in danger just as everything here is in danger. The Ottoman Empire is crumbling and the jackals are loose. Skirmishes, feuds, attacks on peaceful travellers happen every day. The Turks cannot maintain order. And why should they while Arab fights Arab, or the soldiers of the Oil Company, they cannot fight Turk. And with the prospect of a Jihad that will set the desert aflame . . . ’ Harry faltered when angry murmurs rose from the men. Honesty was one thing, recklessness another.
‘Continue,’ Shalan ordered.
‘Britain needs oil. If the pipeline should be cut . . . ’
‘You lose money? Face?’
‘Both,’ Harry conceded.
‘And should I ask my men to watch over your precious pipeline?’
‘I’ll be in your debt.’
‘You?’ Shalan stabbed a thin brown finger at Harry. ‘You’ll be in my debt, Ferenghi.’
‘My CO has made the pipe-line my responsibility, so the debt will be mine.’
‘What manner of man are you.’
‘An honest one, who pays what he owes.’
‘If I should say otherwise. If I should call you, infidel, unbeliever.’
Harry felt himself slipping out of his depth. The Bedouin rarely spoke of a man’s religion, sensibly deeming the God he worshipped to be his own business. He couldn’t imagine why Shalan was bending the inflexible rules of desert hospitality.
‘I, like you believe in the one true God,’ he answered diplomatically.
‘You believe Mohammed to be his prophet.’
‘I believe Mohammed to be his prophet,’ Harry reiterated, meeting Shalan’s eye.
‘As a true believer I can greet you as a friend. But,’ a smile hovered at the corners of Shalan’s mouth. He held out his hands in mock despair. ‘It will take many guns to guard your pipeline. I am a poor man.’
‘I will give you as many guns as you need.’
‘Five hundred.’
‘You will have them.’
‘New, not old stock from your African and Indian wars. I’ll take none with rusted mechanisms.’
‘New, with as much ammunition as you can carry; and the promise of more when you need it.’
‘Your pipeline is long. It lies in country that is hard on the hooves of camels and horses.’
‘I will deliver fifty horses and fifty camels when I deliver the ammunition.’
‘Prime stock.’
‘The best in our Basra compound.’
Just when Harry had expected the divan to end it was beginning. Shalan was up to something. Something that involved him personally, but for the life of him he couldn’t see beyond the demands. The Sheikh had decimated his offer of British friendship without looking at what had been laid out on the bargaining table. Now he was retracing his steps. The sequence didn’t make sense. But he had no choice other than to comply – and generously.
‘Warriors need food. A herd of our goats are sick.’
‘There are many herds of goats in Basra market. Choose one and I will pay the merchants their price.’
‘You.’ Again Shalan pointed his finger at Harry. ‘You offer these things knowing my warriors could eat the goats, ride the horses, and turn the guns on the soldiers of the Oil Company. British soldiers,’ he added, so there’d be no misunderstanding.
‘I have lived in your tent. I know the Bedouin and Sheikh Ibn Shalan for the noble, honourable, leader that he is. You would use the guns wisely, and in friendship.’
Shalan reached inside his black abba and pulled out his camel skin tobacco pouch. It was a signal for relaxation. As a quiet hum of voices buzzed around the divan, Harry felt as though half time had been called in a punishing rugby match. Shalan withdrew a single paper and a pinch of tobacco from the pouch. Sprinkling a thin line of powdered tobacco along the edge of the crumpled paper he began to roll the paper between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand.
‘You are a strange man, Ferenghi.’ He contemplated the finished cigarette. ‘You are not Bedouin, yet you ride with us and live in our tents. You are Ferenghi, yet you speak our tongue and wear our dress. And, unlike every other Ferenghi I have met, you speak the truth.’
‘You are gracious.’
‘I accept your offer, my friend.’ For the first time Shalan dropped “Ferenghi.” ‘Five hundred new rifles, ammunition, fifty of your best Army horses, fifty camels, and a herd of goats.’
‘They will be delivered as soon as I can arrange it.’
‘You will seal this bargain between friends by marrying my daughter. Afterwards my men will guard your pipeline as if it were our own.’
‘Marry . . . ’
‘You are surprised, my friend. Gratified I grant you that which I have refused so many others.’
‘I am surprised.’ Harry struggled to maintain his composure.
Shalan rose, signalling the end of the divan. ‘It is agreed, my friend, your pipeline will be protected. We will talk later. Marriage is best discussed at night, after food. Dalhour?’
A Negro slave appeared from behind the wall of woven goat hair that separated Shalan’s public quarters from those of his harem. With a practised flick of the wrist, the slave held back the cloth without revealing what lay beyond. Shalan salaamed to the assembly and disappeared into the closed world of his women.
Ignoring the glances and whispers fired in his direction Harry remained where he was until the men began to disperse. He would have liked to have joined them but his legs were numb and, as he was bound to make a complete ass of himself when he moved, he preferred to do it before as small an audience as possible. Black veiled women appeared and unleashed the ties that secured the tent walls. One man, taller and darker than the rest came and stood before him.
‘So, the British Lieutenant is to become the son-in-law of Ibn Shalan.’
‘One wrong word from you Mitkhal and I’ll kick you across the desert faster than a duck can fly,’ Harry snarled, venting the frustration he’d been forced to keep in check all afternoon.
‘That would be an interesting experience.’ Mitkhal grinned, looking down on Harry from his six and a half feet.
‘First you help me up.’ Harry extended his hand. ‘Then you explain exactly what happened here just now.’
‘If the, honourable, Ferenghi, would care to walk to the outskirts of the camp, we can talk without an audience,’ Mitkhal muttered in English as he heaved Harry to his feet. Weakened by a rush of blood to his legs Harry grasped Mitkhal’s arm. Walking was impossible. Standing pure torture.
‘You offered the Sheikh the one thing he could not refuse, Harry, guns. Whatever the future holds for the desert, it will involve bloodshed. The tribes with the greatest firepower stand the best chance of surviving.’
‘That’s it?’ Harry gingerly lifted one foot and placed it in front of the other.
‘The horses helped. Shalan’s impressed with Dorset. Perhaps he’s taken her as an indication of the quality of British stock.’
‘And his daughter? Hasn’t she a say in the matter?’
‘Marriage among the Bedawi is often a compromise, just as it is among the Effendi. I overheard Colonel Perry tell Mrs Perry when she took Miss Perry to India that an officer with good connections and a private income would make the most suitable match for their daughter.’
‘The Perrys’ affairs are none of your concern.’
‘But the Bedawi’s are soon to become yours. And we all serve the interests of those who pay for our bread.’
‘Save the philosophy for Shalan.’ Harry tentatively moved forward. ‘If you want to serve, you can begin by telling me why Shalan is prepared to accept an infidel as a son-in-law. I thought we were regarded as lower than desert sand.’
‘Infidels are, but you have just proved yourself a true believer. I hope for your sake Shalan doesn’t put your knowledge of the Koran to the test. But then,’ Mitkhal shrugged his massive shoulders as they stepped into the dried up wadi that served as a stockade for the tribe’s riding mares. ‘Any Sheikh would take the devil himself into his family for five hundred guns.’
‘And if the devil has no desire to marry an illiterate Harem girl.’
‘Ssh!’ Mitkhal glanced around, seeing no one, he continued in a whisper. ‘The devil should think again. Shalan has offered his protection for the pipeline on the only terms possible. If he openly allied his tribe to the British, he would endanger his position with every independent tribe in the desert, including his own. He neither needs, nor wants a British alliance, but he does need guns. In accepting them from you as his daughter’s bride price, he compromises no one. His tribe will understand. After all, every man knows, or thinks he knows, something of young girls and love.’
‘What do the Bedawi with their bride bartering and closed harems know of love.’
‘As much, if not more than the Effendi. Women see more than goats outside the harem. They often pick out the man they wish to marry, then it is up to their father, or brother, to contact the chosen one. Shalan is probably telling everyone who’ll listen, that to his dismay his daughter settled on you. As a Bedouin, he would like to oppose the match, but as a loving father, his daughter’s happiness is paramount.’
When they reached the stubble of thorn bushes that provided sparse grazing for the horses Harry whistled. His grey mare Dorset cantered towards them, nuzzling into his abba, she searched for hidden food. Women’s love wasn’t even as straightforwardly selfish as that of an animal he mused as he patted her neck.
He’d had enough of women’s subterfuge to last him a lifetime. First there had been darling cousin Lucy. It had taken a disastrous engagement to wake him up to the fact that her deep and abiding love was for his inheritance, not him. Then he’d met Alicia, a pretty but fortuneless Captain’s niece who’d sworn undying affection until a forty year old major offered her a wedding ring. And Christina - despite the problems she’d caused him, he smiled. Elegant, beautiful, innocent-eyed Christina, the Colonel’s wife who generously made love to every new Lieutenant who joined the Regiment; only to get caught in his bed.
Lucy - Alicia - Christina - scandal - Basra - and now some damned Arab girl he hadn’t even seen. He slid to the ground and rested his back against Dorset’s legs. Wrenching his head coil and kafieh from his head he ran his hands through his thick fair hair.
‘It’s close to sunset but you could still get sunstroke.’ Mitkhal crouched beside him.
‘You think I should marry this girl.’
‘Refuse the hand of Shalan’s daughter and you will insult a great Sheikh. Shalan is not rich, but he is powerful, and even Colonel Perry would tell you it is not wise to offend a powerful Sheikh.’
‘So, if I refuse to marry this girl, Shalan would lose face.’
‘And you would probably lose your head, but there is a sunny side as Lieutenant Smythe would say.’
‘Really?’
‘Really,’ Mitkhal echoed. ‘The Koran tells every man, beggar or Sheikh he can have only four wives, no matter how he may lust for more but the Koran also tells us how to divorce an unsatisfactory one. Alliances consolidated by marriage stand, provided the wife was treated well while the marriage lasted. And, if the woman is returned to her family without a demand for the repayment of the bridal price, everyone is happy. The wife’s family is richer, the wife free to find another husband, and the man has a vacancy which will enable him to make another alliance through the marriage bed.’
‘Desert politics.’
‘Common sense.’
‘To an Arab.’
‘What other kind of honourable man is there?’
Harry felt the sun burning his scalp and tossed his kafieh back on his head. ‘Suppose I just go through the motions of marrying this girl?’ He wound the Bedouin agal of black horsehair around his head cloth.
‘If you leave her before you enter the bridal tent you’d insult the bride and her family and Shalan could be accused of retaining the bride price under false pretences. If you have a problem with women . . . ’ Mitkhal faltered, recalling Harry’s lack of interest in the Bedouin gypsy girls he procured for the use of the British officers from time to time.
‘The girl could be as ugly as sin.’
‘She is rumoured to be beautiful. Shalan has received many offers for her. Sheikhs from the Muhasin, Bawi, Chaab, Sirdieh have asked for her, only to be turned away.’
‘They may have asked, but for which daughter? Every Arab talks of his sons, but I’ve yet to meet one who’s counted his daughters.’
‘Shalan has only one daughter of marriageable age, Furja. Her mother, Aza, was very beautiful. Shalan loved her deeply.’
‘Spare me the romance,’ Harry pleaded, recognising the storyteller about to emerge.
‘It is important you understand the relationship between this girl and Shalan. He loves her because she is all that remains of her mother’s blood. Aza’s family were Sirdieh, ordinary tribesmen, yet Shalan paid Aza’s father a bride price fit for a princess. He married Aza because he loved her.’
‘I take it he was fortunate enough to see her before their wedding.’
‘Shalan was fifteen and Aza thirteen when they married,’ Mitkhal continued, ignoring Harry’s interruption. ‘During the twenty-three years that followed, he took no other wives. Aza bore him four children. His sons, Mahmoud, Faris, and Amir, and this one daughter Furja. And his sons . . . ’
‘Were hung by the Turks last year.’ Harry recalled Perry’s briefing.
‘Aza and Furja were forced to watch. By the time Shalan returned, the Turks had left, and the women had cut down the bodies and buried them. Shalan did not wait to eat or drink before riding out to avenge their deaths. That night Aza left the tent and walked out into the desert. A week later her body was found. When Shalan was told of Aza’s death he was desolate. He had taken his vengeance but there was nothing left of his family except Furja. He married again; taking the four wives allowed by Allah’s law but has made it plain he loves none as he loved Aza. Now he has two sons and I think a daughter, but the eldest boy is a baby. He stands alone without the sons of his youth at his side. Only Furja remains. It is she, not his eldest wife who rules the harem. Shalan has said he values her too highly to allow her to marry outside the tribe, which is why she lives in his tent although she is past the age of marriage.’
‘How old is she?’
‘Fifteen.’
Harry threw a stone at a lizard basking in the sun. He missed but the creature scuttled away. Fifteen! He remembered his twin Georgina at that age. Scrawny figure, ink stained, grubby fingers, spotty face, unkempt hair hanging greasily down her back, shrill, shrewish voice. A child of fifteen. His wife. Sharing his bed!
‘Ibn Shalan wants Furja to stay in his tent but apart from his love for her he is afraid that if he allows her to marry into one desert tribe, the others will see an alliance in the marriage. He already has a blood feud with the tribeless ones. The Turks have put a price on his head; Shalan may have no close allies, but at the moment, he has only two enemies.’
‘But if I marry his daughter, won’t the other tribes assume he has thrown in his lot with the British?’
‘You haven’t been listening,’ Mitkhal answered impatiently. ‘Shalan will present your marriage as a love match. If the bride price is mentioned, it will be dismissed as insignificant compared to Furja’s happiness. Everyone will understand his wanting to please her after the tragedy of her mother and brothers, and then again you are a truly tribeless one. The British have no tents, only houses in the towns and ships that cross the ocean. Where could you take Furja? To your bungalow alongside the barracks in Basra?’ Mitkhal mocked. ‘I think Shalan will suggest you pitch your tent alongside his and when the marriage fails and you divorce her, Furja will return to his harem. Precisely where he wants her.’
Harry shivered. The sun hung low on the horizon, a flaming ball that sank closer to the purple line that divided desert from sky with every passing minute. After the heat of the day, the air was cool but it would soon become uncomfortably cold. That was the problem with this hellish climate. Extremes. Always extremes.
He scrambled to his feet. ‘You’ve discovered a great deal about Shalan.’
‘People talk.’
‘Apparently only within your earshot.’ Harry hit Dorset on the flanks. She cantered off up the wadi.
‘What are you going to do?’
Harry raised an eyebrow. ‘Exactly what you expect me to.’
Mitkhal laid a restraining hand on Harry’s arm. ‘Be careful. You may secure the safety of the pipeline, but don’t treat this marriage as one of your British jokes. Shalan is not a fool. He may be up to something I know nothing of.’
‘I have you to protect my back.’
‘With Ibn Shalan, you need Allah, not me, to protect your back.’
They retraced their steps along the stone spattered wadi as twilight thickened. By the time they reached the closed circle of the camp, the tents were no more than shadows in the darkness. Only one side of Shalan’s tent was rolled up, and that faced inward. The fat lamps were lit, hung high on the tent poles, their pungent, smoky flames ready to illuminate the evening meal. When Harry pushed his way through the throng of men he detected the aroma of roasting goat flesh overlaying the odours of camel dung, coarse tobacco and horse sweat.
Mitkhal sniffed. ‘I’m ready to eat.’
‘You’re always ready to eat.’ When Harry stepped within the confines of Shalan’s tent, the curtain that walled in the harem billowed. Was the girl alongside him, her body separated from his only by a layer of cloth? Was she studying him through a hole in the curtain, sizing him up the way dealers did stud camels? His masculine pride baulked at the notion. Then he remembered she’d been kept in seclusion. The only men who entered the harem were her father and his eunuch slaves, even her brothers would have moved out to the Mukhaad - the men’s quarters - once they’d passed childhood. Hopefully seclusion meant inexperience and a brief “marriage” to an inexperienced virgin couldn’t be any worse than bedding one of the coarse, native whores in the Regimental Rag in India who took delight in discovering their customers’ sexual foibles and even greater delight in broadcasting them to their fellow officers. But then neither would she be a Christina, he reflected regretfully. Christina had been kind, gentle and quick to forgive his fumbling failings as she’d introduced him to an intense and erotic world.
‘Shalan is waiting,’ Mitkhal prompted.
Harry pushed his way through to the circle of favoured guests, leaving Mitkhal with the mass of Shalan’s tribesmen. The Sheikh clasped his shoulder in an ostentatious show of friendship before leading the group outside. They crouched and scrubbed their hands in sand. Dalhour was waiting, brass jug in hand, when they returned. The slave poured a little water over the hands of each man, before passing around the towel slung over his shoulder. After the ritual cleansing they squatted in a semi-circle under the open canopy of the tent.
Harry sat on Shalan’s right and the Sheikh clapped his hands. Five men carried an enormous brass platter into the tent that held four goats’ carcasses heaped on a bed of rice and gravy. Fold upon fold of soft, thin bread flaps rippled around the edge of the dish. On top of each carcass lay the bloodied severed head of the goat, proof that the animals had been freshly slaughtered in honour of the divan.
The favoured circle moved in the moment the dish was set on the ground. Delving into a carcass, Shalan extracted a torn section of liver and offered it to Harry. Harry accepted graciously, swallowing it in one mouthful, gritting his teeth against the bitter taste he’d detested from childhood. Placing his left hand behind his back, he scooped a handful of rice into the palm of his right hand and tossed it over the dish allowing the gravy to trickle through his fingers. Balancing the ball he’d made on his thumb and forefinger, he flicked it into his mouth. Noting the manoeuvre, his fellow guests nodded approval of his manners, followed his example and began to eat.
Mitkhal had expended a great deal of time teaching Harry desert etiquette. Bedouin customs and traditions were more steeped in ceremony than those of the average European Court. Thanks to Mitkhal Harry knew better than to touch the dish with his left hand; or with fingers he’d licked or put into his mouth. As he continued to wade through the selection of morsels Shalan heaped before him, he wished the Sheikh would honour him with the burnt outside, rather than the undercooked entrails of the carcass. He was glad when the favoured few had eaten their fill and Shalan signalled to the slaves. When the dish was carried to the next group of warriors, Mitkhal, among them, Harry rose and walked outside with Shalan. Together they scrubbed the grease from their hands.
‘You would like to smoke?’
Harry pulled a pack of Golden Dawn from his abba; to his amazement Shalan accepted one.
‘How long will it take to deliver the bride price?’
‘A week to travel to Basra, a week to assemble the livestock and guns, and a third week for my companion and I to bring them to wherever you’re camped.’
‘A month in all.’
‘Perhaps a few days less.’
‘We will say one month, that will allow time for the unexpected. It is not wise to count the days too closely when travelling across the desert.’
‘So I’ve learned.’
‘Your friend will travel to Basra without you.’
‘It is dangerous to travel the desert alone.’
‘Twelve of my men will accompany him to assist with any difficulties he may encounter.’
‘And what am I to do while my companion travels to Basra?’
‘Marry my daughter. Tomorrow. She has waited long enough for her bridal night.’
‘But the bridal price . . . ’
‘If your friend fails to deliver it within the month, I will take your head as payment.’ Shalan stared at him from eye sockets that appeared disconcertingly empty in the moonlight.
‘Anything can happen on the road between here and Basra.’
‘My men will see it doesn’t.’ Shalan rubbed the cigarette Harry had given him between his fingers, turning the tobacco to dust. ‘But perhaps it is not the dangers of the desert that concern you. Perhaps you are worried your Commanding Officer will fail to supply the bridal price you have agreed to deliver.’
‘The bridal price will be paid.’ When Perry had said, “You’re free to offer whatever it takes,” Harry fervently hoped it had been Perry, and not the brandy talking.
‘The marriage will take place before your companion leaves so he can tell your British friends of the union between our two great peoples.’
‘And the bride?’
‘Is delighted to be of service to her tribe. How delighted, you will see for yourself in the morning. Now you must excuse me. It is no small matter to arrange a daughter’s wedding at short notice.’
After Shalan left, Harry went in search of Mitkhal. He found him gossiping to Dalhour at the back of the tent. Seeing him, the slave went off to seek the dish of food that was being passed down the descending ranks of Shalan’s guests and retainers. It wouldn’t be carried into the harem until every man had eaten his fill, and the slaves had to wait until after the women had finished.
‘The wedding’s set for the morning.’
‘I heard.’ Mitkhal reached for a cigarette.
‘Shalan’s only just told me.’
‘Dalhour confided that the bride wasn’t too thrilled at the prospect of marrying a Ferenghi. She said she’d as soon marry a donkey.’
‘That makes two of us.’
‘It’s a good omen to agree on something so soon.’
‘Save the jokes, Mitkhal.’
‘Shalan is afraid that if he postpones the wedding until the bride price is delivered he’ll have no bride. Apparently Furja can be headstrong and is quite capable of running off. There’s no shortage of suitors who’d be delighted to run off with her.’
‘That’s just what a reluctant bridegroom needs to hear on the eve of his wedding.’
‘There won’t be a long ceremony. You and Shalan will sign an agreement in his tent. Afterwards you mount your horse, lift the bride on to the saddle behind you and ride around the camp until the whole tribe has been formally advised of your marriage, then, you enter the bridal booth . . . ’ He gave Harry a significant look.
‘And?’ Harry prompted.
‘Begin married life.’ Mitkhal pointed to a small tent being erected on the perimeter of the camp by the light of a thorn bush fire. ‘You’ll live there until I deliver the bridal price.’
‘If I last that long.’
‘With your leave coming up, you’ll last. As I have some hard riding to do tomorrow, I’ll get some sleep while I can.’
Harry dozed fitfully beneath the crowded canopy of Shalan’s tent. He spent half the night watching the fleas that lived in great colonies among the mattresses and rugs, hop huge distances from one sleeping figure to the next. Mitkhal was right, he had no option other than to fall in with Shalan’s scheming and marry the girl, but he’d remain with her as short a time as possible. He’d use the excuse of pressing ferenghi business. Shalan wouldn’t be able to contest that. The moment the bride price was delivered, he’d offer the goods as compensation for his poor performance as bridegroom, and pray Shalan could accept the guns and livestock without losing the peculiar Arab notion of “face.”
His cousin, John Mason and friend, Charles Reid were due to sail from India at the end of June. As soon as his business with Shalan was settled, he’d bolt back to Basra, pick up his ticket of leave and meet their ship when it berthed in the Gulf. They’d travel home together, get drunk, play cards, talk trivia - God, how he missed the small things he’d taken for granted, like daily baths, clean clothes and well cooked food.
He’d spend a token week with his parents, then persuade John, or Charles, or both to go climbing with him. North Wales possibly, Switzerland would be better. But before he went, he’d resign his commission. A year in India followed by eighteen months in Mesopotamia had been enough to convince him that the poky little office his father had offered him in Allan and Downe’s Bank was infinitely preferable to soldiering in the wastelands of the world. Anything had to be better, he decided, surveying the shadowy interior of Shalan’s tent. Even a drawing room full of giggling Lucys.
Mitkhal woke him before dawn. Outside they began the irritating practice of washing in sand. The sun rose as they finished. They had begun to dress when a veiled woman left the harem and extinguished the lamps that had burned throughout the night.
The sun was high before Mitkhal was satisfied with Harry’s appearance. Harry was by no means as grand as Mitkhal would have liked, but his gumbaz and kafieh were clean. Made from white, finely woven linen, he’d been saving them for the return journey. The feel of fresh clothes against his skin was a luxury he’d almost forgotten and helped ease the anguish of his fleabites. His abba had been brushed and re-brushed by Mitkhal with an arm of thorn until he was convinced the cloth would tear. Round his waist, he wore his officer’s sword. Mitkhal eyed it deprecatingly, as he commented on the lack of jewels in the hilt.
‘Can you imagine the stir I’d create if I walked into the mess with a jewelled scimitar hanging from my belt?’
‘I can imagine what Shalan’s warriors are going to say about the absence of jewels. You need a token to give the bride. Gold, or at a push silver.’
‘Shall we take a trip to the Bazaar to pick up something suitable?’ Harry enquired caustically.
‘Give her some sovereigns. She can weave them into her necklaces.’
Harry felt for the purse he kept strung around his neck. He tipped the contents into his hand. ‘There’s twenty here.’
‘They’ll have to do.’
‘Twelve will have to do.’ Harry returned eight to his pouch.
‘Bridegrooms don’t have time to gamble.’
‘Arab bridegrooms don’t have time to gamble. I’m a Ferenghi.’
‘The idea is to make everyone forget your faults.’
‘It’s time.’ Dalhour materialized at Harry’s side.
‘I’ll get Dorset.’ Mitkhal pushed Harry forward.
‘Come with me. I need a best man.’
‘The Bedawi don’t have best men,’ Mitkhal replied in English as he left for the wadi.
The wedding, as Mitkhal had prophesied, was simple. Harry walked into Shalan’s tent and found himself facing a silent, red veiled figure the same height as him. The Imam handed him a quill and he signed his name on a scroll beneath that of his new father-in-law. Free to look at his bride, he studied the only feature he could see above her veil; her eyes, dark, almond-shaped. Was it his imagination, or were they glittering in hostility?
At Shalan’s prompting they left the tent. The tribe had gathered to watch, Mitkhal in the forefront with Dorset. Harry lifted his surprisingly light bride on to the saddle before mounting himself, Mitkhal tugged on the rein and led them slowly around the camp before finally halting outside the booth they had watched Shalan’s women erect the night before. A black veiled matron opened the tent flap. Dismounting, Harry lifted his bride from Dorset’s back. She preceded him into the tent, Mitkhal gave him a final look of encouragement, Harry followed her, the flap swung down behind them and the crowd roared approval.
‘Hello, I’m Harry,’ he ventured in Arabic.
His bride tore off her scarlet veil and threw it to the ground. ‘You did not want to marry me, Ferenghi?’ she demanded in harsh, guttural English.
‘I am only a humble Lieutenant in my King’s Army. You are the daughter of a great Sheikh. I am unworthy of you.’
She stared at him frostily. ‘Save the diplomacy and lies for the divan, I am your wife, and this,’ she waved her hand around the lavishly hung interior of the bridal booth, ‘is our home until I decide to leave you, or you decide to divorce me. Here I expect honesty.’
‘Of course,’ he agreed. Despite his misgivings he’d half hoped for the subservient slave girl of Arabian legend. Instead he found himself confronting a slim, olive skinned girl, whose unprepossessing looks were marred by a stern expression, not unlike Shalan’s. He had an uncomfortable feeling that given sufficient provocation the daughter might prove even more dangerous and unpredictable than the father.
‘Now my husband,’ she sank on to a pile of rugs and patted the ground beside her. ‘You will sit here, and we will discuss this “marriage” of ours.’
CHAPTER TWO
SS Egra, The Persian Gulf, Thursday 2nd July 1914
‘Don’t they look as though they were made for one another,’ Emily Perry whispered to Charles Reid when they walked out of the salon on to the first class section of the deck. Blinded by the gloom after the electric lights of the interior, Charles narrowed his eyes. He made out the tall, well set up figure of John Mason standing next to the slight, glittering figure of Maud Perry. Her gold lace evening dress was set with myriads of tiny amber beads that caught and reflected the light from the portholes, and her laughter, light, silvery echoed through the still, warm air.
‘If by that you mean they’re oblivious to the existence of everyone else on board, I’ll agree with you.’
‘Charles, please,’ Emily clung to his arm. ‘Don’t begrudge them their happiness.’
‘I don’t - it’s just - damn it, Emily, you know what I mean.’ Leaning on the rail he stared into the white crested blue-black shadows swirling in the sea below.
‘Isn’t it enough that I feel the same way as you?’
‘Not when I have to leave you in Basra and go on to England alone.’ He reached for her hand; the salon door opened and he dropped it. ‘Leave him Emily,’ he pleaded when no one appeared. ‘It’s not as if you love him. We can sail on to England together.’
‘My dear boy, I’m old.’
‘Barely ten years older than me. What’s ten years?’
‘In four years you’ll be a young man of thirty, and I’ll be forty.’
He placed a finger over her lips. ‘It won’t matter.’
‘There’d be a scandal. Your career would be ruined.’
‘I’ll resign my commission.’
‘And then what would you do?’
‘Live off my father. Work? What does it matter as long as we’re together?’
‘You’re a soldier, Charles. After living with the army for twenty years I know what that means. You might cope with ostracism from society, but you couldn’t bear the loss of the Regiment. In time you’d hate me for taking you away from the life you love.’
‘It’s you I love. Without you, I’m nothing.’
‘Please, this is our last night together. Don’t spoil it by arguing.’ She started at the sound of the door opening again. Charles nodded to the ship’s officers who left the salon.
‘Bowditch, Grace,’ he acknowledged.
‘Mrs Perry, Captain Reid, marvellous night isn’t it.’ Lieutenant Grace stood on his heels and breathed in deeply.
‘Marvellous,’ Charles echoed dryly.
‘Time is creeping on, it’s after ten thirty.’ The lights went out in the salon as Lieutenant Bowditch spoke. ‘All unaccompanied ladies to their cabins and men to the smoking room. See you there Reid?’
‘If I’m not too tired.’
‘It’s time I said goodnight to Maud and John,’ Emily murmured. ‘It’s going to be a long day tomorrow.’
‘Half an hour?’ Charles mouthed silently. She inclined her head. He offered her his arm. Together they walked along the deck.
‘I wonder if I’d be swept up by Lieutenant Grace if I didn’t have you to protect me.’ Mischief glowed luminously in Maud’s deep blue eyes as she smiled up at John.
‘Alf Grace would be more likely to take my place. You’re beautiful in this light.’ He stared, captivated by her pretty face and shining abundance of golden hair. Ever since he’d seen Romeo and Juliet on his fifteenth birthday he’d been longing to fall in love, but never in his wildest imaginings had he foreseen the advent of anyone like Maud sweeping into his life. She looked like an angel - the Pre-Raphaelite copies of the Botticelli angels that decorated the chapel at Clyneswood. Slender figure, perfectly formed red lips, cherubic cheeks, long curling blonde hair, enormous, innocent blue eyes - but that’s where the resemblance ended. Maud looked like an angel but frequently behaved like a devil, particularly when the straight-laced and pompous were around.
‘Stop looking at me like that.’ Maud pursed her lips, inviting a kiss.
‘Have I told you I love you?’ he whispered huskily.
‘Not for at least five minutes.’
‘I love you.’
‘You could kiss me. We’re the only ones here.’
‘You’re shameless.’
‘Only where you’re concerned.’
Despite her assurance, John glanced over his shoulder. ‘Your mother and Charles are walking towards us.’
‘They don’t count.’
‘Why you . . . ’
‘Lover’s tiff?’ Charles enquired sourly.
‘Nothing I can’t handle,’ Maud replied confidently.
‘I dare say.’ Charles lightened his tone in response to the pressure of Emily’s hand on his arm. ‘But look at the result of your handling. John hasn’t got drunk, played cards or visited the “Men Only” sections of this ship once since we sailed. He’s your lap dog, Maud. How can I face Harry with a lap dog in tow?’
‘I’ll tell Harry it’s my fault.’
‘I keep forgetting you’ve met him.’
‘Harry was the reason I was sent to India.’
‘Maud!’
‘It’s true, Mother. I’ve told John all about it, not that there’s much other than Father’s imaginings, but given Harry’s reputation . . . ’
‘Maud, that’s enough. Don’t keep her up, John. We’ve a long day tomorrow.’ Emily kissed her daughter.
‘I won’t, Emily. Goodnight.’
‘Think I'll go to bed soon too.’ Charles yawned. ‘Don’t disturb me when you come in.’
‘I won’t,’ John replied shortly. ‘Goodnight.’
Maud waited until her mother and Charles disappeared through the door that led to the deck cabins. ‘Now we’re really alone.’
John checked. The deck was deserted. Wrapping his arms around her waist he drew her close. Bending his head to hers he finally kissed her.
‘I adore you, Captain Mason.’ Lifting her arms to his neck she pulled his head to hers once more. The thin silk of her evening gown fluttered in the breeze and her bare arm brushed against his cheek.
‘You’re cold. Here,’ he arranged her shawl around her shoulders. ‘And I’m not Captain Mason any longer. Just plain John Mason, civilian.’
‘Doctor John Mason.’
‘A very undistinguished doctor with no ambitions beyond marrying you.’
‘And living happily ever after,’ she finished playfully.
‘I’m not a Prince.’
‘Then you must be a knight. A knight who’s rescued me from a fate worse than death.’
‘Harry?’
‘Most certainly not Harry. He’s fun. You’ve rescued me from life in Basra. You’ve no idea how bad it can be, heat, flies - ugh, you can't even begin to imagine the flies.’
‘Now I’ve rescued you, you can forget Basra and the flies. I intend to carry you off into the depths of the English Countryside and find a sleepy little village . . . ’
‘What will we do in a sleepy little village?’ she broke in.
‘Be happy. I’ll cure the natives of their mumps and measles, and you, my beautiful wife, will make a home for us. We’ll fill it full of lovely things. Furniture, books, friends and children. Dozens of children.’
Maud held him at arm’s length. ‘Dozens of children are not a part of any “happily ever after” I’ve read about.’
‘Don’t you want children?’ he asked seriously.
‘In moderation.’
‘Then I’ll amend our future to include children in moderation.’
‘There’s someone behind us.’
John glanced over his shoulder and saw an Indian steward peering around the door that led to the staff quarters. ‘We’re holding up the workers. They need to clean the decks for tomorrow.’
‘Can’t we keep them waiting a little longer?’
‘It wouldn’t be fair. They have to get up horribly early, besides I promised your mother we wouldn’t be late.’
‘But I want to stay with you,’ she protested petulantly.
‘There’s nowhere for us to go, my darling. The lounge is closed. I can hardly take you into the Men’s Smoking Room. If you so much as stood outside the door you'd create a sensation.’
‘I could live with a sensation if you could.’
‘I like the quiet life. How about I walk you to your cabin?’
‘Whatever my lord and master decrees.’
‘I won’t be that legally for a few more days, and knowing you, my love, I doubt you’ll take notice of anything I decree.’
‘You could teach me subservience.’
‘God help the man who tried.’ He pulled her into an alcove, then, after glancing up and down to make sure they weren’t in view of the small army of hands swarming over the deck, cleaning, and straightening chairs and cushions, he kissed her. On the forehead.
‘Is that all I get?’
‘On account. Full payment comes on our wedding night.’
‘If you came to my cabin we could forget about accounts.’
‘What would people say if we were seen? Your reputation - your mother.’ Taken aback by her suggestion, John failed to notice the effort it had cost her to make it.
‘Mother wouldn’t be able to say anything considering Charles has spent every night in her cabin since we sailed.’
‘Maud!’
‘There’s no use pretending you’re shocked. You must know, seeing as how you and Charles are supposed to be sharing a cabin.’
‘I didn’t realise you knew.’ The secret was Charles and Emily’s. John would rather not have been a party to it but as Maud reminded him, he and Charles were supposed to be sharing a cabin and that made him a conspirator, albeit an unwilling one.
‘I found out the morning after we left India. Our maid slept late, hardly surprising if a tenth of what I heard really went on in the third class lounge the night before. Anyway, I went to see Mother early, I’d lost a button from my grey silk, and hoped she’d have a replacement. When I opened my door I saw Charles, sneak out of her cabin.’
‘Did you tell your mother?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘You don’t intend to?’
‘No.’ Encircling his waist with her arms, she laid her head against his chest. ‘I’m pleased for them. If I hadn’t seen Charles leaving I might not have realised that he and Mother were actually - but I would have to be blind not to notice the difference in her. All she talked about in India was love. How the right man could make a woman happy. It wasn’t only her maternal interest in us. She smiled more when Charles was around and although she tried using our happiness as an excuse, it fell flat when you were on duty and Charles visited us alone. They managed to make me feel like a middle-aged chaperone. Wouldn’t it be marvellous if they ran off together?’
‘They’d become social lepers.’
‘Nothing would matter if they had one another. You wouldn’t mind if they lived together, would you?’
‘Your mother will always be welcome in our house, when we get one. But I don’t think either your mother or Charles would be happy. Charles would have to resign his commission, and outside of us, no one would receive your mother.’
‘Surely, once everyone saw how well suited they are . . . ’
‘Whatever we think is irrelevant,’ he interrupted. ‘It’s none of our business.’
‘It is mine. You haven’t met my father. Don’t misunderstand me,’ she qualified. ‘He’s a good father and husband in the provider sense. Mother and I have always had most of the things we’ve wanted, clothes, jewellery, things for the house - but he’s so - wooden. Grade one British Army, officer material for the use of - wooden.’
‘What would he do if he found out about your mother and Charles?’
‘The honourable thing, whatever that might be. Shoot Charles, throw out my mother. He’s not going to find out is he, John?’
‘Not from me. And that’s enough for one night. It’s time you were in your cabin.’
Sensing John’s disapproval of Charles and her mother’s affair, Maud was in emotional turmoil as she led the way to her cabin. She’d lived all her life in Army Quarters among healthy young men. According to her father, the proximity had led to the development of a coarse, unfeminine streak. If Emily’s health had been stronger, he would have sent her to a girls’ school in England to be inculcated with mannerisms befitting a Colonel’s daughter. He’d frequently warned her she’d overhear things no lady should if she persisted in wandering around the barracks. She had.
Before her sixteenth birthday she knew what “Rag” meant, and she’d caught sight of enough whores sidling in and out of the men’s quarters, to realise sex was a saleable and, for men at least, enjoyable commodity, but she’d never considered any of her illicit discoveries relevant to her, until she’d met Captain John Mason.
From the first moment she’d caught sight of him at the Ladies’ Dinner given in the officers’ mess in honour of her mother’s arrival, she was conscious of his dark handsome good looks. It didn’t take her long to discover that he was as unaware of them, as he was of the effect he had on his fellow officers’ wives. She discovered she liked being alone with him, teasing and later, kissing him. And during the whole of their courtship, hovering in the background, whispered, rarely openly spoken of, were the sexual mysteries, embellished and passed on at the claustrophobic, sweltering, all female tea parties.
Knowing winks and nods exchanged between the older matrons. Congratulations accompanied by blatantly envious looks from the younger wives. Major Harrap’s wife had unbent enough to follow her routine good wishes with the confidence that John had attended her during the long and difficult birth of her first child and throughout the whole undignified, painful, ordeal he had been a pillar of strength, gentleness and comfort.
‘My dear,’ Marjorie had laid a damp, pale hand on her arm. ‘You can have no idea how kind your fiancé was. He brought my son out with considerably less pain and embarrassment than Major Harrap inflicted putting him in. You my dear, Maud, have not only caught yourself the best looking officer in the Regiment but also the most considerate.’
‘Penny for them?’
Maud looked up and realised they were outside her cabin door. ‘I was thinking of you.’ She gave him her key; he turned it in the lock. She grasped his hand. ‘Come in. Just for a little while.’
Seeing no one in the corridor he followed her. Closing the door behind him, he locked it.
‘I gave Harriet the evening off.’ Maud turned her back to him so he wouldn’t see the nervousness in her eyes. ‘Would you unhook my dress for me?
‘That’s him. The tall, fair one speaking to the waiter,’ the steward whispered.
The sepoy pressed closer to the porthole.
‘In the name of Allah get back. If you’re seen, we’ll both be done for. You know the rule about sticking to your own deck.’
The Indian moved away from the porthole and slid into the shadows. ‘You’re sure that’s Captain Reid.’
‘I serve early morning tea to him and Captain Mason.’
‘He’s leaving the ship at Basra?’
‘I heard them talking. Captain Mason’s getting married there.’
Chatta Ram pressed a few rupees into the steward’s hand. He closed his eyes, pictured the man he’d seen. Yes, he’d know him again.
‘You’ve got to get back to the staff quarters.’
‘You go first. I’ll find my own way.’
The man needed no second bidding. He’d risked his job by taking the sepoy to the first class deck. Chatta Ram took one last look. Captain Charles Reid, long legs crossed in front of him, whisky glass in hand was laughing. Chatta wondered if he’d laugh as loud in the Spartan Indian section of the ship. There were no upholstered chairs, thick carpets, crystal glasses, or whisky there. Only thin sleeping pallets, canvas buckets and rough wooden stools. One day – Chatta Ram left the porthole and crept along the deck towards the stern.
Harry woke to see the moon shining, a huge golden ball segmented by the carved stonework of the trellis windows. Turning on his side he watched the shadows play across Furja’s cheek. Their first night together under a roof. Already he was regretting the ease with which he’d acceded to Shalan’s demands.
“I know the Ferenghis, Hassan.” It hadn’t taken Shalan long to Arabicise his name. “I know their ways. Their contempt.” Shalan had spat into the dust. “You will not take my daughter among your people.”