‘Oh, I’m not alone,’ Aida was quick to contradict him. ‘My uncle Naguib is a great help and most of the people involved are experienced employees who worked for my father.’
‘Well, you know you can always count on me for assistance. I myself own quite a large amount of land in Minieh, which I often visit. It’s not that far from Luxor, and it would be easy for me to call on you if you needed help.’
Aida smiled awkwardly. ‘You are very kind. I will certainly bear that in mind.’
A high-pitched female voice entered the conversation: a young Englishwoman sitting next to Alastair Carlisle. ‘Are you giving your annual party at your oasis? I hope I’m not being too cheeky in saying I’d love to see your desert palace. My friends who went last year really enjoyed themselves.’
The prince flashed her a smile. ‘Yes, of course. I’m a little late this year, having been busy organising the fashion show. The invitations are going out as we speak. I’ll make sure you are on the list. This year I propose to organise the event differently. My guests will not drive to the edge of the desert and leave their cars there, as in previous years. Despite my men standing guard, there was some vandalism last time. I wouldn’t want it to happen again so I will have a bus collect my guests and camels will carry you into the desert to Kasr El Nawafeer. Naturally you are all invited for the weekend.’
The proposition was met with cries of enthusiasm.
The prince’s gaze switched back to Aida. ‘I hope you will do me the great honour of accepting this invitation,’ he said, bowing towards her. ‘I will accept no excuses.’ His voice flicked like a whip and his heavy seal ring caught a last bright ray of the setting sun as he laid a hand proprietorially over Aida’s, making her shiver.
‘But, of course,’ she said, a forced smile quivering on her mouth. ‘It sounds terribly exotic.’
‘Camelia, Aida, I’m afraid it is time to leave.’ Phares had stood up abruptly, his black eyes holding a meaningful gleam as they met hers. ‘Father has invited some friends over for dinner and it’ll take us a good while to get to Kasr El Shorouk. We’d better get a move on.’ Turning to the group who were protesting loudly, he gave them his most charming smile, his teeth brilliant against the copper tone of his skin. ‘There’ll be many more occasions to get together, my friends, but you must excuse us today.’
Aida breathed an internal sigh of relief that she was able to escape the prince’s possessive hold, and they left the pavilion in silence as they made their way to the car.
‘What was all that about dinner? Papa left this morning,’ Camelia asked her brother as soon as they were out of earshot.
‘I know,’ Phares muttered, frowning as he strode ahead, ‘but it was the only way I could get you both away from that suave fox. How dare he paw Aida einy einak, in broad daylight! I had to do something.’
Osta Fathi was waiting for them with the Cadillac outside the clubhouse. Here, Phares took his leave: ‘I have my own car. I’ll shower and change and join you at Kasr El Shorouk.’ Turning to Aida, he added, ‘We could have an early dinner. Perhaps you would care for a horse ride after that in the desert?’
Aida’s heart quickened at Phares’s suggestion. Although she knew being alone with him again was dangerous in case she was to lose her self-control, she turned to Camelia for her approval. Knowing her friend didn’t particularly enjoy riding, Aida didn’t feel she should leave her on her own without checking first with her.
‘Go ahead, please. There’s something on the wireless I want to listen to tonight. They’re reading passages from Kifah Tibah, Thebes at War. Naguib Mahfouz is my favourite writer, I don’t want to miss it.’ And with that, she climbed into the car.
Aida cheeks burned as she lifted her eyes to Phares, hoping he couldn’t read too much into them. ‘I haven’t ridden in the desert for years. I’d love to go for a ride after dinner. Thank you.’
His eyes met hers with a glint of awareness. ‘Our last escapade was rather successful, wasn’t it?’ he murmured. And as he held her blue gaze prisoner of his own, so dark and intense, Aida was aware that everything around her was quiet but for the cicadas who were ever present yet always unseen, like the motives of the human heart.
* * *
After dinner, Phares was already waiting for Aida in the hall when she came down the grand staircase wearing fawn-coloured slacks and a man’s shirt tied at the waist. As she took in his tall, lean frame, she couldn’t help but feel that familiar stirring deep in her belly. Standing next to one of the long windows, one arm resting on the architrave, staring out into the night, he had a dignified and noble appearance, looking more than ever like the proud Copt he was, who held firmly to the traditions of his race and caste. His long legs were encased in black riding breeches, and he wore a white shirt open at the neck with the sleeves rolled up and knee-length boots of gleaming black leather; a powerful figure in his riding gear, full of vigour, the thong of a whip wrapped around his brown knuckles.
‘Ready?’ he asked as he turned towards Aida with a broad smile.
‘Yes. I haven’t yet had time to buy my riding gear, but I think this will do.’
His gaze moved over her appreciatively. ‘Yes. You look good in trousers and the way you’re wearing that shirt is very …’ he hesitated, then added, ‘flattering. You need a riding hat though. You can borrow one of Camelia’s from the tack room in the stables. She hasn’t ridden much since Mounir died.’
‘I feel bad leaving her alone this evening,’ Aida murmured as they headed for the large wooden front door.
‘I wouldn’t worry. Camelia likes her own company and listening to the radio.’ He gave her a warm look. ‘She’s really brightened up since your return. For the first few months after the accident she was almost a recluse.’
‘It’s terrible to lose a loved one, especially so suddenly,’ Aida said, knowing the significance of her words but not caring.
Phares’s lips twisted. ‘Yes,’ he muttered, his jaw tightening.
For a brief moment the atmosphere crackled with electricity, threatening to raise the usual wall of antagonism between them, but it evaporated as soon as they stepped out into the garden and a rush of cool, sweet air greeted them. Phares reached out for Aida’s hand and regretting her earlier point-scoring, she didn’t pull away.
Darkness had fallen. In the navy-blue sky the stars shone with an intense and lustrous brilliancy, blinking and winking in the early night. They went through a wrought-iron gate that led into the big gravelled yard of the stables, a long line of whitewashed brick buildings behind the house surrounded by high walls. Aida sniffed the air and found the smell of horses and hay a healthy dispeller of melancholic thoughts. Youths were busy about the place and though they eyed her furtively with curiosity, they did not speak to her, keeping their gaze to the floor. It was not protocol in Egypt for the yard hands to look at or converse with the guests, no matter how informal their dress or manner.
Phares approached a boy who was cleaning saddles and asked him about the foal whose mother had apparently been put down the week before. The boy set aside his cleaning rag and rubbed his palms down the sides of his narrow trousers, then led them across the yard and down a passageway. There in a scrubbed stall was the foal, firmly planted on its long legs, a black beauty with a cocky little tail and the promise of a proud mane along its silky neck. Aida knew little about horses but she could tell that the foal was exceptionally fine. She went forward to fondle the perked ears, and at once, the foal backed away from her and began to kick the wall with its back legs.
‘Be careful,’ Phares warned, pulling her back. ‘He’s young, but he’s already spirited like his father, Zein el Sahara, Prince of the Desert, my best horse.’
‘Was he in one of the stalls upstairs? I didn’t notice him.’
‘No, he’s much too nervy to be among other horses. He has his own box outside, behind this stable block.’
‘Are you riding him this evening?’
Phares shook his hea
d. ‘I only ride him when I’m on my own. For our evening stroll, I have chosen a beautiful fawn-coloured mare, Bint El Nil, Daughter of the Nile, for you, and for me, my other favourite mount, Bourkan, Volcano. Another spirited black horse, but older and wiser than Zein el Sahara. I named him Bourkan because when I give him free rein it sounds like an erupting volcano when his hooves start galloping.’
Aida’s eyes followed Phares as he moved slowly but deliberately to stand in front of the foal, who immediately began to nuzzle his hand. ‘Your love of horses and the desert is so strange,’ she said finally. ‘You were made to be a Bedouin.’
‘Maybe that was who I was in a previous life,’ he said, his eyes looking far away, as if he saw the immense desert before him.
She stilled. ‘With a harem of women … is that what you pine after?’
Phares sighed. ‘Contrary to what you think of me, I’m not as one-track minded as you are. I might have known a lot of women, but that is not my sole objective in life. But sometimes, like you, I feel the overpowering constraints of our society and I long to break free of its chains. Still, most of the time I am well aware of how lucky I am to live the wonderful life I have, especially when I look around me and see all the misery in the world.’
Aida watched him thoughtfully, wondering what constraints Phares felt. Was he thinking of Nairy Paplosian and the customs controlling Egyptian society that looked unkindly on the mingling of blood and the mixing of social strata, condemning a person if they married outside their circle and their cast? A lump suddenly formed in her throat at the disturbing thought: it had happened to Ayoub when he had married her mother, an Englishwoman.
The stable hand returned with some cubes of sugar. Aida laid one on the palm of her hand and spoke seductively to the foal. He at once pricked up his ears with curiosity and took one or two sidling steps towards the sweet bribe she held out to him. The young animal quivered as he caught the scent of it, and the next moment his velvety muzzle was tucked in her palm and he was gobbling up the sugar. When it was all gone, he pushed his head against her, roughly but not spitefully, and allowed her to fondle his ears.
‘He’s beautiful.’
‘He should be, he has a fine pedigree. Both his parents have won awards.’
Phares and Aida went back to the stable block, where their two mounts were waiting for them.
‘She’s lovely,’ Aida exclaimed as she ran her hand down the glossy neck of Bint El Nil’s pale satiny fawn coat.
‘She should be. She’s the descendant of Baz.’
‘Baz?’
‘Yes, it’s a Berber name from the desert-born legend, The Birth of a Stud.’
Aida glanced at him, her eyes twinkling. ‘I remember those days when you used to read me and Camelia tales from the Arabian Nights, but you never told me that one before.’
A flare of warm recognition lit his eyes and leaning up against the stable wall, he adopted the mien of raconteur, familiar to Aida from those far-off days.
‘In a tale whispered through the ages,’ he began, ‘it is rumoured the mare was born from the breath of the Creator. No animal on earth could improve upon her nature or form. It’s said that she was in foal and gave birth to a colt, and in time they were mated. For generations her descendants replicated her perfect beauty, intelligence, and agile strength. She was named Baz, and is the Eve of the Arabian horse breed. For thousands of years, the original shepherd’s descendants bred the pure stock of Baz. Her family grew and branched out, as did her caretaker’s, until the desert lands were renowned for both the nomadic Bedouin tribes and their unique hot-blooded horses.’
Aida smiled at him, for a moment transported to those carefree days of her youth. Then she asked, ‘How did you come across her?’
‘I have many friends among the Bedouins,’ he said, checking the girth of Aida’s mare was properly tightened, something Bint El Nil clearly did not like, for he had to speak to her in a low, gentle voice to get her to stand still so that he could help Aida up into the soft brown saddle.
She then watched as he mounted Bourkan, who did his best to get rid of his rider. Using his wits and horsemanship, Phares stuck on. Aida could see immediately that the the stallion was not only swift but free-spirited, occasionally giving way to youthful exuberance, dancing sideways as they went. But trained to the nth degree, he finally became amenable to Phares’s touch on the rein, settling down to business, aware that a master was in the saddle. Phares recognised to a fraction the difference between high spirits and vice, and knew exactly how far he might indulge his Arab mount, and when he needed to bring Bourkan to heel without jerking the horse’s sensitive velvet mouth unnecessarily. It was wonderful to watch the two wills, that of the man and his beast, fighting for supremacy.
A belated third-quarter moon lent an uncertain light, its pale bulk reflected in the tranquil bosom of the canal that lay along the way from Kasr El Shorouk to the Pyramids Road. As they rode, talking easily together, the broad expanse of the fields’ waving green faded away into the illimitable distance. The scattered mud villages, huddling under clumps of palms, were mere ghostly sketches, like mirages in the night, and the pyramids stood high above on a surprisingly lofty bluff which marked the eastern edge of the eternal sands.
Soon, they reached the Great Pyramid. Here, on the edge of the desert, the night was lighter and the Nile Valley presented an almost unreal, haunting view.
‘Shall we go down to the Sphinx?’
‘Yes, it’s never so impressive than by moonlight,’ Aida replied keenly.
‘I’ve seen him at various times of the day and at each hour I find he has a different expression but I think it’s by moonlight that I like him the best.’
‘You automatically say he. Is the Sphinx a man? Wasn’t the Greek Sphinx of Thebes a woman?’
‘Man or woman, it’s the most extraordinary piece of sculpture ever wrought by human hands, even if its sex is lost in that pitiless, stony glare. I slept at its feet one night. My Bedouin friends disapproved because they say the place is haunted by the ghosts of the Arab cemetery just over the rise from the Sphinx.’
‘Was it a good experience?’
Phares beamed. ‘It was wonderful. The desert was an extraordinary pink colour in the moonlight.’
Aida smiled at his enthusiam. ‘Did you see any ghosts?’
‘There were a few Arabs crossing the cemetery in the distance. They did actually look like black ghosts. Anyone walking in the desert at night seems to be stealing across it. Strangely enough, a grey owl flew out from somewhere, I couldn’t tell where, and sat on the Sphinx. It stayed there a long time before flying away. The moon gave it a curious ghostly sheen. A beautiful sight …’
‘The spirit of one of the Arabs lying in the cemetery perhaps.’
‘Maybe. It did cross my mind.’ Phares gave a low chuckle. He seemed completely at ease on horseback here in the desert. ‘One feels very privileged to lie under a wondrous sky, gazing at the majestic calm of the Sphinx’s face.’ He turned to look at her, the glint in his eye visible in the dim light: ‘We must do it together some time.’
At a walking pace they passed the Pyramid of Cheops, bore around its massive eastern face and down into a valley. The three great pyramids towered nearby, their silhouettes soft yet glowing in the magic of the moonlight. There was no one else about and the effect was so potent, all conversation between them was hushed in awe at the grandeur of those monsters of the past and the illimitable spaces of the billowy desert. It felt to Aida like passing over a recent soft snowfall, and she was lulled by the gentle, swaying motion of their mounts and numbed by the chill of the night.
Cantering now, they descended to the deserted hollow wherein lay the Sphinx. The huge sculpture, carved out of the solid rock of the plateau, was half buried in the sands. The moon softened the gaze of its sightless eyes and threw the sharp shadow of its mighty back on the face of the desert. In this soul-stirring atmosphere it wore the mystic look for which it was renowned, one w
hich spoke of eternal secrecy. At a standstill on their horses, Aida and Phares did not speak but stared up at the mighty sandstone figure so disdainful of man, marvelling at the leviathan’s length. It was almost terrifying in this vast solitude. Silent, menacing, a crouching half man, half lion lying at the edge of the desert, it gazed through human eyes towards the dawn.
‘It makes you feel like an ant,’ Aida whispered to Phares.
He nodded in agreement, then dismounted, tying Bourkan to a post before helping Aida down. In doing so, Phares kept his arm around her waist a fraction longer than necessary, their gazes tangling in the half-light. She stared back at him in a half-daze before he released her to tie the mare next to his horse. A new awareness crept into the air between them as they started to walk silently through the valley.
He turned suddenly to face her. ‘Have you thought about our conversation the other day?’
‘Yes.’ She stole a glance at him from under her lashes, dreading the next question.
He had turned away from her and appeared to be totally absorbed in the view in front of him, his profile set in unreadable lines. ‘Have you come to any conclusion?’
She almost held her breath. ‘Not really, Phares.’
He said nothing, but Aida sensed he was brooding on his own thoughts. She wanted him to know she cared, wanted him to understand her dilemma, and searched her mind to explain more clearly what she felt.
‘The situation between us is not simple, Phares …’
Aida trailed off as he suddenly strode towards her. His hands closed around her shoulders as he pulled her against him, turning her face up to him so that she was forced to meet his penetrating gaze. ‘Would it be simpler for you if I was Shams Sakr El Din asking you to marry me?’ he said in a dangerously low voice. ‘I saw the way he was looking at you at the clubhouse.’
Aida’s eyes widened in surprise. ‘The prince? No, he has nothing to do with…’
He hooked an arm around her waist and drew her sharply against his hard, strong body. Continuing as if he hadn’t heard her, he growled, ‘Because it’s not him you want, Aida, it’s me.’
Song of the Nile Page 30