Like a cluster of debutantes, the Tuareg men had dressed in their finest clothing. Turbans adorned with sweeping bows and silver pins wound around their heads in fantastic shapes, covering all but their eyes. They sported burnouses embroidered in gold, silver, red, and white threads. Ornate charms and amulets hung around their necks as they swept into the group of women and took their places.
Tillie sensed the amenoukal beside her as he lowered himself to the ground, sinking into his burnous like the Wicked Witch of the West. She wished she could dump a bucket of water on him and make him evaporate completely. His eyes, blacker than lumps of coal, stared at her. Unwilling to kowtow to him, she stared back.
He wore a dark indigo turban knotted at his neck and pinned with a gold and amethyst brooch. His black burnous had been sewn with golden threads that took the shape of monitor lizards—the beloved waran of the Tuareg. His black veil was fringed in gold, and his long fingers sported golden rings set with fiery jewels. His slippers, made of dusky blue embroidered silk, bore golden tassels on each toe.
Tillie tried to pray, but no words would come. She swallowed hard and tore her attention from the man who now clutched her mind as if he possessed that, too. She slid closer to Khatty, drawing her knees up to her chest.
Women began to wail their love songs. Men replied in deeper tones. Hours slipped by. Khatty tried to explain the meanings of the songs, but Tillie could hardly listen. Instead, she watched the younger woman. It was clear by the way she murmured and flirted with her husband that Khatty was in love with the man. But the way the amenoukal looked at Tillie left her no doubt that he had set his sights on the tree-planting woman. Her heart broke for Khatty . . . and quaked for herself.
When the moon was high and the feasters had sated themselves on songs, camels’ milk, and date wine, Khatty leaned over and whispered in Tillie’s ear. “It is time. Now you go away to a place near trees. Men who wish to admire you follow.”
Her blood hammering, Tillie shook her head. “No, Khatty, I—”
“Yes! It is custom. If not, amenoukal will—”
“What happens under the tree?”
“You tell men a story or make poems. All men who wish to be your love-partner will make sign in your hand. They draw circle with finger, then touch center of circle. After that, you make sign to each man. If you do not choose man, you draw line from wrist to fingers. But if you choose man, you draw line from wrist to fingers, then follow it back. Men will all leave; then man you have chosen returns. You go to my tent with him for courting.”
Khatty finished speaking and sat in silence for a moment, her dark eyes searching Tillie’s face. Then she heaved a heavy sigh. “Amenoukal of the Tuareg goes with you, I am certain,” she whispered. “You must choose him.”
“No.”
“Enkar! Get up! Go, Tree-Planting Woman!”
Khatty shoved an elbow into Tillie’s ribs and prodded her to her feet. Stumbling out into the darkness, Tillie watched the other small groups of men and women making their way into the cover of night. She grasped the edges of her burnous to her chest and glanced behind her. Already three men followed. Their leader was the amenoukal.
Help me, Father. Please help.
Wiping the sweat from her forehead, she tried to think as she made her way through the cluster of tents out into the low shrubs. She could hear the plaintive wailing of the old woman and her imzad as she spotted a tall palm tree. Sinking to her knees at its base, she crossed her arms over her chest.
“Tree-Planting Woman,” the amenoukal’s voice was low. “Tell story.”
Tillie glanced at the row of five veiled and turbaned men seated around her. The amenoukal had placed himself in front of her and was waiting, his eyes hidden in shadow.
Clearing her throat, Tillie looked up at the stars. “Tell story,” she repeated, trying to think of the longest possible tale she knew. War and Peace? Too Russian. Moby Dick? Too wet. Maybe if she ran together every single one of Grimm’s fairy tales, it would be sunrise before she finished.
“Okay, let’s see. Once upon a time, there was a poor but beautiful girl named Cinderella. She had three wicked stepsisters and an evil stepmother, who always wore a blue turban and liked to go around slashing people’s heads off.”
The amenoukal gazed at her in fascination. Tillie launched into the story Hannah had told her and her sisters a hundred times. Aware that the men would hardly understand a word she said, she embellished the tale with every tidbit that came into her mind. She couldn’t bring herself to look into the men’s faces, so she stared out at the moonlit river and the gleaming dunes beyond it.
“And so the handsome prince fell in love with the beautiful Cinderella in her silk gown and glass slippers,” she went on. “They danced and danced all the night long until the clock began to strike twelve. Of course, you fellows probably don’t know what a clock is. Suffice it to say, it was way past Cindy’s bedtime.”
She drew out the story as long as she could, unconsciously knotting and unknotting her fingers as she spoke. “And, of course, the glass slipper fit, and the prince knew right away that this poor little housemaid was his beautiful Cinderella. He asked her to marry him then and there. She said yes, of course, so he put her on the back of his white stallion, and they rode off to the castle to live happily ever after. And that’s the end of that one. Now, um . . . Snow White. Let’s see . . .”
In the moment she was silent, the amenoukal reached out and clamped his hand over Tillie’s. “Enough story, Tree-Planting Woman.”
He forced open her palm, drew a wide circle, and pressed its center with his forefinger. She jerked her hand away, but it was grabbed by a second man who made the same motion on her palm. When the third man repeated the gesture, Tillie yanked her hand from his grasp and pushed it deep into the folds of her burnous.
“That’s enough.” Shaking, she turned away from the men and looked at the swaying grass. “I’m not doing it, and I don’t—”
“Tree-Planting Woman.” A man at the far end of the row snatched her wrist.
“No,” Tillie snapped. “Leave me alone. I get the idea, okay?”
The man opened Tillie’s palm and took the third finger of her left hand. Grasping the beaded ring, he pulled hard and twisted so that she yelped in pain.
“Ouch! Listen, buster—!” Tillie drew back to clobber him when her focus crystallized on the man’s face. She narrowed her eyes and looked under the indigo turban that swooped over the man’s forehead and mouth and wound into a wide knot at his neck. She could see a few strands of black hair, a pair of dark eyebrows, a long nose. A broken nose. And then his right eye—a deep blue-green eye—winked.
She stifled a cry, turned to the other men, and took their palms one by one. As Khatty had instructed, she drew a line from wrist to fingers, signifying her refusal of each man’s attentions.
When she held the amenoukal’s hand, she felt the heat of his desire against her own cold fingers. She traced a hard line from his wrist to his fingers, then folded his hand and shoved it away. He sat bolt upright, rage darkening his features as she traced and retraced the palm of the man who sat at the end of the row.
Grunting in acknowledgment, all the men rose and ambled away. But the amenoukal turned back to Tillie and looked at her with hatred in his eyes. She picked up the amulet and held it out in front of her like a shield.
“Ssst,” she hissed. “Don’t take another step. The Tree-Planting Woman has chosen. Go away.”
The chieftain glared at her for a moment longer, then whirled on his heel and stomped off. Alone, she rose to her knees and searched the clearing. Could she have imagined it? No, there he was now. The man in the indigo turban slipped out of the shadows and ran to her through the tall grass. She jerked off her veil and held out her arms.
“Graeme!” she whispered as he caught her up and swung her around and around. “Is it you?”
“You scared me half out of my mind with that stunt back in the canal, Tillie-girl. It fe
els good to hold you again.”
She slipped her arms around him and laid her cheek on his dark burnous. “Graeme, your life’s in danger here. The amenoukal will kill you if he finds out who you are.”
He tilted her chin and brushed her lips with a quick kiss. “Let’s get out of here. It’s a short hop to Mopti, and I’ve got an old truck waiting for us in town. Come on.”
He nestled her against his side and led her across the clearing toward a copse of tall banyan trees. But when they reached the first tree, someone moved out of the shadows.
“Tree-Planting Woman!” It was a woman’s voice, filled with whispered terror. She beckoned across the clearing.
“It’s Khatty,” Tillie told Graeme. “She’s seen us.”
“It’s okay; she knows about me. She’s the one who rigged me up in this outfit.”
“Tree-Planting Woman, come to my tent!” Khatty took Tillie’s hand. “Bring black-haired man. Ahodu Ag Amastane is there. He waits for you. He cannot believe you choose another. You must show him you do not escape, or he comes after you now. Already he thinks you trick him. Come, come quickly!”
“We can’t afford to let him catch on yet,” Graeme’s voice was low. “If he’s after us, we’ll never make it to Mopti. Come on, we’d better do what she says.”
“No, Graeme! You don’t know the man like I do. I can’t go back.”
Khatty stood wringing her hands. “Tree-Planting Woman, Khatty protect you. You see. Come! Come!”
Graeme gave Tillie’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze and prodded her forward through the brush. Khatty breathed a huge sigh of relief and faded into the night.
Approaching the lighted tent, Tillie could see the amenoukal standing before the open flap, his fists planted on his hips. His black burnous fluttered and whipped behind him, its golden waran lizard flashing in the firelight. She tried to breathe normally as she led Graeme up to the fire, knowing the amenoukal was now close enough to unleash a death swing with his broadsword.
As they took the final steps toward the awning, Khatty materialized beside the amenoukal and grasped his arm. Pulling him to her side, she began singing a high-pitched love song and stroking his hand. Tillie avoided the man’s gaze and slipped into the tent.
Graeme followed her through the dusky room and into Khatty’s chambers behind it. “Come here, Tillie,” he whispered, pulling her close. “Scared?”
“Not anymore.”
Holding her tight, he stroked her hair and kissed her forehead. She rested her head on his chest and listened to Khatty’s song. Tillie watched the amenoukal’s shadow as he paced back and forth. He muttered angrily, resisting his wife’s advances.
“Tillie.” Graeme’s whisper sent chills down her back. “Have you seen any weapons in this room? knives or anything?”
She shook her head. “They’re all in there. With him.”
“Then we’d better lay low until he settles down. Come on, let’s get a couple of those pillows.”
Still numb with disbelief that Graeme had found the caravan, wooed Khatty into giving him a disguise, and then rescued her from the ahal, Tillie watched him drag a heavy pillow to the center of the room. He sank onto it and propped his elbows on his knees.
She looked down into the face of the man she had thought she might never see again and couldn’t hold back a smile. Graeme looked completely out of place in the sweeping turban and jeweled burnous. She could see his jacket discarded on the carpeted floor. Out of one skin and into another. He was a man who fit wherever he found himself. Thank God.
Thank you, God!
Reaching up, he took her hand and pulled her down onto his lap. They sat in silence, listening to Khatty make up soothing poems to placate her angry husband. Her practiced charms soon began to take effect, and the man at last stood still to let his wife work her loving ministrations upon him.
“She loves him, you know,” Tillie whispered. “I can’t understand it, but she really does love him.”
“I know. That’s why she helped me tonight.”
Tillie drew her head from the curve of Graeme’s neck and looked at him. “Why?”
“She didn’t want him to have you. She believes in love more than she believes in the power of the amulet. She cares about him more than she cares about the treasure. And I’m pretty sure she wanted to see the two of us together, too.”
Tillie nodded. That she could believe. Khatty had been enamored with the idea of Tillie and her black-haired man from the very beginning. Her feelings for their relationship had shown in the poem she had composed for Graeme.
“I think, too, she wanted my God to win out over her husband’s,” she said. “She learned about Christ at a mission school, and she believes he is God’s Son.”
Her heart softening even more toward her Targui ally, Tillie watched the shadows as Khatty seduced her husband away from his anger and toward her love. She was a good woman. But she was correct—it would be hard to live as a Christian in a Tuareg caravan.
“Tillie,” Graeme whispered. “Khatty was right, you know. We do belong together.”
She studied his face and saw he meant what he said. Lord, her heart cried yet again. What do you want me to do? You know how I feel about Graeme . . . and how he feels about you. . . . Despair welled up within her. Father, why does it have to be so hard? She wanted to share her confusion, her struggle, but she couldn’t. Not yet. Instead, she met his eyes and shook her head. “I just wonder how long. This amulet keeps tearing us apart.”
“It brought us together.”
She looked down at her beaded ring. “I didn’t think I’d see you again.”
He covered her hand with his. “You’re with me from now on. No more heroics, okay?”
“I’ll do what I have to do.”
“Tillie.” He bent over her and let his mouth meet hers in soft kisses, promises of commitment. His lips moved across her cheek, down her neck, then up to the curve of her ear. “Tillie, when you jumped onto the amenoukal’s boat the other day . . .”
“He would have killed you.”
“You saved my life.” His voice was a husky whisper no louder than the desert wind blowing outside the tent. “I’ve never known a woman with your strength.”
“Just keep your promise of honor. . . . Always tell me the truth. Be who you said you were.”
“Tillie, I can’t—” He stopped speaking and let out a hot breath. “You can’t know the whole truth about me. I have to—”
A guttural noise nearby stopped his words, and he looked across to the shadows of Khatty and the amenoukal. They had moved inside the other chamber and were speaking in low voices.
“I honor you, Tillie.” Graeme lifted Tillie from his lap and stood. “I won’t betray your trust. I swear that.”
He took the brass lantern by its finial and blew out the light. The room fell into nearly total darkness, and he dropped back to his knees, listening for a sign that their absence wouldn’t be noticed.
Tillie sat alone, chilled. She couldn’t know the whole truth about him? What had he meant by that? They were together again, but her heart felt heavier than stone.
Graeme’s hands found the back of her neck, and his fingers slipped through the tangle of braids and silver chains. “We’ve got to get out of this place and head for the truck in Mopti. Come on.”
He stood up and pulled her to her feet. She motioned toward the curtain through which the servants always entered and exited. Together they slipped across the room. Graeme lifted the heavy flap and stepped out to scout the area. In a moment his head popped back inside. “It’s clear. Let’s go.”
Tillie stood in the darkness for a moment, remembering her hours in the tent with Khatty. The Targui woman had become a real friend. Almost like a sister. “Thank you, Khatty,” she whispered into the blackened chamber. “Thank you for believing in love.”
The Tuareg fires were no more than glowing embers when Graeme and Tillie slipped past them and scrambled down the stony embankment
to the river. Running hand in hand, they stumbled through reeds and over stubby bushes that caught at their flowing burnouses.
Graeme’s billowing gown impeded his run. But his exhilaration at freeing Tillie and having her beside him again outweighed any concerns.
“Why don’t we take the road?” Tillie whispered. She lost her footing and splashed into the river.
He hauled her back onto the bank. “You’ll see.”
“But what about crocs and hippos?”
“Stick with me. You’ll be all right.” Before long, he pulled her to a stop, waded into the water, and pushed back a thicket of brush that hung over the river. “Here we go. The finest transportation in these here parts.”
“A boat.” Surprised, she watched the tiny dugout drift out into the shallows. “It’s the fisherman’s boat from Djenne. How did you get it here?”
“The guy sold it to me, and I rowed it up the river. That’s how I found the Tuareg camp.”
“You spotted the camp from the river? I don’t see how. The Tuareg made a huge effort to hide their tents and erase every trace of where they’d been.”
“I know. For a while I thought I’d lost you for good. Then this afternoon, after I’d wandered around in Mopti a while, I decided to backtrack the river. That’s when I spotted the glimmer of a fire. It was a miracle.”
“A miracle?” She cocked her head. “Like you had divine help or something? Like the God of the entire universe is with you through every problem, and he’s always there to love you no matter what? That’s something, Graeme. That’s really something.”
At her recitation of his own statements of doubt, he couldn’t hold back a grin. “Hey, it’s making a believer out of me. Ready for a boat ride?”
“It’ll feel like home.”
He reached out to help her into the bobbing dugout. Once she’d settled herself at one end, he pushed them out into the river and then climbed aboard. He paddled hard until he found the midstream current. As the drift took them, he settled back and stretched out his legs with a contented sigh. “Huck and Jim on the river again.”
A Kiss of Adventure Page 17