The Sheikh

by Anne Herries

  ‘Today belongs to the people,’ he told her when he left to attend the lengthy ceremony. ‘Forgive me for abandoning you, but I cannot do other than what is expected of me.’

  ‘You must do what is right,’ Chloe told him. ‘I shall write to Justine and to Mariam while I wait for you to come back.’

  They had been able to attend Justine’s engagement party, and to see Mariam safely settled at Henry’s before they left on their journey to convey the prince’s body back to his homeland. It had taken several days to clear all the paperwork despite Pasha hurrying it along as best he could, because the police had been reluctant to release the body. Arrests had been made and there was a diplomatic tussle going on over where the assassins were to be tried. But, in the end Pasha had finalised the details so that the journey home could begin.

  However, once the funeral was over, Pasha had told Chloe that he intended to fly his own light aircraft to Morocco, and after a short stay in Marrakesh to take care of some unfinished business, they would go on to his father’s casbah in the Atlas Mountains.

  She had been given splendid rooms in the prince’s palace, and his wives had made her welcome, several of them able to talk to her either in English or French. They were all curious about her clothes, and asked her where she had bought them. She saw envious looks on some of their faces as she told them she had visited the salon of Coco Chanel in Paris.

  She was asked what would happen now that the prince was dead, but Chloe merely smiled and shook her head. She could not tell them for she did not know yet what Pasha would decide.

  He spoke of giving up his political life, and spending more time with her. He had a business to run, and many other interests, and she believed he genuinely wanted to break free—but would he be allowed to do so?

  ‘Not if the prince’s advisers have their way,’ Pasha told her when he returned late that evening, clearly drained. ‘They are worried that the State is vulnerable to being taken over by another ruler if I do not grasp the reins myself.’ He frowned and ran his fingers through his hair, looking more tired than she had ever seen him. ‘I have to decide what is best, Chloe.’

  She instinctively understood that his worried expression was for her, for what effect the assassination attempt might have had on her, on her peace of mind.

  ‘I know you will do whatever is right. You mustn’t worry about me, Pasha. I was a foolish child when we married, but now I understand so many things. I know that you must do whatever is necessary.’

  ‘My dearest Chloe. If I should lose you…’

  ‘You won’t,’ she told him with a loving smile. ‘Nothing can part us now.’

  ‘If only I could be sure.’

  ‘Come to bed, my love,’ she said, going up to him and putting her arms about him, reaching up to brush her mouth softly over his. The effect was instantaneous, his tiredness falling away as he scooped her up in his arms and carried her to their bed. ‘I am so heavy,’ she said and laughed at him as he laid her down. ‘Soon you will not be able to lift me.’

  Her teasing was having its desired effect. Pasha threw off his worries and began to kiss her, stroking her body until it quivered and trembled and she was ready for him to love her again.

  That night Chloe was woken by Pasha’s violent thrashing beside her in the bed, and she knew that he was troubled by his dreams. He feared that he was being dragged into a life that he disliked but could not avoid…and there was nothing she could do to help him, except offer him her love and her body.

  Only Pasha could decide what he must do.

  Chloe felt excited as they circled over the fort so that she could see it completely from the air. It was built of a pinkish stone, as were many of the ruined forts in the mountains, but this was neither ruined nor abandoned.

  She could see people moving about below them, looking up at the sky, shading their eyes with their hands to watch as the small aircraft prepared to land on the strip that had been prepared specially for their coming.

  As they flew over the mountains, Chloe had seen the children herding goats and sheep, their clothes much as their fathers and grandfathers had worn before them. This might be the twentieth century, but time had stood still here for many years. The land was arid, fit only for the poor living that these people wrested from it, relying mainly on their flocks.

  However, when Pasha helped her from the plane and they began to walk towards the fort, the people came out to greet them, shyly at first, and then with mounting enthusiasm as if they were genuinely pleased to see their feudal master.

  The children gathered about Chloe, pulling at the long skirts of the dress she had chosen to wear, which reached almost to her ankles and, though of rich materials, was otherwise much as their mothers might wear.

  ‘What are they saying?’ she asked Pasha as they chattered and pointed at her, their little faces as cheeky as they were happy.

  ‘They are saying that you carry my child,’ he replied, ‘and they think it is good that you should be so fruitful so soon.’

  Chloe flushed bright red. ‘Do they know when we were married? I thought you hadn’t been here for years?’

  ‘I paid a brief visit when I was travelling with my uncle,’ Pasha said. ‘I thought it was time I checked to make sure that they were all managing well, and I was able to make some improvements. A new well down in the valley and other things.’

  ‘Well, they certainly seem pleased to see you.’

  ‘I think it is you they are mostly interested in,’ Pasha said. ‘It seems they have not forgotten the way my mother tried to help the women when she lived here.’

  ‘She wanted the women to learn a trade, didn’t she?’ Chloe remembered that his mother had died of blood poisoning after cutting her hand on a piece of rusty metal.

  ‘Apparently, they had a visit from a western merchant some months ago. He was interested in buying cloth the women had been weaving. I’m planning to set up some weaving sheds here so that the women can make a little money for themselves. They may have to be dragged into the twentieth century, Chloe, but I believe they are beginning to see the benefits as well as the evils.’

  ‘With you to help them, I am sure they will,’ Chloe said, her eyes warm with love for him. She reached out to touch his hand, and then saw that the children were giggling, clearly watching everything she did with avid interest. ‘I shall have to be careful what I do!’

  ‘Oh, they won’t mind.’ Pasha laughed. ‘They believe that it is your influence that has brought them their good fortune. You are a talisman and can do no wrong.’

  They stayed at the fort for five days before Pasha decided it was time to move on. Chloe was reluctant to leave the friendly people who had taken her to their hearts, and she waved to the children who stood watching as their plane rose like a huge white bird into the sky.

  ‘I am not surprised that they tug at your heartstrings,’ she told Pasha. ‘I like your people.’

  ‘And they liked you,’ he said, smiling at her tenderly. ‘We shall go back there one day, but first I have something I must do.’

  ‘You have arranged a meeting in the desert with Mohammed…’ She looked at him doubtfully. ‘Is it wise to meet on his territory? Can you trust him, Pasha?’

  ‘As much as I can trust any man,’ he replied and frowned at her. ‘I do not fear a knife in my back while we are in Mohammed’s camp, Chloe. If he wished to murder me it would not be while we are his guests. We were safe while we stayed with Ahmad. It was only later that he tried to harm you.’

  Chloe nodding, understanding that it would be against the Bedouin code of honour to offer an insult to a guest.

  ‘Have you heard from Sashimi at all?’ she asked him. ‘Is she still living in Paris? I gather that is where she went when she left England.’

  ‘She lives there still,’ Pasha said. ‘I believe that she has lovers, though she vows never to marry again, but she likes men who give her presents, I have heard.’

  ‘Who told you that?’

&
nbsp; ‘Mohammed,’ he replied. ‘He is angry that she flaunts our ways like that, but he was forbidden to approach her while the prince lived. I have made a similar order.’

  ‘So you protect her.’ Chloe smiled at him. ‘I was such a fool that day, Pasha. I should have known that you would not kill in cold blood…’

  ‘It is forgotten,’ he said and smiled at her, his eyes going over her in concern. ‘Are you well, my love? I know there are still some months but I am anxious for you.’

  ‘There is no need, I am perfectly well,’ Chloe replied. ‘You know that I am, Pasha. It is merely that I grow fat and ugly like a cow.’

  ‘You are beautiful and most un-cowlike,’ he said, looking amused.

  ‘That is not what I was told yesterday,’ she said. ‘One of the women told me that I was like a beautiful sleek cow and that I would give birth to a fine calf.’

  Pasha chuckled, his brows rising. ‘She believed she was paying you a compliment, Chloe. A cow such as she meant would bring a good price in the market.’

  ‘I dare say,’ Chloe said. ‘But I had far rather not be sold, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Oh, it all depends how many camels I am offered for you,’ he said, a wicked gleam in his eyes. ‘I think I shall not take less than ten.’

  ‘If you were not flying this plane, I would strangle you!’

  ‘I must remind you of that tonight,’ Pasha murmured. ‘When I summon you to my couch. Remember, woman, I am a Sheikh and you are about to be taken to my tent in the desert…’

  ‘I think it’s a bit late if you were intending to seduce me,’ Chloe said and pulled a face at him as she patted what she liked to think of as her bulge. ‘Did you know that they are talking of making The Son of the Sheikh now? I shall expect you to take me to see that when it is shown at home.’

  Pasha looked at her oddly. ‘You never know,’ he said. ‘I might do more than that, providing you give me the son you promised me, woman.’

  ‘And what does that mean?’ she asked, intrigued by his provocative look. ‘Just what have you been up to now, Pasha?’

  ‘Something I think you may enjoy,’ he said, but would not be drawn further, no matter how she pouted and provoked. ‘You will just have to wait and see…’

  They had begun to circle lower over the desert. Chloe looked out of the window as the tents began to look real and not just like tiny dots in the acres of sand surrounding them. People were looking up as they approached the landing area, some of them waving.

  She held her breath as they touched down. The last time she had been in the desert she had been close to death, and then she had fallen in love.

  Chloe was washing her face in a brightly polished copper bowl when Pasha walked into the tent that evening. They had been three days in the desert and she had hardly seen him in all that time. He and Mohammed had been talking constantly day and night, and Chloe had been relegated to the women’s company.

  She was well aware that Mohammed did not approve of her being given as much freedom as Pasha normally allowed her, and she had noticed his dark eyes watching her with barely hidden hostility.

  It was a surprise then when Pasha told her that she was bidden to a feast that evening.

  ‘My cousin has asked that you sit with him at his right hand,’ Pasha told her. ‘He wishes you to tell him about the way women live in your world.’

  ‘Are you serious?’ Chloe asked, staring at him in surprise. ‘I thought that was the last thing he was interested in.’

  ‘My cousin has finally realised that it is time he became a twentieth-century man,’ Pasha said, a wicked glint in his eyes. ‘I am very pleased to tell you that I believe we have finally reached an agreement, Chloe—and this banquet is to celebrate. Mohammed wishes to show you honour, and I believe you will be surprised by the change in him.’

  ‘That sounds very intriguing.’ Her eyes held curiosity as she looked at him, but he merely smiled and shook his head. She pouted at him, but she was too content, too serene, to demand an answer. She was beginning to understand him now, to know that whatever he did would be just. ‘You are being mysterious again, but I shall not be drawn. I don’t care what you are up to, Pasha. I like being here. There is something special about the desert…it calls to something inside me…’ She laughed and looked self-conscious. ‘I suppose that sounds foolish?’

  ‘It sounds good to me,’ Pasha said. ‘I hope that we shall return both to the casbah and the desert one day, my love.’

  As he turned and went out, Chloe began to look through her clothes. She would have to choose something very special for that evening, for she sensed that it was an important occasion.

  Pasha looked at her when she presented herself, his eyes warm and admiring. She had chosen a long flowing gown in a rich royal blue. It had a squared neckline and a high waist caught beneath her breasts with an embroidered band, and the sleeves were long and flared.

  Her hair, which was below her shoulders now, and much lighter than it had been when they first met, was swept back and caught with a gold headband that looked very much like any Bedouin woman would wear, but she wore no veil. Her throat was bare and she wore no other jewel except her wedding ring.

  ‘You look beautiful,’ Pasha said and took her hand. ‘And I love the way you have chosen to show respect and yet be yourself—a woman of the West.’

  ‘Since you told me that Mohammed wishes to know what the women of my world like, I thought it right to show as well as to tell him—should he ask for my advice.’

  ‘Oh, he will ask,’ Pasha said. ‘You see there are to be big changes in Mohammed’s life, and he has realised that he must begin to live in the new world to which he is called.’

  ‘What have you done, Pasha?’ Chloe gazed up into his eyes. ‘I think I can guess, but you do not wish to tell me yet. Why?’

  ‘Because the announcement is to be made at the feast this evening,’ Pasha said. ‘It would not be fitting if I told my wife before the other men are informed.’

  Chloe nodded her understanding. She could not, of course, expect to be told something this important until it was officially announced, but she had guessed what Pasha had not told her.

  A huge tent capable of holding many people had been erected at the edge of the camp, and as Pasha led Chloe towards it she saw that several men had arrived. Important men by the look of it, men who had brought their followers with them, women and children too so that the camp had spread outwards from the oasis into the sand for a long way.

  Fires were burning all over the camps, and the smell of roasting meat filled the air, as did the sense of excitement. It was clearly a large feast and the mood of celebration had spread amongst the people; it was as if they all knew that something momentous was about to happen.

  Inside the tent, silken cushions were placed everywhere with little lamps and tables. Here there was the scent of sweet oils burning, spices and a heavy musky perfume. At the far end there were three raised couches, where Mohammed was already seated, and Pasha led Chloe towards them.

  Mohammed rose as they approached, bowing to her and coming forward to take her hand and lead her to the place of honour on his right-hand side.

  ‘You are welcome, lady,’ he said in the most courteous tone she had had from him. ‘Please honour me by sitting here and giving me the favour of your conversation. I have much to learn, and my honoured cousin tells me that you are well disposed towards our people.’

  ‘I have found your people friendly and your way of life good,’ Chloe said. ‘There are many wonders to be found in the modern world, sir, and I believe that we should take the best of them, but the simple ways of the desert people should not be entirely forgotten.’

  Mohammed nodded, his eyes seeming to hold amusement. She had not thought it before, but now she began to see something of Pasha in him, and to realise that they were more alike than she had imagined.

  ‘You speak wisely,’ he said. ‘I believe when we first met I misjudged you, princess, but now I un
derstand why Pasha married you. I believe your influence has been good for him.’

  ‘My husband acts always as he believes right, sir.’

  Mohammed nodded again. ‘This too is right and we shall hear more of this before the night is over…’ He motioned to her to sit down. ‘Sit, eat, my lady, and we shall talk.’

  Chloe sat on the couch and smiled as she was approached by one of the serving women with a little silver dish, on which were all kinds of delicacies. She took one of the little cakes, which were sticky and soft in the middle and tasted of almonds, nibbling at it as Mohammed began to ask her questions.

  Chloe found that he was far more knowledgeable of the ways of the West than she had imagined, and although he clearly did not approve of the fashions women wore these days, which he thought hardly decent, he was very interested to learn that she had been to college and that she was interested in Arabic literature, in particular poetry.

  They spoke of Omar Khayyam, the astronomer-poet of Persia, who was born in the eleventh century, the son of a tent maker.

  ‘Your people know of his writings through the translation of the Rubaiyat and other works,’ Mohammed said. ‘But there was far more to the man. He was a great mathematician and he reformed the Muslim calendar.’

  ‘Yes, I have read several of the translations,’ Chloe agreed, ‘and a life of the poet. But I have also read lesser known poets I think his equal or perhaps even more intriguing.’

  They spoke for some time of the poets and of the possibility of some original material that Mohammed possessed that he would be willing to lend her so that Pasha could help her translate it. After that they talked more of what Chloe felt he might do to help the women amongst his people live more enriching lives.

  It was not until quite late in the evening, after they had all eaten and been entertained by jugglers and dancers, that the business began.