Salim frowned. He couldn’t understand the question.
‘Dr Musa, he is a great doctor,’ he said at last. ‘I learn from him too much.’ He thought for a moment, sensing that there was something else behind Adam’s question. ‘A very good man. Like my own uncle or my grandfather.’
‘But the Jews, I thought they were wicked,’ Adam blurted out. ‘They killed Jesus. Only of course, you don’t know Jesus, being an infid— I mean, a – a . . .’
‘Of course I know the Prophet Jesus!’ Salim said, affronted. ‘Jesus a very great prophet. Only the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him, is greater than Jesus.’
Adam had only ever heard the Prophet Mohammed described as anti-Christ, a fiend and the son of the devil, and he surreptiously crossed himself. He didn’t know how to answer.
‘You don’t hate Jesus, then?’ he said, floundering.
‘No! I tell you! He a great prophet!’
‘But the doctor, he does. Hate Jesus, I mean.’
Salim laughed.
‘Why Dr Musa he hate the Prophet Jesus? Jesus was a Jew, like him. He call Jesus rabbi. Teacher.’
The path narrowed at this point and Adam was forced to drop behind. Salim, riding on ahead, tried to think things over. He couldn’t make Adam out. He asked such stupid questions, and he had such strange faith in the dust he wanted to collect in Jerusalem, which he actually believed would save his mother from hell! Then too he was ignorant of the most basic good manners, and never even washed his hands before he ate.
But there was something impressive about the Frankish boy. It was amazingly brave to set out to rescue the little girl from the slavers when he didn’t know the country and couldn’t speak a word of the language. She wasn’t even his daughter or his sister.
If I’d been all alone in the world, without any family at all, I’d have crumpled up completely, he thought.
Then there was his astonishing skill with dogs. Salim never ceased to marvel at the almost human communication between Adam and Faithful. The dog seemed to understand Adam’s every word and gesture, and obeyed him at once. Even the village dogs, who barked hysterically at the approach of strangers, calmed down at a word from Adam.
A few paces behind the horses, Adam was also deep in thought. His world of certainties was crumbling alarmingly. The people he’d been told to hate and despise, the Jews and Muslims – infidels, Christ-killers, persecutors of the Virgin – were treating him with the utmost kindess, sharing their food with him, paying for his lodging, putting themselves at risk for him, and all this after the cruel and unjust treatment they’d received from the Crusaders.
I never realized that Saracens were ordinary people, he thought, just farmers and merchants. They’re like the people at home in Ashton, in a way.
He’d been deeply impressed to discover that Salim could read and write. He’d been surprised too to see both him and the doctor pray. He’d watched Tewfik and Salim rise and fall on their prayer mats, and the doctor rocking back and forth, his prayer shawl draped over his head.
Wicked idolatry, Father Jerome would have called their prayers. Perhaps it was, but there had been no smell of sulphur, no fumes from the fires of hell, as he might have expected. There had been only a kind of quietness and peace.
They came to the last staging post before Jerusalem, up in the cool hills, on the fourth night of their journey. The sun was setting, and far over to their right the water of the Mediterranean Sea shone like a sheet of gold.
Adam had woken that morning in the grip of a nightmare. He’d been running after Tibby, who was tied to the back of a monstrous, dragon-like creature with wings and a lashing tail. She’d turned into Jennet, who had held her arms out to him and screamed in terror. He’d tried to run, but his legs had been weighted down, and he hadn’t been able to lift them properly. With a superhuman effort, he’d nearly reached her, when Jennet had disappeared and Tibby had taken her place. Just as he was about to put out his hand and touch her, the creature had launched itself into the air and flown away, far out of reach. He’d woken shouting and sweating.
It was the devil I saw, taking Jenny to hell, he thought with a shudder. Even if I get the dust from Jerusalem, I can’t put it on her grave.
The fate of Jennet’s soul was another burden on his mind. It added to his sense of impatience. He’d been nagging at Salim all day.
‘Are we nearly there?’ he’d kept saying. ‘How far is Jerusalem from here?’
When the doctor turned his horse, with a sigh of relief, into the courtyard of the khan, and the khan servants hurried up to greet him and help him dismount, Adam could have cried with frustration. This place, a staging post for travellers, was a large square courtyard surrounded by arched alcoves set against the walls. It was in the middle of nowhere. There was no sign that a city was within miles.
‘But I thought we’d be at Jerusalem tonight! You said it was only a few miles away – just over the next hill!’ he protested to Salim.
‘Fifteen miles. Is too late tonight. The gates of Jerusalem shut now. We stay here tonight. You hungry, no? Nice food here, Dr Musa say. We have good supper, then we play knucklebones game again.’
Two men trotted past, bowing under the huge bales of cotton they were carrying on their shoulders. Salim gave Adam a warning nudge and led his horse off to the water trough.
Salim was surprised by how much he was looking forward to the evening. He would never have imagined, a week ago, that he could feel so friendly towards a Crusader, a sworn enemy, one of the army who had driven his family out of their home and nearly murdered Ali. But he couldn’t help liking the Frankish boy. There was a dogged loneliness about him, an untouchable quality, that stirred Salim’s sympathy. He’d sensed that Adam, like him, had never had many friends of his own age. Playing a simple game of knucklebones with another boy was, to Adam, as much a novelty as it was to Salim himself.
After those first strange questions about Muslims and Jews, Adam hadn’t brought up the subject again.
I changed his mind for him, Salim thought proudly. I taught him something.
Although the smells of cooking were wafting enticingly out of the khan’s kitchens, Salim knew that it would be a while before they could hope to eat. Dr Musa was well known here, and people were already coming up hopefully with symptoms to offer and requests for treatment. Sighing, Salim obeyed his master’s beckon and went to sit beside him on the mat spread out in the alcove where they would sleep that night. He saw Adam settle himself inconspicuously in a quiet corner with Tewfik, who had begged some scraps for Faithful from the kitchen.
It was almost dark by now. A torch had been lit in the kitchen, and dancing shadows fluttered out through the door on to the white stone arches that surmounted the alcoves. Under them, men were sitting on mats, talking quietly and clicking their worry beads. Adam, peering round, thought how different this place was from the travellers’ taverns he’d seen in England and France. There, ale and wine had flowed freely, and men and women together had drunk and shouted and brawled in a fug of stale air rich with the smell of unwashed bodies.
Half of him liked this restrained, orderly, clean world, but at the same time he missed the cheerful rowdiness of home.
The doctor seemed to have finished his consultations at last, and servants were bringing bowls of food to his alcove.
‘Ta’al,’ said Tewfik, nudging Adam. ‘Come.’
They were crossing the courtyard when the watchman swung open the heavy double gates to admit a big group of late arrivals. Two men in the gowns and turbans of prosperous merchants rode in first on stocky little horses, followed by four others on donkeys. The wrists of these men were tied together, and their legs were bound under the donkeys’ bellies. Behind them came a couple of pack camels, a woman carrying something heavy in her arms and two other men, who wore the simple short tunics of labourers and carried heavy cudgels.
Adam’s heart leaped in his chest and he caught hold of Tewfik’s arm.
‘It�
�s them!’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘Those two men. It’s them!’
Tewfik shot him a warning glance, then walked up to the turbaned merchants and began to converse pleasantly with them. Salim, seeing what was going on, stood up and limped across to Adam.
‘It’s them!’ Adam repeated. ‘That woman, look, she’s carrying a child, see? It’s Tibby! It’s got to be!’
‘Shh,’ Salim said. ‘Stay here. I listen.’
He went casually up to join Tewfik.
‘From Acre, did you say?’ Tewfik was saying. ‘A long walk!’ He raised his chin questioningly towards the bound men. ‘How much do you expect to get for them? Where are they from?’
‘Two are Franks, curses be upon them,’ one of the merchants answered. ‘They’re for the galleys. The Africans too, maybe.’
Tewfik let his gaze wander towards the woman, then looked down quickly, trying to indicate curiosity without bad manners, in case she was a wife or relative and so ought to be respectfully ignored.
‘My sister,’ the merchant said shortly. He turned away to speak to the owner of the khan who had hurried up to greet him.
Tewfik and Salim walked back to Adam who was biting his lip in an agony of impatience. Faithful had sensed his excitement and was standing tensed, his hackles raised, ready to break into a bout of hysterical barking. Adam bent to calm him, holding his collar in a restraining hand.
‘Are you sure it’s them, Adam?’ Salim asked him. ‘It could be. They said they’ve come from Acre.’
‘I’m nearly sure. I only saw them from a long way off,’ said Adam, trying to breathe normally. He’d imagined that the two traders he’d seen with Jacques would be alone with Tibby. The sight of such a big group, especially the two tough-looking men with cudgels, had come as a shock.
‘Maybe it’s them, maybe not,’ answered Tewfik. ‘A child would have woken up by now being carted about like that. You can’t see in this light. It could be a rug, or a sack of nuts, or anything.’
The traders had been allocated two alcoves on the far side of the khan from where Dr Musa was already peacefully eating his dinner. In the last glimmers of light from the darkening sky, the woman could just be seen. She was laying her bundle down on the ground.
‘Oh!’ groaned Adam. ‘That can’t be Tibby. She’d be wide awake and squawking. They’ve sold her already. We’ve come too late!’
‘No, no. Maybe is all right,’ said Salim hopefully. ‘Maybe it is a child. If she cry in the night, we know for sure. My little sister, she always cry in the night, but when she sleep in the day, you cannot wake her if you try.’
‘What are you doing over there?’ the doctor called across to them. ‘Are you planning to sleep tonight without eating? Is that it?’
Dr Musa listened gravely as Salim, between mouthfuls, told him their suspicion. Then he shook his head.
‘How could a child remain so quiet?’ He paused, frowning. ‘Unless of course it has been drugged. That, certainly, is a possibility. Syrup of poppies, perhaps. In any case, there’s nothing to be done. Even if there is a child, we can’t tell that it’s the right one until we see it in the morning.’ He gave a gigantic yawn. ‘My old bones are calling me to sleep. Unpack my prayer shawl, Salim. At the very least, I must give thanks tonight that we have come safely so near to the end of our journey.’
He stood up and shook out his gown. The khan had settled down now for the night. The only sounds were the chewing of the camels working on their cud, the snores of a pair of muleteers in an alcove nearby, the last clatter of pots from the kitchen and, from the hillside above, the sharp yap of a jackal, which set the khan dogs outside the doors barking furiously.
Faithful, who was lying at the bottom of the steps leading up to the alcove, had ignored the fuss of the dogs outside, but something else was exciting him. He sat up and cocked an ear, then suddenly let out a deep bark of his own.
‘Keep the dog quiet,’ Dr Musa said sternly. ‘Do you want to disturb everyone?’
But Adam was watching Faithful. He was on all fours now, his hackles raised, his nose stretched out, alert, straining towards the alcove on the far side of the khan. As he did so, there came the unmistakable wail of a child, and a little voice, slurred and confused, cried out in English, ‘Ma! Want Mama!’
‘It’s her! That’s Tibby!’
Adam was on his feet too. Without thinking, he was about to rush across the courtyard and snatch Tibby up. But Dr Musa put a restraining hand on his shoulder and said something to Salim.
‘He says come, sit,’ Salim said. ‘First we make plan. Now.’
A moment later, the four of them were sitting close together as far back in the alcove as possible, their heads bent forwards.
‘The first thing,’ Dr Musa said, ‘is to establish if this child really is the one we’re looking for.’
Salim translated.
‘She is!’ said Adam. ‘I heard her voice. I know it. And she was speaking English!’
‘Then it’s simple.’ The doctor yawned. ‘Tomorrow morning I’ll approach these fellows and simply buy the child from them.’
‘He’ll buy her,’ Salim told Adam.
Tewfik was talking now.
‘They won’t sell to you, ya-hakim. I heard them talking when they were unloading their camels. They’ve sold her to a buyer already.’
‘Ah, what a tangle this is! Why did I ever consent to such a mad adventure!’
The doctor threw his hands up, knocking his turban sideways.
‘If we can only get Adam and the child out of here tonight,’ Tewfik went on, ‘and hide them somewhere nearby, I could meet them in the morning with the horses and take the two of them back to Acre. As your honour knows, I was supposed to escort you all the way to Jerusalem, but it’s only one more day’s journey. If you could manage it with the mule, on your own . . .’
‘Of course! You think I’ve never walked before?’ the doctor said irritably. ‘But it’s too dangerous. These are ruffians. Did you see them? They’d pursue you, and beat you up, or worse. And if they took you to the authorities you’d be branded as a thief.’
‘But you’d tell the merchants that you were sending Tewfik out to search for Adam,’ Salim interrupted in an excited whisper. ‘You’d tell them you were sure they were making for Jerusalem. They’d chase after them, but really Adam and Tewfik would be riding the other way back to Acre.’
‘A criminal mind, I see,’ the doctor remarked acidly, ‘and in one who looks so innocent! But there’s one great flaw in this master plan of yours. How do you propose to smuggle a large boy and a small child out of this place? There’s only one entrance, which is heavily barred and bolted with the watchman sleeping right beside it.’
‘What are they saying? What’s going on?’ Adam said, tugging at Salim’s sleeve.
Salim explained.
Adam drew in his breath. He’d been planning on his own while the others had been talking.
‘I could get out across the roof,’ he said. ‘There’re stairs up to it. I saw them earlier. And you could let me down on the other side with the rope you use to tie the chest on to the mule.’
‘But Tibby,’ objected Salim. ‘You cannot climb down and hold her at the same time.’
‘I’ll tie her on to my back, like the—’ Adam stopped. He’d been about to say ‘infidel women’. ‘Like a woman,’ he finished.
Salim translated rapidly to the doctor and Tewfik.
‘Ridiculous!’ snorted the doctor. ‘It’s far too dangerous.’
But Tewfik’s teeth showed white in a grin. He was clearly enjoying this adventure.
‘Slavers took my brother,’ he said. ‘Ten years chained to an oar in the galleys. He’s crippled now. That’s why I volunteered to come with you. It’ll be a real pleasure to pull a trick on crooks like them.’
The moon was rising now. It lit the courtyard in a ghostly light. Nothing was stirring. The watchman by the gate had wrapped himself in his cloak and was lying as still as a sack. Even t
he camels had stopped chewing. A slight breeze had sprung up, stirring the wisps of hay by the horses.
The four had fallen silent, all of them thinking furiously.
‘The baby’s fast asleep again,’ Salim whispered at last. ‘She’d be making a noise if she wasn’t. I could go over there, and if anyone sees me I could pretend I was walking in my sleep. People expect me to do strange things because I’m – because of my leg. You could tell them, sidi Musa, that I’m not right in the head.’
‘I’d be telling the truth, as a matter of fact,’ growled the doctor.
‘You know how little children sleep so deeply. If Allah wills, she’ll stay asleep and not make a noise till I bring her back here to Adam. She knows him. He can keep her quiet.’
‘You expect me to lend my good name to this outrageous nonsense?’ grumbled the doctor. ‘Because if you do, then I suggest you make a start at once, while the cloud I see approaching the moon is covering it.’
Swiftly, Salim relayed this to Adam.
‘I’m to go now?’ Adam was unexpectedly dismayed. It was one thing to plan how he’d snatch Tibby and go back to Acre on his own, but quite another to leave this little group, which felt almost like a family. He’d come to trust Salim and the doctor absolutely. He felt bereft at the thought of parting from them. He tried to see the doctor’s face, but the shadow was too deep and he couldn’t read his expression.
‘How do you say “thank you”?’ he whispered to Salim.
‘Shukran.’
Adam reached forwards and caught hold of the doctor’s hand.
‘Shukran,’ he said fervently. ‘Shukran. Shukran!’
He wasn’t used to showing his feelings and shrank back again, embarrassed.
The doctor’s hands were on his shoulders. He was talking rapidly in Arabic.
‘He says sorry you never reach Jerusalem,’ translated Salim. ‘But he says, don’t matter. Never to worry about your mama. No need for the dust. Nothing good in that. But God, he is good. She not go to hell.’
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