Grandfather Riad put down the paper. “It’s not as easy as that, child.”
“Is it true what Mother said?” she asked. “Will we never see him again?”
He was silent for a moment before he answered. “Your mother was angry. She’ll get over it in time.”
But she never did. And with the passing of the years, the girls gradually began to accept their mother’s attitude toward their father. And since their father made no attempt to bridge the gap between them, they finally were convinced that she was right.
***
The air was growing cool as the sun began to drop and the summer blue faded into darkness. Leila rolled to her side and looked at the Syrian. “How much more time?”
“About another half-hour,” he said, smiling. “There’s enough time for us.” He reached for her.
She moved away from him quickly. “Don’t.”
He stared at her. “What is the matter with you? Are you a Lesbian?”
“No,” she said quietly.
“Then don’t be so old-fashioned. Why do you think they’re giving you girls those pills?”
She stared at him. Contempt crept into her voice. Men were all alike. “For my protection, not your convenience,” she said.
He gave her what he thought was a winning smile. “Come on then,” he said, reaching for her again. “Maybe I can teach you to enjoy it.”
She moved quickly; her rifle prodded his belly. “I doubt it,” she said quietly. “You may have taught me how to use this gun but I already know how to fuck.”
He looked down at the rifle then up into her face. A genuine laugh bubbled up in his throat. “I didn’t doubt that for a minute,” he said quickly. “I was only worried that you might get out of practice.”
CHAPTER 7
Tortuously, Leila squirmed across the hard, sandy surface of the rock until she reached the rows of barbed wire. She stopped, gasping for breath. After a moment, she turned and peered through the pale moonlight. Soad, the big Egyptian woman, and Ayida, the Lebanese, were inching up behind her. “Where’s Hamid?” she asked.
“How the hell do I know?” swore the Egyptian. “I thought he was up here in front of us.”
“Jamila scraped her knee when she came across the rocks,” Ayida said. “I saw him putting a bandage on it.”
“That was an hour ago,” Soad said sarcastically. “By now he’s probably got her cunt in a sling.”
“What are we going to do?” Leila asked. “We need wire cutters to get through this.”
“I think Farida has a pair,” Ayida said.
“Pass the word back,” Leila said.
Quickly the message traveled down the line of women strung out behind her. A moment later, the wire cutters passed forward from hand to hand until they reached Leila.
Soad gave them to her. “Did you ever use these before?”
“No,” Leila said. “Did you?”
Soad shook her head.
“It shouldn’t be too difficult. I saw the way Hamid did it the last time.”
She took the heavy wire cutters and inched up to the barbed wire fence, then rolled over on her back. She raised the cutters slowly over her head. The polished metal blades reflected the moonlight. It could only have lasted a fraction of a second but immediately the machine gun up forward began to chatter, and the bullets whined over their heads.
“Damn,” Leila exclaimed in disgust, trying to press her body into the ground. She didn’t dare move her head to look back to the others. “Where are you?” she called.
“We’re here,” Soad said. “We’re not moving.”
“We have to move,” Leila said. “They’ve got us spotted.”
“You move. I’m not goin’ anywhere until that gun stops.”
“If we crawl we’re safe—they’re firing three feet over our heads.”
“They’re Arabs,” Soad said sarcastically. “And I’ve never known one that can shoot straight. I’m staying right here.”
“I’m going. You can stay here all night if you want to.”
Cautiously she rolled over on her stomach and began to crawl crabwise along the wire fence. After a few moments, she heard scratching noises behind her. She looked back. The other women were following.
Almost a half-hour later, she stopped. The machine gun was still firing but the bullets were no longer whistling over their heads. They had passed out of its range.
This time she took no chances. She smeared dirt over the blades of the cutters so that no light would be reflected. Again she rolled over on her back and reached up for the wire. It was harder than she thought it would be and the noise resounded in the stillness of the night, but no one seemed to hear. A few minutes later she had cut her way through the first row. She crawled through the opening and toward the next row. Two more and they would be in the clear.
Despite the chill, she was beginning to sweat. Anxiously she went to work on the second row. It was constructed of double strands and took almost twenty minutes to cut through. The last row was made up of triple strands, and it was forty minutes more before she was finished.
She lay on her back, gasping for breath, her arms and shoulders aching with pain. After a moment, she looked back at Soad. “We stay down until we reach the white markers. That should be about two hundred meters farther on. After that we’re in the clear.”
“Okay,” Soad answered.
“Remember to keep your heads down,” Leila said.
She rolled back on her belly and began to crawl forward. Two hundred meters seemed like a thousand miles on your belly.
Finally she could see the white markers sticking out of the ground a few meters in front of them. At the same time, she heard the voices—men’s voices.
Leila held out a hand, palm backward so the women would be silent. It would be a shame if they were spotted now. They all hugged themselves into the ground.
The voices came from her left. In the moonlight, she could see three soldiers. One of them was lighting a cigarette; the others were seated behind a machine gun. The match spun away from the soldier in a flaming arc, landing near Leila’s face.
“Those whores are still out there,” the soldier with the cigarette said.
One of the others stood up, swinging his arms to warm himself. “Hamid’s going to find himself with a lot of frozen pussy on his hands.”
The soldier with the cigarette laughed. “He can give some to me. I’ll show him how to thaw them out.”
“Hamid gives away nothing,” the seated one said. “He acts like a pasha with his harem.”
A faint buzzer sounded. The soldier with the cigarette picked up a walkie-talkie. Leila could not hear what he said as he spoke into it but she could hear him addressing his companions after he put it down. “That was Post One. They had them spotted but they lost them. They think they might be coming in this direction.”
“They’re full of crap,” one of the others said. “I can see a half a mile in this moonlight. Nothing’s out there.”
“Just the same keep your eyes peeled. It wouldn’t look good if a couple of girls made donkey’s asses out of us.”
Leila smiled grimly to herself. That was exactly what they were going to do. She reached back and tapped Soad on the shoulder. She mouthed the words silently. “Did you hear?”
Soad nodded, as did the woman behind her. They had all heard.
Leila moved her hand in a wide sweeping gesture. They understood. They would crawl in a wide circle that would bring them back to the machine gun emplacement from behind. Slowly, holding their breath they began to move.
It took almost an hour and they were well behind the white markers and directly behind the machine gun when Leila gave the signal.
With a yell, the women sprang to their feet and charged. Cursing, the soldiers turned toward them, and found themselves staring into barrels of the women’s rifles.
“You’re our prisoners,” Leila said.
The corporal smiled suddenly. “I guess so,
” he admitted.
Leila recognized him as the one with the cigarette. She couldn’t keep the note of triumph out of her voice. “Maybe you’ll think differently about women soldiers now.”
The corporal nodded. “Maybe.”
“Now what do we do?” Soad asked.
“I don’t know,” Leila said. “I think we should call in and report their capture.” She turned to the corporal. “Give me your walkie-talkie.”
He held it out to her. He was still smiling. “May I make a suggestion?”
“If you like,” Leila’s voice was businesslike.
“We are your prisoners, aren’t we?”
Leila nodded.
“Why don’t you rape us before you report in? We promise not to complain.”
The women began to snicker. Leila was angry. Arab men were the worst kind of male chauvinist pigs. She jammed down the call button on the walkie-talkie. But before she could get a reply, Hamid and Jamila came strolling up to them, as casually as if they had spent an afternoon in the park.
“Where the hell were you?” she yelled at Hamid.
“Right behind you.”
“Why didn’t you help us?”
He shrugged. “What for? You were doing all right.”
She looked at Jamila. The pudgy Palestinian had a relaxed look on her face and Leila knew why. She turned back to Hamid. “How did you get through the barbed wire?”
“Easily,” he said, a broad smile coming to his lips. “We dug ourselves a little trench and fucked our way through it.”
Leila held a straight face as long as she could, then started to laugh. The Syrian mercenary had a strange sense of humor but he was funny. She handed the walkie-talkie to him. “Here, call us in,” she said. “Maybe you can get them to send a truck out for us. I think we could all use a hot bath.”
***
The steam rose over the tops of the barracks shower stalls. Above the splashing of the running water came the chatter of the women.
The stalls each had four jets and were designed for communal use, four women to a shower. Since there were only two stalls, there was always a line of women waiting for a shower to open up. Leila liked to wait until most of the others had finished their baths, so that she did not have to hurry to make way for the next one. She leaned against the window smoking a cigarette, listening to the chatter.
Almost three months had passed since she had come to the camp, and all during that time she had been drilled from morning until night. Whatever fat there had been on her body had long since disappeared. Now she was lean, her belly and flank muscles firm, her breasts like two apples. Her lustrous black hair, cut short for convenience when she arrived, now fell to her shoulders.
Every morning there had been two hours of calisthenics and drill before breakfast. After breakfast there had been manual training in which the women learned about guns—how to use them and how to take care of them. They also learned about grenades and the use of plastique, the techniques of preparing and concealing letter bombs and the practicality of transistorized timer-detonator devices. Afternoons were spent practicing the techniques of manual combat, hand-to-hand and weapon to weapon. Later in the day, they were given political lectures. The ideological indoctrination was important because each of them was considered a missionary for a new order in the Arab world.
Later the political lectures gave way to lessons in military tactics, paramilitary infiltration and sabotage, guerrilla warfare and subversive diversion.
For the last month, they had all been training in the field. Everything they had learned had been put to use. Gradually Leila could feel herself toughening. She thought of herself as a woman less and less. The purpose for which she trained possessed her and became a way of life. It was through her and others like her that a new world would come. For a moment she thought of her mother and her sister. They were in Beirut, still living in that old world—her sister with her petty family and social problems; her mother, still bitter and resentful over the way she had been tossed aside by her father but doing nothing constructive with her life. She closed her eyes for a moment, remembering that day in the south of France before she had come here. She thought of her father and his sons water-skiing on the bay in front of the Carlton. Her father hadn’t changed since she had last seen him almost nine years before. He was still tall and handsome, filled with strength and vitality. If only he could understand, if only he knew how much he could do to help free the Arab from the imperialism of Israel and America. If he only knew the need, the suffering, the oppression of his brothers, he would not stand idly by and permit this to happen. But she was only wishfully dreaming. Of course he knew. He had to know.
It was just that he didn’t care. Wealth was his by birth and his only concern was to increase it. He loved the luxury and the power that sprang to his beckoning finger. And the terrible truth was that he was not alone. The sheiks, the princes and kings, the bankers and men of wealth were all the same, Arab or not. They cared only for themselves. Whatever benefits filtered down from their efforts were only incidental to their own. There were still millions of peasants in every Arab land who lived on the fringes of starvation while their rulers drove in air-conditioned Cadillacs, flew in private jets, maintained palaces and homes all over the world and then talked pompously about freedom for their people.
Eventually it had to come. The war was not only against the foreigners—that was only the first step. The second step and probably the more difficult would be the war against their own oppressors—men like her father, men who took everything and shared nothing.
A shower stall was now vacant, and Leila threw her coarse large towel over the wall panel and stepped under the streaming shower. The heat of the water spread over her like a soothing balm. She could feel the tension in her muscles loosen. Slowly, languidly, she began to soap herself, the touch of her fingers on her skin giving her a sensual pleasure.
In that she was like her father. Again she saw him on the water skis, the muscles straining against the lead, his entire being enjoying the physical effort of skill and balance.
She lathered the soft pubic hair until the dark curls were covered with the white fluff. Then she thrust her hips forward and let the shower beat directly down on her. The tingling and the warmth ran through her. Softly, almost automatically, she stroked herself. Her orgasm and the vision of her father on skis with hips thrust forward came together, taking her by surprise. Before she could stop another orgasm shook her body. She felt shock, then anger, then disgust at herself. She was sick to even allow such thoughts. Violently she turned off the hot water and held herself rigid under the icy stream until her flesh was blue with the cold. Then she stepped from the stall, wrapping the towel around her.
It was crazy. She had never had thoughts like that before. But it was in her blood. Her mother had said so many times. She was like her father. His body ruled him; his lusts and appetites were never to be satisfied. Her mother had told them stories about him and his women. He was not a man who could ever be satisfied with one good woman. Bad blood, her mother had said in warning.
She rubbed herself dry and then, tying the towel around her, went into the barracks.
Soad, whose bed was next to her, was almost dressed. “What are you doing tonight?”
Leila reached for a robe. “Nothing. I thought I would just stay in bed and read.”
Soad began to apply her lipstick. “I’ve got a date with Abdullah and a friend of his. Why don’t you come along?”
“I don’t really feel like it.”
Soad looked at her. “Come on. It would do you good to get out.”
Leila didn’t answer. She remembered Soad on her first day here. She had come to be near her boyfriend and had told everyone how she couldn’t wait to be with him. But when he didn’t appear she hadn’t been upset. She took her female liberation seriously. Women had equal rights in this army and by now she had fucked her way through the entire camp and made no bones about it. “Cairo was never
like this,” she’d say with a burst of raucous laughter.
“Tell you what,” Soad said seriously. “If you come along I’ll let you have Abdullah. He’s the best cocksman in the camp. I’ll settle for his friend.”
Leila looked at her. “I don’t think so.”
“What are you saving it for?” Soad asked. “Even if you don’t want it for yourself, it’s part of your duty. Didn’t the CO tell us that it was our responsibility to give solace and comfort to our men? I can’t imagine a better way to combine duty and pleasure all at the same time.”
Leila began to laugh. Soad has a one-track mind. “You’re fantastic,” she said. “But none of those men appeal to me.”
“You’ll never know until you try them,” Soad said. “Men can surprise you. The greatest lovers look like nothing sometimes.”
Leila shook her head.
A puzzled look came over Soad’s face. “Are you a virgin?”
Leila smiled. “No.”
“Then you’re in love.” It was a statement.
“No.”
Soad gave up. “I don’t understand you.”
That was the truest thing Soad had ever said. But how could she make the woman understand that there were things more important to her than sex?
CHAPTER 8
It was just ten minutes after reveille when the barracks door opened unexpectedly and Hamid shouted from the doorway. “Attention!”
There was a flurry of motion as the women fell into place, in front of their beds, in various stages of dress.
Hamid stepped back from the doorway and the CO entered. Her sharp dark eyes took in the entire barracks in one sweeping glance, then she walked into the center of the room followed by Hamid. The fact that some of the women were half-naked seemed to make no difference to her.
She was silent for a long moment before she spoke. Her voice was clear and emotionless. “Today will be your last day. Your training has been completed. Our work has been done. This camp will be closed and each of us assigned to duties elsewhere.”
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