THE BOY FROM THE TANGIER SOUK

by Richard Savin

  She felt the pang of disappointment as her plans dissolved in front of her. She could buy it, but it would take nearly all the money. There would be little left to start the business. She needed time to rethink her plans but when she said so Borja was ill disposed to any delay, pointing out that there were others standing ready in the queue behind. He felt no need to accommodate her indecision. She realised she would have to concede or lose it. She hated the snap decision, but it was clear the opportunity in front of her was rare and that it was unlikely to come again.

  ‘Very well. I shall take it.’

  ‘Good. Please let me know who will act for you in the purchase.’ Borja’s face was unsmiling; he seemed to be a man of little sentiment, and even less vocabulary.

  That afternoon, when they had returned to the house Evangeline made a phone call to Cortez. ‘I have need of a lawyer to act for me in this transaction. Given all that has gone before, I shall ask you to do this at no cost. It is the least you owe me.’

  There was no resistance from Cortez. He politely accepted and the matter was settled there and then.

  She spent the rest of the day juggling the costs, jotting down the numbers in a notebook. They would need equipment, baker’s trays, a preparation table. There had to be provision to buy paint and pay the artisans. Furniture would be needed for the rooms above. There would be flour and yeast to buy – and they would need a van. There would be very little to spare but she was determined it would work – it had to.

  *

  As the month of June faded into the first week of July, Evangeline and Tamaya made ready to move from the house. The Mercedes was long gone and in its place there was a small, rather ancient Renault camionette. They loaded what remained to be taken from the house and left. Evangeline did not look back; the place held nothing but disappointments and regrets.

  The first thing they had done was to get the rooms above the shop habitable. It had been a rushed job but they had managed it.

  There was a salon, a dining room and a kitchen on the first level. Above there was a bathroom, two bedrooms and a box room. Everything had been faded, but now there was a no longer a smell of damp and the peeling wallpaper had gone; it wasn’t perfect but it would do.

  ‘Will you be happy with the smaller room at the back?’ Evangeline asked Tamaya. ‘It is just that with the baby coming I shall need more space.’

  ‘Of course,’ Tamaya agreed as they stood in the back bedroom, ‘it is only right that you should.’

  She crossed to stand by the window and looked out on the view. ‘It is lovely. I can watch the river and the people promenading.’ She clasped her hands together and looked down at them. ‘I have been a servant all my adult life and I have not had a room that I could make my own since I was a child. Thank you, Evangeline, for this room. I think it will be beautiful for me.’

  It had taken longer and cost more than the meagre budget Evangeline had set aside for the task, but they were in and she felt secure.

  By the end of July the pregnancy was beginning to take its toll. The nausea had gone but there was still the fatigue. The weather had become unbearably hot and she started each day with an effort.

  On the second week of August she woke to the smell of fresh baking. Going downstairs, she found Tamaya at the oven. On the table she had set out six newly baked croissants. She smiled when she saw Evangeline. ‘It is finished, Evi,’ she said with a flourish; then stopped in her tracks when it sank in she had used the diminutive to address her. ‘Oh dear,’ she giggled, ‘I didn’t mean to call you that.’

  Evangeline laughed, ‘No, that is good, I am glad you have finally got around to calling me that; Evangeline is such a mouthful.’

  ‘I have baked these,’ Tamaya said, still sounding a little sheepish. ‘It is a good oven.’ There was an air of pride in the way she said it. ‘And the last of the work was finished this morning. I have paid everyone except the plumber who has had only half of his money. There was not enough in the tin so he has agreed to come back tomorrow for the rest.

  Evangeline picked up a croissant and nibbled it. It was light and crisp, and flaked just as it should. ‘Wonderful. We should have coffee to go with these.’

  She went to the oven and opened the fire door to inspect it. ‘Yes, they have done a good job. At last we can get open. After breakfast I will go to the bank and draw what is left of the money.’

  She had never particularly liked Morales; now she liked him even less. As banker to the de Lorca family he had always been punctilious in his dealings with her, but that had changed with the death of Carlos. There was no more fawning and tea in fine china. If he saw her in the bank he would wish her a polite ‘buen dia’, but that was the limit of his courtesy.

  The cashier at the counter peered into the open ledger in front of him. He looked at the cheque she had written and the amount on it: 400 pesetas. He appeared uncomfortable. ‘I am afraid, señora, there is only five pesetas in the account.’

  ‘That can’t be right. Are you sure?’ He turned the ledger so that she could read it. ‘What is that?’ She pointed to a figure in red.

  He turned the ledger back to face him and stared down at it. ‘Those are the bank’s charges, señora.’

  ‘Charges? Why are there charges? I have never been charged before.’

  The cashier shot her a worried glance. ‘I am not sure, señora. Please wait for a moment and I will speak with the manager.’

  Morales declined to see her. The message from him was clear. When she married Don Carlos she came under the umbrella of the de Lorca family. The de Lorcas did not pay charges because of deposits held for them by the bank. Now she was no longer a de Lorca she would be charged like any other customer. Those were his instructions from Don Ferdinand.

  She left the bank with the five pesetas. Outside, she stood on the pavement and burst into tears. After a while she gathered her resolve. There was one more thing she could do. It would be the hardest thing of her life. It was all she had of her memories of Richard but deep down she knew she had no choice. She walked the short distance to Carrer de les Hortes and the jeweller’s shop where she had sold the watch and the cufflinks. On the counter top she placed her half of the gold Napoleon, the half that matched the piece she had given Richard after their escape from France.

  ‘What will you give me for this?’

  The jeweller picked up the half coin and turned it over. He looked at the date on it. ‘It is a shame you have only half of this coin, señora. The whole piece would have been very valuable, but – it a rare piece and is still of interest to those who collect such things.’ He placed it on his scales. ‘For the gold it has a value of 327 pesetas.’

  She picked it up and put it back into her purse. ‘It is not enough.’

  ‘Please let me finish, señora. That is the value of the gold alone – but the item has more value to a collector. This is from 1805, the time of Bonaparte. I could offer you nearly double its gold value – say, six hundred and fifty.’

  Evangeline took it back out of her purse, put it to her lips, gently kissed it, then placed it again on the counter.

  As she left the jeweller she sought consolation in the thought that Richard would have understood.

  In his office in Cadaqués, Antonio Cortez lifted the receiver of the telephone on his desk. ‘She has bought a shop in Girona. Is there anything you need me to do, Don Ferdinand?’

  Chapter 23

  The ship

  The call to midday prayers had died away. Prayer mats had been rolled up, and those who had time were leaving the mosque and going in search of their lunch. The rich aroma of the food sellers was filling the air, a liaison of the sweet, the spiced and the savoury, all mixed with the perfumed scent of wood smoke from the cooks’ braziers.

  Deep in the Medina, a boy walked slowly and purposefully through the souk of the food sellers, examining each one as he went. At the stall of one seller of small dishes and drinks the boy stopped and perched himself on a stool.
/>   The seller touched his forehead and offered a polite greeting, appropriate for a street boy. ‘Salaam, sayidi alsh shabu.’

  ‘Salaam, Baba,’ the boy replied, ‘give me one shawarma – and one 7up.’

  The man extended a hand, palm open. ‘That will be 30 centimes.’ The boy counted out the coins and placed them in the waiting hand.

  ‘Tell me, Baba,’ he said, his mouth crammed with flat bread and mutton, ‘what is the news in the souk?’

  The man cocked his head a little to one side and laughed. ‘There is always much news in the souk, sayidi. Is there any one thing that would interest a boy?’

  ‘I heard a carpet trader and his apprentice were killed.’

  The seller lowered his voice. ‘Ah, the Persian. Yes, of course, everyone speaks of this.’

  ‘There is another story I have heard, Baba. A foreigner, from Algiers they say – he was taken away in a cart, under some carpets; carpets sold by the Persian.’

  ‘You have heard much, sayidi.’

  ‘There is talk of a beggar, a very poor man, peace be upon him. It is said he comes sometimes to your stall and that you feed him; may Allah bless you.’

  The seller nodded slowly. ‘You have a wise head and a clever tongue for a boy from the Tangier souks.’

  The boy looked put out; it was not the answer he wanted. ‘I do not recall saying I was from Tangier, Baba – did I miss hearing what I am saying.’

  At this the seller laughed. ‘You speak with the voice of a Tangerine. So, tell me, why do you look for this beggar – is he of your clan?’

  At this the boy first thought to lie, to claim some link of kinship, but this man knew he was from Tangier and what possible kin could he have begging on the streets of Casablanca. ‘He can tell me much I need to know,’ the boy replied.

  ‘Ha! What can you learn from a man who knows only how to take baksheesh?’

  ‘Even the poor can be wise, Baba.’

  The seller turned away to tend to a pot of spiced snails stewing over the brazier. ‘I do know of such a beggar,’ he said, slowly stirring the pot and causing the shells to clack and clatter. ‘He comes here to be fed sometimes.’

  The boy tried again. ‘So, Baba, if it should be the will of Allah, alhumdulillah, may his peace be upon you, that you should tell me – where shall I find this beggar?’

  The man turned back to face the boy. ‘Well, sayidi alsh shabu, you should go to the port – that is where you will find him. He is called Saleem Qadim, most will know him just as Qadim.’

  Under the shade of a small cluster of date palms in the Arab League Park the boy settled, his back propped against a tree, to wait out the heat of the early afternoon. There was no point in going to the port. At that hour there would be nobody; it was too hot even for a beggar.

  As he sat there thinking of what he might do next, a sight took his attention. A man was walking along the path that led through the middle of the park. This was not unusual, except that he was dressed in a dark suit and wearing a dark felt hat, neither of which were either suitable or normal for Casablanca in the heat of summer. He was, the boy concluded, a foreigner. He was probably good for a sous but it was too hot to bother – and, besides, what need had he of baksheesh. He still had about him most of the ten francs his new employer had given him in Fez. He would find the beggar Qadim and he would buy his information. He had now become the giver of baksheesh. The thought made him feel important, a person of worth, not just some boy from the Tangier souk.

  The call of the muezzin drifted on the air. Asr, the afternoon prayer, told him it was time to move. It was a short walk to his destination and he had new sandals, bought second-hand for a franc in the clothes merchants’ souk. They slapped lightly on the sun-drenched pavement, protecting his feet from the searing heat stored in the stone slabs.

  The port was big, much larger than the one in Tangier. The wharves were packed, crowded with loading gangs, runners and tallymen; chaotic and busy. The task to find one man at first seemed impossible. He would have to find a gangmaster – they were men in the know, men who had their fingers in all the pies of the port. Men on the take and on the make.

  He found one standing on the hold covers of a newly docked freighter, shouting out instructions, a tally-board in one hand.

  ‘Chef,’ the boy called to him.

  The man glanced briefly in his direction and, seeing it was a boy, assumed he was a messenger. He held up the board and waved for the boy to come onto the ship. ‘What is it?’ he demanded after the boy had scrambled up the plank, dodging between the lines of men who were struggling under their loads of sacks and bales.

  ‘I am looking for the beggar Saleem Qadim.’

  The man shook his head and went back to his business. ‘Ask the harbourmaster,’ he shouted as the boy jumped ashore.

  At the harbourmaster’s office his way was barred. ‘Oi, you, you can’t go in there.’ A man dressed in a uniform with an impressive badge on a naval hat stood in his way. ‘Only dock business. What do you want?’

  ‘I am on important business, sayidi. I am looking for a beggar, Saleem Qadim. A gangmaster on one of the ships said I should ask the harbourmaster.’

  The man pulled a sour face. ‘No chance, sod off.’ He pushed the boy away.

  At the entrance to another dock he again asked the question, but the answer was the same. Few seemed to know of ‘Saleem the old’, as the name translated and those who did could not say where he could be found.

  The afternoon was late and the sun was settling into the western horizon when he decided to give up for the day. The dockworkers were beginning to make their way out of the port. He would come back and try again tomorrow.

  At the main entrance he found an old man with a bowl, his shoulders bowed under the weight of his years; a short grey beard covering his thin face. As each worker passed, his thin, reedy voice called out, ‘Alsadqa, bismillah’ (alms in the name of Allah). When the boy heard it his face lit up. He knew he had found him; this must be his man. Only the old and devout would use such an archaic expression. It was exactly how he had imagined Saleem Qadim would be.

  The boy waited, content to let the aged greybeard have his time. Most of the workers walked by without a look. Just occasionally the metallic chink of a coin would be heard as a sous was dropped into his tin bowl.

  When it had quietened and the file of men had thinned to nothing, he approached the old man. ‘Salaam, jadde.’ He addressed him in the familiar but respectful term of grandfather. He took fifty centimes from his pocket and dropped it into the bowl. ‘I have heard that you saw something, jadde.’

  Together, they walked to a much quieter place in the port. A place of sheds and commercial warehouses. ‘It was here they came,’ Saleem Qadim pointed to one of the larger buildings. ‘They went in there, that door.’

  The boy thanked him and passed him another fifty centimes. Saleem Qadim touched his hand to his prayer cap. ‘Masha Allah, God’s blessing be upon you.’

  The boy watched until the old man had shuffled out of sight, then he walked over to the building. It was firmly shut and there was no sign of life. The light was almost gone and there was, he decided, nothing more he could do in that place. He left and headed back to the souks where he would beg shelter for the night. Tomorrow he would return.

  Just before the first light of dawn he made his way back to the port and went directly to the warehouse. There he found a place and squatted down to wait. After the morning prayer of Fajr had passed, the workers began to drift in to the docks. Casual labourers most of them; men and boys looking for a day’s work. It was good cover. No one would pay heed to a boy sitting idly with his back to the wall.

  About an hour into his vigil there was a reward. A green Renault car entered the area and drove slowly to the warehouse, where it parked.

  ‘Ha,’ he said to himself as a man got out. He was wearing a straw boater. Then a woman got out and the two of them went into the warehouse. Minutes later another man arriv
ed. ‘Aha,’ the boy said under his breath, as he recognised the man in the dark suit he had seen in the park the day before, ‘there are times when Allah is generous.’

  He watched as the man disappeared through the gap of the part opened warehouse door. Getting up from where he had been squatting, the boy casually sauntered over to where the green car was parked. He loitered for a moment to see if anyone had noticed him, and when he was sure they had not, he sidled up to the open gap and slipped into the cool darkness.

  For a moment he stood still, holding his breath and listening. As his eyes grew familiar with the gloom he could see that the cavernous space he had entered was stacked with bales and crates. There was a large handcart standing alone in an open space between two stacks of crates. He went quickly over to it and looked into its depth. It was empty. On the floor, dropped carelessly next to it, there were four carpets: fine Persian carpets.

  ‘Sophie.’ A man’s voice broke the stillness. The boy quickly dropped behind the cart. A door burst open and a shaft of light ripped into the darkness, revealing a platform and a short flight of steps leading down to the floor. It was barely more than ten metres from where he was, crouched down among the carpets. He kept perfectly still. The light had spilled just a metre from his body. Only the dark cloth of his djellaba hid him from their eyes. The man came down the steps followed closely by the woman and then two more men. They walked so near to him as they threaded their way along an aisle of bales that he could hear their breath. He watched as they headed for the far end of the warehouse where another door was opened and the blinding glare of the sun lit their silhouettes. The door closed and he was again in darkness.

  He ran as fast as he dare in the poor light until he got to the door they had just passed through. He could hear their voices, then there was the sound of a motor being started. Carefully he inched the door open, just a crack, wide enough to see what was outside.