by Wilbur Smith
A servant of the vizier tried to delay him in the antechamber, but Tom brushed past him: he knew his way to the inner cabinet. He jerked aside the thick silk curtains that covered the doorway and barged through.
The vizier was seated on the low platform at the far side of the room. The room stank of incense and hashish. There was a writing-tablet in front of him and a secretary beside him, offering documents one at a time for his signature. The vizier looked up, startled by Tom’s precipitate entrance.
‘A minute ago I spoke to the English captain who was coming from an audience of His Excellency,’ Tom announced. ‘I was pleased to hear that the Sultan has recovered so swiftly from his indisposition,’ he went on, in Arabic, ‘for this means that he is now able to meet me, and respond to my petition.’
The vizier scrambled to his feet, but Tom brushed past him, making for the doorway beyond. ‘You cannot go in there!’ he cried fearfully, but Tom ignored him.
‘Guard!’ the vizier shouted. ‘Stop that man.’
A big man in a long robe and half-armour appeared in the doorway and blocked Tom’s way. He had his hand on the pommel of the sheathed scimitar on his belt. Tom stepped up to him, and seized his sword arm at the wrist. The guard tried to draw his weapon but Tom held his arm, and crushed his wrist in a vicious grip that made him wince, looking over his shoulder into the room beyond.
‘Greetings, mighty lord,’ he called to the man who reclined on a mound of cushions. ‘I call down all the blessings of Allah upon you, and offer you my humble and dutiful respects. I beg to address you on a matter of mercy. As the Prophet Himself has said, the small child and the widow are deserving of our compassion.’
The Sultan blinked at him, and sat upright. He wore a stiff jacket of heavily brocaded silk over scarlet pantaloons, gathered at the waist with a girdle of gold filigree. His turban was scarlet to match his trousers, and his beard was bushy and thick. He tugged at it nervously. He had not expected to be confronted by this barbaric Frank, quoting the sacred words of the Koran at him.
The vizier had run after Tom. Now he thrust himself between them. ‘Forgive me, lord, I tried to stop him. This is the mean and worthless unbeliever of whom I told you. I will call the guard to have him removed.’
‘Let him be,’ the Sultan said. ‘I will listen to what he has to say.’
Tom released the guard’s wrist and pushed him aside. ‘This mean and worthless unbeliever thanks the mighty Sultan Ali Muhammad, and presents his humble respects.’
His words were so much at odds with his behaviour that the Sultan smiled. ‘Speak to me, then, on this compassionate matter,’ he invited.
‘I seek a child, my own brother. He was lost two years ago. I have good reason to suspect that he is being held captive in the territories of the Omani.’
The Sultan’s expression became guarded.
‘My brother is a subject of His Majesty King William the Third. There is a treaty between your Caliph and our King which forbids the enslavement of their subjects.’
‘I know who you are.’ The Sultan held up his hand to silence Tom. ‘I have heard from the English consul concerning you. I have also received enquiries from the consul about this child. These matters are being investigated. There is nothing more I can tell you until I receive a reply from the court of the Caliph in Muscat.’
‘It is a year and more since—’ Tom began angrily, but the Sultan stopped him.
‘I am sure that you must realize the folly of arousing the displeasure of the Caliph by importuning him on such a trivial matter as this.’
‘It is no trivial matter,’ Tom protested. ‘My family is noble, and wields much influence.’
‘To the Caliph, it is a trivial matter. However, His Majesty is a man of great compassion. We can rest assured that we will hear from him if he can tell us anything about the boy. He will reply to these queries when he has something to tell us. In the meantime we must wait upon his grace.’
‘How long?’ Tom demanded. ‘How long must we wait?’
‘As long as is necessary.’ The Sultan made the gesture of dismissal. ‘Next time you burst in upon me like an enemy I will treat you as one, Englishman,’ he warned coldly.
When Tom had been led away, the Sultan summoned his vizier and the man prostrated himself before him. ‘Forgive me, mighty lord. I am dust before you. I tried to prevent that mad Frank—’
The Sultan silenced him with a wave of his hand. ‘Send word to the English consul that I wish to speak to him immediately.’
‘Guy went down to the fort yesterday. The Sultan sent for him,’ Sarah told Tom. ‘When he came back he had a black dog on his back. He beat one of the grooms senseless, and shouted at Caroline and me.’
‘He didn’t beat you?’ Tom asked. ‘I swear I will thrash him into a pulp if he raises a hand to you.’
‘He tried that only once.’ Sarah laughed, and shook out her hair so that it danced in the monsoon wind. ‘I doubt he will do so again. I broke one of his precious Chinese vases over his head. It didn’t bleed much, but he behaved as if he was dying. But enough of that! I was giving you my report.’
‘Stand by about!’ Tom interrupted her, and she jumped to the mizen halyard of the little felucca. She was learning the ropes quickly and was already a handy crew. Tom had hired the craft in Zanzibar harbour for a few rupees a day, and they laid her on a tack to round the south point of the island. Then Sarah came back to sit beside him.
‘So, after throwing the entire household into pandemonium, Guy spent the rest of the afternoon in his room. At supper he spoke hardly a word, but drank two bottles of port, and another of Madeira. It took two servants to help Caroline and me carry him up to bed.’
‘So my twin has become a sot?’ Tom asked.
‘No, it was most unusual – the first time I have seen him drink himself into a stupor. You seem to have a strange effect on people.’ She made the double-edged remark with such insouciance that Tom was not certain how to interpret it. She went on lightly, ‘After we had tucked him up, and Caroline was beside him in the bed, I went down to his office, and found he had written a sheaf of letters. I made copies of those that concern us.’
She pulled out the folded pages from the pocket of her skirt. ‘This one is to Lord Childs, and this to your brother William.’ She handed them to him and the sheets fluttered in her hand.
‘Take the tiller.’ He handed it to her, and Sarah perched up on the transom, her skirts pulled up to her knees to let the sun and wind play on her skin. With an effort Tom averted his eyes from those long, strong limbs and focused his attention on the papers. He frowned as he read the first letter, and as he continued the frown turned into a dark scowl. ‘The treacherous bastard!’ he exclaimed, then was immediately contrite. ‘Forgive me. I did not mean to use rough language.’
She laughed, crinkling her eyes. ‘If Guy is a bastard that makes you one also. We had better choose another description. How about toad or bunghole?’
Tom felt himself blush, he had not expected to be outdone in the use of invective. Hurriedly he switched his attention back to the letter to William. It was an eerie feeling to read words directed to the man he had killed.
When he finished reading he tore both letters to shreds and threw them up into the air. They watched them fly away like white gulls on the wind.
‘So tell me about your audience with the Sultan. Every last detail,’ Sarah demanded.
Before replying Tom stood up and went to the foot of the mast. He lowered the lateen sail, and immediately the motion of the felucca changed: she no longer plunged and wrestled with the wind, but gave herself to it like a lover, with a gentle swoop and climb. He went back and sat close to Sarah, but not quite touching her. ‘I had to force my way into his inner cabinet,’ he said, ‘but I had armed myself with a quotation from the Koran.’ He described the meeting to her, repeating the exchanges word for word, and she listened solemnly, not interrupting once, which he realized even from their short acquaintance was un
usual.
Once or twice during the recital Tom lost the thread and repeated himself. Her eyes were wide-set, and the whites were clear and so white that they seemed to be tinged with a faint bluish radiance, like those of a healthy infant. Their faces were so close together that he could trace that elusive fragrance to her breath. When he had finished speaking they were both silent, but neither made any move to pull apart.
Sarah broke the silence. ‘Are you planning to kiss me, Tom?’ She stroked the long tendrils of hair back from her face with one hand. ‘Because if you are this is a good time for it. There is no one to spy on us.’
He moved his face towards hers, then stopped with only an inch between their lips, overcome by an almost religious sense of awe and sacrilege. ‘I don’t want to do anything that will give you offence,’ he croaked.
‘Don’t be a booby, Tom Courtney.’ Despite the insult her voice was husky, and her eyes closed slowly, the thick dark lashes interlacing. She ran the pink tip of her tongue over her lips, then pursed them expectantly.
Tom felt an almost irresistible urge to seize her and crush her body against his own. Instead he touched his lips to hers as lightly as a butterfly settling on a petal. The moisture on them tasted faintly sweet, and he felt that he might suffocate with the pressure in his chest. After a moment he drew back.
Her eyes flew open. They were startlingly green. ‘Damn you, Tom Courtney,’ she said. ‘I have waited so long, and that was the best you could do.’
‘You are so soft and beautiful,’ he stammered. ‘I don’t want to hurt you or make you despise me.’
‘If you don’t want me to despise you, then you must do better than that.’ She closed her eyes again and leaned towards him. He hesitated only a heartbeat longer then seized her, wrapped her in his arms, and crushed her mouth with his.
She made a small mewing sound of surprise and stiffened with shock at the unexpected power of his embrace, then flung herself forward, meeting his kiss with such abandon that their lips were forced open, their teeth clashed together, the softness and wetness of their mouths melded and their tongues entwined.
A larger wave hit the side of the drifting felucca and tumbled them from their perch on the transom. It did not break their embrace and they fell to the deck, oblivious of the smell of the bilges and of the dried fish scales that covered the hard planks beneath them.
‘Tom! Tom!’ She was trying to speak without lifting her mouth from his. ‘Yes! So long! I never thought – oh, yes, you are so strong. Don’t stop now.’
He wanted to devour her, to engulf her completely. The lining of her mouth was slippery, and her tongue was a maddening goad. His senses swam, the universe closed in upon him until this warm fragrant body in his arms was all of existence.
At last they had to free their mouths to breathe. It was only for a moment, just long enough for her to gasp, ‘Tom. Oh, Tom. I have loved you from the first moment I saw you. All these years I thought I had lost you.’
Then they flew at each other again, moaning and clawing at each other, her arms locked about his neck, bruising their lips against each other’s mouth and teeth. Blindly he groped for her breasts, and when he found them their shape and elastic weight made him cry out aloud as if in pain. He fumbled at the fastening of her bodice, but he was clumsy and inexpert. Impatiently she pushed away his hands and undid the ribbon. She reached in and scooped out one of her breasts and pushed it into his hand, closing his fingers over it.
‘There,’ she said, into his mouth, ‘it’s yours. Everything is yours.’ He kneaded her flesh, and though she whimpered she exulted in the pain.
‘Oh, I have hurt you.’ He pulled away. ‘I’m sorry. Truly, I’m sorry.’
‘No, no!’ She reached for his hands and replaced them on her bosom. ‘Do it. Do whatever you want.’
He stared at the breast in his hand. It was as white as though it had been freshly carved from ivory, but with the pink marks of his rough fingers on it. It filled his cupped hand. The nipple was engorged and hard, dark with blood. ‘So beautiful. I have never seen anything so beautiful.’
He bowed his head and placed his lips on the nipple. She arched her back, thrusting her chest up to meet him. She reached up with both hands, twisted and entwined her fingers in the thick, springing curls at the back of his head, guiding his mouth. When at last he lifted it to look at her face, she locked her mouth on his once more.
He was on top of her now, and suddenly she realized what that hardness was that he was pushing against her thighs and belly. She had never felt it before, but often she and Caroline had discussed it, and she had wheedled every detail out of her elder sister. As the realization struck her, she stopped breathing and stiffened with shock. Immediately Tom tried to break away again. ‘I didn’t mean to frighten you. We should stop now.’
The threat terrified her. She was desperate at the thought of being deprived of him and the hardness of his body. She pulled him back. ‘Please, Tom, don’t go away!’
Almost timidly he embraced her again, but he arched his lower body away from her. She wanted to feel him again, that wondrous man-thing hard against her. She reached around behind him and locked her hands over his buttocks, pulling him in and hunting for him with straining hips. ‘Yes!’ She had found him. ‘Oh, yes.’ She was in a transport, her emotions tumbling and twisting like a twig caught in a whirlpool. She felt him tugging at her clothing, reaching down between them, and she realized what he was trying to do.
She raised herself on her shoulders and heels, arching her bottom off the deck, and reached down to help him, pulling her skirts over her thighs, then as high as her navel. The monsoon wind was cool on her naked belly, and Tom was kneeling over her, plucking frantically at the fastenings of his breeches. She raised herself on her elbows, wanting to see him. Caroline’s descriptions had been graphic, but she wanted to see for herself. Tom was taking so long, she felt she could not wait longer. She wanted to help him and stretched out her hand.
Then, with one movement, he wrenched his breeches down to his knees, and she gasped aloud. Nothing her sister had told her had prepared her for this. Staring at him, she fell back on the hard deck and her legs fell apart weakly as if she had no control of them.
A long time later he lay heavy and inert on top of her. He was gasping like a man rescued from drowning. Droplets of his sweat had fallen upon her like rain, and wet the front of her bodice, her face and her bare breast. She had locked her legs around him, and she held him still. The felucca under them rocked them like infants in the cradle.
Tom stirred and tried to rise, but she tightened the grip of her arms and legs to prevent him leaving her. He sighed raggedly and slumped back on top of her. She felt a strange sense of triumph and possession, as though she had achieved something of almost mystical importance, something beyond mere flesh. She could not find the words to describe it to herself, but she stroked his head and murmured gentle but incoherent endearments to him.
With infinite regret, and a sense of aching loss, she felt him shrivel inside her, and though she ached where he had forced his way into her, she tightened her muscles and tried to hold him in, but he slipped away, and she had to let him sit up. He looked about him with a bewildered expression. ‘We have drifted a league out to sea.’
She sat up beside him, smoothing down her skirts, and saw that the island was a blue line on the horizon. Tom came up on his knees, pulling up his breeches, and she watched him. She felt maternal and protective, as though she had miraculously become a full woman, as though she had put her girlhood behind her, that she was now the strong one and he the child who must be fostered and cherished.
Tom staggered to the halyard, unsteady on his feet, raised the sail and put the felucca on the wind. Sarah straightened her clothing and retied the ribbon of her bodice, then rose from the deck and went to sit with him at the tiller. He put his arm around her shoulders and she snuggled close to him. They were halfway back to the island before either of them spoke.
She rejoiced to hear him say it and tightened her embrace. ‘As I said before, I have loved you since the first day I laid eyes upon you, Tom Courtney. Even though I was only a child, I prayed that one day I would be your woman.’
‘That day has come,’ he said, and kissed her again.
They met as often as Sarah could escape the vigilance of Caroline and Guy. Sometimes the intervals between their meetings were two or three days, but then their passion was inflamed by the delay.
These trysts were always in the afternoons, for in the mornings Sarah helped her sister run the household, or looked after little Christopher. Neither could Tom leave the Swallow and his crew: the ship had suffered extensive storm damage to her hull and rigging after leaving Good Hope, and this had to be repaired, the ship made fully seaworthy again.
Most mornings Tom was up at the fort, for he was desperate to have news of Dorian from Muscat, and he was still waiting for his licence to trade. Although he lavished flattery and baksheesh on the vizier, he was still in bad grace and the vizier punished him with flowery excuses and apologies for the delay. Without the Sultan’s firman in his hands Tom could not deal in the island markets.
Those precious hours when Tom and Sarah could be together sped by too swiftly for both of them. Some afternoons they lay in each other’s arms, not bothering to touch the delicacies that Sarah had brought with her, making love as though it were for the last time. In the intervals between they talked, breathless in their need to say everything they felt for each other, making fantastic plans for the future, for the time when they could escape the island together and, with Dorian, sail away in the Swallow.
On other days they took the felucca and sailed to the outer reefs, anchoring over the coral and fishing with hand lines, laughing and shouting with excitement as they dragged up the lovely creatures from the depths, kicking on the lines, sparkling like great gemstones in the sunlight as they were swung inboard.