"For the purpose of using me later?"
"Yes."
"And so perhaps I will be killed in the end, anyway, to accomplish what you came here to make me do?"
"Perhaps. But I hope it will not end that way."
"Yes. Hope." Amr exhaled softly. "Well, you are still an honest man, Cajun. But I never learned to play poker as well as you. And I never could read what went on in that brain of yours. We were friends once, and yet we were strangers. We are too different ever to know each other as I would like to know you."
"Sit down," Durell said again.
Amr sat on the sand beside him. He groaned a little and said, "I must tell you, I am wounded."
"How?"
"It is a bullet, I think. In my side. I did not know it, at first. There was so little pain. And then—here—I began to bleed. The bullet went through my side. Amusing, is it not? I have heard of men being shot and not realizing it. It ... I feel ill, now. I thought you should know . . . i need a doctor. . . ."
Durell had moved with Amr's first words and was kneeling beside him to gently tear away the moist, blood-soaked silk shirting. Amr made a petulant sound of pain. "Be careful, please!"
"Does it hurt now?"
"Naturally. I must insist on a doctor."
Durell said, "You were just grazed. It's a flesh wound."
"But it is my flesh, and I suffer from it, and I wish to have a doctor, please."
"You understand what will happen to you if the assassins find you again?"
"I am in pain! Are you inhuman? I command you—"
"Shut up, Bogo," Durell said. "Maybe some day you can punish me for insubordination. But right now I'm in command. There's more than just your skin to consider. There's Zoraya, for one—"
"I am not interested in a woman just now. I order you—"
"Shut up," Durell said again. "I'll bandage this. The bleeding has stopped. The bullet went in and out through soft tissue. With care, you could heal in a week. Meanwhile, I admit it is painful. And you'll be stiff and uncomfortable tomorrow. But that's better than being very dead."
"Am I supposed to thank you?"
"I didn't save you for thanks. I want to take you back to Jidrat with me. I want you to acknowledge your responsibilities and stop Colonel Ta'arife and the Q'adi from their inflammatory tactics, from turning the Moslem world upside down."
"Upside down from whose point of view?" Amr asked softly. His words made Durell glance up at him. Whatever dissipation the man had suffered, whatever damage was done to his body, the corrosion had not yet destroyed the keen foxlike mind. Durell grinned, and Amr said, "You think to set me on my throne as a puppet of the West?"
"No. Knowing you, no."
"I give you no guarantee, promise no favors."
"A fair deal, that's all we ask."
"And if I conspired with your enemies on the other side?"
"We know you, and we are willing to take that risk."
"You would gamble on someone like me? An evil man, they say, a lecher, a weakling, a playboy?"
"No man is altogether evil."
"I am," Amr said. "I admit it. I have made a career of being evil." He laughed bitterly. "To be a true Moslem, one must live up to the meaning of the word. Do you know it? A Moslem, in Arabic, is one who submits—to the will of God, of course. I have submitted to nothing and to no man. Do you know the five duties of a man in Islam? One must pray five times daily; give alms generously; keep the fast of Ramadan; make the pilgrimage to Mecca, the hajj; and last, one time in his life the believer must say with full understanding and absolute acceptance, There is no God but God, and Mohammed is his Prophet/ I have done all these things but the last. Though I have spoken the words, I neither understood nor accepted them. Once, when Zoraya was taken from me and my honor destroyed and I knew I had lost her as my true bride, I fell on my knees in the desert and wept and tried to feel the understanding of those words, to accept them, to submit to Allah's will blindly. I stayed in the desert for a day and a night and a day again, saying those words over and over again until my eyes were blinded by the sun and my tongue swollen by thirst." The man's words faded for a moment, and he sighed. "I could not accept. I could not believe."
"Perhaps such a day will come for you, Bogo," Durell said, after a time. He finished making a rough, but serviceable, bandage; a pad and strips that went around the man's fat, flabby chest. "This will serve you. I'll get some penicillin for you tomorrow to make sure there's no infection. Zoraya will nurse you on the way."
"I don't want Zoraya to nurse me."
"Why not? I'm sure she's competent."
"I heard what she said to you. You both thought I had fainted with exhaustion—which is what I should have done if it had not been for the pain of my wound. I heard her confession to you."
"It meant nothing."
"You think so?"
Durell paused. "Why won't you have her, Bogo? Or if you don't want her, why not divorce her and set her free?"
"The whole world asks that question. It is simple. I have answered it, but no one believes me. I love my pleasures, and I am not sure I want sons of my seed, heirs to carry on. You see, I know what I am. I enjoy being what I am. Do you think you can change me, Cajun?"
"I am going to try."
"Because it is your job? Because it is your duty?"
"Perhaps. And perhaps for one other small reason."
"What is that?"
"We once were friends," Durell said.
Anir al-Maari was silent. Like Durell, he stared at the dark sea. It was almost midnight. In the stone cottage, the girl slept. Durelfhad talked earnestly for an hour, but he did not know if his words had made any impression. He felt as if his voice had washed against a sponge and been absorbed without meaning; as if this man in whom he was supposed to inspire courage and political responsibility was nothing, a soft animal able only to recognize its perverted appetites.
He received no answer. No promise to cooperate. No agreement to return to Jidrat and take over the throne from the old Imam Yazid.
He felt as if he had expended all his energy and argument on a cipher. While he had talked, the prince had petulantly examined his wound, complained about the tightness of the bandage, wished for a drink, discussed the anatomical merits of the blonde who had danced with the black leopard, and chuckled over the eventual panic among the guests. The thin fox face that Durell remembered was soft and round and sagging. The eyes that once were proud were now either vague or cunning.
Durell waited. He had said all he could, tried to be as persuasive as possible. He did not know if Amr had even listened.
He remembered a night in the bayous when he had been hunting with Amodeo Talliaferro, from Bayou Peche Rouge, and Talliaferro had broken his leg and Durell had had to persuade him to struggle home through the swamps, with the whine of mosquitoes driving them insane, with all the dangers and terrors of the dark, dripping delta around them. They'd been only boys then. Durell had talked and talked, afraid to stop because he needed the sound of his own voice, and Talliaferro had needed his words, too, in order not to give up. They might have drowned, or been lost in the grim cypress bogs, or gone into quicksand under the gum trees.
He tried to remember what he had said to Amodeo. Anything and everything. About the mysteries of women, of the wide world, of people they knew in Bayou Peche Rouge. About his grandfather Jonathan and the old days on the Mississippi when Jonathan was a boy, when the river was wide and primitive and lusty, when the side-wheeler steamboats were an everyday sight, not just a rotting hulk in the mud serving as a home for Sam Durell and his old grandfather. Eventually, while he'd talked to Talliaferro, they had come to an old Indian cheniere and they followed the ridge of the dike to a road, and from there they had come to safety. All the time, Talliaferro had leaned on him, trying to spare his broken leg while they dragged themselves on, and afterward Durell realized that his friend had leaned on the sound of his voice, going on and on, as well as upon the strength of his
body.
But he had run out of words with Bogo. There was nothing more he could say. Then, when he was silent, Amr al-Maari spoke.
"It is too much for me to accept. It is too sudden."
'Take your time. We have until daylight, perhaps."
'They will kill me to prevent my going home?"
"You have the bullet wound to tell you that."
"And you can get me to Jidrat?"
"Yes."
"And then?"
"Then it will be up to you."
Amr grinned slyly. "In Jidrat I could enjoy my revenge, Durell."
"Revenge?"
"I could have you shot for insulting me as you have done. Do you think I might order such a thing?"
"I don't know," Durell said. "You might."
"Yes, I might. It depends. But you can save me now?"
"If you want me to."
"One wants to live a little longer, naturally."
"Then you will have to do everything I tell you to do."
"Until Jidrat?"
"Until then."
Amr was silent again. The sound of the wind had left the pine trees. The night seemed warmer. The lights of an air liner, probably the Rome-Paris flight, passed high overhead. It seemed remote and unattainable, that world up there.
"I am weak, Durell. I have indulged myself. My enemies have been satisfied that I am not dangerous to them, if I continue this life. If I refuse to go with you, if I leave you now, I will be safe. They will know I have rejected you, that I will not play your game."
"Yes, if they believe you."
"Why wouldn't they?"
"They may not wait to ask questions. They didn't wait tonight. They bought your friend, the Count «d'Igli. His villa was a death trap for you."
''Because they knew you were coming therel" the prince objected. "Only because of that."
"True. Otherwise, they laugh at you. They encourage your vices and look for the end of the al-Maari family. As you have been, you are dangerous to no one but yourself. I have told you all this/' Durell said, "and now I am finished."
Amr said, "But I am a coward, Durell."
"We all know fear, at times."
"If I go with you, it will be only under protest. And I do not promise what I shall demand as revenge when we reach home. You are too strong. I resent this. I shall see what I can do when we are home. I want to see if you will weep and cry out for mercy. You trapped me, by coming here, and now I have no choice. They would have left me alone, otherwise. So you are my enemy, too, as well as they. Is this understood between us?"
"Yes. We are enemies. And friends."
"Later, I will not help you," Amr said. "I am ready to die here, if it must be. If it all proves to be too boring."
"You will not die," Durell said. "I will die first."
"For me?" The prince laughed.
"It is my job."
"How you must despise me now!"
"Yes," Durell said. "I do."
Before dawn, Zoraya awoke and led them down the beach to the cottage of a fisherman whose wife worked as a housemaid in her villa. The fisherman owned a small seine boat. For a sum of money that Durell paid out of the expense cash Haggarty had given him in Geneva, the fisherman went into Portoferraio and sailed his boat up the shore and brought it to the beach, where they waited. He reported much excitement in the town because of the events at the Count d'Igli's villa. Durell paid him an equal sum to forget what he had heard, and they sailed, not for the fishing grounds, but, for most of the day, southward along the coast, toward Ostia, the port of Rome.
The radio reported the mystery "tragedy" at the Count d'Igli's and the disappearance of Prince Amr al-Maari, heir to the throne of Jidrat.
In Ostia, Zoraya bought new clothes for herself and Durell walked through the Coney Island atmosphere of the resort with Amr and ordered supper for them, and then they took the crowded, high-speed suburban train, packed with chattering, sweating Romans returning from a day's holiday at the beach, to Rome.
In Rome, Durell telephoned Haggarty again. He picked up visas from a man in the lobby of the Excelsior Hotel, together with new airline tickets. Before the moon rose again, they were flying east to Athens, Ankara, and Karachi.
As far as he knew, they were neither followed nor suspected.
Chapter Eleven
At dawn, Naomi Haledi, the passenger aboard the Atlantic Maid, still had not slept.'Now, as the brassy sun lifted out of the sea beyond Jidrat, she heard the city wake and stir, like a giant grumbling at being disturbed.
The sounds of confusion began with a flat, heavy explosion in the oil field. The concussion rolled across the harbor like the clap of an ogre's hands, and Naomi got up slowly from her bunk to stare through the porthole. In her confusion, she thought for a moment that she was back in Budapest, when the Soviet tanks returned to crush the rebellion. An image came before her of machine guns ravening the crowds her father and brother had joined—and then the image was gone. A sheet of flame leaped in fury from the oil tanks and lit the pre-dawn sky. Minor blasts followed as individual storage tanks went up. In the unreal light, Naomi saw the tankers at the end of the feeder lines coming alive, unhooking the loading pipes and getting ready to cast off their moorings.
It was stifling in the cabin and the brass rim of the porthole was hot to the touch because the old freighter could not shed the heat of the day. Naomi did not dare unlock the cabin door. Once, during the night, she'd heard the voices of an official boarding party, heard the gutteral Arabic of a port officer demanding the crew's papers. MacPherson had protested in vain. Naked feet had slapped the steel decks nearby and bulkhead doors had slammed endlessly.
She had stood up, her heart pounding in familiar terror, her hand at her throat. She'd felt suffocated. Footsteps had come down the ladder from the captain's quarters, and another voice—one she'd recognized as being accustomed to cold authority—had called her name in English.
"Miss Haledi?"
She had stood in the darkness of her cabin—silent, not daring tp reply. MacPherson's voice had rumbled in answer.
"Let my passenger alone. Her papers are in order."
"I must inspect them, sir."
'The girl is ill. I don't want her disturbed."
"I see. . . . Perhaps you can tell me her nationality?"
MacPherson had spoken without hesitation. "British. She's a lady representative for a Sheffield firm doing business in Singapore and Malaya. She took my ship for a sea voyage, for her health."
"You seem remarkably concerned for the young woman, sir."
"I'm only trying to be decent, Colonel Ta'arife."
"Decency is a virtue one cannot always afford. It is rumored that saboteurs are entering Jidrat. Enemy spies, elements subversive to the state. We must take precautions, you understand. The mob cannot always be controlled."
"Only when it suits your convenience," MacPherson had replied caustically.
The conversation at her stateroom door might have been planned for her benefit, Naomi thought. She sat down on the bunk, shuddering. Why was she such a coward? So many millions of her people had died bravely in Europe. Why couldn't she be strong enough to fight back? She had hoped to find the strength in Israel, in a new start, forgetting Kolia when she'd thrown her wedding ring into the Aegean Sea. But he had stayed with her, a cruel enigma, a distortion of love.
And she had never acted in violence in all her life. When her father and brothers had died under the guns fired because of Kolia's orders, she had gone back to the apartment to shoot him when he came home. But she hadn't been able to do it. Instead, she had vanished, erased herself from Budapest to find a new life and identity. But escape still eluded her.
She felt the morning sun on her back like a brand. The air smelled of metal. Although the night had shown flames in the oil fields, the dawn had changed the scene to dense, billowing clouds of black smoke soaring into the brassy sky. Now and then she heard a grenade explode sharply somewhere in the city. And from ac
ross the filthy waters of the harbor she heard the screams of the mob.
The mob of Jidrat was like a resentful animal that had been prodded awake. Sporadic bursts of gunfire came from the white palace, Faiz, the Imam's stronghold on the hill above the city. Captain MacPherson had pointed Faiz out to her as the residence of the Imam Yazid al-Maari. Apparently the royal guards were having trouble with the rioters at the gates. The rifle fire was stitched through with a pattern of bursts from machine guns and grenades. Through the porthole Naomi saw two tanks tumble along the quay and squeeze, like ugly brown beetles, into the narrow streets of the old quarter. They flew the green and white pennons of the Imam's forces. The thud-thud-thud of the cannon followed their disappearance.
Naomi turned away as someone rapped on her cabin door. She drew a deep breath. She did not want to answer it. And then she heard, incredulously, a woman's voice calling her name.
"Miss Haledi?" It was a crisp British accent. "Please let me in. I'm Mrs. Paul Kenton. Are you there? Hurry, please."
Naomi pulled back the bolt and a slender woman in a white suit quickly stepped inside, closed the door, and leaned back against it, staring at her.
"I've come fo help you," Esme Kenton said. "There isn't time to explain much. MacPherson came to see me at dawn. To help you. We've decided we can't let Colonel Ta'arife get you, my dear."
"Colonel Ta'arife?"
"Head of the military police. He and the Q'adi started the ball rolling last night, you see. He knows you're aboard. And that you're an Israeli citizen. MacPherson's cabin was forced and his logs were removed last night. Your name and nationality and passport number were logged there, naturally."
"I will be arrested then," Naomi said flatly.
"Yes. As a spy. Do you understand?"
"I have been able to think of nothing else. But why should you help me?"
"Why not? They'll use you, child. If the mob effort slackens and fails, they'll come here for you and stand you up in an open truck and parade you through the city as an enemy tolerated by the Imam."
"How do you know all this?"
"I've lived here a long time. Too long," Esme said bitterly. "You're being held in reserve, child. That's why I've come—while there is still time. I'll get you ashore."
Assignment Zoraya Page 10