Chapter XXIX
There were, of course, a number of small boys fussing around the horses and as the priest, Harun and I talked this number grew. Several youths came and stood nearby, listening to us, as well as a couple of young girls who clutched headscarves over their faces and watched us with one eye peeping out from its folds. After some time Harun glanced up at the sun and then down at the shadows.
"Where is Charles?" he asked.
"He is with the sheikh of the village," I told him.
"If he doesn't come soon, we will not reach Kerak before night," Harun said.
At once the priest called one of the youths and spoke to him in a language I did not understand. The youth crossed the square and entered into a large house on the other side. After a short time he reappeared and spoke to us in our language.
"He is just coming."
"Al-hamdu-lillah," Harun exclaimed. "I have no wish to spend the night in the open in this country."
"Indeed," the priest nodded, "these are unsettled times."
"But we are under the hand of the Bani Jibrin," I protested.
"Their land ends within an hour of this place," Harun told me. "Beyond are only small tribes which wander constantly. If we seek the face of one tribe for a certain distance, by the time we return they have gone and another tribe is there - perhaps the enemies of the first one, so that it would be foolish to claim their protection in the tents of the second tribe."
"We are three," I pointed out, "and well armed."
"Indeed," Harun replied, "but it is no fun to sit for one third of the night keeping watch on your own and imagining that every rock and shrub is an enemy creeping up on you or feeling fear every time a mouse stirs nearby. Better by far to sleep in a place with walls."
"You do not fear to enter a Frankish castle?" I teased him.
"I doubt I will have the chance," Harun replied gravely. "Neither you nor I are like to be allowed within the walls of Kerak castle, but the town is a different matter and there is one with whom I stay there."
We chatted for another period of time and then Harun again looked at the sun.
"For one who is 'just coming', your friend is taking a long time. Is it possible that he has lost his way?" Harun spoke to me.
Once more the priest beckoned to the youth and sent him to the house of the sheikh.
"Tell him that we will travel without him," I yelled after the lad as he crossed the square.
Two men came back with the lad.
"He is just coming, just now," they assured us. "Don't worry."
"By the beard of the Prophet," Harun growled in mock anger, "if he doesn't come immediately, I shall go myself and drag him out."
"Don't worry, don't worry," one of the men tried to placate him, while the other went back across the square and disappeared into the sheikh's house.
This time at last there was action, for we heard voices and within a short time Charles came out of the house, accompanied by the sheikh and several other men. They crossed the square towards us, talking happily together and then there was a lengthy leave-taking as the sheikh embraced Charles, followed by the other men. Harun gestured to me and we both mounted our horses, ready to depart as soon as Charles was ready, but it still took time for him to bid farewell to all the men and mount his beast.
"Bismillah," Harun said when at last Charles was in the saddle.
"Bismillah," I replied, shaking my reins. "In the name of God."
Harun led the way out of the village and I followed, turning only once to wave at the priest - and then again to yell to Charles to follow, for he was leaning down saying something private to the blind sheikh.
"Will we reach Kerak tonight, do you think?" Harun asked Charles when we were clear of the village and had shaken off the last of the pariah dogs.
Charles glanced up at the sun and pulled a long face.
"Hmmm. I didn't realise how late it was. You should have called me."
"By the Prophet, O Charles," I interrupted. "We called you twice and you did not come. After the third time we were going to seek armed men to rescue you, for we thought you had been kidnapped."
"Kidnapped?" Harun snorted. "More likely there is a woman in this. The sheikh's daughter, perhaps?"
Either Harun spoke of his own knowledge, or he guessed more truly than he knew, for in front of my astonished eyes Charles face went bright red and I already knew that this is how the Franks reacted when they were embarrassed or ashamed. Harun looked at me and winked.
"Do you know any love-songs, Fuad?" he asked, innocently.
"Ya Allah!" I said, disgustedly. "I thought to leave love songs and poems behind with Hamed."
"Who is Hamed?" Harun enquired.
Thus the afternoon passed away as I told of Hamed, Hilmi and the other young men with whom I associated in the house of Sid Guy. Harun laughed at my descriptions and in return told tales of his friends in ash-Shams, but Charles rode in silence. Even when we spoke to him, he answered in as few words as possible and then fell silent again.
"Let him be," Harun said. "For a snakebite one can draw blood and perhaps find some powerful medicine, but for the bite of a woman there is no cure. The only medicine is another woman, even more beautiful than the one who has bitten him - and in this desert, where will we find such a thing?"
He spoke truly, for the further we rode, the more dry and desolate the land before us became; not quite as desolate as the area around the tents of my tribe, but certainly much more harsh than the lands of the Bani Jibrin. I drank sparingly from my bottle, only too glad that we had been able to refill it in Madeba.
"By Saint Dennis," Charles exclaimed as we crested a rise and a vast dry plain opened before us, "would that we were in France!"
For an hour or more he spoke of the land of the Franks which, according to him, was filled with water, for not only did it rain every day, but every valley was filled by a river that, like the Jordan, flowed without ceasing both summer and winter. As a result the whole country was green like Damascus, which the Prophet, peace be upon him, refused to enter, saying that a man could only go once into Paradise.
Harun winked at me when Charles fell silent. "And every house is a palace built by the djinn and every hen is as big as the Roc with whom Sinbad fought," he grinned.
"No," Charles shook his head. "You think that I exaggerate. I am telling you nothing but the truth, my friends. Nothing but the truth."
