Strangers (16 page)

Roisin ran over and over her encounter with Najia and Yasmin in her mind as she waited for Joe to come home. She went into the kitchen and pulled stuff out of the fridge. It was a motley assortment. She decided to make soup–they could have soup and salad. And she could make some bread.

She wondered how Yasmin was. She had no way of finding out–she didn’t have home addresses or telephone numbers for any of her students. Yasmin had looked tense and weary from the start. It probably wasn’t good for a woman in late pregnancy to get stressed. Maybe that was what had caused her sudden illness.

Hard as she tried to focus on what she was doing as she chopped onions and thawed out some chicken stock she’d made a few weeks ago, her mind wouldn’t stay away from the events of the afternoon. They’d been talking about this woman Yasmin wanted to find, this maid called Jesal, a migrant worker alone and apparently guilty of
theft in a country where such crimes were brutally punished.

And then…just before she became ill, Yasmin had glanced round the mall, looking out for Bakul’s return. And something had made her drop her cup in shock, causing the colour to drain from her face. She hadn’t seen Bakul–Najia had had to use her phone to summon the maid. She’d seen something else that had upset her. Roisin tried to picture the mall again, but she’d had her back to whatever it was Yasmin had been looking at. And after that, her attention had been focused on the two women and the importance of getting Yasmin home.

To stop her mind from fruitlessly going over and over the incident, she started thinking about the problem Yasmin had set her. She hadn’t asked, but the question that was bothering her was,
why?
Why did Yasmin want to trace Jesal Rajkhumar?

Jesal had been in trouble–that much was clear from Yasmin’s reluctant admission. Yasmin had tried to help her, and then Jesal had vanished…

A young woman escapes from her Saudi employers, claiming they are abusing her. She has stolen from them, and applies to another Saudi woman for help. Why Yasmin? Why would a runaway woman in trouble turn to Yasmin?

The ‘cultural salons’. Yasmin had talked about the cultural salons that she and her friends had. Roisin had asked Damien O’Neill about the
women’s movement in Saudi Arabia. It looked as though she might have found it. If so, what Yasmin and Najia were doing was dangerous. There was a government department whose Arabic name translated as ‘the rejecting evil and evoking right association’. She could remember joking about it with Joe, but to women like Yasmin and Najia it was deadly serious. ‘Shit.’ Roisin didn’t realize she’d spoken aloud until her own voice broke the silence. If she was right, Yasmin’s request meant trouble.

She tipped the chopped vegetables into the stock and began frying chicken. In her bag, she had the contact number for Damien O’Neill–he’d given it to her and Joe on that first day. She was certain that he had the means to get her the information she needed–either where Jesal was, or how she could find out–but he’d want to know why she was asking. She tried to think of a pretext that wouldn’t involve any mention of Yasmin or Najia.

She put a tight lid on the pan and left the soup to cook over a low flame. On impulse, she picked up the phone and keyed in O’Neill’s number. There was no point in being evasive with him, she decided. She would simply put the question with no explanation. Either he would tell her where to look, or he would refuse to help.

The phone rang seven times, then his voice came on the line:
l can’t take your call at the moment. If you need to contact me urgently, call my mobile. Otherwise, leave a message and I’ll get back to you
.

She hung up without leaving a message–this was something for a direct conversation.

Of course, there was Amy. Amy probably knew a lot more about the women’s movement–she worked with women, and she had hinted, briefly, that she had given some assistance to women who were pregnant and single. Amy might be able to help. Roisin had been waiting for Amy to call her since that day she had visited, but there had been nothing. Maybe she felt awkward about pushing the connection. It was time for Roisin to take the initiative.

She tried the number Amy had given her, but once again all she got was the answering service. This time, she left a message. ‘It’s Roisin. How are you? Let’s meet sometime soon.’

Then there was nothing else she could do.

Roisin hadn’t been looking forward to her next session at the university, but she had too many things to think about now to let it worry her. Now that the end was in sight, Joe was relaxed and happy. He was home by four most days and they spent their spare time together, sometimes walking in the cool of the evening, sometimes sitting in the garden they’d barely used in the two months they’d been here. It didn’t matter. They were just enjoying themselves. Roisin stopped doing the extra days at the university and spent her free time catching up with neglected correspondence. She wrote to old George back in London–guiltily aware that this was only the second letter she’d sent. And she started sorting their things out for the time they could leave. Once they left Saudi, they planned to take a month off so they could go back to the UK before they travelled to Melbourne.

‘It’s going the long way round,’ Joe pointed out when she suggested it.

‘I know, but I want to show you Newcastle. And Bamburgh, and Seahouses. And Druridge Sands.’

‘OK, OK.’ He was laughing at her.

‘You wait. It’ll surprise you.’

Coming back to the campus was like stepping back into a different world. She felt detached from it all, as though their new life in Melbourne had already begun. She knew it was far too soon to start wondering if she might be pregnant, but the prospect made her smile at people she didn’t know as she walked along the corridors of the women’s campus.

She’d expected to find instructions about the new regime in her pigeonhole when she went into the office, but nothing seemed to have changed. The seminar room was set up and the students were waiting for her. They worked hard and cheerfully, their voices rising in a buzz as they tried out the English Roisin had taught them. Even Haifa was as friendly as she seemed capable of being. The only sour note was the absence of Najia. No one remarked on the empty place. There was no sign of Yasmin either, but it was one of the days she was chauffeured to the villages outside Riyadh to teach English. Still, Roisin felt anxious, remembering that Yasmin had been unwell at the mall. None of the students seemed to know anything.

She didn’t see Souad until the end of the morning when she was packing her bag to leave. The professor came into the seminar room and
greeted her, sounding friendly enough. She looked at the notes on the whiteboard, and at the handouts Roisin had been working with. ‘This is interesting,’ she said. ‘May I have a copy?’

‘Of course. I put everything I use into the resource bank.’

‘I know. This is all most helpful to us. I have come to tell you that I have booked the lecture theatre for you from next week. You will be ready by then?’

‘Whenever you want me to start.’ Roisin gave a mental shrug. Today had just been a brief hope of a reprieve. It didn’t matter now anyway.

‘We will record your lectures for other use, so please dress appropriately.’ She spoke as if Roisin was in the habit of teaching in crop-tops and shorts.

‘Will what I’m wearing today be suitable?’

‘Perfectly acceptable,’ the professor said. ‘As long as you wear your scarf. You will lecture to all the students who are studying English,’ she went on. ‘We have beginners and intermediate as well as advanced. So you will do three lectures.’

Suddenly it was clear to Roisin what Souad had in mind. Roisin would lecture, they would film, and then Souad would have a teaching resource she could use for as long as she wanted without having to worry about employing another troublesome foreigner. Roisin was being asked to cooperate in her own redundancy. In addition, the programme amounted to six times the work she’d
been contracted for. ‘I’ll have to concentrate on the intermediate level this month. As you know, that’s what I came here to teach.’

Souad’s eyebrows lifted. ‘But you have done the other levels. I don’t see the problem.’

‘Ah, but not as lectures. If you wanted me to do seminars and classes, then I could do it at once. Lectures will need some time to prepare.’

‘I believed, when we employed you, that you were prepared at all levels,’ Souad said coldly.

‘I am. For seminars. As we agreed.’ Roisin smiled helpfully. It was a small victory, but she was enjoying it. She’d still be busy most of next weekend as it was. Except the party. She was damned if she was going to miss the party because of Souad al-Munajjed. ‘But I’ll be ready to do the intermediate work next week.’ She didn’t want to get tangled in an argument so she said quickly, ‘I haven’t seen Yasmin today.’

‘Yasmin has had her baby–a son.’

Roisin forgot about the lectures. Yasmin’s illness at the mall must have been the onset of labour. ‘A little boy? That’s wonderful. Is Yasmin all right? And the baby?’

‘Yasmin is well, but I believe the child is having some problems.’

‘Is it serious?’

‘The child was born healthy, but he seems to have become ill now. He was due to go home, but they are keeping him in the hospital. I have no more information. Yasmin should not have worked
as long as she did. She was warned it could be dangerous.’

That was ridiculous. Yasmin was young and fit. ‘Will you let me know how they both are? When you hear?’

‘Yasmin is no longer my responsibility,’ the professor said. ‘It is a matter for her family.’

‘Is she in the hospital?’

‘Yasmin is home. The child is not.’

‘But if you have any news, let me know. I’d like to see her. And the baby.’ Before she left the mall, she’d bought a baby shawl, a drift of white cashmere, ridiculously expensive, that was now wrapped in tissue at the bottom of her wardrobe.

‘It is a matter for the family.’ Souad went to the door. ‘Lecture. Next week,’ she said.

Roisin watched her leave and turned back to her books. Souad wasn’t going to tell her anything. It didn’t matter. The students would let her know, or she could e-mail Najia.

She turned her mind to the problem of lectures.

‘Damien. It’s Amy.’

‘Amy,’ he said, keeping his voice level.

‘How are you?’ Her voice sounded thin and far away.

‘I’m fine. How are you?’

‘Fine. I just wanted to tell you, I’m leaving tonight.’

‘Leaving?’ He had no idea she’d been planning to leave. ‘For good?’

‘I’m not sure yet. I think so.’

‘Why? You never told me.’ But there was no reason why she should. He had no right to know about her plans, not any more.

‘I did,’ she said. ‘More or less. I told you I was getting my life sorted out.’

Then that was it. ‘I hope everything works out for you.’

‘Thank you.’ There was silence.

He couldn’t leave it there. ‘Amy, don’t you think you should have told me about Nazarian? Didn’t you owe me…didn’t we owe each other that much honesty?’

She was quiet for so long that he thought she must have put the phone down, then she said, ‘I was as honest as I could be. As honest as you’ve always been with me.’

As he’d always
…‘Amy, I have never lied to you.’

‘No. You didn’t need to. You never told me anything.’

The truth of what she was saying silenced his objections. She was right. The habit of secrecy had always been strong in him. ‘I thought that what we had was enough.’

He heard her sigh. ‘That’s what I thought, too. But it wasn’t.’

‘And now…?’

‘And now I’m going. I’m leaving tonight. I want to be with my sister when she has her baby. I’ve taken a month’s leave, so there’s no need for me to work out my notice.’

They’d already said goodbye in all the ways that mattered, but…‘What time’s your plane? I’ll come to the airport to see you off.’

The brittle edge of her voice broke. ‘Will you? I’d…I’d like that.’

They’d say their final goodbyes in the chaos of the departures hall of Riyadh International Airport. Maybe it was the best place. In the meantime, there was work.

He had another meeting at the hospital. The management there seemed to think he could work miracles. He’d already told them: put up the incentives, or people won’t come. He pulled into the car park and was picking up his laptop from the back seat when he saw Majid. He was by his car, the key in his hand, staring into space. He looked as though he had been there for a while.

Damien slammed his car door shut and went across. He wanted to congratulate Majid on his recent fatherhood, but his greeting died in his throat when he saw Majid’s face. His jaw was clenched and tears were trickling down his cheeks.

‘Majid,’ he said.

Majid jumped and looked round as though he had forgotten where he was. Then he saw Damien. Damien put his arm round the other man’s shoulder, and held him in a quick embrace. ‘What’s wrong?’ he said, then, in Arabic, ‘You have troubles, my friend?’

‘I’m sorry. It’s not your trouble,’ Majid said.

‘My friend’s troubles are my troubles.’ The
Arabic rituals of politeness were sincere and helped over difficult moments. Damien waited. It had to be Yasmin or the baby.

Majid stood in silence, trying to get his emotions under control, then he said, ‘Yasmin’s–
our
baby, he was born too soon. He is…’ His hands cupped themselves as if he was holding something fragile. ‘Perfect. Perfect.’ His gaze met Damien’s in baffled confusion. ‘But now they are saying…they do some blood tests–just routine, and then everything changes. This is wrong, that is wrong, nothing is well. So why didn’t they find it at once? Why did they wait? They moved him this morning to the ITU. They say, “This we will do, that we will do”…I am a policeman. I know when they are lying. They have done something wrong.’ His face twisted in grief. ‘I am afraid my son will die.’

Damien felt his throat tighten. ‘Majid,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’ He didn’t try and hide his own emotion. That wasn’t the way here.

Majid’s expression was bleak. ‘Yasmin…all these weeks she has been working.’ He shook his head wearily. ‘My mother says that our baby is ill because Yasmin didn’t take enough care. She wouldn’t go to the clinic. She went to work, she went to the mall, she saw her friends. My mother says it is Yasmin’s fault.’

Damien could remember the night he had seen the beautiful young face looking out of the window. ‘Majid, sometimes these things just happen. Sometimes it’s no one’s fault.’

‘A good wife and a good mother will always put her husband and her children first. Yasmin did not do this.’

Damien had seen this in Saudi families before–the mother held sway over her daughter-in-law, and the husband often listened to his mother before he listened to his wife. If the two were antagonistic, the daughter-in-law’s life could be hard. ‘Your son’s still here,’ he said. ‘He’s alive, he’s…perfect. You said he was perfect. Majid, he might be all right.’

Majid’s mouth tightened and he shook his head. ‘There is something wrong,’ he said. ‘I know it.’