The Gilgamesh Conspiracy (5 page)

‘Hi, Omar. What’s the weather forecast, then?’

‘Wait; it’s just coming up now.’

They watched the forecaster describe a grey but dry day in prospect; no rain or gales or biting cold to prevent a good turnout. Then the two presenters led with the story of the planned protest and then interviewed an uncomfortable looking apologist for the Blair government. The two young men grinned and thumped each other on the shoulder in enthusiasm. ‘It’s going to be a good day,’ Rashid declared. ‘Come on; the coach is due to leave in fifty minutes.’

  Forty five minutes later they were standing in an untidy queue of jostling undergraduates who chattered excitedly about the day in prospect. A group of older people came walking up to join them. Rashid recognised them as University teaching staff and post grads including his English literature tutor. ‘Hey, Doctor Shaw! Are you coming with us?’ Rashid asked.

‘Hello Rashid. Yes we are; the senior common room coach is full so we thought we might cadge a lift with you lot, if you’ll have us.’

‘You are most welcome,’ said Rashid in Arabic. He had taught his tutor several phrases in the course of his association with him.

‘Thank you very much,’ Dr Shaw returned in the same language.

‘That woman in the red coat is even more welcome,’ said Omar in Arabic, giving Rashid a nudge. He looked at the front of the group where a tall, striking woman with long dark hair, large dark brown eyes and strong but attractive features was talking to another man who he recognised as one of the language lecturers.

‘Absolutely lovely,’ said Rashid. The woman broke off her conversation, caught his eye and stared at him for a moment.

‘So is it me or my red coat that you find lovely?’ she asked him in fluent Arabic. Rashid stared at her in amazement, feeling a glow spread over his face which he hoped would not show on his dark skin. The chances of a random encounter with an English woman who spoke his language was so remote that he was at a loss.

‘So you speak Arabic!’ he said, somewhat idiotically.

‘Yes I do,’ she raised her eyebrows and gave him a challenging smile. ‘And I will take it as a compliment either way.’

Rashid was wondering what he could say by way of an apology, but just then a voice called out encouraging everyone to climb on to the bus. He looked back at the woman in the red coat and he saw her chatting away to the man stood beside her. He sat down next to Omar and a moment later she walked past him down the aisle. They discussed the woman and her unexpected ability to speak Arabic.

‘Maybe she’s a post-graduate languages student who’s already taken a degree course in Arabic,’ said Omar. ‘Why don’t you go and ask her?’ he suggested with a grin.

‘No way,’ Rashid answered. ‘I’ve already embarrassed myself enough for one day.’ He glanced round quickly down the aisle and saw a red clothed shoulder a few rows behind. ‘She did seem to be very fluent, though. More than you would expect from academic study. Anyway, she’s several years older than me. I think she must have been at least twenty-five, maybe more.’

‘And how old was Lorraine?’ Omar asked.

‘Ok, she told me she was twenty. She thought I was some rich guy from the Gulf. It’s hard to tell with English women; you know… how old they are.’

They both thought back over the last year they had lived in England, and their struggle to bridge the cultural chasm. It had been less difficult for Omar accustomed to the more cosmopolitan society of Cairo, whereas for many years Baghdad had been more or less cut off from the rest of the world.

At the Thames Embankment they joined the throng that jostled towards Piccadilly Circus and thence to Hyde Park. The turn-out was vast, and progress was slow. They joined a group of fellow Arabs who were chanting in Arabic and it felt good to let rip with the colourful language of the street and the souk against Blair and Bush. As they pranced about Rashid caught sight of the woman in the red coat and felt strangely embarrassed at his outburst of youthful exuberance. She caught his eye and gave a little wave, as if to say that she supported the message in their chanting. After a while he and Omar decided that this group was going too slowly; they hurried towards Hyde Park to hear the speeches.

The mood in the park was intense, but good natured. Rashid recognised the speaker as an MP, George Galloway, who had visited Iraq. Perhaps his father had been his interpreter for the visit and Rashid imagined he would have enjoyed the challenge of the MP’s strongly accented English. Omar gave him a nudge.

‘I’m going to meet my cousin now. Are you sure you’re not going to stay the night in London as well?’

‘No thanks,’ Rashid replied, ‘I’m going to get home to finish that essay.’ He did not really like Omar’s cousin, a lively young woman who could have graced an ancient Egyptian wall painting. She was a year older than he was and slightly condescending about his lack of European social finesse. ‘I’ll see you when you get back tomorrow evening. Give her my regards, though.’

They shook hands and Rashid watched Omar push his way back through the crowd. Off to one side he glimpsed the woman in the red coat again; she seemed to be listening intently to the speech, but then he realised that she was talking into her mobile phone. He turned back towards the stage. Half a minute later he was surprised to find her standing next to him.

‘Hello, me again,’ she said with a smile. He was somewhat tongue tied and before he could think of an appropriate greeting she continued. ‘Can you remember what time our coach is due to leave? I’m a bit worried I’m going to miss it.’

Rashid glanced down at his watch the way people do whenever a question of time arises. ‘I think it’s at four thirty,’ he said.

‘Oh I thought maybe it was four o’clock. I couldn’t remember what Simon said.’

‘Is that the guy you were talking to?’ Rashid asked, looking around for the missing lecturer.

‘Yes. He’s gone off to visit his mum in Sutton. He’s not coming back until tomorrow. Where’s your friend?’

‘Oh, Omar’s gone to stay with his cousin tonight. He’s not coming back on the coach either.’

The woman nodded and then looked at her watch. ‘I’m going to head off now, I think; it could take a while to get back to where it’s parked. There must be a million people here at least. Bye now.’ She gave him a warm smile and turned away. Rashid hesitated for two seconds, and then took a couple of quick paces to catch up with her.

‘Look; do you mind if I go with you? I think you’re right about the time and I’m not sure of the way.’

‘Yes, glad to have you along. Oh, my names Sandra, by the way. I’m doing a post-grad in Middle Eastern studies.’

‘My name’s Rashid; I’m a second year English student.’

‘I am pleased to meet you, Rashid,’ she said to him in Arabic, and he grinned happily at her, but he wished that she was not five or six centimetres taller than him as he felt somewhat at a disadvantage. 

During the walk back to the coach they exchanged comments about how well the day had turned out, and how marvellous it was to see such a huge crowd. ‘Biggest ever, I bet,’ Sandra remarked, and Rashid said she must be right, but having to push and shove their way back through the good-natured crowd prevented him from having any opportunities to continue a real conversation.

They were nearly the last to board the coach and Rashid was disappointed to see that there was no pair of seats unoccupied. He was about to resign himself to sitting next to another student he vaguely recollected  seeing around the campus but Sandra leant past him and spoke authoritatively to the young man.

‘Excuse me would you mind sitting next to the girl in front as I would like to talk to my friend on the way home?’ The student looked up at the smiling woman and with a self-conscious grin he got out of his seat.

‘Thank you so much,’ Sandra said and sat down in the window seat. She pulled one arm out of a coat sleeve and then turned to Rashid ‘Could you give me a hand to take this off? I’m a bit warm. She leant forward and he enjoyed the slight intimacy as he ran his hand under her long hair to pull the coat down from her shoulders and then he tugged it out from underneath her and finally off her outstretched arm.

‘Could you just fling it up on the rack please,’ she said.

When the coach was underway they fell in to discussing the possibilities of averting the war through the wave of public opinion that was sweeping through Europe, and Sandra gave her view that although the regime in Iraq was a disgrace in so many ways, notable for its financial mismanagement, corruption, general denial of human rights, with judicial murder and arbitrary arrest commonplace, an invasion would lead to far greater problems.

Rashid was thankful that he had told her he was from Amman so he was not drawn into defending the regime that his father worked for and (he admitted to himself) was paying for his university education.  He wanted to ask Sandra how she had learned to speak Arabic so well, and generally move the conversation away from the political to the personal, but she suddenly yawned and announced ‘Excuse me!’ then ‘How long do you think before we’re back?’

Rashid glanced at his watch. ‘Oh about forty five minutes from here, I think,’ he said.

‘Ok, I’m going to have a little sleep; wake me up when we arrive,’ she declared.

‘Sleep well. May God watch over you,’ he murmured in Arabic.

‘And over you too, Rashid,’ she replied. Then she folded her arms, closed her eyes and settled back in the corner; her breathing soon settled into an even rhythm.

Rashid spent the journey thinking about the situation in Baghdad and wondering if his parents would be safe. He had offered to go home to his family back in January, but his father had insisted that he remained in England. If only the strength of feeling demonstrated by ordinary people in Europe would influence their political leaders, there would be no invasion and his parents would be safe.

After a while he drifted off to sleep himself. The coach stopped and he was woken by the sudden activity of the passengers climbing out of their seats, dragging their belongings out of the overhead racks and calling out to their friends. He turned round and watched Sandra yawning and stretching within the confines of her seat. He stood up and retrieved her red coat from the rack and passed it over to her and they waited their turn to shuffle off the coach.

‘It was nice to meet you Rashid,’ said Sandra. ‘I expect I’ll see you around sometime. Where do you live? I’m in a flat in Sheridan Street.’

‘You’re just round the corner from me. I share a flat with Omar in Dinsmore Road.’

‘Well there’s our bus over there.’

They rode the bus to the small parade of shops opposite Rashid’s flat. During the journey he had felt hungry and wondered if he could suggest that they get something to eat together. He was considering how to phrase his question when she said ‘I’m really hungry. Do you fancy getting something to eat at that  curry house over there?’

During the meal Rashid decided he would try and make the conversation more personal. ‘How come you speak such good Arabic?’ he asked.

‘Oh I’ve studied it at A level and at University, but also my Dad used to be in the Embassy in Damascus and in Abu Dhabi, and I picked up a lot while I was there. Where did you learn such good English?’

‘Actually my father is a translator; he’s completely fluent and he always encouraged us to speak it; me and my younger sister.’

‘Oh yes? Where does he work now?’

‘Well we’re originally from Jordan, but my father now works for the civil service in Baghdad,’ he admitted.

‘In Iraq! No wonder you wanted to be at the protest today. Is your family safe, do you think?’

‘I don’t know,’ Rashid shrugged. ‘He works for the government, but he’s not part of it,’ he added hastily. ‘I don’t know if he would be allowed to leave Baghdad. I was going to go back a few weeks ago, but he told me to stay here.’ He fell silent, and Sandra changed the subject.

‘So have you managed to travel around much in the time you‘ve been over in the UK?’ she asked. Rashid smiled and they talked about places they had been and people they had met for the rest of the meal.

They left the restaurant and walked across the road. Coming to the other side Sandra stumbled over the kerb and fell on to the pavement. She began to get up and as Rashid bent down to help her she gave a yelp of pain and clutched her ankle. ‘Oh shit! I’ve sprained it or something.’ With Rashid’s assistance she struggled to her feet, but stood heavily on one leg and said ‘Ow, ow, ow!’ as she tried to put some weight on her right foot. Rashid looked around. His own flat was just twenty metres away.

‘Look, come back to my place. You can rest it for a while. Maybe we can bandage it up. Perhaps we should call a taxi and get you to the casualty department at the hospital.’

She thought for a moment. ‘Is your place on the ground floor?’

‘No, first floor,’ he said.

‘Oh well. If you can help me up the stairs I’ll see if the pain gets worse or passes off after a while.’ She raised an arm. ‘Would you give me a hand?’ He stood next to her and put an arm around her waist, trying not to appear too eager to make the intimate contact. She put her arm across his shoulders and he led her through the door and up the stairs to the flat he shared with Omar, feeling relieved that they had cleaned and tidied the place up the previous afternoon.