The Monsoon (42 page)

This lipless reptilian mouth opened now, and the voice that issued from it was soft and melodious, its gentleness given the lie by the cruel tar-black eyes above.

“You must have good reason to disturb our deliberations,” said alAuf.

“Mighty lord, I am a piece of camel dung drying in the sunshine of your countenance.” Three times Yusuf touched the stone floor with his forehead.

“That at least is true,” al-Auf agreed.

“I have brought you a great treasure, Beloved of the Prophet.”

Yusuf raised his head long enough to indicate Dorian.

“A slave?” al-Auf asked.

“I have filled the markets of the world with slaves. You bring me one more?”

“A lad,” Yusuf confirmed.

“I am no pederast,” said al-Auf.

“I prefer the honey pot to the dung-heap.”

” lad,” jabbered Yusu fnervously.” But no ordinary lad, this.”

He pressed his forehead once more to the stones.

“A golden boy, but more precious than gold.”

“You speak in riddles and circles, thou son of a diseased forest hog.”

“May I have your permission to display this treasure to your benevolent gaze, O mighty one? Then you will see the truth of what I tell you.” Al-Auf nodded and stroked his dyed beard.

“Swiftly, then. Already I grow weary of your inanities.” Yusuf rose to his feet, but with his back bent almost double and his head bowed with deep respect. He took Dorian’s hand and pulled him forward.

He was sweating with terror.

“Do as I tell you now,” he whispered ferociously, trying to cover his own fear, “or I will have you gelded and give you to my crew as their whore.” He dragged Dorian to the centre of the room, and stood behind him.

“Great lord, Musallim bin-jangiri, I will show you something you have never seen before!” He paused to let the anticipation build UP and then, with a flourish, he drew back the hood that covered Dorian’s head.

“Behold! The Crown of the Prophet, foretold in the prophecy!” The four seated men stared at Dorian in silence.

By this time Dorian had become accustomed to this reaction from any Arab who looked upon him for the first time.

“You have dyed his head with henna,” al-Auf said at last, “as I have dyed my beard.” But his voice was uncertain and his expression awed.

“Not so, lord.” Yusuf was gaining confidence. He had contradicted al-Auf without a qualm, a trespass for which many men had died.

“It is God alone who has dyed his hair, just as he dyed the hair of Muhammad, his one true Prophet.”

“Praise be to God,” the others murmured automatically.

“Bring him here!” ordered al-Auf. Yusuf seized Dorian by the shoulder and almost yanked him off his feet in his eagerness to obey.

“Gently!” al-Auf cautioned him.

“Treat him with care!” Yusuf re oiced in this reprimand for it showed that al-Auf had not rejected outright the validity of his claims for the slave-boy. He pulled Dorian forward more carefully and forced him to his knees in front of the corsair.

“I am an Englishman.” Unfortunately his childish voice quavered, robbing it of its force.

“Keep your dirty bloodstained hands off me.”

“The heart of a black-maned lion in an unweaned cub.” Al-Auf nodded with approval.

“But what did he say?” No one could answer him, and al-Auf looked back at Dorian.

“Do you speak Arabic, little one?” An angry retort in the same language rose to Dorian’s lips, but he fought it back and spoke in English.

“You can go straight to hell, and give the devil my compliments when you get there.” This was one of his father’s expressions and he felt his courage return. He tried to rise from his knees but Yusuf held him down.

“He does not speak Arabic,” said al-Auf, and there was a drop of disappointment in his tone.

“That was part of the prophecy of the holy St. Taimtaim, may his name be blessed for ever.”

“He can be taught,” Yusuf suggested, with a hint of desperation.

“If you leave him with me I will have him quoting the whole of the Koran within a month.”

“It is not the same.” Al-Auf shook his head.

“The prophecy is that the child would come from the sea wearing the red mantle of the Prophet on his head, and that he would speak the language of the Prophet.” He stared at Dorian in silence. The unlikely proposition was dawning slowly upon Dorian that none of the Arabs had ever seen red hair in their lives.

He was beginning to understand that they looked upon it as some sacred religious stigmata: they spoke of their Prophet Muhammad having the same colouring. He had a vague recollection of All Wilson also mentioning this during one of his long lectures on the beliefs of Islam. Obviously al-Auf had dyed his own beard in imitation of the Prophet.

“Perhaps his hair is only cunningly dyed after all,” alAuf said gloomily.

“If that is so,” he scowled suddenly at Yusuf, “I will send both you and the child to the execution ground Dorian felt fresh terror choke his breathing at the thought. The memory of the tormented wretches on the tripods in the palm grove was sickeningly fresh in his mind.

Yusuf was down on his knees once more, blab bering his innocence, and trying to kiss al-Auf’s feet. The corsair kicked him away and raised his voice.

“Send for Ben Abram, the physician.” Within minutes a venerable Arab came hurrying to make his obeisance before al-Auf He had a silver-white beard and brows. His skin was eggshell pale and his eyes bright and intelligent. Even al-Auf spoke to him in a kindly tone.

“Examine this Frankish lad, old uncle. Is his hair a natural colour or has it been stained? Tell me if he is healthy and well formed.” The doctor’s hands on Dorian’s head were gentle but firm, and Dorian submitted to his touch with bad grace, holding his whole body stiff and uncompromising. Ben Abram rubbed the silky red locks between his fingers, making sharp little sucking sounds between his teeth.

Then he parted the hair and examined Dorian’s scalp closely, turning his head to catch the light from the high, barred windows. He sniffed at his head, trying to detect any odour of chemicals or herbs.

“I have never seen any like it in fifty years of medicine, not on man or woman, though I have heard of peoples in the north of Parthia who are crowned I thus, Ben Abram said at last.

“It is not dyed, then.” Al-Auf sat forward on his cushions, his interest reawakening.

“It is his natural colour,” Ben Abram confirmed.

“What of the rest of his body?”

“We shall see. Tell him to disrobe.”

“He does not speak the language of the Prophet. You must undress him yourself.” Even with Yusuf holding him down, they could not carry out the order. Dorian fought them like a cat being forced head first into a bucket of cold water. He clawed and kicked and bit, and in the end they had to call two guards from the door to restrain him.

At last he stood naked before them, a guard holding each wrist to prevent Dorian cupping his hands over himself.

“See the colour and texture of his skin,” Ben Abram marvelled.

“It is as beautiful as the finest white silk, the same as the hide of the Sultan’s stallion. It is without blemish. It complements the red of his hair exactly, and proves beyond the last doubt that what I say is correct. His colouring is natural.” Al-Auf nodded.

“What of the rest of his body?”

“Hold him!” Ben Abram told the guards. The bite on his wrist was still bleeding. He reached out warily and began to palpate Dorian’s small white genitals.

“His eggs have not yet descended into their pouch, but they are intact.” He took the childish white penis between his fingers.

“As you can see, he is not yet circumcised, but-” He drew back Dorian’s foreskin and the pink cherry-top popped out.

Dorian writhed in the grip of the guards and all his resolutions of silence were swept away by his shame and humiliation.

“You heathen pig!” he screamed in Arabic.

Take your filthy hands off my prick, or I swear to God I will kill you.” Al -Auf recoiled on his cushions, shock and religious awe suffusing his gaunt features.

“He speaks! It is the prophecy!”

“Allah is merciful! Praise His Glorious Name!” the men on either side of him chorused.

“It is the prophecy of St. Taimtaim.”

” Tom screamed from his perch high on the foremast, cupping both hands around his mouth against the wind.

“Sail-oh!”

“Where away?” Ned Tyler hailed back.

“Fine on the port bow. Two leagues distant.” Hal heard the shouts in his cabin, and jumped to his feet so vigorously that drops from the ink-pot splattered his chart. He wiped them away quickly and ran to the door.

He came on deck in his shirtsleeves.

“Masthead! What do you make of her?” he called up.

“A small craft, lateen-rigged.” Tom’s reply, floated down.

“Ah!

She has seen us. She’s going about.”

“Only a guilty man runs.”

Big Daniel had come on deck and stood by the helm.

“Or a prudent one!” said Ned Tyler.

“I bet a guinea to a pinch of dung that she’s coming from at-Auf’s island,” said Big Daniel.

Hal looked back at them.

“We’ll bespeak her, Mr. Tyler. Clap on all your canvas, and lay the ship on a course to intercept her, whoever she is.” Trying to claw her way back to windward through the wind-chopped seas, the small dhow was no match for the Seraph. Within half an hour she was hull up, and the big square-rigged ship was bearing down on her remorselessly.

“Give her a gun, Mr. Fisher,” Hal ordered, and Big Daniel hurried forward to the bow-chasers. Minutes later a single cannon shot thudded out. Hal watched through his telescope, and a few seconds after the shot he saw a brief fountain of white spray erupt from the surface half a cable’s length to one side of the fleeing dhow.

“I think even the infidel will understand that language,” he muttered, and was proved correct immediately as the dhow surrendered to the inevitable. She dropped her single sail and rounded up into the wind.

“Have an armed boarding-party ready to send into her,” Hal ordered Big Daniel, as they raced down on the tiny vessel.

Big Daniel took his party across in the longboat. He jumped up onto the dhow’s deck and disappeared into her hold. In the meantime his men secured the vessel, and herded her small crew forward under the threat of their cutlasses. Within ten minutes Big Daniel was back on deck, and hailed the Seraph.

“Captain, she has a full cargo of silk, all of the bales sTomped with the seal of John Company.”

“Pirate booty, by God.” Hal smiled for the first time in days, then called back, “Leave Mr. Wilson and five men to sail her. Bring the captain and all his crew back to this ship under guard.” Big Daniel brought the confused, frightened Arabs on board, while All Wilson put the dhow under sail and followed in the Seraph’s wake as she resumed her previous course close-hauled on the wind.

The Arab captain needed little persuasion to talk.

“I am Abdulla Wazari of Lamu. I am an honest trader,” he protested, part defiant and part servile.

“Where did you trade for your present cargo, Wazari?” Hal asked.

“I paid for it in honest coin and in good faith, as Allah is my witness,” said the captain, becoming evasive.

“No doubt it escaped your notice that the bales in your hold bear the chop of the English East India Company.”

“I am no thief. I did not steal them. I purchased them in fair trade.”

“Who sold them to you, then, O Wazari the Honest Trader? And where?” A man named Musallim bin-Jangiri sold them to me.

I had no way of knowing that they were the property of this English company.”

“Nothing except the evidence of your own eyes,” said Hal drily in English. Then he went on, in Arabic, “And where did you meet Jangiri?”

“On the island of Door Al Shaitan.”

“Where is this island? When did you sail from there?”

“It is fifty leagues distant, perhaps.” Wazari shrugged.

“We sailed with the dawn wind yesterday.” This estimate of the island’s position agreed with the co-ordinates from his father’s log book. Hal turned away and paced back and forth slowly while he pondered this fresh intelligence. It seemed apparent that al-Auf was conducting an open market on the island of Flor de la Mar, selling off his booty. Probably Arab traders from all the western seas were flocking to him to fill their holds with stolen goods at bargain prices. He came back to Wazari.

“You saw Jangiri himself, not one of his lieutenants?”

“I saw him. He was freshly returned from a terrible battle with an infidel ship. His own vessel lies in the bay, and it is pitifully damaged-” Wazari broke off as the possibility dawned upon him that he stood on the deck of M the very same infidel ship he was describing. His expression .

became shifty.

“Did jangiri tell you he had taken any infidel prisoners in this battle?” Hal asked. Wazari shook his head.

“He did not boast to you and you heard no talk that he had taken a Frankish child as slave? A boy of eleven or twelve summers?” Hal tried to make it seem a casual question, but saw a sudden flash of interest in Wazari’s expression, which the man masked quickly as a good trader should.

“I am an old man and my memory fails me,” said Wazari.

“Perhaps some act of hospitality or kindrlessmight restore my memory.”

“What kindness?” Hal asked.

“That you, my lord, allow me and my ship to go on our way without further let. That would be a kindness that would be written against your name in the golden book.” i “One kindness deserves another,” Hal said.

“Be kind to me, Wazari, then perhaps I shall be kind to you. Did you hear of a Frankish child when you were with jangiri, who is also known as al-Auf?”

The Arab tugged at his beard indecisively, then sighed.

“Ah, now, I do recall something of that nature.”

“What do you recall?” Hal demanded, and instinctively touched the hilt of the dagger on his belt.

It was a gesture not wasted on the Arab.

“I recall that two days ago jangiri offered to sell me a slave, a Frankish child, but one who spoke the language of the Prophet.”

“Why did you not buy from him?” Hal leaned so close to him that he could smell Wazari’s last meal of sun-dried fish on his breath.