Scales of Gold - Dorothy Dunnett [211]
He said, ‘I’ve only just come.’
‘To the Fountain of Youth.’
‘Just another irrigation job,’ Nicholas said. He was slightly taken aback to discover quite how much he had had to drink. He said, ‘I’m not worried. Not about that. Let’s go and find some sheep’s eyes.’
‘Then about what?’ she said. They were standing in one of the corridors and all the other revellers had passed them by.
It seemed likely she would find out. He said, ‘Umar and I disagreed. I shall find him, and all will be well.’
‘Will it?’ she said. ‘I don’t know all that many people who can tackle Umar sober and alter his mind. What about? Ethiopia?’
‘No,’ he said. He saw Zuhra walking towards them with her frizzled hair grooved and pleated, and gold earrings the size of thick golden buckets suspended on either side of her headband. He deduced that Zuhra’s family had dressed her for today: she wore a long tunic made of silks and all the rest of her bracelets, which presumably represented her dowry. In spite of it all, she looked lovely. He felt embarrassment for Umar, and then resentment, and then the pain he had felt before.
Umar was not with his future wife, or at least not the Umar who had been Loppe. Walking beside Zuhra was the youth of the same name, the Timbuktu-Koy’s son. He was pestering her. At the same moment, Zuhra saw Nicholas. Her face stiffened.
It occurred to Nicholas that it was no pleasure, being extremely rich. He took a single, cowardly step to one side. Gelis said, ‘That’s Muhammed ben Idir’s son. Damn him, look what he’s doing!’ She looked round. ‘You’re not going to let him?’
Nicholas, now four paces away, said, ‘He’ll stop now.’ Behind him, the corridor led to a garden pavilion and freedom.
Umar ben Muhammed ben Idir, who had been caressing the neck of the future wife of his namesake, looked up and grinned. His face, big-nosed and teak-coloured, was more Tuareg than Negroid in character, and he had the Tuareg’s bad teeth. He called, in Arabic, ‘Is she not a pretty monkey? Will her big, stupid husband know what to do with her, after ten years with white women who cannot tell whether it is a little dog or a man in their bed? Do you not think we should teach her some secrets?’
‘You know Arabic,’ Nicholas said sadly to Gelis. He stopped retreating and prepared to advance. Before he could move, Zuhra tore herself from her tormentor’s grasp and, tramping up, stood before Nicholas. Her earrings clanked and jangled, and she looked furious. Behind her, the Koy’s son looked astonished. Nicholas said, ‘You’ll give yourself a headache.’ Gelis suddenly giggled.
Zuhra said, ‘You will not take him.’
‘Holy Mary!’ said Nicholas.
‘Wrong culture,’ said Gelis.
‘Do you have peace? Nothing but peace,’ said Nicholas rapidly. He began to walk backwards and bumped into a pillar. He was in a chamber full of pillars, with a white vaulted ceiling made of honeycombed stucco, and a basin in the middle which he had never managed to mend. It led to a court with a pool. He said, ‘Gelis, take her away.’
‘Why?’ said Gelis.
‘Indeed, why?’ said the other Umar. ‘This is my father’s house.’
‘And in it,’ Nicholas said, ‘are …’ He backed down the steps to the courtyard. ‘Many fountains.’
‘You will not take him away,’ said Zuhra again, following. ‘Who are you to erase Umar’s name from the tablet of life? To make his sons fatherless, and myself a young, grieving widow with no shares in your Bank? Take some other man to save your life this time.’
‘You aren’t even married to him yet,’ Nicholas said. He spoke crossly, and hurriedly. The Koy’s Umar had also followed and was standing beside him, one arm round Zuhra’s shoulders. She shook it off, and the Koy’s son slapped her, smiling.
Gelis said, ‘Stop that! Why don’t you stop him?’
Nicholas said, ‘Zuhra, come here. See here, you. Hearken, O Lord. Forgive us if we offend, but the lady’s well-being has been confided in me by her future husband, to whom we now propose to – Gelis. Don’t.’
She put down the foot she had raised. She said in Flemish, ‘You didn’t mind when I did it to David de Salmeton.