The Last Camel Died at Noon - Elizabeth Peters [32]
And the variety of languages! I understood Greek and Arabic, and had learned a little Nubian, but most of the babble was in dialects I could not identify, much less understand.
Emerson finally finished exchanging tall stories with his friend and turned to me. “Yussuf says he can find some workers for us. We had better go on and… Ramses! Where the devil has he got to? Peabody, you were supposed to keep an eye on him.”
I could have pointed out that it was impossible to keep track of Ramses by keeping one eye on him; the task required one’s total attention and a firm hand on the collar. Before I could do so, Yussuf said in Arabic, “The young effendi went that way.”
Muttering, Emerson plunged off in the direction Yussuf had indicated, and I followed. We soon found the miscreant; he was squatting in front of one of the booths, engaged in animated conversation with a man wrapped in a voluminous robe or mantle, a fold of which had been drawn over his head to protect it from the sun.
Emerson bellowed, “Ramses!” whereupon Ramses jumped up and turned to face us. In his hand he held a short wooden skewer upon which were impaled chunks of meat whose origin I could not (and did not care to) determine. He waved it at me, swallowed the mouthful he had been chewing, and began, “Mama and Papa, I have just found a most interesting—”
“So I see,” said Emerson. “Essalâmu ‘aleikum, friend.”
The man had also risen, with a slow dignity that verged on arrogance. Instead of touching brow, breast, and lips in the traditional Arabic greeting, he inclined his head slightly and lifted his hands in a curious gesture. “Greetings, Emerson Effendi. And to the lady of your house, good health and life.”
“You speak English,” I exclaimed.
“A few words, lady.” He shrugged out of the mantle, which was nothing more than a long strip of cloth, and laid the folds across his shoulders like a shawl. Under it he wore only a pair of loose, knee-length trousers, which displayed to excellent advantage his lean, athletic form and sinewy limbs. On his feet were red leather sandals with long, upward-curving toes. Such sandals were a mark of distinction among the Nubians, most of whom went barefoot. But this man was no ordinary Nubian, though his skin was a dark reddish-brown. His chiseled, regular features bore a certain resemblance to those of the Baggara, but his black hair was cut close to his head.
“He speaks a most interesting dialect, which is unfamiliar to me,” Ramses said. “I could not resist asking him where—”
“We will discuss your inability to resist interesting dialects later, Ramses,” I said. “And throw away that—”
It was too late. The skewer was bare.
The tall man repeated his gesture. “I go now. Farewell.” Inclining his head, he addressed a brief speech to Ramses in a language that was unfamiliar to me. Ramses, however, had the audacity to nod, as if he had understood it.
“What did he say?” I demanded, taking hold of Ramses. “Don’t tell me you learned enough of the language in five minutes to—”
“You are about to contradict yourself, Amelia,” said Emerson, watching with furrowed brow the dignified yet brisk retreat of Ramses’s new acquaintance. “If he has not learned enough of the language to understand what was said, he can