The Sheltering Sky - Bowles, Paul [83]
“Milk is completely unnecessary for your husband in any case, madame,” he said dryly. “The soup I have ordered is quite sufficient, and more digestible. I shall have Zina bring a bowl immediately.” He went out; the sand-laden wind still roared.
Kit spent the day reading and seeing to it that Port was dosed and fed regularly. He was utterly disinclined to speak; perhaps he did not have the strength. While she was reading, sometimes she forgot the room, the situation, for minutes at a time, and on each occasion when she raised her head and remembered again, it was like being struck in the face. Once she almost laughed, it seemed so ridiculously unlikely. “Sba,” she said, prolonging the vowel so that it sounded like the bleat of a sheep.
Toward late afternoon she tired of her book and stretched out on her bed, carefully, so as not to disturb Port. As she turned toward him, she realized with a disagreeable shock that his eyes were open, looking at her across the few inches of bedding. The sensation was so violently unpleasant that she sprang up, and staring back at him, said in a tone of forced solicitude: “How do you feel?” He frowned a little, but did not reply. Falteringly she pursued. “Do you think the pills help? At least they seem to bring the fever down a bit.” And now, surprisingly enough, he answered, in a soft but clear voice. “I’m very sick,” he said slowly. “I don’t know whether I’ll come back.”
“Back?” she said stupidly. Then she patted his hot forehead, feeling disgusted with herself even as she uttered the words: “You’ll be all right.”
All at once she decided she must get out of the room for a while before dark-even if just for a few minutes. A change of air. She waited until he had closed his eyes. Then without looking at him again for fear she would see them open once more, she got up quickly and stepped out into the wind. It seemed to have shifted a little, and there was less sand in the air. Even so, she felt the sting of the grains on her cheeks. Briskly she walked out beneath the high mud portal, not looking at the guards, not stopping when she reached the road, but continuing downward until she came to the street that led to the market place. Down there the wind was less noticeable. Apart from an inert figure lying here and there entirely swathed in its burnous, the way was empty. As she moved along through the soft sand of the street, the remote sun fell rapidly behind the flat hammada ahead, and the walls and arches took on their twilight rose hue. She was a little ashamed of herself for having given in to her nervous impatience to be out of the room, but she banished the sentiment by arguing with herself that nurses, like everyone else, must rest occasionally.
She came to the market, a vast, square, open space enclosed on all four sides by whitewashed arcades whose innumerable arches made a monotonous pattern whichever way she turned her head. A few camels lay grumbling in the center, a few palm-branch fires flared, but the merchants and their wares were gone. Then she heard the muezzins calling in three distinct parts of the town, and saw those men who were left begin their evening prayer. Crossing the market, she wandered into a side street with its earthen buildings all orange in the momentary glow. The little shop doors were closed-all but one, in front of which she paused an instant, peering in vaguely. A man wearing a beret crouched inside over a small fire built in the middle of the floor, holding his hands fanwise almost in the flames. He glanced up and saw her, then rising, he came to the door. “Entrez, madame,” he said, making a wide gesture. For lack of anything else to do, she obeyed. It was a tiny shop; in the dimness she could see a few bolts of white cloth lying on the shelves. He fitted a carbide lamp together, touched a match to the spout, and watched the sharp flame spring up. “Daoud Zozeph,” he said, holding forth his hand. She was faintly surprised: for some reason she had thought he was French. Certainly he was not