Assassination in Al Qahira

by James Boschert

  They went under, and the back surge brought the grating closer to where Talon was trying to keep afloat. Somehow Montague had managed to hang on. Talon made a desperate lunge to reach his only means of salvation. He grasped wood and hung on grimly. At first Montague was not aware that he was there until Talon shouted for help. Then the burly man turned and threw a hand out to grab Talon by the shoulder. Montague heaved Talon onto the wooden raft where he lay gasping, trying to find his breath. Then he looked around.

  “Montague, where is Max? Max! Jeffrey!” he called. “Where are you? I am here! I am here! Can you hear me? Dear God, please save them, they should not die like this!” he cried.

  Montague added to the shouts, but the shrieking wind tore their words away. In the distance they heard a faint call came back to them, but even with the help of a gray light of dawn, Talon could see nothing, and only when the waves lifted his raft up high could he catch a glimpse of the stricken ship. What he could see through the lashing rain and spray was that she was now down at the aft section, which had almost disappeared, leaving only the remains of the bow and the shattered mast pointing into the sky.

  He could see nothing of the crew and passengers. He guessed that some of the remaining survivors might be clinging to the mast and bows but they would be few, and their time nearly done. At one time he thought he saw a person struggling in the water a hundred yards away, but there was no way he could affect the direction the raft was drifting. In his despair he called on God many times to be merciful and spare others. But although the storm was clearly abating and the rain had eased, the waves were still high, with windblown spray sweeping across them.

  He was soaked; his teeth began to chatter and his body shook with cold. Then a hand came out of the water as though a body was beckoning him to the depths. He started back in fright, but he recognized the sleeve and snatched at it and hung on. Montague had seen as well, and he reached out and seized the extended arm in a vise-like grip.

  Max’s head surfaced and he blew a huge spray of water out of his mouth, gasping for air with his mouth wide open. Talon and Montague continued to pull on Max’s arm, and then Max recovered enough to seize hold of the grating edge and support himself long enough to take more breaths. He looked up at them and bared his teeth in a grimace; then, with their help, he scrambled onto the grating where he lay flat, pressed against Talon.

  “Dear Lord, have mercy on us,” he groaned as he looked about him.

  “The ship is finished. I do not see Jeffrey anywhere or anyone else. God be kind to their souls!” Talon shouted, pointing with his chin at the dark silhouette of the doomed ship. There was a distant cry, and then the wind and the roar of the seas prevented them from hearing anything more. The ship slipped under the waves. Talon wept for Jabbar as he watched.

  The three men remained gripping the sparse handholds of the grating with fingers locked, while the waves continued to wash over them and the sea drew them farther and farther away from the scene of the wreck. They called out until they were hoarse, but there was no response from anyone. Talon prayed that they would not end up being drawn out to sea; none of them could survive for very long in this condition. Yet he was equally afraid of being dashed to death on the rocks of the hostile coastline their ship had foundered upon.

  Talon beat his head on the wood and wept. “What is to become of us?” he cried. “Thank God we are saved together, but we will die from this freezing cold, if we are not soon dashed upon the rocks.” His arms and fingers ached and he kept his eyes mostly shut against the stinging salt and constantly splashing water.

  He must have lost consciousness through exhaustion. Later he lifted his head and looked around with bleary eyes. It was well past sunrise, and his fingers and arms were locked in a cramped grip on their wooden platform. Max was still beside him, but he was either asleep or unconscious, and Montague was lying still as a corpse, although Talon could tell with relief that his companion was breathing.

  Looking up, he saw low clouds scudding by, but there was now a glimpse of blue above as well. All the same, it was a cold, gray morning that greeted him. He turned his head painfully to the left and right to try and find out where they might be.

  Then his heart lifted. Ahead, about two hundred yards away, was a short beach upon which breakers were crashing. On either side of the sandy stretch were black, wet rocks and cliffs. The rocks seemed menacing, despite the fact it was at least land. The breakers marched in ranks to crash against the rocks and toss spray high into the air. He saw that their raft had drifted into a narrow cove, framed with low cliffs on either side of a short beach. But they were headed toward the rocks and that was death, so he unlocked his cramped fingers from their hold and pushed at Montague and Max until they awoke and then showed them the danger. They needed no other persuasion and began to paddle as hard as their exhausted limbs could move to try to guide the unstable raft toward the thin strip of beach. They were still too far away to risk swimming; in his present frozen and depleted state, Talon knew that he would not survive and doubted that either of his companions was in any better condition.

  They managed to change the direction of the grating sufficiently to feel that the rollers were now going to take it onto the beach, so Talon paused for a moment and took stock of their surroundings. Montague and Max, heads down, continued to paddle weakly.

  The realization came to Talon that they were quite alone; there were no others from the ship that he could see. Still, there was a lot of flotsam accompanying the raft toward the beach. Many objects that had floated off the ship were bobbing alongside, including, he realized with a start of horror, some bodies of their former companions and crew, luckless people who could not swim and had not found a means to survive.

  He stared in dismay at the several bodies that were nearest to them. One of the closest was that of the former crewman. Face down in the water, his body was limp and drifted loosely as the swell pulled it this way and that.

  Talon whispered a prayer for the dead man then turned his attention toward the shore. As the grating came into more shallow water, it was seized by a wave and driven forward toward the beach on a long swell. It struck the sand, tossing the three men into the surf. Rolling in the water, Max seized Talon by the collar and held onto him. They crawled out of the retreating wave onto the dry sand, where they lay inert for long minutes, gasping for breath. Eventuall, Talon lifted himself off the wet sand on hands and knees, and gave thanks to God for his deliverance. He looked at Montague and then over at Max. His companions were lying on the sand, their chests heaving, too exhausted to move.

  Talon felt deadly tired; his bones ached, and he was again feeling the cold from a wind that was blowing ashore. There was no shelter on the open sand. The wind whipped the spray from a crashing wave so that it stung his face.

  Max sat up. “We have to find a cover or we will perish in this wind,” he said.

  Montague pushed himself up onto his hands and knees; then staggered to his feet.

  “You are right, Max, but where?” he grunted.

  Talon got slowly to his feet, too tired to say anything. All three stared wordlessly out at the calmer sea of the inlet, amazed that they had survived.

  “There is no shelter on the beach. We must go inland.” Max pointed weakly up the slope.

  They tottered up the low rise of the sandy beach to see what lay beyond and saw what appeared to be the remains of a boat lying on its back, partially buried. Talon tripped and fell to his hands and knees in the soft sand. He felt weak and close to fainting. He lifted his head and saw a dense copse of low trees about a half mile ahead. Closer, he saw that a small stream emptied into the little bay, which explained the cloudy currenthe had vaguely noticed while still in the water as their raft pushed to land.

  “There, that boat, we can find shelter under it,” Montague gasped.

  Talon looked in the direction Montague was pointing. He noticed that the boat was not seaworthy; its underside was stove in. Right now he did not
care; it provided them with the only shelter available from the cold wind, and they needed cover urgently. They dragged themselves through the narrow gap of one side. The other side was buried in the sand. It smelled of old fish, but he did not care. Talon pushed deeper into the underside to get fully out of the wind, then he and his companions curled up together for warmth, and the three of them fell immediately into an exhausted slumber.

  It was night and the sky was clear

  And the moon was pure at its center

  And it led me along discernment’s sphere

  Teaching me by its light and direction

  —Shelomo Ibn Gabriol

  Chapter 2

  The Caravan

  The line of camels plodded slowly along the almost trackless desert, heading towards the distant palm trees on the eastern horizon. Their heads were tilted back against the curve of their long necks and their eyes mere slits in their puffy lids. The sun was well past the mid-afternoon peak, and although much lower in the sky, it was still burning the sand, the backs of the men, and the rears of the camels. They moved as though sleepwalking through the shimmering haze towards the promised water and shelter of the oasis.

  There were about thirty camels in all. Their shadows reached ahead of them: distorted silhouettes projected on the myriad of rock-strewn sand dunes, almost as though the camels were accompanied by elongated phantoms. It had been a long, hot day for the men and animals; the late spring sun already threw out its scorching heat after the cool of winter.

  Haidara Abdul 'Ikrimah, the owner and master of the caravan, was seated upon the swaying back of one of the lead camels. He wiped his brow with his kafeya, a loose cotton rag he used to cover his lower face; he was a portly man who sweated profusely from the afternoon heat. He glanced nervously back at the train, shading his eyes, to check that there were no stragglers. Haidara hated to have the caravan spread out over half the desert in its virtually unprotected state.

  His drovers, men and a few boys, were hardened people of the desert, but he was only too aware that they lacked the soldiering skills to resist a determined attack from robbers, especially the fierce Tuareg, who were known to come out of the deep desert without warning to kill the riders and loot caravans such as his. It had been many weeks since they had left the safety of Barqa, and longer still since they had left the region of Magrib, that last promontory of North Africa from where the land known as Al Andalucía could be seen across the narrow strip of sea. This had meant many sleepless nights and long days of trying to stay awake when what he wanted most was to sleep. He could have paid for an armed escort, but he was a miserly person, and besides, those particular trained men, the Berbers, were more trouble than the dubious protection they were supposed to offer.

  His precious cargo of minerals, hides, and wool bales was destined for Al Iskandrȋyah, the royal city of Egypt. His caravan had left the south coast opposite the Iberian Peninsula some two months previously. Some of the silver had come from the sultanate of Granada, as had the pelts of wild animals. Other goods were from the fabled city of Cordova. He even carried books that he knew would fetch a high price in the literary quarters of the city. There was an almost insatiable need for books of the kind that came from Al Andalucía these days, as the supply from other libraries was drying up—for reasons he did not care to investigate.

  Weeks before setting out, he had made the journey across the sea to Granada in southern Al Andalucía, where he had bargained for fine cloths, as well as bear and wolf skins. He had obtained amber and silver from the cold northern lands of the infidels, brought south by some of the more adventurous Jewish merchants. Now he was making his annual pilgrimage to Al Iskandrȋyah to sell his wares. He prayed every evening that the prices were as good as last year, when he had made a killing.

  He observed the trees ahead with some relief. As they approached the dense clump of palms clustered around the bir, or waterhole, still a mile away, he became aware of the sound of the sea to his left. The faint booming of the surf told him that he had less than a week more of travel following along the coast line, and then he would be in the great city. He would have a bath and then a woman and then a hot meal. Perhaps he would have all three at once! Then he would enjoy a bed that did not consist of sand. He smiled to himself.

  He knew this area they were crossing had once been inhabited by pirates who preyed upon defenseless merchants, both on land and sea. They had been cleaned out of the bay some time ago by the troops of the new young Sultan in Egypt, Salah al Din. Haidara muttered a prayer of thanks to Allah for having provided the young man with the courage and will to take care of these vermin. It saved him an extra month of travel, as he would otherwise have had to make in a wide detour to avoid the place.

  When they were still a half mile from the trees, Haidara, ever cautious, beckoned to one of the riders behind him. It was difficult to make out the boy’s features, as his face was swathed in what had once been a white linen kafeya, now turned brown like the sand, leaving only his eyes and the bridge of his nose open to the harsh climate. But Haidara knew which one he was.

  “Dhakiy, go forward with ‘Utbah and check that no one has taken our camp for the night. If you see anything, get back here as fast as you can. There will be no one else there, Insha’Allah.”

  “I go, master!” the boy called back.

  With a shout to his companion, he maneuvered his camel adroitly past the lead animals and slapped it with his stick to get it to lumber into a heavy trot, while the other boy shouted with excitement and beat his camel, kicking its hump with his heels and whacking its furry neck to get it to catch up.

  Haidara raised his hand and called back to the men behind him to stop. They slowly bunched up and then, without being told, they formed a half circle and squatted on the sand in the shade of their patient camels to await the return of the boys. Some fingered their bows and checked on their arrows.

  “We are about three days, maybe a week out from the city, and Insha’Allah we will arrive with no unwelcome interruptions,” Haidara commented to no one in particular. He waved his fly whisk idly in front of his face, peering towards the distant trees through the shimmering heat.

  It did not take long for the boys to do a cursory inspection of the clump of trees clustered around a small spring of sweet water. It was a very cursory inspection. To their untrained eyes there was no one there and had not been for some time. They did find the remains of a fire, but it was cold. There were no other signs of recent human visitation that they could detect.

  They trotted their clumsy charges back to the waiting caravan and shouted that all was safe. The caravan moved in noisily; the scent of fresh water energized everyone. The camels and men followed the well-worn routine for setting up camp. The snarling, roaring camels were forced to their knees. The more recalcitrant ones were hauled down painfully by a string attached to their noses, protesting loudly, while the favorites were gentled down by their drovers. They were relieved of their loads, hobbled by their front legs, and taken to be watered downstream from the oasis. Later they were fed from the fodder carried by other camels.

  Only then were the fires lit, and the meager fare, consisting of dates, thin strips of dried goat’s meat, and a creamy mixture of camel’s milk and crushed grain, was laid out on hastily thrown mats.

  Now, however, it was time for prayers, led by Haidara, who always assumed the lead place for his men. He had performed his ablutions dutifully with the available water in the tiny stream. Hitherto they had been forced to perform their ablutions with sand, as there had been no water available. God gave dispensation to those in hard desert conditions, but now there was the luxury of water and they were all content.

  After the meal, and with the sun a great red orb on the edge of the burnt western horizon, the two boys Dhakiy and ‘Utbah were allowed to explore. They decided to go the short distance to the bay about a half mile away. They followed a path, excitedly looking for a sight of the sea, which they had not seen since they left
the coastal city of Barqa two weeks before. Neither noticed that the track was well-worn and had been in use very recently. Nor were they aware that they were observed as they came near the beach. It was only when they breasted the sand bank where the track ended and the beach of loose sand began that they realized they were in trouble. With a shout of surprise Dhakiy slapped ‘Utbah’s shoulder and pointed. There, in front of them, was a construction that could only just be called a hut. They stared at it in silence for a moment, trying to grasp its meaning.

  But their pause cost them. A man jumped up a few feet in front of them and grimaced horribly in silence. Both boys were frozen in terror for a second, which was enough. Hard hands seized them from behind and pinned them, helpless to move. Then, just as quickly, hands were clapped over their mouths before they could scream. The man who had jumped out in front of them now shambled towards them.

  He spoke a strange language and looked terrifying. His beard was very long, and he had a tangled mass of filthy red hair sprouting out of his head. His eyes, terrifying blue bulging eyes, glared at the boys, who were just getting over their shock and trying to cry out in alarm. Dhakiy was so frightened that he wet himself.

  “Do not make a sound and we will not harm you,” one of the people said in a low voice.

  Dhakiy twisted his head and gazed up at another wild looking man in similar garb.

  The man, still holding him firmly in a vice-like grip said again, “Be quiet, both of you, we mean you no harm. But if you scream we will have to kill you.”

  The same man addressed the other two in a strange language, and they all turned their eyes over their shoulders at the distant trees as though expecting to see other curious visitors. The man holding Dhakiy said something briefly to his companions, whereupon the boys were marched down the beach, well out of sight of the oasis. The boys’ legs and hands were tied with some old rope. The men dumped them without ceremony on the sand and then squatted, facing them.