Song of the Nile

by Fielding, Hannah

  Aida stood defiantly on the path, hands clenched into fists as she glared up at him. His face, set hard, was a shock to her. It could be a trick of the moonlight, but it seemed bone white and drawn; she could see the veins in his neck stand out as his jaw clenched. In the penumbra, he suddenly looked taller, rather menacing, and disturbingly male.

  With a bound, Phares was back in the saddle. ‘Step into the stirrups,’ he growled, his eyes holding hers. She obeyed – the hypnotic effect of his gaze so compelling that she felt wholly dominated. His arms encircled her, but this time there was a lack of intimacy in his embrace and she knew that the overwhelming connection between them earlier was now broken.

  The moon slid out of sight behind a far-off cloud, plunging the night sky into darkness as they rode back to Aida’s home, extinguishing the glitter of the calm waters of the canal and the silvery patina on the palms.

  * * *

  Hours later, Phares was finally back at El Shorouk. He paced the room, trying to rub the tension from his neck.

  On arrival at Karawan House he and Aida had found Naguib Bishara on tenterhooks as he waited for her. The older man’s face had lit up with the most enormous smile when he saw the couple arrive together. Obviously misunderstanding the situation, he had clearly thought that the young doctor had been invited for dinner. He was on the point of leaving when Phares quickly clarified the situation, insisting that he wanted to supervise the retrieval of Aida’s Ford convertible, adding that it was only proper as the young woman’s delay was all his own fault. Then, reassured that Aida was safely at her house, Phares had gone back to the roadside with a mechanic who maintained the fleet of Pharaony cars. There, he made sure the vehicle was checked thoroughly before being delivered to Karawan House.

  By the time he had dealt with the matter, it was past midnight. Busying himself with the car had taken his mind off the turmoil that had warred inside him earlier, but now he felt a storm of feelings rising up again.

  Phares had gone through half a pack of Gitanes while waiting for the vehicle to be examined. Smoking usually did the trick, but still he was restless – restless and ashamed. He had gone too far with Aida; she was inexperienced and he should have known better. He wasn’t himself at the moment: the way he was behaving with her was so out of character, but all the while he tried to argue in his own defence, he couldn’t ignore his foibles. Phares was too honest for that.

  He showered and changed into a pair of loose jeans. It was late … already almost two o’clock. Still too charged up, he knew that if he went to bed now, he wouldn’t be able to sleep. Where had all this come from? Phares cast a swift glance out of his bedroom window. The Nile, the patriarch of rivers, lay silver and serene in the moonlight. Centuries had come and gone and there he was, the ‘Father of All Life’, flowing gently in the sweltering darkness, suffering no change that seemed of any account. He wondered at the placid beauty of the picture, and a sudden urge to be near the river possessed him; maybe his agitated soul would become transfused by its imperturbable tranquillity.

  Wandering out into the garden he went to the waterfront and sat down on the grass, leaning his back against a large flame tree. The soundless shore was a graceful arc of sand, the moonlight lying across it making it appear as white as snow, while on the farthest bank, a grove of trees was lit by the stars burning hazily overhead. Nestled in between, the Nile meandered through the land like an undulating cobra in smooth, seductive curves: beautiful, cool and secretive. The heavy scent of orange blossom seemed to drench the entire landscape, its potent nightly scent making him slightly lightheaded. His temples beat like drums and his head was aching.

  Aida … he couldn’t get her out of his mind. A longing filled him, a yearning he had dreamed about but never before experienced, despite his many relationships. From the age of sixteen, women had paraded through Phares’s life, and his bed. None had had this effect on him: even Nairy, whose enticing erotic games had for a while satisfied his needs. Aida was different. She was a puzzle to him – she always had been.

  Aida El Masri. Ever since they were children he had been drawn to the spirited personality of his sister’s best friend. There was a wildness to her that had always interested him, and while Phares often found himself exasperated by her unruly ways, a part of him secretly admired the girl for her audacity. When he thought about it, he remembered that she had been quite pretty too, despite the hint of puppy fat remaining as she reached her teens. He recalled striking eyes that glistened with life, like the blue waters of an oasis. Admittedly, her looks hadn’t registered much with him on those summer holidays from medical school. More often than not he had been too busy admonishing Aida for her latest escapade, or baiting her for his own amusement.

  It seemed the girl who had always managed to get under his skin was still plaguing him.

  But now it was different.

  Ever since the day he had laid eyes on Aida at the cottage, he had been brimming with a senseless desire to possess her. Then the sweet confusion of spotting her again at Princess Nazek’s ball had been multiplied by the realisation of her identity. His limbs had frozen, along with his brain.

  His beautiful stranger was none other than Aida El Masri?

  That magnificent dress she had worn moulded seductively to her waist and when his eyes had wandered to the lush swell of her flesh above, it made his heart pound in his chest.

  This was little Aida El Masri, standing there like a vision, like a woman; and ever since that evening, Phares had been thrown into a turmoil of confusion.

  She made the blood burn in his veins, his loins aching with an overpowering need that had kept him awake night after night. He seemed to have no control when in her presence. There was something sensual in her voice, which in womanhood had deepened to a warm contralto, and the generous mouth that begged to be kissed. The seductive allure in the way she moved made him instantly want to run his hands all over the curves of her beautiful body; and then, most of all, there was such innocence in the fine bone structure of her face and the depth of those large, lustrous eyes, the deep colour of the Mediterranean sea. Eyes which, now he had looked into them again after so many years, were still so wonderfully blue and clear, and seemed to study his in an almost detached way. Aida El Masri had grown from an awkward, moody teenager into a fiery temptress who had turned Phares into someone he himself barely recognised.

  Twice now he had made a fool of himself; twice he had lost his self-control. And to save his pride, he had managed to deflect attention away from his own unbridled lust. He had used Aida’s inexperience with men, had taken advantage of her innocence … oh yes, he knew that she was pure, despite a body that called out to be loved, and savoured every kiss, every caress. The slightest touch fuelled her senses. They had only skimmed the surface of lovemaking and her reactions had not been those of a jaded woman. She was still fresh, a budding flower waiting to bloom, and of that he had no doubt.

  The memory of his disappointment when she had pushed him away was as nothing to the guilt which gnawed now at his insides. He wanted Aida. He wanted her for his wife, but more than that, he wanted to get to know her again – this girl with such an independent spirit, who had been through so much and had grown into a woman who was as fascinating to him – and complicated – as she was beautiful.

  The tragedy of Ayoub El Masri’s death eight years back had scarred Aida, of that he was certain. It was a terrible business which Phares would never forget either. How could he? The devastated look on Aida’s face when he had knelt beside Ayoub’s lifeless body, unable to resuscitate him, was one that would be forever etched in his memory … and, too, her distraught appearance at El Shorouk the day after the trial. Phares had hoped that her initial animosity to his family had died a natural death with time … but no. It was clear tonight that Aida still carried a heavy burden of grief and anger, and he had badly misjudged her feelings.

  He picked up a smooth stone and threw it absentmindedly into the river, watching its distant
splash as it hit the surface of the water.

  Thinking of how Aida had thrown his offer of marriage back in his face, he winced inwardly. He hadn’t been enough for her, it seemed. Incensed, all his pent-up desire had boiled over. Phares knew that he’d been conceited and totally selfish. If only he had been reasonable in the way he had spoken to her they wouldn’t have quarrelled, and there might still be some hope for them to have a future together.

  As it was, he couldn’t envisage them ever getting together now. He had lost her. Lost the wild, free spirit he admired despite himself. Her mocking words reverberated in his head. I remember you exactly as you always were, Phares Pharaony. Arrogant, haughty and narrow-minded.

  He picked up another stone and hurled it with angry force into the water. He should have handled her more carefully but could she not see that he was trying to protect her?

  He began to feel angry with Aida again … angry, because she wouldn’t let go of the foolish and unfounded accusations she’d made against his father. If he could only lay his hands on the person who had filled her head with such calumnious charges, but the El Masris’ maid Souma Hassanein had disappeared immediately after Ayoub’s arrest and all his efforts to find the woman had been fruitless – it was if the ground had swallowed her up. That in itself was the greatest proof that the maid’s allegations had been pure fabrication. Still, one question never ceased hammering at him: why should a woman who’d been virtually a stranger to the Pharaony family invent such a story? What did she have to gain? Even if she had a bone to pick with Ayoub, or even Aida, why had she involved Kamel Pharaony? Had someone else put her up to it?

  Sighing, Phares closed his eyes and struggled against the overwhelming anguish washing through him.

  The only way to conquer Aida was to find out the truth about how the Nefertari statue had landed at Karawan House, and exonerate both their fathers: Ayoub from theft and Kamel from betraying his best friend. But for now, he needed to find the right time to speak to Aida, to apologise for his behaviour.

  * * *

  During the following days Aida avoided the Pharaony Estate, reluctant to put herself in the way of Phares’s sarcastic comments again. There was hot rebellion in her heart and yet also a terrible, gnawing regret for this latest wedge between them. It was made worse by the knowledge that she had acted so wantonly. This, coupled with the horrible things she had said to him that night at the pyramids, left her uneasy with guilt, despite her anger. In fact, where Phares was concerned, nothing about Aida’s feelings was clear to her. Deep down she knew that on the morning she had first seen him again, somewhere a door had closed on her antipathy towards him, but a new one was yet to open.

  Aida was also aware of a certain restlessness at being home, a feeling that the life which eight years ago had completely satisfied her was somehow now lacking in purpose. She had lost her father, of course, and had gone through a war. So much had happened to her, and she had learnt from an early age that in life nothing ever remains static.

  So, helped by Dada Amina, she busied herself with the preparations for Easter and Sham El Nessim. There were the eggs to boil and colour and the salted fish to prepare. Both customs were attached to rituals that dated from the days of the pharaohs. Aida had grown up with these traditions which Ayoub never broke, and this year she planned to revive them. As she had been invited to Uncle Naguib’s for Easter, she offered to bring over the eggs and fish.

  The colouring of eggs was mentioned in the pharaohs’ Book of the Dead, and in Akhnaton’s chants: ‘God is one. He created life from the inanimate and he created chicks from eggs.’ A symbol of life to Ancient Egyptians, they had decorated the eggs in various patterns, writing their wishes on the shells. Then they would tuck them in baskets made of palm fronds and hang them on trees or the roofs of their houses in the hope that, by dawn, the gods would answer their wishes. As a child, Aida used to write her wish on a couple of eggs, much like children write letters to Father Christmas, and hide them in a large basket among all the others she and her father had assembled between them. If her wish had been for a toy of some sort, she’d always find it on her bed; and if it were some other sort of wish, Ayoub always tried to grant it to her, whether it was a picnic on a felucca on the Nile or a night-time visit to the Temple of Karnak when the moon was out.

  Fish were highly valued in Ancient Egypt and, as such, were a crucial part of the Easter festivities. They were easily caught when the waters receded from the annual Nile flood, which enriched the earth and left them trapped in natural pools, and their abundance symbolised fertility and wellbeing. Salted seer fish, or melouha, was offered to the gods in Esna in Upper Egypt to ensure a good harvest, and indeed the city’s ancient name was Lathpolis, the pharaonic name for the fish before it is salted. Most people bought the melouha ready-made, but both the Pharaony and Ayoub families had it prepared at home, the elaborate process having been passed down from father to son.

  A week before Sham El Nessim, Dada Amina had herself been to the market to buy the fresh seer which had to be washed thoroughly, then dried for at least twenty-four hours until it turned white and the skin was crusty and hard. As a child, Aida used to watch her at work at the large kitchen table, filling the gills of the dried seer with coarse salt so they remained open, covering the rest of the fish in salt and placing it in clear polythene bags. When she was older, Aida would be allowed to help the housekeeper create neat parcels to ensure warmth and avoid air, doing this meticulously so the fish would not become contaminated. The melouha was ready once the seer turned silvery and shiny.

  Easter parties the day before Sham El Nessim were always hosted by Uncle Naguib and Aunt Nabila at Esbat El Fardouz, Paradise Farm, and the festivities always had a delightfully informal air, characteristic of the place. A few miles from Luxor’s centre, the estate was not on the banks of the Nile, but much further into the countryside. It nestled among the single-storey mud houses thatched with straw in which the hens roosted, and was surrounded by the sweet-smelling flowering bean fields, intersected by canals and full of dark Nile silt. On this occasion, cloth for a new kaftan and food were distributed to all the fellahin and their families.

  Although in an elevated position, Esbat El Fardouz did not hold itself above the poorer dwellings in spirit, bound together as they were by the land, with the unbreakable bonds of the lush Egyptian countryside. There were no great walls surrounding the property, only tall palm trees soaring overhead, and although not as large as either Kasr El Shorouk or Karawan House, Esbat El Fardouz was nonetheless an estate of considerable size. Naguib and his wife Nabila were loved by the fellahin who worked on their land, and although it was a Christian celebration, the couple treated Easter as an eed – a feast for everyone – to be celebrated before next day’s Sham El Nessim, which the Bisharas always spent at the Pharaonys.

  Naguib and Nabila’s guests consisted of a group of middle-class professionals: doctors, lawyers and accountants from Luxor and Aswan, whom Aida had never met. They came with their children and grandchildren and were a lively and friendly but unsophisticated group who talked a lot, laughed a lot and ate even more. Each brought with them their special dish to be shared at a large buffet set up in the garden, where the decorated eggs formed a colourful centrepiece. Guests sat themselves either in the shade on the terrace on comfortable chairs and sofas or at large, round tables on the grass, surrounded by trellises of sweet peas and herbaceous borders of delphiniums, peonies, lupins, phlox, snapdragons and asters in blues, burgundies, purples and gold. It was a civilised but noisy affair – everyone mingling happily, all speaking at once as Egyptians are prone to do, and tucking into the vast array of dishes.

  Aunt Nabila was an excellent cook. She owned an upmarket bakery where she sold her cakes, speciality breads and pastries. She always joked that the reason Naguib married her was for her cooking. Her fitir, Aida’s favourite, was known all over Luxor. A hot dish made of layers of stretched and folded pastry dough brushed all over with samna baladi,
clarified butter, it was baked until crusty and served with molasses and kishtat laban, a thick cream made from buffalo milk. ‘A recipe for a heart attack,’ Aida had often heard Phares describe it as he watched her and Camelia tuck into large sheets of fitir whenever it appeared on the breakfast table.

  Nabila Bishara was a beautiful woman with smiling hazel eyes and chestnut hair, who always reminded Aida of a lioness. She had been like a surrogate mother to her ever since Eleanor El Masri died, and ever protective, she now immediately busied herself reintroducing Aida to the Bisharas’ circle of friends.

  ‘I bumped into Camelia Pharaony while having lunch yesterday at the Winter Palace Hotel,’ Nabila said, as they wandered over to a group of guests. ‘She told me she’d invited you to the Pharaonys’ brunch party tomorrow.’ She gave Aida a knowing look, her eyes shining. ‘You are going, aren’t you, habibti?’

  ‘Well, I have accepted.’

  Aunt Nabila smiled. ‘Good. The Pharaonys give wonderful parties, and Sham El Nessim is one not to be missed.’ She picked up two glasses of white wine from the buffet table and handed one to Aida. ‘And you and Phares … you are getting to know each other again?’

  You could say that, Aida thought wryly with a slight flush in her cheeks at the recollection of what had happened between them only a few nights before. She accepted the chilled wine her aunt offered and took a sip. ‘We spoke at Princess Nazek’s ball,’ she answered non-committally.

  ‘You two must have even more to talk about now. Phares is such a hard-working doctor and you being a nurse. Come to think of it, Naguib should talk to him about you going to work with him at his hospital.’

  Aida’s face brightened. ‘Do you think he will? I must admit, I’d love to have something useful to do again.’ If Uncle Naguib were to approach Phares it would be so much easier than if she were to do so. Particularly at the moment.

  ‘Of course, habibti. You and Phares would work well together.’ Nabila squeezed Aida’s arm affectionately.