‘Turn round the way you came and drive along the shore of the great river until you find a bridge which will lead you to El Oxor.’
‘Thank you. I have no money to reward you for your kindness, but maybe this will do,’ Phares told the man, reaching under his seat.
He took out the precious head wrapped in a towel and held it out. Before taking the bundle, the man signalled to his companions to bring his horse and join him. It was only once the men on their camels had surrounded the Jeep that the Bedouin took the bundle from Phares and proceeded to unwrap it. Uncovering the head, which shone in the silvery light, the shadow of a smile passed over his angular face.
‘That will do,’ he said, and handed Phares a small jute bag. ‘Be on your way and Allah be with you.’
‘And with you. Salam.’
Before Phares had had time to blink, the Bedouin had mounted his horse and the three men disappeared in a cloud of dust, soon swallowed up by the shadows, the ravines and the cliffs.
Phares didn’t leave immediately. He sat for a while in the open Jeep, savouring the velvety windless night. Shadows were sharp among the honeycombed sides of the gorge. Storks flitted uneasily around their rooftop nests, white and ghostly against a blue night sky brilliant with stars – a canopy of sapphires and silver, broken by occasional long-tailed comets, shooting restlessly from one spot to another in the patterned heavens. Phares had seen mirages by day, but the night, too, had its mysteries – cold and aloof, yet deeply romantic. He sighed deeply, wishing Aida was with him to share the magic of it all.
It was a long time before he started up the engine and began the long journey back, his mind brooding on his promise to Aida.
Chapter 8
Although the days that followed Sham El Nessim were busy ones for Aida, they went by on legs of lead.
The work on the estate was complicated, especially as it was carried out in Arabic, which was not Aida’s forte. Every other day she would need to look over the books and she was not used to the endless discussions about crops and livestock. The daily dealings with the fellahin were also difficult, because although they loved and respected her, these older men, some of whom had worked for her father, viewed with scepticism her ability to run such a large domain. To begin with, she was a woman, and they knew she had no real experience of the land.
As time passed, Aida began to grasp the logic in the advice given her by Uncle Naguib and Dada Amina. Marriage to Phares would be the ideal solution to these material problems.
It was not only the estate work that made the days seem arduous. Phares was away in Cairo for a couple of weeks and Aida could not keep her thoughts from straying to their wild night on the felucca. His touch had left upon her the forceful imprint of his personality, and if during the day she was able to push his memory away through sheer determination, at night it was different: he haunted her dreams over which she had no power. Although she thought she knew him quite well so his personality on the whole didn’t frighten her, she also knew that there were women in his life and there always would be. She had tried to imagine what it would be like married to Phares, living in the family home with Kamel Pharaony and Kamel’s elder sister Halima, who had never liked her. It would be a strange life, not at all the life she had planned for herself, but in time she would get used to it, she supposed, and when they had children … they would, of course, have children. She had to remember, too, that Phares was a loner. There was a side of his life in which she had no part: the part of him that needed to escape the routine of life and hankered for the wide-open spaces of the desert, for the silence, the peace. Aida could never be part of that, even if she married him, if only because she would be the woman who would be his wife, cherished and protected, on a pedestal where she must remain, like all married women in their circle.
At this point her thoughts would always flow back to Isis and to Nairy … Phares was a man with a great appetite and she would never be able to rest assured that he wouldn’t always be having some sort of affair going on the side. How could she ever consider linking her life to someone she couldn’t trust?
So, it was on one of these musing afternoons that the invitation to the fashion show of the year arrived. This haute-couture extravaganza was to take place in one week’s time in the ballroom of Shepheard’s Hotel. Aida had scarcely finished reading the details on the card when she received a phone call from Camelia inviting her to stay at Kasr El Shorouk for the event, eager for her friend to spend some time with her in Cairo. They agreed to leave the next day by plane, giving them a whole week to explore the Musky bazaar and enjoy socialising at the Gezireh Sporting Club, of which they were both members. The first polo match of the season was to take place on the day after their arrival and when Camelia told her that Phares would be participating, a nervous thrill went down Aida’s spine.
Although she had not been back to the club since her return from England and she was slightly apprehensive at meeting the circle of friends she had mixed with before the tragedy, Aida was elated at the idea of seeing Phares again. Not only that, but she would be staying under the same roof as him. The very thought made her whole body tingle with excitement.
* * *
The Gezireh Sporting Club, a British military club since the late nineteenth century, was an exclusive meeting place in Cairo where the Egyptian elite rubbed shoulders with British officials and cosmopolitan socialites. That afternoon the polo ground presented an animated scene.
The players had not yet appeared, but the ponies were on the field in the charge of their white-gowned saises, grooms. Nervous and eager, the animals’ coats were gleaming, their small hoofs dancing with impatience. The pavilion and the rows of chairs were filling with spectators: men in cool linen, women in bright summer frocks and shady hats. In the brilliant sunshine, under a deep-blue sky, all colours were intensified: the vivid grass, the striped awning, the tall trees beyond. The very hot air had that dry and stimulating quality peculiar to Egypt, a heat that sharpened the senses, exciting and seldom exhausting.
Everyone seemed to know everyone else; as more and more people arrived cheerful greetings and laughter could be heard. Men already seated sprang up, women found their closest friends and sat down side by side, girls waved to each other and to young men. There was an air of ease and intimacy in the assembly, something very pleasant to those who belonged to the charmed circle, less pleasant for any who did not, as Aida had found out to her cost after the scandal of her father’s trial. The volte-face happened overnight – suddenly she had been ostracised and isolated. She remembered clearly one instance when she had visited the club and was watching a tennis match: she had a chair in the centre of a row, but she might have been on a desert island, or indeed totally invisible. No one seemed aware of her; women talked across her as if she did not exist. Nevertheless, her presence had not gone unnoticed and she soon realised that everyone was whispering about her.
Today, although guarded, she was determined to keep her head held high. The premises at the club hadn’t undergone any changes: as far as she could see, the eighteen-hole golf course, the immaculate tennis courts, the beautifully tended lawns and gardens were the same, and the red-brick tiled clubhouse with flower beds on either side of its straight driveway lay under the scorching sun just as she remembered it. Still, most of the people she’d known all those years back were not around anymore. The crowd today was largely British: army officers, agency officials, and administrators working for the Egyptian government as well as the royal family. And of course there were the rich Egyptians and foreign residents of Cairo with their wives and families.
Aida leaned back in her cane chair with a vague, thrilling sense of anticipation. She and Camelia had arrived at Kasr El Shorouk very late the night before and had not seen Phares. That morning, he had left for the hospital before the young women had woken up.
Aida had decided to wear one of the new outfits she had bought from the Shemla department store, a dashing bright-red frock with buttons sc
ampering down the side to fasten in the new popular side-closing. Its gathered yoke-line culminated in a self-fabric belt with crossover buttoning. The tailored collar gave the dress a neat formality, while the handy little pocket on the bodice, mirrored again but tilted at the hipline on the skirt, added a charming, casual touch.
The players were now coming on to the field. She immediately spotted Phares’s tall figure as he appeared with a sais leading his pony. Phares swung himself into the saddle, turning to wave towards the pavilion where Aida, Camelia and so many of his friends were gathered in the first and second rows. Catching sight of Aida, his smile lingered on her face, making her flush. He stood out among the others. Dark, handsome, deep-set black eyes, straight nose, strong mouth and chin: a rider par excellence, Aida thought, at one with his mount, his big frame showing the grace of perfectly trained muscles.
But he was not the only polo player Aida recognised. In his team she identified Alastair Carlisle from the British Embassy and in the other, she noticed, with an uncomfortable pang, Prince Shams Sakr El Din. The prince was quick to spot her in the group of spectators and, like Phares, acknowledged her presence with a tilt of his head, lifting his hand in a salute as he came on to the field, his penetrating eyes piercing right through her. A strange, apprehensive premonition shuddered through her as she met his gaze despite herself. Like a small bird fascinated by a snake, she was enthralled and helpless, hating and loathing its oppressor while succumbing to his charm.
‘Look who’s there,’ Camelia whispered. ‘I’ve never seen him on the polo ground before.’
The umpire threw in the bamboo ball between the two teams lined up in front of him in their helmets and knee guards, and the chukka started. The teams were well matched and the players first-class. The ponies’ small feet thundered on the hard ground, that lovely thunder like no other sound on earth, up and down, wheeling, up and down again. Phares had the ball; leaning perilously from his saddle he followed through with his polo stick and scored a goal while the audience clapped and cheered.
‘Bravo!’ Camelia cried out.
‘Moheeb, magnificent, bravo!’ echoed the strong voice of a woman immediately behind them. Aida recognised it at once, and a little shiver of jealousy ran through her as she saw Phares’s head lift a moment on hearing Isis Geratly cheer, his eyes searching the audience before a smile flashed across his face in their direction. A moment later, taking advantage of the three-minute interval between chukkas, Isis leant forward. ‘Hello Camelia, what a surprise to see you in Cairo.’ She nodded politely towards Aida. ‘May I join you?’ she asked, pointing to the empty chair next to Camelia.
‘Yes, of course,’ Camelia replied, smiling, though Aida could feel her lack of enthusiasm.
Isis looked stunning in a bottle-green day dress with a bias pleated bodice, green jadeite jewellery on her ears, at her wrists and on her fingers. Her head seemed almost regal with its shining coil of black hair pinned up high; her face beneath a picture of perfection with its finely arched brows, small mouth and narrow forehead.
‘How long are you staying in Cairo?’ she asked Camelia.
‘For a week or so. We’re here for the Shepheard’s fashion show.’
Turning to Aida, the young woman continued her interrogation. ‘Where are you staying? At Shepheard’s?’
‘No,’ Camelia answered for her, almost defiantly. ‘Aida is staying with us, at Kasr El Shorouk.’
Isis’s round brown eyes stared unblinkingly at Aida, a stilted smile frozen on her beautiful face. ‘How lovely for you! Aren’t you lucky to have such generous friends?’
Refusing to be embarrassed by the stinging allusion she couldn’t have missed, Aida replied simply, ‘I know.’
Camelia was about to add something when the whistle announcing the next chukka silenced her. Aida’s eyes were now on Phares. Flushed like a rose, lips parted with excitement, she watched the man who had occupied her thoughts day and night since their trip on the felucca. From time to time her attention strayed almost indifferently towards the other players; she studiously avoided looking at Prince Shams Sakr El Din, recognising the fascination the desert monarch held for her and wanting to sever any chance of a friendship burgeoning between them.
During the next break between chukkas, Camelia and Aida talked among themselves, purposely ignoring Isis. The latter swiftly disappeared, reappearing after the interval to sit with a group of her friends.
And now, during the final chukka, the ball was Phares’s for the fourth time that day. Again, came the clapping, the hurrahs as he made the last goal of the game, securing victory for his team. Heart beating fast, Aida watched as he came towards them, a broad smile lighting his flushed face. He looked superb in his polo outfit, a towel slung around his neck.
‘Aida, Camelia, how lovely to see you here! I didn’t realise you knew that I was playing today.’ As they stood to greet him, he gave each a peck on the cheek, his lips lingering a little longer on Aida’s. His fleeting proximity and the powerful heat radiating from his muscular frame brought a swift recollection of the last time his body had been this close to her, and her pulse seemed to thunder as loudly as the ponies’ hooves on the polo field.
Camelia’s voice piped up: ‘Papa told us this morning at breakfast. We felt it would be a great way of spending an afternoon. Aida hasn’t been to a polo match since she left Cairo and we wanted to support you.’
His velvet jet-black eyes dwelled intensely on Aida’s face, making her legs turn to water. ‘Well, you definitely achieved your goal! Your presence made all the difference. You might even say that our team owes its triumph to you.’
Camelia laughed and nudged her brother affectionately. ‘Don’t be so modest. The team always wins when you’re playing.’
Out of the corner of her eye, Aida could see Shams Sakr El Din walking into the pavilion with an assured step; to her horror, after uttering a quick, pleasant word of greeting for his friends, he wandered over to their little group. In her confusion, without thinking, Aida made the introductions.
The prince smiled graciously. ‘Phares Pharaony, at last we are introduced officially after years of our paths almost crossing … By Allah! This is a trick of fate – a most delightful one.’ And turning to Camelia, taking her hand and lifting it to his lips, he whispered, ‘And your beautiful sister. Enchantée, madame.’
Shams Sakr El Din then held out his hand to Phares, which the young doctor accepted, his level gaze holding the Bedouin’s. Electricity crackled in the air.
‘A truce,’ the prince proclaimed, and laughed.
‘You think?’ Phares replied coolly, his eyes narrowing to slits.
‘Is it not so?’ the other demanded. ‘We meet here, in this beautiful garden, in the presence of these charming ladies. You and I, for the first time playing polo together, albeit on opposite teams. Is this not a sign?’
With a swift, almost imperceptible gesture he drew from somewhere – a pocket or his belt – a little toy dagger set with semi-precious stones such as Aida had seen sold in the Musky bazaar as souvenirs and which were usually used for slitting envelopes or the pages of an uncut book. With a twist of his long slim hands, he broke it at the hilt and flung it to the floor of the pavilion, between himself and Phares.
‘Thus,’ he said, seeming to consider that by his action he had finished something which no one present was aware had ever begun, and that all was made clear and satisfactory.
Phares seemed to have perceived the cloaked meaning of the gesture because Aida saw his face darken in a way she recognised when he was holding his anger back. Still, he said nothing, but looked directly at the prince in an unwavering stare.
‘Allah!’ the prince exclaimed, hands thrust out, palms upward – a gesture recognising his by-play had fallen flat. ‘Do you not remember …? I can’t believe you don’t know …’ There was a note of harsh reproach in his voice. ‘Have you forgotten that your ancestor and mine met in a single combat to cleanse the honour of a daughter of the H
ouse of Sakr El Din? And how, when both fatally wounded, they cursed each other and all their descendants?’
Phares looked blank. ‘I don’t.’
‘But, habibi, my dear fellow, the enmity between your house and mine is historic! I drank it in with my mother’s milk as surely you did with yours. Though the shame was washed out, the memory remains.’ His compelling yellow eyes betrayed a twinkle as they held Phares’s cool gaze, his urgent voice holding an undertone of amusement which belied the force of his words. ‘Can we ever be friends?’
Phares was saved from replying by Alastair Carlisle, who had just joined the group. The conversation quickly moved on to the match, and as other players from both teams and their friends came over, settling at the small tables in the garden just outside the pavilion as afternoon tea was ordered, all talk now revolved around the polo tournament.
Excitement was in the air, fostered by the spring weather – a time for engagements and weddings. This time of year, the days were dazzling, the sun hot, and the evenings like velvet. The intense heat of summer had not yet visited Cairo. There was a fresh tang to the mornings and a cool desert wind still sprung up about midnight, which made sleeping a comfortable thing. This was the time for gymkhanas, amateur singing galas, garden parties, dancing under the stars, and of course, picnics in the desert.
The prince was quick to choose a seat between Aida and Camelia, while Isis, who had by now joined the group, grabbed a place next to Phares.
It’s all so predictable, Aida thought with a sinking heart as she watched her lay a possessive hand on Phares’s arm and whisper something in his ear.
Her attention was broken by the prince’s deep voice, his tone almost reproachful. ‘I haven’t seen you around since Princess Nazek’s ball,’ he told her, his pale eyes scrutinising her face.
‘I’ve been in Luxor, trying to put my estate in some order.’
He nodded sympathetically. ‘Yes, I can imagine that it is a great burden for a woman on her own.’
Song of the Nile Page 29
