She found her attention wandering. She thought about the
TARDIS and the unconscious Englishman from the desert and about the long,
tedious months in the Ottoman gaol. She thought about the war, about all those
young men arrayed in their trenches from one end of Europe to the other.
Grandpa had been in the Somme. She remembered asking her mum about it once –
she’d had to do a school project on it and she wondered if she could ask him
about it. Best not, the reply had
come. Even forty-odd years later the memories were still raw. It had seemed
unbelievable at the time. All that time… Jo could barely remember what Beth had
done to upset her so much in the playground the month before. How could
anything still hurt after many child’s-lifetimes of years?
The Somme had been last year.
Somewhere out there, Grandpa was a shell-shocked kid struggling
to get through the days in an army convalescence hospital.
It was a weird thought.
The Doctor and Lawrence burst out into laughter at some
witticism Jo hadn’t paid attention to.
‘I’m going for some air,’ she said. They didn’t seem to hear her; if they noticed when she slipped out, they gave no sign.
The figure huddled outside in the dark beside Lawrence’s tent noticed, though. Half-curious, it watched Jo vanish into the night. It didn’t follow. It had business elsewhere for now. The service revolver in its hand gleamed under the starlight.
'What if it’s important?’ asked Abdul-Malik. ‘It could jeopardise the war effort!’
Najid shook his head wearily. ‘If it was that important they’d hardly have left it to one man alone in the desert to deliver, would they? They’d have telephoned. Or sent a telegram.’
‘I’m going for some air,’ she said. They didn’t seem to hear her; if they noticed when she slipped out, they gave no sign.
The figure huddled outside in the dark beside Lawrence’s tent noticed, though. Half-curious, it watched Jo vanish into the night. It didn’t follow. It had business elsewhere for now. The service revolver in its hand gleamed under the starlight.
~~~
'What if it’s important?’ asked Abdul-Malik. ‘It could jeopardise the war effort!’
Najid shook his head wearily. ‘If it was that important they’d hardly have left it to one man alone in the desert to deliver, would they? They’d have telephoned. Or sent a telegram.’
That made sense, he had to admit. But still… The envelope sat in his hands, his finger half-inserted into the flap to tear it open. He hadn’t yet been able to pluck up the courage to do so. His mind kept throwing up worries and objections. What if Ali found out? What about Aurens? What if it contained something they couldn’t ignore and they had to take the letter, opened, to their superiors? They’d be flogged, and that was if they were lucky. And beyond that, they were meant to be the British’s allies. How could they ever hope for their partners to trust them and treat them as equals if they went around doing rascally, untrustworthy things like opening secret correspondence? That was the kind of thing savages did, not civilised people!
And yet, he couldn’t deny the temptation he felt. There was nothing like labelling something ‘secret’ to make you want to know what it said.
Najid was impatient. ‘Ya allah!’ he exclaimed for the tenth time. ‘Just open it! You can’t keep me waiting like this. You’re worse than my wife on our wedding night!’
‘Oh, what’ve you got there?’ The unexpected voice made both men jump. Abdul-Malik nearly fumbled the letter into the fire, but managed to clumsily stuff it into a fold of his robes. Najid recovered from his surprise more quickly and welcomed the English girl with a warm and phony grin.
‘Ya anisa! You honour us. All the army’s abuzz tonight with chatter of you and your friend. What brings you to our humble fireside?’
‘Oh, you know. Just out for a stroll and thought I’d come and say hello properly. After you helped me out before,’ she added, with a smile towards Abdul-Malik. ‘The Doctor and Lawrence are getting on like a house on fire. Chatting away in there like it’s a university common room or something. It doesn’t matter where we go, the Doctor always manages to find something in common with the bigwigs to reminisce about.’
Abdul-Malik nodded, still tongue-tied. He wasn’t sure whether to be astonished that she’d remembered him and come to talk or just terrified that she’d seen the letter. Did she know what it was? Would she tell el-Aurens? In the end he just proffered the shisha-pipe lamely.
She looked for a moment like she was about to decline, but then she shrugged. ‘What the heck. You only live once.’ The first suck had her spluttering and coughing out sweet-smelling smoke. Abdul-Malik couldn’t help laughing. By the third drag, she’d got the hang of it.
‘Funny,’ she said after a while. ‘These were really popular a few years back. Where I come from, I mean. When the Beatles went east and all the Age of Aquarius stuff was going round. I wouldn’t have gone near one then. I sometimes wonder if I haven’t spent far too long being a good girl.’
Abdul-Malik had met women where a line like that would be a blatant come-on. The kinds of women his mother had warned him about. His father’s views on the subject were somewhat different, but then they seldom did agree. From Jo, though, it was utterly guileless. She was so straightforward and innocent that Abdul-Malik found it difficult to guess exactly how old she was. Younger than she looked, perhaps, and that was far from old.
‘You were prisoners of the Turks?’ Abdul-Malik asked. ‘El-Aurens rescued you?’
‘El-Aur… Oh, I get it! That’s cute. Uh-huh. They were sending us to Mada’in Saleh, wherever that is. Heaven alone knows why. Maybe they’ve got the TARDIS, but it is pretty unlikely they’d take it there.’
‘Mada’in Saleh.’ Najid repeated the word darkly, his lip curling in a sneer.
‘You know it?’
‘I’ve been,’ he said, lowering his voice an octave. ‘Before the war. An evil place. Ancient ruins. Unislamic; thick with djinn.’ Abdul-Malik rolled his eyes. Was it unislamic to be a ham?
‘What is it with you and djinn today?’
‘Give the punters what they want. You’d know if you’d ever done an honest day’s work in your life.’
‘I worked for my uncle!’
‘I said honest work.’
‘I’m confused,’ said Jo. ‘Have you been to Mada’in Saleh or not?’
‘I knew someone who had,’ Najid admitted with a shrug. ‘Before the Turks built the railway through it. Not interested in ruins myself. Wouldn’t catch me anywhere near the place these days.’
‘Djinn?’ she asked.
‘Please! I’m Najid abu Rasil, feared camel-lord of the Hejaz! I’m not some jadda who believes in spooks around every corner.’
Abdul-Malik coughed pointedly, remembering the dog in the desert.
‘It’s Turks I’m worried about,’ Najid went on. ‘There’s some new bey at the railway depot, they say. Rabid dog of a man. Been torturing any Bedu they capture to try and learn our secrets.’
‘The Turk’s a foul creature,’ Abdul-Malik confided in her. ‘You’re lucky you got away.’
To his surprise, Jo didn’t swoon at the thought of her
fortunate escape. She looked disappointed. ‘The Turks aren’t monsters, Abdul.
Most of them don’t want to be here any more than you do. They’re just kids. Conscripts from all
over the Empire. They’re as scared as you are.’
‘I’m not scared of anything!’ Abdul-Malik proclaimed boldly, punching his chest to emphasise it.
Najid stifled a snort of derision. ‘You’re scared of that,’ he said, nodding at the envelope, which had fallen out of the folds of his thawb.
Abdul-Malik panicked. What in the Prophet’s name – peace be upon him! – had possessed Najid? Jo was English! Her friend was at this very moment inveigling himself deep into Aurens’ confidence! It was bad enough that the letter had fallen where she might see it, but to deliberately point it out. Jo would tell – of course she would. Like all Europeans, her loyalty was to her countrymen.
He made a token attempt to hide the letter, but he knew it was too late.
‘What is that?’ Jo asked, reminded of her earlier question. She noticed the English script on it. ‘Secret? Where did you get it? Wait – that Englishman in the desert. You were the ones who found him!’
‘We were going to take it to Aurens,’ Abdul-Malik insisted. ‘It fell out of his pocket. We found it… by accident.’
‘Hmm. A likely story. You two should be ashamed of yourselves! Poor Lawrence comes out here into the desert to help you out, to try and free you from the Turks and get you a country of your own and you go around stealing his mail!’
‘Lawrence came out here to be a hero,’ Najid snapped back. ‘He wants to be the Musa of Arabia. The British don’t want to help us, any more than they’ve helped the Egyptians or the Indians or the Negroes!’
‘It won’t be like that,’ Abdul-Malik protested. ‘Not with us. We’re civilised!’
Najid scoffed. ‘What do you think Lawrence sees when he looks at me? You think he sees a father and a warrior, a man who has worked to make a life for himself in the desert? A man who has loved and hated and pondered philosophy with scholars? You think he sees a man who has read the Qur’an, al-Jahiz, al-Tafis, Marrash and Haykal? A man whose ancestors preserved the learning of Greece and Rome when the European barbarians would have burned them in the fires of plunder? Or do you think he sees a toothless old comic pirate on a flea-bitten camel? A grizzled old crook not to be trusted?’
Abdul-Malik was taken aback. He scrabbled for words to answer. Jo just looked bewildered and uncomfortable.
‘Either way, you’d be wrong,’ Najid said bitterly. ‘He doesn’t deign to look at me at all. We matter less than a grain of sand to the English, my friend. When we drive the Turks out, it is not we who will inherit this land.’
He snatched the envelope from Abdul-Malik and tore it open, shoving the page of typewritten text within into the hands of the startled Jo.
‘Read it!’
‘I…’ She glanced down at the letter.
‘What does it say?’
In a voice that faltered at first, and then grew stronger with horror and outrage, Jo Grant began to read.
~~~
‘I think of what we’re doing as intrusive,’ Lawrence pontificated,
lounging back on a cushion and sipping at his tea. ‘Britain has a certain way
of doing things. Her foreign policy runs along tracks every bit as predictably
as the Hejaz Railway. Those tracks were laid down by our ancestors, all the
great generals and industrialists and entrepreneurs of the Empire. And I mean
to blow them up, Doctor. The British think I lied to Prince Feisal, leading him
and his men along with empty promises of an Arab nation. Sometimes I even
believe that myself.
Bit I mean to do it. By God, I mean to do it!