The three wives spoke in unison, overwhelming Abdelsaid. He would have fought with them, but he knew it was a fight he could not win. On the rare occasions where the women agreed on something, their collective will was unbreakable. Abdelsaid knew, sadly, that it was hopeless.
But he could not send the woman away. He had lost all sense of reality. He felt that he must make her his, for ever. Abdelsaid had fallen in love with the strange French woman without a name. With Monsieur Breton.
There was only one way that the French woman might be allowed to stay in Abdelsaid’s house. Abdelsaid argued with his three wives for what seemed like hours. Finally, they agreed. Upon this condition, the French whore could live with them indefinitely. But Abdelsaid had to provide the Black Lily from his private stock. He assured his wives that there was more than enough Black Lily to accomplish the task.
The third wife returned to Amelia, bringing food. Amelia’s memories of the incident were vague at best, but she felt an overwhelming sense of worry and of emotional need, and a desire to make love to the woman, to make everything all right. Amelia reached out, but the woman resisted. Finally, she gave in and allowed Amelia to kiss her, but her lips were stern and unmoving.
Amelia finally let the woman go, accepting the food. After the long hours of unknowing worry, she was famished. She ate greedily. In addition to the usual food, there were several large, dark flowers. The third wife plucked off the petals and encouraged Amelia to eat them. Amelia sniffed at them, unsure, but finally let the woman put the petals in her mouth. The taste was thick and sweet. It was some sort of dessert. But not a terribly exciting one. Amelia swallowed each of the petals, and the wife looked satisfied.
Amelia tried to kiss the woman again. But the woman pulled away and Amelia was left in the darkness, lonely and filled with a terrifying desire.
She slept more deeply that night than ever before.
In the morning, the first wife came to her with food and the black flowers. Amelia ate first the food and then the flower petals, wondering. It seemed more savory to her this time. Again the woman refused to kiss Amelia after the flowers had been eaten. Amelia lapsed back into sleep. She did not know how many times she awakened and ate and drank. The taste and smell of the flower seemed to fill her consciousness.
When Abdelsaid came to her, many meals later, her need was intense. Abdelsaid kissed her, deeply, for a long time before he unfastened her robe and helped her out of it. He touched her chest, feeling the thin hair growing there between her breasts, toying with each of her nipples. Slowly he drew his other hand over Amelia’s thigh. His hand came to rest in the hollow between her legs, seeking, more clinical than erotic. Amelia felt a curious absence of sensation, though her desire was still overwhelming, perhaps more than before. Abdelsaid seemed satisfied, and left Amelia with no more than a kiss.
Amelia was not disappointed, only curious. Why had he not wanted to make love this time?
The hair of her loins had begun to fall out, scattering across the mat like leaves in Autumn.
He was aware of the woman, upon him. He could not recall how he came to be there, or what his name was, or even whether he had ever existed. Encompassed in her caresses, the insistent mouth and breasts of the woman, guided by her demanding movements, he came to want her. A curious sensation came over him as the woman sank down upon his body, pressing his cock deep inside her. Had he been here before, thrusting up into the woman’s naked body while she whispered soothing luxuries to him? He found, after a time, that he could understand her words. When the sensations exploded inside him, he felt an intense pain, as if his body were being torn in half.
Later, much later, he became aware of another woman. But the first was still there. There was a warm touch upon his cock, the taste of her tongue, the texture of female flesh under his hands. There was the warmth, the muscled figure of the man behind him, penetrating him while the three women took their turns using their mouths and hands upon his shaft, their bodies sprawled underneath his kneeling form, pressed as it was against the man. He knew, somehow, that he belonged to these four people, the man and the women. They were as one being with five bodies.
He tried, shortly after the moment of his orgasm, to remember his name. It was only then that he understood. He did not have a name, and never had.
Abdelsaid was optimistic. The trade in Black Lily was increasing. The decadent palaces of the French, it seemed, couldn’t get enough of the flower. And it was indeed rare. It grew only in the mirage oases in the southern part of the country, and the plants would not take root anywhere else. And Abdelsaid was one of the few traffickers who could find the flowers in the wild, and lead the caravans out again.
While the colonial government had declared an official crackdown on sale of the substance, and promised brutal retribution against all traffickers, the soldiers and policemen preferred to line their pockets rather than interfere with the rights of free trade.
The locals mostly smoked the drug. The Europeans indulged alternately. It was only those who ate the drug who experienced its most extreme effects. Regardless, once the substance was taken out of the desert, it lost some of its secondary properties, and served primarily as a hallucinogenic. Certain of Abdelsaid’s business partners were discussing the possibility of establishing an export trade through European shipping companies, of smuggling the substance to a country where it could be sold legally.
Now that he had Breton to lead the caravan, Abdelsaid was able to devote his attention to these more complex matters of business. Breton had learned the trade, had learned to speak and understand Arabic. He had proved an excellent guide. Breton’s knowledge of French had suffered, however, as he learned Arabic. Abdelsaid supposed it had to be a heretofore unknown side effect of the Black Lily. There was nothing to be done about it.
And it was such a small price to pay. Any price was small, for Abdelsaid had kept the Frenchwoman he desired, albeit in a somewhat different form. But the love of the Black Lily knows no boundaries. Abdelsaid told himself this whenever he looked with pride at the Frenchman. Whenever he shared him with his wives.
It was enough, to have this small bit of luxury in this cruel world, thought Abdelsaid. For any amount of luxury is preferred to none, and some is preferred to very little. And no one can stop the wind, nor make the sun stand motionless in the sky.
Breton guided the caravan endlessly, from Abdelsaid’s town to the oasis many miles across the phantom sand. He was one with the desert.
Breton knew he was from another place. But he also knew that place no longer existed.
Breton knew that he had been sent here, to guide the caravan through the endless desert. Perhaps he had been sent by the gods of his tribe, cast out. Perhaps to bring a blessing to Abdelsaid and his family, for Abdelsaid was infertile. Breton would be the father of Abdelsaid’s children. Already Aouicha was with child, and Mimouna suspected also she might be pregnant. Breton imagined these children, in a sense, were a gift from a merciful deity, perhaps a gift from the Black Lily. Breton thought of the sons or daughters as a gift from the universe to Abdelsaid.
Perhaps these gifts were like the visions Breton saw as he slept or daydreamed. The sensations that flowed over him in his dreams. The intimate knowledge of a woman quite unlike Aouicha or Mimouna or Outka. She was more like a boy than a girl, and a mournful boy at that. She was English, he thought, or possibly French. He wondered if perhaps he had loved this woman at some point. He felt sure that he had not, that his union with her had been a matter of convenience.
Breton released his thoughts of the strange woman as he guided the camel train into the oasis, knowing he must turn his thoughts to practical matters of trade and the highest possible price for the blossoms of the Black Lily. He let his memories of the strange woman fly away on the wind, scattering like grains of sand through his fingers. He knew the woman was gone now. It was over.