“I am engaged upon a certain mission,” he said carefully. “In order to complete this successfully, it is vital that I do not in any way attract attention while I am with the caravan.”
“So? You are running away, are you not? It was you that Ahmed and the soldiers were chasing, no? Evidently you are on some secret business, for you are dressed as an effendi. But this is no concern of mine. Why do you not stay here with me? Come—sit here beside me and I will send for some refreshment.”
“Yemanja, I cannot.”
“But I wish it. You are beautiful. You have a kind and gentle face. You are different, my friend. In my life I have not met men like you. If you find me pleasing, why do you reject me—”
“If I become ‘friendly’ with you, it will make Ahmed jealous. And if he becomes more jealous than he already is, he will notice me all the more in the caravan—and that must not happen. Because, you see, he does not yet connect the man he is chasing tonight with the man his woman so obviously likes in the caravan.”
“Ahmed!” The girl’s voice was full of scorn. “He is a brute, that one. He beats me. Look—I will show you…”
“No, no,” Solo said hastily. “I believe you.”
“Anyway, I wish to leave him. I do not understand this of the caravan and your private business. I have said it does not concern me. You need not be afraid of Ahmed: he is a bully, all brag and no courage.”
“I am not afraid of him. It is just that he must not notice me.”
“Well, he cannot notice you here,” the girl cried triumphantly.
She broke off abruptly. From somewhere below a persistent hammering was echoing up the stairway. Yemanja rose on to her knees, her eyes wide with alarm. “The soldiers,” she whispered. “They said they would search every house…”
“Oh, no! Not again!” Solo said in English.
“You are right, my friend. They must not find you here. You must go.”
“Yes, but how?”
“Nobody saw you come in. So far as they know, I have been here alone all the time. If you leave through this window…”
“Does Ahmed know you are here?”
“Of course. I am here at his command. Where do you wish to go?”
“I want to get back to a lane which runs behind the wall at one side of the square where the encampment is.”
The girl drew back the curtain over the window embrasure. “Out here is a flat roof. Beyond is an alley. You cannot get back directly without crossing the street in front here. So take the alley in the opposite direction and you will find you are in the street circling the town inside the walls. Turn right along this and you will find that the—one, two, three, four, yes, fifth—the fifth turning will lead you to the mosque. And from there, the lane you speak of—”
“Yes, yes. I know the way from there,” Solo said. The hammering had stopped and there was the sound of many voices below. He swung a leg over the window-sill, and then turned back towards the girl.
“You are very beautiful and very kind,” he said. “I am grateful. If ever there is anything I can do…”
“You know what you can do,” the girl said.
Solo grinned, leaned inwards and kissed her briefly on the lips.
“I will not forget you,” she said softly. “You will see me again, my friend. I am a determined woman…”
Solo waved and jumped lightly to the flat roof. The curtain slid back over the window.
The drop to the alley was about fifteen feet. Even in his rubber-soled sneakers, he seemed to himself to make quite a noise when he landed. But nobody appeared to have heard; no voice questioned him and no footsteps advanced. After waiting a moment, listening, he ran lightly off in the direction the girl had suggested. The beaten earth road inside the wall of the town was deserted. Just before he got to the fifth turning, he saw the back of a patrolling sentry silhouetted against the sky on top of the wall. But he had reached the safety of the corner before the man had reached the end of his beat.
The mosque was nearly a quarter of a mile down the quiet street. There was one dangerous spot, when he had to cross an open space between the end of the street and the domed building—but the few passersby were all facing towards the lights of the bazaar, which showed through an archway on the far side. Shouts of command from the soldiers could still be heard above the hubbub of the market.
Solo passed noiselessly behind the watchers and turned the corner of the mosque. Two minutes later, he was jumping for the top of the wall bounding the encampment. Peering cautiously over the top, he saw that he had overestimated the distance by about two yards. He dropped back into the lane and climbed up again behind his bivouac. Then, lowering himself quietly behind the tent, he lifted the back flap and crawled inside with a sigh of relief.
As soon as he had stripped off the bush shirt and shorts and resumed the burnoose, he looked out across the square from the front. Flares had been set up where the beasts were tethered. One of the horses was restive, snorting and rearing on the end of its rope. There was a group of soldiers lounging by the entrance to the alleyway down which he had made his escape, and, nearer at hand, Ahmed was pacing up and down with a tall, dark man in Arab robes.
“I don’t see how he can have got away,” the camelmaster was saying angrily. “We had the whole street bottled up….I don’t think it likely, but just in case he did come from here, I am asking the soldiers to arouse all these people”—he gestured towards the corner of the encampment where Solo and the other pilgrims were quartered—”and get them out so we can have a look at them.”
The tall man took his arm. “It is not necessary,” he said. “There are plans, my friend, of which you know nothing. Leave it.”
Solo withdrew like a tortoise into his bivouac and rolled himse1f in his sleeping bag. Ten minutes later, he was asleep.
Chapter 9
The Retreat of Napoleon
THE RENDEZVOUS WITH the cavalry was outside the south gate of Wadi Elmira. From here, the pilgrims continued along the left bank of the river, while the pack train negotiated a ford and climbed up into the hills on the right.
Napoleon Solo kept his head well down as Ahmed rode up and down the long line of camels and horses with a Sudanese officer, separating the travelers and their beasts into two sections. The dromedary with the red, yellow and black striped blanket roll was one of a string of three led by a paunchy Bedouin immediately behind the head of the column. The camel-master’s heavy features were set in their usual scowl as he maneuvered his horse in among the throng of riders, roughly shepherding them into the correct line.
Solo kneed his camel as unobtrusively as he could towards the file of pilgrims, hoping to escape notice while Ahmed’s back was turned. But the army officer saw him move and called out, “Hey! You, there! Where do you think you’re going?” He spurred his horse towards the agent, cursing freely. Fortunately Ahmed was disputing some point with a burly pilgrim and did not come with him.
“I was but joining my fellow pilgrims,” Solo said meekly as the soldier reined up beside him.
“You wait until you are told. And that is a strange manner in which you speak, my friend,” the officer said.
“My speech is not as yours by virtue of the fact that I have traveled far,” Solo said. “I come from Al Khuraiba in Saudi Arabia.”
“Hmm. Well, see that you do not get out of line again.”