Holmes suspected there was more to the story than Ali was giving, but the man had never been one to reveal any softer side, and taking a mute orphan under his wing would definitely be considered soft.
“He appears to know Fez well. Has he spent time here?”
“Not that I have heard. But the boy does have a remarkable gift for finding his way around even a strange patch of countryside.”
“He’s trustworthy?”
Ali shrugged. “Who else does he have, but us? Mahmoud uses him to run messages from time to time, and couldn’t see any reason not to bring him along when he came south.”
“So what have the two of them done with Russell?”
Ali just shook his head.
“What about Mahmoud? Why are you here, and not him?”
“We planned to meet here. My brother left the mountains for Rabat on the thirteenth, as the last Spanish troops retreated from Chaouen. His French is better than mine, so he came here while I stayed with Abd el-Krim, trying to keep him from getting killed, and, during any lulls in fighting, reminding him that a talk with Lyautey was in his best interest. Mahmoud’s plan was to find you, and ask that you present the same argument to Lyautey, or if he couldn’t find you, to come to Fez himself and speak with the Maréchal.”
“Any idea why he didn’t wait for me—or, us?”
“No.”
“Since I doubt that Mahmoud would have sent a child, even one gifted at finding his way, all the way to Erfoud to fetch Russell, we may assume that Mahmoud and Russell left the desert together.”
“And came here to Fez, leaving Idir to watch for you in the café, while my brother went … where?”
“The boy will know. Certainly, he appeared to be looking for someone as we came through the medina. What if we go back to the railway café and see if he is there?”
“That’s as good an idea as any,” Ali agreed. “We might also ask the Maréchal if our partners, as you call them, are in custody somewhere in the city.”
Holmes gave a wry smile. “The gaol hasn’t been built that could hold those two for long. What if we—”
But Ali was not to know what Holmes was about to propose, because the older man went still at the sound of another group of arrivals, outside the room. Voices rose from the dar courtyard, loud and troubled voices, familiar voices. One in particular—
Holmes dropped his cigarette into the coals and made rapidly for the door. Ali was at his heels.
CHAPTER NINE
On the dar’s balcony over the courtyard, the two men moved towards the argument that was echoing out of the enclosed corner stairway. In a moment, figures began to appear: a small boy in a dirt-coloured djellaba; behind him—being physically pulled up the uneven stone steps by the lad—a slim young person with blue eyes, wearing a similarly rough and grubby djellaba; behind the boy and his unwilling charge came Youssef, looking displeased at the invasion.
“—might be better if we were to remain below and wait to be claimed,” the slim young person was saying—in English, oddly enough, and with an attitude of musing aloud rather than conversation. “Seems to me this poor chap has been very forgiving of our intrusion, and in a moment that soldier will come after us and— Oh, pardon,” the voice broke off, switching to French. “I’m sorry to disturb you gentlemen, truth to tell I’m not sure what I’m doing here. Perhaps one of you could—”
“Russell, don’t tell me you’ve lost your spectacles again!” Before she could notice Ali and give him away with an exclamation, Holmes stepped smartly forward to seize his wife’s elbow. “Come along, you’ll find it brighter—” he began to say.
But there followed a series of fast and confusing motions that left the slim young person standing alone and bristling at the top of the steps, the child who’d been at the fore of the procession glued up against one wall, Ali Hazr taking a step back in astonishment, and Holmes sprawled against the iron railings amidst the remains of a vase of flowers.
Youssef looked at the child, saw that he was safe, and fled down the steps for reinforcements.
Holmes gasped for breath. “Russell, what is wrong with you? You’ve seen me in a beard before!”
The newcomer’s hood had fallen back, revealing what looked less like a turban than a head bandage. From beneath it peeped wisps of yellow hair.
The blue eyes beneath the bandage narrowed, then shot a quick glance at the swarthier man, standing farther down the balcony. Assured that he was not about to attack, the slim figure took a step forward. “Do you know me, sir?”
The prostrate figure’s grey eyes stretched wide; after a moment, he turned his head, to meet the other man’s equally alarmed, dark eyes.
Ali Hazr pursed his bearded lips. “We may have a problem.”
CHAPTER TEN
It was my mute young guide who convinced me that the two strangers were friends—or at least, that they were not my immediate enemies. Once past the first shock that my defensive reaction had caused, the lad trotted past me and took hold of the younger man’s hand, holding it and patting it, smiling at me by way of illustration.
My head gave a mighty pound; the resulting sway of my body brought a look of alarm to the face of the man on the floor. I let my fists unclench, and said to him, “I’m sorry, Monsieur, you startled me. I hope I haven’t hurt you.”
He scrambled to his feet, agile for a man with that much grey in his beard. “Russell, I—”
He broke off at the same instant I leapt around to put the unoccupied stretch of balcony at my back: Soldiers came pounding up the twisting steps, the servant close behind. The man I had thrown across the balcony moved to intercept, holding up a pair of pacifying hands, assuring them that it had been a mistake, that everything was fine, that we—we!—were sorry to have alarmed poor Youssef.
The guards took some convincing, but once the older fellow had plucked the flowers from his damp shoulder and run his hands over his head, they lowered their rifles and turned to me.
“This man should never have been permitted entrance,” one of them declared, but before they could question me, or take me into custody, my victim moved between us like a dog separating a sheep from a flock. (Where, I vaguely wondered, had that rural image come from?) He put out his arm, taking care not to make physical contact, gathering me past the soldiers and along the balcony, talking all the while in an almost accent-free French.
“This is a friend, a person Maréchal Lyautey will want to speak with later. We won’t disturb the Maréchal just yet, we shall permit my friend here to have a rest and perhaps something to eat. Youssef, might we have another tray of the couscous? And perhaps a large pot of mint tea? Oh yes, and some of your excellent coffee as well would be a good idea.”
Then we were inside a room—the two men, the boy, and me—and he shut the door in the soldiers’ faces.
The four of us held our collective breath, waiting for the soldiers to assault the door. Instead, they retreated, growling commands at the servant. I cleared my throat.
“So,” I said. “That’s my name? Russell?”
The older man’s face betrayed no reaction, yet I seemed to feel a shudder run through his body. “Your surname,” he replied. “Your first name is Mary. You’ve had a head injury?”
“My skull certainly aches. I haven’t dared look.”
“Perhaps that is where we should begin. Would you like to sit before the fire, while I investigate?”
It was odd—odder than any of the long string of peculiarities that had happened since I woke in that small upper room, nearly twenty-four hours before—but despite being an absolute stranger to my eyes, my bones seemed to respond to him. He could be trusted, with my scalp and with my life. I was still utterly lost, and yet I was home.
Tears came to my eyes, and again I swayed. This time, I did not hit out when he gently grasped my arm, but allowed him to lead me to a chair before a most welcome brazier. I sat with my eyes closed, that I could not see the room spinning around me. Deft fingers exp
lored my bandage-turban, locating the end and starting gently to undo it. After several turns, the cloth stuck.
I heard him move around in front of me. I opened my eyes. He slid one hand inside his garments, drawing out a folding knife. He displayed it on his palm. “I don’t have scissors, and I need to cut the cloth.”
“I trust you,” I said. Again, I felt his internal reaction to the statement, but he simply unfolded the knife and returned to my side, pulling at the clotted fabric, sawing gently.
The younger man, who had been standing in place all this time, moved now, gathering up a glass bowl of flowers and carrying it out of the room. When he came back, the flowers had been replaced by a face-cloth and the bowl’s water was steaming.
He set it onto a large, centuries-old inlaid trunk pushed against the wall near my knee, and took the other chair. I felt his eyes on me, dark and disapproving but not without a degree of concern. The mute boy had found a small wooden toy on the trunk, and had taken it over to the table, where he was now picking over a tray of cold food.
“I’ll have to cut some of your hair,” said the man at my side.
“That may be the least of my worries,” I told him, and winced at the tug on whatever injury lay beneath.
The water in the bowl was red-brown when he lifted the final pieces of fabric away. His fingers parted the remaining hair, then stopped moving.
“What do you see?” I asked, imagining some gaping bits of bone that had been revealed.
“This has been treated. Someone put in stitches. The wound itself is healing.”
Well, that was something, anyway.
“You don’t remember who nursed you?”
“I woke in a room, somewhere in the suq. Or, medina. Soldiers came, so I left.”
He started to ask something, then stopped. “When you are clean, fed, and rested, we can talk about what you remember and what you do not.”
But the other man had waited long enough. “What of Mahmoud?” he demanded—and I realised that we were speaking English, although he appeared Moroccan.
“An injury like this only becomes more intractable under pressure,” the older man warned. “Let her rest, the memories will slip back.”
The swarthy fellow did not like it, but I found the words immensely reassuring. This damnable fog I was moving through was an injury, and it would heal. Hold that to yourself, Russell. Yes, that was my name: progress! “I should very much like to bath,” I agreed.
“Shall I—” the older man began, then immediately caught himself. “No, probably not.”
“What were you about to ask?”
“I was going to suggest that I might help you clean your hair, since it would not be a good idea to get too much soap and water in that wound, but I doubt in your current state you would care for that.”
“I should think not,” I said with indignation, then paused. “Er, were I not in my current state, would I permit your assistance in the bath?”
“It has been known. Russell, I am your husband.”
The room was very still. Even the boy, who had followed none of this, glanced up from his snack. “Well. So you say. Perhaps I ought to ask your name?”
“Sherlock Holmes. You call me Holmes.”
The name had a distinct ring of familiarity to it, and I tipped my head as if it might encourage my scattered thoughts to roll back into place. But no, if anything the name sounded like a story, and I’d had enough of unreality for a while. I looked at the other man.
“Ali Hazr,” he said. Recognition seemed to be expected, but at least he did not claim to be my brother, or a second husband. I looked more closely, confirming that the man’s slight lisp was caused by a pair of missing front teeth—but what is normally a humorous, even endearing speech flaw had in this man a sinister air. One’s mind lingered on the blow that had caused it.
“Mr Hazr, Mr—er, Holmes. I should appreciate the use of your bath. Although I believe I shall make do without your assistance, for the present.”
“It is the first room to your right. Latch the door, if it makes you feel better,” he said. “I’ll have Youssef leave a change of clothing for you, and one of the female staff can help cleanse your hair once you’re dressed. Or I can. Oh, and I found these in your—you left these behind.”
He crossed the room and came back with an object in each hand. The first was a passport, very battered. I glanced at the pages, tracing what appeared to be my travels: a lot of borders crossed in the past twelve months. The other was a small object, pinched between his thumb and forefinger. I stretched out my palm and drew back a ring, gold like the other. This one was a wedding band.
It breathed out familiarity, as the stone in my pocket and the writing on the scrap of onionskin had. Which could mean everything, or nothing at all.
I thanked him and was moving towards the door, then stopped when I noticed a subtle design etched into the ring’s surface: a pattern of fine, interwoven hexagons circling the ring. Almost like a honeycomb.
Bees, yet again. The persistent hallucinatory odour of honey. The hive images that had kept coming to me in the medina. And when I looked up into the grey eyes, I realised that I did, in fact, know him: The face before me had appeared in a brief flash the previous day, surrounded by fog. “Are you by any chance a beekeeper, sir?”
“I am. Among other things.”
I nodded, and slipped the ring onto my finger.
It fit perfectly. I knew it would.
The hot water was utter Paradise. I scrubbed my filthy skin, nose to toe, even managing to get at the undamaged side of my head. Then I filled the large porcelain tub a second time, with water that was considerably cooler, and sank in it to my chin, safe behind the locked door.
For ten delicious minutes, I lay without thought or concern. I was aware of voices and movement outside, aware even of anger there, but that was another world, and I did not care.
Since the clipaclop of donkey’s hooves had wakened me in the brass-maker’s shop, snips and flashes of my past had come to me at odd moments. I had the clear memory of a room, for example, crowded with furniture, presided over by a stern white-haired lady who smelt of lavender. And the ocean—I remembered sitting on a cliff over the ocean, looking across at a distant smudge of land, ships in between.
And beehives, redolent with the summer-smell of honey.
All in all, I felt distinctly more real, now that I had a body and not simply multiple layers of rough drapes. I raised my arm from the water, trying to read my skin’s history.
The hands were brown, but above the elbows, I was pale, suggesting that I had spent some weeks in the sun, dressed in short sleeves and without the ring. There were many old scars, including what could only be a bullet hole in my right shoulder, but the more recent injuries were mostly contusions. Multiple bruises explained the tenderness I felt in my right hip and shoulder, my left knee, both elbows—all over, really. They were mostly the same degree of black, indicating that whatever herd of bison had run me down, it had been about two days before.
The day before I woke up.
A different kind of pain came from the back of my left biceps, which I craned to see: a neat slice, sharp but not deep, about three inches long.
Again came the disquieting sensation of a knife in my hand, and I shivered in the cooling water. I could sense the knowledge of what those bruises meant, what that slice came from, resting just at the edges of my mind.
It was reassuring, really, if still maddening. When the man who claimed to be my husband (he did not look like someone who fit the word husband) said my name, faint reverberations had gone down my spine, stirring—not so much memories as the shadow of memories. As if I were outside of a library (libraries—those I remembered!) anticipating the treasures within.
I considered the taps, and decided that I had soaked enough. I splashed my face again, tugged out the stopper, and heaved my aches out of the French-manufactured porcelain.
As I moved towards the towels, my eye
caught on the strange person in the elaborate brass-rimmed looking-glass. She had my blue eyes, my lanky build, but what happened to my hair? I lifted a hand to the blonde crop, and was brushed by another odd sense of dissonance: My eyes did not know the short hair, but my hand seemed to. I took a face flannel and worked at the matted locks around the wound, and at the end of it I had clean hair and a tentative acceptance of the woman in the glass. Mary Russell.
With a towel wrapped securely around me, I snaked one arm out the door to draw in a stack of garments. They were, as before, those of a Moroccan man, but a richer fabric, tawny brown with dark chocolate trim. The slice on my biceps had opened in the bath, but the ooze was not serious, so I just wrapped a hand-towel around my upper arm before I dressed. I took a final glance in the looking-glass, grateful that the bruising seemed to have by-passed my face, then ran my fingers up the ridge of my nose.
At the reminder, I squatted by my discarded garments, emptying the pockets.
The match-box and fruit I dropped into the waste-bin. The knife and its makeshift sheath I strapped back on my arm. The spectacles needed repairs lest that shaky and irreplaceable right lens drop to the tile floor, so I pushed them into a pocket along with the mysterious ring, the crimson note-book, and the rest of my worldly goods. Then with a deep breath (husband?) I went down the balcony to the first room.
Three sets of eyes met me.
“May I ask for another moment of your nursing skills?” I asked Mr Holmes. “Just a small plaster—I’d do it myself, but it’s awkwardly placed, and I hate to get any blood on this nice robe.”