Nazeera. She pushed aside his limp body and rolled out from beneath him. Then she scrambled to her feet, pulling down her skirts as she came to help Yakub, who was stooped over Penrod. With the blood-smeared dagger Yakub cut the thongs that pinioned his arms and Penrod almost screamed as the blood coursed back into his starved arteries and veins. While Nazeera took the weight of the yoke to prevent it crushing Penrod’s larynx, Yakub cut the thongs at the back of his neck. Between them they lifted it off.
“Drink.” Nazeera held a small glass flask to his lips. “It will deaden the pain.” With three gulps Penrod swallowed the contents. The bitter taste of laudanum was unmistakable. They helped him to his feet and half carried him to the wall. Yakub had left a rope in place. While Nazeera propped him up, Yakub settled the loop on the end of the rope under Penrod’s armpits. As he straddled the top of the wall and heaved on the rope Nazeera pushed from below and they hoisted Penrod over. He fell in a heap on the far side. Nazeera slipped quietly away in the direction of the harem. Yakub dropped down beside Penrod and hauled him on to his numb feet.
At first their progress towards the riverbank was torturously slow, but then the laudanum took effect and Penrod pushed away Yakub’s hands. “In future, do not stay away so long, tardy Yakub,” he mumbled, and Yakub giggled at the jest. Penrod broke into a shambling run towards the river, where he knew the felucca was waiting to take them across.
As the favourite of Osman Atalan, Rebecca had her own quarters and Amber was allowed to share them with her. The two waited by the small grilled window through which they had a glimpse of the silver moonlight reflected from the wide river. Rebecca had turned the wick of the oil lamp low, so they could just make out each other’s faces. Amber was wearing a light woollen robe and sandals, ready to travel, and she was quivering with excitement.
“It is almost time. You must make ready, Becky,” she entreated. “Nazeera will be back at any moment to fetch us.”
“Listen to me, my darling Amber.” Rebecca placed her hands on her sister’s shoulders. “You must be brave now. I am not coming with you. You are going alone with Penrod Ballantyne.”
Amber went as still as stone, and stared into her sister’s eyes, but they were unfathomable in the gloom. When she spoke at last her voice shook. “I don’t understand.”
“I cannot go with you. I must stay here.”
“But why, Becky? Why, oh, why?”
In reply Rebecca took her sister’s hands and guided them under her shift. She placed them on her own naked belly. “Do you feel that?”
“It’s just a little fat,” Amber protested. “That won’t stop you. You must come.”
“There is a baby inside me, Amber.”
“I don’t believe it. It cannot be. I still love you and need you.”
“It’s a baby,” Rebecca assured her. “It’s Osman Atalan’s bastard. Do you know what a bastard is, Amber?”
“Yes.” Amber could not bring herself to say more.
“Do you know what will happen if I go home to England with an Arab bastard inside me?”
“Yes.” Amber’s voice was almost inaudible. “But the midwives could take it away, couldn’t they?”
“You mean kill my baby?” Rebecca asked. “Would you kill your own baby, Amber darling?” Amber shook her head. “Then you cannot ask me to do it.”
“I will stay with you,” said Amber.
“You saw what a sorry condition Penrod is in.” Rebecca knew it was the strongest lever she had to move Amber. “You have saved his life already. You fed him and gave him water when he was dying. If you desert him now, he will not survive. You must do your duty.”
“But what about you?” Amber was cruelly torn.
“I will be safe, I promise.” Rebecca hugged her hard, and then her tone became firm and brisk. “Now, you must take this with you. It’s Daddy’s journal, which I have added to. When you reach England, take it to his lawyer. His name is Sebastian Hardy. I have written his name and address on the first page. He will know what to do with it.” She handed the book to Amber. She had packed it into a bag of woven palm leaves and bound it up carefully. It was heavy and bulky, but Rebecca had plaited a rope handle to make it easier to carry.
“I don’t want to leave you,” Amber blurted.
“I know, darling. Duty can be hard. But you must do it.”
“I will love you for ever and always.”
“I know you will, and I will love you just as hard and just as long.” They clung to each other until Nazeera appeared quietly beside them.
“Come, Zahra. It is time to go. Yakub and Abadan Riji are waiting for you by the riverside.”
There was nothing left to say. They embraced for the last time, then Nazeera took Amber’s hand and led her away, with the bag that contained her legacy. Only once she was alone did Rebecca allow her grief to burst out. She threw herself on to their angareb below the window and wept. Every sob came up painfully from deep inside her.
Then something inside her was awakened by the strength of her sorrow, and for the first time she felt the infant kick in her womb. It startled her into stillness, and filled her with such bitter joy that she clasped her arms round her belly and whispered, “You are all I have left now.” She rocked herself and the infant to sleep.
The felucca was anchored close to the muddy strip of beach below the old mosque. It was a battered, neglected craft that stank of river mud and old fish. The owner hoped to replace it with a new vessel paid for out of the exorbitant fee he had been promised for a single crossing of the river. Its amount warned him that he was at great risk, and he was edgy and fidgety as he waited.
The laudanum made Penrod Ballantyne feel muzzy-headed and divorced from reality, but at least he was without pain in his limbs. He and Yakub were lying on the floorboards where they would be concealed from casual inspection. In a whisper Yakub was trying to tell him something that he seemed to think was of prime importance. However, Penrod’s mind kept floating off on the wings of opium, and Yakub’s words made no sense to him.
Then, vaguely, he was aware that somebody was wading out to the vessel. He lifted himself on one elbow and looked groggily over the side. Nazeera was standing on the beach, and the lithe figure of Amber Benbrook, with a large bag on her head, was moving towards the felucca. “Where is Rebecca?” he asked, and blinked to make certain he was seeing straight.
Amber pulled herself aboard the felucca, then Nazeera turned away from the water and ran off.
“Where is Nazeera going?” he wondered vaguely.
Amber dropped her bag on the deck and stooped over him. “Penrod! Thank goodness! How are you feeling? Let me see your arms. I have some ointment for your bruises.”
“Wait until we get to the other side,” he demurred. “Where is Nazeera going? Where is Rebecca?” Neither Amber nor Yakub answered him. Instead Yakub gave a sharp order to the boat-owner and scrambled to help him hoist the lateen sail. It filled to the night breeze and they bore away.
The felucca sailed closer to the wind than her age would suggest, and she kicked up such a bow wave that the spray splattered over them. On the Khartoum side they went aground with such force that the rotten keel was almost torn off her. Amber and Yakub helped Penrod ashore, and Yakub propped his shoulder under his armpit to steady him as they hurried through the deserted streets of the ruined city. They met not a living soul until they reached Ryder Courtney’s abandoned compound. There, a Bedouin boy was waiting for them with a string of camels. As soon as he had handed the lead reins to Yakub, he fled into the shadows.
The riding camels were fully saddled and equipped. They mounted at once, but Yakub had to help Penrod into the saddle and he was almost unseated as the animal lurched to its feet. Yakub took him on the lead rein and led the little caravan through the mud of the almost dry canal and into the desert beyond. There he goaded the camels onwards and they paced away, keeping the river in sight on their left-hand side. Within the first mile, Penrod lost his balance and slipped sideways out of the saddle. He hit the ground heavily and lay for a while like a dead man. They dismounted and helped him back into the saddle.
“I will hold him,” Amber told Yakub. She climbed up, sat behind Penrod and placed both arms round his waist to steady him. They went on for hours without a halt, until in the first light of dawn they picked out the shape of the lagoon ahead in the river mist. There was no sign of the steamer out on the open water.
On the edge of the reed bed Yakub reined in his camel and stood upright on his saddle. He sang out over the lagoon in a high wail that would carry for a mile. “In God’s Name, is there no man or jinnee who hears me?”
