The Delicate Prey: And Other Stories

with his apron, and set it down.

“Dirty Jew dog!” screamed the little boy from the middle of the street.

Mjid heard this epithet even in the middle of his tirade. Turning in his chair, he called to the child: “Go home. You’ll be beaten this evening.”

“Is it your brother?” she asked with interest.

Since Mjid did not answer her, but seemed not even to have heard her, she looked at the urchin again and saw his ragged clothing. She was apologetic.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she began. “I hadn’t looked at him. I see now . . .”

Mjid said, without looking at her: “You would not need to look at that child to know he was not of my family. You heard him speak. . . .”

“A neighbor’s child. A poor little thing,” interrupted Ghazi.

Mjid seemed lost in wonder for a moment. Then he turned and explained slowly to her: “One word we can’t hear is tuberculosis. Any other word, syphillis, leprosy, even pneumonia, we can listen to, but not that word. And Ghazi knows that. He wants you to think we have Paris morals here. There I know everyone says that word everywhere, on the boulevards, in the cafes, in Montparnasse, in the Dome—” he grew excited as he listed these points of interest— “in the Moulin Rouge, in Sacre Coeur, in the Louvre. Some day I shall go myself. My brother has been. That’s where he got sick.”

During this time Driss, whose feeling of ownership of the American lady was so complete that he was not worried by any conversation she might have with what he considered schoolboys, was talking haughtily to the other students. They were all pimply and bespectacled. He was telling them about the football games he had seen in Malaga. They had never been across to Spain, and they listened, gravely sipped their limonade, and spat on the floor like Spaniards.

“Since I can’t invite you to my home, because we have sickness there, I want you to make a picnic with me tomorrow,” announced Mjid. Ghazi made some inaudible objection which his friend silenced with a glance, whereupon Ghazi decided to beam, and followed the plans with interest.

“We shall hire a carriage, and take some ham to my country villa,” continued Mjid, his eyes shining with excitement. Ghazi started to look about apprehensively at the other men seated on the terrace; then he got up and went inside.

When he returned he objected: “You have no sense, Mjid. You say ’ham’ right out loud when you know some friends of my father might be here. It would be very bad for me. Not everyone is free as you are.”

Mjid was penitent for an instant. He stretched out his leg, pulling aside his silk gandoura. “Do you like my garters?” he asked her suddenly.

She was startled. “They’re quite good ones,” she began.

“Let me see yours,” he demanded.

She glanced down at her slacks. She had espadrilles on her feet, and wore no socks. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I haven’t any.”

Mjid looked uncomfortable, and she guessed that it was more for having discovered, in front of the others, a flaw in her apparel, than for having caused her possible embarrassment. He cast a contrite glance at Ghazi, as if to excuse himself for having encouraged a foreign lady who was obviously not of the right sort. She felt that some gesture on her part was called for. Pulling out several hundred francs, which was all the money in her purse, she laid it on the table, and went on searching in her handbag for her mirror. Mjid’s eyes softened. He turned with a certain triumph to Ghazi, and permitting himself a slight display of exaltation, patted his friend’s cheek three times.

“So it’s set!” he exclaimed. “Tomorrow at noon we meet here at the Cafe du Telegraphe Anglais. I shall have hired a carriage at eleven-thirty at the market. You, dear mademoiselle,” turning to her, “will have gone at ten- thirty to the English grocery and bought the food. Be sure to get Jambon Olida, because it’s the best.”

“The best ham,” murmured Ghazi, looking up and down the street a bit uneasily.

“And buy one bottle of wine.”

“Mjid, you know this can get back to my father,” Ghazi began.

Mjid had had enough interference. He turned to her. “If you like, mademoiselle, we can go alone.”

She glanced at Ghazi; his cowlike eyes had veiled with actual tears.

Mjid continued. “It’ll be very beautiful up there on the mountain with just us two. We’ll take a walk along the top of the mountain to the rose gardens. There’s a breeze from the sea all afternoon. At dusk we’ll be back at the farm. We’ll have tea and rest.” He stopped at this point, which he considered crucial.

Ghazi was pretending to read his social correspondence textbook, with his chechia tilted over his eyebrows so as to hide his hopelessly troubled face. Mjid smiled tenderly.

“We’ll go all three,” he said softly.

Ghazi simply said: “Mjid is bad.”

Driss was now roaring drunk. The other students were impressed and awed. Some of the bearded men in the cafe looked over at the table with open disapproval in their faces. She saw that they regarded her as a symbol of corruption. Consulting her fancy little enamel watch, which everyone at the table had to examine and study closely before she could put it back into its case, she announced that she was hungry.

“Will you eat with us?” Ghazi inquired anxiously. It was clear he had read that an invitation should be extended on such occasions; it was equally clear that he was in terror lest she accept.

She declined and rose. The glare of the street and the commotion of the passers-by had tired her. She took her leave of all the students while Driss was inside the cafe, and went down to the restaurant on the beach where she generally had lunch.

There while she ate, looking out at the water, she thought: “That was amusing, but it was just enough,” and she decided not to go on the picnic.

She did not even wait until the next day to stock up with provisions at the English grocery. She bought three bottles of ordinary red wine, two cans of Jambon Olida, several kinds of Huntley and Palmer’s biscuits, a bottle of stuffed olives and five hundred grams of chocolates full of liqueurs. The English lady made a splendid parcel for her.

At noon next day she was drinking an orgeat at the Cafe du Telegraphe Anglais. A carriage drove up, drawn by two horses loaded down with sleighbells. Behind the driver, shielded from the sun by the beige canopy of the victoria, sat Ghazi and Mjid, looking serious and pleasant. They got down to help her in. As they drove off up the hill, Mjid inspected the parcel approvingly and whispered: “The wine?”

“All inside,” she said.

The locusts made a great noise from the dusty cliffs beside the road as they came to the edge of town. “Our nightingales,” smiled Mjid. “Here is a ring for you. Let me see your hand.”

She was startled, held out her left hand.

“No, no! The right!” he cried. The ring was of massive silver; it fitted her index finger. She was immensely pleased.

“But you are too nice. What can I give you?” She tried to look pained and helpless.

“The pleasure of having a true European friend,” said Mjid gravely.

“But I’m American,” she objected.

“All the better.”

Ghazi was looking silently toward the distant Riffian mountains. Prophetically he raised his arm with its silk sleeve blowing in the hot wind, and pointed across the cracked mud fields.

“Down that way,” he said softly, “there is a village where all the people are mad. I rode there once with one of my father’s assistants. It’s the water they drink.”

The carriage lurched they were climbing. Below them the sea began to spread out, a poster blue. The tops of the mountains across the water in Spain rose above the haze. Mjid started to sing. Ghazi covered his ears with his fat dimpled hands.

The summer villa was inhabited by a family with a large number of children. After dismissing the carriage driver and instructing him not to return, since he wanted to walk back down, Mjid took his guests on a tour of inspection of the grounds. There were a good many wells; Ghazi had certainly seen these countless times before, but he stopped as if in amazement at each well as they inspected it, and whispered: “Think of it!”

On a rocky elevation above the farm stood a great olive tree. There they spread the food, and ate slowly. The