Panther's Prey (30 page)

“And what shall I tell Beatrice about where we are going?” Amy asked, wiping her eyes, which were tearing in spite of her best efforts to control herself.

“Tell her Kalid is taking us on a tour of the old city. Bea knows you haven’t done much sightseeing. I’ll bring the right clothes for you to change into during the carriage ride.”

Amy nodded. Was it feasible her idea could work?

Sarah squeezed Amy’s arm. “Don’t count on this too much, Amelia. I can’t mislead you, it’s a long gamble at best.”

“I have to hope for something,” Amy murmured.

“I know. I’ll send word to you as soon as Kalid can see the Sultan. Now perk up and smile or Beatrice will be wondering what we’ve been doing out here.”

The two women walked back to the house, arm in arm.

* * *

Malik stared up at the dripping ceiling of the dungeon, thinking about how many days he might have left to live. He was sprawled full length on a dirt floor strewn with filthy straw, his feet manacled together and his hands tightly cuffed to an iron peg set in the stone wall.
 

He turned his head to look at the thin stream of lamplight filtering through a crack in the wall near the solid oak door. He had few regrets about his life, he had done what he wanted to do, and he knew that despite what Anwar had said the revolution would live on after he himself was dust. The people in his band had tasted freedom, and they would want more of it. Their victory in the Armenian mahalle had shown them that it was possible to affect and dilute the Sultan’s power; he was not an omnipotent being against whom they had no chance at all. They would grow in numbers and strength and eventually achieve their goal.
 

Malik was satisfied that his blood would be spilled in a just cause that would survive him.

His only concern was Amelia. He had made promises he couldn’t keep, had led her to believe there was a future for them that now would never be. She was not the type to get over him easily; she might never get over him at all. He couldn’t bear the thought that he had ruined her life, that she would grow old and embittered, grieving her lost love, denying herself the comfort of marriage and children because she had given her heart away in her youth. His final hope was that she could recover from her experience with him and go on with her life.

Malik closed his eyes, trying not to think about the implications of this wish. Another man would make love to her, hold her in his arms as they slept, father her children. Malik wasn’t selfish enough to want Amelia to spend her life in mourning for him, but as long as he still breathed the thought of someone else claiming her as he had would curl his fingers into fists.

He shifted his mind from that subject; it produced an impotent fury that only drained his strength. He was not dead yet, so he directed his thoughts toward escape. He had been formally sentenced that morning. His move to the jail near the docks was imminent. He knew he would be heavily guarded, but he was also more resourceful than any soldier the Sultan employed.

There was always a chance.

He remembered how he had been taken, surrounded by a force of ten armed men as he arrived at Yuri’s house for his horse. He had yielded in order to live and possibly fight another day; to have resisted would have meant his death right there. He assumed he had finally been betrayed. Most of the Sultan’s subjects were so poor that the only surprise lay in their ignoring the lure of the reward so long. Malik knew poverty from personal experience, he knew what its rigors could force a person to do.
 

He understood only too well what had happened.

He shifted position in the straw, wondering how Amelia had learned of his arrest and what she was thinking now. He hoped that she wouldn’t do anything foolish or dangerous, but he knew how impulsive she could be. Her courage was mostly a reckless determination that had to be channeled effectively, but in these circumstances she could easily go wild.

He heard the guard coming and quickly closed his eyes again, feigning sleep.

When he was alone again, he would make plans.
 

* * *

Amy heard the horse’s hooves on the drive in the late afternoon and came out of her room. She had been waiting for five days to hear from Sarah, five days of agony spent gleaning whatever information she could about Malik from newspapers and gossip. She stopped on the landing and watched Beatrice answer the door, then come back inside with a letter in her hand.

Amy walked down the stairs, restraining herself from running with an effort. She didn’t want to look as if she were expecting to receive something.

Beatrice looked up and said, “This is for you, Amelia. It was just hand delivered by a rider in Shah livery. It must be from Sarah.” She gave Amy the envelope.

Amy folded it into the sleeve of her dress. She was dying to tear it open, but didn’t want to read it in front of Bea and subject herself to questions.

“The Imperial postal service is no longer in operation?” Beatrice asked mildly, looking at James, who had just arrived home from his office and was hanging his hat on the rack in the hall.

“Sarah probably sent the rider on an errand to town and just asked him to drop this off,” Amy said dismissively. She went into the library and got a book, pretending that was the reason for her sudden appearance, then went into the parlor.

Beatrice looked after her and murmured to James, “You don’t think Sarah could be helping Amelia pursue...” she stopped short, amazed at what she was thinking.

“I’m sure Sarah is far too responsible for that,” James said briskly, not sure at all. “Besides, Bey is incarcerated. His official condemnation was in the paper today. What can happen? Don’t worry about it. Come up with me while I change for dinner. Are we having the mutton or the pork roast?”

Amy waited for Beatrice and her husband to go up the stairs, then ripped open the envelope.

“Permission has been granted,” Sarah had written. “Kalid and I will be by for you at two on Friday the 15th.”

Amy refolded the letter and pressed it to her lips, closing her eyes. The 15th was the next day.

Amy took the letter up to her room and destroyed it the same way she had destroyed the long letter she had written to Sarah. She tore it into small pieces and then charred each fragment with a candle flame until there was nothing left but a pile of ash, which she swept into the fireplace. Then she selected a dress which would be easy to change out of, draped it over a chair to air it for the next day, and went down to dinner.

It was a quiet meal, with all three participants absorbed in their own thoughts.

“Sarah has offered to take me on a tour of the old city tomorrow afternoon,” Amy finally announced as dessert was being served. “She’s coming by for me around two.”

James and Beatrice exchanged glances.

“That’s nice, dear,” Bea said, pouring caramel sauce over her slice of flan. “Is that why she wrote you?”

Amy nodded. “It was a last minute decision for Sarah and Kalid to come to the city. Kalid has some business, and Sarah thought I might like to visit a few of the historical spots. I really haven’t seen much beyond Pera since I’ve been here.”

“Will you be back for dinner?” James asked.

“I’m sure I will be,” Amy replied.

“Do you think Kalid and Sarah will want to stay here for the night?” Bea asked.

“They’re staying at the American Embassy,” Amy lied hastily. “Kalid is meeting with Secretary Danforth.”

Her relatives seemed to accept this, and Amy suppressed the familiar twinge of guilt she felt at lying to them.

Nothing was more important than getting in to see Malik.

Nothing.

* * *

Amy was waiting in the foyer when the Shah carriage pulled into the Woolcott’s street
 
the next afternoon. Kalid was mounted on his horse, riding behind the coach. He came to the door, observed the formalities with a characteristically reserved Beatrice, and handed Amy into the coach.

“I don’t know how I let Sarah talk me into this,” he muttered to Amy as she released his arm. “But then, she’s been talking me into things for years.”

“You won’t be sorry,” Amy said to him as she sat across from his wife.

“I’m already sorry,” he said, looking meaningfully at Sarah. “If anything happens to either one of you I will hold myself responsible.”

“If you were in Malik’s shoes, wouldn’t you want to see Sarah?” Amy demanded.

Kalid looked at her a long moment, then nodded.

“I guess that’s why I’m doing this,” he said, and shut the carriage door.

“Is he angry?” Amy said to Sarah.

Sarah shook her head. “He’s worried, and not just about this afternoon. He’s involved in some plot against the Sultan, I’m not supposed to know about it but of course I do. He thinks he’s protecting me by not telling me about it, but I have my own sources.” She picked up a bundle from the seat next to her and said, “Hurry and change, I have some things to tell you before we arrive.”

Once Amy was attired in Sarah’s Turkish ensemble and veiled to the eyes, Sarah said, “The guards at the jail will know Kalid by sight, of course, and they will assume that you are me, since they have been instructed to admit the Pasha of Bursa and his wife. I will tell the driver to pull away so they don’t see me sitting in the carriage, and then come back for you in ten minutes. Don’t say anything, to Kalid or anyone else, until you are inside with Malik. The guards will undoubtedly remain with you during your visit, so make sure that you behave appropriately. You are supposed to be a friend of Malik’s sister-in-law, not his lover, so bear that in mind.”

Amy nodded.

“Do you have any questions?” Sarah asked.

“No.” Amy folded her hands together in her lap; they were like ice.

“I am trusting you to be circumspect,” Sarah added pointedly, looking at Amy.

“I promise I won’t make a scene,” Amy replied softly. “I can’t thank you enough for your help in arranging this visit.”

Sarah turned her head to look out the window. “While I was in the harem at Orchid Palace Kalid was wounded in a bedouin raid, and for a while it looked as if he might die. I have always remembered how I felt then; it must approximate how you feel now. I want to help you, but I don’t want you to do anything foolish. Be careful.”

“I will.”

The driver turned off the crowded main street and down a cobbled alley which ended at the water. Even from a distance Amy could see the Sultan’s halberdiers, outfitted more elaborately than Kalid’s, standing at attention, two on either side of the main door. As they got closer to the low stone building she could see the janissaries armed with pistols perched in lookouts stationed at regular intervals on the surrounding wall. It was a forbidding place, made all the more so by its lyrical name, Pamukkale, or “cotton castle,” for the rock formations which formed a natural barrier between the prison and the bay.

The coach came to a stop before the prison and the halberdiers immediately presented their truncheons. Amy looked across at Sarah nervously.

“It’s all right,” Sarah said, moving back from the isinglass window. “That’s just procedure. Kalid will tie up his horse, then he’ll come to get you.”
 

A short time later Amy’s door opened and Kalid said quietly, “Come with me. Don’t say a word.”

He looked quickly at Sarah, who whispered the words, “Good luck.”

Amy descended from the carriage, and as soon as her feet touched the cobbled street, it pulled away, the horses’ hooves clopping with a hollow sound on the paving stones. She looked after it, wondering if she and Kalid were both mad to have left its safety for the perilous encounter ahead of them.

Kalid took Amy’s arm and steered her past the halberdiers, who stared straight ahead, and into the office of the jail, which was a bleak windowless room containing a desk and a chair and a series of scarred wooden cabinets. A turbaned man in a gray uniform bowed to Kalid and said something in Turkish. Kalid replied curtly. The man bowed again, snapped his fingers, and two soldiers with rifles moved from the corners of the room to flank Kalid and Amy.

This, apparently, was their escort.

The turnkey removed an iron ring from the heavy belt at his waist and led the way down a dark hall where none of the outside sunlight penetrated; it was illuminated only by a flaring taper set into the flaking stone wall. The little group reached a massive oak door, double barred and double bolted, which the warden proceeded to unlock with a succession of keys. Finally he shifted the crossbars and the door swung open creakily, admitting them to a square, stone paved room which contained four individual cells. Each cell featured a tiny, barred window near the ceiling and a narrow linen cot. Only one cell was occupied.

Amy sucked in her breath as she felt Kalid’s steadying hand on her shoulder. Malik was lying face down on his cot, his back to them, identifiable by his broad shoulders and thick black hair. The only other thing in his cell aside from the cot was a bucket on a wall peg.

“Has he been beaten?” Amy whispered, alarmed by Malik’s slack posture.
 

“Not before a public execution,” Kalid replied. “The Sultan would not want anyone to see the marks.”