Princess (23 page)

The woman’s hands were bound. Her head hung low. With an official manner, a man loudly read out her crime for the crowd to hear. A dirty rag was used to gag her mouth and a black hood was fastened around her head. She was forced to kneel. A large man, the executioner, flogged the woman upon her back; fifty blows.

A truck appeared and rocks and stones were emptied in a large pile. The man who had read off the crime informed the crowd that the execution should begin. Omar said the group of people, mostly men, rushed toward the stones and began to hurl the rocks at the woman. The guilty one quickly slumped to the ground and her body jerked in all directions. Omar said the rocks continued to thud against her body for what seemed to be an interminable time. Every so often, the stones would quiet while a doctor would check the woman’s pulse. After a period of nearly two hours, the doctor finally pronounced the woman dead and the stoning ceased.

The British nurse interrupted my sad ponderings when she returned to my rooms in great agitation. The police and mutawas were taking the girl away for her punishment. She said that if I stood in my doorway I could see her face, for the girl was not veiled. I heard a great commotion in the hallway. Quickly, I fastened my veil around my face. My feet moved my body forward without thought or intention.

The doomed one was fragile and childlike between the tall, stoic guards who led her to her fate. Her chin rested on her chest, so it was difficult to see the expression on her face. But I discerned that she was a pretty child, one who would have grown into beauty had she been allowed the opportunity to age. She glanced up with dread and peered into the sea of faces that was watching her with great curiosity. I saw that her fear was great. There were no relatives to travel with her to the grave, only strangers to see her off on the darkest of journeys.

I returned to my suite. I held my baby son with great tenderness and considered the relief I felt that he was not of the weaker sex. I gazed into his tiny face with wonder. Would he too uphold and thereby harden the system that was so unfair to his mother and sisters? I considered the possibility that all female babies should be put to death at birth in my land. Perhaps the stern attitude of our men would be tempered by our absence. I shuddered and the question came into my mind. How could a mother protect the young of her own sex from the laws of the land?

The eyes of the stalwart British nurse were wet with tears. She sniffled and asked why I, a princess, did not intervene in such madness. I told her that I could not help the one condemned; women are not allowed a voice in my land, not even women of the Royal Family. With sorrow I told the nurse that not only would the girl die as scheduled but her death would be hard and her life and death would go unrecorded. With bitterness, I thought of the truly guilty ones roaming free, without thought or care for the tragic death they had wrought.

Kareem arrived with a joyful face. He had organized our return to the palace as carefully as a plan of war. Police escorts eased our journey through the bustling traffic of the growing city of Riyadh. Kareem told me to hush when I related the incident at the hospital. He had no desire to hear such sadness with his new son in his arms, traveling toward his destiny as a prince in a land that soothed and nurtured such a one as he.

My feelings for my husband suffered as I saw that he cared little for the fate of a lowly girl. I gave a deep sigh and felt lonely and afraid of what I and my future daughters might face in the years to come.

Chapter Sixteen: Death of a King

The year 1975 holds bittersweet memories for me; it was a year of both glittering happiness and discouraging sadness for my family and my country.

Surrounded by those who loved him, Abdullah, my adored son, celebrated his second birthday. A small circus from France was brought over on our private planes to entertain. The circus stayed for a week at the palace of Kareem’s father.

Sara and Asad had survived their daring courtship and were now happily married and awaiting their first child. Asad, in great expectation of the child to be born, had flown to Paris and purchased all the baby clothes in stock at three large stores. Noorah, his disbelieving mother, told all who would listen that Asad had lost his mind. Enveloped in such love, my longsuffering sister, Sara, beamed with happiness at last.

Ali was studying in the United States and was no longer intimately involved in his sisters’ affairs. He gave Father the fright of his life when he announced that he was in love with an American working-class woman, but much to Father’s relief, Ali was fickle and soon informed us that he preferred to have a Saudi wife. We later discovered that the woman had struck Ali over the head with a candlestick when he became belligerent and demanding at her refusal to be obedient.

We young, modern-thinking Saudi couples embraced the subtle relaxation of the severe restrictions upon women as the years of efforts by King Faisal and his wife Iffat for women’s education and freedom proved successful. Along with our education came a determination to change our country. A few women no longer covered their faces, discarding their veils and bravely staring down the religious men who dared to challenge them. They still covered their hair and wore abaayas, but the bravery of these few gave hope to us all. We royals would never be allowed such freedom; it was the middle class that showed their strength.

Schools for women were now opening without public demonstrations of disapproval by the mutawas. We felt certain that women’s education would eventually lead to our equality. Unfortunately, the punishment of death for women among the uneducated fundamentalists still occurred. One small step at a time, we grimly reminded each other.

Suddenly, over a six-month period, Kareem and I became the owners of four new homes. Our new palace in Riyadh was finally completed. Kareem decided his new son would grow more hardy if he inhaled fresh sea breezes, so we purchased a new villa by the seaside in Jeddah. My father owned a spacious apartment house in London only four streets away from Harrods, and he offered the property, at a grand bargain, to any of his children who might be interested. Since my other sisters and their husbands already owned apartments in London, and Sara and Asad were in the process of purchasing an apartment in Venice, Kareem and I eagerly seized the opportunity to have a home in that colorful city so loved by Arabs. And finally, as a special three-year wedding anniversary gift for presenting him with a precious son, Kareem bought me a lovely villa in Cairo.

Upon the occasion of Abdullah’s birth, the family jeweler had flown to Riyadh from Paris to bring a selection of diamonds, rubies, and emeralds that he had designed into seven distinctive necklace, bracelet, and earring sets. Needless to say, I felt richly rewarded for doing what I had wanted to do.

Kareem and I spent as much time as possible in Jeddah. Happily, our villa was located on a coveted spot frequented by the Royal Family.

We played backgammon as we watched our son, surrounded by Filipino maids, paddle in the warm blue waters that teemed with exotic fish. Even we females were allowed to swim, though we kept our abaayas tight around us until we were up to our necks in water. One of the servants relieved me of the abaaya held high with my hand so that I could swim and splash with abandon. I was as free as it was possible for a woman to be in Saudi Arabia.

It was the end of March, not a hot month of the year, so we did not linger long after the midday sun. I told the servants to gather our laughing baby and rinse him under the specially made portable hot shower. We watched him as he gurgled and kicked his short, fat legs. Our smiles were broad with pride; Kareem squeezed my hand and said he felt guilty for feeling such happiness. I accused him later of bringing us, and all Saudis, bad luck by voicing his joy with life.

Most Arabs believe in the evil eye; never do we speak aloud of our joy with life or of the beauty of our children. Quite possibly, some evil spirit will hear and steal the object of our joy or cause us some grief by taking away a loved one. To ward off this evil eye, our babies are protected by blue beads pinned to their clothing. As enlightened as we were, our son was no exception.

Moments later, we recoiled in horror as Asad ran toward us with the words, “King Faisal is dead! Murdered by one of the family!” Struck dumb, we sat quivering as Asad told us the scanty details he had learned from a royal cousin.

At the root of our uncle’s death was a dispute about the opening of a television station that had occurred nearly ten years before. King Faisal had always stood firm for the progress of modernization for our backward land. Kareem said he had heard him say once that whether we Saudis liked it or not, he was going to pull us, kicking and screaming, into the twentieth century.

The problems he faced with the extremely religious citizens were a continuation of vexing situations encountered by our very first ruler and Faisal’s father, Abdul Aziz. These men of religion fought furiously against the opening of the first radio station, and our first king overcame the objections by ordering the Koran read over the airwaves. The religious ones could find little fault in such a speedy method of spreading God’s word. Years later, when Faisal strove to provide television stations to our people, he, like his father before him, encountered much opposition from the Ulema (the religious sheikhs).

Tragically, members of the Royal Family joined in such protests, and in September 1965, when I was but a child, one of our cousins was shot and killed by the police as he led a demonstration against a television station a few miles outside Riyadh. The renegade prince, with his followers in tow, had stormed the station. This episode ended in a rifle battle with the police, and he was killed. Nearly ten years had passed, but hate had bubbled in the younger brother of the prince until he had now retaliated by shooting and killing his uncle, the king.

Kareem and Asad flew to Riyadh. Sara and I, along with various female royal cousins, congregated within the confines of a family walled palace. We all wailed and shouted our grief to each other. There were few female cousins who did not love King Faisal, for he was our sole chance for change and ultimate freedom. He alone had the prestige with both the religious men and royal factions of our land to further the cause of women. He felt our chains as his own, and beseeched our fathers to stand behind him in his quest for social change. Once I myself heard him say that even though there are separate roles for men and women, as directed by God, no sex should rule with unquestioned supremacy over the other. With a quiet voice he said that he would know little happiness until each citizen of his land, both male and female, was the master of his or her own fate. He believed that only through the education of our women would our cause be enforced, for our ignorance has surely kept us in darkness. Certainly, no ruler since Faisal has championed our plight. Looking back, our short but heady climb to freedom began its slippery descent the moment his life exploded with the bullets of deceit from his own family. Sadly, we women knew that our one chance for freedom was buried with King Faisal.

Each of us felt anger and hate for the family that had bred such a one as our cousin, Faisal ibn Musaid, the slayer of our hopes and dreams. One of my cousins shouted out that the slayer’s father himself was not right in his mind. He, who had been born prominent in the scheme of Saudi royalty, a half-brother of King Faisal himself, had shunned all contact with family members and responsibility of the throne. One son had been a fanatic, willing to die to prevent the innocent installment of a television station, and another son had killed our beloved and respected King Faisal.

No pain could be worse than the thought of Saudi Arabia without such wisdom to guide us. Never before or since have I witnessed such national grief. It was as if our entire land and all its people were swathed in agony. The best leadership our family had to offer had been struck down by one of our own.

Three days later, Sara’s daughter surprised her mother by entering the world as a breech baby. Little Fadeela, named for our mother, joined a nation in mourning. Our grief was so deep that recovery was sluggish, but little Fadeela revived our minds and we recalled the message of joy through her new life.

Sara, in her fear for her daughter’s future, convinced Asad to sign a document that said their daughter would be free to choose her husband without family interference. Sara had suffered a troubling nightmare that she and Asad were killed in an airplane crash and her daughter was raised in the rigid manner of our generation. Sara, staring pointedly at Asad, said she would commit murder rather than see her daughter wed to a man of evil schemes. Asad, still wild with love for his wife, comforted her by signing the paper and by establishing a Swiss bank account in the baby’s name for one million dollars. Sara’s daughter would have the legal and financial means to escape her personal nightmares should necessity arise.

Ali returned from the United States for the summer holiday and, if it were possible, he was even more obnoxious than I recalled. He made a great point of telling us of his escapades with American women and announced that, yes, it was true, just as he had been told, they were all whores!

When Kareem interrupted and stated that he had met many women of high morals when he was in Washington, Ali laughed and suggested that much had changed. He declared that the women he had met in bars took the initiative and proposed sex before he had had the opportunity even to bring up the subject.

Kareem told him that was the issue; if a woman was alone in a bar, she was more than likely looking for a one-night stand or a good time. After all, women were free in America, the same as men. He advised Ali to attend church or cultural events, where he would be surprised at the conduct of the women. Ali was adamant. He said that he had tested the morals of women from all walks of life in America; they were all definitely whores, in his experience.