The Saffron Gate (64 page)

^{Again he didn't speak for a long time. Then he said, 'Manon was playing with words.' It was an odd statement, and I didn't understand it.}

^{'Oh.' There seemed nothing more to say, and we again drove in silence. Last night, what I had experienced was jealousy. I wasn't proud of it, but I couldn't deny it. So now, when he dismissed the woman as simply one of the villagers, saying he didn't have a wife, shouldn't I feel something like pleasure? But my reaction was the opposite. Aszulay's response troubled me. His face, his voice, his suddenly stiff hold on the steering wheel all told me there was something more. I had somehow upset him.}

^{He pulled to the side of the
piste
and turned off the engine, and then got out of the truck and unstrapped one of the large metal containers of fuel from the roof. Using a funnel, he poured gas into the tank. When he got back into the truck, the smell of the fuel surrounded him.}

^{'We shouldn't have left so late. The light is going early today; it's the dust,' he said.}

^{I nodded.}

^{'I had children,' he said then. 'Two.'}

^{The word
had
made the air in the truck suddenly too oppressive. It was as if there was no oxygen. I looked down at the edge of the blanket I sat on, running a loose thread through my fingers.}

^{'It was a fever. It killed my children, and my wife. Iliana,' he said, simply. 'Many died of this fever. Rabia's first son also died.'}

^{Suddenly I thought of his disappearance at the stream we'd stopped near just before the Ourika valley, and the cemetery we had passed.}

^{'Your wife and children,' I said. 'They're buried in the cemetery where we stopped, yesterday?'}

^{He nodded, and then tucked the end of his turban over his lower face and started the engine, and we continued along the
piste.}

^{I thought of Manon, slyly smiling as she told me Aszulay had a wife. I glanced at Aszulay, but he said nothing more.}

^{Within half an hour, the sky had turned a strange pale yellow. There was no more sun, and a wind came up, blowing so strongly that I saw how Aszulay had to grip the steering wheel to keep the truck on the track. Suddenly there was no distinction between earth and sky; it was a solid wall of dust. And yet Aszulay seemed to know where to go. I imagined him in the sandstorms of a desert, and how the knowledge of direction would be part of his nomadic instinct. Perhaps part of his genetic make-up, carried within his ancestors for centuries.}

^{I thought of what Etienne carried from his father.}

^{We had rolled up the windows as soon as the wind started, but still it howled around the cracks, blowing in the sandy dust. Finally Aszulay turned the wheel sharply to one side, and stopped the truck.}

^{Badou kneeled behind us, looking through the windshield. The wind whipped around the vehicle so ferociously that it swayed, just the slightest.}

^{Nothing was visible.}

^{'I don't like it, Oncle Aszulay,' Badou said, and his mouth turned down as his breathing became ragged. 'Is it
djinns?}

^{Tears filled his eyes. It was the first time I had seen him cry. 'Will they eat us?' I reached back and stroked his cheeks to dry them.}

^{'Of course not, Badou. It's only wind. Only wind,' Aszulay repeated. 'It can't hurt us. We just have to wait until it stops, so we can see the
piste
again.'}

^{'But . . .' Badou leaned over and whispered into Aszulay's ear.}

^{'He must go outside,' Aszulay said, his hand on the door handle.}

^{'I'll take him,' I said, because I was in the same situation.}

^{'No. The wind is so strong. I'll—'}

^{'Please, Aszulay. Let me take him,' I said, and Aszulay nodded, understanding, while Badou climbed over the seat into my lap.}

^{'Keep one hand on the truck at all times,' Aszulay said, as we pushed open the door and clambered out into the wind.}

^{Badou immediately turned to face the truck, pulling up his djellaba.}

^{'I'm just going around to the back of the truck, Badou,' I said, loudly, into his ear. With one hand on the truck as Aszulay had instructed, I went to the back, where I fought with my kaftan, whipping about me in the wind.}

^{It took only moments, and when I made my way back to the passenger side, Badou wasn't there. I opened the door and climbed in, pushing my hair back and rubbing at my eyes.}

^{'Where is he?' Aszulay said, and I turned to him, blinking.}

^{'What do you mean?' I climbed on my knees, pushing aside the canvas curtain, but Aszulay had already opened his door. 'I only left him for . . . a second . . . I thought he came back.'}

^{'Stay inside,' Aszulay shouted, over the wind.}

^{'No, I'll come—'}

^{'I said stay inside,' he yelled again, and slammed the door. I sat as if frozen, staring through the windshield. Surely Badou was just at the front of the truck. Or maybe I hadn't seen him as I'd felt my way back along the side. He must have been crouching near the tyre. Aszulay would bring him right back.}

^{But Aszulay didn't immediately come back into the truck with Badou. My heart thudded. How could I have left him, even for that moment? I had been so critical of Manon's lack of concern over him, and yet what had I just done? I put my hands over my mouth.}

^{Then I closed my eyes, my fingers laced in front of my face, rocking back and forth, saying, 'Let him find him, let him find him, let him find him.'}

^{But they didn't come back.}

^{The truck grew darker and darker. I wept, I prayed, I banged the side of my head against the window. I was a fool, an idiot. Could Badou survive even for a short time in this dust, or would it choke him? And Aszulay. I saw him wandering, calling for Badou, the wind snatching the name from his mouth. He had just told me he'd lost his own two children. Now. . .}

^{I couldn't bear it. I put my hand on the door. I would get out and find Badou. I was responsible for this, and I would find him. But as I reached for the handle I thought of Aszulay, shouting at me to stay inside, and knew he was right. I would be even more of a fool to leave the truck and wander about on my own.}

^{I held my watch close to my face in the dim light, trying to think what time it had been when we'd left the village, how long we had driven, how long I had waited here. The time didn't make sense. All I knew that it was too long, too long.}

^{Aszulay hadn't found Badou.}

^{THIRTY FIVE}

^{I
had stopped hoping. I simply sat there, in the slightly rocking truck, staring at the nothingness beyond the windshield.}

^{I didn't want to look at my watch, but finally I could stand it no more. Almost an hour had passed.}

^{Again I covered my face with my hands; again I wept.}

^{And then the driver's door banged open, and Aszulay pushed Badou in, climbed in behind him and slammed the door.}

^{I grabbed Badou, pulling away Aszulay's turban. It was wrapped completely around Badou's head and torso. I uncovered his little face; he stared at me. Sand was stuck in dried tracks down his cheeks.}

^{'Sidonie. I was lost. I didn't keep my hand on the truck.'}

^{'I know, Badou,' I said, weeping, rocking him against me.}

^{'I tried to find it,' he said.}

^{'I know. But you're safe now. You're safe,' I repeated, 'you're back in the truck.' And then I looked over his head at Aszulay, afraid of what I would see, knowing what a fool he must think me, how angry he would be.}

^{There was nothing but exhaustion on Aszulay's face. His eyes were closed as he leaned his head back. His hair and eyebrows and eyelashes were so coated that they were no longer black, but an odd dusty red. His nostrils were filled with the dust as well.}

^{'Are you . . . you're all right, Aszulay?' I asked, my voice stuttering with tears.}

^{'Give him water,' he said, and I moved Badou so I could lean over the back seat and grab the skin of water. I took out the cork and held it to Badou's mouth. He drank and drank, letting it run down his chin and neck. When he had finished, I held the skin to Aszulay, but his eyes were still closed. I moved closer, putting the mouth of the skin to his lips, and as it touched them he drank, still not opening his eyes.}

^{When he put his hand up to push away the skin, I poured water on to the end of his turban and wiped his eyes, trying to clear away as much grit as I could. He took the wet cloth from me and rubbed his face until he at last opened his eyes.}

^{'I'm sorry,' I whispered.}

^{He didn't answer for a moment. 'I found him not far from the truck. But I couldn't take a chance on not getting back, on wandering in the wrong direction. We took shelter in a small shelf of earth driven up by the wind. I waited, and finally the wind changed direction just enough for me to see the truck.' He looked down at Badou. 'I made you a little Blue Man, yes?'}

^{Badou nodded, and left my lap to push against Aszulay's side. Aszulay put his arm around him.}

^{Time passed. At some point Aszulay began to hum, holding Badou against him with one arm. It was a quiet, sad melody, much like the one he had played on the fife — the
rekka
, I knew now that it was called.}

^{I imagined him holding his own children, like this, humming to soothe them. I turned my head, staring at the swirling sand and dust, feeling I was witnessing something too personal.}

^{After a while he stopped humming, and I looked back at him. Badou had fallen asleep, his head on Aszulay's chest.}

^{'Will the wind end soon?'}

^{'I don't know. But we'll spend the night here. Even if the wind stops, it's too dark for me to drive the
piste
safely. Much of it will be covered now.'}

^{I nodded. It was almost completely dark in the truck, due to both the dust and the approach of evening. Aszulay reached beneath the seat and pulled out a candle and a box of wooden matches. He lit the candle and wedged it into a small opening on the dashboard.}

^{We sat in the soft light.}

^{'Aszulay,' I said. 'I'm so sorry. I don't know how—'}

^{'It's over,' he interrupted. 'He's all right. He was only frightened.'}