burning it.
Her aimless wandering brought her to the door of the kitchen. She put her hand to the heavy panelling and pushed.
Auntie looked up at once. ‘Mum-reese?’ she asked, pillowing her cheek against her folded hands.
‘Yes, she’s sleeping.’
‘Ah.’ The old woman put down the knife she had been using to slice vegetables and came round the table to Ruby. She reached up and pinched her cheek, gently, shaking her head and smiling at the same time so that her pale gums and isolated teeth were all on show. She murmured something in Arabic, the tone of her voice so soft with sympathy that Ruby’s eyes stung with sudden tears of self-pity. She sniffed furiously and pulled out of Auntie’s grasp.
Auntie pointed to the comfortable chair near the stove. It was padded with cushions made out of worn carpet strips in shades of faded garnet and copper, and it seemed to hold the substantial print of Mamdooh’s body.
‘Me?’ Ruby asked, and Auntie nodded so she sat down.
It was peaceful in the kitchen, with the click of the knife blade on scrubbed wood and the sharp scent of cut leaves. After a while, starting with a drawn-out note that still made Ruby jump, the chanting of the muezzin poured in through the screened windows. That was where Mamdooh had gone, to prayer.
Auntie took a pomegranate out of a woven rush basket and sliced it in half. With the sharp point of her knife she cut the jewelled beads of fruit away from the creamy pith and let them fall into a bowl. Next she took an earthenware pitcher, ladled a couple of spoonfuls of yoghurt onto the fruit and handed the bowl and a spoon to Ruby with a series of small encouraging nods.
Ruby dipped the spoon, and tasted. Tiny sharp globes burst against the roof of her mouth and her tongue was thick with velvety yoghurt. To be fed made her feel that she was back in a warm, familiar place again. For now; for the time being.
‘It’s nice.’ She smiled. ‘Thank you.’
When the call to prayer died away, Auntie began singing to herself as she worked. The sad chain of notes seemed to come from somewhere between her throat and the back of her nose, ululating in half and quarter-tones, with no beginning or end. Ruby listened and ate her pomegranate. Tomorrow was Ash’s day off. He had promised to come on the moby and take her out somewhere.
‘Where?’ Iris asked sharply. This morning she was wearing her silky striped gown and her hair was caught up at the sides of her head with turquoise and coral-headed combs. Ruby and Ash shuffled a little awkwardly under her gaze. ‘Where are you taking her?’
‘To al-Qalaa. To Citadel, Ma’am,’ Ash answered politely.
To where? Ruby was going to protest, but decided that she would save it until they were alone together.
‘I see. You will tell her some of the history?’
‘Of course. I am proud of this.’
‘Good.’ Iris approved of Ash, and even Mamdooh had opened the front door and shown him through into Iris’s garden without any noticeable signs of objection. ‘Go on. Off you go. Make sure you bring her back here by six o’clock on the dot.’
‘Of course.’ This time, Ash even bowed.
‘Creep,’ Ruby whispered under her breath.
The moby was outside. Ash pulled his sunglasses down over his eyes, flicked back his hair and gestured to the pillion. He was wearing his white shirt and dark-blue nylon Adidas tracksuit bottoms.
‘Where are we going?’
‘Didn’t you hear? To Citadel.’
‘Don’t I even get consulted? Maybe I don’t want to go there.’
He frowned at her. ‘Why not?’
Ash never backed down and Ruby liked that. He was also looking particularly fit today. She flicked a grin at him and bounced onto the pillion seat.
‘Oh, come on then. Let’s get going.’
He kicked the starter and they plunged out into the traffic. By now, Ruby was quite confident on the back of the bike. She pulled a scarf across her mouth and nose to filter out the dust and fumes, as she had seen other women passengers do, and wound her arm round Ash’s waist. Above them, monopolising the skyline, were the sand-coloured walls and turrets of the old Citadel. The way to it curved upwards along a series of wide, sun-baked avenues, past gaudy tents and littered fairgrounds on Midan Salah al-Din. When they reached the entrance at Bab al-Gabal they left the bike padlocked to the trunk of a struggling sapling and continued on foot, into a walled and crenellated maze of turrets and domes separated by glaring empty spaces that trapped the afternoon’s heat. Treading over hot stone and dust-lapped patches of lawn, Ruby began to lag behind Ash.
‘Why are we here?’ she demanded irritably.
‘History. First fort built here, nine hundred years old. By Salah al-Din.’
‘Yeah?’
‘You know who this is?’
‘Should I?’
He frowned at her again. ‘You are educated English woman and you know nothing, it seems. He is a great leader and warrior against your Christian Crusaders. You have heard of Saladin?’
She sighed. This did ring a faint bell. ‘Yeah. Look, I’m crap at history, always was. And geography and maths and biology, you name it. But I’m not at school anymore so it really doesn’t matter, does it?’
Ash looked dubious. ‘Learning is important. It is a way to make a life better for yourself and your family. You don’t believe this?’
Ruby squinted against the light. There was a weight inside these walls that made her feel uncomfortable and Ash’s crowding insistence made it worse.
‘Yes, I believe it, but that doesn’t mean I have to do it.’
He gave her his white crescent of a smile. ‘You are funny. And you are very pretty today.’
That was better. ‘Am I?’
Ruby had stopped making up her eyes with black lines and dark smudges, and she had also stopped gelling her hair into spikes because she had run out of gel with which to do it. It flopped over her forehead now in a shiny fringe that she clipped on one side to leave her pale forehead bare.
‘Yes,’ he said. He took her hand and turned it over to look at the veins on the inner side of her wrist. He glanced round to make sure that no one was watching them, then touched the tip of his tongue to the place where her pulse beat.
A second’s giddiness made Ruby close her eyes.
‘Come on,’ Ash whispered at last. ‘I show you something.’
The enormous mosque enclosed at the heart of the Citadel could be seen from almost every corner of the city, but from close at hand Ruby thought it was disappointing. The domes were covered in dull tin and the pale walls were stained, and a fat snake of tourist visitors lethargically coiled in front of the huge doors.
‘What
