Secret of the Sands Read Online Free PDF

– Zena loved her grandmother. She had nursed Baba devotedly through her short illness. When death finally came, Zena washed the old woman’s naked body and wrapped it in a white linen shroud. The servants buried the corpse and then Zena cried for three days without sleeping. Yari fed her yoghurt and honey though she scarcely tasted it.
    Above Zena’s head, the hold opens suddenly and those in the way pull back from the bright stream of blinding light that beams down. A bucket of brackish water is lowered on a rope and two more of scraps – rancid fat, raw fish and rock-hard khubz . The slaves fall upon it, tearing at each other to secure a cupped handful of water and a mouthful of food. A sound that Zena identifies as laughter floats down from the white square above her head as she eats the mush between her fingers and tries not to retch. Then the light is obliterated.
    The following day, a ladder is lowered and two men climb into the darkness. Each has a cloth tied round his mouth and nose, for the stench is foul. Together, they roughly remove the dead, hacking the chains and hoisting the stiff bodies over their backs. When the hatch closes behind them once more, they throw the cadavers into the sea from above, like a fishwife emptying a pan of trash – a shudder runs through the cabin as the survivors hear the splash, though all are relieved the rotting corpses are finally gone.
    The night after, the ship arrives in Muscat, rolls up its sail and the slaves are marched onto the deck by the light of the moon to be doused in sea water under the careful, still gaze of Asaf Ibn Mohammed. As the sky lightens and the Muslim call to prayer echoes over the city from minarets dotted along the shoreline of the sapphire bay, Zena catches sight of Kasim in the shadows, feeding scraps to a small guenon monkey he must have captured in the forest – a white-lipped tamarin. The little beast is tethered to him on a string but the animal is cleaner and better cared for than any of the dhow ’s human cargo. Zena is not sure, but thinks that she can make out that it is eating fruit of some kind. Gently, the man who less than a month ago beat Zena’s uncle to death sets the animal to one side with a small, metal cup of water so he can watch the slaves disembarking. He does not move into the light as three huge negroes, six feet tall, bound in muscles, their veins standing out like vines over sculpted stone and their eyes like the eyes of statues, bundle the new shipment ashore into a rickety warehouse. Everyone is so afraid and so glad to be on land again that not one single protest is raised. It would make no matter, in any case, for the handlers are in possession of both whips and the strength of lions. They are deliberately only dressed in indigo loincloths so that every rock-hard muscle is on show. What starving, enfeebled fool is going to try to make his case in the face of such strength? Who would dare even ask a question? These men can slice the weakest of them right down the middle and drink their blood, if they wish it, and no one will say a thing.
    *   *   *
    Locked inside the warehouse, Zena knows what to expect. She’s heard of this. Her skin will be oiled for the marketplace, which is surely close by. She can hear it, smell it. She feels sick with apprehension and hunger as she squats and waits. No one says a word, though two boys, not more than twelve and probably brothers, if Zena guesses correctly, hold hands. Wafting from a distance, they hear the waves of communal prayer that accompany the dawn. The haunting words of the Salat sung by a mullah with a strong, clear voice: ‘You alone we worship. You alone we ask for help.’
    I should have run, she berates herself, thinking of the proximity of the undergrowth near the beach. She knows she is confused. One moment one thing, one moment another. But right now running seems as if it would have been easy, certainly easier than the long days on the dhow. I might have