Moroccan Traffic: Send a Fax to the Kasbah Read online

  My mother stood waiting, as at an invisible bus stop. She said, ‘Are you starting a cold? People are beginning to leave. You’re meant to leave, or their dinners get cold.’

  I said, ‘I’ve resigned.’

  She stared at me, her eyes set like hazelnut whirls. It was the way she probably looked at my father. He had never resigned. He had never even got the hang of getting methodically sacked. His way was to start up his own spanking new business, and go on his beam ends when it did. My mother knew me better than that. All the same, I could see the text in her head before it got printed out. References. . . Pensions. . . Redundancy money. And by the way, what about our room at the Golden Sahara Hotel?

  She didn’t get to say any of it because Morgan spoke first. He said, ‘She did the right thing. And she’s got a new job. Helping me.’

  ‘She can’t cook?’ said my mother. I knew from the tentative way she spoke that she was interested.

  ‘Jeez!’ said Ellwood Pymm. I’d forgotten he was there. He said, ‘You resigned too, Mr. Morgan?’

  ‘Unfortunately, no,’ said Mo Morgan. ‘But I can choose what staff I please, and I need a personal assistant. If Sir Robert doesn’t like it, I’ll pay her salary out of the rivers of gold I’ve been promised.’

  ‘He sure came out of that room looking like thunder,’ said Mr. Pymm. ‘Would I be right in guessing at an ideological clash? Some kinds of Englishmen, they’ve got no respect for other men’s colours and creeds. You a practising Muslim, Mr. Morgan?’

  Mo Morgan, thinking his own thoughts, looked taken aback. He said, ‘Brother, we’re at a drinks party.’

  ‘I wouldn’t think that you were,’ said Ellwood Pymm. ‘Any more than Mr. Oppenheim can be Orthodox, with Muriel there as his wife. But to some Englishmen, a foreigner’s always a foreigner. You want to look at how much better we do things in the New World. I could take you to a party or two back in London where you’d hear things that would open your eyes.’

  ‘Oh, there you are,’ Johnson said. ‘Mo, Jimmy wants to have another look at your legs. The public figures have gone, and there’s a move afoot to transfer the whole detritus to the Place for a special knees-up folklore performance in honour of Auld. Pymm, your Canadian pals have sent out a raccoon call for your company. Mrs. Helmann—’

  ‘She’s resigned,’ said my mother, staring at him over a plateau of ethnic emigrant garments. ‘Sir Robert was here. Wendy’s resigned.’

  ‘What happened?’ said Johnson. He looked busy. Perhaps he was.

  I said, ‘I thought you said my mother’d be safe. She’s been with Mr. Pymm the whole day, and now we’ve no hotel. And you told Lady Kingsley where we were. Sir Robert knew just where to come. He walked right in on Mr. Morgan. If you want to know what happened, ask Mr. Oppenheim.’

  ‘That’s why I came,’ Johnson said. ‘Message from Muriel: the party’s moving outside. And really, I’m sorry about Sir Robert getting into a spat, but I don’t think it was Charity’s fault. Ask her. She came after all: there she is, talking to Oliver.’

  Oliver. I saw him now, for the first time: the large young man from Johnson’s yacht. Johnson said, ‘He’s been with your mother all day as well, but I don’t think she noticed him.’

  ‘Yes, I did,’ said my mother. ‘Thought he fancied me.’

  Johnson’s mouth moved. ‘So I think you’ll be safe,’ he said. ‘If, that is, you’d like to join the party. Horse-drawn carriages waiting outside, service free. All the drivers have nephews coached somewhere by Jimmy. I’ll go and tell Oppenheim.’

  I watched him walk to the study door and tap on it. I thought of Oppenheim sitting alone, looking at all those photographs. I realised we had to go with the party, because we didn’t have anywhere else to go. I set off for the door, walking slowly because I didn’t want to catch up with Muriel, and also because my mother had collected five different people who wanted to talk to her. Then we stood on the steps by the carriages, which was where Johnson eventually found us. He had brought Oppenheim with him and would have launched my mother into a vehicle except that she suddenly vanished.

  I gave myself five minutes to panic. She reappeared in rather less, preceded by a large ball of wool which bounded publicly down the Oppenheims’ steps, there to be cheered to a landing and pounced on by many dribbling feet. Professional and amateur, Jimmy Auld’s guests clotted into a jumping, elbow-swinging, hollering crowd that moved off with the ball down the drive, on to the grass and then back again to the steps, by which time it was a collection of yarn.

  Mo Morgan, I noticed, had been in there with the team: he passed us once, giving the thumbs-up sign to my mother. She stared back at him violently. She knits very good socks, as well as cooking and baking and ironing shirts and fixing up courses to get me appointments from which I resign.

  Chapter 15

  Iread an article once. It said, The Most Difficult Transition of All: From £1 to £2 Million Turnover.

  It isn’t.

  That was the evening I gave up what I had worked for. That was the evening I sat in the lee of my mother on a bench behind two trotting horses and watched the sun go down twice and maybe for ever in Johnson’s spectacles opposite.

  Nobody spoke. The wheels jolted over the potholes on the way to the Place Jemaa-el-Fna, and the horses’ hooves kept the same steady beat as the braces of horses before us pulling the coaches of Jimmy Auld and his footballing cronies, and the line of horses behind bringing Daniel Oppenheim and his much-photographed wife. Bringing Lady Kingsley without her eminent spear-throwing husband; and Ellwood Pymm, who organised charades to do with kidnapping and knives; and Mo Morgan who, having ratted in vain, had offered me a share in his highly uncertain future. Bringing Johnson’s high-class thug Oliver, whom I remembered hovering over the svelte topless Muriel on Dolly, and who might – who just might – feature in those later, shocking pictures shown to her husband. Unless, of course, the man in those pictures was Johnson. Sitting with him in that barouche I should have told him what happened, but I wasn’t going to. Morgan could do it.

  A cheerful throng escorted us every step of the way. Boys somersaulted and cartwheeled beside us. Folk-dancers scampered on bare feet and leaped, their djellabahs flying. Singers rode beside us in pairs on Motobecane Vespas, ululating above the buzz of the motor. And although the main body of horsemen had galloped ahead to prepare the display they had promised us, the occasional rider appeared, and upset the carriage horses by firing his rifle.

  The first time it happened, I saw Johnson glance at my mother. I couldn’t be bothered to turn. I didn’t even peer at the riders to see if I recognised Sullivan’s vicious friend Gerry Owen. Men got shot; rooms got blown up; people were blackmailed and threatened. I didn’t care. I didn’t work for Kingsley’s any more. My mother said, ‘You lost your nerve?’

  She wasn’t speaking to me: she was speaking to the twin setting suns which were Johnson. He showed no particular desire to respond. Scents of lemon and orange and garlic whipped past our noses. Every building was pink; lamps glimmered; the Koutoubia minaret was abruptly outlined in light bulbs. Johnson said, ‘Yes. I think you should both go straight to Rita’s.’

  ‘Nix,’ said my mother, groping inside her bag. ‘Wendy? You did all them courses on self-defence? You got your hatpin?’

  My hatpin was at Rita’s with my modest holiday clothes. I shook my head, and was handed a long battered skewer with a scuffed crochet ball on the end. ‘Are you a coach potato?’ asked my mother. You take that, and do what you have to.’

  It isn’t my fault my mother is crazy. I wished we really were going to Rita’s. I had given up calling her Geddes.

  Johnson murmured, ‘Go easy.’

  ‘My name’s Doris,’ my mother said. ‘You think you know better than I do?’

  He never really smiled. He said, ‘No, Doris. I don’t.’ I thought the next thing we knew, he’d be fixing her pipes or her wiring. At least one thing was for sure. He wouldn’t be moved to paint her flaming po
rtrait.

  We arrived in the square, and dismounted, and piled with the rest into the forecourt of one of the cafés that lined it. Jimmy Auld was absorbed by a robed crowd of men who kept kissing him on either cheek. Johnson hefted my mother into a seat while I looked about me and patted the horses, which were fitted with blue plastic eyeshades, and answered to Françoise and Bijou. As soon as the café seat by my mother was filled, I went and found another one, by itself, with a view. I looked for Mo Morgan and saw him with three men with big jaws, whom I suspected must be some of his climbing friends. I saw Oppenheim arrive with his wife, who had flung a cashmere shawl over her toga. In the rosy light she seemed to be smiling, although Oppenheim beside her was expressionless. I thought she saw me, but she didn’t come over. Ellwood Pymm, who did, said, ‘Well, is it my lucky day! You don’t mind, baby? After all those close shaves we had together?’

  He had brought his own chair. I couldn’t stop him sitting down. He couldn’t do anything to me surrounded by people. I looked about but didn’t see Johnson, or Oliver. Oppenheim took his seat, in the end, beside his father-in-law among the front tables edging the Place. I saw Muriel moving about, talking and smiling. Eventually she sat down with some couple. Pymm said, ‘Your mother reads Arab newspapers?’

  I was about to say no, and then remembered where he was staying. I said, ‘Sometimes.’ I kept my voice low, because he did.

  ‘Naturally, she’s sympathetic. And Mo there, why not. And you’re a nice girl: you do what your mother says, and I like it. But as I was saying to Mo, Arabs ain’t natural businessmen. You want a contract, you want it legal, in words your lawyer and my lawyer understand. I say, don’t get round a table with Arabs. You tell that to your mother. And JJ, whatever commission he’s getting up there at the Palace. And you wise up old Danny boy there.’

  ‘Mr. Oppenheim?’ I said. I had no idea where Johnson stood racially, but if anyone was the opposite of an Arab, it was Daniel Oppenheim.

  Pymm shrugged. ‘You never seen him with those Arab princes? And listen, you pass all that on to Mo. Mo wants to have fun and get rich, all he has to do is stay where he is.’

  I said, ‘But he doesn’t get on with Sir Robert.’

  Mr. Pymm smiled, his pug nose expanding. He looked like a door-to-door fruit bat. ‘Some things get sorted out,’ said Mr. Pymm. ‘My gut feeling is that some things get sorted out if you wait long enough. You doing anything later tonight?’

  I had wakened up. I stared at him. I said, ‘Yes. Having my dinner standing up with my mother.’

  ‘Hey, baby!’ said Ellwood Pymm. His voice conveyed hurt. ‘I didn’t mean her. Your Mom’s a real proper lady. But say, what about after dinner? There we are, in the same big hotel. I don’t want for you to be lonely. It can be lonely, being out of a job. Friends are useful.’

  I used the skewer. He took his hand off my thigh with a gasp just as Charity Kingsley settled herself in a chair on my other side. She was still wearing her jodhpurs, and maybe even her spurs. Pymm hesitated, then got up and walked away. Lady Kingsley said, ‘Those poor bloody horses. You look very nice.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘I’ve resigned.’

  ‘Good,’ she said.

  She wasn’t getting away with that. Not now, she wasn’t. I said, ‘Sir Robert came. You told him where Mr. Morgan would be. You said you weren’t coming to the Oppenheim party.’

  ‘I know. I didn’t mean to bother,’ she said. ‘And then some friends at the stables persuaded me. Actually, I didn’t tell him: I don’t know how he found out. If you’re sorry, I’m sorry. Are you in need of a job?’

  ‘I’ve got one,’ I said. ‘With Mr. Morgan.’

  For a moment her surprise showed; then she laughed. She said, ‘Oh, dear.’

  ‘What do you mean, oh dear?’ I asked. They were serving drinks. I saw Morgan had got up in response to a wave from Jimmy Auld, and had gone to the front to join him and Oppenheim. A table arrived, and a plate of pastries and two full glasses of whisky. Lady Kingsley took one, so I took the other. She smelled faintly of horse.

  She said, ‘Just that I think you’re rather splendid. Look. We ought to watch. Isn’t Jimmy Auld marvellous?’

  ‘I thought you didn’t like football?’ I said.

  I could see her profile, as she trained her large, light eyes on the arena. She had no make-up on, and I had a suspicion she wore glasses for reading. She was bestowing critical attention on the lines of black caps and swaying white djellabahs before us, and the rows of bright, fleshy feminine faces topped with coins and gauzes and flowers and looped with beads big as onions. The women were singing already, holding hands and stamping their feet to a welter of sound arising from drums and percussion and tubes and fiddles and a man wearing a brass cap and chiming himself monotonously with a stick. Lady Kingsley said, shouting a little, ‘Football? My dear, I think it’s ludicrous, but I adore Jimmy Auld. Mr. Johnson, don’t you adore Jimmy Auld?’

  I didn’t know where Johnson had come from. He placed a chair plumb in front of us and, sitting, shouted amicably back, ‘Legendary,’ Johnson said. ‘Nicest fanny-pincher I know. May I blanket some of the sound for you?’

  My mother appeared to have brightened him up. I could see her where he had left her, a coloured bolster surrounded by people, her mouth opening and shutting. She had got one elbow on the table, which was equivalent to a performance by Houdini. Her presumed guardian angel Oliver was not to be seen, even doting on Muriel; but I saw Pymm, and he was nowhere near her.

  Johnson wasn’t looking about him at all, but was good at refilling our glasses and talking. The lines of singers were replaced by clapping men and dancing girls in glistening kaftans. There was some slapstick with drums, and some juggling. There was another dance, done by men dressed as women. We applauded, and everyone drank and ate and chattered and Johnson, receiving permission, took out and loaded his pipe and smoked it peacefully. I remembered he wasn’t supposed to, and realised he was skiving from Rita.

  At some point Morgan noticed us sitting behind him and turned and grinned. He had pinned his pigtail on top of his head with a twist of frilled braid and a cherry. I wondered if he had had a chance to tell Johnson that the great Oppenheim-Morgan buyout was off, and exactly why. For a while the two of them held a drawling conversation about something I didn’t understand, although Jimmy Auld turned round now and then and threw in a remark or a bellow of laughter, and once Oppenheim turned and gave a measured view of his well-cared-for teeth. Then Johnson said, ‘Look. The horses are coming.’

  By then, the light had almost gone. The space before us flickered with acetylene lights from the stalls and the open-air cooking places. Hot charcoal winked in the dark, and yellow filaments beaded far buildings. The glare of light from our café threw our shadows over the tables and on to the ground of the Place.

  Now the storytellers, the snake-charmers and the acrobats had given way to a solid phalanx of sturdy, quarrelsome men mounted on tasseled horses and brandishing rifles. The Fantasia was imminent. The Fantasia which reproduces a tribal cavalry charge with all its speed, its swerves, its manoeuvres, as can be seen at the Hotel Golden Sahara, outside the front door on Mondays and Thursdays.

  The horses were excited already, rearing and prancing, and their booted riders, robed and turbaned in white, would have ridden straight over a Desert Song audience without even noticing. Lady Kingsley said, ‘Now, this is going to be something.’

  Johnson agreed. His pipe had gone out, but he looked none the worse for having smoked it. A waiter, threading softly among us, placed a candle on Morgan’s table and then on ours and lit them both, protecting them from the wind with his palm. He had moved away when Johnson touched his pipe and called something to him. His French was quite idiomatic: I wasn’t even sure what he said until the man returned, smiling, and handed over his matchbox. He waited, answering politely, while Johnson relit his pipe and made friendly small-talk. The flame pulsed and Johnson, puffing gently, lidded the bowl with the bo
x.

  It took all that time for me to realise that the waiter’s voice was familiar, and to remember where I had heard it before. I paid no attention to the body of men now massed into a horde at the end of the square. I didn’t hear any command, or even the distant rumble of hooves as there began, deceptively slowly, the series of large ragged movements that would climax at top speed before us. I just said to Johnson, ‘It’s the carpet man!’

  I suppose I screamed it. Lady Kingsley jumped. Morgan turned round, half-rising. The waiter took a step back. Johnson dropped the matchbox and killed the candle flame with a sweep of one hand, shoving me low with the other. He was calling to Morgan, who began, all too slowly, to reach for the flame on his table. His and ours were the only two candles alight. Then I was down from my chair on one knee, and gasping as Johnson half-landed on top of me. Something clattered and flashed. I saw the waiter’s sandalled foot turn, and then stop as its ankle was seized. The foot kicked, and Johnson rolled back to go with the blow, but still holding. The waiter twisted to scoop up the thing that had fallen.

  I still had the skewer with the crochet ball handy. I chose the leg the waiter was standing on, and drove the thing up to the neck in his calf. He cried out twice, the second time because Johnson had got better leverage and jerked him right off his balance. He began to fall, bumping against tables whose occupants, thinking us drunk, were only mildly distracted. Johnson rose to seize him, to cries of disapproval from all those whose view he was blocking, as the Desert Song at full pelt swept towards us.

  By now, you couldn’t ignore it. The riders, howling, thundered over the square. The heat and smell of the cavalry charge hit us. The delirious explosion of scores of rifles wrapped us in smoke, pungent with the stench of cordite and onions and horse dung. The white-clad army skidded to a glorious halt at our feet, and went on shouting and firing its rifles. Johnson, reaching out for the waiter, threw a rapid glance over his shoulder. The waiter tugged, the rifles fired, and Daniel Oppenheim gave a scream and crashed forward over the table.