Secret of the Sands. Sara Sheridan

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 made it, she thinks. At least I would have tried.

      As the dawn rises, the fiery orange gradually fades from the sky and through the slats of the locked door Zena catches bare glimpses of the harbour, slices of Muscat life in the bright morning light. It is unexpectedly beautiful. She has never seen anything like this place – a huge bay bordered by high, green hills. It is a big city, she realises – larger than any settlement she has ever known. The dockside is properly paved and the houses and businesses built of a pale mud crammed between the date palms. The newer constructions are whitewashed so they dazzle when the sun hits them, and over time the older ones have muted to a dun brown. Along the dock there is a castle of some kind – a fortification set back from the water’s edge, with huge, dark guns pointing out to sea over its battlements.

      The dock is already busy – a sure sign of a profitable trading port – with forty ships or more at anchor. Outside, the morning’s trade has started – a man with birds in a wicker cage is setting up his stall next to a hawker in a dazzling white jubbah with a litter of prayer mats. The men are boiling water over a small fire and are set to brew mint tea with a sliver of cinnamon and some honey which they will sip from delicate, etched-glass cups. Three dirty goats are tethered between the stalls. A toothless beggar with only one leg and one eye struggles past, arrayed in a filthy swathe of rags, his sole possession a calabash from which he stops intermittently to drink. One of the traders hastens to beat him away. ‘Son of a dog!’ the man shouts, waving his arms as if batting off a fly, the tone of his protestation furious. ‘Away with you!’ Ibn al-kalb. Imshi. Imshi.

      ‘They will eat us,’ one of the other girls bursts out suddenly as the angry words filter through. Her voice is trembling. ‘No one ever comes back when they are taken. They will eat us all.’

      She begins to cry, huge sobs wracking her angular, bony frame. The rest of the group remain absolutely silent though a few shoulders round in fear. Zena ignores the hysteric – she knows she will be sold here, not devoured. Besides, seeing Muscat waking up has somehow heartened her. It is not as alien as she might have expected. The city is prosperous, clearly, and if the call to prayer is anything to go by, there are a lot of mosques so perhaps it is also devout. She knows it is unlikely she will get away now, for apart from anything else, where can she run to? But this is a large and cosmopolitan place, she knows more about it than anyone else she is locked up with and the worst, surely, is over. She turns her head towards the light and thinks she must, at least, try to remain hopeful. Someone kind will buy me, she thinks as she clutches her empty stomach and assures herself that she will eat soon, perhaps within the hour.

       Chapter Eight

      In a five-storey, palatial townhouse on Albemarle Street, just off Piccadilly, John Murray, London’s most prestigious publisher, rises late, the summertime sounds of London finally cutting short his slumbers. Some damn fool is shouting his wares at the top of his voice. Murray has to concentrate for the words to become distinct – he has never woken easily and it always takes him a while to come to full consciousness. After a few seconds it becomes apparent that the costermonger has roused the master of the house over some beets and pears that are available to purchase. Murray groans and reaches over to the other side of the bed. His wife is already gone and he is glad of it. They squabble almost constantly and he tries to avoid her whenever he can – the damn woman is as bad as his mother. She will, like many upper-class ladies, leave town at the end of the month to visit friends in the country, and Murray (unlike many upper-class gentlemen) will remain in the capital, shot of her for a few, satisfying weeks. It is a cheering thought.

      He makes use of the chamber pot and stows it back under the bed. Then, rather than calling for his valet, he washes in a desultory fashion, pulling on his wig haphazardly, preoccupied over whether he might have chocolate this morning with his rolls, or coffee. Still debating this, he takes the stairs down at a sharpish trot to the sunny, yellow drawing room on the first floor. He never will get used to the portrait of Lord Byron over the mantel, though, of course, to remove it would cause a scandal were further scandal required. It has been a good ten years since Murray’s father famously burned Byron’s memoirs to safeguard public morality, and hardly a week passes even now that he is not asked by some starry-eyed matron or other if the old codger had, by chance, ever mentioned to his son the nature of the manuscript’s contents. Murray considers the matter both foolish and tiresome. He is a serious man of science and his interests do not stretch to poetry – unless perhaps it is German poetry – or indeed to much in the way of scandal. Byron’s musings on sherbet and sodomy might have funded Murray’s education, but now, as he has been known to dryly remark, it is time to put aside such childish things. At least in conversation – for Byron’s full canon still graces the great publisher’s list and sells at least several hundred copies every year. In addition, each week Murray receives by post a number of attempts at Byronic genius, all of which, on principle, he consigns to the fire.

      Coffee, Murray decides.

      The enticing smell of fresh bread is floating upstairs from the kitchens in the basement and he can almost taste the melting butter and lemon conserve already. A glass of rhenish, some ham perhaps and he will be set.

      There is a pile of correspondence on his desk and, as it is Friday, he might have passed it by for it is his habit to ride on a Friday morning, but there is one packet that catches his eye. Neither the handwriting nor the paper is extraordinary but in the small, nondescript, black wax seal there are embedded some grains of sand. Murray breaks open the packet with a satisfying click and inside lies a manuscript bound in worn card, accompanied by a covering letter dated several weeks before and written in a neat hand.

       Dear Sir,

      I wish to offer for your consideration an account of my recent exploration and adventures on the island of Socotra where I have been humbly employed as an officer of the Indian Navy during the current survey of the Red Sea by the ship Palinurus. I hope you might wish to publish my unworthy writings and find them of some small interest.

       Yours, etc.,

       James Raymond Wellsted (Lieutenant)

      Murray crosses the room and spins the leather globe until he finds the Red Sea. Then he peers short-sightedly to try to identify the islands nearby. He has never heard of this Socotra place but with the help of a magnifying glass he quickly plants a firm finger over the speck of the island, which is far smaller than his nail. It is perched to the east of Abyssinia and to the south of Oman.

      I must ask George about this, he thinks.

      Murray will be dining that evening with the President of the Royal Geographical Society and his beautiful wife, Louisa. The manuscript might make for some interesting dinner conversation over the roast fowl and jellied beets. His wife will not like it, for her interests do not run to anything the least bit sensible, but Murray, like most of London, is eager for news of the Empire’s burgeoning territories – the more exotic, the better – and a keen sense for a bestseller is in his blood. If it is written well, an explorer’s memoir is generally a sure-fire success. So many people these days are either venturing abroad themselves, or have relations in the far reaches, that there is something of a vogue for travel writing and Murray’s view is that he will be publishing more and more of the stuff. After all, it is worthy, educational and occasionally exciting (all of which he approves far more than any damned fiction). There is a market, he fancies, for some kind of guidance for those embarking on life overseas. He must make a note of that, he thinks, and scrambles around for a clean sheet of paper. In any case, the prospect of dinner tonight is especially entertaining and, he is certain, there may even be pear pudding, for that costermonger had been right outside. Cook surely will have