Agent on a Mission Read online

  This was the house that Sultan, as a young newlywed, investing long hours of work, had built by the sweat of his brow. He laid the foundations about six months before their marriage and set the last stone on the birth of his firstborn son, Adel. There was no other house like it on the sands of the Negev and the young husband and father was very proud of it, in spite of the fact that he never bothered to sleep in it. He preferred his tent, where he ate, drank and received his guests and, in fact, the building of the house was proof of his love for the rare woman he had found and the family nest he had nurtured.

  That was many years ago and now she would hear strange, jarring voices emanate from the house he had built in her honor. The giggles of a woman would come from the house and when Leila also recognized the laughter of her husband, she would clench her teeth at the insult. Nevertheless, she ignored it and never raised the subject between them. Each time she heard the voices, she preferred to bury her head in the sand. Her healthy reasoning led her to understand that such moments were preferable to her husband taking another wife. She feared that one day she would find a fresh young Bedouin woman in her tent, more beautiful than herself, who would take his love from her.

  Leila underestimated herself. She was especially impressive and very tall, perhaps too tall by her standards, because she was of similar height to the tallest men of the tribe. Her figure was slim, in spite of many births, and she concealed her amazing face under a voluminous veil so that strangers would not see her. Only her enormous black eyes were revealed and nothing was hidden from them. Her long thick lashes resembled those of the white camel, which was pegged to the outer tent with a short rope. Her infant daughter had also inherited these lashes.

  * * *

  Three weeks later, Naim, who was still in mourning for his wife, Rama, visited the tent of his brother in law, Sultan. Before leaving home, he loaded and secured the young camel cow, born on the same day as Leila and Sultan’s daughter, onto his green truck. He had waited for it to be weaned of its mother’s milk before bringing it as a gift to the Ka’abiah tribe to mark the occasion of the birth of their daughter.

  When he reached the tent, he untied the calf and led it over the hot sand. The calf walked behind him, swaying its head like a lissome dancer and remained standing when they reached the tent.

  Naim entered, nodded slightly in greeting and sat on the mat with his head bowed. The men took turns in comforting him with words of condolence and participation in his mourning the death of his wife.

  “Rama died on the very day that out little Naima was born,” Sultan began, in words of condolence and everyone noticed the name he had given his infant daughter. Naim’s eyes filled with tears and he turned his gaze away. He was a Bedouin man, who had been taught to conceal his emotions.

  “Naim, I am very sorry about your wife,” Hamdan Abu-Zeiton of the neighboring tribe said as he extended his arm and touched his shoulder. Naim bowed his head as Hamdan continued, “She was a good wife to you and a good mother to your children.”

  Sultan sucked hard on his hookah, exhaled smoke from his nose.

  “You know, Naim, that we are now your family.” Silence reigned among the men. The proud father, Sultan, offered his hookah to Naim but Naim raised his arm to refuse, apologizing that he did not smoke. Liraz, Sultan’s eldest daughter stood at the entrance to the tent, a round silver tray in her hand. The pungent aroma of coffee rose up from the Finjan on the tray as the little cups were filled. On a sign from his father, Adel, his eldest son of fifteen rose and went to the entrance of the tent to take the tray from his sister.

  Sultan raised the cup of coffee and toasted. “To the life of my new daughter, whom we have named Naima.”

  Naim laughed briefly, raised his cup of coffee and added, “To the life of Naima and to the life of Ramia, the camel cow that was born at exactly the same time as she was and which I have brought her as a gift.”

  Liraz appeared again, carrying a wooden box, which she laid at Sultan’s feet. The baby lay in the box on an embroidered cushion. The men peeped inside and sucked their lips to express sincere admiration.

  Chapter Two

  They all saw that, in spite of the baby being the third daughter born in a row, Sultan was especially proud of her. He spoke of her golden hair, pale eyes and the lush lashes that framed them.

  What Sultan, the proud father, could not have known of was the phone call from Omar to her uncle, Naim. Omar was a powerful slave trader from Saudi Arabia, who dominated the marketing of women

  Special news spreads in a flash over the vast terrain of the desert.

  It hadn’t taken long for the rumor of the birth of an unusual Bedouin girl to make its way to other places. Such things are like nectar to the bees among these traders and they have great patience.

  The first call came on the same morning that Naim was preparing to set out on his visit to the ‘Ka’abiah encampment. The phone in the saddlebag on his camel rang. Hesitated, but, finally, pulled the phone out of the bag and answered the call. In retrospect, he regretted doing so, regretted it very much.

  “Ahalan, hello,” he said.

  “Ahalan w’Sahalan, hello and welcome, ya’Naim, congratulations on the birth of your daughter.”

  “Shukran, thank you. You know that this baby is not mine, Omar, but I will convey your blessings to her parents.”

  “We know and are well aware of that,” Omar replied, “but the new little one belongs to your family, doesn’t she?”

  “Yes, that’s right.” Naim replied, proudly.

  Silence. Naim squinted in suspicion and waited. It was clear to him at once why this trader of women had called him.

  “Listen, my dearest Naim, I am sending someone to fetch the child and bring her here,” he said, to which Naim responded with an immediate protest.

  “Wait, it isn’t that simple. I will personally assure you of a good price, not just good, but excellent! You must admit, that one doesn’t obtain such fine goods every day, right?”

  Naim choked, unable to swallow and the words stuck in his throat.

  “Hello, Naim? Are you there?”

  “Yes, yes, Omar, I’m still here, with all due respect…” He gathered all his strength to answer him: “This one is beyond price and really isn’t your kind of merchandise. I’m really very sorry, ya'Effendi’, Sir.”

  Omar continued babbling on the phone, but Naim was panic stricken. The small phone fell out of his hand and dropped on the sand. He slipped down from the camel, fumbled about for the phone in the hot grains of sand like a blind man and when he tried to sit down again, he slipped off again and hurt his elbow. He remained sitting beside the legs of the camel that was waiting to straighten up, thought for a moment and decided not to ride it. He preferred to drive his truck to visit his brother in law’s family, there, where the unusual baby girl had been born.

  Now, he sat there with everyone but his thoughts were not with them. They all chattered and babbled and all he could think about was how to evade the traffickers and save the child from their grasp.

  Naim had been working in the service of his masters from Saudi Arabia for some ten years. There, he had made the acquaintance of Omar, a tough and dangerous trafficker. Naim understood that there was almost no possibility of getting away from them. Till now, there had never been an occasion when a girl or a young woman, marked by them, had been saved and left in her place of birth.

  As evening fell, Naim took leave of his hosts and drove off in his truck to return to his tribe. The desert was already dark and the two straight beams of his headlights were swallowed up in the distance as they forged their way through the dark desert night.

  Naim returned to his tents and his heart was filled with foreboding.

  There was silence for eight months with no further messages from Saudi Arabia. The last conversation had almost disappeared from Naim’s memory when he heard the telephone ring. The number on the screen was the last one in the world he wanted to see. This time it was Ashraf’
s voice, loud and clear. Ashraf was speaking on behalf of Omar, his employer.

  “Ahalan, Naim, how are you, dear friend?”

  “Ahalan w’Sahalan, Hello and welcome, ya’Ashraf.”

  Unlike the pleasantries that were the customary opening of their conversations, this time Ashraf got down to business immediately without going round in circles.

  “What’s the matter with you, Naim, why aren’t you coming to talk business with us?”

  Naim remained silent. His thoughts raced around in his head. He couldn’t tell Ashraf that he knew what he was referring to or reveal that he was frightened to death.

  “Naim, you’re still there, aren’t you?” the despised voice asked.

  “Yes, yes, Ashraf,” he replied as if wakening from a reverie.

  “Listen here, Naim, let me make myself clear with regard to that little one, I mean that baby girl with the light colored eyes and golden hair.” He sounded excited. “First of all, how did it happen, in the name of Allah that you brought a Bedouin with colors like that into the world?”

  Naim winced. Ashraf seemed to be talking about some rare species, a priceless animal. He imagined little Naima with her mother, Leila, and kicked at the sand beneath him with repressed rage.

  “Naim, I would like to put your mind at rest. This time, when you bring us this little girl, she will be raised by Adel, my first wife. Believe me; in a few years you won’t even recognize her. We will turn her into a queen.”

  He continued chattering away and making plans while Naim distanced the phone from his ear. It was difficult to listen to his remarks and he realized that, this time, there was no escaping a face to face meeting and a frank discussion with the ‘Rais’ (the leader), Omar.

  Omar, the master and Ashraf, his servant, lived in Saudi Arabia where they controlled the global market in trafficking women. They could get any woman they wanted with a flick of a finger and no one could stop them.

  Naim immediately began to plan his secret departure for the long journey to confront Omar. It was clear to him that no one should know he was on the way to Saudi Arabia, on a difficult route through the desert.

  * * *

  Naim decided not to delay his departure. He planned to set out on the long journey the day after he spoke to Ashraf. He placed a soft, special carpet on the hump of his white camel. His daughter sewed pockets into the carpet and filled them with provisions for the journey that would suffice for two days.

  The plan was to cover a third of the way to Saudi Arabia across the Negev desert, from West to East on the back of his camel and continue the remainder of the way to Omar and Ashraf by car. A vehicle would await him, as always, at the usual place, beside the hills of Edom in Jordan.

  Naim was an experienced man of the desert, who had travelled this route several times. He knew it was a long, bumpy and perilous road, a road that only people who live in the desert are able to travel and survive. It was also a journey that could not be travelled in the company of others but alone, with nature as a guide. That way, he knew he would have the time he needed to plan what he was going to say to ‘Big Omar’. He searched endlessly for an idea that would make Omar stop demanding the baby girl and shy away from the deal.

  He rode for many hours.

  The sun rose in the sky and was almost a directly above him. It was difficult to breathe in the oppressive heat. Naim slid down out of the saddle and stood on the hot sand. His hands slid over the warm skin of the desert animal and he felt her trembling beneath his touch. He pulled the rope attached to her neck and pushed her downwards. The camel crouched, first folding her hind legs and afterwards, the front ones and roared with a mighty voice that disappeared into the hot air. The camel’s mouth opened and white froth came out of it. Naim leaned against the camel, took a water bottle from his belt and drank the chilled water. Afterwards, he poured some in his hand and moistened his brow and eyes. There was not a spot of shade and no shelter from the terrible heat that surrounded them so he sought refuge, hiding in the shade of the camel’s body.

  Naim’s eyes closed for a few minutes. His breathing and body relaxed and he slept for a very short while. When he awakened, and stood up again on his feet, he urged the crouching camel to get up. Moving heavily, he mounted her, gently touched her belly with the heels of his shoes and she continued on her way, swaying her long neck to the rhythm of her strides. From a bird’s eye view the man and the beast appeared joined together like two small dark dots in an endless sea of yellow sand.

  Even though there was no path or clearly defined route, Naim was familiar with the terrain. He knew that towards evening, after another four hours of riding, the tops of the palm trees at the oasis he was familiar with would pop into view. He planned to pass the first night of his journey there.

  And, indeed, after a few hours the treetops appeared on the horizon. They seemed to be floating in the air, detached and suspended in the haze that rose up from the boiling sand.

  Sparse stalks of grass grew between the trunks of the tall palms. Naim spread an old carpet out on the sand and took his bag of food out of the saddlebag. He was as hungry as a wolf. He cupped the pita that had been baked the day before in the taboun by his daughters and dipped it in green olive oil. His meal was as satisfying to him as a king’s feast. Bitter olives and cucumbers that had been pickled at home in his tent were a splendid addition to his desert meal.

  When he finished eating, he got up, looked around and gathered some dry twigs and which he piled into a small mound. He lit a fire with a transparent lighter and placed a Finjan with water on the fire after adding three heaped spoons of dark brown coffee. The aroma of the coffee was as pleasing as that of myrrh oil.

  Naim picked up the blanket and shook the crumbs left from his meal off it, then spread it out again on the ground. He lay his tired body down on it and before he fell asleep, he wondered momentarily whether he was behaving stupidly by going all the way just to tell them that they would not get that child from him. Within minutes, he fell asleep.

  He traversed the desert for another two days till he heard the vibrato of the muezzin’s calls echoing in the air. The tall round minarets of the mosques could gradually be seen as sharp bare cliffs in shades of purple and brown appeared before Naim. He reached them and stopped close to the place where a red cliff rose up in the sky. Here, he looked for the entrance that he knew existed, but everything appeared smooth. Suddenly, as if out of the rock face, a dark-haired youth appeared. Naim wondered to himself for a moment how a man could stand here and never know that there was an entrance to a dwelling among these rocks.

  He dismounted the camel and handed its rope to the young man. His name was Sharif and he had been sent here by Judge Adam, whom he was serving. Sharif was acquainted with Naim from a previous visit and acknowledged him with a nod as he stroked the back of the camel’s neck and whispered to it affectionately.

  “Are you alone?” Naim asked but received no reply.

  Sharif led them to a building constructed of wooden beams that was a kind of stable. A dappled gray horse that was tied close by whinnied and snorted at the camel.

  “I’m here alone and everything’s in order,” Sharif said and suddenly stopped, as if he just remembered something, stared at Naim and asked:

  “The Bedouin baby, what’s happening with her?”

  “I’m not prepared to talk about her now,” Naim responded with a measure of anger in his voice.

  “Understood.”

  Sharif turned his back and pulled the camel by the rope. He continued in silence and Naim followed him. After a few seconds, Naim relented and spoke to Sharif, whose back was still turned on him:

  “I set out on this journey only because of her, to speak to someone confidentially about her.”

  Sharif did not reply and after they had gone a few meters further he said, “Naim, you know that you are invited to eat with us. Tomorrow morning the keys of the car will await you under the large ewer at the entrance. May Allah bless you and be
with you.”

  “Amen and thank you,” Naim replied and ran his hand over his weary face.

  He watched Sharif faithfully carrying out his work and while he pulled the rope, Naim noticed the brown sheath of a sword or a knife hidden under Sharif’s shirt.

  “When do you expect to return, Naim?” Sharif asked and looked up at him with his large black eyes.

  “If all goes well, I will return in two night’s time. I only ask that you take care of the camel for me. Know that the camel will tell me everything,” he said, laughing, and patted the youth’s shoulder, but Sharif moved away without turning to look at him and disappeared behind the fence.

  In the morning, Naim equipped himself with a water skin made of black rubber, a bag of pitas and a plastic box containing cheese and olives. As he left the Red Rock, he lifted a large clay ewer and pushed it back. Under it, he found the key. He picked it up and went to a small, battered car that was parked on the gravel path in front of the entrance, started it and drove off.

  To his left, the Edom Mountains on the Jordanian border rose up high as the sun painted the surrounding mountains with shades of purple and reddish brown. The road was uneven and the car bounced over potholes and debris, shaking Naim up. The shaking caused him great fatigue and his eyelids grew as heavy as lead.

  When he reached the border between Jordan and Saudi Arabia, the sun had already set and darkness fell. Naim knew that, as usual, Sharif had made all the necessary arrangements and he looked forward to crossing the border with ease. He knew that a payment had already been transferred to the official manning the border post, but they had to play the customary game of crossing the border. As usual, Ahmed awaited him and flashed his headlights in response to Naim’s light signals as he drew up beside him.