*
Al-Ubullah, a roadstead and port adjacent to Basra, was where the trading ships were fitting out for the annual voyage to the land of Zanj. Jaffar’s staff arranged for Osric, Walo and me to stay there in a merchant’s house while we waited for the shipmasters to complete their preparations. It was a fine, substantial building made of whitewashed coral blocks, part storehouse, part residence, with large double doors that led from the street into a central courtyard where the owner stacked his trade goods. Al-Ubullah was not as bakingly hot as Baghdad, but the sea air was more humid and stifling, and we sweltered as the days dragged by. Sulaiman, the shipmaster whom Nadim Jaffar assigned to take us to Zanj, was a gnome-like figure, all skin and bone and with a rim of straggly white beard around his jaw. I put his age at approaching sixty but he had the bright eyes of a four-year-old and the sprightly energy to match. He invited Osric and me to inspect his vessel lying at anchor just off al-Ubullah’s waterfront. The place echoed to the sounds of vessels being prepared for long-distance voyages: the work chants of dock gangs handling heavy cargo, the thump of mallets as rope workers spliced cables, the rasp of saws, and the long-drawn-out creak and squeal of wood on wood as spars were hoisted, checked and then lowered again, rubbing against their masts. There were smells of new-cut timber, foreshore rubbish, charcoal cooking fires and the fish oil smeared on hulls.
Sulaiman led us down into the dark gloom of the hold of his ship, clambering across a newly loaded cargo of sacks of dates.
‘Not a single stitch broken after more than fifty years,’ he said, pointing to the inside of the hull.
When my eyes adjusted to the dark, I saw that the planks were held together with thick cords, and similarly fastened to the ribs of the vessel. There were no nails.
I thought back to how Protis’s ship had sprung a leak and foundered, and wondered what would happen if the cords burst. Sulaiman’s vessel would disintegrate, the planks dropping away like the petals of a dying flower in autumn.
The shipmaster prodded a rope fastening. It was black with age. ‘Soaked in coconut oil every season. It will see me out my lifetime,’ he assured us. Tucking up his loincloth he scurried up the ladder and back on deck so nimbly that Osric and I lagged far behind him.
‘When do we set sail?’ I called after him, as we emerged into the bright sunlight. ‘My companions and I are ready to leave whenever is convenient for you.’
‘We leave on the mawsim for Zanj,’ he said firmly, folding his legs under him as he sat down cross-legged on a tattered scrap of carpet on the stern deck. He gestured at us to join him.
‘The mawsim?’
‘The correct day of departure. I’ve sailed to Zanj more than a dozen times on the appointed day, and come back safely,’ he answered.
‘And when is this mawsim?’
‘The end of the first week of October.’
‘Can we not leave earlier?’ I was eager to get the expedition over with as quickly as possible.
‘We sail in company with others.’ He gestured to the anchorage where three or four merchant ships, similar to our own, lay with their crews hard at work on mending sails and rigging.
‘And how long before we reach Zanj?’
‘A month or two, depending on the wind and the speed of our business. Nadim Jaffar agreed that I can stop at the usual places along the coast and trade.’
He gave me a sideways, conspiratorial look. ‘If your interpreter could help out, it will reduce the time spent on these stopovers.’
I mumbled something about being prepared to assist in any way I could.
The shipmaster wanted a more definite undertaking from me. ‘The further we travel along the coast, the more difficult it is to deal with the locals. We bargain in a mix of Arabic and the regional languages. Misunderstandings arise. They take time to untangle.’
‘My interpreter will help out as best he can,’ I promised.
Sulaiman burst out in a cackle of sheer delight. ‘Not he . . . she!’
I blinked in surprise.
The shipmaster rocked back on his haunches, still chuckling, ‘So you haven’t heard the rumour. Your interpreter is to be a woman, and what a woman!’ He rolled his eyes.
‘I look forward to meeting her,’ I said frostily. This was the first time I had heard that Jaffar was making such an unusual arrangement, and I felt put out.
Suddenly the old man became serious. ‘I do not mean to sound ungrateful or frivolous. Nadim Jaffar has been most thoughtful in providing such an interpreter. Very few are fluent in the languages spoken along the coast –’ he paused, ‘and she cost him a very great deal of money.’