The Lioness of Morocco(28)
The rhythmic sound of boot-shod steps cut through the morning stillness. Sibylla turned around and saw five men coming through the city gate. At the head was a Black Guard captain, Benjamin behind him. He was flanked on the right and the left by soldiers. Another followed. Sibylla jumped up and ran to the small group. The captain immediately drew his saber. “Stay back, Mrs. Hopkins!”
She obediently kept her distance but ran alongside the men. Benjamin looked disheveled and bleary. His frockcoat was rumpled, his pants stained. She was shocked to see that his wrists were chained together.
“Benjamin! Are you all right? What has happened?”
He turned his head and she saw his reddened eyes. “Hasn’t Willshire told you?”
“Yes, but I cannot believe that it is true.”
“You must help me!” he groaned. “Go to Toledano and force him to recant!”
By now, the group had arrived at the boat. The soldiers shoved Benjamin in and the captain shouted orders to cast off. The oars were plunged into the water and the boat glided swiftly away. Sibylla watched as it disappeared in the morning mist.
Chapter Fourteen
“The master is not at home,” the Toledanos’ gatekeeper announced to Sibylla, though she was sure she had glimpsed him through the windows of the second floor.
“Please let me in! I must speak with him!” she begged, but he crossed his arms in front of his muscular chest and turned away.
Dejected, she returned home. She wanted nothing more than to lock herself in her bedroom and cry. But there were the concerned and anxious looks of the servants. And her distraught children, who would not leave her side.
“Where’s Daddy?” Johnny asked. Tom wanted to know if the soldiers had hurt him.
Sibylla resorted to a white lie. “Daddy has had to go on a trip and the soldiers are going with him. You know that he travels often. But he will come back home.”
“And he’ll bring us presents,” Johnny added with satisfaction. Tom, however, was not so easily comforted. He looked up at his mother with large doubting eyes.
Nadira knocked on the door of the drawing room, where Sibylla was sitting on the divan with the boys. She entered carrying a tray with a bowl of steaming couscous.
“Please take it away again. I’m not hungry,” Sibylla said and massaged her aching temples.
Nadira placed the bowl on the table. “You have to eat, my lady. And you must rest. Come, children, there are freshly baked gazelle horns waiting in the kitchen for you.”
For Nadira’s sake, Sibylla tried a spoonful of couscous. It tasted surprisingly good and she quickly finished the entire bowl. Then she collapsed on the divan. She must have fallen asleep, because a knock at the door shook her from bizarre dreams. The tray was gone, and someone—probably Nadira—had covered her with a blanket.
“Yes?” She quickly sat up and smoothed her hair.
The door opened hesitantly and Firyal appeared. “Monsieur Rouston is downstairs at the gate and wishes to speak with you, my lady.”
André! Sibylla’s heart began to beat wildly. So news of the events had reached him. How she longed to take refuge in his arms and relive the sweet, carefree moments of a few days ago! But she forced herself not to remember.
“Ask Monsieur Rouston in.”
But the young woman did not budge.
“What are you waiting for?” Sibylla asked impatiently.
The servant haltingly came closer. Once she stood in front of Sibylla, she fell to her knees. “Please, my lady,” she stammered. “How is the master?”
“How dare you!” Sibylla exploded. But when she saw Firyal’s distress, she was ashamed at her lack of self-control. “Your master is being treated decently,” she answered in a calmer tone. “That is all I can tell you. Now go and get Monsieur Rouston!”
Firyal hurried away, and after a few moments, André entered. He looked serious. The French consul had informed him of the arrest.
“I can imagine how difficult all this must be for you,” he said.
She looked into his honest, sympathetic face and was seized by a crazy idea. “Ride to Abd al-Rahman! The sultan respects you. Tell him that I wish to have an audience with him to clear up this matter!”
“Is that what you truly want?” Her wish to use his relationship with the sultan on Benjamin’s behalf took him by surprise, and he did not like it. “If there is anything to the accusations, I cannot help your husband.”
But she was not to be deterred. “I know what a great favor I am asking. But I must ask! Benjamin is the father of my children, and he has not yet been proven guilty.”
André frowned. Like many others, he thought Benjamin quite capable of being a slave trader. “All right. I’ll ride to Marrakesh. But not for him. I’m doing it because I do not wish you to suffer for his mistakes.”
“Thank you,” she breathed.
Sibylla’s courage moved him deeply. He crossed to her, took her in his arms, and kissed her passionately. But her lips stayed lifeless and cold.
“André, no!” she pleaded and freed herself. “I have to take care of my family now—just my family.”
He took a deep breath. “I respect your wishes. And so that you know I am serious, I will leave for Marrakesh today. I will be gone for some time. If you should need me, send a messenger and I’ll return immediately.”
When she did not answer, he lifted her chin with his hand and looked into her eyes. “Promise me.”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“I shall rely on it.”
What would happen to herself and her children? Had Benjamin truly traded in slaves or was it all part of a plot?
Several days had passed since André’s departure, one week since Benjamin’s transfer to the Island of Mogador. Sibylla had tried to visit the qaid, but he refused to see her.
She could hear the boys laughing in the courtyard and playing with the wooden horses Benjamin had brought them. They seemed to have accepted Sibylla’s explanation that their father was away on a trip.
She sat at the desk in her office, trying to make a list of all the questions she had for Benjamin, but she just could not concentrate. Her thoughts kept wandering back to André. He must have arrived in Marrakesh by now. She wondered if he had spoken with the sultan yet. Had his petition changed anything?
She was torn out of her reverie by Tom’s voice, excited and shrill. “Mummy! The soldiers are back!”
Sibylla dashed to the gallery. Just a few yards from her on the landing stood the captain of the Black Guards, accompanied by two guards.
“Mrs. Hopkins, we have orders to search your house. His Excellency believes that your husband hid the money he made from the slave trade here.”
Sibylla coolly looked over the giant man. “Not before you show me His Excellency’s written order.”
Without saying a word, he held out the paper with the governor’s seal on it. She briefly considered asking Consul Willshire for help, but she had not seen him since the night of Benjamin’s arrest. Nor had Sara inquired after her. Sibylla doubted that they would come to her aid now. She took a deep breath and handed the paper back to the captain.
“Do what you must.”
It was not until after the maghrib, the prayer at sundown, that the three men left. The destruction was shocking, particularly in Benjamin’s office. The guards had slit open pillows and sofas, emptied drawers, and moved furniture. They had pushed over cabinets, torn apart books, and pried up floorboards. In the courtyard, they had dug holes around the olive tree and the fishpond and torn the water lilies out of the water. But they had not found a secret hiding place with money. What they had discovered was Benjamin’s coffer in one of the closets. The Spencer & Son Shipping Company regularly sent promissory notes that he exchanged for cash at a banker in the Jewish quarter. He used the money to pay suppliers as well as the sultan’s customs and tax officials. And he gave some of it to Sibylla, who used it to pay the servants and finance their household expenses. Although she explained all that to the captain of the Black Guards, he still confiscated the coffer. Some time later, he also discovered Sibylla’s rosewood box and confiscated that as well.
She protested vehemently. “Put that back! That is not the money you are looking for!”
The captain paid no heed to her and handed both boxes to his soldiers.
A little while later, the nightmare was finally over, and Sibylla was the picture of misery as she sank onto a divan, its horsehair stuffing pouring out.
“These barbarians have left us nothing!” she lamented to Nadira, who had begun at once to clean up the mess. “If all they had done was destroy the furniture, that would be one thing. But how am I going to buy food now? I cannot even give you your pay! If Benjamin had not paid rent for the whole year, we would find ourselves without a roof over our heads!”
The servant put down a cushion she had just picked up off the floor. “I have been saving my pay,” she said with dignity. “I always received everything I needed from my masters and rarely spent anything. We will be able to buy food, my lady.”
Firyal, who had been in the corner sweeping up shards, dropped her broom and ran out. She soon returned and timidly held out the pair of gold earrings Benjamin had given her.