After three days docked in Muscat, the midships of the
Palinurus
smell like a hops house and Ormsby, with too little to do, has entered a cycle of drinking himself to a stupor, playing cards with his fellows and passing out in his tiny hammock, day after day. The other midshipmen have made a half-hearted attempt at surveying the twin forts of Al Jalali and Al Mirani as well as drawing maps of the walled city and its three fine gates. This is solely for the practice of it, for Muscat, unlike the interior of Oman, is freely open to Europeans, or as open as an Arab city can possibly be, and all salient points of its defence system and architecture are already in the hands of the Navy’s high command. Still, Haines oversees the boys’ efforts and suggests improvements, for one day, who knows, they may be called upon to provide maps of somewhere that no white man has ever been before. Preparation for such an eventuality is everything – an Englishman is always at the ready.
The crew, meanwhile, are fully employed; the carpenters have planed down the rough edges and hammered everything back into place and now the unskilled men are painting the new wood. The deck is swabbed so clean you could eat off it. Most importantly, the craggy steward, Jardine, has bought enough spices (ostensibly for the captain’s table) so that if he ever again has to eat mutton for three months straight he can, at the very least, marinade the filthy stuff and make a curry. He has a wide repertoire of recipes suitable for this eventuality, gleaned from the sweet-faced, dark-skinned little
bibi
with whom he has an arrangement back in Bombay at the port on the island of Colaba – he only wishes he had had his spice box with him when they hit the supply problems at Makkah. He won’t let that happen again.
At three in the afternoon, his papers in order, Haines bursts tight-lipped onto the deck and makes an inspection of the rigging and the repairs. In particularly poor humour, he picks at details and orders several perfectly satisfactory jobs to be attempted again, for he has been presented with a quandary this afternoon – a summons from the palace delivered by a blue-robed messenger bearing the royal seal. The
soultan
wishes the pleasure of his company that evening, and the company of his senior officers. For choice Haines would take the midshipmen, but of course he has to take Wellsted if he takes anyone, and he does not want to attend the palace alone. In the shady recesses of his mind, just beyond his reach, the captain knows he is being mean-spirited but the truth is that once he is launched upon a certain course he finds it difficult to veer from it and the fire in his belly about Wellsted’s behaviour over the manuscript is burning as brightly as ever.
‘This rope,’ the captain comments, kicking a carefully tidied coil on deck, ‘is a disgrace. Do it again.’
The men fall to it in the heat and Haines stands watching them. He feels no better. As Wellsted marches along the dock towards the
Palinurus
, the captain easily spots him from a distance. When he comes up the gangplank smartly, Haines is waiting at the top.
‘Been ashore then, Wellsted?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Well, I will be requiring you this evening, Lieutenant. The senior officers of this vessel are to present themselves in the service of the sultan, when the sun goes down. Dress uniform, of course.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Wellsted salutes.
‘Where the devil did you get to, anyway?’
‘I went to the
souk
, sir,’ Wellsted says.
He likes the market in Muscat. It’s cosmopolitan. The
soultan
is liberal – come one, come all, if you’ve something to sell – the streets of Muttrah welcome everyone. Wellsted is unaware he has this very day been spotted by both Farida and Zena. He has spent most of the afternoon smoking a
shisha
pipe with a rug merchant from Constantinople. The fellow has taken an ornate old Portuguese house up from the waterfront and plies his wares there in some style. They discussed the habit of Muslim rug makers in making sure there is always one thread out of place in their work, for perfection is the province of Allah alone and to do otherwise is blasphemy. More importantly, the man swears blind that he saw French ships off the Somali coast not two months before – far further south than the British might like.
‘The
souk?
’ Haines’ tone is derisory. ‘A spot of shopping, is it?’
‘No, sir.’
‘If you’re thinking you might use your allocated space on this trip, it is out of the question.’
Officers are entitled to request hold space for their personal profit. It is one of the perks of an Indian Navy commission – though Wellsted has never used his. He has his eye on a far greater prize than a few guineas. He is after respectability. After all, trade is the very thing he wants to get away from.
‘No, sir. Not that.’
‘Well?’
‘I just went to see it, sir. I find it interesting. While I was there, I heard the French were nearby a couple of months ago. Three ships headed westwards and then south down the African coastline off Mogadishu. I thought you should know.’
Haines thinks he must mention this in his dispatches. The directors of the East India Company naturally spend a good deal of their time anticipating what the French may or may not do. Haines wouldn’t like to say why the French might be off the coast of Somalia – their territories in Africa are predominantly to the north and west and even going to the Seychelles or Reunion, the French Navy usually follows the line of their protectorates and head around the Cape rather than sailing south from Egypt. The most likely explanation is that the buggers have been slaving. One way or another, he’ll be damned if he is going to congratulate Wellsted on procuring this information – the chap is only doing his duty after all. He dismisses his lieutenant haughtily as if he is an errant midshipman who has been up to no good.
‘I see. Well, off with you, then. Come for me when the
muezzins
are making their song this evening. Be ready.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Below decks in his cramped cabin, Wellsted opens his trunk and pulls out his dress uniform. He has not worn it since Bombay but it is clean and only needs an airing or at least as good an airing as he can manage. The cabin is baking and, coming in from outside, he notices the long-seasoned wood still smells fresh from the forest when it gets hot and the pine resin’s musky aroma is roused. He hangs the blue jacket with its gold brocade alongside his dress breeches on the back of the door. Then he decides to get one of the boys to polish his boots. First though, he picks one of the pastries he bought and savours the almond paste and honey stuffing. The Arabs bake well, he thinks. Then, licking his fingers clean, he shaves in the bucket of cold saltwater. The brine stings his skin. When he is done with the cutthroat he stows it carefully and passes a brush through his hair. It will be interesting to see inside the palace though the truth is that the lieutenant invariably feels out of place in fine surroundings. He comes far more into his own in the dockside taverns or striking up a conversation with a man who has something to sell. He heartily prefers life in a caravan, camping under the stars, to the brief periods he has spent in ambassadors’ residences and at the disposal of the aristocracy even if, ultimately, that is where the plan he is set upon is heading.
‘Polish these will you, Hughes?’ he pokes his head into the hallway and catches the ship’s boy as he is passing. ‘I am off to the palace tonight.’
The boy’s eyes light up as he grasps the officer’s footwear. ‘Yes, sir,’ he says, and hovers a moment.
Wellsted nods to give the boy permission to speak.
‘Will there be dancing girls, sir? At the palace.’
‘Dancing girls?’
‘Yes. I saw some in the bazaar. Darkies. Dancing on chains, sir. Mr Ormsby calls them belly dancers. Half-naked they were, sir, begging your pardon.’
The boy begins to hum a tune and raises his arms to demonstrate the way the slave girls move, then he giggles.
‘Ladies’ man, eh?’ Wellsted teases him. ‘Well, I suppose there might be dancing girls tonight. Couldn’t say. But hopefully dinner will at least be better than we’ve had on board of late.’
Banned from the captain’s table and hence also Jardine’s culinary ingenuity, Wellsted has been subsisting on the same food as the men – of a far lower quality even at port than he would like. His body, always lithe, has become quite wiry.
‘Still, keeps body and soul together. A high shine on those boots, Hughes, if you please,’ he says breezily and dis appears, closing the door behind him.
At six o’clock, the sun sinks into the sea, its brazen colours bleeding over the horizon, and Haines, on deck with old-fashioned captain’s feathers in his dress cap, fixed in place with a gold cockade, marches down the gangplank with Wellsted behind him. The men each carry a brass lantern on their way along the dark waterfront and the light picks up the glint of the embroidered brocade on their jackets and the brass buttons, polished till they almost glow. The relief after the heat of the day is palpable, although even at night Muscat is still hotter than the midday of an English July. The smell of fully fired bread ovens and roasting meat wafts out on the evening air and the glow of
naft
lamps oozes yellow light like syrup between the slats of the shutters all the way up the hillside. The night flowers are open and the streets, usually as full of animals as people, are deserted apart from here and there where luminous figures in bright, white
jubbahs
float like spectres along the dockside, the stragglers heading home from the
mosque
after evening prayers. They disappear up one side street or another shadowed by a black slave or two dodging out of the way of the free men between the palms. The officers enter the palace courtyard, the gates swinging open before them, and are greeted by a slave, one of many waiting at the disposal of the sultan’s visitors.
‘Captain Haines. Lieutenant Wellsted,’ Haines announces, as if the two men could be anyone else – there are few naval men in Muscat at any one time and the
Palinurus
is currently the only European ship at anchor.
The man motions for them to follow him.
Inside, the rooms are a riot of detail and colour. Every surface is ornately decorated with bright tiles or carvings of a detailed geometric nature. A series of courtyards open to the stars and lit by burning pools pepper the matrix that the slave navigates easily. The air smells of burning
naft
and
luban
with the occasional whiff of frankincense, as shadows dance across the broad, glossy leaves of exotic oasis plants and up the carved, pale stone of the palace walls. There is music; the haunting sound of an
oud
and a
khallool
– the Arabian lute and flute – and the chiming of the
sajat
bells. The exotic melody slips smoothly down the hallways like a snake. As they come to the court, the slave steps out of their way and they enter, both officers making their
salaams
amid the clatter of the bells and the hum of conversation. There are no women in the room, one would not expect them. Instead, there are groups of Muscat’s well-dressed merchants and retainers,
imams, mullahs
and minor aristocracy, arrayed in a kaleidoscope of colourful silks, gold and precious jewels that would put a Mayfair dinner party to shame. Most of the men crouch on pillows, smoking and laughing. The room feels like a rarefied version of the
souk
and Wellsted finds himself relaxing at the welcome familiarity of it. To one side there is the orchestra and beside that there are three young dancing boys, clean-shaven, with their eyes heavily outlined in kohl. Their dress is effeminate to a white man’s eye. Draped in lurid silks, their smooth skin glows in the lamplight, patterned with brown henna and thin strips of gold tied around their bodies. Jaunty hats, like bright bowls, sit upturned on their dark hair. Raphael himself could not array them more finely.
At the head, all eyes respectful of him, the ruler of Muscat, Oman and Zanzibar, Said Ibn Sultan, father of many children, husband of many wives, smiles graciously at the two foreigners. Resplendent in a red
jubbah
with a thick, purple silk sash and a magnificent turban wound around his head, he is comfortably seated on a huge leather cushion with gold ribbon at the edges. The sultan strokes his trimmed, greying beard and his eyes are bright with interest. Ibn Sultan is perpetually intrigued by pale skin and European clothes and is particularly gratified to note that the younger of the two men before him has not picked up even a hint of a tan on his travels, which sets his skin in particularly high contrast to his vivid blue eyes, and that the older one is wearing some rather striking feathers and a sufficiency of gold brocade. Immediately, it is the younger man that interests him most – his eyes are the eyes of a strange animal and Ibn Sultan is fascinated by all things foreign and strange. His jaded palate craves novelty and he always finds himself slightly afraid of white men, though he would never admit it and in any case, he thinks of the emotion as thrilling. He motions Wellsted forward.
‘You will sit near me,’ he commands.
Haines stiffens. He is the senior officer but he can hardly argue with a sultan over precedence.
Wellsted lowers himself onto the cushions at Said Ibn Sultan’s knee. He is careful to display the soles of his feet to no one for that would be the height of bad manners. There is, it seems to him, no position where it is possible to be comfortable for long without displaying the soles of his feet, and the lieutenant always ends up with pins and needles after an Arabian meal; however, he does the best he can and then accepts the small cup of spiced coffee that appears instantly at his hand.
‘
Shukran,
’ he says.
Haines, further along, takes his place next to an emir. To Ibn Sultan’s disappointment, the captain removes the hat with the feathers and places it out of sight. Then he takes a long, slow draw on a
shisha
pipe.
‘They drink coffee in London?’ the sultan enquires.
‘Yes,’ Wellsted nods. ‘Though not as strong and never spiced. We drink ours often with cow’s milk or cream. I like it the Arabian way, the taste of cinnamon, cardamom and cloves.’