Princess Sultana's Circle (22 page)

Sara looked at Huda in
horror.

With my hand at my throat,
I sat paralyzed. I, too, knew something about the swordsman Saeed
Al Sayaf, as I had seen him years before being interviewed on Saudi
television. I had never forgotten him.

Saeed’s jovial manner
belied his gruesome job, and never would I forget his terrifying
words. Saeed Al Sayaf is an employee of the Ministry of Interior.
An executioner since he was a young man, he has wielded his sword
many times, and he is now training one of his sons to take his
place! For beheadings, Saeed claimed to use a special sword
presented to him by Prince Ahmad bin Abdul Aziz Al
Sa’ud.

Saeed also carries out
punishments for lesser crimes, such as theft. I recalled Saeed
explaining that he used sharp knives to cut the wrists of thieves,
since it would be difficult to hit the exact spot on a small target
such a wrist with a weapon as large as a sword!

During the interview, Saeed
had laughingly claimed that he preferred chopping off heads to
cutting off wrists. He also expressed his keen disappointment that
the booming economy of Saudi Arabia had lowered the crime rate.
There were too few criminals to keep him busy! He had then
discussed some of his more memorable beheadings. And, after
chopping off more than six hundred heads, as well as sixty hands,
he had many stories to tell.

The most horrifying story I
had never forgotten involved two condemned men, partners in crime,
who were to be executed together. This was before our current
procedure of covering the eyes of the condemned. As a result, the
second man watched as Saeed’s sword sliced through the neck of his
comrade; the severed head fell at his feet. The terrified man
looked up and saw that Saeed was preparing his sword to strike him.
He fell to the ground in a faint. He was examined by the attending
doctor who declared that the man’s heart had stopped. As the body
of his friend was carried away for burial, the fallen man revived.
The swordsman was called back, and the man pleaded to be
spared.

I will never forget the
wicked smile on the executioner’s face as he chuckled at the memory
of what must have been one of his better days. Of course, Saeed
could not agree to any such thing, and the man was immediately
beheaded.

Huda spoke once again.
“These British women are obviously guilty of murder. They should
pay for their crime against Allah.”

Sara, with her soft heart,
looked at our cousin in disbelief. “Oh, Huda! Surely, you do not
mean that.”

“
And why not? If a Saudi
citizen commits a crime in England, or in America, are they not
forced to answer for their crimes?” Huda flicked her fingers in
dismissal, “Do our Muslim laws mean nothing?”

Maysa spoke up as she waved
a newspaper in her hand. “Did you not read this report, Huda?
Perhaps these women are innocent. They say here that they were
tortured by Saudi policemen. Such things do happen, you
know.”

Huda flashed her an ugly
look. “Maysa, do not be so naïve. Of course the women did it! They
were found guilty in a Saudi court! And what else would a foreign
criminal claim, if not police brutality? It is a typical Western
trick to escape punishment!”

Huda then rose from her
seat and straightened her dress. “All this talk makes me hungry. I
believe I will have Sultana’s cook prepare me this new recipe I
found in New York.”

My heretofore hidden
distaste for Huda was about to surface. I spoke loudly enough for
Huda to hear: “It appears that the glutton has an insatiable
appetite for blood, as well as for food.”

Huda slumped against the
wall as if she was stricken with severe chest pains, but we could
see she was pretending. Nevertheless, Sara and Maysa ran to her
side. As she was being led away, Huda shouted that she was having a
heart attack, and that someone should call her husband to tell him
to arrange her funeral!

Our maids were alarmed, but
I reassured them. “Do not worry. Although Huda is destined to
collapse of a heart attack, her destiny has no connection with my
words. Huda’s final fate is directly linked to the thick layers of
fat that have gathered around her heart.”

The maids began to laugh.
Although overweight, Huda was the most robust woman in our extended
Al Sa’ud family, and well known for her dramatics. Since she was a
young girl, Huda had routinely feigned heart attacks. Most likely,
I assured everyone, Huda would enjoy many delicious dishes before
she heard God’s final summons.

Still smiling, I went into
the kitchen to instruct Jada, our London cook and housekeeper, to
prepare our dinner.

To my surprise, I found
that Jada had already cooked a small feast for us: eggplant salad,
lentil soup, pilaw, kufta, and shish kabob. I saw that this dear
girl had even baked Arab bread to please us. “I’m so happy you are
here, Ma’am,” she said as she began to load the food onto trays. “I
get lonely, sometimes,” she admitted softly.

I found myself wondering
about Jada’s life. I had to admit that I knew very little about the
girl. While traveling alone to England the year before, Kareem had
discovered that our housemaid and one of our drivers were involved
in an illicit affair. Since both were wed to others, Kareem
terminated their employment and sent them back to their spouses. It
was then that he had hired Jada.

I now recalled Kareem
telling me that Jada had wept copious tears when pleading for this
position, as both maid and cook. She had told him that she came
from a poor Egyptian family and must work to help finance an older
brother’s college education. Although she had arrived with no
references, Kareem had sensed a goodness in the girl and had hired
her immediately.

I recalled hearing that her
parents had emigrated from Egypt years before. After the father was
unable to find suitable employment in London, the possibility of a
manufacturing job had taken the family to the city of Manchester.
Now that she lived in London, Jada, who was unmarried, rarely saw
her family. Since Kareem and I stay at our home in London no more
than once or twice a year, I knew that Jada must spend many long,
boring months with few distractions to fill her days.

Looking into Jada’s
youthful face, I guessed that she was not much older than my
youngest daughter, Amani. Yet, Jada conducted herself as a mature
woman while Amani often displayed childlike conduct. Wealth and
privilege too often bring out unattractive attributes, I thought to
myself. And, I must admit, that included me as well.

Through gentle questioning,
I learned that Jada had been an excellent student at school, and
had always longed to become a medical doctor. Her greatest ambition
was to return to Egypt and care for pregnant women in the small
villages in an effort to lower the high infant mortality of that
country, and to combat the practice of female
circumcision.

Recently, there had been a
great deal of international public outrage concerning the custom of
female circumcision in Egypt, and Jada was earnest in her desire to
help educate women in her land so that they would turn away from
that barbaric custom.

“
That is an admirable
cause,” I told her, as my thoughts went back in time. “The
granddaughter of Fatma, our housekeeper in Egypt, was forced to
undergo that brutal practice. Unbelievably, it was the child’s own
mother, Elham, who had insisted upon the inhumane
ritual!

“
I went with Fatma to try
to convince Elham not to subject her daughter to such a dangerous
mutilation. But Elham truly believed that our religion demands
women to be circumcised, and that her daughter could not defy the
laws of her religion.” I sighed heavily, still depressed when I
thought of it. “I agree that educating women is the only solution
to end this frightful custom.”

“
Women must learn to
question authority,” Jada said. “Otherwise, they will continue to
believe everything their fathers and husbands tell
them.”

“
That is so true,” I
agreed.

In view of her own
aspirations, I was surprised to learn that Jada felt no animosity
about the fact that the whole of her salary was going towards
educating her brother. Jada kept only a few pounds a month for
herself.

“
Once my brother has
graduated,” Jada said with a smile, “then I will ask him to pay for
my education.” The dear girl was quietly self-assured that her
dreams would come true, and that her brother would honor her wishes
as she had so unselfishly honored his.

I gazed at Jada in
fascination. I well knew that had I faced the same situation with
my brother Ali that I would have made a bonfire with my salary
before I would have given it to him. Sadly, I suspected that Jada’s
dreams might never be fulfilled, for once educated, her brother
would most likely wed. Then, the needs of his wife and children
would surely take precedence over his sister.

As I walked away, thoughts
of Afaaf and Hussah came to my mind. I was struck once more by how
the wishes and needs of Arab women are always placed behind the
desires of Arab men. There is a terrible truth that permeates
Muslim cultures—a truth that few Muslims will ever admit. In every
Arab or Muslim society, women’s lives are like soft wax, which men
are allowed to twist and stretch according to their individual
beliefs and desires.

Since Kareem and Asad did
not return from the Saudi Embassy until late in the evening, we
women alone enjoyed the feast prepared by Jada. Huda, still angry
at my earlier remarks, ate in isolation in her room. Since everyone
was weary from the rigors of our trip, we retired as soon as we had
finished our evening meal.

The following morning, we
returned to the airport to continue our journey to Saudi Arabia. We
had been out of the Kingdom for only eight days, but for some
reason, the time away seemed endless to me.

Our airplane landed in
Jeddah, since Maysa and Huda both lived in that city. The rest of
us planned to travel on to Riyadh within the next few days. After
hearing the tragic story of Heidi, I was anxious to gather Maha and
Amani in my arms.

Before retiring that
evening in our Jeddah palace, Kareem and I relaxed with a few
cocktails. The topic of our conversation staged on the current
crisis between Saudi Arabia and England. Although I attempted to
change the subject more than once, Kareem was infused with anger
that our country was being criticized for upholding our laws—laws
that kept our crime rate substantially lower than most other
countries in the world.

All the talk of beheadings
distressed me even more than usual, especially because Kareem
compared in great detail the barbaric cruelties of the American
methods of capital punishment, such as the electric chair and gas
chamber, to the quick and more humane method of
beheading.

Moments after we retired,
Kareem fell into a deep sleep. I, on the other hand, tossed and
turned throughout the night.

For some reason, my mind
rested on the tragic fate of a young man by the name of Abdullah
Al'Hadhaif, a story which was well-known to every Saudi Arabian. In
August of 1995, Abdullah Al'Hadhaif was only thirty-three years
old, and the father of six young children, when he was executed on
the orders of the Saudi government. Along with many other Saudis,
Abdullah, his two brothers, and his elderly father, had been
arrested for political crimes, involving personal conduct which
offended our government, such as speaking out in the mosques, or
distributing leaflets or audio tapes banned by our
government.

It was reported that
Abdullah’s aged father had been tortured while imprisoned, and that
his abuse had been so brutal that it had led to a heart attack.
Naturally, this had enraged the sons of the elder Al’Hudhaif, and
none more than the sensitive Abdullah. When Abdullah was released
from prison, he had sought out the secret policeman who had
tortured his father. Once that man’s identity was known, Abdullah
struck back by throwing a container of acid at the man. That man
was injured, but not killed, and was able to identify his
attacker.

Once again, Abdullah was
thrown into jail. All the festering rage of Saudi authorities
against the protesters focused on this one man. Friends and family
of Abdullah reported that he was brutally tortured to obtain a
confession. Reports said that he had been dipped in corrosive
liquid, to revenge the policeman he had attacked. His bowels were
inflated through his anus, and threats were made that his dear
mother and precious wife would be sexually violated in his
presence.

Still, Abdullah Al'Hadhaif
refused to sign the confession.

The fury of his torturers
was further heightened by his stubbornness. One report said that
Abdullah was hung like a slaughtered sheep with his head tied
between his legs. He had been so mercilessly beaten that he was
paralyzed from his waist down.

I had to admit that the men
of my family can be unbelievably heartless! Abdullah’s ordeal had
ended only when he was beheaded.

What had been that tortured
man’s final thoughts, I wonder. Had he known fear, and sadness at
the thought he would not live to raise his six children? Or, had he
been relieved that death would soon bring peace from the agony of
his last days? Only God knew the answer to my question.