The Pirate (9 page)

The Prince signaled the major-domo and whispered in his ear. The major-domo nodded. He turned and made a gesture to the boys sitting behind the Prince, then signaled the orchestra to begin again.

At the first sound of the music, four girls came on the stage and began their dance. Gradually, the lights went down until the room was in almost total darkness, with the exception of tiny blue spots on the dancers. As the music grew wilder, the spotlight would lose a dancer, then find her moving more excitingly than ever before. The dance lasted more than fifteen minutes, and when it was finished, the girls seemed to be in a frenzy, finally falling to the floor as the stage went completely dark.

For a moment there was silence, then for the first time the Prince began to applaud enthusiastically. Slowly the lights came up. The dancers, still prostrate on the floor, began to rise to their feet. Baydr stared unbelievingly. The dancers on the stage were not the girls who had begun the dance. Instead, their places had been taken by the boys who had been seated behind the Prince.

This time the Prince didn’t bother to crumple the banknotes. He threw the money on the stage in handfuls while the champagne corks popped wildly.

Baydr glanced at his father. Samir’s face was impassive. He wondered what his father thought of the evening. Those were one-hundred-pound notes that the Prince was so carelessly throwing at the dancers—more money than the average workman earned in a year.

The Prince looked at Baydr and spoke in French. “C’est ceau, c’est magnifique, non?” Baydr met his eyes. They were watchful and appraising. “Oui.” He hesitated for a moment. “C’est tout pédéraste?”

The Prince nodded. “Vous aimez? Choisissez quel-qu’un pour votre plaisir.”

Baydr still looked into the older man’s eyes. He shook his head. “Merci, non. Pas pour moi. Je préf“ere les femmes.”

The Prince laughed aloud and turned to Samir. “Your son is lovely and he has sound taste,” he said. “He is also very American.”

Samir looked at his son and smiled proudly. Somehow Baydr knew that he had passed the Prince’s first test.

It was five o’clock in the morning and dawn was breaking in the mountains when Baydr bid his father good night and went into the bedroom. The drapes were drawn and the room was dark. He reached for the light switch.

A hand stopped his arm. The woman’s voice was soft and held the faintest Egyptian accent. “We will have candles, your excellency.”

The faint scent of musk came to his nostrils as she moved away from him. He stood very still in the darkness, his eyes trying to make her out, but he could see nothing until the match scratched and glowed. Then the dark, heavy-lashed eyes smiled at him and she turned to the candle.

The soft yellow light spilled into the room. He recognized the woman as one of the dancers who had performed earlier that evening. The only portion of her costume that had been changed was her brassiere. Her breasts were no longer contained by the silver metal plate. Instead, they were covered by a diaphanous silken scarf through which the dark areola of her nipples could clearly be seen. She smiled again at him. “I have had a warm bath prepared in case his excellency should be weary.”

He didn’t answer.

She clapped her hands. Two more women came from the corners of the room, where they had been standing in the shadows. They wore even less costume than the first. Only the thinnest of veils covered their breasts and fell from their hips around their legs. As they moved toward Baydr, they crossed in front of the light, and he could clearly see the shape of their nude bodies and their carefully depilated hair-free mounds. Only their lower faces were hidden by the traditional Muslim veil.

The first woman clapped her hands again and still another woman came from a far corner. She turned on a record player and the soft sound of music began to come into the room. She began to sway gently to the rhythm.

The two women took his hands and led him toward the bed. Their touch was light and swift as they undressed him. He still hadn’t spoken.

The first woman lit a cigarette and gave it to him. He took a drag. The faintly sweet pungent odor of hashish floated into his nostrils, and he felt a gentle rush of warmth. He took another deep puff and gave back the cigarette.

He looked at her. “What is your name?”

“Nadia, your excellency,” she said, making the gesture of obeisance.

He smiled at her, feeling the surge of sex rising within him. He stretched out on the bed. “Must we bathe?” he asked.

She laughed. “Whatever your excellency desires.”

He looked around at them. He could feel the hashish in his loins. He looked down at his phallus, long and lean and hard against his belly, then back at the first woman. “I desire all of you,” he said.

CHAPTER 8

He awoke with the sunlight spilling into the room and Jabir standing next to his bed, with a cup of hot steaming Turkish coffee. He took a sip. It scalded his mouth. “What time is it?” he asked.

“It is noon, master,” the servant said.

He looked around the room. He could not remember when the women had gone. His last memory of them was a wild tangle of bodies and warmth. He had been lying on his side. One of them had anointed his entire body with oil and then they were all licking at him with their tongues, at his anus, his scrotum, his nipples, his phallus, his belly until the sensation had become so exquisite that the juice burst from him in a final exhausting geyser. Then he had fallen asleep.

He took another sip of the scalding coffee and shook his head. “Is my father awake?”

“Yes, master. He is with the Prince and they await you for breakfast.”

He took another gulp of the coffee and got out of bed. “Tell them I’ll grab a shower and be right there.”

He let the water run cold, then hot, then cold again. In a moment he was wide awake. He ran his fingers quickly over his chin and decided that he could shave later. When he came out of the bathroom, Jabir had laid out shirt and slacks for him.

The Prince and his father were still seated at the breakfast table when he came into their room. The major-domo was just clearing away the breakfast dishes.

Baydr kissed his father, then the Prince’s hand. At the Emir’s gesture he sat down. “Would you like something to eat?” the Prince asked politely.

“No, thank you,” Baydr said. It would have been impolite for him to eat after they had finished.

“Some coffee then,” the Prince said.

“Thank you.” Baydr nodded.

The major-domo hurried to fill his cup. Baydr tasted it. It was thick and sweet. He waited quietly, respectfully. Though the shades were drawn so that the sunlight could not enter the room, the Prince still wore dark sunglasses, behind which his eyes could not be seen. He waited until Baydr put down his cup. “Your father and I have been discussing your future.”

Baydr bowed his head. “I am your servant.”

The Prince smiled. “First, you are my cousin, my blood.”

Baydr didn’t speak. He was not expected to say anything.

“The world is changing rapidly,” the Prince said. “Many things have happened since your birth. Our plans must change accordingly.” He clapped his hands sharply.

The major-domo withdrew from the room, silently closing the door behind him. They were alone in the room.

The Prince waited for a moment. His voice dropped almost to a whisper. “You know that I have always looked upon you as my heir and believed that someday you would take my place as ruler of our country.”

Baydr glanced at his father. Samir’s face was expressionless. He turned back to the Prince.

“But times have changed,” the Emir said. “There are other, more important matters that confront us. All through the Middle East the tide of the future flows from beneath the sands of the desert, promising riches such as we have never envisioned. The source of this wealth is oil. The lifeblood of the modern industrialized Western world. And our little country sits upon some of the greatest pools of oil ever known to man.”

He paused for breath, raising his coffee cup to his lips to taste the hot sweet mixture. “I have this past month concluded an agreement with several American, British and European companies to develop this resource. For exploration rights, they have agreed to pay us ten million dollars. If oil is discovered, they will pay us additional sums for each operating well and a royalty on the oil that is exported. They have also committed themselves to build refineries and help develop the country. All of this has great promise but I am still not at ease.”

“I don’t understand,” Baydr said. But he did. It was for this reason that he had been sent to learn the ways of the Western world.

“I think you do,” the Emir said shrewdly. “But let me continue in my own way. Though the world has renounced imperialism and colonization as a way of life, there are other ways to enslave a country and its people. By making them economically dependent. I do not intend to let the West do that to us, but it suits my plan to let them pay for our progress.”

Baydr nodded. He began to feel a new respect for the Prince. Behind all the strange peculiar ways lurked a man of thought. “How can I be of help?” he asked. “I am yours to command.”

The Prince looked at Samir and nodded approvingly. Samir smiled. The Prince turned back to Baydr. “I have a more important task for you than to succeed me. I want a man who can walk in the Western world and take these riches they grudgingly give to us and use them in the Western way to acquire even more riches. And if you will undertake this task for which you have been trained and will be trained even further, I promise you that your first-born son will become my heir and the next prince.”

“I need no promise from my sovereign prince,” Baydr said. “I will take my joy in carrying out his wishes.”

The Emir rose to his feet and embraced Baydr. “My own son could not do more for me.”

“I thank your excellency for your trust. My only prayer is that Allah sees fit in His wisdom to make me worthy of it.”

“It will be as Allah wills,” the Prince said. He returned to his seat. “You will return to America to school. Only now your education will be in the hands of certain men recommended to me by the American oil companies. You will not take the ordinary schooling. Your education will be specialized and completed within a three-year period.”

Baydr nodded. “I understand.”

“And now there is just one further matter to be arranged,” the Prince said. “Your marriage.”

Baydr stared at him in surprise. This was something he had not expected. “My marriage?” he echoed.

The Prince smiled. “You need not be surprised. From the reports I have had about last night, you should provide me with many sons.”

Baydr was silent.

“Your father and I have been discussing the matter very carefully and after a great deal of thought have selected a bride for you of whom you can be very proud. She is young and beautiful and comes of one of the best families in Lebanon. Her name is Maryam Riad, daughter of Mohammed Riad, the famous banker.”

“I know the girl,” his father said hastily. “She is indeed very beautiful. And very devout.”

Baydr looked at his father. “How old is she?”

“Sixteen,” Samir answered. “Though she has never been abroad, she is very well educated. At the present time she is attending the American Girls College in Beirut.”

“Sixteen is young for marriage,” Baydr said.

The Emir began to laugh. “I have chosen wisely. Perhaps in America a maiden of sixteen is young. In our lands, she is just ripe.”

***

Baydr was silent in the car on the drive back to Beirut. It wasn’t until they were at the outskirts of the city that Samir spoke to him. “What is it, my son?”

“Nothing, Father.”

“Are you disappointed that you are not to be the Prince’s heir?”

“No.”

“Then it is the thought of your impending marriage?”

Baydr hesitated. “I don’t even know the girl. I never heard of her before this afternoon.”

Samir looked at him. “I think I understand. You wonder why we go to all the trouble to educate you in the Western ways and then revert to our own in arranging your marriage. Is that it?”

“I guess that’s it. In America, at least, you get to meet the girl first and find out if you like each other.”

“That happens here too, son,” Samir said quietly. “But we are not ordinary folk. We have responsibilities that go beyond our own personal feelings.”

“But you and Mother knew each other before you were married. You practically grew up together.”

Samir smiled. “That’s true. But our marriage had been arranged while we were still children. Somehow we knew that and it brought us closer together.”

“Would you have married someone else if it had been arranged? Knowing how you felt about Mother?”

Samir thought for a moment, then he nodded. “Yes. I might not have liked it but I would have had no choice. One must do what one must do. It is the will of Allah.”

Baydr looked at his father, and sighed. The will of Allah. That covered it all. Man himself had very few options. “I would like to meet the girl,” he said.

“It is already arranged,” Samir replied. “Her family has been invited to spend the weekend with us in the mountains. They will arrive the day after tomorrow.”

A sudden thought crossed Baydr’s mind. “You have known about this for a long time?”

“Not long,” his father answered. “The Prince just told me of his decision last week.”

“Does Mother know?”

“Yes.”

“Did she approve?”

“Of the marriage? Yes.”

“You seem to hesitate,” Baydr said.

“Your mother had grand dreams of you becoming the Prince.” Samir laughed. “Women aren’t always very practical.”

“And you, Father, were you disappointed too?”

Samir looked into his son’s eyes. “No.” He thought back to the night his son was born. “You always were and always will be my prince.”

CHAPTER 9

Maryam Riad, like most Lebanese girls, was small, no more than five feet tall, with large dark eyes. Her black hair was worn high on her head in the latest Paris fashion to give an illusion of greater height. Her skin was pale olive and she had a tendency toward plumpness, which she continually fought by dieting, much to the despair of her parents, who preferred the roundness of the Arab woman. She spoke French fluently and English uncomfortably, hated going to the American Girls College and made a point of continually letting her parents know that she felt she should have gone to Swiss or French schools like the children of other well-to-do families.