Lost Riders Read online

  ‘Lucky you,’ he said, ‘not going to school.’

  Rashid straightened up and smiled uneasily, but Abdullah had forgotten him already. He was walking out past the watchman, who was holding the metal gate open for him.

  Ten minutes passed, then Syed Ali emerged from the house. The driver snapped smartly to attention and opened the front passenger seat door.

  ‘Into the back with you, young man,’ Syed Ali said to Rashid.

  The car rolled out through the open gates and turned into the road.

  ‘Well,’ said Syed Ali, looking over his shoulder at Rashid. ‘You’ve had a wonderful time, haven’t you?’

  His mobile rang. He put it to his ear.

  ‘Yes? Ah, Gaman Khan. Thanks for calling me back.’

  Rashid started at the name, and felt goose pimples rise along his arms. He shivered, in spite of the heat of the morning.

  ‘That’s right, I need a replacement,’ Syed Ali was saying. ‘A little one, to ride the smallest camels. Four or five years old.’

  The voice crackled at the other end.

  ‘I know there are difficulties.’ Syed Ali’s usually calm voice betrayed impatience. ‘Look, it’s urgent. The season’s in full swing. Good. I’ll wait to hear from you.’

  He folded his phone away. Rashid, who had listened with all his might, was trying to make sense of what he’d heard.

  ‘I suppose you miss your family sometimes, Yasser?’ Syed Ali said after a while.

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Rashid guessed at the desired answer.

  ‘You should look on your work here as an opportunity’ Without grasping the meaning of Syed Ali’s words, Rashid was astonished to detect in his voice an almost apologetic note, as if he was trying to justify himself. ‘You’re making good money, you know. It’s all going back to your family. You’re being paid every week here more than you could possibly earn in a month at home. You have sisters?’

  Rashid didn’t answer.

  ‘Sisters, Yasser. You have a sister?’

  ‘Yes. One sister.’

  ‘And she has to have a dowry, of course. You’ll be providing that for her. Brothers?’

  ‘One, sir.’

  ‘Younger or older than you?’

  Rashid grasped the back of the driver’s seat in front of him, trying to work out what the question meant.

  ‘Your brother, what age is he?’ Syed Ali asked patiently.

  ‘He is little, sir. Four. Maybe five years old now.’

  ‘Ah.’ Syed Ali’s voice warmed with interest. ‘He is at home, with your mother and father?’

  ‘He is here. In Dubai. At an uzba.’

  ‘Really? Which one? Who owns it?’

  ‘Bedu name, sir? I not know. But masoul, he very bad. Name is Mr Boota. He—’

  Rashid stopped, afraid that he would make Syed Ali angry.

  Syed Ali spoke to the driver, whose reply Rashid didn’t hear. They talked on together. Rashid sat back and looked out of the window, trying to remember everything he could about Syed Ali’s magnificent house. Surreptitiously, he slipped his hand into his pocket and touched the car. He was hearing again the splash of the fountain, tasting the meatballs he’d had for supper, and the drink full of bubbles, watching once more the fight of the monsters on the computer screen, and the car that ran by itself, reliving the sensation of the slippery marble floor as he slid across it in Abdullah’s cotton socks. He’d tell Iqbal and Amal everything, and watch their eyes grow wide with satisfying envy. He might even let them hold the car and play with it. They’d love him for that.

  They reached the uzba at last. Rashid tumbled out of the back seat and ran round to the shelter. No one was there.

  Still out exercising, he thought, disappointed. He had thought they’d be home by now.

  He walked back slowly to the entrance. Syed Ali was talking to Haji Faroukh, who was nodding, his expression hard to read.

  From outside came the familiar grunting complaint of a camel, and in through the gap in the palm-frond fence strutted the string of Syed Ali’s precious racers, with Salman, Iqbal and Amal riding three of them, leading the rest by the bridle. Rashid ran after them into the camel pen.

  ‘I won the golden sword in Abu Dhabi,’ he burst out before they’d even dismounted. ‘Syed Ali took me to his house. I stayed there all night. It’s so amazing, you wouldn’t believe. Abdullah, he’s Syed Ali’s son. He’s got this car that goes by itself. A toy one. He’s stupid. We slid on the floors. He gave me this.’

  He pulled the toy car from his pocket and held it up to show them. Iqbal took it and turned it over, examining it.

  ‘It’s broken,’ he said carelessly, pointing to the windscreen, and handed it back.

  Amal didn’t even look at it.

  ‘You didn’t hear then, about Shari?’

  ‘What about him? It doesn’t matter about the broken bit. The wheels turn and everything. It’s lovely, don’t you think so, Iqbal?’

  ‘Shari was at the race here yesterday,’ Iqbal said. ‘He was really sick. Then he fell off his camel and it trod on his arm. He’s hurt bad.’

  A cold hand clutched at Rashid’s heart.

  ‘What do you mean? Shari? He’s not dead?’

  ‘No, not dead.’ Salman came up. ‘But that masoul not take him the hospital. Should take him. He just put in car and drive back to uzba. Sorry to tell you, Rashid. Your brother, he very sick. Iqbal see his face. No open his eyes at all.’

  For the rest of the day, Rashid felt jangled and restless. His mind was still full of the glories of Syed Ali’s house, but nobody wanted to hear about them. Iqbal and Amal wouldn’t listen, and Salman said only, ‘I know that place. I go there one time with Haji.’

  The news about Shari took some time to sink in, but as the morning turned into afternoon, the image of Shari lying injured, sick, perhaps even dying, with no one near to help him, grew and grew inside his head like a big black cloud swelling before a storm.

  Zero five zero seven seven . . . he began chanting to himself, as he helped the others lay out fodder for the camels on the feeding racks. Zero five zero seven seven . . .

  He stopped, his mouth falling open as he realized what he was doing. He was reciting Uncle Bilal’s phone number. Uncle Bilal. He had to tell his uncle what had happened. Uncle Bilal was a grown-up. He would know what to do.

  One of the hired men, who was supervising the boys, saw that he had stopped working.

  ‘Get on with it, you little slacker,’ he called out.

  Rashid saw Iqbal grin, and flushed. Iqbal was pleased he was being told off, he could tell. He began to work again, but his mind was racing. How could he call Uncle Bilal? Where would he find a phone? There was only one on the uzba. It belonged to Haji Faroukh. It lived in his pocket and was never out of his sight.

  The boys were released at last and drifted back to the shelter. Iqbal had laid his arm over Amal’s shoulders, and they were walking ahead together, leaving Rashid to trail behind them. Once, he would have minded desperately, but he hardly noticed today. He walked with his eyes on the ground, his brow furrowed, his mind working round and round the problem of the phone.

  When they reached the shelter, and had dropped down on the sand, Iqbal said nastily, ‘What’s got into you then? Think you’re too good for us now, do you?’

  Rashid, surprising himself as much as the other two, burst into violent sobs.

  ‘Shari!’ he managed to get out. ‘What if he’s dying? What if he’s dead already? I’ve got to call my uncle. I want Uncle Bilal.’

  Iqbal’s manner changed. He leaned forward and gently shook Rashid’s arm. Amal shuffled closer on the other side. They waited till Rashid’s loud crying had begun to subside into hiccups.

  ‘Haji’s got a mobile,’ Amal said at last.

  ‘I know,’ Rashid cried despairingly, ‘but it’s always in his pocket!’

  ‘Not always,’ said Iqbal. ‘Not when he takes his bath. Not when he’s asleep.’

  Rashid’s hiccups
stopped at once. He stared at Iqbal, his cheeks growing pale with fright.

  ‘I wouldn’t dare,’ he whispered. ‘I couldn’t.’

  ‘Yes, you could.’ Iqbal was nodding at him vigorously, a spark of mischief in his eyes. ‘For Shari. You’ve got to. Soldiers do stuff like that all the time.’

  For a long moment, the three boys sat staring at each other, then they scrambled to their feet all at the same time, went out of the shelter and stood looking out across the uzba.

  It was early afternoon, the quietest and hottest part of the day. The two hired men had gone into the village. Salman’s feet could be seen jutting out of the kitchen door, where he was sleeping on a mat.

  Moving as one, the three tiptoed across the sand towards Haji Faroukh’s little house, drawn by the regular rhythm of snores that emanated from it.

  ‘He’s asleep. You can get it now,’ whispered Iqbal.

  ‘No I can’t. It’ll still be in his pocket.’

  ‘Bet it’s not. Bet he’s taken it out. Go and look.’

  ‘I can’t go in there!’ Rashid’s voice rose to a high-pitched squeak. ‘What if he wakes up? He’ll kill me!’

  Iqbal gave him a shove.

  ‘Go on. You’ve got to.’

  Rashid crept across the hot sand towards the dark mouth of Haji Faroukh’s open door. The snores were building to a crescendo. Rashid reached the doorway and peered inside, one trembling hand touching the door post.

  Haji Faroukh was lying on his back on his string bed. His mouth was wide open and his large belly was rising and falling like huge bellows under his blue kameez. And there, on the ground beside the bed, its shiny grey metal reflecting the sunshine outside, was the mobile phone.

  Rashid’s heart bounded. He wanted to turn and run back to the safety of the shelter, but he could feel Iqbal’s eyes on his back.

  You’ve got to, Iqbal had said. For Shari.

  Rashid shut his eyes, took a deep breath, opened them again, darted forward, grabbed the phone and ran outside. Just as he joined the others, Haji Faroukh’s snores reached their peak with one last shuddering whistle. Then there was a long, terrifying silence.

  ‘He’s woken up. He’ll see it’s gone,’ whispered Rashid.

  ‘No he hasn’t. Listen. He’s starting again.’

  Iqbal was already dashing back to the shelter.

  Rashid and Amal followed. In the dim light of the room, their heads crowded together, the three boys stared down at the mobile in Rashid’s hand.

  ‘Go on then. Phone him,’ urged Iqbal.

  Rashid, concentrating furiously, pressed the precious numbers down one by one, then held the phone to his ear. He waited for a long time, expecting to hear Uncle Bilal’s voice, but there was only silence. He had been so sure that the magic numbers would work, that they would summon his uncle at once, from wherever he might be, that he was crushed with disappointment.

  ‘He didn’t answer. He’s not there,’ he told the others, who were watching with eager expectation.

  ‘Here, let me listen,’ said Iqbal.

  He bent his head sideways over the phone.

  ‘There should be a light on in it,’ Amal said. ‘There is when Haji phones.’

  Iqbal took the phone from his ear and they all examined it again.

  ‘You have to press something to make it work,’ Amal said.

  ‘Press what?’ Iqbal asked, glaring at him.

  Amal took a step backwards.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Iqbal began to push all the buttons on the phone, one after another. Suddenly, it started to ring. He cried out and dropped it, shaking his hand, as if the phone had been red hot and had burned him.

  Rashid’s hair was standing on end.

  ‘What do we do now?’

  ‘Take it back, quick, before he wakes up,’ Amal said.

  Rashid picked up the phone and hared back to Haji Faroukh’s house. The masoul was still asleep, his snores loud and regular once again, but the sound coming out of the phone, which had started out as a quiet tinkling, was growing louder and more shrill. It was impossible to believe that something so small could make such a terrible noise.

  Panic seized Rashid. Blindly, he dashed through Haji Faroukh’s open door. He didn’t notice that the snores had stopped. He didn’t see that the masoul had woken and was bending over to search for his phone on the ground. He was poised to throw it down and dash out again when Haji Faroukh looked up, and Rashid found himself staring straight into his face.

  Rashid froze, the trilling phone still in his hand. With one glance, Haji Faroukh took in the appalling sight of the boy invading his sanctum, the phone in the boy’s hand and the guilt on the boy’s face. A roar gathering in his throat, he jumped to his feet, snatched the phone from Rashid’s limp fingers with his right hand and grasped Rashid’s arm in a vicious grip with his left.

  He held the phone to his ear.

  ‘Han-ji?’ he barked. ‘Oh, sir, it’s you. Yes, sir. I’ll expect his call. Thank you, sir.’

  He thrust the phone into his pocket and Rashid saw with horror that the blind rage that the boys so dreaded had descended on him. There was a familiar redness round the masoul’s eyes, and his full lips were drawn back into a snarl.

  ‘Please, Haji, no, please,’ stammered Rashid. ‘Uncle Bilal. It was to call Uncle Bilal. I need him, Haji, for Shari.’

  Haji Faroukh, still holding him, was groping under his bed for the length of plastic hose.

  ‘Thief!’ he was shouting. ‘Imp of Satan! Thief!’

  Drops of spittle flew from his mouth.

  As he felt for the hose, his grip slackened and Rashid twisted his arm free. In an instant he was out of Haji Faroukh’s house, haring away across the sand. He bolted round the corner towards the kitchen. Salman, who had woken up, was sitting, still bemused with sleep, scratching his head and yawning. Rashid ran into the kitchen and hid behind him.

  ‘Salman, help me! Haji’s angry. I took his phone. To call my uncle. To save Shari!’

  ‘What?’ Salman rose shakily to his feet. ‘What you talking, Yasser? You take Haji phone? Are you crazy boy, or what?’

  ‘For Shari! To call Uncle Bilal! So he can come and look after him!’ Rashid explained desperately. ‘Tell Haji, Salman, please!’

  Haji Faroukh, the hose in his hand, had already stalked up to the kitchen door. Iqbal and Amal were shadowing him as closely as they dared.

  ‘Haji, it was my fault,’ Iqbal was saying bravely. ‘I told him to, for his brother. Shari’s injured, Haji.’

  Haji Faroukh lifted the hose and swiped at him, and Rashid, peeping out from behind Salman, saw him fell Iqbal with a blow.

  ‘Come out here, you!’ roared the masoul. ‘How dare you run away from me! Thief! I’ll show you!’

  ‘No! Please! No!’ shrieked Rashid, but Salman had already been swept aside and Haji Faroukh’s fingers had closed once more round Rashid’s thin arm. He was dragging him out of the kitchen.

  Rashid looked up at his face and saw that the masoul was deaf now and blind to everything but the rage that consumed him. He gave up trying to explain. He bent down, covering his head with his free arm to protect it from the beating to come.

  But as Haji Faroukh raised the hose for the first vicious cut, his phone ran again. He hesitated, swore, flung Rashid away from him, wrenched the phone out of his pocket and answered it curtly.

  His expression changed. He walked away from the boys, listening intently.

  ‘Gaman Khan?’ they heard him say. ‘Yes, I’ll expect you. Tomorrow. Yes.’

  Blinded by panic, with the single idea in his head that he had to flee from the masoul’s wrath, Rashid was out of the uzba entrance and racing along the outside of the palm-frond fence before he knew what he was doing.

  He’ll kill me! He’ll kill me!

  The words banged in his head like a drum beat.

  He was up on the road and halfway to the cluster of buildings near the mosque before lack of breath made hi
m slow down. He bent over, clutching at the stitch in his side.

  I’ll just go on running. I’ll keep running on, he thought. I’ll never go back.

  He started walking again, his feet taking him automaticaly in the familiar direction of mosque. The shopkeeper was outside his door, fiddling with the awning that shaded his window. He nodded at Rashid, who slowed down, his resolve weakening at the sight of this familiar person.

  ‘Hello, young man. Where are you off to? Your masoul sent you on an errand?’

  Rashid stared at him, the enormity of what he had done dawning on him. How could he possibly run away? Where could he go? What would he eat? How could he hide from the grown-ups who would come after him?

  ‘Here, are you all right? You’re Haji Faroukh’s boy, aren’t you? You’re the one who wins all the races.’

  Rashid didn’t take in the man’s words but the kindness in his voice overwhelmed him. He felt sobs rise in his chest and knuckled tears out of his eyes.

  ‘Done something you shouldn’t?’ the shopkeeper said shrewdly. ‘Scared of a beating? You’ll only make things worse, hanging about round here.’

  ‘My brother,’ Rashid managed to say. ‘He sick. I want call—’

  A woman’s voice called out from inside the shop. The man lost interest in Rashid and shouted back at her. He turned to go back inside.

  ‘Please!’ Rashid gasped out. ‘Please, my uncle, he—’

  The door of the shop was swinging shut behind the man. Rashid darted after him.

  ‘He going to die!’ he yelled desperately.

  ‘Who’ll die?’

  The shopkeeper’s wife had come out.

  ‘My brother. He too sick and fall off camel and masoul no get doctor, and my uncle, he got a phone, and I try call him but no good.’

  He was gabbling too fast, and he saw she could only just follow his halting Arabic.

  ‘Your brother is sick? You want to call your uncle?’ she said, puzzled.

  ‘Yes! Yes!’