Page 75 of Marry in Secret
He sighed. He’d expected more questions. Rose was determined to find out all about the life he’d led in the last four years. He couldn’t blame her. She had a right to know about the missing years. And though he found it uncomfortable, he forced himself to do it.
“Only twice. It’s hard enough to escape from your master—only the most trusted slaves are permitted outside the home compound. Then if you do escape, it’s almost impossible to find a ship that will take you—you need a permit to leave, you see. And the waterfronts are well patrolled by the sultan’s guards. Both times I was caught and returned to my owner.” And was given a thorough beating—sometimes two, one from the guards and one from his owner—but Rose didn’t need to know that.
“And after each attempt I was sold on. Nobody wants a troublesome slave.”
“Were any of your owners kind?”
“Kindwasn’t quite the right word, but decent, yes; for the most part I was reasonably well treated. My last owner, Sidi Achmed, was a good and decent man who treated all the people of his household well and fairly.”
“What happened?”
“He sickened and died, quite suddenly, and we—all the household slaves—were left in the hands of his widow.”
“What was she like?”
“Not kind, for a start; in fact,kindis the very last word I’d use to describe her, or her spoiled bully-boy of a son. She and her son shared a taste and a talent for cruelty.” Conditions for the household slaves worsened considerably under their rule.
“The boy was sixteen, and Sayida—that’s how we had to address her; it meansmadam—indulged him in everything. Nothing was too good for Adil.” Whatever he wanted, he took, and he took great pleasure in cruelty.
“None of the female slaves was safe from him, not even the twelve-year-old kitchen girl, though I did my best to protect the child.” All it did was make Adil more determined to torment Thomas in whatever way he could, usually by torturing things that were smaller and weaker and couldn’t fight back—he didn’t dare take on Thomas himself; he knew Thomas wouldn’t hold back, regardless of the threat of punishment.
“It was the women who suffered most under Adil, until the little sod realized I was fond of animals.”
“He sounds appalling.”
“His mother was just as bad. Two months after her husband died, Sayida decided it was time for me to warm her bed.”
She rose up on one elbow. “What did you do?”
“What do you think?”
Her eyes widened. “Thomas, you didn’t.”
“Rose, I didn’t.” He leaned down and kissed her nose. “Of course I refused.” Without apology or grace. No flowery excuses, just a blunt refusal. And when she persisted, plunging her hand into his loincloth and handling him like an animal, he shoved her off him, saying, “Touch me again like that and you die.” But Rose didn’t need to know about that humiliation.
“You weren’t tempted? She wasn’t pretty?”
He made a scornful sound. “She was pretty enough on the outside, but inside she was poison through and through.” From then on his life became one long round of hard work, semistarvation and beatings. “The more I got to know her, the more I understood why Sidi Achmed had turned up his toes and died so easily. It must have been hell being married to her.”
“She and her son sound like a dreadful pair.”
“They were. He had me beaten one day for refusing to call himsidi—which means ‘lord.’ I put on my thickheaded Englishman guise and pretended I didn’t understand the order.” Thomas smiled grimly at the memory. “He’d summoned the whole household to witness my punishment. But when he’d finished with the beating, I told him in perfect, fluent Arabic, in front of everyone, ‘Sidi Achmed was a good man; he would be shamed a thousand times over if he knew the vile creature his son has become.’”
His expression hardened. “It was war from then on.”
She nuzzled her cheek against him.
“The last straw came when I came across Adil beating up a frail old man.” His stomach clenched at the memory. “Nasr was a gentle old scholar, Rose, a Greek, I think. He’d been with the family sixty years—imagine being a slave for that long. He’d taught Sidi Achmed his letters and later Adil. He must have had a fine brain, for he’d overseen the family business all that time, and it had thrived. He kept the account books, conducted all their correspondence—he spoke and wrote at least four languages. But by the time I arrived the poor old fellow was nearly ninety, and his mind was going.”
Rose hugged him silently.
“You’d think he would have earned an honorable retirement, but gratitude wasn’t in that woman’s vocabulary, nor her son’s,” Thomas said. “That day, I heard the old man crying out in the courtyard and went to see to him. That little worm was beating him, kicking him, punching, hitting him with a stick—a stick! And laughing, as the poor confused old fellow wept hopelessly and tried to dodge the blows.”
Her eyes darkened with sympathy.
“Years of faithful service and this was to be his old age. Bad enough to be confused and forgetful, but being endlessly tormented by a vicious young thug? For reasons that made no sense? It was unbearable.”
“Poor old man. What did you do?”
