Читать книгу Deadline Yemen (The Elizabeth Darcy Series) - Peggy Hanson - Страница 7

CHAPTER 3

“I look at this country and I see a plane ready to take off.”

“In what direction?”

Victoria Clark, Yemen, Dancing on the Heads of Snakes

En route into Sana’a, the familiar scent of smoke from cooking fires blew into my face from the open front window, waking me up. The radio’s sad, insinuating music echoed my unease. I’d answered the e-mail, saying I was coming. Why hadn’t Halima written back? Very unlike her to not get my flight details so she could meet me, or have me met. Something serious must be wrong.

The traffic light changed but the taxi wasn’t going anywhere. The intersection was clogged with a wedding celebration. People gathered around loosely-turbaned men as they danced to the mesmerizing, heart-thudding beat of Yemeni drums. Curved silver jambiyas, the famous knives of Yemen, slashed toward other dancers. As the crowd ululated in approval, one of the dancers pointed his knife at his own head and danced ever-faster. Then he grabbed two jambiyas and went into a routine. The knife caught light from the street lamp as it slashed under his legs and back up again. The jambiyas lifted in cadence with the drums, coming perilously close to what are politely referred to as the “family jewels.”

As if to accentuate the gap between the sexes, a little flotilla of black-garbed women sailed gracefully down the cobble-stoned street, right past my taxi. Returning home from the wedding, obviously. Anonymity personified, as opposed to macho show-off tactics. The yin and yang of Yemen, differences sharply etched. For me, a magic interlude.

The last time I’d visited this exotic backwater of the Arabian Peninsula, in 1994, civil war raged between north and south. SCUDs had been frightening, but not as scary as my arrest by the secret police. Had Halima not come to my rescue, wielding impressive family credentials and the respect of the tribes…well, I didn’t want to think about that. It had been my first encounter with the special fear women face when under the control of brutal men who need proof of nothing and have few restraints.

On happier topics, I’d caught my breath both times arriving as the plane descended through stark mountain peaks, clustered fortress villages flickering faintly.

Yemen had come through the 1994 war still united, but not without massive bloodshed on both sides. This visit, though not in wartime, promised to be unsettling in a different way. This time I had to help my lifesaver, in any way I could.

I reached into my carry-on to touch my Jane Austen security blanket—Emma, this time. I never travel without Jane.

In a way, I was happy to have Jane Austen my sole companion tonight. The tinge of rejection when my travel companion hadn’t offered a ride had been wiped out by the wedding, the familiar wood smoke in the high altitude air, and excitement at being back. Peaks of Yemen, I had arrived.