I get out and wave, and in reflex she pulls a white scarf, which has fallen onto her shoulders, back onto her head.
‘As-salaamu aleikum.’ It’s time to play the role of the helpful passer-by.
She returns the greeting peremptorily and looks up at me full of suspicion. She says something angrily in Arabic which I don’t catch, then rolls her eyes as if help from a white tourist is the last thing she wants.
I walk down from the shoulder of the road to where she stands beside her car, the wheels of which have sunk into the sand up to the axles.
‘I saw what happened. Can I help?’
‘No, thank you,’ she says, putting up her hands in a gesture of refusal. ‘Everything is OK. I don’t need help.’ She has a clear soft voice with a distinct French accent.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes,’ she says testily, ‘I’m sure. I’m a woman, but I’m sure. Thank you.’
She looks even more annoyed now. Her reaction has caught me by surprise. I had the impression from her photograph that she’d be meek and reserved, a timid Muslim woman who only speaks when she’s spoken to. I couldn’t be more wrong. She’s all fire and pride, conspicuously strong-willed and too stubborn to admit how angry she is. She’s also more beautiful than in the photograph, which is perhaps why I’m staring. Even without having seen her picture, I’m certain I would have this feeling that I already know her, as if we’ve met before. But we haven’t. I catch myself and look away, as if breaking free from the spell of a hypnotist.
‘I can help to pull you out,’ I say. It worked with the Uzbek girl.
‘Thank you,’ she says. ‘I don’t need your help. I can take care of this.’ Then, half to herself but distinctly enough for me to hear, she mutters ‘Imbecile’ under her breath.
I say nothing. It’s a stand-off. She won’t accept help, and I’m too proud to be rebuffed. We look at each other for a few seconds. It’s the first time our eyes really meet. Her face is still but her scarf is moving slightly in the breeze. My mind’s racing with unexpected thoughts and I’m reluctant to take my eyes off her. I walk back to my car and fetch the tow rope. She’s still glowering at me as I return, but there’s a hint of curiosity in her eyes now.
‘En cas d’urgence.’ I put the tow rope on the bonnet of her car.
‘I don’t need that,’ she says.
‘I’d say you need it more than I do,’ I say. ‘In case you have trouble parking again. Nice to meet you.’
She opens her mouth to speak but then decides not to. I turn and walk back to my car. I have my pride too.
On the roof of the guest house I can sit unobserved and power up the satphone. It’s been modified by the operational support geeks back home to accept a memory card with randomised codes on it, which makes it the modern equivalent of a code book and one-time pad combined. Each word of my contact report for Seethrough has a corresponding code number which is then encrypted and sent in a burst that lowers the probability of recognition or intercept to virtually nil. The most challenging part of the operation is shielding the screen from sunlight so as to see the words as I select them: first contact hibiscus successful arranged new rv next week. It’s not perfectly accurate, but he’s not to know. I’m just hoping I can think of a way to meet Jameela again before the week is out.
The solution comes after I pay a visit to the UNICEF office in Street 47 and am given an armful of documents about the organisation’s activities in the Sudan. Among them is a list of upcoming events in Khartoum, which I scan down until Jameela’s name leaps out at me beneath the title Global Programme for Polio Eradication. In three days’ time she’s giving a briefing on the progress of an immunisation campaign in the Nuba mountains in the south of the country. Staff and NGO partners, it reads further down, are welcome.
When the time comes, I find a seat among an audience of about thirty people and remind myself that I’m supposed to have found my way there by accident because the woman I’ve come to see hasn’t even told me her name yet. Listening to her speak about the inter-agency appeal targeted at multi-sectoral activities, I’m reminded that the world of humanitarian aid is almost as afflicted by jargon as the army. But when it’s time for questions, I make sure I’m the first to raise my hand, introducing myself and my company in the process, to ask about the risk of anti-personnel mines to children in the region.
There’s a flicker of puzzlement on her features as she wonders where she’s seen me before then delivers a textbook answer. At the end of the session I linger by the door as the others file out, and am glad to see that while she’s talking to another of the participants her eyes turn in my direction several times. I don’t make any effort to hide my pleasure at seeing her again. She walks up to me, clutching her papers across her chest.
‘So, Mr Tavernier.’ She’s Frenchified my name. ‘Is it a coincidence that you are here, or are you spying on me?’ The charm in her restrained smile robs the suggestion of seriousness, but her manner is bold all the same.
‘It’s a coincidence.’ I return the smile. ‘Although I’m sure I would enjoy spying on you too. Unfortunately I’m in Khartoum only for a short time.’
She puts out her hand and introduces herself. She uses her maiden name. The surname bin Laden is not mentioned. ‘It’s nice to meet you again,’ she says. ‘I gave your rope to a village chief. He liked it very much. I have a few minutes before my next meeting. Would you like some tea?’
We walk to a small cafe in the gardens behind the building and sit in the shade under a canopy. She asks me about mine awareness in the Sudan and I tell her what I know: that the problem of mines and unexploded ordnance affects not only the central and southern areas where there’s been recent fighting, but also the Eritrean border east of Kassala, and places on the country’s other borders with Chad, Congo, Libya and Uganda.
She nods approvingly as if satisfied that I really do know about mines. I go on to explain my hopes for designing a mine awareness programme in collaboration with the UN. As I talk, I realise I’m having trouble taking my eyes off her and am hardly listening to my own words. She’s exceptionally beautiful. Her eyes are dark and calm. At moments they express a faintly imploring quality, magnified by her habit of tilting her head almost imperceptibly downwards as she looks at me, as if she’s hiding something she wants to tell me. Her face is narrower and her skin lighter than the Sudanese women I’ve seen, and her smooth rounded forehead and high hairline are unmistakably Ethiopian.
‘You have Tigray blood in you,’ I say impulsively, then regret it. It’s too personal a detail for our first meeting and she’s visibly taken aback, as if I’ve reached too suddenly into her world. I apologise, explaining that she reminds me of a friend’s wife, who was from Ethiopia. She was very beautiful, I add.
‘From my mother,’ she says, and her tone is both curious and guarded.
Yet the conversation survives, and remains unexpectedly personal as we speak of our parents and families. Her mother was born in Ethiopia to a Christian family and her father in Khartoum to a Muslim one. Their marriage was a rare combination but the difference in religion had not interfered with their happiness.
‘The Islam of the Sudan is not like anywhere else,’ she says. ‘Have you seen the stars in the desert yet?’
‘Not yet.’
‘You must, before you go. The stars are great teachers.’
I’m watching her closely as she speaks, observing her face as it traces over each different emotion that rises in her, and catching what I can of its beauty like the glimpse of a butterfly that settles and opens its wings in the sunlight before dancing away. Then suddenly I remember that my purpose in meeting this beautiful woman is to deceive her, and this hits me like the guilt of a murderer. For a moment my head sinks into my hands. I look up again and she’s staring at me with a look of concern.