Lies and Weddings(58)
“I have no idea why it’s taken me this long. I’ve wanted to come here since reading The Sheltering Sky,” Rufus mused.
“Well, there’s no better way to experience Morocco than with Carolyne organizing things—she always goes all out.”
“Carolyne’s the bride?”
“No, the groom’s mother. Christian is her son—you’ll like him, he surfs too—and the bride is Alison…Amy? I can’t remember her name now. She’s American, medium-size blond, Harvard, the usual.”
“How do you know these people again?”
“I told you, our families do a lot of business together.”
“So why didn’t Uncle Peter come?”
“Hiyah, you know your uncle has so little time to spare these days—you’re lucky he even managed to show his face at Augie’s wedding!”
“It’s a bit weird going to a wedding where I don’t know the couple at all.”
“What’s so weird about that? I go to so many weddings where I don’t even know the bride and groom’s names! You know, weddings aren’t about the couple. They’re for the families to impress their guests. I mean, look at your own sister’s wedding.”
“That’s not how my wedding is going to be.”
Rosina gave him a pitying look, as if to say, Like you have a choice. “Well, this wedding is going to be totally different from Augusta’s. You’ll see. The Radfords have no need to impress anyone, so they are making it a very intimate affair—only a hundred and fifty of their closest friends.”
“Then it’s even weirder that I’m here,” Rufus groaned.
“Nonsense! I am an honored guest, and you’re my plus-one.”
Rufus simply chuckled at the absurdity of it all as the forest-green Audi came to a stop by the side of a busy roadway and the chauffeur pointed to an archway leading into the medina. “You wait there.”
“Are you sure?” Rufus said, peering dubiously at the seemingly random spot.
“Yes, they come,” the chauffeur said.
Rufus helped his aunt out of the car, and as soon as he shut the door it quickly sped off, leaving them standing alone by the walls of the souk. Aside from two cats that came skulking along, the street suddenly became deserted and a bit foreboding. Rufus glanced at his aunt’s magnificent string of pearls glistening in the darkness and whispered, “Auntie, you should cover your pearls with your scarf.”
Rosina scoffed, “Hiyah, moh daam sam![*1] This necklace cost less than twenty pounds.”
Rufus stared at the pearls in surprise. Even though they were fake, he still wondered why his aunt didn’t bring any bodyguards on this trip when he recalled the Leungs were constantly trailed by a retinue of men in dark suits wherever they went. “Where’s your security this time?” he asked.
Rosina scoffed. “When I’m traveling by myself, I never bring security. Calls too much attention. Besides, who wants to come after me? It’s Peter they want.”
“But you’re his wife…”
“Your uncle already said a long time ago, ‘Rosina, if you ever get kidnapped, don’t expect me to pay the ransom.’ Now, if one of the boys ever got kidnapped, that’s a different story. He would run and deliver the bags of cash himself.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Typical Hong Kong man—his sons are more precious than his wife. Peter and my sons are Leungs, I am not. He can always get another wife, hai ma? A younger, tighter model.”
Rufus laughed. “Auntie Rosina, you can never be replaced and everyone knows that!”
“You are too sweet. Of course I can be replaced, but your uncle knows that I will cut off his balls if he ever tries. Now, where is this person that’s supposed to meet us?” As she uttered those words, an elderly man in a hooded brown djellaba emerged from the alleyway holding a dim brass lantern that swayed precariously on a long wooden stick.
“Dar Yacout?” he asked them.
“Yes, Yacout, that’s where we’re going, isn’t it?” Rufus replied, a little relieved.
Without another word, the man turned and started walking much more briskly than either of them expected, darting down the labyrinthine alleyways with surprising agility. The walls of the old souk seemed to transform at every turn, changing in color and texture. Rosina gasped as they passed by the spice quarter of the souk, where spice traders sat beside hundreds of bins bursting with mountainous piles of saffron, cumin, rose petals, nuts, and dried fruit lit with bright overhead lamps. “Oh my goodness, look at those giant medjool dates! I need to come back to get some tomorrow! Doesn’t it feel like we’ve stepped back in time? What I love about the souk is that the people here are living exactly like their ancestors did in medieval times.”
Rufus looked up at the roofs crowded with satellite dishes. “I wish I had brought my Leica along. I could spend days here just taking pictures!”
“Where the hell is he taking us?” Rosina whispered in Cantonese to her nephew as they went deeper into the old city. Just as Rufus was beginning to wonder the same, the old man abruptly stopped at a corner by the unmarked rusted iron door of a nondescript riad. He banged twice, and the heavy door was opened by a tall man in a pristine white djellaba with a red fez on his head. The tall man bowed graciously and said, “Madame Leung, Vicomte St. Ives? As-salaam alaykum!” He stepped aside and waved his hand with a flourish to reveal a tiny foyer lined with flickering lanterns. They followed him down a narrow hallway through another doorway, which opened abruptly into one of the most exquisite spaces either of them had ever seen—a palatial courtyard that shimmered in jewel tones, from the emerald pool in the center of the zellige mosaic tiled floors to the antique bronze and crimson glass lanterns that cast kaleidoscopic shadows along the sparkling tadelakt plaster walls. Along each side of the courtyard were intimate dining alcoves caressed by the lush foliage of tall palms and cooled by burbling marble fountains.