Chapter 11: Shopping

David decided that it would be a good idea if he visited the slave auctions and watched how women were bought and sold. He asked about the way this was done and was told that there was a polite fiction that these women were not slaves, but indentured servants for a fixed period, usually twenty years, and it was these indentures that were sold. Also men were bought and sold on the same basis. He told Kamal Qumsiyeh to arrange a visit.

"There may be some difficulties, Master," said Kamal Qumsiyeh, which was the nearest he ever came to refusing David anything.

"Smooth them out," said David, "and not by arranging a fake auction, either."

"Master, the problem is nobody will bid if you are there. If the Emir bids for a slave then nobody would dare to bid against him. If he does not bid for a slave, then everyone would assume there is a fault in the slave," explained Kamal Qumsiyeh.

"Tell them I am only sightseeing. I will not bid for, nor will I comment on any slave. I will buy only through my usual agents," said David, "No, better still, arrange for me to be hidden from view and tell nobody I am visiting."

"The latter is truly impossible, Master. The auctioneer will want to advertise your presence as much as he can."

"Then hide me, but I want to see as near to a normal auction as can be arranged. Do not tell the auctioneer until we arrive at his door."

Some days later Kamal Qumsiyeh said, "If it is still my Master's wish, there is a slave auction today. We could attend quite discretely. Many people will know that you are there but they have been told that you wish to be invisible; none will acknowledge your presence."

"Good," said David, "I was beginning to think you had forgotten."

"I would never forget your slightest wish, Master," was the quick reassurance.

The limousine whisked them to the low warehouse near the airport where the auction was to take place. As David walked in everyone present fell to their knees and pressed their heads to the floor.

"The Emir is not here," he reminded them in a firm tone.

Everyone stood up sheepishly, but David felt flattered that they liked him as Emir enough to show respect when they had specifically been told not to do so. The fact that most of them had thought his invisibility wish was a trick to catch them not showing respect never occurred to him.

The Emir was shown round escorted by the Auctioneer, a man called 'Old Saud' by all and sundry because of his nationality. The slaves to be sold were kept in pens which reminded David of the pictures of old cattle markets in England and there were a large number of men moving from pen to pen assessing the goods. Some were making notes on their catalogues as they went. David waved away the offer of a catalogue, since he was not buying and did not want to confuse the genuine customers.

There were women there of all shapes and sizes and of ages ranging from about sixteen to sixty, David judged. Some of the younger ones had babies with them, but none of the children seemed to be old enough to walk. Their skin colours ranged from the deepest purple-brown of equatorial Africa to light skinned women who could easily pass for sun-tanned white women. The clothing they wore was as varied as their shapes. Some wore very little, others wore tattered finery, while a few of the healthiest-looking wore clean new-looking outfits of varied types but all of those seemed to be suited more to the bedroom than to field work.

Kamal Qumsiyeh explained that there were three classes of indenture for sale; field workers, domestic workers and pleasure workers. The field workers were the big strong women who tilled the fields and generally acted as farm labourers all over the country. One of those in prime condition could fetch as much as two hundred Kobestis, which David quickly equated to about a thousand English pounds; Certainly they were valuable property and one of proven breeding ability would fetch more than that. Domestic workers were considered the lowest form of slaves and one of them might sell for as little as four Kobestis or twenty pounds sterling if she was small, old or otherwise poorly suited to working.

It was the pleasure workers which interested David the most. These were the harem slaves who were concubines trained to please men. The price of these, Old Saud explained, depended more on their pedigree and provenance than on anything else. As an example he cited Djamilla, who would fetch next to nothing for herself, and would probably be sold as a domestic and not a high-priced one at that. However, because she had been Head Wife to the Emir, many men would bid for her as a status symbol and she would be worth, perhaps, several thousand Kobestis.

"So my little Maryam would fetch what?" asked David, "She was bought at the breast by my grandfather and raised in the Golden Palace harem. She is about twenty-five years old."

"She is, I believe, Master, only nineteen," replied the trader, "For herself, a few hundred Kobestis, but as your ex-favourite concubine and still young as she is, the price could be anything. The best price I ever sold for was a girl who had passed only one night with the Emir your grandfather and she fetched almost three thousand Kobestis."

David thought that fifteen thousand pounds was too much for any woman, even if money was no object, as it was for him. Considering what the man had implied about his knowledge of the workings of the Emir's harem, David asked him how he knew these things.

"Master," came the confident reply, "The buyers for the big harems and the Chief Eunuchs who fetch and carry the women are all close friends of Old Saud. I could not operate successfully without the knowledge I gain from them. In return there are special women occasionally, who are not openly auctioned."

That made sense to David. In England an estate agent would need to be au fait with everything happening in his area and would offer favoured informants first crack at the occasional bargain property. This was really no different.

"In fact, Master," continued Old Saud, "If you care to come this way there is one 'special' in this auction which might interest the Emir. She is a one hundred percent guaranteed virgin from somewhere in Europe; she speaks some English but I cannot understand her easily. She seems to have no Arabic or French. Other languages I do not know."

David was shown into a small room with a window which was tightly shuttered. When the door was closed darkness descended and the slave auctioneer then opened the shutters to show a cell not unlike a prison cell containing a sad-looking white woman of thirty or so, wearing a torn dress and showing no evidence of having any underwear beneath it. She was sitting dejectedly on a low bench and looked very unappetising. Then she started shouting and David at once recognised an Irish accent, though the swear words she was using were not all familiar to him. When he indicated a possible interest in her, the auctioneer immediately had her stripped.

'On balance, ' David thought, 'that was a mistake; the attraction of a partly clothed body was lost without any compensating beauty being revealed.'

She looked what she probably was, an Irish slut who had strayed too far from home. Her virginity, in the unlikely event of it being true, made the stretch marks on her body evidence of the second coming.

After he had been shown to his seat behind a screen on a gallery above the auction, David asked Kamal Qumsiyeh if he could arrange for the 'special' he had seen to be bought on his behalf.