Free The Hidden by Jo Chumas

it. A notebook fell out. He flipped through it, held it upside down, and shook it. Nothing.
    “Damn,” he muttered under his breath. He ventured into the bedroom and lifted up the mattress, pushing it off the bed frame onto the floor. He wanted to find something there, a box with secret papers, but there was nothing. He flung open the doors of an armoire, found a suitcase, jacked it open, extracted a man’s suit, fumbled in the pockets, and pulled back a sheath of fabric hiding a revolver. Seeing that it was loaded, he slipped it in his pocket and stood up. His eyes darted around manically, his mouth was parched, and the sound of his heart was vibrating and crashing against his eardrum. He was running out of time. There must be a safe, a vault. He padded over the kilims, treading carefully in an effort to locate an uneven floorboard, something that would indicate a hiding place for secret papers. He went to the farthest corner of the house. Huge windows overlooked Sharia Suleyman Pasha. From the window, he saw a smart-looking car draw up and two women get out. A blond woman with ringlets looked up at the window and pointed. He drew back from the window, not wanting her to see him. The other, a dark-haired girl with pale skin, shook her head and kissed her friend four times on the cheek. Was she the girl? Already home fromAchmed’s party? Littoni slipped invisibly through the darkness and hid in the shadows of the courtyard to wait for her.
    The journal of Hezba Iqbal Sultan Hanim al-Shezira,
    Cairo, August 19, 1919
    Papa is here. He has summoned his Fire to his library. I can’t wait to see him. He has been away too long. I am not sure how long he is in Cairo, but I must not waste another moment. I must go to him. Fire is the affectionate name he has for me. I used to sit on his knee, curl up in his lap, pull his moustache, and tickle his nose. Papa loved to stroke my face back then. As a young child, barely older than four, I remember him remarking how hot my forehead and cheeks were. Since then he has always called me Fire. Oh Papa.
    I walk through the long corridors of the harem towards the salamlik and my father’s quarters. As I walk, I am transported back in time. I am the Fire of the Sarai, the five-year-old who is held down by her nurse and her eunuchs and her mother while she is circumcised and made pure, who screams in pain, who doesn’t understand why she is being mutilated. I am the Fire of the Sarai, the six-year-old who plays hide-and-seek with the other children of the palace. I am the Fire of the Sarai, the seven-year-old who is separated from her dear brother, Omar, and sent to live in the harem because that is the way of our people. I am the Fire of the Sarai, the eight-year-old who sings the suras of the Qur’an while Maman scolds me. “You should not sing them, child. Recite them with heart, not in a flippant voice full of light and joy. Be serious for once. Have some respect for the Prophet.”
    I am the Fire of the Sarai with a voice that can be heard through the marble corridors, the great dining rooms, the bathhouse, the stables. I am the Fire who begs Papa for riding lessons and a horse, who promises to be a good girl forever. I am the Fire of the Sarai, the ten-year-oldchild who puts her arm around Papa’s shoulders and kisses him on the cheek, who dances and runs from room to room, who hides little poems under her maman’s pillow, wanting her love so badly, who writes verses about the sun and the moon and the silvery light that falls on the trees in the palace gardens at night.
    I am the Fire of the Sarai, the young girl whose body is no longer hers, whose blood starts to flow, who is scrubbed of womanly impurities, who is stripped of all her body hair, who is perfumed and veiled. I am the Fire of the Sarai who is married as soon as she is old enough to be opened up, so she can bear children.
    I shiver when I remember all these things, my girlhood taken from me. And now I have to face my