Chapter 8 · Chapter 8

The paper reached me before the hour did.

It came at seven, folded in three, in an envelope with no crest, and the boy who handed it to me at the door did not wait to be asked anything. The first line called itself a verification. The second named an estate on the northern road. The third left the day blank, and beneath the blank, in a hand I knew, my uncle had written that I would hear the rest of it read aloud, and would not sign before I did.

So at nine I was in the corridor outside his majlis with my shoes in my hand, and the door stood open the width of a hand, which is how a door is left when the men behind it have decided that what they are saying is not a secret, and is not for me either.

I could see the edge of the carpet, and one man's knee, and the Dallah going round.

"Thursday," said a voice I did not know. "Eight in the morning. Before the household is up.