The Power of Five Oblivion

once again. He was smiling. “You are a very clever young lady!” he exclaimed waggling a finger at her. “I have not seen you here before. What is your name?”
    “I’m Scarlett.”
    “Tell me how you did that. How did you know where the ball was going to fall?”
    “I didn’t,” Scarlett said, tiredly. “I was just lucky.”
    “You came here to win money? To buy supplies?”
    “Yes.”
    “There is no need for that. You will come to my palace for dinner. You and your friend will sit beside me as my guests of honour and we will talk. Come, Jaheda! Let us leave…”
    The sheikh examined her one last time, then turned on his heel and left the room. Scarlett looked at Richard. They both knew that she hadn’t received an invitation. It had been a command.
    They watched as the sheikh disappeared through the doors that had brought him here. His wife – Jaheda – followed him, but at the last moment she turned and looked at Scarlett with an expression of intense hatred.
    Then the doors closed and the two of them had gone.

TWENTY-NINE
    There were thirty people invited to dinner at the palace that night. Like the casino crowd, they were all dressed in their finest clothes and displayed enough jewellery to fill a treasure chest. Many of them were smoking – cigars and cigarettes – sucking in smoke between mouthfuls of food. They sat on cushions around a low table, with Sheikh Rasheed at the very centre so that none of his guests would miss his jokes or his observations. Scarlett had been placed on his right. Richard was concerned to find himself separated from her, some distance away. And to make matters worse, the sheikh’s wife, Jaheda, had been banished from her usual place and placed next to him.
    The palace was a sprawling mass of white marble and gold fittings, where every door seemed to open onto a room larger than the one before. The building had been put together with one single aim: to prove that the owner was the richest and most important person in Dubai, surrounding him with pillars, arches, ornamental balconies, latticed windows, glittering chandeliers, fountains, pools and fish tanks. And yet at the same time it was a strangely ugly place. It reminded Scarlett of a department store, stuffed with expensive objects that nobody wanted to buy. On the way into dinner she had counted no fewer than seven portraits of Sheikh Rasheed. Even the elaborate mirrors seemed to have been positioned so that they would always reflect him.
    The dining room led to a courtyard and a garden. There might not be enough water in the country to serve the people but there was certainly enough to keep the plants and trees blooming. The air was thick with the smell of flowers. A classical quartet wearing dark suits and bow ties, was sitting outside, playing pop songs and hits from American musicals. And inside, waiters – crowds of them – circulated with food piled high on silver plates. Each guest had half a dozen glasses. Red wine, white wine, champagne and spirits were being served non-stop. It was almost impossible to hear anything. The noise of people talking in English and Arabic, the clatter of plates and glasses, the music – all these had blended together into a general din, broken from time to time by a high-pitched squeal of laughter from the sheikh himself.
    He was piling food into his mouth … but only after everything had been tasted by one of the three bodyguards who stood behind him, taking each dish from the waiters and then passing it on. Very little of the food was fresh but all of it was expensive. They had started with caviar, great mounds of it. Sheikh Rasheed had scooped the oily black eggs out of the tin with his fingers, laughing in delight as the juices trickled down the palm of his hand.
    “Lick it! Lick it!” He had thrust his hand at the woman sitting opposite and she had done exactly that.
    Scarlett was sickened. She was also hugely relieved that he hadn’t asked her to do the same.
    Then there were traditional meze, a selection of Arabic dishes that included stuffed vine leaves, red cabbage, falafel, cream cheese and pancakes. Scarlett had lost her appetite but she forced herself to eat. It had been more than twelve hours since her last meal and she couldn’t say how long it would be until the next. She glanced at Richard, who was also eating without much enthusiasm.
    Then Sheikh Rasheed leant over her. He had been drinking heavily and he was already very drunk, his eyes rolling,