HALF AN hour later, we draw up outside the compound. The drivers have been instructed to wait until we are inside before pulling away. I am almost at the gate when a searing pain shoots up my ankle. I double over, dropping everything I am carrying.
Sultan has seen what has happened and is next to me in an instant. He goes down on one knee and lifts my foot. Any other time, his look of alarm would have been funny. My sandal is nailed to my foot by a screw, most of its length embedded in my heel. I try to dislodge my sandal but the pain is severe and the nail doesn’t budge.
I sink onto the grass beside the paved concrete. Even in this state, I cannot help noticing the many cats that take refuge under parked cars. They sit and watch us.
Sultan, bless him, keeps talking, gently, soothingly, in Arabic, as he firmly grips my sandal and pulls it away from my foot. I didn’t anticipate that, and my guttural scream frightens me as much as it does him. For a moment I sit there, eyes closed, trying to catch my breath. I am surprised at the amount of blood that is gushing from the hole.
I thank him and after assuring him that I am okay, he helps me up. I limp to our flat, leaving a bloody trail on the terracotta tiles in the compound. I have the rusty nail with me, and realise I will have to go for a tetanus shot as the last one I had was as a child. I clean the wound as best I can and wrap it up firmly, more to staunch the flow of blood than anything else.
I will go to hospital first thing in the morning.
When I wake up, my heel is swollen out of shape. I phone the princess and after I explain what has happened, she sends Sultan for me straight away. An hour later, I am sitting in the waiting room at the hospital. Although medical aid is part of my contract, it doesn’t quite work that way. The princess pays all the medical bills so you aren’t free to go to a doctor without her knowing. Unless you pay for it yourself.
This is the family doctor and also a personal friend of the royals, even travelling with them on their trips to Europe. He is not available immediately as it is prayer time. I can’t help wondering what would happen if a patient was at death’s door at prayer time. Insha’Allah I won’t find out. I’ve become used to waiting, so I don’t go anywhere without something to read. I take out Mark’s kindle and settle in.
Doctor “Friendly” is standing in front of me with a smile and his hand extended. I get up, but jerk backwards forcefully, the neckline of my abaya under my chin. I had stepped on the hem at the back as I got up. He waits with his hand extended and this time I manage the second attempt at standing with a little more dignity.
He asks where I’m from, then responds by greeting me with, “Goeie môre. Hoe gaan dit?” accompanied by a beaming smile. Sometime in his life he had dated a South African and takes great pride in the few Afrikaans words he can still speak. He is very talkative and asks me many questions. “How are you enjoying Riyadh?” “How is work going?” “Do you like working for the princess?”
I did not know that the princess had confided to Mona that Dr Friendly is in love with her. Had she mentioned that, I would have been very wary about what I told him. For this reason, my second visit to him is the beginning of the end . . .
After the tetanus injection, Sultan is waiting for me, as always. This time he jumps out and opens the door back for me, a courtesy usually reserved for the princess.
As I limp into the villa, Lilly says the princess is waiting to see me. I knock and she beckons me in. I try not to limp as I walk in but the friendly doc did not give me painkillers. This calls for two myprodols and a shot of whisky but neither is at hand. In this topsy-turvy world, antibiotics are available over the counter but any medication that will make you look at your neighbour twice, is banned. So are pool noodles and anything else deemed phallic.
The princess is concerned but I assure her I am all right. I am still new on the job and don’t want to give the impression that I’m a hypochondriac, so after the pleasantries, I pull the four centimetre nail out of my pocket to show the princess the culprit. She shrieks as she whips back as if an invisible force had just backhanded her. Apparently she doesn’t have a strong stomach. Imagine I had shown her the gaping hole in my foot! I limp out backwards.