The Storyteller of Casablanca (33)

We looked at the arrays of stalls with their baskets of olives, dates, spices and fish, and we saw a butcher’s shop with camel meat hanging from a hook on the ceiling. There were rug sellers and leather workers too. Then Bert bought some sprigs of mint from a stall and said we should hold them to our noses because we were about to go and see the famous and very ancient traditional leather tanneries and the smell was really pretty dreadful. She was right. The tannery looks a bit like a giant honeycomb of stone vats although it certainly doesn’t smell as pleasant as a real honeycomb would. The tanners use bird droppings and urine to treat the hides while they are being dyed different colours and the stench of sulphur and ammonia makes your eyes water. The sprigs of mint helped a bit and Bert showed us how to crush them a little between our fingers to release more of their sweetness. First the hides are rubbed with salt to remove the hair and then they are put into one of the very stinky vats and men get in there with them and stamp on them until they become soft. I dread to think what their feet must smell like when they go home at the end of the day. Perhaps their wives make them wash before they come into the house. At the end of the process, the hides are rinsed with mimosa flowers to get rid of the bad smell. (Maybe that works on the men’s feet too.) It was very interesting to see how the different colours were made, using plants like indigo, poppies and saffron, but I must admit it was quite a relief to move on from the tannery and be able to breathe some fresher air at last.

After a very tasty supper (the cook at the riad is almost as good as Kenza), we retired to our beds.

True to her word, Gert took us to visit the library at the university the next morning. The guard wasn’t keen to let us in at first, but Gert was very persuasive, and he obviously knew that she was a very intelligent scholar who treated the library with deep respect, and so in the end he let us pass. Gert showed us shelves of leather-bound books, some over a thousand years old and written on camel skin. She also showed us a very old wooden plaque, which she explained was the university degree certificate awarded to its founder, Fatima Al-Fihri, all those centuries ago. She smiled at me and said, ‘Ironic, isn’t it, that my own university still doesn’t award proper degrees to women.’

There was a reading room, which we tiptoed through, feeling a great sense of awe at the thought of all those scholars who had studied here down the years. Even Annette was impressed. And then Gert led us along a narrow corridor and up a winding stone staircase, which grew narrower and narrower until at last we emerged, blinking, into the bright daylight on the roof of the library. Beyond the concertina-like folds of the green-tiled roofs of the university buildings, the huddled jumble of the medina’s streets stretched for miles. Far in the distance, in a haze of heat and dust, the mountains of the Middle Atlas rose from the surrounding plain. Papa pointed towards them. ‘Taza must be somewhere in that direction,’ he said. And judging by the preoccupied expression in his eyes, I surmised that Gert and Bert were most probably just two more red herrings and that the real reason for our trip lay in those mountains.

I liked Fez very much. If we weren’t going to America, I think I might even have liked to have lived there and been a scholar, reading ancient books in that quiet library.

I’ve written a lot so I think I’ll stop for a bit now and finish writing down the rest of the story of our trip another day.





Josie’s Journal – Friday 11th April, 1941

I didn’t have time to write anything in my journal yesterday as Maman insisted that Annette and I accompany her to the hairdresser – in my case for a trim and in Annette’s case for a far more fancy wave and set, which she’d wanted to try out ever since she saw Katharine Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story at the cinema a couple of weeks ago. Then I had an English lesson with Miss Ellis in the afternoon to make up for the ones I’d missed with us being away. She asked me to tell her all about our lovely family outing to the mountains. Ha! I was quite tempted to say that now I knew why we’d gone on that trip, just as she and Mr Reid did, but I realised I was probably still going to be needed as a decoy to protect Papa in the future and that if I blew my cover then they might ask him to go on other trips without me, which would put him more at risk. So, for the sake of protecting him, I just imagined I was a radio newsreader and told the story while leaving out some of the important bits of the truth. Perhaps I’ll get a job as a radio presenter in America instead of a lawyer, except my programme will tell the whole truth about things. I bet a lot of people would be very interested to listen to that.

The chergui is blowing today, whipping up the dust and filling my eyes with grit when I tried to go and do some skipping in the courtyard, so we are staying inside with all the doors and windows tight shut and that gives me time to finish writing the true story of what took place on our trip . . .

We said a fond farewell to Bert and Gert, and they promised to visit us in Casablanca sometime, if they ever got the chance to come and see their friend Dorothy Ellis.

From Fez the road began to rise more steeply as we climbed into the mountains. The scenery was completely different on the way to Taza, much greener, and there were shady forests and pastures where sheep grazed contentedly. We drove along a deep valley and Papa said we were between two mountain ranges – the Middle Atlas and the Rif. The air smelled different, of woodsmoke and wild thyme, and it felt much fresher than down on the plain.

Then the road got really steep and we had to stop the Dodge Sedan and put water in the radiator because steam was coming out. Before he could put the water in, we had to wait a bit for the radiator cap to cool down enough for Papa to open it, so I went for a little wander along the side of the road. Perched on the rocky slopes above us, I spotted a herd of black goats balancing on the pinnacles and shards of the sheer mountainside. It was hard to imagine how they’d managed to get themselves up there. They seem to leap around the rocks like acrobats. A man came past us herding a flock of sheep down the road. His head was swathed in a turban, which he’d wrapped around his nose and mouth too to keep out the dust kicked up by the trotting hooves. All you could see were his deeply hooded eyes. He didn’t stop, just kept on following the river of sheep as they flowed downhill to the greener pastures. Apart from that it was very peaceful and we didn’t see another soul. A large bird with a white head and vast black wings circled overhead, as if it was watching us. When I pointed it out to Papa he said it was a kind of vulture called a lammergeier and it was keeping an eye out for food. That made me shiver a bit because it seemed like it might be considering us for its next meal. Thankfully we managed to get going again soon after that, so the lammergeier had to swoop off to search elsewhere.