Iris and Ruby by Rosie Thomas

Author:Rosie Thomas [Thomas, Rosie]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, General
ISBN: 9780007173549
Google: _4MWlN39QHQC
Amazon: 0007173547
Publisher: HarperCollins UK
Published: 2006-12-14T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The car was repaired.

The work was done by Nafouz’s friend Husain who was a garage mechanic, and when it was finished Nafouz and Ash returned the car to the alleyway behind Iris’s house. The pitted chrome had been polished as far as possible and the patches of bodywork not consumed by rust were black again.

They stood in a row behind the car, Mamdooh and Auntie and Ruby flanking Iris, and peered at the oily interior. With the engine running the whole vehicle shuddered and coughed like a phthisic old man.

‘Just as fine with engine, see?’ Nafouz beamed.

‘Ace,’ Ruby said.

‘This is not for driving, it is not secure,’ Mamdooh tutted while Auntie stood with her veil drawn across the lower part of her face and her eyes turned down and away from the two boys.

Iris said nothing. Instead, she made a slow tour from the back to the front of the car, touching the door handles and running her fingertips over the blisters of rust that bubbled around the sills. She stroked the bonnet’s slope and completed the circuit to rejoin the four of them. Then she looked Nafouz straight in the eye. ‘I will put my car in the garage now. Then you may come into the house and speak to me.’

‘Lady, Doctor, I will put away …’

‘No thank you,’ Iris snapped. She opened the driver’s door and slid into the creaking seat, grasping the wheel with her freckled hands. She sat up straighter, craning her neck and lifting her chin so she could see ahead through the windscreen. Then with a crescendo of revs she stamped on the clutch and scraped the gearstick into first. The car strained until she remembered the handbrake, and then it sprang forward and Iris spun the wheel to bring it coasting into the garage. She switched off the engine and stepped out, pocketing the ignition key at the same time.

‘Mamdooh will show you the way,’ she told Ash and Nafouz.

Iris and Ruby reached the inner garden first. Iris took Ruby’s arm and hung on to it. She was panting a little but her cheeks were flushed and she looked as excited as a child. ‘You know, I wasn’t sure I could do that.’

‘You didn’t have any trouble at all.’

‘I didn’t, did I? And it was fun. It’s going to be fun.’ She took the keys out of her pocket and flipped them into the air, just managing to catch them again. Ruby thought she was like a teenager who had coaxed the use of his car out of her father for a Saturday night, and the idea made her smile.

Mamdooh escorted the boys out into the garden and stood like a sentinel with his hands clasped in front of him. Ash and Nafouz shuffled a little, staring around them without wanting to stare. The pots of greenery gave off a warm scent of leaves and earth, and the water splashed into its glazed bowl. Above the tiled walls and the haramlek windows the minarets reared against a flat grey sky.

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