She shook her head. ‘My parents took what we had. My grandmother had a few coins, but when she was dying I spent the last of those on a bit of water.’

‘Yet you must eat,’ Ibrahim said. ‘Yet you must drink. How did you pay him?’

She glanced at Ali Gurdu, and looked down at her baby, clearly ashamed.

‘Well, I think that’s clear enough,’ Ibrahim said, not bothering to hide his disgust. ‘Food for sex, Ali Gurdu? Is that the game?’

Ali Gurdu looked defiant. ‘You could call it pity. I mean, look at her. Skin and bone. Who would want her?’ He slammed one fat fist into another. ‘But it’s still theft, that’s the top and bottom of it. So what are you going to do about it, “vizier to the vizier”?’

Ibrahim’s thirst raged, though there were hours to endure before his next sip of his water ration. He felt fouled by this grubby case, like so many others he had had to deal with.

It was all the fault of the Christians. The Castilians had lain siege around the city in the spring, when King Fernando had assembled a fleet of ships from the coastal waters, forced his way up the Guadalquivir and rammed the pontoon bridge. Thus, after years of pressure, Fernando had at last bottled the city up. As spring gave way to the usual ferocious summer, disease, famine, and worst of all drought had afflicted the city. Fernando seemed content to wait it out, even as his own men dropped of drought and fever. Once there had been rumours of a relieving force coming from Granada. But that taifa’s ruler Muhammad Abu Alahmar, concerned above all to secure his own position, submitted to King Fernando and actually joined in the siege against his fellow Muslims in Seville.

Sometimes Ibrahim wondered grimly how it would be if the siege never lifted. Would Ibrahim and those like him be forced to administer the death of an entire city, down to the last man, the last child, the last dog and cat?

But meanwhile, today, he had Ali Gurdu and this child-mother Obona to deal with. He glanced at Ibn Shaprut’s stern face, seeking guidance.

‘Here is my decision. Ali Gurdu, you have a certain usefulness. Men like you, with your grafting and your greed, actually enforce the rationing. You’re dribbling out your stock, bit by bit. If you gave it all away there would be a riot, it would be gone in a day, and we’d be a lot worse off.’

‘You need me, do you?’ Ali Gurdu scoffed.