That was a big day, her ninth birthday. Her father had taken her and her mother to eat ice cream at the Sheraton Hotel. Then he’d hired a man at the pier to take them to the playground on Sinbad Island in the middle of the Shatt al-Arab river. Her father spent the fifteen-minute journey reciting Sinbad’s adventures battling serpents and devil birdmen. Meanwhile, Rania had hung over the side of the boat and searched for more neon-striped eels.

A bead of sweat ran down her back, and she crept under the shelter of the fat palm tree. Below her, the stream frothed and hissed. She raised the red vial to one eye and the blue to the other and made bicolor binoculars. Then Huda swept into view, mid-river, crouched on the pointy-beaked bow of the mashoof.

Huda’s grandmother sat in the middle of the skiff, a squat figure enrobed in black. Huda’s ten-year-old brother, Mustafa, stood at the stern, steering the vessel with a punting reed thicker than Rania’s arm. Whittled to a point, it doubled as a spear for hunting ducks or dark-scaled bunni fish.

The stream was running high and the current twisted like a startled snake through sand. Mustafa leaned his weight on the punt. The canoe’s nose turned, and the vessel cut a foaming line to the bank. Huda leaped from the bow, her long apricot dress fluttering behind her like a goldfish tail. She landed with a thud, and her bare feet sunk into the sand. Mustafa followed and the two children hauled the mashoof onto the bank beside the other skiffs.

Huda’s grandmother passed the girl a brightly woven saddlebag. Mustafa held the boat steady as she climbed from the vessel, one short, plump limb after the other. She reminded Rania of a black-robed teddy bear. The old woman straightened the purple dress she wore under her abaya and adjusted her scarf over her hair. She stepped into slippers that Huda had removed from the saddle bag, then waddled toward the women’s quarters.

Once his grandmother left, Mustafa raised the sharp end of his punt.

“I spotted a pheasant’s nest back up river.” He looked in his sister’s direction, but Rania had the feeling he wanted her to hear too. “I’m going to get us a bird for dinner.”

“Can I come?” said Huda.

“Girls don’t hunt.” Mustafa puffed out his chest. “It’s a man’s job.”

Huda scowled at his back as he waded north along the narrow bank. She peeked at Rania from the corner of her eye.

“You’re the sheikh’s granddaughter, right?”

Rania smoothed her starched dress.

“And who are you?”

“The fortune-teller’s granddaughter. Of course.” Huda wedged her hands on her hips. “Didn’t you recognize my jaddah? She visits the sheikh’s home twice a month, sometimes more.”

“You’re lying.”