Karim al-Zib

A Helpful Wife

Prologue

In a very special part of Algiers, where the police did not go without invitation except to pick up their monthly bonus, and where the only customers were the government ministers and the super rich businessmen who came to North Africa for an anonymous and frankly expensive forbidden thrill, Pierre Lemarge plied his trade at his poshly and gaudily decorated night club that was called, not strangely, "Pierre's." Thirty years before, Pierre had been a strikingly handsome, slender and prosperous gigolo and pimp in Paris and Marseilles. Years of self-indulgence and dissipation had left him almost hairless and quite overweight, with a blotchy complexion and a hacking cough, but he enjoyed his life and the money he made at his business running his string of clubs all over North Africa and Mediterranean Europe.

Now he stood at the door of his club in Algiers, welcoming his rich guests who paid 500 French francs, or 100 American dollars, or 65 pounds sterling to see the cabaret. They paid an equal price for champagne, and other drinks were marked up ten times over the normal as well. Of course, that was not all. The cabaret performer always was heavily tipped, but Pierre took all of this for himself. There was no sense in letting the girl have money so she could run away.

Inside, the customers now seated themselves around the circular stage so that the act could take place in the center. The stage itself revolved slowly for the benefit of the clients and gave everyone an equal look at what was going on. Pierre noted the presence of the Greek shipping magnate, the Arabian sheikh, who always spent the most money, the Italian movie star and her boyfriend, and the Algerian minister of defense. The common tourist could never afford to see this show, would not even hear about it. Pierre made twenty thousand dollars a night for his shows, so they were the best.

His girls were the best. The most beautiful, loveliest, youngest. He rotated the acts through his string of nightclubs so that each act played each club at most three weeks a year.

Tonight's "star" was the daughter of an American tourist.