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When she checks in to the Cypress, a run-down pensione in Morocco, the life of Lizzy Holmes, a young American travel writer, unravels. She becomes entangled in the world of its denizens, all of whose lives orbit Ahmed, a charismatic, handsome, morally pliable Tunisian. Teddy, a dissolute English expat, owner of the Cypress, keeps Ahmed in his employ to satisfy all desires. Not knowing that Ahmed is married to Asilah, an Arabic woman who was trafficked, sold, branded in shame, Lizzy befriends her and helps her to learn English. The ensuing love triangle fuels Lizzy's self-destructive submission to aphasia and drugs. A plan devised for Asilah to leave the country ends in betrayal and death.
Alerted to Asilah's tragic death by Lizzy's increasingly distressing letters, and drawn to Morocco by her concern for her, Clare, Lizzy's older sister, arrives in Tangiers in the company of Harry Hopkins, an American businessman she met in Paris. She does not know that Teddy and Harry traffic together in young Arab girls. Ahmed discovers that Harry is responsible for the rape of his wife. He draws a knife and attempts to avenge Asilah's death. Teddy, who has signed ownership of the Cypress over to Ahmed as an expression of his love for him, takes the knife, and plunges it into Harry's chest. Teddy is arrested, but confident of his release. Lizzy has vanished. Clare, determined to find Lizzy, remains at the Cypress, with Ahmed.
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