by David Ward
The clothes were hung just out of reach between the two windows. He felt a twinge of guilt. It wasn’t right to steal, and even more so from people who had so little. But what else could he do?
Yeats jumped at a tunic clipped to the middle of the line that hung a little lower then the rest. His fingers skimmed the hem. He tried again and managed to grip the cloth with his thumb and finger for a split second. On his third try the garment came free and Yeats fell to the ground in triumph with the tunic on his head.
As he was dusting himself off it dawned on him that he was going to have to remove his own clothes in order to put on the stolen tunic. “That’s all right,” he murmured. “I’ll leave mine here. That way, it’s not stealing. It’s trading.” He was down to his underwear and running shoes when he heard a giggle. He grasped the tunic to his chest and tried to cover himself. From the window on the other side of the alley a head peered down. It was a girl, somewhat younger than him.
Yeats did not know what to say. He glanced at the tunic in his hands. “Sorry,” he whispered. “But I’ve left my own clothes here to replace it.”
There was another giggle and the girl said softly, “It belongs to Vignan. He lives next to us. He pulls my hair. I won’t tell.” She leaned out a little farther and he saw her eyes and cheerful face.
“Thank you,” said Yeats. He struggled into the tunic. Then he hastily folded the remaining coins into the waistline of his underwear. The running shoes he left propped against a wall.
“Are you hungry?” the girl whispered.
“Yes, I am.”
She disappeared for a moment and Yeats wondered if he should leave. Just as he was about to go the girl returned. “We don’t have much,” she said. “But you can have my breakfast. Catch?”
Yeats held up his hands and caught a half cabbage. “Thank you!”
“You should go,” the girl said. “My mother is coming.”
“I think you are a wonderful person,” he answered. “If Vignan pulls your hair again, tell me, and I’ll punch him in the nose.”
The girl covered her mouth in a burst of giggles and disappeared from the window. Yeats made for the street.
He merged into the traffic with precision this time, slipping in between two carts. The ground was hard packed and he cried out when he stepped on a sharp stone. “I should have kept the shoes!” he muttered.
Despite the discomfort of walking barefoot, he was quickly distracted by the amazing sights and sounds around him. There was so much happening he didn’t know where to look first. No wonder his father and Shari had wished for an adventure like this. Everything was so vivid and real. And the smells! Both good and bad mingled in a profusion of scents. Baked bread and fruit, animal manure, and sweat from many people overwhelmed his senses. While he walked he munched on his cabbage. The bitter leaves made him long for hot buttered toast and honey.
A man a few strides ahead suddenly veered off the main road. He raised his robe and urinated. Dust rose over the gathering puddle. A beggar, missing both eyes, raucously gathered a wad of saliva in his mouth and spat amid the sandals of the nearest people. No one even acknowledged it. Everyone was carrying something and trying to get somewhere faster than everyone else.
There was drudgery in the faces of the people, reflecting a mood that reminded Yeats of his father. The people lifted their feet like those with burdens too heavy to bear. “It’s a hard life,” Yeats murmured. “And no wonder, when the king of the country is murdering their daughters!”
No sooner had the words left his mouth when a terrible wail made him choke on his cabbage. A row of black-clad women came into view, their robes covered in dust. They sat on the ground scooping the dirt with their hands and throwing it into the air.
They were sitting near an unfinished wall made of smooth flat stones. Each stone was splashed with whitewash and placed on the next.
As Yeats watched, the veiled women raised their arms to greet an approaching figure. It was a woman wrapped in black with only her eyes exposed. She walked alone, stopping every few feet to allow her tears to splash onto the stone she carried. Her grief was painful to watch. The wailing reached a crescendo when the woman stooped to place her stone on the wall.
“There must be hundreds of stones,” Yeats murmured. “Perhaps even a thousand!” He sucked in a breath when he realized the terrible truth. Each stone represented a dead girl! He squeezed his eyes to shut out the scene. The noises he had heard the previous night were mothers and fathers weeping for their daughters. Now he had an answer to Shari’s question. Oh, why had she wished to travel into such a tragedy?
He forced himself to look. The woman had joined the others on the ground, throwing fistfuls of dust into the air to show her grief. The injustice of the scene strengthened his resolve. He scowled fiercely. It was time to find Shaharazad. “Don’t worry, Mom,” he whispered. “I’m coming back. I will make it back!” He looked up and angrily brushed a tear away. “And I’m bringing Shari with me! This ends tonight!”
“Get on!” a voice boomed, and someone pressed a basket of fruit against his shoulders.
Yeats spun around and raised his fist. He stared into the startled eyes of a farmer. The man warily moved around him. Yeats rubbed his temples. “What am I saying? The poor guy has probably lost a daughter. Sorry!” he called too late for the man to hear him.
The sun broke over the eastern horizon, illuminating the palace domes standing boldly against the morning sky beyond the town. It did not look as far away as his nocturnal journey had suggested. Somewhere in that maze was a girl, the key to his family’s problems.
His stomach growled. The cabbage was a start but not enough. Working through the crowd, he found a fruit seller’s stand readied for the day’s business.
The street was not like any market Yeats had seen before. Various-size baskets and sacks lay uncovered on the ground and clustered around the merchants. Interspersed with pomegranates, lemons, and melons were nuts and seeds. Yeats gazed uncertainly. The merchant was engaged with a customer who was bargaining for a melon. Beside the largest basket another boy stood idly staring at the street. While the merchant was talking, the boy glanced at Yeats, smiled, and stole a pomegranate. He disappeared into the crowd.
Yeats picked up a dried fig. The other fruit looked like it might require a knife. The merchant addressed him warily and Yeats fumbled for a coin. He wasn’t good at this sort of thing—he was better at words than at math. But one of the coins felt heavier than the others.
“How many?” the merchant queried.
Yeats showed the coin. “Ah … four?”
“What else will you have?”
Yeats stared blankly.
The merchant’s lip twisted into a cunning smile. He looked Yeats up and down, his gaze lingering on his fair hair and turbanless head. “No need! Take the four figs and go in peace.”
“Wait,” Yeats fumbled at his waist. “I’ve got other coins. What about this one?”
No longer smiling, the merchant pressed forward. “Who are you? I have not seen you before. And where did you get such money? Have you stolen it?” His voice brought scowls in Yeats’s direction.
“No! Of course not.” He felt a prickle of sweat behind his ear.
“Who are you?” a woman asked.
“I … I’ll just take the figs!” Yeats grabbed his fruit, tossed a coin at the merchant, and then ran toward the gates.
Shouts erupted. “A thief! A thief!” Several people leapt out of Yeats’s way. He made for the thick of the crowd and disappeared into the mass of jostling merchants. He looked back after a few minutes and it appeared that no one was chasing him.
Outside the main town the long line of farmers and merchants thinned, and Yeats slowed to catch his breath and chew on a fig. In the distance, the palace rose up majestically from the desert, far enough to give him time to think. The figs were a welcome relief from the bitter cabbage. The dust was thick and already Vignan’s freshly cleaned tunic was turning t
he color of the red earth. He thought again of the friendly girl who had helped him in the alley. If only there was someone like her ahead!
He joined a procession of carts and people carrying baskets toward the palace. A donkey brayed and a moment later Yeats had to step over a steaming pile of manure.
The crowd grew thicker closer to the palace gates. He caught his breath against a wall. He munched on another fig and spat the stem at the feet of the moving crowd.
“Stupid!” he chided himself. Some rescuer! He couldn’t even buy fruit without drawing attention.
The crowd pressed forward through the enormous gate to the palace. Hewn slabs formed the archway and, open on either side, tall timbers made an impressive door. In the daylight, the roadways and walls gleamed white and channeled the people under a myriad of branches.
He had to find Mohassin. But where were the kitchens? He stood uncertainly at a fork in the great road while people brushed by.
He was about to merge into the crowd when suddenly someone yelled, “You’ll catch trouble for it, Ali, if those cabbages are not on the King’s table by midday.”
A tall young man pushed a cart full of cabbages along the right-hand road. Yeats hurried after him. The road was so packed that Yeats had to jump up above the crowd occasionally to follow the cabbage seller’s bobbing turban. It all looked so different in the daylight; he saw nothing of the route he had taken the previous evening. Somewhere ahead was the door that led to Shaharazad’s chamber. If he could just find Mohassin! His only chance was to follow the cabbage seller and hope that he was headed in the right direction.
Yeats made use of his size to push through the crowd. He stopped saying “Excuse me” after he realized that everyone else was pushing too, the shorter people more than anyone. For one brief moment he lost sight of his quarry. He stood up on a cage full of colorful birds and looked. The cabbage seller had stopped under the shadow of an arched entryway.
“Get off!” shouted a voice below.
“Sorry!” called Yeats and he jumped back into the crowd. He sidled up to Ali and his cart. The seller was desperately defending himself to an angry cook.
“The roads are madness today. Look at them!”
The cook waved a finger. “They are no less mad than yesterday or a thousand days before that! Watch yourself, Ali. Or I may get my cabbages from another. Is there such darkness in your heart that you would keep his lordship waiting for his meal?”
Another figure appeared behind the cook. “What is all this talk of darkness on such a fine morning?”
Mohassin! Although he was now dressed in an apron, Yeats recognized him immediately. Yeats took the ring from his pocket and clasped it tightly.
“Look at poor Ali,” Mohassin continued. “You have turned his face as white as his turban. And over cabbages! Go heat the fires. I will take the cabbages.”
Ali bowed low, then hurriedly unloaded his vegetables into giant baskets on the floor. Yeats remained frozen to the wall. He had to speak to Mohassin. But would he listen?
“Filth!” croaked a voice at his knees. Yeats recoiled from a mangled figure he had mistaken for a heap of onion sacks. A beggar, lying on the ground, with a crumpled face that looked as worn as the cloak he was wearing, stared him down. “My spot, young maggot. Mohassin! Tell this maggot to leave my spot!”
Yeats held his ground and his breath as well.
Mohassin came closer and stared curiously at Yeats. He was not as old as Yeats had first thought, at least, not quite as old as Mr. Sutcliff. But years of hard work and sun had taken their toll, judging by his bent back and weathered face. He wiped his sweating forehead with a cloth.
“God’s blessings, child,” he said. “Do not mind Mustafa’s scolding. The cabbages from my kitchen doors feed the rich and poor alike.”
Yeats nodded weakly. He couldn’t find his voice.
“Come, child. There is enough. No, Mustafa! Do not shake your stick! Eat your cabbage stew with thankfulness or I’ll put you around the corner.”
The beggar was mortified and tried to make amends. “Nice maggot. Come and sit with Mustafa. There is room!”
Still unable to speak, Yeats opened his hand to reveal Shaharazad’s ring. The effect was immediate. The beggar pointed in astonishment and opened his mouth.
Mohassin pounced. He clapped a hand over the begger’s mouth and hissed, “Have you not always eaten your fill here?”
The beggar nodded.
“Then fear not and speak not.”
Before Yeats could retract his prize, Mohassin pulled him into the palace kitchens. Fires from two stone hearths, one at either end of the large room, filled the space with heat and flickering light. No wonder Mohassin was sweating! Earthen pots, herbs, and plants hung from lattices above their heads. The air was filled with spice. Two cooks laboring over a pot looked up at him.
“Young fool!” Mohassin whispered. “Why endanger the lady? Put the ring away!” He whisked Yeats into a storeroom shelved floor to ceiling with baskets. The odor of rotten cabbage was nauseating. “Speak quickly,” Mohassin whispered. “We’ve already been noticed.”
Yeats lifted the ring again hopefully.
Mohassin released him. Then he folded his hands in prayer. “I know the lady’s token. Give it to me. There now, why are you here? What does she require and how have you managed to see her?”
Yeats shook his head, unsure of where to start. “I can’t tell you! She told me not to. But she said you would help me.”
Mohassin’s shrewd gaze held him firmly. “I must honor her wishes, of course. Unless it presents a danger to herself. What is it you need?”
Yeats looked up sharply. “Take me to her chamber at midnight.”
Twirling the end of his beard thoughtfully, the man answered, “A most unusual request. Highly unusual.”
“It is very important,” Yeats said. “And I need your help. I don’t know how to get to there from here. I can’t remember the way. But I must be there by midnight because that is when she … she will be expecting me.”
Mohassin rested his hands on his portly belly. “How in the realm of heaven did you manage to meet her in the first place? The palace is sealed off from the town and the garden is guarded by more than just palace soldiers.”
“I … I was taken there. By people who know my father.” It was partially true. Mohassin was unconvinced.
“And what, pray, is your father’s name?”
“William Butler Trafford.”
“He is a merchant? Certainly not royalty—not from the way you are dressed. And a foreigner.”
Yeats peered down at his robe. “These aren’t my regular clothes!”
The old man raised his eyebrows. “I should hope not.”
“Will you help me?”
Mohassin regarded him thoughtfully. Finally he chuckled. “Shaharazad is always up to some new mischief. I imagine she is hungry for young company—strange as it appears to my eyes. And you are but a child! No harm to it, I think.” He turned the ring over in his hand. “Although it is a dangerous game you two are playing. If you are caught, your head will hang from the palace gates.”
Yeats held himself steady against the wall. He tried to hear Mohassin’s next words but there was the image of his own head hanging. …
“You will need servant’s clothes,” Mohassin was saying. “I will garb you as a cook’s assistant. If you are met on the way, you shall say you are delivering a sleeping draft to ease her ladyship’s dreams.”
Despite his assistance, Yeats sensed mistrust in the old man’s words. He returned the cook’s steady gaze as a show of good faith. Yeats had to gain his trust. It was his only hope of getting to Shaharazad.
The sound of wailing women rose above the clamor of the crowds. A wave of pain crossed Mohassin’s face. “That is something Shaharazad need not know about.” He gripped Yeats firmly. “You know that, don’t you—foreigner though you be? She must not learn of what is happening.”
Yeats shook loos
e. “I’m here for something else!”
The old man scowled. “Who are you, child?”
“Mohassin!” a gruff voice interrupted. A man holding a curved sword stood in the doorway. His robes were black and a silk scarf covered his mouth and nose. His silver helmet had a spike at the top. “Trouble?”
Palace guard! It was Yeats’s first good look at one and the sight was enough to make him wish he never saw another. The guard’s bare arms rippled with muscles and there was a scar on his face that ran from the corner of one eye to his chin.
Straightening, Mohassin turned. “No. Not yet. The new assistant doesn’t seem to know the difference between a cabbage and an onion.”
The guard laughed cruelly. Then he ran his finger along the flat side of his blade. “Shall I give him a lesson?”
Mohassin studied Yeats thoughtfully, as if waiting to see his reaction. “No, thank you,” he said finally. “The assistant will need both his hands, and all his fingers too. But you will return to check his progress?”
Yeats thrust his hands behind his back.
“With pleasure.” The guard left the doorway for the busy street.
“Shaharazad asked me to help her,” Yeats blurted before the old cook could speak. “She did! Honestly! I swear I’m telling the truth.”
Mohassin grunted. “Since her ladyship was a baby I have brought food to her table. I was the cook when her mother was a child! Never before has such dread fallen upon her ladyship’s family and this town. I have sworn no harm will come to her.” He gripped Yeats’s arm tightly. “Do you understand? You will find little mercy from me if I discover you are lying.” The cook gave a frightening glare. “It must be my lady’s swordsmanship.”
When Yeats did not respond, Mohassin added, “She practices her swordsmanship at night. In secret. I assume you will be her sparring partner. Her own servant, Rawiya, is not trained in such arts.” He looked Yeats up and down. “I can’t believe you’ve even held a sword! And where she found you …” He sighed and then released Yeats. “In the meantime you must learn to be inconspicuous. I will show you your work for the day.” He lowered his voice. “And I will show you the way by which you must enter the palace tonight. Provided,” he added ominously, “you are found to be trustworthy. If not, I shall call for the guard.”
