Among the Faithful

by Dahris Martin

  ‘C’est beaucoup possible,’ he sighed with regret. ‘Mais qu’est ce que vous voulez? Après beaucoup de marriages – est surtout quand on n’est plus jeune.’ But, whether the groom be young or old, he said, the Marriage Week belongs principally to the bride. Which, of course, is perfectly true. The sheltered girl has lived for this. It is her moment of triumph, debut-and consummation – the very summit of her existence. The strict seclusion in which she was reared is justified; her parents’ fondest hope for her is fulfilled. She is larossa, virgin bride, theme of lyric odes and romances, the plaint of every popular song. For her the beat of the drums, the zaghareet, the festal tapers and incense! For her the ancient honours! Never again in the course of her whole life will there be anything like it. For when the brief period is up, as the property of her husband instead of her father, she will step back into obscurity. She has had woman’s full measure of homage; of that sweet meed there will not be one more drop. Even at the birth of her children the praise will not be for her.

  Continuously, for seven days, the bride’s home is filled with women come to celebrate her good fortune and to assist in the beautification of her body. The activity of the musicians and the beauty specialist keep the air glittering with ecstatic joycries. But, like the queen bee in her turbulent hive, the betrothed sits inscrutable amidst the noisy jubilance. Enthroned in her stiff finery she presides – never moving, never speaking, never opening her eyes. Custom has assigned her a heavy rôle for the duration of this week – the personification of Maidenly Modesty. She must not desecrate it by so much, it would seem, as the flicker of a lash.

  Each night of the Marriage Week is sacred to its own ritual. On the first, The Night of the Henna, the bride’s feet and hands are stained with the virtuous leaf so beloved of the Prophet, on the second, she is conducted to the baths, the third is dedicated to another application of the henna. She is taken, on the fourth evening, once more to the hammam. On this occasion the minstrels accompany the bathers, and while she is being washed, shaved, perfumed, and whitened, they sing of the coming event, The Ineffable Entrance. On the fifth night her finger tips and the palms of her hands are blackened with harcoos, the sixth is simply the night of farewell. On the afternoon of the seventh day, The Night of the Entrance, she is finally given the traditional make-up and clothed in bridal raiment.

  For reasons which have no place in this chapter, I did not see Kalipha’s bride until the afternoon of the great day itself. As Mohammed and I were on our way to her home. I discovered that I was really quite excited.

  He was none too sure of our direction, but once in the right quarter we had only to follow the sounds of rejoicing that hung like an aureole above the roof-tops causing passers-by to shout, ‘Salloo-annebee!’ Bless ye the Prophet! The noise led us into a lane against the ramparts where we located the house by the Marriage Sign – a huge tree of life crudely described in whitewash on that part of the city wall opposite the door.

  The little boy had to let the knocker fall sharply several times before it raised a splatter of hurrying pattens. To the accompaniment of the zaghareet, I was led into an exotic garden of women with kohled eyes, hennaed feet and hands, and breasts that swelled from tinselled bodices like rising dough. Raw, brilliant colours – as many to each costume as there were pieces of apparel – wove and intermingled in barbaric patterns. Above, the bright heads of the uninvited garlanded the parapet. A little grandstand of five or six tiers, a customary feature of such occasions, had been erected across one corner of the court, and upon it were seated the elect – young women who had, themselves, been wed within the last year. The splendour, if not the rank, of larossa was theirs again to-day, for they were wearing their gold and silver marriage costumes – the sack-like tunics and paunchy trousers of which gave them a chunky appearance suggesting bags of bullion ranged in rows. Their hair flamed uniformly with henna and perched over their ears were incongruous little caps – gilt or pearl-strung, flat or cone-shaped. While of amulets (notably fish and Hands of Fatma) and other jewellery, each wore at least a bushel. These exalted ones took no part in the merrymaking: they were the show-piece. Nobody attempted to distract them from the contemplation of their magnificence. They simply sat, their dyed hands, stiff with rings, one upon the other in their laps, looking benignly down upon the unmarried girls and worn matrons.

  In another corner of the spacious court was the familiar ring of black mounds, the musicians. I recognized Eltifa by her heavy gold bracelets, but I could not expect her to greet me today or to be even conscious that I had come in. Bundled guests kept coming, each new group a signal for vocal comets of rejoicing, the uninvited shrilling as generously as the guests themselves. But the real noise was coming from the chamber where the bride was in the hands of the belláneh, the beauty specialist. In there, the zaghareet was almost continuous, one bright burst succeeding and mingling with another.

  Kadusha’s gentle-faced mother, Zorrah, who was portly with child, and her mother, a toothless, humorous old woman, had taken kind charge of me from the moment I entered. After I had been served coffee, they undertook the prodigious feat of getting me into the bridal chamber. It was jammed to the threshold, nevertheless I was pushed and propelled until I stood within a finger’s length of the bride. She sat with her back against the wall near the low grilled window. Her feet and hands were still tied up in plump moist bags of henna-meal. She looked like a doll with her eyes shut, her legs in lace-edged pantaloons stuck out in front of her, her arms loose at her sides. A takritah was snugly bound about her head to protect her hair and a piece of white material, wrapped around her under the arm-pits, served as an apron.

  She was young – far too young by western standards to be the wife of Kalipha who, although he did not know his exact age, must have been fifty. Yet, like Arab brides in general, she did not look a child. Her face, her arms, her rich bosom had the fresh ripeness of early womanhood. Her skin was dusky – the café-crême her husband hoped it would be – her lips were very full and her closed eyes gave her countenance the usual larossa look of great passivity and submission. As if to test her immobility, the women talked at and twitted her, whispered in her ears, asked her mirth-provoking questions, but not a muscle of the quiet face quivered. I searched it over for some clue to her character. The full lips – did they mean that she was petulant or sullen? God forbid! The eyes dark-fringed and far apart, the high cheek bones, that broad, clear brow – what did they signify? The blind docility of her face disarmed me of the little I knew of physiognomy; it was as incomprehensible to me as the moon or a coin kicked up from the dust of Carthage. Her youth and girlish bloom were all that I really saw, and so strong was their appeal that I forgave Kadusha for being a virgin, for not being, frankly, Turkia bint Sadoc! Rockets of praise were shooting up to Allah. Instinctively to one of them I tied the fervent prayer, ‘Make her strong to command her husband’s respect, and, for her own sake, O great Allah, make her imperturbable!’

  Crouched facing her was Hahja Bala, the aged specialist in the decoration of brides. A withered sorceress she seemed with her mysterious pots, vases, and jars, her abracadabra – for as she worked she invoked divine assistance in a kind of keening chant. The women were taking turns rubbing almond lotion into the arms; Hahja Bala was giving all her skill to the face. When it had been creamed and powdered until it was the dead white of chalk, she selected from the little tools in her lap an ivory probe. Dipping this into liquid kohl, with slow calculated strokes she began the ornamentation of the eyes. An Egyptian urn of remote antiquity might have served as a model. The eyebrows were emphasized, stylized; the lashes coaxed together into tiny lacquered spikes; then a thick black line was drawn along the edge of each lid. Now Hahja Bala discarded the probe for a blunt needle. Dipping it, also, into the kohl-vessel she wrought two parallel strips of black lace across the chaste brow. It was not the first to be adorned by those gnarled old fingers! Exquisite arabesques – minutely fashioned of flowers and minarets, crescents, stars, in
tertwining leaves and pyramided dots – a stately flow from temple to temple. The delight of the onlookers was frantic as Hahja Bala, always crooning, roofed her eyes with her hands to survey her handiwork. With the same sure needle, next, she left here and there, on chin, throat, the slope of each breast, a single delicate motif. Now for the lips. With scarlet she accented their luscious pout. And last of all the cheeks. For them the bright pink salve. She took a wad of it on a forefinger and painted on each side of the face a solid circle of raw cerise. By now Kadusha was absolutely blotted out. Every trace of individuality, of life even, was gone. We were looking at an empty, grotesque mask – the same that Zinibe had worn upon her bier, the same that Lellah Zorrah would wear in a few months when she sat in state upon the natal chair.

  Hahja Bala was done. The zaghareet published the glad news until it seemed that, wherever he might be, Kalipha ben Kassem must know that the face of his bride was ready for his sight! The meal-bags were taken off, the green paste washed away. Feet and hands were the orange-red of flame, but the toes, the finger-tips, and the palms were black. The apron was removed, her hair unbound. The rented cloth of gold raiment was brought in. At its appearance we all moved excitedly into the open, leaving the final rites to the belláneh. A little platform was pulled into the centre of the court. In about twenty minutes, the drums registered the bride’s approach with a rapid zanging. Come forth! Come forth! commanded the wild drums. Come forth! Come forth! thrilled the zaghareet. Come like the full moon in thy ancient splendour! Shine to the glory of Islam! The door opened and, inch by inch, Hahja Bala led over the threshold the shapeless golden bundle. Peaked headdress, epauletted jacket, flaring tunic, bulging trousers – all were solid gold. The pair of false braids hanging over her shoulders to her knees scarcely stirred, so slowly did she advance. A square of red silk, which fell from the front of her headdress, completely covered her face. Fire-pots were held before and above her and in a maze of bridal incense – aloes-wood, musk, and amber – and delirious joy-cries she was huddled up to the platform where, about to be exhibited for the approval of the assembly, she assumed the traditional, stiffly coy posture, her sanguine fingers outspread at her waist. ‘All that love Allah, give praises to Him now!’ shrieked Hahja Bala fiddling with the pins that held the red curtain in place. ‘Praise the glorious Prophet! All homage to Mohammed!’ The drums, the frantic trilling, urged her to hasten, but the belláneh must not hurry. Mindful of the Evil Eye, she must not appear to flaunt the bridal face. With reluctance and holy shouts, rather, she strives to avert the awful consequences of envious admiration.

  The curtain fell away finally. Ah, then what shouts went up! ‘Blessings!’ ‘Blessings!’ ‘Praise the glorious Prophet!’ ‘May thy husband approve thee!’ ‘All homage to Mohammed!’ ‘O bless ye the Prophet!’ ‘Blest be this night, O Kadusha!’ ‘Blest be the Night of the Entrance!’

  CHAPTER 15

  The Night of the Entrance

  EARLY THAT EVENING, shortly after the sunset Call, the bride was taken in a closed carriage to her future home where the women and children of Kalipha’s family received her. Persian rugs and rich hangings, borrowed from merchant friends, had transformed his crude little room into a nuptial chamber. Here, seated cross-legged upon the bed, in her stiff vestments, with covered face, hands motionless in her lap, Kadusha awaited the coming of her husband.

  Out in the court great glass lanterns, suspended from the walls and cross-beams, shed festive brightness upon the revellers, upon the Seat of the Bridegroom, the pale blue throne that stood ready to receive him. ‘Tread, tread, O my joy!’ wailed the minstrels, ‘Unite me to my beloved. By Allah we will intoxicate ourselves. Under the jasmine tree we will acquaint ourselves with rapture, and none shall reproach us. Tread, tread, O my joy! Allah hath ordained our sweet madness!’

  The marriage procession, in the meantime, was forming around the corner. The cataclysmic noise of it starting on its way was my signal; in the lane below Mohammed was waiting for me and together we skirted the crowds half running to get a front place on the kerb. We climbed upon an empty date-stall where we crouched on our knees in the darkness waiting for the tremendous tide of light and noise to break over us.

  The zaffeh had set out from the mosque from the Hôtel de Sfax and was moving slowly forward, creeping at a turtle’s pace with intermittent long pauses: by ancient Kairouan tradition, it must consume a full hour. We could not see it yet because of an abrupt turn in the road, but we could see the brilliant illumination upon the shopfronts, the massed onlookers. Now a sudden flare flooded them with wan rose or green, then a rocket fled up-up-up to spill its stars in the black sky. It was a lurid uproar – the powerful drums booming to different measures, the pipes squealing, an army of voices confusedly bawling scripture to popular song tunes and – swooping like gulls above the tumult – the hoarse shouts of the populace. Blest be the marriage of Courage! May Power go with thee! Blest be this night! Praise Mohammed the last of the Prophets!

  ‘Ah c’est magnifique, ce bruit!’ cried his namesake, squirming with impatience. Magnificent! It was mad, outrageous, the barbarous din of fanatics swarming to do holy war! Though I had heard it every Thursday night that I had been in Kairouan – it terrified me. A great fan of light preceded the zaffeh and presently it hove around the corner, slow-surging like a breaker. Antique lanterns towered on heads and shoulders, tall torches were carried staff-wise. First the singers of the Koran, several hundred strong, then the dervish Aissaouas massed around their sheik, after them, the burners of benjoin with uplifted fire-pots. At intervals, when the throng ceased to move – as if carried away by its vehemence – youths formed rings by locking arms and bowed from the waist in passionate unison. When the train swept onward, they bore one of their companions high on the palms of their hands.

  At the end of the mob stalked Kalipha and his best men transfigured by footlights; on both sides and in front of them boys smaller than Mohammed carried long laths studded with candles. A fleecy burnous hung from Kalipha’s head, the slit where the folds came together showed his whiskered, brown face, but, in the manner of the bridegrooms of Islam, he kept his stern eyes ahead, oblivious of the cries. ‘Blest be thy marriage, ya Courage!’ ‘Blessed be this night!’ ‘Assistance from Allah and a speedy victory!’ On either side of him, in silken robes, with flowers over their ears, paced his attendants – the corpulent Sallah with tall Shedlie on one hand; on the other Farrah, handsome, bronzed giant, ludicrously coupled with Babelhahj. Babelhahj in his biggest turban and loudest stripes trying his utmost to look austere! A few feet from our tipsy grand stand they paused in their wondrous dazzle. Voices shouted to us by way of letting Kalipha know just where we were, but the eyes in the black muzzle remained riveted on a point just above the heads of the crowd. ‘You are lapping this up, don’t deny it!’ I thought of him as the light of his presence moved past us.

  We slid to the ground and were carried along in the drove of woolly burnouses. It was past the hour as we tunnelled through The Way of the Assassins and out upon Kalipha’s broad lane. The front part of the procession, loudly singing, were already piling up the stairs and through the door of Number Twenty. No fear of surprising the women: they knew at what moment to vacate the court. The rest of us halted. Kalipha and his attendants seated themselves on a row of chairs mounted upon a daïs against the house-wall; the candle-bearers encased them with their lustres, from nails above their heads the men hung their lanterns. Only the groom’s immediate party were left in the lane. A long wait ensued during which, within doors, the groups comprising the zaffeh, in exuberant succession, honoured him with séances. This is the moment when young, inexperienced bridegrooms are given last words of advice. Surely nobody could suppose that Kalipha needed any! Yet many leaned to address his ears in sober confidence.

  It must have been another hour before the celebrations inside were over. As the last of the singing throng trooped down to the street, I slipped up the stairs. The womenfolk with lighted tapers w
ere pouring back into the court. The black wraiths were brandishing their bare arms in a great shaking of tambours, clapping of cymbals, and high walloping of drums. There was a stampede about the door leading to the staircase, the excited women laughing, yodelling, their candles tilted at crazy angles. A little girl’s hair caught on fire, but was slapped out before any harm was done. All at once Kalipha’s draped head loomed above them, framed for an instant by the darkness from which he emerged. They threw themselves upon him in the most abandoned welcome. With shrill cries they shepherded him to the throne, where he seated himself, ignoring with superhuman composure their violent hugs and kisses, the hot tallow dripping upon his new fez and the burnous that Eltifa had had made for him. Poor Kalipha! The loreleis were rearranging the folds of his headdress, making trumpets of their hands to buzz in his ears, daring to toy with that moustache so handsomely waxed at the tips!

  But now the drum beats – like pistol shots – proclaimed the coming forth of the bride. Hypnotized, they moved away from the throne and formed brilliant flanges of colour and candlelight on either side of the door. It opened, seemingly of itself, and Hahja Bala assisted her over the threshold. Blindfolded, her scarlet fingers posed stiffly at her waist, the rhombic gold shape was being slowly led towards The Seat of the Bridegroom, while the air shook with the magnificat of the women, the mad tumult of the drums. ‘Salutations to the glorious Prophet!’ Hahja Bala’s cackling chant could sometimes be heard. Step by step by step, the feet of larossa groped forward in their high pattens inlaid with mother-of-pearl; once she stumbled slightly.

  Kalipha’s face was as it should be – absolutely expressionless – as he watched their faltering approach. When she was stood at last squarely in front of the throne in the full pour of the lanterns, the candles came clustering around her. Like little wings they fluttered just above the point of her headdress symbolizing those ideals to which the wives of The Faithful should aspire. But all the light seemed to emanate from larossa herself, – from the quivering gold of her raiment, the paste jewels of her diadem, sparkling blue, green, and purple, the red silk of her concealment. Only Kalipha was calm while this was being unpinned. And when, with a triumphant gesture, it was swept from the antic death-mask – The Bridal Face – his dark gaze was the same. Once, twice, three times she was pivoted for his inspection amidst joy-cries and galloping drums. ‘Is she not beautiful?’ ‘Say. Is she not beautiful?’ he was asked confidingly. But Kalipha arose, stepped down from his throne. Putting his hand through the sharp little angle of her arm he moved in full possession of his bride towards the nuptial chamber. The women followed, but only to close the door upon them.