by Noah Gordon
“No. Not the plague.” The vomitus wasn’t black and there were no buboes. Small consolation. His abdomen had hardened on the right side until it was boardlike. When Rob pressed on it, Cullen—although he appeared to be lost in the deep softness of coma—screamed.
Rob knew what it was. The last time he had seen it, he had juggled and sang so a little boy could die without fright.
“A distemper of the large intestine. Sometimes they call it the side sickness. It is a poison that began in his gut and has spread through his body.”
“What has caused it?”
He shook his head. “Perhaps the bowel has become kinked or there is an obstruction.” They both recognized the hopelessness of his ignorance.
He worked hard over James Cullen, trying anything that might possibly help. He gave enemas of milky chamomile tea and when they didn’t do anything he administered doses of rhubarb and salts. He applied hot packs to the abdomen, but by then he knew it was no use.
He stayed next to the Scot’s bed. He would have sent Mary into the next room to get some of the rest she had denied herself, but he knew the end was near and reasoned she would have plenty of time to rest later.
In the middle of the night Cullen just gave a little leap, a small start.
“It’s all right, Da,” Mary whispered, rubbing his hands, and there was a slipping away, so quiet and easy that for a little while neither she nor Rob knew that her father was no longer alive.
* * *
She had given up shaving him a few days before he died and there was gray beard to be scraped from his face. Rob combed his hair and held the body in his arms while she washed it, dry-eyed. “I am glad to do this. I wasn’t allowed to help with my mother,” she said.
Cullen had a long scar on the right thigh. “He got that chasing a wild boar into the brush, when I was eleven. He had to spend the winter in the house. We made a crèche together for Yuletide and it was then I came to know him.”
After her father had been prepared, Rob carried more water from the brook and heated it on the fire. While she bathed he dug a grave, which proved devilishly hard, for the soil was mostly stone and he hadn’t a proper tool. In the end he used Cullen’s sword and a stout sharpened branch for prying, and his bare hands. When the grave was ready, he fashioned a rood of two sticks lashed together with the dead man’s belt.
She wore the black dress in which he had first seen her. He carried Cullen in a winding sheet that was a wool blanket they had brought from their home, so beautiful and warm he regretted placing it in the grave.
It required a Holy Mass of Requiem and he couldn’t even speak a proper burial prayer, not trusting himself to get the Latin right. But a psalm that had been one of Mam’s came to mind.
“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; He leadeth me beside the still waters.
He restoreth my soul; He guideth me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies; Thou hast anointed my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.”
He closed the grave and fixed the cross. When he walked away she remained kneeling, her eyes closed and her lips moving with words only her own mind could hear.
He gave her time to be alone in the house. She had told him about turning loose their two horses to forage for themselves on the thin growth in the wadi, and he rode out to find the animals.
He saw they had built a pen with a thornbush fence. Inside he found the bones of four sheep, probably killed by animals and eaten. Doubtless Cullen had bought many more sheep that had been stolen by humans.
Crazy Scot! He never could have brought a flock all the way to Scotland. And now he would not bring himself home either, and his daughter was left alone in an unfriendly land.
At one end of the stony little valley Rob discovered the remains of Cullen’s white horse. Perhaps it had broken a leg and had been easy prey; the carcass was almost consumed, but he recognized the work of jackals and went back to the fresh grave and armored it in heavy, flat stones that would prevent the beasts from digging up the body.
He came upon her black mount at the other end of the wadi, as far from the jackals’ feast as it had been able to get. It wasn’t difficult to put a halter on the horse, which appeared eager for the safety and security of servitude.
When he returned to the house he found her composed but pale. “What would I have done, had you not appeared?”
He smiled at her, remembering the barricaded door and the sword in her hand. “What was needed.”
She was tightly controlled. “I would like to return to Ispahan with you.”
“I want that.” His heart leaped, but he was chastened by her next words.
“There is a caravanserai there?”
“Yes. Busily trafficked.”
“Then I’ll join a protected caravan traveling west. And make my way to a port where I may be able to book passage home.”
He went to her and took her hands, the first time he had touched her. Her fingers were rough from work, unlike a haram woman’s hands, but he didn’t want to release them. “Mary, I made a terrible mistake. I can’t let you go again.”
Her steady eyes contemplated him.
“Come with me to Ispahan, but live there with me.”
It would have been easier if he hadn’t felt constrained to speak guiltily of Jesse ben Benjamin and the need for pretense.
It was as if a current ran between their fingers, but he saw anger in her eyes, a kind of horror. “So many lies,” she said, quietly. She pulled herself away from him and went outside.
He went to the door and watched her walking away from the house over the broken ground of the riverbed.
She was gone long enough for him to worry, but she returned.
“Tell me why it is worth the deception.”
He forced himself to put it into words, an embarrassment he undertook because he wanted her and knew the truth was her due.
“It’s being chosen. As though God has said, ‘In the creation of human beings I made mistakes and I charge you with working to correct some of my errors.’ It isn’t a thing I desired. It sought me out.”
His words frightened her. “Surely that is blasphemy, to set yourself as one who corrects God’s mistakes?”
“No, no,” he said gently. “A good physician is but His instrument.”
She nodded, and now he thought he saw in her eyes a glimmer of understanding, perhaps even envy.
“I would always share you with a mistress.”
Somehow she had sensed Despina, he thought foolishly. “I want only you,” he said.
“No, you want your work and it will come first, before family, before anything. But I have loved you so, Rob. And want to be your wife.”
He put his arms around her.
“Cullens are married in the Church,” she said into his shoulder.
“Even if we could find a priest in Persia he wouldn’t marry a Christian woman and a Jew. We must tell people we were married in Constantinople. When I finish my medical training we’ll return to England and be properly wed.”
“And meantime?” she said bleakly.
“A hand-held marriage.” He took both of her hands in his.
They regarded one another soberly. “There should be words, even with a hand-held marriage,” she said.
“Mary Cullen, I take you for my wife,” he said thickly. “I promise to cherish and protect you, and you have my love.” He wished the words were better but he was deeply moved and didn’t feel in control of his tongue.
“Robert Jeremy Cole, I take you for husband,” she said clearly. “I promise to go where you go a
nd ever to seek your well-being. You have had my love since first I saw you.”
She gripped his hands so hard they hurt and he could feel her vitality, a throbbing. He was aware that the fresh grave outside made joy indecent, yet he felt a wild mixture of emotions and he told himself their vows had been better than many he had heard in a church.
He packed her belongings on the brown horse and she rode the black. He would trade the pack off between the animals, transferring it each morning. On the rare occasions when the way was smooth and flat, both he and Mary sat the one horse, but most of the time she rode and he led the way on foot. It made for slow travel, but he wasn’t in a hurry.
She was more given to silence than he recalled and he made no move to touch her, sensitive to her grief. Camping in a brushy clearing by the side of the road on the second night of their trip to Ispahan, he lay awake and listened to her finally weeping.
“If you’re God’s helper, correcting mistakes, why could you not save him?”
“I don’t know enough.”
The weeping had been a long time coming and now she couldn’t stop. He took her into his arms. While they lay with her head on his shoulder, he began to kiss her wet face and finally her mouth, which was soft and welcoming and tasted as he remembered. He rubbed her back and stroked the lovely hollow at the base of her spine and then, as their kiss hardened and he felt her tongue, he groped through her underclothing.
She was weeping again but open to his fingers and spreading to accept him.
What he felt more than passion was an overriding regard for her and a thanksgiving. Their joining was a delicate, tender rocking in which they scarcely moved at all. It went on and on, on and on, until it ended exquisitely for him; seeking to heal he was healed, and seeking to comfort he was comforted, but to bring her some measure of solace he had to finish her with his hand.
Afterward he held her and talked softly, telling her of Ispahan and Yehuddiyyeh, and the madrassa and the hospital, and Ibn Sina. And of his friends the Muslim and the Jew, Mirdin and Karim.
“Do they have wives?”
“Mirdin has a wife. Karim has a lot of women.”
They fell asleep wrapped in one another.
He was awakened in the harsh gray light of morning by the creaking of saddle leather, the slow thudding of hooves in the dusty road, someone’s ragged coughing, men talking as they sat their walking beasts.
Looking over her shoulder through the thorny brush that separated their hiding place from the road, he watched a force of mounted soldiers riding past. They were fierce-looking, carrying the same eastern swords as Alā’s men but with bows that were shorter than the Persian variety. They wore ragged robes and once-white turbans stained dark with sweat and dirt, and they exuded a stink that reached Rob where he lay in agony, waiting for one of his horses to give him away or for a rider to glance through the bushes and see him and the sleeping woman.
A familiar face came into view and he recognized Hadad Khan, the hot-tempered Seljuk ambassador to the court of the Alā Shah.
These were Seljuks, then. And riding next to white-haired Hadad Khan was another figure known to him, a mullah named Musa Ibn Abbas, chief aide to the Imam Mirza-aboul Qandrasseh, the Persian Vizier.
Rob saw a total of six other mullahs and counted ninety-six horse soldiers. There was no knowing how many had ridden past while he slept.
Neither his horse nor Mary’s whinnied or made any other sound to reveal their presence, and eventually the last Seljuk rode past and Rob dared to breathe, listening to their sounds growing fainter.
Presently he kissed his wife to waken her and then lost no time breaking their rude camp and starting on their way, for he had found a reason for hurrying.
50
THE CHATIR
“Married?” Karim said. He looked at Rob and grinned.
“A wife! I didn’t expect you would heed my advice,” Mirdin said, beaming. “Who arranged this match?”
“No one. That is,” Rob said hastily, “there was a nuptial agreement more than a year ago, but it wasn’t acted upon until now.”
“What is her name?” Karim asked.
“Mary Cullen. She’s a Scot. I met her and her father in a caravan on my eastward journey.” He told them something of James Cullen, and of his illness and death.
Mirdin seemed scarcely to be listening. “A Scot. That is a European?”
“Yes. She comes from a place north of my own country.”
“She is a Christian?”
Rob nodded.
“I must see this European woman,” Karim said. “Is she a pretty female?”
“She’s so beautiful!” Rob blurted, and Karim laughed. “But I want you to judge for yourself.” Rob turned to include Mirdin in the invitation, but saw that his friend had walked away.
Rob didn’t relish reporting to the Shah what he had seen, but he knew he had committed his loyalty and had little choice. When he appeared at the palace and asked to see the king, Khuff smiled his hard smile.
“What is your errand?”
The Captain of the Gates hurled a glance like a stone when Rob shook his head in silence.
But Khuff bade him wait and went to tell Alā that the foreign Dhimmi Jesse wished to see him, and presently the old soldier ushered Rob in to the royal presence.
Alā smelled of drink but listened soberly enough to Rob’s report that his Vizier had sent pietist disciples to meet and confer with a party of the Shah’s enemies.
“There has been no report of attacks in Hamadhān,” Alā said slowly. “It was not a Seljuk raiding party, therefore doubtless they met to discuss treachery.” He examined Rob through veiled eyes. “To whom have you spoken of this?”
“To no man, Majesty.”
“Let it remain so.”
Instead of further talk, Alā placed the board of the Shah’s Game between them. He was visibly pleased to encounter a more difficult opponent than heretofore he had met in Rob.
“Ah, Dhimmi, you grow skilled and cunning as a Persian!”
Rob was able to hold him off for a time. In the end, Alā ground him into the dust and it was as always, shahtreng. But each recognized that their game had turned a corner. It was more of a struggle now, and Rob might have been able to hold out even longer if he were not so eager to return to his bride.
Ispahan was the most beautiful city Mary had ever seen, or perhaps it was because she was there with Rob. She was pleased with the little house in Yehuddiyyeh, although the Jewish quarter was shabby. The house wasn’t as large as the house in which she and her father had lived by the wadi in Hamadhān, but it was of sounder construction.
At her insistence Rob bought plaster and a few simple tools and she vowed to repair the house while he was gone, her first day alone. The full heat of the Persian summer was on them, and the long-sleeved black dress of bereavement soon was sodden with perspiration.
In the middle of the morning the most handsome man she had ever seen knocked at the door. He was carrying a basket of black plums, which he set down so he could reach out to touch her red hair, frightening her. He was chuckling and looked awed, dazzling her with his perfect white teeth in his tanned face. He spoke at length; it sounded eloquent and graceful and full of feeling, but it was in Persian.
“I am sorry,” she said.
“Ah.” He understood at once and touched his chest. “Karim.”
She lost her fright and was delighted. “So. You are my husband’s friend. He’s spoken of you.”
He beamed and led her, protesting in words he couldn’t understand, to a chair where she sat and ate a sweet plum while he mixed plaster to exactly the correct consistency and spread it on three cracks in the interior walls, and then replaced a windowsill. Shamelessly, she also allowed him to help her cut out the large, wicked thornbushes in the garden.
Karim was still there when Rob came home and she insisted that he share their meal, which then they had to delay until darkness had fallen, for it was Ramadan, the nint
h month, the month of fasting.
“I like Karim,” she told Rob when he had gone. “When shall I meet the other one—Mirdin?”
He kissed her and shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said.
Ramadan seemed a most peculiar holiday to Mary. It was Rob’s second Ramadan in Ispahan, and he told her it was a somber month, supposed to be devoted to prayer and shriving, but food seemed foremost on everyone’s mind because Muslims were proscribed from taking nourishment or liquid from dawn to sunset. Vendors of food were absent from the markets and the streets, and the maidans remained dark and silent all month, though friends and families assembled at night to eat and fortify themselves for the next day’s fasting.
“We were in Anatolia last year during Ramadan,” Mary said wistfully. “Da bought lambs from a herdsman and gave a feast for our Muslim servants.”
“We could give a Ramadan dinner.”
“It would be pleasant, but I am in mourning,” she reminded him.
Indeed, she was torn by conflicting emotions, at times racked by such grief that she felt crippled by the pain of her loss, at other times giddily aware she was the most fortunate of women in her marriage.
On the few occasions when she ventured from the house, it seemed to her that people stared at her with enmity. Her black mourning dress wasn’t dissimilar from the costume of the other women of Yehuddiyyeh, but doubtless her uncovered red hair marked her as a European. She tried wearing her wide-brimmed traveling hat, but she saw women point her out in the street just the same, and their coldness toward her was unabated.
Under other circumstances she might have felt loneliness, for in the midst of a teeming city she was able to communicate with but one person; but instead of isolation she felt a privacy that was complete, as though only she and her new husband peopled the world.
In that waning month of Ramadan they were visited solely by Karim Harun, and several times she saw the young Persian physician running, running through the streets, a sight that made her catch her breath, for it was like watching a roe deer. Rob told her about the footrace, the chatir, which would be held on the first day of the three-day holiday called Bairam that celebrated the end of the long fast.
