by Jane Johnson
You would think there was an incalculable alchemy to the piquing of desire, but either she knows him too well or he is indiscriminate. Certainly, he has a prodigious appetite. Even the most energetic of men would be surfeited within weeks of such boundless plenty, but not Ismail. It is another of the reasons he is so revered: the women adore him to the point of idolatry. They creep up behind him to touch the hem of his robe for good luck; if he touches them they do not wash the hand or cheek for days; they keep talismans they have gleaned from their time with him – a hair from his head or beard, the seed that has dried on their thighs, or that they have kept all night in their mouths – in little phials or amulets that they wear so that its baraka, that mysterious force of blessing and luck the sultan exudes, will ward off illness and the evil eye. Those whom he beds will be carried in procession about the harem the following morning. The greatest baraka of all is to bear his child: though after his initial enthusiasm – accompanied by the firing of cannons, the proclamation and trumpets (for the birth of a boy), or the fireworks or strewing of flowers (for a girl) – he soon loses interest. Zidana makes sure of that too, for always she keeps her firstborn – Zidan – to the forefront, and although the child is both a brute and a dunce, Ismail dotes upon him, carries him around the gardens on his shoulders, spoils him most horribly and has named him his heir, for all that his mother was a slave.
Of course, there is a high natural mortality rate and many do not make it past the first few months, but it is worthy of note that there is a marked preponderance of boy children born to mothers for whom the sultan has shown more than a passing interest dying of various colics, gripes and vomiting disorders. Often their mothers follow them to the grave: dead of grief, I’ve heard the empress declare, quite impassively, even as the other women weep and wail and tear their clothes. I say no more.
I put the couching book back in my chest and am visited once more by a shudder of horror. The pattens should be standing in their accustomed place to the right of the chest. But they are not there. Dread fills me as I wonder if they are still where I left them, or whether they have as yet escaped notice.
I do not have long to wait to find out. Later that morning I go to inspect the newly inaugurated Bab al-Raïs so that I can report back to Ismail that his orders have been properly carried out. Sure enough, the poor wolf’s head has been set above the gate and is grimacing away in a suitably ferocious fashion. On my way back to the inner courts my way is barred by two men wearing the coloured sashes that mark them as officers of the qadi and they are accompanied by a pair of palace guards, who carry the guns they have taken from the qadi’s men before guiding them into the palace grounds. No one but the imperial guards may bear arms within the palace walls, a sensible precaution in a kingdom Ismail has himself described as ‘a basketful of rats’ – always ready to rebel, and bite the hand that feeds.
‘Are you the court official known as Nus-Nus?’
Behind them, Hassan shrugs at me. ‘Sorry.’
‘I am.’
‘We wish to question you over a certain matter. A man has been most foully murdered in the souq.’
I try to look shocked. I try to look innocent. I am innocent, for heaven’s sake: so why do I feel so guilty?
‘Where were you between the hours of eleven and two the day before yesterday?’
I look him in the eye. ‘Running an errand for his majesty in the bazaar.’ And I tell him about my appointment with the Coptic Bookseller.
The second officer steps closer. I do not like the look of him: he is young and well fed and clearly thinks a lot of himself, judging by the care with which he has trimmed his beard into a fancy shape. I suspect he has plucked his eyebrows too. ‘We already interviewed the book-trader so we know you were there after noon. At what time did you return to the palace?’ He asks me this in a way that suggests he already knows the answer.
‘Just before the emperor’s daily rounds,’ I concede.
‘And what time might that be?’
‘Around two.’
‘There is a large gap of time unaccounted for. While you were in the souq, did you happen to visit the stall of one Hamid ibn M‘barek Kabour?’
The mask is firmly in place. ‘That name is not familiar to me.’
‘We know you were there. You were seen entering his stall at’ – he examines the tablet on which he has written his notes – ‘just after eleven, wearing a “white burnous richly trimmed with gold”.’
My heart starts to thunder. ‘Ah, Sidi Kabour. I do apologize: I have never been on first name terms with him. And you say the poor man is dead, murdered? That is terrible news indeed. What will the emperor do now for his incense? He cannot do without his agarwood and frankincense, and he refuses to buy it from anyone else. I don’t know what Ismail will say when he hears this news, he will be most upset. Is there a widow to whom he could make a gift?’ I think I am doing well in acting the part of concerned factotum, but the younger officer is not taken in by my babbling.
‘Not purchasing illegal substances for the Lady Zidana, then?’ he says.
‘Good heavens, no. And if I were you I would be very careful about repeating such malicious gossip about the emperor’s chief wife.’
‘She is a witch: everyone knows it.’
I turn away. ‘I have things to do: I cannot stand around here listening to your vicious tittle-tattle.’
He catches me by the arm. In a former life he would be laid out cold on the ground, but you soon learn to curb your natural reactions at Ismail’s court. ‘I have a warrant signed by the qadi to take you into custody if you do not cooperate with us.’
So they really do consider me a suspect. With a sudden lurch of memory I recall the voice shouting after me as I left the herbman’s stall. It had called Sidi Kabour’s name, but what if someone recognized me despite my disguise?
‘The white cloak you were wearing – where is it now?’
Thank God for Zidana. ‘In my room. Why do you ask?’
‘The man who killed Hamid Kabour would have been covered in his blood: it was a brutal slaying.’
I make a sign to ward off the evil eye, and so does the older officer. He catches my eye. ‘Do you have this cloak so that we may see it? Then we can leave you to get on with your day,’ he says, rather more gently than his companion.
‘Of course: the emperor himself gave it to me. It is one of my most treasured possessions.’
The guards flank us as we walk through all the hammering and scurrying of the ongoing building works. In the second courtyard a great hole has been dug for the mixing of tadelakt, the special plaster that can be polished to a high sheen. It is a delicate and difficult art and can take months to cure. In the early stages it can be very volatile. Even as we walk past there is a cry and one of the workmen staggers backwards, clutching his face. ‘Lime burn,’ I say, shaking my head. ‘He’ll probably be blind for life.’
‘Good God,’ says the older officer. ‘The poor man.’
‘If he’s lucky he’ll escape with his life.’
‘Insha‘allah.’ He thinks about this, then adds, ‘And if he isn’t?’
‘They’ll add him to the mix.’ He looks appalled. ‘You’ll see worse than that if you stick around. On average we lose thirty workmen a day.’
After that, we walk in silence, although, as we make our way towards the inner courts where the buildings become ever more immense and highly decorated, I can see the older man’s eyes darting everywhere. Who can blame him? Nothing of such size or scope has ever been undertaken in Morocco before. The younger officer seems unimpressed, and I suspect he has already been inside the palace complex. He seems impatient, his chin thrusting out with every step, as if nothing can swerve him from his duty. I toy with the idea of admitting that I had found the corpse of Sidi Kabour and walked away without reporting it, but something tells me they are set on their course and this will only make matters worse.
At the entrance to my room, I stop. ‘I will bring
you the burnous to inspect.’
‘We will come in with you.’ The second man gives me a gimlet stare.
They stand in the doorway taking in the sparse furnishings as I go to the chest and take out the cloak, which they examine minutely. Finding no blood, they hand it back. ‘And this is the only white burnous you own?’
‘I am not made of money.’
The younger man sneers, then turns to Hassan. ‘You said you were on duty yesterday when this man returned?’
Hassan nods. ‘Yes, I opened the gate to him. He was running—’
‘He was running?’ He turns back to me. ‘Why were you running?’
‘It was raining.’
‘You did not say he was wearing a white cloak when he returned,’ the officer says to Hassan, though his eyes remain upon me.
My eyes flick in consternation to the guard: he stares back at me impassively. ‘I do not have time to take notice of what everyone wears, but I am sure Nus-Nus was wearing that burnous.’
The younger man’s disappointment is palpable. ‘And what about your footwear, sir?’
The ‘sir’ is new, which is a better sign; but I forgot the babouches.
‘You were barefoot, I believe,’ Hassan supplies helpfully.
‘Barefoot?’ Both officers stare at me with renewed interest.
‘The mud was appalling: I did not want to ruin my babouches.’
The younger man refers to his notes again. ‘It says here that you left the palace wearing a pair of high cork pattens.’
Oh, good God. ‘Does it?’ Have they even interviewed the wretched slaves? The idea is absurd, but even the walls have eyes in this place. ‘I was wearing pattens when I went out but they were the devil to walk in, so I took them off, preferring to go barefoot. It is a lot easier to wash mud off one’s feet than one’s shoes.’
The two officers exchange a look. I wonder what it means.
‘May we see the babouches, sir? For the sake of completeness,’ the older man says almost apologetically.
Hell and damnation. I point to my feet. ‘Here they are: I have them on.’ They look down. These Fassi slippers start life the colour of a new lemon, but with time they mellow to a muddy brown, and the leather spreads and moulds itself to the shape of your feet. Mine are as scuffed as those of the poorest carpenter, hardly warranting the necessity for pattens. The officers look suitably sceptical. ‘And these are the only babouches you own?’
‘Yes.’ It sounds unlikely even to me.
‘You won’t mind if we have a quick look through your room.’ A statement, not a question.
I stand aside. ‘Go ahead.’
It does not take them long: there is not much to see. They go through the chest, even flicking through my books, as if I could have hidden incriminating slippers between the pages. They find the wrapped packages I bought for Malik and forgot to give him: the ras el hanout and essence of attar; but these are easily identifiable by smell. Then they have a good look at the lap-desk, sniffing the inks as if they think I have bottled poisons out on display. When they find my khanjar, the ceremonial dagger all men (even the cut) carry on special occasions, they become quite animated; but their faces soon fall when they find it blunt and rusty, useless for sawing through an old man’s beard and throat. At last, unsatisfied, the young officer takes out of his satchel a roll of cloth and lays it on the floor. On it the shape of a foot has been imprinted in a dark, rusty brown.
‘I made this impression at the scene of the crime. Would you be so good as to place your right foot upon it, sir?’
Still so polite. I do as requested. The leather of my old babouches has spilled over the original line of the sole: my foot engulfs the smaller impression.
‘Thank you, sir.’ The officer’s voice is pinched, spiteful. He rolls up the footprint resentfully. But still he isn’t finished. ‘Rachid,’ he says to the older man, ‘the pattens, please.’
Oh, Maleeo… there they are, the damned things. The second officer removes them from his bag and places them on the ground before me.
‘Would you slip these on… sir?’ His tone is spiteful.
Should I pitch myself to the floor, feign sudden illness? Should I bluster and refuse to comply? I do neither. Balancing carefully, I push my right foot into the corresponding patten. But instead of incriminating me it sticks halfway down, the comfortable old leather babouche a good two sizes bigger than its pretty jewelled counterpart. The officer seeks to force the issue, but it is obvious that slipper and patten do not fit together. With a wrench that almost has me losing my balance, he separates the two and throws the offending patten aside.
A huge smile threatens to light up my face, but I summon my kponyungu mask and quell the urge.
‘They must have belonged to the dead gentleman.’ I spread my hands apologetically. ‘Is that all, sir? I have many duties to attend to.’
The first officer regards me stonily. I return the stare, unblinking. At last his eyes slide past me. ‘And do you have the private use of the courtyard?’
‘Others use it too,’ I say warily, but out they file.
The rain has washed all the traces of blood from the fountain: the marble gleams pristine white. They kick around the enclosed square for a few minutes while I stand propped against the door. Behind me, Hassan and the other guard are discussing a woman one of them has glimpsed in the mellah. As it is the Jewish quarter, the balconies there face out to the world and she wore no veil and was apparently a peach. The guards of the outer courts are not always castrated unless they seek promotion to the inner courts: their banter is bawdy.
‘Are these yours, sir?’
In his hands he holds the bloodstained Fassi slippers I buried out there. You can feel the glee boiling off him. Then, like a man performing a piece of theatre, he unrolls the bloody footprint again and places the right babouche upon the stain. It is, of course, a perfect match.
‘And what do you have to say about this?’
Calm, Nus-Nus. Calm. I am careful to maintain silence, rather than saying anything that would incriminate me further.
‘Remove your babouches,’ he orders me, and when I have done so he indicates the ruined slippers. ‘Put them on.’
The blood has dried and crusted on them. They were already tight: I pray they will be more so now, but the treacherous things go on, at a pinch.
Cocksure now, the officer retrieves the discarded patten, makes a great show of placing it on the ground before me. ‘Now place your foot in the overshoe.’
I do as he says. The fit is perfect, of course. I am lost.
‘Court official Nus-Nus,’ he announces with pompous triumph, then pauses. ‘Do you have no other name?’
I shake my head: none that I will give to such as him.
‘Court official Nus-Nus, these guards bear witness to the fact that we are arresting you on suspicion of killing the herbman, Sidi Hamid Kabour.’
‘It is not me you should be arresting: there was someone with Sidi Kabour when I arrived, a shifty-looking young man, thin in the face, with a southern accent. He was still there at the stall when I left, when the herbman was still alive. That’s the man who must have killed him, not me!’
The younger officer sneers. ‘The defence of the desperate! The man of whom you speak is a gentleman of impeccable character, well known to the qadi. He came forward as soon as he heard of Sidi Kabour’s death and has been extremely helpful in our inquiry.’
‘He said it was you he left with the herbman,’ the older officer says, and I can tell by his tone that he no longer believes a word I say. They bind my hands and take me away.
Part Two
6
2nd May 1677
‘My name is Alys Swann and I am twenty-nine years of age.’
‘No, I have no children: I have never married.’
‘Yes, I am still a maid.’
I answer their questions with my head held high. I am not ashamed of my estate. So I look the foreign picaroon in the eye with
all the courage I can muster and speak out clearly. Had our circumstances been different, some of those present would probably have sniggered, but since we are all in fear for our lives they have other more pressing matters to concern them than my spinsterhood and long-preserved virginity.
My captors’ scribe takes down these details for his record in a script that reads from right to left. That, in conjunction with his dark skin and cloth-wrapped head, suggests to me that we have been boarded by Turks. Behind me, I can hear Anouk and Marika, my maids, sisters hired to accompany me on the voyage from Scheveningen to England, snuffling and gulping, and feel a brief moment’s pity. They are barely more than children, and, although sullen and unbiddable, they do not deserve to meet an early death. Poor dears, they are just starting out, full of the dreams I had at their age – of young men and marriage, of babies and laughter. They have spent most of the voyage giggling and making sheep’s eyes at the crew; but now many of those handsome lads lie dead on the deck of our ship, or in chains aboard this one.
‘Do you think they will rape us?’ Anouk asks me, her eyes huge.
‘I hope not,’ is all I can honestly say.
And yet a man grasped my breast as they took us off the other vessel. I was so surprised I did not even think to scream, but simply took hold of his hand and pushed it away. An unmistakable expression of shame crossed his face: he bobbed his head and muttered something in his strange language that I believed to be an apology, which did not correspond with the ruthless fashion in which our ship had been taken.
But it does not take us long to realize that we are merchandise, worth far more than the bolts of cloth in the hold of the ship. The two mulatto women who served the dead captain as cooks (and I am sorry to say also more than likely mistresses) roll their eyes. ‘Slaves,’ one says; and the other replies: ‘Again.’
