After all, Ismail too was handicapped.
Though not in his wits. He added after a moment, “As to purring, though: I wish you could have bridled your tongue until you arrived here where it’s safe to talk freely. Our market is, I grant you, one of the most remarkable sights in the world. But.”
“I don’t know what came over me,” the younger man said sheepishly.
“I know only too well!”—in a tone of sharp reproof.
‘You’re proud of what you’ve achieved and eager to spread the news! But where do you want to wind up? Before a firing squad? Down an alley with a dagger in your back? ’ ’
“Worse thing have been done to my people!” “Worse things have been done to my person. And here I am.”
The words hung in the air like steam. Eventually Ismail judged that the point had sunk home, and spoke again.
“What of your fellow-travelers’ reaction to my offer of hospitality? Amusing, was it not?”
Relieved at the change of subject, because he was still too young to contemplate a rational discussion of his own demise, Djinghiz said, “You could practically hear Paluka’s mind working, couldn’t you?”
“You mean when he was deciding whether to ask how I knew about the ‘interesting passengers’?” “Mm-hm. Djinghiz reached for the sake jug and refilled his thimble-size cup.
“In your view, what’s the question most likely to be on their minds at the moment? ’ ’
The younger man pondered, sipping.
“I think you've convinced them you're a genuine eccentric. If not, I’m sure the rosebuds will finish the job. [ assume you’ve primed them with amusing stories about previous visitors?”
“Of course. Most of them by the way true, albeit a rLrifle embellished.” Ismail chuckled, and the rolls of fat around his belly shook in rhythm.
“In that case . . . Hmm! This hadn’t struck me until now, but the tiredness is being beaten out of my mind as well as my body.” Rolling over, signaling to Tibor, he indicated that his right thigh needed more attention.
In a musing tone he continued, “I suspect they may be wondering what makes me such an interesting traveler. ’ ’
“Ah, you’re Krak6w-bom. We’re oid friends. I knew your parents, didn’t I?”
“On any given day at least a handful of expatriate Cracovians must by the law of averages be visiting their natal city. Over the course of a year the total must be hundreds at least. Why should you pick on Djinghiz— on me—out of that many? I’m not from an ‘exotic locale’!”
“As I said: an old friend. Although ...” Ismail rubbed his multiple chins, looking rueful. “You have a point, I confess. I’ll bear it in mind. Now!” He brisk-ened. “Do I get to hear how you accomplished your mission? Or is it a professional secret? ’ ’
“You might put it like that.”
Djinghiz grinned to himself, fully expecting that Ismail would proceed to wheedling and cajoling, and fully intending to explain in due course, for he was consumed with the urge to brag about his ingenuity to the one person in the world in whom he could safely confide. Moreover, he was anxious to know what Ismail had meant about the war “of a most unusual kind,” and assumed this exchange would lead to an explanation.
However—
“Do you intend to pursue that profession full-time?” The question was so remote from what he had anticipated that Djinghiz sat up, brushing Tibor aside. Although he had yet to rub down his client, Ismail signaled the masseur to depart. Throwing a towel at Djinghiz, he said, “I take it you would rather not answer with anyone else in earshot. Very sensible. There’s always the risk that even somebody profoundly deaf may learn to lip-read.”
“I’d rather not answer at all!”—indignantly. “What a thing to say!”
“Then what do you plan to do with the rest of your life, now you’ve accomplished what since childhood has been your most burning ambition? ’ ’
And, while Djinghiz was still mentally reeling from the shock of that even more unexpected question, Ismail heaved himself up, wobbling like a badly strutted dirigible.
“Slava and his—ah—companion should be succumbing to the blandishments of my rosebuds about now. I want to be clad and present when they get here.” “Wait!” Djinghiz implored. “/ ’ ant to know what you meant when you said a war a- Jy—”
“My dear boy!” Ismail flutter lis eyelashes in a way that in his youth had monsi: sly impressed his numerous suitors. “I sit here like a spider in a web, receiving news in telegraphic form, crudely abridged. You, on the other hand, were on the spot. You were the one who moved the Gate of Worlds.”
“I did, didn’t I?” said Djinghiz huskily. The awesome fact of what he’d accomplished, the amazing fact that he was here to speak of it, came close to overwhelming him anew, and shivers racked his spine.
And I was so looking forward to describing what I did!
Yet he was able, a heartbeat later, to regain his usual insouciance.
“But it was you, Ismail, who oiled the hinges!”
“For that, I will take credit. ... Go get dressed! It might amuse you to witness what I have in mind for Slava.
“Bear in mind, though, that—like the war—his fate may manifest in a peculiar form.”
Four: Thorns
In the lobby the business typical of a well-reputed hostelry on the first cold evening of the winter continued as normal. Prospective clients arrived; some were accorded lodging, others were advised to apply elsewhere. Servants entered, shaking snow from caps and cloaks, to inquire whether their employers might dine here tonight; some were granted reservations, others wishing to bring too large a party were politely turned away. Ensconced on a canopied divan swung from a frame, mistakable for customers awaiting friends, Djinghiz and Ismail watched the passing show. It still lacked forty minutes of the time the latter had set for dinner with his “guests.”
Just as Djinghiz had concluded that the place must by now be full save one room reserved for Slava and Hideki (and while she, poor brat, well deserved a comfortable bed by herself, in his view her owner deserved to freeze in the gutter!), something happened to disabuse him. A young couple entered, the boy with his arm around the girl, both in snow-soaked black, each carrying a carpetbag, his yellow and hers blue. Her face was covered with a yashmak, but her large eloquent eyes darted from her companion to Djinghiz; to Ismail; to the clerks at reception, the rosebuds, two other clients asking directions to a concert hall . . .
Summoning his courage, the boy approached the desk and under his breath murmured a half-audible request.
Ismail signaled one of the girl rosebuds. She bent her ear to his lips, nodded, ran to reception where the young people’s passports were being inspected, asked two rapid questions and returned.
Ismail pondered a second, then signaled affirmation.
All this went unseen by the couple. But instantly their carpetbags were being carried up the stairway. Seeming unable to believe their luck, they rushed after, almost colliding with a Teuton family descending en masse.
Djinghiz said sourly, “Tiirkish runaways?”
“Mm-hm.” Ismail’s face was expressionless. “Both from rich families; both doomed to arranged marriages in order to increase their parents’ wealth . . . but not, of course, with each other. And both students of the University of Istanbul. Which is, one must admit, performing sterling service in the cause of freedom.”
“You knew all that—?”
“Just by looking at them?” Ismail chuckled. “Hardly! Turkish passports are difficult to forge, and it’s hideously expensive to buy one in a false name. I’m assuming they presented their real ones, in which case— ’ ’
“In which case you’ll have a hold over their families!” Djinghiz snapped.
Ismail regarded him coolly. “You have reason to hate Russians. I have reason to hate the Ottomans. Puppy-love doesn’t last. I doubt theirs will survive this escapade, don’t you? But if in two or ten years’ time some pot-bellied Stamboulian learn
s his daughter has been shamed by bedding with the son of his most hated rival—”
He broke off.
“More of that another time,” he murmured. “Here come the stray fish, or, if you’d rather, birds.”
Djinghiz’s heart pounded. What snare had this unpredictable yet ultimately honorable man contrived for loathsome Slava? He rose and turned, trembling with anticipation.
And found himself once more confounded.
Just as when he himself had arrived, along with his chance companions, other guests were in the lobby: to wit the Teuton family, consisting of one elderly couple, another in their forties—daughter and husband, or son and wife—and four teenage children, variously inquiring about entertainment, transportation, and, inevitably, what bargains could be found in the great market after the arrival of the first train from Asia in six months.
They glanced around; they checked; they stared in disbelief as the tall one-eyed commissionaire escorted the newcomers toward the reception desk. Arrogant, dirty, hand on the hilt of a knife that he wore conspicuously at his belt, all his other visible belongings in a greasy black bag slung across his back, here indeed came Slava. And, beside him, poor Hideki, who seemed to possess nothing bar what she stood up in. When Djinghiz first set eyes on her she had wom a richly embroidered kimono of dark blue silk with dragons writhing up the back. Her sash, her obi, had been of brilliant crimson. Now—if she retained them—they were hidden under a coat of coarse brown stuff sodden with wet. For want of headgear her elegant coiffure, held in place with six bejeweled pins, was collapsing around her shoulders, while her tiny delicate feet, once silken-slippered, were crammed into clumsy felt boots that left smeared wet patches at every step.
Under huge dark eyes pale cheeks glistened with melting snowflakes ... or were they not more likely to be tears?
Djinghiz would have jumped to his feet and called out the Balt despite his ready knife, but for the plump restraining hand that closed on his wrist and held him still for long enough to realize—
Oh, if 1 believed in a god I would beg forgiveness! Will the day ever dawn when I learn to trust another’s judgment?
—that the commissionaire was not escorting Slava.
At which point he had to struggle to stop himself from laughing.
Making certain that what they did was registered by all present, those of the staff—and particularly the rosebuds—who were not immediately occupied with other customers closed on Hideki, bowing. Slava slipped the strap of his bag off his shoulder, obviously expecting that it would be taken from him. Instead, he was ignored, even by—no, especially by!—Ismail, hauling himself out of his chair.
He spoke in a language Djinghiz had scarcely heard.
Can it be— ? It must be! Japanese!
For the thin pale face lighted up as though one of the newfangled Teuton gas lights had been ignited behind it, and two little hands clutched at Ismail’s sleeve, while a hoarse shrill voice replied.
And was answered.
And two rosebuds converged, making clucking noises like a mother hen over a wet chick, as Ismail issued crisp instructions. His honor was to be taken to the reserved room, bathed, given fresh raiment (Djinghiz noted in passing the deliberate archaism of his speech, but afterwards was unsure which of the many languages they both understood had been in use at what moment) and brought to join the rest of the company at dinner, in—now—half an hour.
The rosebuds complied.
And Slava was still standing there, his mouth agape like a new-caught carp.
He said, muddling Russian and Turkish and maybe a good few other vocabularies into a barely comprehensible stew:
“What about me? Don’t I get any sort of a look-in?”
Ismail, donning a sleepy smile, turned to him.
“Ah, yes. Well, it would be better if you were clean, at least ...”
And snapped his fingers. One of the porters behind the reception desk, a burly youth who doubtless had been a rosebud a few years ago, indicated to Slava that he was to follow, but made no attempt to relieve him of his bag.
For a moment Djinghiz thought the Balt might lose his temper at this sort of treatment . . . but he was too cold and weary. Shoulders slumping, he let himself be led toward the part of the hostelry where servants and coachmen were lodged.
After him, Ismail called: “If you wish to join Hideki
and my other guests at dinner, you may! But be quick! And by then be clean!”
And turned to Djinghiz. Puzzled, the younger man whispered: “You said, did you not: his honor?”
“Ah. Just as I thought. You’re not as observant as you like to pretend.”
“But I spent six months trapped with them at the—” Ismail glared. “And never bothered to look twice at Hideki!”
“Why should I have paid attention to that bastard’s underage whore?”
“Because in Japanese Hideki is not a girl’s name. It’s
a boy's.*’
Ismail let the words rankle for a long reproving moment. Then, uttering a harsh laugh, he clapped Djinghiz on the shoulder.
“You’re forgiven. You’ve had other things on your mind than visiting the theater. But if you’d bothered to watch a performance by the Kabuki troupe Hideki worked for, you’d have noticed that in that tradition all the female roles are played by boys. Or men. Some of them continue until my age.”
“Are they—? ’ Djinghiz had to swallow hard.
“Are they treated as I was? Not so far as I know. Dialogue is relatively unimportant in Kabuki. But they are, I understand, not infrequently—ah—used by their seniors. . . . You have something else on your mind. What? ’ ’
“Why ‘his honor’? Just to annoy Slava?”
“That,” Ismail said in his most sanctimonious and infuriating tone, “you will have to wait till after dinner to find out. Speaking of dinner, I must check on how it’s coming along. Fancy a peep behind the scenes?”
“Not particularly," Djinghiz sighed. “But it might save me from running after Slava and beating him to pulp."
“How inelegant," Ismail murmured. “One of these days you’ll realize violence is never desirable and very seldom unavoidable. . . . This way!"
Dinner was to be taken in a private room on the second floor, overlooking through large half-curtained windows the main restaurant in what had been the courtyard, where early clients were already being served.
Up here waiters were arranging cutlery, dishes of ice containing jugs of wine and fruit juice, and bowls of— naturally—roses on an oblong table spread first with a thick Bokhara rug, then with a white lace cloth. To sit on, there were firm fat cushions covered in a fabric that matched the rug. A hoist set in the wall permitted full dishes to be raised from the kitchen below and empty ones returned. A hookah waited on a low wooden stand, rose petals floating in its glass belly.
Nodding approval, Ismail walked around the room to the far comer, where between the curtains he glanced down towards the dais where his musicians were assembling—Gypsies, by the look of them. Pushing the window open, he attracted their leader’s attention with a whistle and a wave. Recognizing him with a start, the man ordered the band to pick up their instruments, and they launched into a lively air. Judging its volume with a cock of his head, Ismail adjusted the window to admit enough of the music to be pleasant, not so much as to interfere with conversation, and summoned one of the waiters to close the curtains.
“Well, it’s time,” he said at length. “We might as well sit down. Take the place at the east end, facing me ... I wonder which of the guests will show up first. ”
Five: The Meaning of the Symbol
A few moments later Djinghiz realized what he should have known already, and would, had not half his mind still been preoccupied with the mystery of the war that “had already begun”: Ismail actually had no need to speculate in what order his guests would arrive, for he had given orders and—as ever—they were being obeyed.
In the interim, waiting for
the door to open, he found himself wondering for the latest of uncountable times what sort of person Ismail was. If he had been forced to sum up his impression in a single sentence, he would have said, “I think of him as an actor.”
For, long as they had known each other, he could never be sure whether he was seeing the real Ismail, or some mask that he was adopting because it suited his current purpose.
Of course, he too had been obliged to play roles often enough, to disguise if not himself, then his origins and his intentions . . . especially the latter. But doing so was not at all to his taste. That was why he had been disappointed when Ismail denied him the chance to boast of his achievement; it would have been a compensation. Yet he could not be angry about that. He trusted the older man. Had to. Had always had to—or at least since his teens. And so far he had never been let down.
Ismail compared himself to a spider at the center of its web. That makes the guests tonight his prey, to be sucked dry of information like flies of their vital juices. But where does that leave me ? What am I to him ?
Am I perhaps the son he could never have ?
The insight sparked at the edge of his mind in the same instant as the door opened and a deferential rosebud ushered in the first three of their dinner companions: Feisal, Paluka, and—coming third with ostentatious humility—Ratanayaka, whom Ismail placed at Djinghiz’s left, with Paluka facing him. Feisal he seated at his own left. Djinghiz felt a stir of puzzlement. Given what he knew of Slava’s nature, it was entirely likely that he would overindulge in the wine and become quarrelsome, yet by the way the table was laid it looked as though he would now be seated at Ismail’s right (why in the world?), with Hideki between the two other men. Was this for protection, in case Slava vented his ill temper on him? He was capable of it, Djinghiz felt sure. Therefore it made better sense to put him next to Paluka, who could hold him down with one finger.
Surely Ismail wasn’t intending to seat him between Ratanayaka, an avowed pacifist, and himself, who expressed such contempt for violence . . . ?