Ollie's Cloud (5 page)

Chapter 9

In the kelauntar’s anderun, two people are seated on the floor of the front room, which is used for receiving female guests. The first person is Ali’s birth mother, Anisa, so achingly beautiful and porcelain-perfect that it startles to see her move. She reclines on huge satin pillows and clutches an outer robe of pale blue brocade that only partially conceals her billowing skirt and the white stockings that clothe her legs. A creamy-colored muslin veil, bound low on her forehead, cascades down the hair behind. The exquisite beauty of her face is fully revealed to her seated companion, Gordon Cranston, the English missionary who tutors her when he is in Bushruyih.

“So it is confirmed, then?” Anisa quietly asks Gordon in Farsi.

“There is no doubt. If we don’t act tonight it will be too late.”

“But I’m not ready!”

“This is our last chance. Tomorrow morning you will be the vizier’s wife and be on your way to Kirman… without Ali.”

“Without my son? You mean he would separate us?”

Gordon shrugs his shoulders. “That’s what I’ve been told.”

Anisa gathers her resolve. “How will we be ready in time?”

“I’ve arranged for everything we need outside the compound. You need to finish our arrangements inside.”

Anisa sighs nervously. “Maybe it’s better that I don’t have time to think.”

“Just do what we planned. Everything will be all right. I promise.”

Ali thrusts open the door and playfully kicks off his shoes before shuffling inside. He is anxious to announce his good news! At twelve, Ali lies somewhere on the smudged line between childhood and adulthood. He now sleeps in the birun with his father, segregated from the females, but still spends most of his time in the anderun with his mothers and sisters. He enters flushed with his father’s promise.

“Ali, you look so excited,” Anisa says.

“I have wonderful news!”

“Then come over here and tell us!” Anisa replies. Her silky voice has become excited, breathy. Ali runs to his mother and crashes to his knees, grinning.

The lack of furniture in the anderun focuses attention on the floor. Over thick matting, a large Persian carpet stretches down the middle of the room and overlapping runners cover the sides and top. Beyond this room is the kitchen and blue-tiled bathroom, the slave quarters, and the
sherbet-khaneh,
or sherbet house, in which the samovar and kalyan are prepared and washed. A large sleeping room beyond the sherbet-khaneh also serves as a center for games and other entertainment during the day; floor mattresses, bolster-shaped pillows in bright prints, and wadded blankets are stuffed into alcoves and rolled out on the floor at night.

Anisa looks at Ali expectantly, eyes sparkling with a mother’s delight. Seeing her son happy is her greatest joy.

“Tell us, Ali. What is your news?”

“Father is sending me to the madrisih in Mashhad! I leave next week with Jalal!”

Anisa looks away. The light in her eyes is extinguished.

“That’s wonderful, dear,” she says. But her voice is brittle now, insincere.
It’s true then—the kelauntar intends to separate us.

“You’re not happy for me?” Ali asks.

She forces a smile, tight and nervous. “Of course I am,” she replies. “But I’m a mother. I’m happy and sad at the same time.”

Ali hugs his mother. Nestling his face into her neck, he sees for the first time a bruise on her chin. In his mind he hears the strike of fist on flesh. It sucks the joy out of him. “I won’t be gone forever,” he says.

As Anisa hugs her son, she looks at Gordon Cranston. A stare, helpless but demanding.

Prompted by this look, Gordon speaks in English: “Ali, how is your English coming along?”

Ali releases his mother and turns to Gordon. For a moment he doesn’t understand these words. His brain is stuck in Farsi. But then the sounds become familiar. Yes, the words are English. What do they mean,
How is your English coming?

Slowly, Ali forces his tongue into the odd shapes demanded by English words and haltingly says, “My English… is… getting better… but… I need… to practice… more.”

Gordon smiles and touches Ali on the arm. “You will get more practice. Much more. I promise.” Gordon turns to Anisa, looks through her, makes her shiver in the heat.

“It’s time for your lesson,” Gordon says to Ali. “What shall we read this afternoon?” The question is a little joke between Gordon and Ali because the answer is always the same.

“The
Arabian Nights
!” Ali says. “A tale from
The
Arabian Nights
.”

Gordon smiles and reaches for two books that are already on the floor. The first is a bound Farsi volume of
The Arabian Nights
. The other is a tooled leather notebook containing Gordon’s English translation printed neatly in his own hand.

Like most Persians, Ali loves this adventurous story in which the sultan of an ancient dynasty—betrayed by his unfaithful wife—has pronounced all women wicked. To punish them, the sultan has vowed to marry a fresh wife each evening, only to have her strangled the following morning. On the morning of her execution, Scheherazade—the sultan’s newest wife—begins to tell a series of mesmerizing tales that cannot be completed before the time she is to be put to death. Thoroughly captivated by his wife’s masterful storytelling, the sultan grants a day’s reprieve so she can finish. But each day one tale leads to another that is even more fascinating than the one before. And each day the sultan grants yet another reprieve, saving one more woman from certain death.

“It is my turn to choose which of Scheherazade’s tales to read,” Anisa suggests. She pauses, but there is no argument. “Tonight we will read
The Enchanted Horse
. I will read in Farsi and Ali will read in English.”

Ali makes a face. It’s hard work reading in English. He’d rather have his mother simply tell him the story in her gentle, soothing voice, the way she did when Ali was little. In those comfortable days, nestled in his mother’s arms, he would imagine that his mother was Scheherazade.

“All right, then,” Gordon says. “Shall we get started?”

Anisa begins to read.
It was the Feast of the New Year, the oldest and most splendid of all the feasts in the kingdom of Persia.

Ali reads the English translation. Gordon helps with the pronunciation of several words.

Anisa continues.
The day had been spent by the king taking part in the magnificent spectacles prepared by his subjects in the city of Shiraz.

Ali reads the sentence in English.

The sun was setting
, Anisa says.
And the monarch was about to retire, when suddenly an Indian appeared before his throne with an artificial horse that looked like a real one.

Ali looks up at his mother, who is smiling at him. “I don’t know this tale,” he says.

“It’s my favorite,” Anisa confesses. “I’ve been saving it for a very special time. The English, please.” Ali reads the translation. Back and forth, in Farsi then English, Anisa and Ali tell the story of the enchanted horse.

The Indian apologized for his late arrival, then said: “None of the wonders you have seen during the day can be compared to this horse.” The king replied, “It is but a clever imitation of a real one. What is so special about it?”

The Indian explained, “It is special because I have only to mount him and wish myself in some special place, and in a very few moments I shall be there.”

If Ali had been watching Gordon, he would have seen the Englishman’s eyes memorizing his mother’s face. If he had been listening to Gordon’s heartbeat, he would have heard it quickening.

The melody of Anisa’s expressive voice, her impossibly beautiful features, her golden hair cascading like shafts of sunlight—all this is more than Gordon can bear. He cannot stop worshipping her with his eyes, cannot concentrate on the lesson. Everything he has ever desired seems summed up in this magnificent creation reclining on pillows before him. He fights her magnetic pull, battles the attraction of his body to hers. It is important that he project a detached demeanor for a few more hours.

Anisa cannot prevent her eyes from glancing furtively at Gordon. But when she sees Gordon looking at her she quickly turns away, afraid that the intimacy of their eyes might betray her desire to touch the skin of this Englishman, feel his arms around her, his moist breath on her neck.

“Do you see that mountain?” asked the king, pointing to a huge mass that towered into the sky. “Go and bring me the leaf of a palm that grows at the foot.”

Taking a seat on the horse, the Indian turned a peg in its neck and the animal bounded like lightning into the air. In a few minutes the Indian returned with the palm. The king now desired the horse. “Name your price,” he said.

Ali’s half-sisters, their mothers, even the anderun slaves are beginning to quietly crowd near the English lesson, eager for a moment’s escape into the magical world created by the words of their beloved Anisa.

“I can only sell it on one condition,” the Indian replied. “The horse was given to me by its inventor in exchange for my only daughter. He made me promise that I would never part with it except for some object of equal value.”

The king offered any city in his kingdom. But the Indian declined, saying, “I can only give you my horse in exchange for the hand of your daughter.”

Eyes widen throughout the anderun. A startled gasp causes Gordon to become aware of the growing audience. Astonished, he counts fifteen already.

Anisa looks around and sees the many captivated faces. Smiling, she decides to give them what they want—
entertainment
. Her rich voice becomes even more animated as she begins to enact the characters in the story.

Though the king decided the bargain was fair, he insisted that the prince be allowed to test its powers. The Indian agreed and helped the prince to mount the horse. But before he could show the prince how to guide it, the prince turned the peg. He and the horse were soon out of sight.

After a long time, the prince had still failed to return home. The king grew angry with the Indian. “If the prince is not safely back in three months,” he said. “I shall have your head.” The king threw the Indian into prison.

Meanwhile, the prince landed safely on the terraced roof of a huge palace. Bravely he set out to explore, finding himself at last in a magnificent chamber full of sleeping women, all lying on low couches… except one, who was on a sofa. This one, he knew, must be the princess.

The kelauntar’s other wives are intoxicated by fantasies of a gallant prince finding them asleep. The delicious dream makes them shudder with delight. The flame of their silent passion is fanned by the nearness of Gordon, the mysterious foreigner, a man more exotic and beautiful than anyone but Anisa. Gordon becomes their prince, their unattainable prize, their unrequited prayer.

On hot and lonely nights, each of them has longed for intimacy with this handsome Englishman. He is everything the kelauntar is not—kind and gentle, respectful of women, patient, lean and muscular, and so very
very
desirable. Every one of them, at the right moment, would risk her life for one scorching touch of his broad hand…

Gently stealing up to the side of her bed, the prince saw that she was more beautiful than any woman he had ever beheld. The princess opened her eyes, and seeing before her a handsome man, she remained speechless.

It is too much for the kelauntar’s fourth wife who suddenly swoons, spins, collapses—her fall broken by a large pillow. The other women rush to her side, fan her, gently slap her face and pinch her cheeks. She awakens with a blush of embarrassment.

Under the cover of this distraction, Anisa again glances at Gordon. This time she does not avert her eyes when they meet his. Connected ever so briefly in this way, Gordon is certain he can read her thoughts.
I want to be with you so badly. But be careful. We have only a few more hours to wait.

Anisa finally turns away, then takes the hand of the fainted woman and squeezes lovingly. The kelauntar’s wives have grown close in the past few years. In many anderuns, wives grow spiteful and fiercely competitive, jealously plotting against their rivals as they seek power and favored treatment. But here the wives have banded together to survive the oppression of the despised kelauntar. Anisa, the beautiful one, is the usual victim of the kelauntar’s rage, and the others have come to think of her as their savior, the one who suffers for them. They would do anything for her. And tonight they will have the chance.

The faint echo of the
mu’a
dhdh
in
takes everyone by surprise. The entertainment of the English lesson had transported the audience into a timeless world, but now time has intruded. With momentary chaos, the assemblage comically scrambles into position for the evening prayer.

As Ali prostrates himself, he senses a subtle shift in the constellation of bodies surrounding him. Something is different. He raises his head and peeks around the room. Everyone is submissively prostrated in the act of prayer—everyone but Gordon Cranston, the Christian, who can be excused; and Anisa, who kneels alongside the missionary but remains upright with open eyes, unmoving lips and insolent face. Ali is confused.
What does this mean?

Ali’s questioning stare magnetically draws a glance from Anisa. As their eyes meet, Anisa seems momentarily disturbed. She turns to Gordon, who does not notice, and back to Ali. Then her face becomes serene and radiant. She places her palms together, fingers pointing heavenward. Slowly she closes her eyes and bows her head in the Christian posture of prayer, the pose that Ali has seen Gordon piously adopt many times.

Ali again prostrates himself, but he is not listening to the
mu’a
dhdh
in
. A horrifying thought has come to him. He prays for Allah to forgive his mother because the sin of apostasy, of abandoning Islam for another faith, is punishable by death.