Journey of Strangers

by Elizabeth Zelvin

  “I am not proud of taking human life,” I said. “But I have done what I had to.”

  “I admire you for it,” she said.

  After this, we talked more freely. We had time to do so, though we spent many hours working, for there was much to do. With some relief, those who wished to leave the island abandoned the project of building rafts, for I offered to carry any who chose to return to the mainland with us on Esperanza. The ship must be provisioned with food and weapons for the return journey. The villagers helped us dry fish and make arrows, and in return, Esperanza’s crew helped those who wished to stay raise sturdier houses and fashion bows and spears for both hunting and defense. Whether they were ever used to arm a slave revolt, I told Joanna, was none of my business. For now, turning the encampment into a village and providing for its protection was a task in which I willingly participated.

  “This is becoming a community with a sense of purpose,” I said.

  Joanna and I were watching the spectacular equatorial sunset on the beach. She preferred gazing out at the open sea to being hemmed in by forest, and I liked to keep an eye on Esperanza. I would have liked to hide her from view, but Joanna told me there was no way to do so. The Portuguese who had discovered and circumnavigated the island swore its whole coastline was smooth and even, without coves or natural harbors except for the one next to the swamp, where they had built the Povoação.

  “We all need a sense of purpose, do we not?” she said. “If the Jews had not been driven out of Spain, I suppose I would have found mine in being a dutiful wife and mother. It is hard to imagine. I was angry and rebellious from the day my father brought my stepmother home. And you?”

  “I certainly would not have become a sailor,” I said, “had the Jews not had to flee. In Istanbul, we are allowed to worship openly and work at whatever trade we choose. But after my adventures, I am equally ill suited to being a dutiful Jewish man, studying Torah and complying with the rabbis’ rulings on everything. I cannot deal in absolutes, having met and even loved people whose beliefs and ways were so very different from mine.”

  “Is there no place where one can live happily without having to choose?” she asked.

  I grinned.

  “The best such place I know is in the bosom of my family,” I said. “At least, so it will be soon enough, for the Taino friend I told you of, Ümīt, has converted to Islam and will marry Rachel. Their children must be raised as Muslims, but Rachel refuses to live in seclusion, indeed has found work that takes her weekly to the sultan’s palace, and my parents are determined that their grandchildren must understand their Jewish heritage and choose whatever beliefs they will once they are grown. So it will not be a conventional household.”

  “Is what you describe permitted?” Joanna asked.

  “What happens behind the closed gates and high walls of a dwelling in Istanbul is no one’s concern but the family’s.”

  “It sounds lively,” Joanna said wistfully.

  “You will be part of it,” I promised. “And it will not be dull.”

  A full moon rode high in the sky by now, casting a silvery track along the water from Esperanza to the shore. The canopy of palms whispered secrets from frond to frond. Gently rounded waves rolled toward shore, then broke without great violence but with a pleasing crash, sending broad strips of foam toward the beach. I stood and held out my hand to her.

  “Come, let us cool off. The sea is calm enough.”

  She did not take my hand, but unfolded her legs and stood easily. She followed me as I waded in up to my knees. The water was warm and silky.

  “Do you swim?” I asked.

  Her face lit in one of her rare smiles.

  “Do you not know I am the encampment’s swimming instructor? I was recruited to improve Babune’s and the others’ chances of surviving their voyage to Africa on rafts.”

  “Come,” I said.

  As the next breaker rose before me, I dove headlong into the wall of water with its crest of foam. Without hesitation, she did the same. We both came up laughing.

  “Again!” she said.

  We dove again and again, saying little but exchanging delighted looks at the sheer pleasure of it. As a variation, we breasted our way deeper into the water, where we could soar high on the rollers before they broke.

  “I am smiling like a dolphin,” she exclaimed after flying through a particularly exhilarating wave.

  I wished I might risk telling her how beautiful she looked wet and smiling. But I did not want to spoil the moment, when she had lost her wariness and was unself-conscious and happy.

  The sea was getting up, the waves rising higher and breaking more sharply.

  “Are you getting tired?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she said, “but I do not want to stop.”

  “Look at how beautiful the beach is in the moonlight,” I said, “almost as bright as day.”

  Smiling at each other as we turned to look toward shore, we did not see a wave higher than the rest until it towered over us. It crashed down before we could turn to dive through it, tumbling us helplessly toward shore. I spat out seawater and tried to right myself, my feet touching the sand and then sending me head over heels through the surf again. I cannoned into something hard: Joanna’s body, legs and arms flailing as she struggled to find her balance. Her wet, slippery arms came up around my neck as she clutched at me. I grasped her firmly around the waist as my feet finally found purchase in the sand. Her legs clung instinctively, encircling my waist as I rose. Holding her in my arms, I waded toward shore.

  For a moment we panted in unison, our foreheads pressed together, water streaming off us. When she made to pull away, my arms tightened.

  “Joanna,” I whispered. “Do not be afraid. I will not hurt you.”

  “Let me go,” she said. “I wish to stand.”

  I stepped back and released her immediately, holding my hands out, palms up, so she could lean on them for balance if she wished.

  “I love you, Joanna,” I said, realizing it as I spoke the words.

  “I do not know what that means,” she said.

  She frowned as she regarded me, her face troubled rather than angry. From that I took hope.

  “It means I find you beautiful and strong and courageous. It means I wish to see you happy above all things. It means I would give my life for you and make any sacrifice to spare you pain.”

  “Any sacrifice?” She drew the words from the deep well of bitterness within her. “What if I could not offer you physical love? For my body has been used without my consent since I was twelve years old, and I do not know if I could bear for you to touch it in that way.”

  “Oh, my darling Joanna, I am so sorry.” I stepped another pace back, giving her room. “I am sorry that you had to suffer so. I honor your anger and fear. I will do nothing, ever, without your consent. But between two people who care for each other’s happiness, the pleasure of physical love can be a joyous experience. I would like a chance to offer that to you.”

  “I have felt the momentary sensation you speak of,” she said. “I know it as humiliation, a trick to make my body betray me. Being enslaved and subjugated did not shame me as long as I held onto my fury. But an instant of what you call pleasure was enough to break me.”

  My poor darling! My heart ached for her. I thought of Tanama, who had known sorrow when her young husband died but never a moment’s unkindness until the very end. I thought of Papa, wise enough to tell me that the act of love was meant for pleasure for both man and woman long before Tanama taught me how.

  “I curse those who shamed you so,” I said. “But they did not have the right of it. What their joyless intrusions could show you was but a stinking tallow candle compared to the sunlight that is the pleasure of love. If you let their lies rule you now, those who violated you win. You have survived thus far, Joanna, and the world is about to open to you. Do you want them to win?”

  “No!” she said fiercely. “I defy them! Take me, then!”


  “Hush, my love,” I said, “that is not how we will do it. Do not throw yourself at me like a bone to a hungry dog to keep it quiet. I said I would not do anything without your consent. I will amend that. I will not do anything unless you truly wish it.”

  “How do I know what I wish?” She was trembling, her eyes filled with tears. “You are kind and gentle, Diego, and you are not unpleasing to me. But I told you, I know nothing of this.”

  “Let me teach you, sweetheart,” I said, “slowly, as you taught Babune to swim.”

  She gave a snort of laughter.

  “Babune was a slow learner!”

  “See, my darling?” I smiled at her. “You have already learned the first lesson, that laughter has a place in love. I think you will learn this art much faster than Babune learned to swim.”

  Her body was no longer braced for flight. It was a beginning. Her eyes met mine.

  “What must I do?”

  “Will you let me put my arms around you?”

  “Yes.”

  I drew her into my arms and simply held her, so that we stood heart to heart.

  “Now we will try hugging,” I whispered in her ear. “We do it to comfort those we love, not only lovers but parents, brothers and sisters, and children as well.”

  Awkwardly, she raised her arms and embraced me in return. I could feel her hands, light and hesitant, against my back.

  “No one has hugged me since my mother died,” she said.

  With a sigh, she turned her head and laid her cheek against my shoulder.

  “You are warm,” she murmured. “I can feel your heart beat. Can you feel mine?”

  “Yes, my love,” I said. “May I stroke your hair?”

  She gave a soft grunt of assent with amusement in it.

  “It is wet.”

  “So is mine, sweetheart. That is no impediment.”

  I ran my fingers gently up under the tangled locks on her neck and caressed her head. The touch of her shapely skull, her vulnerability, made me tremble. I was afraid that she would pull away. Instead, she nestled closer.

  “Are you frightened now, Joanna?”

  “No. I feel safe.”

  “Good,” I said. “That is how I would always have you feel. May I kiss your lips?”

  “Yes,” she breathed. She lifted her face confidingly to mine. “You will be the first to do so, and I am glad.”

  I brushed her mouth with mine. Her lips parted. I kissed her gently, slowly deepening the caress until she drew a shaky breath, pressed her body more tightly against mine, and started to kiss me back. I sent Ha’shem a silent prayer of thanks.

  Joanna murmured, “Tikkun olam,” against my mouth and drew me closer.

  Yes, I thought, it is love that can heal the world. That is our purpose.

  “Do you wish to lie down, beloved,” I asked, “so we can kiss and touch more easily?”

  In response, she drew me down onto the warm sand. Her hands continued to stroke my body and her mouth to explore mine. Her breath began to come more quickly, as did my own. I lay back on the sand, arranging myself so that her body could rest comfortably on mine. I held back until her hips began to move. Then there was no longer any past to trouble us, no more Diego and Joanna, we were one, and at that moment we began to build our future.

  Chapter 48: Ümīt

  It was his wedding day. Indeed, he was already married by the Muslim rite. But Rachel would not feel married until they had stood beneath the chuppah, and he wished above all to make Rachel happy. If only Diego had returned before the past year ended! He knew that Baba Efraín and Bibi Elena were worried sick about him, as indeed he and Rachel were as well. Nonetheless, they had poured out matu’m upon him like water from an overflowing pitcher, treating him in all ways like a beloved son. They had thrown themselves wholeheartedly into the paradoxical roles of parents of both bride and groom in both the Jewish and Islamic traditions.

  “He who makes a groom happy,” Baba Efraín had said, quoting Talmud, “is like someone who rebuilds the ruins of Jerusalem.”

  “Even when the groom is Muslim and not blood kin to you?” Ümīt had said. “Truly, Baba, I pray daily that your seed, the Mendoza line, may not be wiped off the earth.”

  “As do I, my son,” Baba Efraín said. “We must not give up hope. But if Diego’s return is not Adonai’s will, I could wish for no better continuation of my forefathers’ line than grandchildren who are exactly like you and Rachel.”

  Both the imam and the kadi had been remarkably tolerant too, more so than the rabbis of the Seville congregation.

  “They care more about Jewish seed than Jewish happiness,” Rachel had said tartly.

  The kadi had worked with Akiva to craft two compatible marriage contracts that, according to Akiva, would satisfy God Himself: the Islamic nikâh and the ketubah. His new brother-in-law, whom Ümīt had previously considered rigid, a stickler for obedience to the rabbis’ rulings, had come out strongly on the side of family. So had Akiva’s parents, Cousin Chaim and Cousin Miriam, and Susanna’s husband, Nahum. When Ümīt had tried to express his gratitude for the abundance of goodwill that had made his unconventional marriage possible, Bibi Elena had said that it was entirely to his and Rachel’s credit that so many had been won over.

  “Both of you, my dears,” she said, “are well loved by all the friends that you have made here.”

  Since Ümīt had no Muslim relatives and no separate home to which to bring his bride, his friends among the janissaries had insisted on escorting him from the palace to the Mendoza home on richly caparisoned horses, with a retinue of entertainers from musicians to fire-eaters and servants bearing gifts. They then witnessed the imam’s recital and signing of the contract, politely ignoring the fact that this ceremony took place in a room that was not a proper selamlik, while the ladies listening from the next room were Jewish and unveiled.

  Now he and Rachel stood beneath the chuppah. He had not thought Rachel could possibly look more beautiful than at their Muslim wedding, for which the ladies of the sultan’s own harem had made her a gift of the traditional wedding garments, a long red overdress decorated with elaborate gold embroidery over a white silk tunic and şalvar, with pearls to thread through her hair and a red veil so fine that her glowing face shone through it like a beacon. Looking at her now, dressed as a Jewish bride in a white gown embroidered with pearls and jasmine in her hair, he felt simultaneously ready to burst with joy and faint with desire.

  Ten witnesses, a minyan, were required to witness this wedding. Ümīt had feared they would not be able to find ten Jewish men willing to approve his becoming Rachel’s husband. Rachel had been confident they would, and she had been right. Baba Efraín, Cousin Chaim, Nahum, and Kira Chana’s son Solomon held the poles of the chuppah. It was impossible to look at them without wishing once again that Diego were there to share this moment with them. Akiva, who as officiating rabbi would recite the sheva brachot, the seven blessings of marriage, counted as the fifth, and the rest of the minyan consisted of Akiva’s two brothers, the younger but recently bar mitzvah, two printer friends of Nahum’s, and a neighbor, Avram, whose children had been taken in Lisbon and who awaited news of Diego’s mission almost as eagerly as the Mendozas.

  As Akiva read out the provisions of the ketubah, Ümīt and Rachel exchanged a private smile. Rachel flashed her palms at him to show him that they were still faintly stained with henna. Since Rachel had no Muslim family, the sultan’s ladies had insisted on holding the bride’s traditional visit to the hammam in their own bathhouse within the palace walls and the traditional henna night that followed in the harem. They had even persuaded the Kizlar Agha to allow Rachel’s mother and sisters to enter the harem to take part in these rituals along with Kira Chana. For the bathhouse ceremony, they had bestowed on her another elaborate dress and braided her hair into a dozen tresses entwined with jewels and gold coins. They had dressed her painstakingly in this garb and then proceeded to strip her naked for a procession through t
he bathhouse. After that, they had soaped and scrubbed her and dabbed perfume on her in places that she said Ümīt would discover soon enough.

  “Usually,” Rachel told him, “this rite takes place in a public bathhouse, no matter how wealthy the bride’s family, and even the poorest women are allowed to come and take a look at the bride and the ornaments and gifts the others bestow on her. I knew all the ladies present, of course, but they led me up to each one in turn to be presented and receive yet another gift. I remained naked throughout the proceedings.” She laughed. “Since they know me for a modest maiden, I think they expected me to be embarrassed, but I have not been so reminded of my time as a Taino since I left Quisqueya.”

  That evening, Bülbül Hatun herself, the most imposing of the sultan’s wives, had applied the henna paste to her hands, while the others pressed gold coins into her sticky palms and whispered sly advice and jokes about the wedding night.

  “It is really the bride’s mother-in-law who is supposed to rub on the henna,” Rachel said, “but since my own beloved Mama is my mother-in-law, the hatuns said I would not experience the proper feeling of awe if she performed the ritual. If they really wanted to scare me, they should have made Ayşe Hatun do it. But of course they did not know that.”

  Someone kicked Ümīt’s ankle. Coming back to the present with a start, he realized that Nahum, already behaving like a brother, was calling his attention to the fact that Akiva had finished reading the ketubah. For the blessings, Baba Efraín, as the bride’s father, handed off his chuppah pole to one of Nahum’s printer friends and stepped forward to envelop both Ümīt and Rachel in a spotless white silk tallit. The first blessing was familiar to Ümīt, the blessing of the wine that was always recited on Shabbat.

  “Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam boray pri hagofen,” Akiva intoned.

  Someone handed Ümīt a glass. He sipped, barely touching the dark red liquid to his lips, and handed it to Rachel. This was one of the greatest differences between Islamic and Jewish observance. Muslims abhorred wine, while for Jews, it sanctified the occasion. He wondered if this glass was the one that he would have to crush with his foot at the end of the ceremony. A glass still seemed a miracle to him, a piece of magic made from simple sand, and breaking one deliberately a terrible thing.