The Hand of Fatima

by Falcones, Ildefonso

  ‘Clear the house!’ one of the guards shouted at the Morisco family who came rushing out to greet them.

  They were a middle-aged couple. Like most Morisco matrons, she was quite fat; he was even plumper, and was carrying an ancient gun that he lowered when he saw the soldiers. They were surrounded by a swarm of seven children of all ages.

  Hernando could see that the wife was as submissive as all Morisco women were. A child no more than two years old was hiding behind her, clutching at her rolled-up stockings. Perhaps, he thought, perhaps the presence of this family and all their children could create a different atmosphere from the one in the cave.

  ‘Do you know anything about animals?’ Hernando asked the man, hoping against hope he would say yes. ‘In that case,’ he said, after the man had twisted his mouth in a way he chose to interpret as an affirmation, ‘you and your family can help me with the King’s horses, and we can share the dwelling.’

  Despite being slowed up by three children round his feet, Hernando quickly unsaddled the dozen animals in his charge. He did not care about the man’s obvious lack of experience: the only thing that mattered to him was to find Aisha and Fátima.

  He left the house as quickly as he could. He would feed the animals when he got back. But when he went out through the wrought-iron gate into the earthen street and saw that Aben Humeya’s soldiers were spreading through the whole village and coming up the street, he turned back.

  ‘Close the gate and stand guard behind it,’ he ordered the harquebusiers. ‘Nobody is to come in. Keep watch on all sides. Remember: these are the King’s horses.’

  As two of the men began to carry out his orders, a large group of soldiers and their families tried to push their way into the house.

  ‘This place is for the King’s horses,’ he warned them. The guards slammed the gates shut behind him.

  He had to struggle against a flood of people. The village was too small to accommodate all the Moriscos; a mass of soldiers and their families was heading for the outlying houses just as he was trying to reach the centre. He tried to skirt the crowds he ran into, but sometimes found he had to force a way through the crush of people. Where could he find the women? The mules! It would be easy enough to find them, even if—

  Hernando collided with a man.

  ‘Cornuti!’

  He felt himself being pushed violently against another group coming towards him; they in their turn drove him in the opposite direction. The flood of men and women halted. A small space opened up in the middle of the street.

  ‘Señori . . .’

  Bewildered, Hernando turned to face the man who had pushed him. What language was he speaking? ‘I’ll kill you!’ He understood that plainly enough, and at that moment saw a man with blond curls rushing towards him brandishing a fine dagger with a bejewelled hilt. The stranger loosed off another volley of incomprehensible words. He was not speaking Spanish, Arabic or the aljamiado language. To Hernando it sounded as if he was mixing up words from many different tongues.

  ‘Dog!’ the man growled.

  Hernando understood that too, but he was in a hurry. If Brahim found the two women before he did, he might take them somewhere else. That meant he would lose track of them, because he could not leave the King’s horses. He tried to escape and continue on his way, but found his path blocked by the crowd that had gathered to watch the argument. Someone pushed him back into the centre of the circle around the blond stranger. More people thronged to look at what was going on. His opponent was waving the dagger threateningly in small circles in front of him. When Hernando saw this was his only weapon, he unsheathed his scimitar.

  ‘Allah is great!’ he cried in Arabic. Grasping the sword in both hands, he held it level with his chest, as if about to strike. He planted his feet firmly on the ground and stiffened his whole body.

  The blond stranger stared at his blue eyes.

  ‘Bello!’ he suddenly said, softly rolling the l’s as he spoke.

  ‘Beautiful!’ Hernando heard someone say beside the man. He kept staring straight ahead.

  One of the Moriscos laughed. Some others whistled.

  ‘Bellissimo!’ said the blond man, rolling the l’s once more. All at once he tucked the dagger back in his belt and started up a loud, incomprehensible conversation with his companion. Hernando was still on the alert, scimitar raised and a defiant look on his face, but how could he attack an unarmed man who was not paying him the slightest attention? The stranger looked his way again. He smiled and winked before turning and forcing his way through the crowd, which hastily opened before him.

  ‘Belllllo,’ Hernando heard one of the Moriscos repeat amusedly.

  He could feel the blood rushing to his cheeks. As the guffaws spread through the crowd he could feel himself growing hot with shame. He sheathed his sword, unable to look anyone in the face.

  ‘Beautiful!’ laughed the man he pushed out of the way to escape. As he forced his way through, somebody else pinched his buttocks.

  He found the two women with the mules at the entrance to the village, wondering where they should go. The young boys were trying to prevent the team of mules wandering off with one of the streams of people flowing round them. Neither Aisha nor Fátima, nor even Hernando’s stepbrothers, could hide their relief at the speed with which he took charge of the situation. Even the mules, starting with La Vieja, seemed pleased to hear his familiar voice when he began to shout and get them into line. No one had any news of Brahim.

  When they reached Salah’s house, the obese Morisco received them so deferentially he was almost servile. Hernando told himself that one of the guards must have mentioned the esteem he was held in by Aben Humeya.

  Salah installed his family on the ground floor, and let the new arrivals take over the upper storey. One of the bedrooms still boasted a big bed with what must once have been a magnificent canopy. He told them he had sold the rest of the furniture, swearing on his life that before he did so he had destroyed all the Christian tapestries and images.

  Salah was a sly merchant who sold both Christians and Muslims what they needed. In wartime there was a lot of money about, so why should he, as he often said, break his back trying to make stones grow as the farmers of the Alpujarra did on their inhospitable lands, when he could be selling what others produced?

  Night was falling. Fátima and Aisha helped Salah’s wife prepare the supper. She did not seem to mind in the least that she had five extra mouths to feed. Yusuf, the boy who had helped with the horses, seemed more than happy to share the comforts the new house offered. Hernando accepted him because he had seen how good he was with the animals. He could not count on much other help: his stepbrothers shunned him and would not go near the mules if he was present, while despite their father’s willingness, Salah’s children knew nothing about animals.

  Fátima brought out some fresh lemonade to the men on the front porch. She was not wearing a veil, and smiled at Hernando when she handed him his drink. The lad felt a wrench in his stomach. Had she forgiven him? He could also hear his mother talking and laughing in the kitchen. There was still no sign of Brahim. When Hernando relieved the guards, he told one of the soldiers to ask after his stepfather and come back with whatever news he could find.

  ‘You’ll find him with Ibn Abbu,’ the soldier reported, after asking one of the King’s captains for his whereabouts.

  Before going back inside the house, Fátima had looked Hernando in the eye for several seconds. And she had smiled at him again!

  ‘A good wife,’ Salah commented, breaking the spell. ‘Nice and quiet.’

  Hernando raised the glass to his mouth. He glanced at the merchant out of the corner of his eye. Although it was a cold night, the man seemed to be in a sweat. Hernando mumbled something unintelligible to him.

  ‘Allah has blessed you with a son. My first two children were daughters,’ Salah went on.

  Hernando was annoyed at his chatter. He could of course throw him and his family out . . . but then
he again heard his mother chatting happily in the kitchen: how long had it been since he had heard her laugh? But he did not want to explain too much to Salah about his own family.

  ‘But then He brought you four boys,’ he said.

  Salah was about to reply, but at that moment the muezzin’s call to prayer silenced the hubbub of the market and stifled his curiosity.

  The two men prayed and then had supper. The merchant had a well-stocked larder. He kept the provisions under lock and key together with a wide variety of other goods down in the basement, where the Christian family had kept their oil press. When they had finished eating, Hernando took Yusuf and went to inspect the horses and mules. They were all grazing peacefully, but they had destroyed Salah’s wife’s vegetable garden, and although she looked beseechingly at her husband, there was nothing either of them could do about it. ‘They’re the King’s horses,’ Salah told her helplessly, also turning his head eloquently towards the armed guards.

  They’re going to need barley and fodder, thought Hernando. In a couple of days they would have completely stripped the garden, but the King had told him the horses should be ready at all times, which meant he could not take the animals to graze in the fields outside the village. He would have to find enough feed for them the next morning. His inspection complete, Hernando laid out blankets on the porch.

  ‘I prefer to sleep out here to be near the animals,’ he explained hastily, before Salah could ask him what he was doing.

  Yusuf stayed with him, and the two of them talked until they fell fast asleep. The boy listened keenly to everything Hernando had to say. The new guards dozed at their posts. The women and children went to sleep on the two floors of the house: Aisha had the main bedroom. Even though he was outside, for the first time in many nights Hernando slept soundly: Fátima had smiled at him again.

  At first light he attended to the animals, then decided to go and see the King to ask for money to buy fodder. The King had again installed himself in the house of Pedro López, the chief administrator for the Alpujarra, which was close to the church. He could not see Hernando because he was receiving the commanders of a company of janissaries who had just arrived from Algiers. These were the two hundred men the Sultan had ordered the beylerbey to send to al-Andalus, to keep their brothers in faith happy, if not to give them a false impression.

  Hernando saw them wandering around the huge marketplace that Ugíjar had become. As El Gironcillo had said, it was impossible not to notice them. Although the town was full of people – traders, Berbers, soldiers of fortune, Moriscos and Aben Humeya’s troops – whenever these Turkish warriors appeared, everyone shrank back in fear. They were not dressed in the caps and cloaks in which Farax (who was now lost somewhere in the mountains) had disguised his Morisco followers when they were trying to encourage the inhabitants of the Granada Albaicín to join the revolt. Instead, they sported big turbans, many of which flopped down to one side, so that their fringes almost brushed the ground. They wore pantaloons, long tunics and workmanlike slippers, and many of them had long, fine moustaches. But what was most impressive about them was the amount of weapons they carried: long-barrelled harquebuses, scimitars and daggers.

  They had disembarked on the coast of the Alpujarra under the command of Dalí. He was the janissaries’ ayabachi, one of the highest positions beneath that of aga, and was chosen democratically by the divan of almost twelve thousand members in Algiers. Dalí had with him two subordinates: Caracax and Hussein, and these were the three men Aben Humeya was busy talking to.

  The janissaries had been set up as an élite militia on the Sultan’s orders. They were faithful, indomitable soldiers. They were forcibly recruited from Christian children over the age of eight who lived in the extensive European settlements in the Ottoman empire. One was taken from every forty houses, and they were then taught the Muslim faith and trained as soldiers, despite their young years. Once they became fully fledged janissaries they were entitled to be paid for life and enjoyed many privileges. They administered their own justice: no janissary could be held to account or punished even by the bey. They were governed entirely by their aga, who always tried them in secret.

  The Algiers janissaries had, however, abandoned the system of forced recruitment of Christian boys in the Ottoman empire. The janissaries originally transferred to Algiers from the empire were gradually replaced by their sons or other Turks, or even renegade Christians, although Arabs and Berbers could never join this élite corps. The janissaries were a privileged caste. They constantly looted the villages of Barbary and Algiers. Secure in their power and privileges, they showed utter contempt for everyone else, and thought nothing of raping children and women. No one could touch a janissary!

  The two hundred of them whom the Sultan had ordered the bey of Algiers to despatch to al-Andalus to appease the Moriscos were there to fight, but that did not mean they gave up any of their privileges. Hernando could see as much while he waited outside the administrator’s house for the soldier from Aben Humeya’s bodyguard to return with the King’s answer.

  While he was waiting, in order to satisfy his curiosity and to keep him from staring in fascination at the janissaries lounging outside the building, he asked one of the harquebusiers on guard in the doorway: ‘Do you know what’s become of Brahim the muleteer? He’s my stepfather.’

  ‘He left last night,’ the man replied. ‘He went with Ibn Abbu and a company of soldiers to Poqueira. The King has appointed his cousin mayor of Poqueira, and Ibn Abbu has made your stepfather his lieutenant.’

  ‘How long will they be in Poqueira?’ Hernando asked, unable to keep an eager note out of his voice.

  The guard shrugged.

  Brahim had left! Hernando turned with a smile towards the market spread out in front of the house. Just at that moment, a street-seller came by carrying a basket of raisins on his back. One of the janissaries grabbed a handful. The seller turned and, without thinking, roughly pushed the man who had stolen his humble produce.

  It all happened in an instant. None of the janissaries took the seller to task for his insolence, but several of them grabbed hold of him. One forced his arm out straight, and with a single clean blow from his scimitar the offended janissary chopped his hand off at the wrist. The hand fell into the basket of raisins. The fruit-seller was kicked on his way, while the janissaries resumed their conversation as though nothing had happened. This was the punishment for anybody who dared touch one of the soldiers of the Sultan of the Sublime Porte.

  Hernando found it impossible to react. He stood rooted to the spot, mesmerized by the trail of blood the fruit-seller left behind him until he collapsed on the ground a few steps further on. He was so absorbed by the sight that the King’s guard had to tap him on the shoulder to attract his attention.

  ‘Follow me,’ he told Hernando when the lad finally looked round.

  The house was again perfumed with musk, but this time Hernando was not led into Aben Humeya’s presence. Instead, the guard took him to a room on the first floor. Two harquebusiers stood outside the carved wooden door. The treasure the King had not sent to Algiers must be stored inside, thought Hernando.

  ‘Are you Ibn Hamid?’ he heard someone ask behind him. Hernando turned and found himself facing a richly dressed Morisco. ‘Ibn Umayya has told me about you.’ The stranger held out his hand. ‘I’m Mustafa Calderón. I’m from Ugíjar and a King’s councillor.’

  After this greeting, Mustafa felt for a bunch of keys at his waist, and opened the door.

  ‘Here you have all the barley you need for your horses,’ he said, holding out his hand for Hernando to step inside.

  How could the barley be in there? This was not a granary. Hernando was so surprised that he did not get beyond the doorway.

  The loud laughter from Mustafa and the three harquebusiers did nothing to lessen Hernando’s astonishment: by the light from a small window high on the wall, he saw almost a dozen young boys and girls huddled inside the room. The girls stared at h
im, terrified, trying to hide behind each other, huddled at the far end of the room.

  ‘The King wants to keep the jewels and money he has left,’ the councillor explained, sniffing loudly. ‘Gold is easier to transport than the children he has been given as his share of the plunder . . . and coins do not eat!’ He laughed again. ‘Choose the one you want and sell her in the market. With what she fetches, you’ll be able to buy all you need, although I’ll expect to see you once a month to account for your spending. It’s not what I would have done, but it is what the King wants. He has also said that if you are to ride with him, you must buy yourself some proper clothing.’

  ‘How . . . how am I going to sell a girl?’

  ‘They’ll snatch her from you, my boy,’ said Mustafa. ‘Christian women are much sought after in Algiers, a city in the power of Turks and renegade Christians who have no wish to marry Muslims. Not even the Turks want to! Listen,’ he said, putting a hand on his shoulder, ‘a Christian captive can be rescued by those Mercedarian or Trinitarian friars who go to Barbary with lots of money, but they will never free a woman. One of the few laws governing the lives of the corsairs is one which forbids the sale of women. They worship them!’

  ‘But . . .’ Hernando began to say, noting how the girls were clinging together even more tightly.

  ‘Choose the one you want, now!’ Mustafa pressed him. ‘We’re holding a meeting with the Turks, and I can’t waste any more time here.’

  How was Hernando going to sell a girl? What did he know about . . .?

  ‘I can’t . . .’ he protested, until suddenly he saw the straw-coloured hair of a trembling, filthy little girl right in front of him, whom one of the older girls had pushed roughly out of the group. ‘That one!’ he shouted without thinking.

  ‘Done!’ Mustafa concluded. ‘Tie her up and give her to him,’ he ordered the guards before hurrying off. ‘Remember, I will see you in a month,’ he said as he left.