Iron Earth, Copper Sky

by Yashar Kemal

  ‘No,’ Ömer said, ‘let’s not mix a third party into this business, even if he be our own brother.’

  ‘True, this is a matter of life and death …’

  ‘Let’s take his wife and throw her into the Dry Well too.’

  ‘But isn’t that hard on the poor woman?’ Sefer said. ‘After all, it isn’t her fault.’

  ‘She’s his wife, isn’t she?’ Ömer retorted. ‘Why didn’t she do anything to stop him being a saint? And a saint who wants to wipe out the house of Hidir too …’

  Sefer was tired.

  ‘Ömer,’ he said, ‘it’s a wicked thing to kill a man, isn’t it?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Oh, but it is! Very wicked.’

  ‘Well, it isn’t …’

  ‘Have you ever killed a man, Ömer?’

  ‘No, but I want to kill Tashbash for you. And five or six years later I’ll be able to tell everyone about it.’

  ‘Are you mad?’ Sefer shouted. ‘Is that a thing to boast about? Look, if you’re going to let your tongue run away with you, let’s call the whole thing off.’

  ‘I was only joking,’ Ömer said.

  Sefer relaxed. ‘Well, go and see to the guns now, just in case they should get clogged or something. I’m going to take a rest. Wake me up as the midnight cocks crow.’

  He stretched himself on the couch and closed his eyes. He was overwrought. What was it like, this business of killing a man? You grab the neck and squeeze, you keep on squeezing, harder and harder, the eyes bulge, the limbs become taut, a mad straining and struggling, one last effort and the body drops limply. It grows cold. You cast it into the Dry Well, and that’s all there is to it. One slaughters sheep and goats and cows and every creature without turning a hair, but when it comes to killing a man … He began to tremble. What if they discovered Tashbash’s body in the Dry Well? What if someone saw them as they carried him away? It would be prison then, the hangman’s noose even! Why not give the whole thing up and let Tashbash live? Let him live! On the very first day he was acknowledged as a saint, he would rouse up the villagers. ‘Get hold of that Muhtar, tear him to pieces!’

  How long ago was it? Sefer recalled it all too clearly. Perhaps ten, perhaps fifteen years ago … They were picking cotton for an Agha in one of the border villages of the Chukurova plain where the mountain begins. It was a village where everything belonged to the Agha, the land, the houses, everything. The Agha wanted to turn the peasants out of their homes so as to sow more cotton, and for the past two years they had been in constant conflict. All about the village the Agha had planted cotton, in the lanes, the yards, right into the village square itself.

  One afternoon Sefer and his villagers were picking cotton in the very centre of the village when a terrible noise broke out. They heard the sound of hundreds of screaming voices and suddenly they saw the Agha running for his life, a huge crowd of women at his heels, pelting him with stones. And then he vanished. The women had caught up and closed over him like a horde of eagles. After a while the crowd opened up, still shrieking, and streaked off. In a deathlike silence, the villagers drew near, and what did they see! A leg, an arm and half a lung still bleeding in the dust … Where had the rest of the Agha gone to? They searched and searched in order to bury him, but they found nothing.

  This had happened in broad daylight, in the populated Chukurova, before everyone! And the women had got off with a sentence of only three months each. All through the cotton picking that year, the half lung, oozing blood into the dust, remained before their eyes. The lynching of the Agha was a thing they could never forget.

  Spellbound Ahmet had said his death would be by Tashbash’s hand, and a madman’s word has more truth than a saint’s … No, he had no choice! It must be done, and tonight. But then, God damn it, why this trembling, this tightening of the heart, this urge to vomit? He despised himself. Pah, Sefer! he mocked, who are you to kill a man! Ah, if only it hadn’t got to be tonight, if only he had a week, just one short week before him, he’d go and find Chello, the bandit, in his mountain lair and get him to do it …

  Suddenly, he leaped up from the couch.

  ‘Ömeri’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Have the cocks crowed?’

  ‘No, but it’s nearly time.’

  ‘All right, let’s get ready.’

  They had prepared the soot in a basin. Swiftly, they smeared it over their face, neck and hands.

  ‘And now the sheets,’ the Muhtar said. ‘It’s a good trick for sowing fear in a man’s heart.’

  Outside there was a howling blizzard. The night was like a dark wall. Sefer staggered and fell. Ömer dragged him up.

  ‘Have you got the torch?’ He was trembling again now.

  ‘I’ve got it.’

  ‘Cartridges?’

  ‘Plenty.’

  ‘Perhaps we’d better not use the torch. D’you think we can find our way in this pitch darkness?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Sefer felt weak in the legs and less than ever inclined to commit a murder. But as they struggled on against the blizzard, the hatred in him grew, his anger revived. He had thought he would never be able to go through with it, but now it was different. By the time they came to Tashbash’s house he was calm and determined. He could have strangled Tashbash on the spot without a qualm. At the sound of Long Ali’s voice, he gave a start and grasped his gun more tightly. Then he remembered it was Ömer.

  From inside they heard Tashbash’s wife.

  ‘Is that you, Ali? Memet isn’t home. He hasn’t been in all night. I’m worried.’

  She opened the door, a burning brand in her hand. At the sight of the two white-shrouded figures, she gave a scream and tried to close the door, but Ömer was too quick for her. He pushed his way in.

  ‘Uncle Halil,’ he said to Sefer, ‘you wait outside at the door and see he doesn’t escape. Now, you bitch, where’s he hiding, that dog of a husband of yours?’

  Torch in hand, he began to search. He looked everywhere, in the hold, among the livestock, in the sacks, in every nook and cranny. He even held the torch up into the chimney.

  ‘Where’s he gone to?’

  The woman was frozen with fright. She could not say a word.

  ‘Speak! Where is he? I’ll kill you if you don’t speak.’

  With one blow of his gun he struck her down. She uttered a moan, but did not speak.

  It was then that Ömer lost his nerve. He threw himself out of the house, pulling the door shut behind him.

  ‘Let’s run,’ he said to the Muhtar.

  They did not stop until they were safely back in Sefer’s house. Trembling, they crouched before the fire. In Ömer a dreadful suspicion was growing.

  ‘I searched everywhere, in the hold, among the bedding, inside the grain sacks, everywhere. I even looked up the chimney. Where can he be in the dead of night?’ His breath came in short gasps, his eyes were large with fear.

  Sefer was now resigned to the worst. Where indeed could he be on such a night of devils?

  Chapter 20

  ‘Last night, just as the midnight cocks were crowing, there was a rapping on our door and I heard Long Ali’s voice calling. What can he want at this time of the night? I thought. I opened the door and there before me stood two giants draped in white robes, with faces black as the night and rifles slung over their shoulders. One was like Long Ali, only three times as tall. The other looked like Old Halil, only ten times larger. The Long Ali man said: “Where’s Tashbash?” And I said: “He’s asleep inside.” He came in and held a torch to the bed. It was empty! And would you believe it, Memet had been there a minute ago, sound asleep, his flesh touching mine! The long man said: “He’s slipped through our fingers.” And I said: “How could he? There’s no way out except that door.” “Then I’ll search the house,” he said. He was so huge that he had to move about bent double. He looked everywhere, in the hold, in the stable, up the chimney … He ransacked the whole house, but Memet was nowhere
to be found! I could not believe my eyes. Where could he have gone to? “Ah,” said the man, “if I’d caught him, I’d have sent his soul straight to Hell.” And I said: “Who are you? Are you man or jinn? You come in the guise of Long Ali, but your face is coal-black and anyway would Long Ali ever harm his dear friend Tashbash?” He ground his teeth with a noise like thunder. I was terrified. “Ah,” he said, “if I’d laid my hands on him …” Then he went out into the raging blizzard and I saw the two of them make off in the direction of Mount Tekech. As soon as they were out of sight I began looking for Memet myself. Had the earth opened and swallowed him? Or the roof lifted and he flown into the sky? It was nearly dawn when there was a knock on the door. I couldn’t move for fright. Then Memet’s voice called. I hesitated. What if it were someone in the shape of Memet this time? The knocking persisted. “Woman, are you dead! Open up!” shouted Memet’s voice. Come what may, I thought, and I went to the door. And there was Memet in the flesh, trembling with cold, covered with snow. I told him what had happened. For a long time, he stood there and thought, then suddenly he went out again. “Where are you going?” I asked. “Not far,” he said. He came back only when it was day, quite frozen this time. He’s been sitting by the fire ever since, not eating or drinking, just thinking.’

  Tashbash’s wife first told her story to Meryemdje. Then she repeated it all over the village. There was not a doubt about it, Tashbash had been visited by holy beings from the netherworld. But why the guns then?

  ‘It must be the souls of his ancestors come to help the village in need.’

  ‘Then why did he run away?’

  ‘Who else can it be? Only the spirits can be so tall. They came to do us good.’

  ‘Then why the guns? Why should spirits use guns when they can blast a man with a single spell?’

  ‘Maybe they’re the spirits’ bandits. Why shouldn’t spirits have their bandits too?’

  ‘Would spirits go hunting for Tashbash all over the place? They’d know where he was.’

  ‘But the black faces? And anyway, Long Ali was at home all night and Old Halil disappeared weeks ago.’

  ‘There’s no doubt about it. They were spirits.’

  ‘Then why did Tashbash run away?’

  ‘But he didn’t, that’s just it! He became invisible himself and went with the spirits to Mount Tekech.’

  The conviction took root. Two white-shrouded spirits had visited Tashbash in the night, had made him invisible and carried him off to their palace on Mount Tekech. There they had conversed till dawn. And then they had brought him back, covering him with snow on purpose to make people think he had been walking in the storm.

  On hearing this, the Muhtar went mad. Spirits indeed! He had just learnt from his spies that Tashbash had spent the night with Long Ali, the two of them plotting God knows what against him. This accursed man must have been born on the Holy Night of the Revelation or how could he have got wind of what was afoot? What had made him stay away from home that very night? And how cleverly he was making the most of the incident! Sending his wife all over the village to stuff those gullible fools with fairytales!

  One step, one small step and these stupid villagers would declare him not simply a saint, but a prophet as well! Ah, if only there could be an earthquake now, just as Tashbash had been prophesying! An earthquake that would devastate the village. He visualized the smoking ruins, and suddenly Meryemdje’s voice: ‘Help! Save me, I’m Meryemdje.’ ‘Meryemdje, is it? So you’ve found your tongue now? Who would want to save you! Stay there and croak, spiteful old woman!’ Rafters sticking out of the snow-covered ruins. It is snowing … from the depths of a wreckage a faint moaning. Ökkesh Dagkurdu! ‘Wasn’t it you who craved for Paradise? You who didn’t eat and drink to save money for the Haj? Who hardly slept for making the namaz prayers day and night? Well, there you are, straight on the way to your Paradise! So you don’t want to die, eh? Oh well, I’ll save you this time. You’ll go to Paradise just a little later …’ And this voice? The dying voice of a man trapped under mounds and mounds of earth? Oh, how pleasant to the ear! It is the voice of our saintly Tashbash, who held communion with spirits nightly, who caroused in their palace on Mount Tekech! ‘How did you ever get stuck down there? Where are your spirits now? Why don’t they come and dig you out, you prince of liars?’ That’s one man Sefer will never save! Let him choke to death down there.

  In a fever of delectation he was living through it all, the horror of the earthquake, the deaths, as though it had really come to pass.

  ‘Ömer,’ he said.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘This man must be killed tonight.’

  ‘We’ll never find him tonight, Uncle.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘He’ll go into hiding.’

  ‘What shall we do then? This is your job, Ömer. What do you say?’

  ‘He can’t be killed.’

  ‘Why not? You can do it right away. He’s there in his house, sitting by the fire.’

  ‘What! In broad daylight?’

  ‘Why not? I’ll see that you get off. At the most they’ll give you a year or two. I’ll bring the whole village to witness that you killed him in self-defence. Come on. Now!’

  ‘In broad daylight? Murder …’

  ‘So you’re backing out?’

  ‘But this is killing a man! It isn’t like cutting a chicken’s throat.’

  ‘So you’re afraid? Or is it you too believe he’s a saint?’

  ‘Nooo …’

  ‘Well then?’

  Ömer was silent.

  ‘Cowards, all of you!’ Sefer shouted. ‘Turncoats! Why, you saw it all with your own eyes. Even you and I became saints when we went to his house to kill him! And you heard with your own ears that he was in Long Ali’s house and nowhere else. What are you afraid of?’

  Ömer bowed his head.

  So you too, Ömer? You in whom I put all my faith, you whom I fed and clothed and protected like my own son … An immense loneliness, worse than death, enveloped him. Everyone was deserting him. It was a dirty loathsome world this, not worth living in. There was just one last hope now, the news the members of the Village Council would bring from town. If that was bad, then … Why not do it himself? Why didn’t he go straight to Tashbash’s house now and kill him with his own hand. Yes, but he would get at least fifteen years for it and who would be Muhtar while he served his sentence? Who but that Long Ali, may he be struck down! He was behind it all, egging Tashbash on against him, setting them at odds in order to reap the benefits himself.

  That night Sefer could not sleep a wink. His bed was a rack on which he turned and twisted, inveighing against the worthlessness of this world, its ingratitude, its inhumanity.

  ‘Why don’t they come back?’ he complained. ‘Good or bad, I must have news from town. Then I’ll think up some other plan for Tashbash. Why don’t you come, my brothers?’

  Chapter 21

  A furious storm shook the whole world. No living creature was abroad that morning, not so much as a cat or a dog. Even the mighty eagles must have retreated into their high mountain eyries, drawing their proud heads under their wings and listening to the frenzied tumult outside. The wolves and foxes must have taken refuge in their lairs, curled up against each other to keep from freezing. They might go hungry for days without being able to venture into the open. No living creature could brave this storm.

  The thin snow already turning to ice as it fell was piling up again like sand, the driving wind forming ephemeral heaps of ice about the village. Such a freezing blizzard had never been known before, and yet someone was out and about, flitting like lightning from one door to the next, head hunched between the shoulders, eyes narrowed against the sleety snow. It was Memidik, the hunter, the one person in the village who owned neither sheep nor goats, nor cows, but who made a better living than most thanks to his craft as hunter, or so he alleged, and indeed no man in the whole land of the Taurus knew how to set a better trap for martens than
he.

  Memidik was short, the shortest man in the village. When the girls chaffed him saying, ‘Isn’t it time you grew a little taller, Memidik? You’re old enough. If you grew by just a finger or two, I’d marry you straight away,’ he would pretend he had not heard and make off, his head hanging. Surely he too would gain height in good time. A man doesn’t grow just like that, in one day! It comes slowly, gradually. Anyway, Memidik didn’t wish to be like those two giants, Long Ali and Shirtless. Never! God forbid! What kind of a height was that, reaching up to the skies as it were …

  Memidik was six months old when his father died and his mother had never remarried. She would comfort him, saying: ‘Don’t fret yourself, my child. Your father was tall as a poplar. You’re young still. You’ll grow yet.’

  ‘Who cares!’ Memidik would answer. ‘And anyway, being short comes in handy for a hunter. You lie low on the ground and neither the martens nor the birds can see you …’

  But he did care. The girls’ teasing drove him crazy. And as the years went by and he did not put on an inch, he began to shun people and to spend more and more of his time up in the mountains.

  However, this was no weather to go hunting! What was he doing, rushing about the village?

  He burst in on his mother, a frozen ball, shouting, ‘I saw it, I really did!’ His eyes were wide, his jaw trembling.

  ‘Shake off all that snow first, Memidik,’ his mother said, ‘and sit down by the fire. You’ll die, out all night in this terrible weather.’

  Memidik did not even hear her.

  ‘I saw it,’ he kept on repeating. ‘I really did! May my two eyes drop down before me if I’m lying.’ He pressed his eyes with two fingers. ‘With these eyes I saw it. Who’ll believe me? No one. But I did see it … I had set my traps for martens, four separate traps. It was a proper night for martens. And then the storm broke, such a storm up there, shaking earth and sky, that I had to take shelter in the Peri Caves. I lit a big fire, for it was freezing, the rocks themselves were splitting with the cold. And then … I must say it, I must! Even if they cut my throat, even if they cast the crippling spell on me … A moan rose from the earth. It does sometimes, you know, when you’re alone, but never like this. It grew and grew until it became deafening, until it filled the whole world. My heart leaped right into my mouth and I would have died of fright but suddenly the noise stopped; no storm, no blizzard, and it wasn’t cold any more, but warm and pleasant like a night in May, with the smell of fresh spring flowers wafting over from somewhere. I had no time to think or wonder before, down below the village, I saw seven balls of light come bouncing up the hill. And all at once the whole world was so flooded with light you could have seen the trail of an ant. And then what should I see! In front of the seven balls of light was a man in long white robes and his head was green!fn1 Such a great brightness he shed about him that even the seven balls of light faded into gloom. He was coming nearer and nearer. I began to tremble. Who can it be? I thought. Only some very holy person could make the world in winter become like spring, could bring light into the night. But then I thought, no, I must be dreaming. So I pricked my leg with the tip of my knife. And sure enough, it hurt. The green-headed man, with the seven bouncing balls of light behind him, passed before me and glided off towards Mount Tekech. I lost sight of them and the world was plunged into darkness again. And then! … I saw it with these eyes I tell you, a blaze of light, so brilliant, so strong that I fell down. For a while I thought I had gone blind. I dared not look up. I could hear my heart beat, fit to burst. Then, out of the corner of my eye I stole a glance, and there was the tall man, standing right in front of me. He had a face so beautiful you could not look upon it. A tall tall man followed by seven balls of light that danced behind him, frisky as young colts, shooting out blinding sparks into the night. And as the light hit him, the green-headed man shone greenly, his head, his eyes, his garments, the very ground he stepped on. And then the night, the snow, the summit of Mount Tekech, the rocks, the whole world was aglow with a green brightness. It gushed out from within the snow, blinding me. I could not move for fright. But I looked, and who should I see? His face so beautiful I could hardly bear to look … Who? Our Lord Tashbash! Yes, our Lord Tashbash himself! He it was, all swathed in a green glow, with the seven balls of light at his heels, like seven purebred Arabs. I wanted to go and throw myself at his feet. I wanted to say to him: Forgive us, Lord Tashbash. Be merciful to us, to me, to my mother, to the villagers … But I couldn’t move, as though I no longer had any legs. And then, like the north wind he swept off, with the balls of light hurrying after him. Just like the north wind, I tell you, he streaked off towards Mount Tekech, and soon after I saw the peak of the mountain all radiant with light.’