Dreams of Maryam Tair

by Mhani Alaoui

  ~

  The day that Leila was healed, Zohra took her by the arm and closed the door to her house behind them. She knew that she would never return to the Central Quarries, just as she knew that she would never leave Leila’s side.

  A neighbor, known for her roughness, yelled out to her, “Stay, Zohra Ait Daoud. You will never survive out there. Your home will always be here. You will die and be forgotten like the ugly witch you are. Let the little bird go. Her world is not your world.”

  Zohra did not look back, but the words burned her heart. True, what did she know of the world out there? She had left the Quarries only once, a long time ago. One day, when her mother Hafsa felt that she was close to death, she took Zohra back to their village near Abou Jaad and had her tattooed in the manner of their ancestors. The women tattooed her chin and forehead with the symbols of her tribe—two triangles crossed by a thin line on her chin and a small circle on her forehead, between her eyes.

  Now Zohra left the Quarries once again never to return, holding the hand of a young woman who reminded her of what may have been and may still be. A young man who secretly believed that Zohra was a queen drove them in his yellow R4 to the Place of Dying Palaces and dropped them in front of Leila Nassiri Tair’s family home. Then he bowed low and left quietly.

  The wrought iron portico of the Nassiri residence loomed high above their heads. Zohra rang the doorbell, and they waited. As Zohra and Leila waited, two men walked toward them. They were elderly men in long white djellabas and red felt hats, in heated discussion with one another. When they reached the wrought-iron portico of the Nassiri residence, they stopped, peered at the address on the wall and, satisfied, turned to the two women standing there. Zohra took a close look at them and thought they looked familiar. They bowed to her and introduced themselves as Scholar and Gossiper, respectively and alternately. “If you will listen,” they spoke as a duet, in identical treble, “we will tell the story, big and small, known and unknown, of the House of Nassiri.” After consecutive bows, they brandished the scrolls hidden in the folds of their clothing. The Scholar unrolled his scroll and, trembling, asked to begin first.

  Zohra stood still, as the family’s history and secrets rushed at her. Leila closed her eyes in pain.

  Aisha and Ibrahim

  So, the Scholar began.

  To begin somewhere, to begin where stories emerge from rivers of words, to tell you of a history that runs its course without you, Zohra of the Central slum, we begin in Granada.

  It all began in Spain in 1492 when Granada fell to the Christian King and Queen, and the Moors fled their paradise. They followed their king, Boabdil, into exile to the lands south of the great blue sea. The Nassiris, high dignitaries in the Granada court or illegitimate children to Boabdil, or perhaps both, I cannot say, sewed emeralds, rubies, and diamonds to their clothes, close to their skin, and they too followed their king into exile. It is said that at the very moment the Moors were watching their world die before their eyes, a Genoese adventurer was setting sail for a new world beyond the horizon. It is also said that Boabdil, once king and now poet, cried for the kingdom he had lost in one long, mournful sigh.

  To their new lands in the Maghreb and the Ottoman Empire, the exiles brought their wondrous talents and spiritual daring. While some, like the unfortunate Boabdil, wandered deeper and deeper into their melancholia, others forged new lives out of their sadness.

  The Nassiris, companions to Boabdil, settled in Fes, joining the thriving community of Andalusi exiles. They built homes around patios and fountains to remember their lost Spanish gardens. They dreamt universities, hospitals, and a new adoration of the divine. But gradually, with fear of the outside world closing in on them, religiosity took precedent over science, and they became erudites and mandarins rather than creators and discoverers. They delved into the detail of the phrase and lost themselves in the drop of alchemy. They became the eighteenth and nineteenth-century Machiavellis and Medicis of the southern Mediterranean, but they left the geniuses outside the city gates.

  By the time the colonials conquered them, they had turned conservatism into an art form and self-preservation into a political science. Some still had the blood of Boabdil in their veins, and they swayed under nostalgia and the inability to adapt. Others played a subtle game of bravery, pragmatism, and impeccable penmanship. Women hid bombs under their haiks, while men wrote pro-independence tracts. Young nationalists were sent to jail, tortured, and killed. Independence from the colonials was won here, according to them. It was here that they won their freedom. Then it was here that the decision to remain a kingdom was sealed.

  The Nassiris, who survived the centuries by remaining close to their caste, saw their power and finances decline with the country’s modernization. Like many Andalusi families, one of their branches left Fes in the 1950s to try their luck and skill in Casablanca. This branch, headed by Ibrahim Nassiri, Leila’s father, invested in a plastic factory bought from a colonial who had understood that the tensions in the slums and the countryside were a prelude to the end of colonial rule in Morocco and was prepared to leave. He sold his factory to Ibrahim Nassiri and left, never to be seen again. Ibrahim built a large house for his family in the Place of Dying Palaces, a neighborhood where new wealth and palaces once abounded.

  For the next fifteen years, Ibrahim thrived. Ibrahim Nassiri became the King of Plastics and the Head Inventor in this protocapitalist venture. He invented plastic products adapted to local demands and pockets. He invented the small plastic hammam pail, the large plastic tub, and the flat plastic fly swatter. But the bestseller was the round plastic comb. It was all the rage in Casablanca and a stroke of genius. The comb came in hues of pink, blue, yellow, or green. It fit perfectly in the palm of the hand and could be taken anywhere. It was useful in the hammam or in front of a mirror. It was made for the curly black hair of Moroccans and sat nicely into their empty pockets. With a couple of vigorous strokes and carefully administered hair oil, a rebellious curl could be subdued and flattened. The subject could drive and, freeing one hand, discretely and quickly brush his or her hair.

  The Nassiris had stumbled upon their own Golden Age. They were the lords of the round plastic comb. All the constellations of the universe shined pleasurably on the comb, as it brushed women’s long curly hair until it gleamed. They opened shops in bustling Derb Omar and the Habous, the traditional Arab Quarter built by the colonials in the late 1920s, and distributed their products across the country.

  Their euphoria did not last long. When the late sixties and seventies rolled in, so did the imitators. The harsh competition and jubilant imitations soon pushed the family business close to bankruptcy. To make matters worse, and because bad things often happen one after another, the global price of plastic rose, and plastic products were dumped on the Moroccan market and its ecstatic consumers at a devastatingly low price. The factory stopped working at full capacity and their market shares slid to nothing. The magic was gone.

  The austere Scholar stops, rolls his scroll, and bows to the Gossiper who, thrilled, takes over the story.

  Ibrahim Nassiri was married to Aisha Skalli, a Sharifa, or direct descendant of the Prophet Mohammed, who came to Morocco by way of Sicily. Like many families of the Andalusi caste, Ibrahim’s family had sought a Sharifa for their eldest son. A wife like Aisha was the natural bearer of the Baraka, the ancient blessing of the Sharifs, one which would protect the merchant family’s fortune and good name. She was raised to be the mistress of a large house and to carry its keys with arrogance and pride. She threaded the house’s keys into a ribbon she wore around her neck. She held the keys to the front door, the kitchen, the master bedroom, the storage room, the laundry room, and, most importantly, the long, dark hallway crossing through the center of the house and in whose shadowy depths the spirits lurked. When she entered the spirit-haunted hallway at night or in the morning, she carried with her a bottle of sea water whose contents she sprinkled in corners to ward off the evil djinns. A
isha exaggerated her walk and rolled her hips so all could hear the keys ring and sing. Everyone knew that the lady of the house was approaching with her bundle of keys that locked and unlocked every room in the house.

  What no one knew was that Aisha was an instinctual genius of all things plastic. In reality, she was the voice behind her husband’s wondrous inventions. Her weekly excursions into the changing world of the hammam tickled her imagination. She saw the washers and scrubbers struggle with the vast copper vats and the equally cumbersome copper pails. She saw the women’s long curly hair break the traditional wooden and the long European combs. She observed the changes in the hammam, the desire for lightness and speed, practicality and comfort. She watched the modern world move into the hammam and press it to change, adapt, and continue living. She whispered to her husband what he needed to know, what to invent.

  This would have made perfect sense to all those who knew him if they had only suspected it. For Ibrahim Nassiri was not known for his creativity or for his attention to local practices. This was the Nassiri secret, part of the magic Aisha offered to a husband she had vowed to honor.

  When his wife had borne him many children, two of whom survived, he looked to marry a second time. When he introduced Aisha to his bride-to-be, and her co-wife, she smiled and welcomed her. But her heart broke like glass, and all the broken pieces breathed one word—“Mother. Oh Mother.”

  Aisha’s mother, Nakhla, with the dark skin and the fierce embrace. Her mother the child who had been abducted by slave traders and torn from her landscape of stone and earth to become a slave to a powerful man from the north of the country, before he took her as one of his many wives for bearing him a son. Her mother who tucked her in at night and spoke to her of her home, Timbuktu, a land deep in the Sahara desert, with its flourishing trading centers, kasbahs, palaces, mosques, and granaries in which, during wartime, their most prized belongings were stored, including manuscripts that were dearer to her tribe than gold, grain, or salt.

  Her mother who told her of the peculiarities of Saheli Islam, and how it was only much later that an intransigent Islam from the North came south to level all difference and crush all joy. She told her of the time before that, when the veiled men and free women of the desert oases conquered the North and imprinted Andalusia itself.

  She told her of a past so free that knowledge of the Green Book fed into knowledge of bodies, sensuality, and desire. She told her of the passionate architect who built palaces and mosques of mud—brick, mortar, plaster—and wood.

  Finally, she told her of the great, secret powers of the women of the matriarchal tribes of the Sahel, descendants of Lilith, the first woman, before Eve, free and untangled, who spoke words in the way that birds fly the high skies. She told her of an ancient manuscript that, if studied and read correctly, would reveal itself as Sacred Law. It was a manuscript that plunged into the most distant past and found the source of equality between all human beings. Its power resided in its ability to punish those who ignored its commandments. The manuscript was lost many centuries ago and was never found. Few even remembered that such a story existed.

  One day, Nakhla gave her daughter Aisha a small corner of a page from the manuscript, the only evidence of its existence that was ever found. This was a treasure held by the women of her tribe for centuries and passed down from mother to daughter. But, she warned her, use it wisely, avoid using it altogether. It is little understood, and many legends cloud its essence—the consequences could be terrible.

  Before Ibrahim brought home his child bride, Aisha had believed in her own strength. She did not know what breaking down or doubting beyond repair meant, and had always been intrigued by such weaknesses in others. What Aisha now felt was an an irretrievable flattening of days, life, and joy. She was trapped with an unfaithful man in a land where being unfaithful was both legal and tolerated. Male adultery was the norm. A life built together must be built on this terrain, this swamp of diffuse, misrecognized humiliation. So what did Aisha do when her husband brought her a younger, fresher co-wife?

  There was very little legroom. Divorce willed by the wife was quasi-abhorrent under strict orthodox Maliki law. Women had to seek other ways. They could retire from the fight but leave their children’s interests unprotected. They could try to conquer their husbands all over again or they could ally with the second wife in an uneasy truce. In that defining moment when her life was transformed forever, these were all courses that Aisha considered. Then something erupted inside her, and her full potential surged forth. She touched the many keys around her neck and turned them counterclockwise. “My house is locked, my house is locked, my house is locked, my house is forever locked,” she swore and spat four times on the floor—south, north, west, and east. Then she took the page of the manuscript her mother had given her and burned it.

  After four days, the bride was found dead in her bed. Ibrahim, who had tasted youth again, craved it anew. He brought another bride home. She was lovelier and even younger than her predecessor. Aisha smiled and welcomed her. Four days later, the second second wife was found dead in her bed. Ibrahim waited a while, then brought a third bride home. Four days later, she too was found dead. Families of Ibrahim’s caste now became wary of giving their daughters to Ibrahim Nassiri, no matter how wealthy or noble he was. He began taking wives from poorer backgrounds. The brides came from families desperate for money or who had never heard that the dashing fifty-year-old groom was a homegrown Bluebeard. All were found dead exactly four days after their arrival. Doctors said they died of melancholia.

  Ibrahim finally understood that something unnatural was at work. He went to see a fqih, reputed for his science, to stop the enchantment.

  Said the fqih:

  “No one is powerful enough to fight against the magic used against your brides. It is a dark magic, one of the oldest known to our ancestors. Only a person learned in the ancient manuscripts of Timbuktu could compel a woman’s soul to desire death so fully.

  “The manuscripts of Timbuktu have long been feared by men of science. They trace back to an old Sumerian myth that some claim became inscribed in the scrolls of the Torah, to the tale of Adam and Lilith, his first wife, made of the same matter as he, his equal in every way.

  “The story of Adam and Lilith is an evil story, blasphemously claiming that man and woman were created equal. Lilith is a she-demon whose mission is to destroy Adam’s happiness with his true mate and second wife, Eve, created from one of his ribs and inferior to him in every way. It is rumored, but none have seen the manuscripts, that the lost manuscripts of Timbuktu were written by Lilith herself.

  “The magic used is, I’m sure, the magic of the lost Timbuktu manuscripts. The manuscripts claim that the world was created for two beings, same and equal, built of clay and soul. Once these words, written in an ancient demonic tongue, are heard, they will never be forgotten. The women who fall under its curse are in a state that is neither sleep nor wakefulness. Wives, mistresses, and concubines feel such yearning for that lost freedom that death becomes the only answer. They are plunged into a perpetual trance that takes their soul hostage and pushes them into the arms of death. All you can do now to save your honor is to take your pleasure outside the house. You can never bring another woman into your house, and you can never take a second wife. God help you.”

  Upon hearing the fqih, Ibrahim went wild. Though he could not prove it, he knew the curse came from Aisha. He knew this because of a story Aisha once told him, in the early days of their marriage, about her mother Nakhla and her matriarchal tribe. He knew that his wife came from a place of forgotten power that she was now reclaiming.

  “That is what I am,” Ibrahim raged to the fqih. “A man. I have hair on my thighs and torso, a turban wound around my head. I perform my ablutions and pray five times a day in the direction of Holy Mecca. My djellaba is of the whitest, purest cloth, and I stand tall, taller than most men I know. I am a man. I eat mutton with my right hand and give alms to the poor every
Friday. I bow to no man except to the Sharif who crosses my path and nods in my direction. I made the family business productive and enriched my bloodline with two sons. I have every right, every hard-earned, God-given right. Four wives, countless concubines, are my birthright. It is only a matter of wealth and will. Who dares to curse me? Who dares to stand between me and my privilege...?

  “It is Aisha. Aristocratic, cold, above the law, she would have no qualms in killing an innocent girl, especially one who is not as highly born as herself. In her family, men do not work. They read and write exegeses, study for years, and advise lords and sultans. They don’t know what work is. Even if they are poor and starving, they do not demean themselves to work for a living. They read. When I was younger, I went to the land of the Hind. They, too, have their Sharifs, they call them Brahmins. They piss on their people—merchants, warriors, none compare to the lofty Brahmins. Just so for the Sharif, just so for my wife!

  “She will pay, I promise.”

  So Ibrahim became cruel to Aisha. His heart turned against her, and he became pitiless. He forbade her to leave the house or to have guests of her own. He did not allow her to buy refined cloth for her kaftans and serouals, and he stopped giving her emerald necklaces, pearl earrings, and heavy gold belts. He rarely joined her in her bed and made sure she knew that he was still living like a man. There was violence in all his actions toward her, but he refrained from physically hurting her because he still feared what she would do if humiliated too deeply.

  The Gossiper pauses and bows to the Scholar. Under Zohra’s eyes, the two merge into a feminine, larger-than-life shape. A large woman, who Zohra knows only too well, takes over.

  After the deaths of his many brides, Ibrahim Nassiri’s business began to suffer. The cause of the decline was unclear. It may have been triggered by rising competition or by the appearance of new products and markets. It may have been caused by Yasmine Nassiri’s wealthy husband who, annoyed by his in-laws’ aristocratic pretensions, refused to lend them money. Or it may have been caused by a jealous wife’s curse gone awry. That is precisely what Ibrahim believed—Aisha was to blame.