Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree

by Tariq Ali

  It soon became a triune relationship which concurrently fed their intellects, their religious emotions—they were disciples of the same Sufi shaykh—and, finally their sexual appetites. They had written poetry for each other in rhymed prose. This was composed in a language in which no pleasure was veiled from the other reader’s sight. During the summer months, when they were separated from each other by the necessity of spending time with their families, they both kept diaries in which they recorded every detail of their daily lives as well as the effects of sexual abstinence.

  Mansur had died in a shipwreck while accompanying his father on a trading mission to Istanbul. The inconsolable survivor could not bear the thought of living in al-Qahira any longer. It was this, more than any desire to study the works of Ibn Khaldun, that had brought him to Gharnata. He was drawn intellectually to al-Zindiq, but after several conversations felt that, while the crafty old fox was full of genius and learning, there was a lack of scruple in the stratagems he employed to outwit an opponent. At the end of one discussion of the poetry of Ibn Hazm, Ibn Daud had remembered a similar talk with Mansur. The memory had overpowered him. He had given way to unfeigned emotion. Naturally, he had not told al-Zindiq everything, but the old man was no fool. He had guessed. It was this that was worrying Ibn Daud. Al-Zindiq was a friend of this family. What if he confided his suspicions to Hind’s parents?

  As if guessing his thoughts, Hind fondled his hand and enquired innocently: ‘What was the name of the woman you loved in al-Qahira? I want to know everything about you.’

  Ibn Daud was startled. Before he could reply there was a scream and shouts of laughter as the maid-servants pounced on a mortified Yazid and dragged him into the glade.

  ‘Look who we found, Lady Hind!’ said Umayma, grinning shamelessly.

  ‘Let me go!’ shouted Yazid, the tears pouring down his face.

  Hind could not bear the sight of her brother upset in this fashion. She ran to Yazid and hugged him, but he kept his hands firmly at his side. Hind dried his tears with her hands and kissed his cheeks.

  ‘Why were you spying on me?’

  Yazid wanted to embrace and kiss her, tell her of his fears and worries. He had heard how Great-Aunt Zahra had run away and never come back again. He did not want his Hind to do the same. If they had been alone he would have blurted all this out, but the smile on Ibn Daud’s face stopped him. He turned his back and ran to the house, leaving behind him a bemused and bewildered sister.

  Slowly it was beginning to dawn on Hind that Yazid’s strange behaviour could only be explained in relation to her own state of mind. She had been so bewitched by those eyes, greener than the sea, that everything else had become secondary, even the voice of a lute. It was her carelessness that had upset her brother. She felt guilty. The intoxication of the embrace was all but forgotten.

  The sight of a distraught Yazid reminded her of her own irritation with Ibn Daud.

  ‘The truth is,’ she told herself, ‘that his honourable behaviour was nothing more or less than a refusal to recognize the beauty of our passion.’

  This annoyed her so much that she, who had almost burnt him with her flame, now resolved to teach Ibn Daud a few elementary lessons. He would soon discover that she could be colder than ice. She still wanted him, but on her terms. For the moment her main concern was to repair the breach with Yazid.

  The subject of Hind’s thoughts was lying with his head buried in his mother’s lap. He had burst in on Zubayda with the words: ‘That man was playing with Hind’s breasts. I saw them.’ Yazid had thought his mother would be horrified. She would rush to the scene of the crime and instruct the male servants of the house to whip Ibn Daud. The upstart from al-Qahira would be sent home in disgrace, and on his way to the village to find transport to Gharnata he might even be attacked by wild dogs. Instead Zubayda smiled.

  ‘Your sister is a grown woman now, Ibn Umar. Soon she will be married and will have children and you will be their uncle.’

  ‘Married to him?’ Yazid was incredulous.

  Zubayda nodded and stroked her son’s light brown hair.

  ‘But, but, he owns nothing. He is ...’

  ‘A learned man, my Yazid, and what he owns is in his head. My father always used to say that the weight of a man’s brains is more important than the weight of his purse.’

  ‘Mother,’ said Yazid with a frown. His eyes were like unsheathed swords and his voice reminded her so much of her husband at his most official that she could barely keep a straight face. ‘Have you forgotten that we cannot harvest grapes from prickly pears?’

  ‘True my brother,’ said Hind, who had entered the room unseen just in time to hear Yazid’s last remark, ‘but you know as well as I that a rose is always accompanied by the thorn.’

  Yazid hid his head behind his mother’s back, but Hind, laughing and very much her old self again, dragged him away and imprinted dozens of kisses on his head, neck, shoulders and cheeks.

  ‘I will always love you, Yazid and more than any man I happen to marry. It is my future husband who should worry. Not you.’

  ‘But for the last month ...’ began Yazid.

  ‘I know, I know and I am truly very sorry. I did not realize that we had not spent time together, but all that is in the past. Let’s be friends again.’

  Yazid’s arms went round her neck and she lifted him off the ground. His eyes were shining as she put him down.

  ‘Go and ask the Dwarf what he’s cooking for supper tonight,’ instructed Hind. ‘I must talk to our mother on my own.’

  As Yazid scampered out of the room, mother and daughter smiled at each other.

  ‘How she takes after me,’ thought Zubayda. ‘I, too, was unhappy with love till I obtained permission to marry her father. In my case the delay was brought about by Umar’s mother, unsure of the blood that flowed through my veins. Hind must not go through all that just because the boy is an orphan.’

  Hind appeared to have divined her mother’s thoughts. ‘I could never wait as long as you did, while they discussed the impurities in your blood. It is something else that worries me. Be truthful now. What do you make of him?’

  ‘A very handsome boy, with a brain. He is more than a match for you, my child. What more could you want? Why the doubt?’

  Hind had always enjoyed a special relationship with her mother. The friendship that developed between them was due, in no small measure, to the relaxed atmosphere which prevailed in the house. Hind did not have to imagine what life could have been like had her father married again or kept the odd concubine in one of his houses in the village. She had visited her cousins in Qurtuba and Ishbiliya often enough to remember households in the grip of a permanently stifling atmosphere. Her cousins’ accounts of indiscriminate and casual lechery reminded her of descriptions of brothels; the accounts of infighting amongst the women filled her vision with images of a snake-pit. The contrast with life at al-Hudayl could not have been sharper.

  As she grew older, Hind found herself drawn closer to her mother. Zubayda, whose own upbringing, thanks to a freethinking father, had been unorthodox, was determined that the younger of her two daughters should not be subjected to the straitjacket of superstition or made to conform to any strictly defined role in the household. Kulthum, from her infancy, had been a willing prisoner of tradition. Hind—and even her father had noticed this when she was only two years old—was an iconoclast. Despite Ama’s numerous forebodings and oft-repeated warnings, Zubayda encouraged this side, of her daughter.

  Because of all this there was no doubt in Hind’s mind as to how she should respond to her mother’s question. She did not hesitate at all, but began to describe everything which had taken place that afternoon, making sure that not a single detail was excluded. When she had finished, her mother, who had been listening very intently, simply laughed. Yet the merriment masked a real concern. If Umar had been present he would at once have noticed the nervous edge to the laughter.

  Zubayda did not wish to alarm
her daughter. Uncharacteristically, she embarked on an emollient course.

  ‘You’re worried because he would not let the juice of his palm-tree water your garden. Am I correct?’

  Hind nodded gravely.

  ‘Foolish girl! Ibn Daud behaved correctly. He is our guest, after all and seducing a daughter of the house while maidservants kept watch would not be a very dignified way of responding to your father’s kindness and hospitality.’

  ‘I know that! I know that!’ muttered Hind. ‘But there was something more which I can’t describe to you. Even when his hands were fondling me I felt the absence of passion in them. There was no urgency till I touched him. Even then he became frightened. Not of father, but of me. He has not known a woman before. That much is obvious. What I can’t understand is why. I mean when you and Abu defied his parents and went to ...’

  ‘Your father was not Ibn Daud! He was a knight of the Banu Hudayl. And when we went to Qurtuba we had already been married for several hours. Go and lie in the bath and let me try and solve this puzzle.’

  The sun was setting as Hind walked out into the courtyard. She stood still, hypnotized by the colours around her. The snow-covered peaks overlooking al-Hudayl were bathed in hues of light purple and orange; the small houses of the village looked as though they had been freshly painted. So engrossed was Hind by the beauty around her that her senses became oblivious to all else. A few moments ago she had felt cold and melancholy. Suddenly she was pleased to be alone.

  ‘Only yesterday,’ she thought, ‘if I had found myself like this in the sunset I would have pined for him, wanted him to be here by my side so that we could share the gifts of nature, yet today I am happy to be alone.’

  She was so deeply absorbed in her own thoughts that, as she began to walk slowly to the hammam she did not hear the sounds of merriment emanating from the kitchen.

  Yazid sat on a low stool as the Dwarf played the tambourine and sang a zajal. The servants had been drinking a potent brew which they had distilled from the leftovers in the casks near the al-Hudayl vineyards. The Dwarf was mildly drunk. His three assistants, and the two men whose sole task it was to transfer the food from the pots to the dishes and place it on the table, had imbibed too much of the devil’s piss. They were dancing in a circle while in the centre the Dwarf stood on a table and sang his song. Sitting on the steps outside the kitchen, a look of fierce disapproval on her face, was Ama. She had attempted to distract Yazid and drag him back to the house, but he was enjoying himself enormously and had refused to obey.

  The Dwarf stopped playing. He was tired. But his admirers wanted the performance to continue.

  ‘One last time,’ they shouted, ‘the song of Ibn Quzman. Sing it for our young master.’

  ‘Yes please, Dwarf,’ Yazid found himself joining in the chants. ‘Just one more song.’

  The Dwarf became very serious.

  ‘I will sing the ballad composed by Ibn Quzman over three hundred years ago, but I must insist that it is heard with the respect due a great master. There will never be a troubadour like him again. Any interruptions and I will pour this wine on your beards and set them alight. Is that clear, you boastful babblers?’

  The kitchen, which only a few seconds ago had resembled the scene of a drunken riot, became silent. Only the bubbling of a giant pan containing the evening meal could be heard. The Dwarf nodded to his assistant. The twelve-year-old kitchen boy produced a lute and began to test the strings. Then he nodded to his master and the tiny chef began to sing the zajal of Ibn Quzman in a voice so deep that it was overpowering.

  ‘Come fill it high with a golden sea,

  And hand the precious cup to me!

  Let the old wine circle from guest to guest,

  The bubbles gleaming like pearls on its breast,

  It were as if night is of darkness dispossessed.

  Wa Allah! Watch it foam and smile in a hundred jars!

  ’Tis drawn from the cluster of the stars.

  Pass it, to the melting music’s sound,

  Here on this flowery carpet round,

  Where gentle dews refresh the ground

  And bathe my limbs deliciously

  In their cool and balmy fragrancy.

  Alone with me in the garden green

  A singing girl enchants the scene:

  Her smile diffuses a radiant sheen,

  I cast off shame, for no spy can see,

  And ‘Wa Allah,’ I cry, ‘let us merry be!’

  Everyone cheered, and Yazid the loudest of all.

  ‘Dwarf,’ he cried in an excited voice, ‘you should leave the kitchen and become a troubadour. Your voice is beautiful.’

  The Dwarf hugged the boy and kissed his head.

  ‘It’s too late for all that, Yazid bin Umar. Too late for singing. Too late for everything. I think you had better return with the information the Lady Zubayda asked you to bring back from the kitchen.’

  Yazid had forgotten all about his mother’s request.

  ‘What was it, Dwarf?’

  ‘You have already forgotten the contents of my sunset stew?’

  Yazid frowned and scratched his head but he could not remember a single ingredient. Bewitched by the wine song, he had forgotten the reason for his visit to the kitchen. The Dwarf began to remind him, but this time he made sure that the young boy’s memory would retain the information and so he declaimed the recipe in a rhythm and intonation which was very familiar to Yazid. The Dwarf’s sonorous voice was mimicking a recitation of the al-koran.

  ‘Listen carefully all ye eaters of my food. Tonight I have prepared my favourite stew which can only be consumed after the sun has set. In it you will find twenty-five large potatoes, quartered and diced. Twenty turnips, cleaned and sliced. Ten dasheens skinned till they gleam and ten breasts of lamb which add to the sheen. Four spring chickens, drained of all their blood, a potful of yoghurt, herbs and spices, giving it the colour of mud. Add to this mixture a cup of molasses and, wa Allah, it is done. But young master Yazid, one thing you must remember! The meat and vegetables must be fried separately, then brought together in a pan full of water in which the vegetables have been boiled. Let it all bubble slowly while we sing and make merry. When we come to the end of our fun, wa Allah, the stew is done. The rice is ready. The radishes and carrots, chillies and tomatoes, onions and cucumbers all washed and impatiently waiting their turn to join the stew on your silver plates. Can you remember all this, Yazid bin Umar?’

  ‘Yes!’ shouted Yazid as he ran out of the kitchen trying desperately to memorize the words and their music.

  The Dwarf watched the boy run through the garden to the house followed by Ama, and a sad smile appeared on his face.

  ‘What will be the future of this great-grandson of Ibn Farid?’ he asked no one in particular.

  Yazid ran straight into his mother’s room and repeated the Dwarf’s words.

  His father smiled. ‘If only you could learn the al-koran with the same facility, my child, you would make our villagers very happy. Go and clean yourself before we eat this sunset stew.’

  As the boy scampered out of the room Zubayda’s eyes lit up.

  ‘He is happy again.’

  Umar bin Abdallah and his wife had been discussing the fate of their younger daughter. Zubayda had provided her husband with a modified version of the events in the pomegranate glade. Not wishing to upset him, she had excluded all references to palm-trees, dates and other relevant fruits. Umar had been impressed by the account of Ibn Daud’s forbearance and sense of honour. This fact alone had decided him to give the young man permission to wed Hind. It was at this stage in the discussion that Zubayda had confided her fears.

  ‘Has it not occurred to you that Ibn Daud might only be interested in other men?’

  ‘Why? Simply because he rejected our daughter’s kind invitation to deprive her of her virginity?’

  Not wishing to give away too much, Zubayda decided to proceed no further. ‘No,’ she said, ‘i
t was an instinct on my part. When you talk to him after we have eaten tonight it would help to set my mind at rest if you asked him.’

  ‘What?’ roared Umar. ‘Instead of talking to him about his feelings for our Hind, I should become an Inquisitor, questioning him as if he were a filthy monk who had abused his position in the confessional. Perhaps I should torture him as well? No! No! No! It is not worthy of you.’

  ‘Umar,’ retorted Zubayda, her eyes flashing with anger, ‘I will not let my daughter marry a man who will make her unhappy.’

  ‘What if your father had asked me that question before permitting our marriage?’

  ‘But there was no need, was there my husband? I did not have any doubts about you on that score.’ Zubayda was playing the coquette, which was so out of character that it made him laugh.

  ‘If you insist, woman, I will try to find a way of asking the young man without causing offence.’

  ‘No reason for him to be offended. What we are talking about is not uncommon.’

  The young man under discussion was in his room getting dressed for the evening meal. A strange feeling, hard to put into words, had overcome him and he was plunged in sadness. He knew that he had disappointed Hind. He was reliving the events of the afternoon and the sense of fear was being replaced by an excitement new to him.

  ‘Can nothing drive her out of my head?’ he asked himself as he put on his tunic. ‘I do not wish to think of her and yet I cannot think of anything else. How can these images of her crawl into my mind against my will? I am a fool! I should have told her that the only lover I have known was a man. Why did I not do that? Because I want her so much. I do not want her to reject me. I want her as my wife. She is the first person I have loved since Mansur died. Other men have approached me, but I rejected their advances. It is Hind who has aroused me again, Hind who makes me tremble, but what did she read on my face?’