by Anna Tambour
The great door creaks open. An old man holds an oil lamp to Faldarolo’s face, and before the servant can slam the door in disgust, Faldarolo begins to work.
The town of Çimçim is home to the cloth merchant and his older brother. Your eyes can search every word engaged to every dot on any map, and never will Çimçim show itself. This affectionate or scornful nickname was earned for the town by its quarter devoted to the making of those big brass clackers known as Çimçims, the tuning of which has levelled a mountain (so they say).
Faldarolo’s interrogator, the cloth-merchant’s older brother, looks like a carob pod stored too long— his skin has darkened and pitted with age, and has dried on his bones that stretch his form out, curved and twisted, from desiccated hollows.
He has been roused from bed. Under his eyes, he bears the pillows of the habitually sleepless. His lip is curled up on the right side and his voice is nasal. He examines Faldarolo through a thick piece of glass.
“And what is your proof that you are The Effusor, Chief bladder- pipe player to the Great Timursaçi?”
Faldarolo throws back the cape.
“By the light of His life!” exclaims the cloth merchant in fright and awe. That red mark is so hideous, it must have meaning.
Faldarolo tosses the velvet back over the bladder-pipe. He slouches in his rags, looking not at his interrogator but at some place too mentally lofty for men.
“The scoundrel! Eat, eat!”
Faldarolo had just told how the cloth merchant had rolled him in a bolt of cloth and stolen him from Timursaçi’s palace, of the trials he had suffered travelling with the man of cloth. Of how he had secretly collected rags along the way, and how when they arrived at the cloth merchant’s house only this evening, he had disguised himself as a beggar and escaped, and naturally ran here. How he already knew about the cloth-merchant’s brother from his reputation (by the heavens, yes. There are so few men of discernment and classical taste that their fame spreads like the sun’s warmth in spring). He told of how he learned where to find the house from the descriptions given by the cloth merchant, for the cloth merchant’s brother was the only other topic of conversation the merchant possessed.
If Faldarolo had let himself think, he would not have been able to deliver this sack of lies. He was no storyteller, let alone a liar. Love gave his voice tongue, his eyes candour. Unbeknownst to him, his bearing was that of a great artist. He found it difficult, however, to remember all the details and the prescribed order of telling, and eat at the same time.
His host nibbled an oriole tongue. “And why would he do such a thing?” Faldarolo had told him already, but the man was like a child with a favourite story.
“He swore you have never seen nor heard a bladder-pipe, and that you could never find a bladder-pipe player.”
“And did he say why?”
“Because, he said,” Faldarolo swallowed a mouthful of pigeon with walnut and pomegranate sauce and washed it down with a beaker of wine, “you never do anything.”
And here Faldarolo seemed to remember another something he hadn’t told.
“He said that he would shame you by finding not only a bladder-pipe player, but me.”
“That . . . ” the cloth merchant’s brother spluttered. “That trader! More ass’s butter?”
“No thank you,” Faldarolo almost said. He had secreted a chunk of it under his rags. “Good man,” he said.
The cloth-merchant’s brother smiled shyly, an ugly sight.
“Have it put by my bed,” Faldarolo ordered, and rose.
His host scrambled to his feet. “Yes, Your Effusiveness.”
After massaging the bladder-pipe with the precious ass’s butter, Faldarolo bathed and put on the luxurious set of clothing that was laid out for him. Then he slept the day away.
His host, the cloth-merchant’s brother, spent the first hour gloating. Then he handed out orders and spent the rest of the day and early evening drinking tisanes to soothe his nerves. He was not frightened of the Great Timursaçi, who would never find out that The Effusor himself is in my house, wanting to play for: me.
No, thought the cloth-merchant’s brother. I won’t let the Great Timursaçi know that his Great Effusor is here, not if I don’t fancy being shoved in a bag and drowned like a kitten.
Indeed, the cloth-merchant’s brother considered that it was quite enough to produce a bladder-pipe player for the townspeople to hear—his very own bladder-pipe player who came looking for the famed connoisseur. It is true that he had never seen a bladder-pipe, but he had an old book with a description and picture.
It is true that the more the cloth merchant swore that his older brother didn’t know the sound of a bladder-pipe from a goat bell, the more the elder swore that bladder-pipes had become his life while the travelling trader, his younger brother, was but a ragdoll, his head filled with cotton and silk.
The cloth merchant sits in the back of the room. He has snuck in without an invitation, bribing his brother’s servants (who had been instructed to accept the bribe).
The drama of the two brothers employs all, and many necks will be sore tomorrow.
The introduction is long and flowery, the better to frustrate the audience, who delight in their torture.
Faldarolo looks the part of a celebrated arcane musician. He wears silks not seen by anyone here (except the cloth merchant’s father who had imported them when the boys were young).
The bladder-pipe now wears an over-cloak of stiff brocade, to Faldarolo’s specifications. The introduction finally ends and the host sits.
Faldarolo closes his eyes and puts his lips to the pipe.
My love, he blows. Your constancy fires me. The brightness of your soul guides me. The very stars are but black holes against your firmament. Your voice is honey. You candy my lips. I drown in your sweetness . . .
Not a sound comes from her.
The townsfolk should be forgiven for looking to the connoisseur. Many ears have been ruined by the çimçims.
His hot breath flows through her like water through a sieve. The skin of her bag is soft and supple, yet wrinkled and flat—its visual horror hidden under velvet and brocade.
Why do you torture me? he blows, a song that is so familiar that everyone in the room can hum it. His eyes are closed, his eyebrows moving to the rhythms of the song. He had thought that he would be tense, would have to pretend, but at this moment as in those best times with her, all he feels is love. His lips, his hands, his love do what they’ve always done with her—he doesn’t heed nor care whether others can hear their act.
Faldarolo and the bladder-pipe are more as one than they’ve ever been before. His swaying, his eyebrow-dance—sights only. Not a sound.
For the first few moments, the cloth-merchant’s brother looks disconcerted. But then the connoisseur’s lips fall into that line of tight-muscled (down at the corners) pleasure that is the sign of true discernment. His guests read the look correctly as “What a master! I would give my lifetime for this moment. It is too perfect to contemplate a wrong note, yet I fear . . . Ahh, paradise!”
Faldarolo played the concert of his life. He played till he fainted. He played without remembering that he had strung at his waist under his garments, the purse of gold and the pot of ass’s butter; that alone in the luxurious guest room, he had practiced tumbling with the bladder-pipe (as he would fall when kicked out the door); and that before the concert he had eaten as much as his stomach could hold.
Faldarolo’s eyes were closed, so he didn’t see the audience, who within a songspan, looked not at their master of taste, but to Faldarolo.
He didn’t see a man begin to hum, only to be jabbed quiet.
He didn’t see men begin to sway.
He didn’t see thirty-eight eyebrows rise stiffly, and slowly bend, stretch, then leap.
He didn’t see the tears roll down his host’s face, the uncurling of the man’s lip.
He didn’t see the look in the eyes of those who watched throu
gh the filigreed wall.
He didn’t see (and no one else noticed) the sneaking out of the cloth merchant.
The unconscious Faldarolo (clutching the bladder-pipe) was carried upstairs by two of the concertgoers, the town’s foremost physicians. Beside his bed, all of Çimçim’s five physicians argued noisily over his treatment while the master of the house absentmindedly tore his hair out.
Nightingales were killed for broth. Nougat was pounded to powder and mixed with gold, then rubbed on Faldarolo’s lips. He was washed with rosewater, oiled with neroli, massaged, dribble-fed and sighed over. The bladder-pipe, pried from his fingers, lay on a pillow beside the bed, resplendent and intimidating and hidden as ever in her velvet and brocade.
For a week, Faldarolo hovered between worlds. When he woke, the physicians prescribed bed-rest and the building up of his strength.
So at his host’s insistence, Faldarolo rested and developed that physical feature of the great artist—the little ball of a stomach. He was plied with fine drink and food, raiment, jewels (including ten magnificent toe-rings), gold pieces and cloying respect. No work was asked of him. The cloth-merchant’s brother treated him with such delicacy that Faldarolo felt feared.
The only thing Faldarolo asked for was ass’s butter. He never learnt the name of his host. It was so like all the other names in this town. His host never knew quite how to address him, so meekly called him “Master”.
On about his thirty-second night in Çimçim, Faldarolo stole away. He wore the most modest garb he had been given, though he carried secreted on his person, the velvet-garbed bladder-pipe, a pot of ass’s butter, and more than enough wealth, he estimated, to find and pay for the one who could heal her, though his journey could take years.
And that day began the decline of the cloth-merchant’s brother, who went mad asking himself Why?
Why did the Master leave? And why did he leave behind all the gold and jewels, and the specially specified brocade cloak? Why had he who had been showered with so much and could have asked for anything, eaten so much ass’s butter, yet when he stole away, carried with him so little, he’d disgust a beggar.
The heartbroken connoisseur felt only one certainty. The great Effusor had not run back to the Great Timursaçi. Many of the town’s çimçims were made for His Greatness’s çimçim band.
The pot boils
MORNING IN THE RESTAURANT CAR.
Savva concluded to his audience, “She’s such an independent woman.”
Galina shivered dramatically. “She sounds dangerous. Who knows who she’s working for? But first, how is it that you can hear so much they say? Aren’t they foreigners?”
“They mustn’t be.”
Savva felt a little bad about reporting on them, but it didn’t hurt his friendship with Uncle—and that woman often interrupted a lovely time he’d been having, all snug in 3C, door closed, feet up, talking up a storm with the old man, delving the secrets of the universe. Only this morning they’d been discussing the story, Beheaded human body can stay alive and kicking when that woman too beautiful for anyone’s good had entered, and he’d had to scurry out like some capitalist worker.
“Maybe I should take over your carriage,” said Valentin, earning him not so much as a scornful look.
(But it is a curious fact that the Muse and the Omniscient were lax in the languages they spoke, always grabbing the closest to mind. Not only that, but upon boarding the train they had fallen into the very human habit of speaking to each other at human frequencies.)
“Tell me again,” ordered Galina.
“She calls him ‘master’.”
“No! What does he call her?”
“Mistress.”
“That’s the stuff!” She wagged her finger in Valentin’s face.
“Does she say ‘Fetch me my slippers, dog?’ ”
“No.”
Galina sighed and picked a potato out of her bucket.
“I’ve heard her treat him badly,” Savva offered.
“Eh?” Galina’s face brightened. “Go on.”
“I once heard her call him All-Seeing-One.”
“See, Galina?” Valentin laughed. “A man who isn’t respected can’t understand respect.”
“She laughed when she said it,” said Savva.
“Cruelly?” asked Galina.
“Yes.”
“Aha!” cried Galina, tossing her knife in the air.
“But that was in the past,” Valentin said primly. “Wasn’t it, Savva?”
“Yes, but—”
“Tell me again,” ordered Galina.
“She can kick me with those boots right here,” Valentin said, striking his heart.“Did you see them? When she’s got her hands busy lighting a cigarette and the wind—ouch!”
“You wanted boots.”
“Not yours, Galina, and not on my foot.”
But Galina, who didn’t have a skirt to sexily blow up, nor any boots but train-work-unit issue, had turned all of her attention elsewhere. “You were saying, Savva?”
Valentin and Savva asked the same question at the same time: “What does it matter?”
“Everything,” said Galina. “If he calls her ‘mistress’, it means she is an independent woman, a power to be begged to. But ‘my mistress’ . . . ”
“My mistress,” cooed Valentin, “the purvey of every bourgeois gentleman, tucked away in a little flat in Paris.”
Galina snorted like a horse with a fly up its nose. “Exactly,” she sneered, looking to Savva.
“Ahhhh,” said Savva, who was so unworldly that he had to take Valentin’s word for the secret lives of bourgeois gentlemen. But Galina’s snort, and that sneer that narrowed her gaze till it was two shafts of ice, made him need to grab the counter. Every romantic heartstring in him had just gone sproing!
He’d never listened closely enough to these strange passengers to know, but answered Galina with all his heart: “He is bourgeois, who could deny with that blinding waistcoat, but he’s not a purveyor. ‘Mistress’ he calls her. And . . . I think . . . No, I’m willing to bet he loves her.”
“As if you had anything to bet,” said Valentin, in a tone to assure the others that he was above such diversions. “Fascinating.
But what was that about the millions?”
“Millions?”
“You said that she said she’d been with millions of men.”
“Did I?”
Galina turned to Valentin. “Did he?”
“Yes,” Valentin insisted. “The first time Savva told it.”
Galina poked a potato in the eye. “Tell me again.”
“I can’t remember exactly.”
“Remember unexactly,” ordered Galina. “And be quick about it, before you forget again.”
“There can be no other explanation,” pronounced the worldly Valentin. “He must be her pimp.” His eyes glittered.
Savva wrinkled his nose. “Shameful way to make a living.”
“Umm,” Galina nodded. She fed herself another raw potato peeling from the side of her knife.
Savva and Valentin made way for her as she picked up the bucket of potatoes and tumbled some into her pot.
Valentin perched one pert buttock on a table and lifted his chin.
His eyes took on a far-off look—all wasted since Savva’s eyes were on Galina’s back and she was bent to her stove, where the other two heard a match strike that only partly muffled a filthy word. “Millions of men,” drawled Valentin. “At what? Sixty percent?”
Galina twisted the stove’s dial. “You’re both liars.”
“She’s beautiful enough,” said Valentin, and his eyes flashed.
“For billions!”
“At your speed.”
Valentin exited so fast, the door must have huffed dust in his eyes. Did he suffer? The answer must remain forever a mystery, as no one noticed.
“It doesn’t take beauty,” said Savva.
Quickly Galina turned.
She didn’t take he
r left hand from her mouth—whenever it could, it took up position there as if she were posing for a painting titled “Contemplation”.
But she did rush to the fore door, lock it and tape the CLOSED cardboard over its window; and she also secured the aft.
The soup bubbled . . . , and burnt.
Ekmel twists his ankle
AT LAST EKMEL found the place he sought. Stretched out below, covering the valley between the hills, was a thick grey blanket that only partly muffled what sounded like thousands of goat-bells. Market-day tomorrow? The time now was the turn of afternoon’s back, those few magic moments when, if you pick up a handful of dirt and toss it in the air, the sun gilds every worthless particle.
He heaved a heartfelt sigh and pointed. “Your destination.”
“So, scoundrel,” laughed Burhanettin in surprise. Dark thoughts had assailed him lately—that he was being led on an aimless wander. Now he almost felt remorse for beating Ekmel at those times of doubt.
After so many weeks on the road, Burhanettin could no longer wait.
He shoved Ekmel, and the honey-merchant stumbled and cried out.
Burhanettin threw Ekmel on the donkey’s back, but she would have none of that. Burhanettin almost hit her, he was so incensed, but he caught himself as he balled his fist.
“Patience.” An angered heart clouds judgment.
Kirand-luhun—
Take too little, and madness seizes you.
Take too much, and Death swoops you up.
Take just the right amount . . .
“Come, friend,” Burhanettin cooed. He pulled Ekmel up from where the donkey had thrown the extraordinary little man. The confectioner didn’t notice the look Ekmel shot at him, but the honey-merchant’s weight was remarkable.