by M. M. Kaye
It was, she supposed, inevitable that there should be quarrels and feuds and noisy differences of opinion in such a family as her father’s, for although the old Sultan had for many years only one legal wife, his harem overflowed with sarari—concubines of every shade and colour from blue-eyed, pearl-fair Circassians to ebony-skinned Abyssinians—whose children ranked as royal, with the right to call themselves Seyyid or Seyyida, But the enormous swarm of half-brothers and sisters, who together with their mothers, grandmothers, aunts and uncles, cousins, nephews, nieces and legions of attentive slaves, occupied the Zanzibar palaces and overflowed into a dozen royal residences, had on the whole lived happily together under the kindly and benevolent eye of the Lion of Oman, and it was only since his death that things had changed.
It was, thought Salmé sadly, as though all peace and contentment had died and been buried with him. And sometimes she would awake in the night and weep quietly for all that had been lost—for the once great Empire that her father had ruled and which was now divided between three of his sons; for the gay, careless days of her childhood when quarrels had been transient things, as short and fierce as a fire made of dry grasses, and as quickly over; not slow-burning and deadly like the dissensions that were now tearing apart what had once seemed a happy and united family.
Her abstracted gaze rested on her own small person reflected in one of the great gilt-framed and monsoon-tarnished mirrors that were to be found in all her father’s palaces. And seeing the light glint on the jewelled medallion she wore on her forehead, she recalled a long-ago morning; a blue and gold morning at the Motoni Palace, when she had escaped from her nurse and run to see her father without waiting to put on the jewel-studded ornament that should have held her twenty plaits together, or the jingling gold coins that should by right have been attached to the end of each one of them. Her father had scolded her for appearing before him improperly dressed and had sent her back in disgrace to her mother…It was the only time he had ever been angry with her. The only instance of anger that she could remember in all those sunny, happy, wind-swept years.
Beit-el-Motoni had been her father’s favourite palace, for it lay far out of reach of the noise and stench and bustle of the city, and was encircled by palms, green groves of trees and gardens full of flowers. A tall rambling house, several storeys high, whose windows faced the sea and caught the strong cool breath of the Trade Winds. In its colourful, clock-filled rooms the throngs of sarari had lived in friendliness and amity, surrounded by their children, their servants, slaves and eunuchs, and ruled over by the Sultan’s only legal wife; childless, ugly, imperious Azze-binti-Seif, the Seyyida.
While their elders sewed and gossiped, visited each other or spent long hours in the bath-houses, the children learned to read and write, to ride their father’s fiery Arab horses and sail the light kyacks off the coral beaches. And there were always the gardens to play in and innumerable pets to feed and caress—peacocks, kittens, monkeys, cockatoos and a tame antelope.
Life in the Women’s Quarter at Motoni had been gay and carefree and luxurious, and there had never been any need to plan for the morrow. The long sunny days, regulated by the five sessions of prayer as decreed by the Holy Book, had followed a settled routine that created of itself a pleasant feeling of safety and permanence, and it had never occurred to Salmé that it could ever end. Yet it had ended. Grave news had reached Zanzibar of trouble in far-off Oman, and Sultan Saïd, together with several of his sons and a great retinue of courtiers, servants and slaves, had embarked for Muscat—Oman’s capital city and most valuable possession.
That had been the beginning of the end, and Salmé knew that she would never again hear guns without remembering the sound of cannon firing in farewell as the stately ships sailed slowly past Motoni. The women and children had crowded to the shore to wave and weep and pray for the Sultan’s safe return, and after he had gone the great palace had seemed empty and forlorn, as though the heart had gone out of it.
Her brother Bargash had sailed with his father, but the Princes Khalid and Majid were among those sons who had remained behind. Khalid, the eldest of the sons born in Zanzibar, was to act as Regent in his father’s absence, with Majid next in succession. And since by now the Seyyida Azze was dead, the Sultan had given authority over his women and the palaces to Cholé, his favourite and most beautiful daughter.
But the days that followed his departure had not been happy ones, for lovely Cholé, with the best will in the world, had been unable to avoid arousing jealousy and resentment among the less favoured women, and quarrels and disagreements had become regrettably frequent Khalid, for his part, had been over-strict, and once there had almost been a major tragedy when fire broke out in one of the palaces, and the screaming women, attempting to escape, found that the Regent had caused all the gates to be chained and given orders to the soldiers on guard that no one might leave, for fear that the common people might see the faces of the Sultan’s women.
There were few who for one reason or another did not pray for Seyyid Saïd’s safe and speedy return. But the weeks lengthened into months and the months into years and the news that came from Oman was never good news, and there was no word of Saïd’s return. Khalid fell ill and died, and now it was Majid—kind-hearted, easy-going, dissolute and unheroic Majid—who was Regent in his place and heir to the Sultanate.
Saïd had never intended to stay away for so long, for he loved Zanzibar and was at peace there. But the vexed problems of his native land, that had dragged him from his green and gracious Island, held him fast among the barren sands and harsh rocks of Arabia. His old enemies, the Persians, had defeated his eldest son Thuwani’s army on land and scattered the fleet that he himself had brought to blockade them by sea; and the British having refused his plea for help there had been nothing for it but to accept the harsh terms the victors imposed upon him, and broken and humiliated to turn at last towards home.
Perhaps he knew that he might never reach his beloved island, or see Motoni again, with the blue seas breaking white on the coral shore and the palm trees bowing to the Trade Wind. Or perhaps it was because he felt old and tired and disillusioned—and defeated. But to the surprise and dismay of his followers he had taken with him on board sufficient planks of wood to make a coffin, and given strict orders that should anyone die on the voyage the body would not, according to custom, be consigned to the sea, but would be embalmed and taken to Zanzibar, and laid to rest there. The great dhows had sailed out from Muscat and turned their carved and painted prows towards the south, and five weeks later the crew of a fishing boat, casting their nets off the shores of the Seychelles, sighted the royal ships and raced before the wind to Zanzibar to bring the glad news that the Lion of Oman was returning home.
There were times when Salmé could almost feel that wind on her cheek and smell the scent of those flowers—the garlands of welcome that they had woven when the news came that her father’s ships had been sighted. The palaces had been swept and garnished and a feast had been prepared, and the rich smells of cooking had mingled with the swooning scent of flowers and the heavy perfumes of musk and sandalwood and attar-of-roses that drenched the silken garments of the women. How they had laughed and sung as they put on their finest clothes and their loveliest jewels, and hurried at last into the gardens to stand along the shore, straining their eyes to seaward, and waiting—waiting—
Majid had put out with members of his retinue in two small cutters to meet his father, saying that they would be back before sundown and there would be music and rejoicing and a great feast. But the eager day had drawn towards evening and still the watchers had seen no sails, and as darkness fell lanterns glowed along the seashore and lights glittered on every roof and balcony of the town where the population crowded to greet its returning lord; though it was cold now and the wind was shrill. No one in Zanzibar had slept that night, and when the dawn broke they were still waiting and watching, silent and chilled; straining their eyes to seaward as the sky paled and the sun, lifting
at last above the tossing horizon, glinted gold upon the sails of ships…
Recalling that day, Salmé could hear again in imagination the shout of joy that had arisen from a thousand throats, only to change, terrifyingly, to a long, desolate wail of woe as the fleet drew nearer and it was seen that from every prow there hung a mourning flag.
It had not been granted to Saïd to see his green, spice-scented Island again, for in the same hour that the fishermen had sighted his ships off the Seychelles, Seyyid Saïd-bin-Sultan-bin-el-Imam-Ahmed-bin-Saïd, Imam of Oman and Sultan of Zanzibar, had died. His body had been washed and shrouded, and after prayers had been said over it, his son Bargash enclosed it in a coffin made from the planks that had been brought from Muscat, and made haste to leave the ship before Majid could reach it: taking the coffin with him and landing secretly on the Island to bury it by night near the grave of his brother Khalid, the dead Regent.
Bargash, thought Salmé, had always meant to be Sultan of Zanzibar, and when he heard of Khalid’s death it must have seemed to him like the finger of Fate, for he had never had anything but contempt for weak, kindly Majid, and could not have looked upon him as a serious obstacle in the way of his ambition. But Majid had the advantage of seniority, and the chiefs and elders, and the British, supported his claim. So now he ruled in his father’s place and Bargash must be content with being Heir-Apparent. But when had Bargash ever been content with second-best?
Salmé sighed and dropped her small chin on her palm. Her gaze strayed to her beloved half-sister, and rested there; anxious and adoring. Cholé was so beautiful, and she could not remember a time when she had not loved and admired and looked up to her. In the black days of mourning for their father it had been Cholé who had comforted her, and it was Cholé again to whom she had clung when her mother died of the cholera and she had felt orphaned and alone among the sympathetic sarari and their noisy, swarming children.
Cholé had taken her into her own little palace, Beit-el-Tani, and had mothered her and petted her, turning her childish admiration for an older sister into adoration for a goddess who could do no wrong. But of late Salmé had been troubled by twinges of anxiety and doubt, for though her love had not diminished, she could not help wondering if Cholé were not letting her emotions overrule her sense of justice, and where all this plotting and scheming would lead them.
It had begun with a quarrel: a trivial difference of opinion between the new Sultan and his beautiful, self-willed half-sister over the ownership of a suite of rooms at Beit-el-Motoni that Cholé desired, but that Majid had already allotted to Khalid’s widow, and an emerald necklace that he had given to Méjé and which Cholé said had been promised to her by her father and should have been left to her in his will. Méjé had refused to give them up, and when Majid had offered Cholé a fabulous rope of pearls in their place, she had thrown them at him and swept out of Motoni, vowing never to return.
In their father’s day such a quarrel would have blown over in a matter of hours. But in the changed atmosphere that Saïd’s death had created it had not blown over. Instead it had stayed and taken firm root, until at length what had started as resentment had turned, on Chole’s part, to a bitter hatred that overcame all restraint and common sense. Caught in the grip of that hatred she had looked about her for a weapon to use against her once-loved brother; and found it in the person of his Heir-Apparent—dashing, handsome, swaggering Bargash, who had always despised his older brother and already made two unsuccessful attempts to snatch his throne.
Salmé was fond of Majid: as Cholé too had been until Bargash and a foolish squabble had come between them. But now that Cholé hated him, her friends and partisans must hate him too, and she had forced Salmé to choose—herself or Majid: there could be no half measures. Salmé had wavered and wept and attempted to avoid a decision, but Cholé had been implacable and in the end she had won, and Saïd’s once happy and united family split into opposing camps; intriguing, scheming, spying and being spied on.
Their enmity had by now reached such ridiculous proportions that if a member of one faction wore a new jewel, a member of the other must have a similar or a better one, and if a rumour arose that some supporter of Majid had decided to buy a horse or a house or a plot of land, then a supporter of Bargash would forestall or outbid them for spite. Even the nights were no longer peaceful, for it was by night that they held their secret meetings, and by night that spies and mischief-makers carried tales between them; scratching at doors and casements to whisper scraps of conversation overhead or that moment invented, and to hold out greedy hands for a reward of gold coins, thrust uncounted into the waiting palms.
Money was slipping away like water into parched ground, and wisdom with it, for the Arabic love of intrigue had them fast in its grip and it was as though they were the victims of some illness; a fatal malady that inflamed their brains and ate away their reason, and which they could neither cure nor control.
Chole’s little palace, Beit-el-Tani, was separated by no more than the width of a narrow alleyway from the house in which Bargash lived with his sister Méjé and a small brother, Abd-il-Aziz. And almost as short a distance away stood another owned by Salmé‘s two nieces, Schembua and Farschu, who had followed her into Bargash’s camp. But although the proximity of the three houses had assisted the work of intrigue, it had led to other troubles, for Méjé had become jealous of her brother’s attentions to Cholé, and conceiving herself slighted by his neglect, she complained of Cholé to anyone who would listen, and took to warning her brother and his fellow-conspirators that they were rushing on disaster and that no good would come of this dangerous plotting. The result had been more quarrels and still more bitterness. Yet in spite of her jealousy and doubts, Méjé had been too fond of her brother to leave him, and so she had stayed with him; wringing her hands and prophesying disaster, but still loyal and devoted. Unable to change her allegiance even when Bargash and Cholé horrified her by courting the aid of white foreigners.
The small white community in Zanzibar had, theoretically, no power to interfere in any family dispute concerning the succession. But they were not without influence, and Cholé and Bargash, looking about them for any means that might further their cause, decided that they must enlist sympathizers from among them. Hitherto Bargash had always effected to despise the foreigners, while Cholé had refused to meet their women: but now the wife of Monsieur Tissot, the sister of Mr Hubert Platt, and the daughter of Mr Nathaniel Hollis were encouraged to call at Beit-el-Tani.
Cholé hated their visits and endured them only for the sake of the use that might be made of them. She considered the “white women’—whose skins were barely whiter than her own—to be ignorant and uneducated. For although the two older women spoke passable Kiswahili and more than a little Arabic, their limited knowledge of these languages frequently led them to make gross errors of taste which had to be excused on the score of ignorance, but which were none the less unpalatable for that. As for the American girl. Miss Cressida Hollis, her Arabic was still too limited to enable her to sustain a conversation, and her stumbling efforts exasperated Cholé. But though the visits of these foreigners continued to be an ordeal to her, her young half-sister found them fascinating as well as alarming.
Salmé would watch and listen and smile shyly, envying these women their freedom, and Cholé did not know—no one knew or even suspected—that they were not the only foreigners whom she watched and listened to and smiled at: or who watched and listened and smiled at her! For close to Beit-el-Tani and separated from it only by a lane as narrow as that which divided it from Bargash’s home, was a house owned by Europeans, and from her lattice Salmé had often watched the gay dinner-parties given by Herr Ruete, a handsome young German who worked for a firm of Hamburg merchants, and whose unshielded windows faced her own not-always-discreetly screened ones with nothing between them but the meagre width of a cramped Zanzibar street.
She was aware that he could have caught an occasional glimpse of her, for
once the lamps were lit in Beit-el-Tani, the delicate carving of the wooden shutters made it easy enough for a watcher to see into the rooms they were designed to conceal—a fact that the women were apt to forget because they themselves could not see out into the darkness, and on hot nights the curtains were often left undrawn. But it was only when he took to coming to his window to bow and smile when she peeped at him through her lattice during the daylight hours, that Salmé realized that young Wilhelm Ruete must indeed have seen her, and been watching her with as much interest as she had watched him.
Once he had even leaned out from his sill and tossed a rose across the narrow canyon that divided them. It was so short a distance that he had been able to throw it accurately through the fretted wooden screen so that it fell at her feet. And when she had summoned enough courage to pick it up she found that there was a scrap of paper tied about its stem, on which he had written in Arabic a verse from a song that she herself had often sung to the strains of a mandolin, and which he must have listened to her singing…”
Visit those you love, though your abode be distant
And clouds and darkness have arisen between you.
For no obstacle should restrain a friend
From visiting often the friend he loves.
Salmé had put the rose in water, and when it wilted at last she had collected the fallen petals, and carefully drying them, wrapped them in a little square of silk and hidden them in the bottom of her jewel box. They had become a talisman against fear and anger, and sometimes when the fever of hate and intrigue that infected the very air of Chole’s little palace became more than she could bear, she would take them from their hiding place, and holding them pressed to her cheek, think of such things as love and peace and happiness; and of a young man’s openly admiring eyes and smiling face. A kind face. Her father had been kind. And Cholé too, and Majid But she must not let herself remember Majid’s good qualities, because that would be disloyal to Cholé, who refused to concede any virtues to her once-loved brother.