The Panther and The Pearl

by Doreen Owens Malek

  “Never mind. Come to me this evening and I will tell you all about it.” He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it lingeringly. “My finance minister will be waiting for me by now, so I must go. I will see you tonight.”

  He left, and the eunuchs escorted Sarah back to the harem, where Memtaz was in a lather. She was going through Sarah’s garments, pulling open drawers and trunks.

  “Memtaz, what is going on?” Sarah said from the doorway of her suite.

  Memtaz whirled to face her and bowed. Sarah waited for her to straighten up, resigned to the fact that she would never break the Circassian woman of the habit.

  “I must make you ready for a special evening, mistress,” she said breathlessly. “I was looking for the blue and silver caftan that looks so well on you.”

  “What special evening?”

  “I received a message that you are to present yourself in the mabeyn, dressed for a state occasion.”

  “A state occasion?” Sarah said. What was this? Why hadn’t Kalid said anything about it?

  “Yes, mistress.”

  “Memtaz, I’ll wear the caftan but just with a shift. No earrings, no girdle, no cap. I’m tired of wearing twenty pounds of clothes every time I get dressed.”

  Memtaz looked distressed.

  “All right, we’ll compromise,” Sarah said, relenting. The little maid felt she was not doing her job if Sarah didn’t leave the harem beribboned like a birthday present. “You dress me, and then I’ll take five items off,” Sarah added.

  “Five?” Memtaz said.

  “Yes.”

  Memtaz nodded happily.

  By the time Sarah had the evening meal and had bathed and dressed it was time for her to visit Kalid. As per agreement, she had disposed of the jewelry and the ornate girdle Memtaz had selected, but she was still gaudy enough to satisfy the maid that she was satisfactorily attired. She left the harem wondering what Kalid had planned for the night, but he gave no sign as he admitted her to his suite and dismissed the servants.

  Sarah watched him turn down the oil lamps and then face her. He was wearing western clothes, as he almost always did now when he was with her, resulting in a curious case of turnabout: she was dressed like an Eastern concubine and he like a London playboy in tweed trousers and an ivory lisle shirt. He gestured for her to sit down and then presented her with a scrolled box sealed at the clasp with yellow wax.

  “What is this?” she asked.

  He sat at her feet and then reclined on one elbow. “Open it,” he said.

  Sarah obeyed, thinking that he was always giving her presents. It was difficult not to get used to it.

  The box contained a pair of ornate velvet slippers, trimmed with gold thread and studded with precious gems. She picked up one shoe and studied it, the crystals sparkling in the lamplight.

  “They’re very beautiful. Are they for me?”

  “Of course. I had them made. They were measured from your kid boots.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Do you understand the significance of this gift?”

  “Uh, no.”

  “That’s what I thought. I’m asking you to marry me.”

  Sarah stared at him, speechless. “By giving me a pair of shoes?” she finally said stupidly.

  He smiled. “It is the custom.”

  “Why?”

  “It signifies that I will be supplying all of your necessaries for the rest of your life. The custom demands slippers for all the members of your household. I had a pair made for Memtaz too.”

  Sarah sat holding the shoes, looking down at him.

  “What is your answer?” he said.

  Sarah was silent.

  “You are still free to go back to America, if that is your choice,” he said quietly. “I am asking you to stay here in Bursa with me and be my wife.”

  Sarah bent to touch his face, and he pulled her down into his arms.

  “Can you leave me?” he asked, cradling her tenderly against his shoulder. “Can you, kourista?”

  “No.”

  “Then why do you hesitate?”

  “It’s just such a total commitment, abandoning a former life for a completely different new one. I will never see my home again, will I?”

  “Perhaps you will. We can take trips.”

  “That’s not all, Kalid.”

  “What else?”

  “I don’t want to be the pashana.”

  “I’m afraid there’s no choice about that.”

  “But all these people bowing and scraping before me, it makes me nervous. It was bad enough as the ikbal, but as your wife...”

  “I could tell them all to spit on you if it makes you feel any better,” he said dryly.

  “I don’t think that’s very funny.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Can’t we just go on as we were?” Sarah asked. “I’ve been so happy, haven’t you?”

  “Do you really want to spend your time here as a concubine?” he demanded.

  “No, I suppose not.”

  “Do you want to see me take another wife? I will have to eventually, for the safety of the title.”

  “I could never stand to see you marry anyone else,” she said quietly.

  “Then you have no choice. I want you to be my wife and have my children. I want you to be the mother of the heir,” he said.

  The thought of having Kalid’s children gave her butterflies in her stomach. What would they look like? Would they have his slender body, dark eyes and lustrous black hair? Would they be as beautiful as their father?

  “What are you thinking?” he said.

  “About the future.”

  “I want you to share it with me,” he said.

  “I never thought, when I met you, that we would be having this conversation,” she said.

  “I did.”

  “You knew you wanted to marry me the moment you saw me?” she asked.

  “I knew you would be important in my life. More than that it was impossible to say.”

  “I guess I felt the same, but I didn’t want to admit it,” she said softly.

  “Then your answer is yes?” he asked, taking her hand and holding it to his cheek.

  “Yes, Kalid. I’ll marry you.”

  He kissed her forehead lightly. “I’ll make the arrangements right away,” he said.

  “What arrangements?”

  He smiled. “I am still the pasha of this district, and I must have a formal wedding so that my heir will be recognized.”

  “What does a formal wedding involve?”

  “Well, let me think. You will arrive at Orchid Palace, heavily veiled and dressed in a red silk wedding gown. Then you will come through a silk tunnel stretching from your carriage to the door. Kosem will lead you to the bridal throne set up on a dais. Once I lift the veil and see you I will throw coins at the spectators to signify my acceptance of you as my bride.”

  “Why do you have to accept me?”

  “In marriages among commoners the husband often does not see the wife until the wedding day.”

  “Oh, no, that’s awful. You mean he can reject her if he doesn’t like the way she looks?”

  “Yes.”

  “But the wife has no such option.”

  “No.”

  “Lovely custom. What else?”

  “Then there is a feast and after it you are delivered to my room by your male relatives. Since you have none here your escort will be a selection of my halberdiers.”

  “And then?”

  “Then you enter my bed from the foot to signify that I am your master,” he said, grinning.

  “We’ll skip that part. Anything else?”

  “In the morning we display the bloody sheet from my balcony,” he said casually.

  Sarah stared at him. “We might have a little trouble with that one,” she finally said.

  He laughed. “You were a virgin bride, kourista. We just didn’t wait for the formal ceremony, and that, to me, is a matter of no consequence.�
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  “Your subjects might not see it that way.”

  “They won’t know. No man touched you before I did, and that is what counts.”

  “So what do we do about the sheet?”

  “We’ll kill a rooster and then smear the animal’s blood on the bed linen.”

  Sarah was speechless, appalled. “I hope that’s a joke,” she eventually managed to whisper.

  “No. It’s often done. Virgins are not as plentiful as they once were.”

  Sarah closed her eyes. “Kalid, are you making all of this up?” she asked, almost hopefully.

  “I am not. In the rural areas if the bloody sheet is not displayed the husband can repudiate the wife.”

  “What? Again?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s so...”

  “Barbaric?” he said, watching her face.

  “I know you don’t like that word.”

  “But that’s part of my attraction for you, isn’t it?”

  Sarah glanced at him but didn’t reply.

  “I’m not exactly what you might encounter back home at a tea dance given by the Daughters of the American Renovation.”

  “Revolution,” she corrected him.

  “Whatever. You know what I mean.”

  Sarah looked away from him. She did. “How do you know about tea dances?” she said.

  “I attended a few of them at Oxford,” he replied, sighing exaggeratedly.

  “I gather you found them boring.”

  “I found them very…Western. Lots of chit-chat and not much action.”

  “You must have caused quite a sensation among the finger sandwiches and canapés.”

  “I was a curiosity. I think some of the young ladies expected me to arrive with a knife clasped in my teeth.”

  “Or they were hoping,” Sarah said under her breath.

  “What?”

  “It doesn’t matter. When will the ceremony take place?”

  “In three days.”

  “Three days! That doesn’t give me much time.”

  “To do what?”

  “Well, I have to get ready.”

  “And what exactly would that involve, kourista?” he asked, amused.

  Sarah considered it. There wasn’t a single human being for her to invite, she had no personal effects other than those at the palace, and everything she needed was there.

  “Thinking about it?” she offered lamely.

  “I understand. Brides to be always have their dreams. What are yours?”

  “To be with you forever,” she said promptly.

  “That I can guarantee.”

  “To have children as handsome and brave and smart as their father,” she added.

  He didn’t say anything, merely took her chin in his hand and ran his thumb lightly over her lips, his dark eyes lambent in the softly lit room.

  “And to be your best friend,” she added.

  “You are my best friend,” he said, his voice catching on the second word. He eased her down onto the carpet and began to undo the outfit Memtaz had so carefully assembled.

  “Do you think you will ever tire of me, want to send me back to Boston?” she asked, running her fingers through his hair.

  “You’ll be too old to travel by then,” he replied, and bent his head to kiss her.

  “Oh, mistress, there never was such a lovely bride,” Memtaz said, clasping her hands together and staring at Sarah’s reflection in the pier glass.

  Sarah looked too, unable to believe that the woman in the mirror was herself. She was dressed in a long sleeved, high necked silk gown with frog closures of golden thread, embroidered all over with golden flowers and cinched with a gold mesh belt. A diamond tiara held a short veil of silk gauze trimmed with gold. Fastened to it was the abayah, or long veil, and her earbobs were golden circlets with huge, dangling pearls. Over all she would wear a red velvet feradge when she traveled by coach to enter the palace by the Carriage House gate. It lay on her sleeping couch, a reminder that in an hour she would be the new Pashana of Bursa.

  “I’m so glad you’ll be able to attend the ceremony,” Sarah said to Memtaz.

  The servant nodded happily. “The pasha said all may come. And Dr. Shakoz said the khislar is well enough to be up for a few hours as well.”

  “Good.” It wouldn’t seem like an Orchid Palace event without Achmed.

  “Is there anything else you need?” Memtaz asked.

  “No. Please tell Kosem that I’m ready.”

  Memtaz went to get the valide pashana, who would accompany Sarah to the coach, and then to the throne room, where Kalid was already waiting.

  The pasha paced back and forth in front of his throne, oblivious to the crowd of his subjects who waited for the ceremony to begin. He ignored the halberdiers and janissaries who stood in attendance and the khislar who occupied a chair by the door, permitted to sit in the presence of the pasha because of his injury. Kalid looked repeatedly at only one spot: the door through which Sarah would enter the throne room to become his wife.

  It seemed an eternity before she finally appeared, standing tall and regal behind Kosem, who was also outfitted in her finest, looking like a tiny doll. He watched as the women walked toward him and Sarah took her place at his side. He smiled tenderly and lifted the abayah, looking down into her face.

  At the same time Turhan Aga stepped out of the crowd, banging his halberd on the floor.

  Kalid whirled on him furiously, growling something in guttural Turkish.

  Turhan said something in ancient, ceremonial language that Sarah couldn’t understand, but there was a murmur in the crowd, and Kalid left Sarah’s side abruptly, moving rapidly through the assembled people to the door.

  “What is it?” Sarah said to Kosem, whose expression was wooden. “What’s wrong?”

  “Someone objects to the marriage,” Kosem said evenly. “It is our custom that the ceremony should not take place until the grievance is aired, even if the groom is our pasha.”

  Kosem did not seem surprised by the turn of events, and Sarah said to her, “Do you know something about this?”

  Kosem made no reply, and then Sarah was stunned to see her cousin James appear at the entrance to the throne room. As she watched, aghast, Kalid made a gesture and two halberdiers seized her cousin and held him fast.

  “Don’t worry, Sarah,” James yelled over the excited babble of the wedding guests. “You don’t have to marry this man!”

  “Take him to the dungeon!” Kalid called.The halberdiers began to drag James away.

  “You can’t stop me!” James shouted. “The American Embassy knows I’m here! I have come to take Sarah home.”

  Chapter 13

  Sarah ran up to Kalid and seized his arm. “If you have him arrested him I’ll never speak to you again,” she said tightly. “I want to hear what he has to say.”

  Kalid jerked his arm away from her, but gestured for the guards to release James. They did so, and James shook himself, then straightened his coat and tie, his eyes on his Sarah.

  “Clear the room of the guests,” Kalid said harshly to the janissaries. “There will be no wedding today.”

  They all stood awkwardly as the people filed out, and then Sarah said, in as normal a tone as she could manage, “Just what exactly is going on here?”

  “I’ve been trying to get in to see you since you disappeared from the Sultan’s harem, Sarah,” James said in a rush. “I finally sent a letter to the pasha here, and he replied that he would be busy for a month and unable to grant me an audience.”

  Sarah looked at Kalid in astonishment, but he avoided her gaze, his expression grim.

  “Then I finally tried to bribe my way inside the palace, and when the valide pashana heard about it she sent for me.”

  Kalid turned to glare at his grandmother, who met his gaze defiantly.

  “She told me that you had been kidnapped by the bedouins, and that the pasha had gone after you. She promised that if you came back here she would
get word to me.”

  A vein in Kalid’s temple was throbbing as he looked at the old lady. Sarah moved to Kosem’s side and took her hand, staring malevolently at Kalid.

  He looked away.

  “A few days ago I got a note from the valide pashana saying that you were in Bursa, and well, and planning to marry the pasha today,” James went on. “I left Constantinople and got here as soon as I could. This morning I sent a message to the pasha saying that I wanted to see him immediately. He refused an audience and barred me from the palace.”

  Sarah’s eyes filled with tears of rage. She couldn’t even look at Kalid.

  “How did you get in?” she whispered to James.

  “The Captain of the Halberdiers is honor bound to obey the custom of admitting anyone who objects to a wedding to attend the ceremony. That’s why I’m here.”

  Sarah looked at Turhan Aga, who was staring morosely at the floor. Not even for the pasha would he shirk his duty. He truly was an honest man.

  “James, I will be with you in a few minutes,” Sarah said calmly. “Kosem, would you see that my cousin is made comfortable while he waits for me? I would like to speak to Kalid alone.”

  Kosem looked at Kalid, who said flatly to the khislar, “Achmed, make sure that the ikbal’s wishes are fulfilled. Kosem will entertain our guest. The rest of you may go.”

  When they were alone Sarah said to Kalid, “How could you do such a thing? How could you?”

  He looked back at her stonily, saying nothing.

  “You allowed me to think that my family didn’t care about me! You allowed me to think that I had been abandoned to whatever fate befell me here. You lied to me!”

  “I didn’t lie. I merely didn’t tell you about your cousin’s inquiries,” he finally said.

  “It’s the same thing!” She felt the fullness of more tears in her throat and fought them back. “When you told me I didn’t have to sleep with you in payment for my rescue from the bedouins, I thought you had changed. When you said I was still free to go home to Boston when we got back here, that it was my choice to stay with you, again I thought you had changed. That’s why I decided to marry you. I assumed you had learned to respect the feelings, and the free will, of someone other than yourself. Now I find out that all along you knew James was trying to contact me and you never even told me. You haven’t changed, Kalid, you were merely saying what you knew I wanted to hear in order to pacify me.”