The Ruby In Her Navel

by Barry Unsworth

  Fitzherbert, who is haughty and cold in his usual manner, smiled upon me and congratulated me on the finding of such dancers. And in this courtier's smile of his I read the King's pleasure. The coins that had been thrown were gathered up for us and this turned out to be a great advantage, as more were added in the process and it was a heavy purse that lay in my palm by the end.

  There was more to come. Orders had been sent through to the kitchen. We were escorted to the lodge that forms part of the gatehouse at the entrance to the inner courtyard, and a table was set up on a trestle in a room there, and before long there came servants with trays of food: roast venison in a juice of grapes and garlic, fish cooked in wine and dressed with sage and parsley, the bread they call gastel, made with brown flour and olive oil and honey. These were dishes from the King's own table! And with them came flagons of raisin wine, as they make it in the eastern parts of the island, wine that was clear to the bottom of the cup and delicate in taste and deceiving in this delicacy, as it mounted quickly to the head.

  We feasted together like lords, and afterwards with the wine still passing round, I emptied the purse on the table and shared the coin among them. I made the division in five parts, but it was the women who took charge of the money, making bundles with the scarves they had discarded in the dance.

  "This is only the beginning," I said. "You have pleased the King greatly, you have also pleased his very important guests. He will not delay in showing the marks of his favour."

  I was exhilarated by the wine and by the success of the evening and my rescue from opprobrium, for which rescue I now felt deeply grateful to these people, altogether forgetting, in the exaltation of my spirits, that it was they who had caused the risk of it in the first place. I decided that it would be fitting to make a speech at this point and got to my feet. I said that this had been a very brilliant and unusual occasion with a good many first times in it, the first time there had been such great applause, the first time anyone had been engaged for the succeeding evening, the first time food and drink had been sent, at least in the years I had been purveyor of pleasures at the Diwan of Control. And from the King's own table! Above all, it was the first time that I had stayed to watch and been included in the applause. The idea of including me might have been in all their minds, but it was Nesrin who had come and taken my hand, so it could be said that it was her doing. I looked at her as I spoke. Her hair was tied back with a red ribbon and the upper part of her stomach, below where the bodice ended, was still uncovered – she had tied the scarf, with its knot of money, round her waist. Under that scarf, I thought, there would be the glittering pebble in her abdomen, temporarily eclipsed. Whatever I noted in her looks came always as a surprise to me, even when I had looked at her only shortly before, it was still surprising, even though familiar.

  I am well aware that this is a statement lacking in logic. In this my account I labour to serve truth; logic I leave to the schoolmen. She was smiling at me now and there sprang into my mind the unruly notion of yet another first time, and I stumbled in my discourse, saying I was not sure why they, why she, had wanted me to stay but I was glad that I had done so and would remember this evening for a very long time to come. I could think of nothing further to add to this, but only to thank them, which I did, with a full heart, and I raised my cup and drank to them and wished them luck.

  Then Ozgur got to his feet and he smiled and looked at me fully, which I could not remember him doing before, and began speaking in his hesitant and strangely accented Greek. They had all wanted me to stay but it was certainly Nesrin who had taken my hand and she had decided this herself, why he could not tell, it would have to be asked from her. He was only a man, what did he know? There was laughter at this and Nesrin looked aside, but not as one displeased. In any case, Ozgur said, it was something only she among them could have done. But they all felt glad I had stayed and they thanked me for bringing them here and making their fortunes and they would never forget me.

  Still on his feet, he glanced around him and said some words in a low tone, and the others rose and they all moved from the table and formed a line before me and they bowed all together as I had shown them how to do and they began counting, but aloud and in their own language. They did it exactly, perfectly, the bowing and the counting and the straightening up. And every one of their faces had a smile for me.

  I was greatly moved by this because I knew it for an expression of friendship and respect and because by making a joke of the ceremony in that way they were seeking to show me that I had been in the wrong when I tried to compel them. And I had thought them savages. No doubt it was the fault of the wine but I felt some start of tears and thought of making another speech but decided to give them a song instead. I chose one written by a great hero of mine, the troubadour Bernard of Ventadour, born the son of a castle servant, whose talents won him honour in many courts and made his name famous.

  When grass grows green and leaves show forth And trees are bright with blossom, And lark lifts up his voice, Such joy it gives me, Joy in my lady, and in myself joy…

  As I sang I looked often at Nesrin and I saw by her face she was held by my singing, and this brought more tenderness and joy into my voice.

  There was much applause when I finished and they asked for another song and would not be satisfied till I agreed. This time I chose one I had composed myself, very different in mood.

  The one I most desire

  Is cold towards me.

  She does not summon me now.

  Why is she so changed?

  If she love me not with her body

  At least let her show me kindness…

  The heartbreak of this and the abjectness of it, and my heightened feelings, and Nesrin's attentive face before me, combined to break my voice a little as I sang – it was sometimes a fault in me when I sang before others that I allowed my feelings to come too close to the words I was singing and so the even tenor of the voice was threatened.

  I did not sing more, though they wanted me to and loudly asked it. I could tell from their words and faces that my singing had moved them, the more so perhaps as they had not known of this talent of mine and so had been taken by surprise.

  "This night stays in our memory for ever," Temel said, and he raised his cup to me and I touched it with mine and we drank together. I saw how they all enjoyed the wine, though the women drank less. I made some joking remark about the Prophet's forbidding of it, and they said they were not Moslems but Yazidis. This was a religion quite new to me and I was about to enquire into the tenets of its faith when it occurred to me that it was a question I might put to Nesrin, if ever I got the opportunity to engage her in talk when no one else was by.

  The opportunity came sooner than expected. It was growing late, the gathering had been a happy one for all of us, and when we began to bid one another good night it was in friendly and affectionate fashion, both the men and the women reaching to take my hand and the men also patting me on the shoulder.

  I do not know exactly how it came about, this was a night of blessings.

  I waited for the others to pass first, Nesrin hung back a little, and so it happened that we two found ourselves alone together at the door and standing rather close. The time was very short if I wanted to keep her there – a matter of moments. I wished only to delay her, to delay the parting a little, I had no other thought. The Yazidis would not serve as a topic, this proximity had come by chance, it was not a moment for discussing religion. My slow-wittedness makes the blood rise to my face now, as I remember it and confess it. In my dumbness I nearly lost her, nearly let her leave in silence and rejoin the others, who I thought perhaps might be waiting outside. She herself said nothing. She looked at me briefly then looked away. After a moment she made a movement towards the door…

  "How did you become such a marvellous dancer?"

  She smiled a little and I had the feeling that she was relieved that I had found some words. "My mother… she also was a dancer. She teach me
when I am a child, tall like this." She raised her hand to show me the height from the floor. "I start to dance when I start to walk."

  "Your dancing is beautiful." Everything about you is beautiful, I wanted to say, your eyes, your throat, your hair. But I did not find the courage. It was the first time she and I had ever been alone together. I had often wished for this and imagined how it might be. But in that wishing I had always been ready of speech, at my ease, masterful – even lordly. I had not been this present Thurstan, tongue-tied, woefully lacking in address, gazing at a dancing girl with a nude stomach as if she were a princess in a courtly fable.

  She waited a moment longer then passed through the door out on to the cobbled space before the gatehouse. There were guards at the gate and two lamplighters with their ladders against the inner wall, but there was no sign at all of the other Anatolians. It was a warm night and the moon was nearly at the full. In the gentler light beyond the range of the lanterns at the gate we paused again. Even more strongly than before I wanted to keep her with me.

  "There was moonlight when first I saw you," I said. "Moonlight and firelight together. Why did you take my hand tonight? Why did you want me to stay?"

  I saw her shake her head a little as if perplexed. "You do not know? It cannot be one of the men because men do not take the hand that way. It cannot be Yildiz or Havva because they have their men with them, it is not a proper thing for them to take your hand. And so it is left to me because I do not… because there is no one…"

  I was obscurely disappointed by this explanation. Was it no more than that? I began to move in the direction of the stables where I had left my horse. "You do not tell me all the truth," I said. "You speak as if all of you had decided on it and you were the one chosen. But that is not so. I was there, I was watching. The others were already dancing and playing. You decided without them to come and take my hand. You decided alone."

  She stopped at this and turned to me and tossed her head at me like an impatient pony. "I tell you what is true," she said. "I say what is in my mind. Thurstan Bey, you are important man and pass your days in a palace but there is much you not understand. I do not say who decided, I say why the others could not do it." There seemed to me a lack of logic in this, but her eyes had a light of battle in them and I did not feel equal to drawing her attention to this lack. And there was something else now occupying my mind. Absorbed as I had been in the talk between us, I realised only now that Nesrin was going the wrong way: instead of turning to rejoin her companions she had turned with me towards the stables. Did she know this? It was probably a mistake, she did not know the precincts of the palace very well, she might believe I was accompanying her when in fact she was accompanying me. Immediately I was beset with questions – always a weakness with me. What would a man of honour do? What would a man do who aspired to knighthood? What would Alicia expect of her splendid Thurstan? She would expect him to assume it was a mistake and point the mistake out with utmost promptitude. In that case Nesrin and I would part there and then, a thought I found difficult to endure. Or perhaps I could offer to escort her back to her sleeping quarters. But if it was not a mistake, what then? Nesrin would be wounded. Was it an ideal of knighthood to wound the weak and frail?

  It was not easy to think of Nesrin as weak and frail, but I tried hard to do so, and this is an example of how we force our thoughts to suit our wishes. In short, I said not one word. And with every step my hope mounted.

  "I tell the truth to you," she said, and stopped again. "Yes, I decide alone. I choose you to stay, because I am free to choose. The other ones that watch me, I do not choose them. If they watch me or not, I do not care. I do not dance for them. But you, I care that you watch me. What is so difficult in that?"

  We had started walking again and were drawing near to the stables. My heart was beating in my ears and my chest felt constricted. "I care that you listen to my singing," I said. "I was singing for you, that is the truth." We were close to the stable door now. The mare had heard my voice and step and she whinnied softly.

  "That is your horse? She knows you."

  "She is waiting to go home. I do not live in the palace, I live in the town."

  "I know this. Stefanos told me."

  "Did he so? I wanted to ask you… I did not know if you came here with me… if you had mistaken the way."

  "Mistake the way?" Her eyes had widened with surprise. "How can I mistake the way? How strange man you are. All this time, while we walk together, you ask yourself does she mistake the way? One would only go with you if she mistake the way?"

  "But you did not say anything."

  "What should I say? I go with you, where is need to say anything? I wait for you to say if you do not want me."

  "Not want you?" I said. "Not want you?"

  For a moment she looked solemnly at me, then she gave me a smile that threatened to take away what poor breath I had left. "I do not mistake the way, I know the way," she said, and her voice was softer than I could have thought possible.

  As we entered the stable the mare shifted but there was no other sound.

  Light from the lamp that hung outside the door fell across some straw bales piled against the far wall. There was the sharp smell of the mare, the smell of beaten earth and pissy straw. Smells of every day, deeply familiar, transformed into strangeness by the clasp of our hands together, the first kisses. I might have been a man at the dawn of creation, sniffing at a new world.

  There was a loft above the stable where they kept feed for the horses. A wooden stairway went up to it. There were sacks of grain here and some loose hay. I made a bed with my riding cloak and surcoat and all the rest of my clothes, careless now of the finery I had donned with such care for this court occasion. My hands were impatient and clumsy and I made some wreckage of buttons and stitches as I tore and tugged at myself in the twilight of the loft – the lamplight did not reach here but there was a barred window in the wall and the moonlight came through it.

  "I must not hurt my new dress," I heard her saying. She was standing between me and the window and the moonlight fell on her as she undressed. I heard the rustle of her clothes, saw the movements of her arms as she raised the bodice over her head, saw the skirt fall to her knees, saw her step out and away from it. And all this was done with a deliberate grace, as if she was still dancing for me.

  The moonlight lay on her hair and shoulders and flanks as she came towards me. Against these parts touched by the light, her eyes and the nipples of her breasts and the little bush of Venus made zones of darkness. Light was caught in the glass pebble at her abdomen, focus of my dreams, and in the thin chain that held it there, slung round the light bones of her hips. I was to think – not then, I was too stirred for thought, but later – that in these last moments before we were joined, as she showed herself to me, she was offering the beauty and promise of her body, an image on which love could rest, could guard itself through periods of separation in a way that memories of ecstasy, of bodies clutched together, cannot be guarded.

  What she and I did I could not exactly say, in the sense of one thing following upon another. And since that night I have known for self-deceivers all those who claim a love was blissful and say first we did this, then we did that, as if there were one single track to the reaching of joy. It was no alleyway Nesrin and I entered together but a wondrous labyrinth, from the moment she came to me and with her nearness shielded the moonlight from me and brought me the feeling of darkness as our bodies touched, as if a band had been laid over my eyes. She came down to me and I remember – then or soon afterwards or later – my sight restored to see her face above me, lit once more by the moon, and her face had a look of sorrowing and she made a long murmuring sound. Then the moonlight was streaked with fire and I closed my eyes against the glare. I must have cried out because the mare was startled and snorted – I heard the sounds she made but not my own. I kept my eyes closed, as if the fiery light and the throes of my body could not be endured together, but I still
saw the glimmers of red against the lids. They were like sunstreaks: it was like closing one's eyes against some ravishment of the sun. I swear it: there was cool and burn, moon and fire together, this first time we met with our bodies, as there had been on the night when we met with our eyes only.

  XVIII

  She was not there when I woke in the morning. On the floor, for only trace of her, was the red ribbon she had used to tie back her hair. The evening of that day they danced again and according to Stefanos, whom I asked to go in my place, they enjoyed a success no less resounding. He had not been asked into the hall, he said; Stephen Fitzherbert, with his jackal's nose for the whiff of success, had taken the Anatolians into his custody and care, and it was he who had presented them.

  I was glad to hear of this second triumph, but glad also that I had not been there to assist at it. I could not feel regret for what had passed between Nesrin and me; I could not cease to dwell on it and marvel at it in my mind. But the morning light had brought guilt with it, memories of the vows I had made to Alicia and our exchange of rings at the lakeside.

  She was so delicate and fine, a lady born, of noble family, all the best of my past was in her keeping, and all my hopes of betterment in the future. And in spite of this, within days of our promises, I had been overmastered by passion for a vagrant dancer of no birth or breeding whatever and no knowledge of what it means to aspire to knighthood.

  Made gloomy by these thoughts, I fell to thinking how much simpler our life on earth would be, how much more tranquil and dignified, if we could return to the time before the Fall. It is clear that Adam was meant to pour his seed into Eve's womb; we know it from God's commandment in Genesis to go forth and multiply. But at that time there was no disturbance of lust. Saint Augustine explains this to us in his 'De Civitate Dei' – I think it is to be found there. He says that in the state of innocence those parts were moved by the same act of will by which we move our other parts, without the soul being snared by hot desire. Like raising an arm or winking an eye. I tried to imagine this blessed state, tried to imagine Adam's member as being moved in the same way as his fingers or his toes, but I could not. I believed it but I could not imagine it. Many men find their faith strengthened by what is beyond their imagining, but I am so constituted that the reverse is true of me – such failure makes the belief grow less. I began to wonder how Saint Augustine could have formed so definite an idea about these things, since he too had come after the Fall and his parts were moved in the same way as those of all of us – and not infrequently, if we can judge from the 'Confessions'.