Sofia
hungry that I drank it right off without considering its contents. Only later, with the cramps, the diarrhea, and the terrible unquenchable thirst, did I realize it must have been a special brew. To purge me.”“Aloe? Autumn crocus? Mandrake? Mustard?”
“All of those, any of those, more besides. Yes, I remember the smell of mustard and garlic, but that may have been to cover the other things and make me think the mess was edible. Anyway, while I was in agonies in the privy, I overheard Salah ad-Din and another man with a high, whiny voice discussing my case. I’d had to stand before them—in my sickness—like Michelangelo’s David.’”
“I don’t know what that is,” Esmikhan reminded me.
I had seen the famous Florentine statue in small plaster copies, but of course my lady had not. I began to try to explain it to her, but the notion of nakedness was too offensive to her sensibilities to even imagine trying to capture it in art.
“Well, I certainly didn’t feel as beautiful, as nonchalant as young David,” was the best assurance I finally found for her.
“‘What beautiful lines! What physique!’ said Salah ad-Din, just as if I had been a masterpiece. Heedless of what I felt, he poked and prodded with his bony fingers.” I closed my eyes at the memory. “He poked until I rose in spite of myself. The two of them had a laugh at this and commented how that would be the last time I enjoyed that sensation. This was Allah’s will for me. I don’t think they realized I spoke Turkish this well. I didn’t realize it myself, until I became a subject and it seemed a matter of life and death.
“‘We must drag and crush him so he can still function,’ Salah ad-Din said. Drag and crush. Those were words a client might use when he complained of what had happened to his cargo in transit.
“Salah ad-Din was not complaining. ‘Such reflexes! There’s many a high-born lady will pay top price for a certified eunuch with such looks, such youth, if he can satisfy her without the ill effects.’
“‘But look,’ said the whiner. ‘He’s already got a bit of fuzz. He’s too old. To drag and crush when they are this old is too dangerous.’
“‘You are a skilled artist, my friend.’
“‘There is art and there is foolishness. To drag and crush will kill him.’
“‘Try it.’
“‘I daren’t.’
“‘He’s a strong, sturdy lad.’
“‘I can see that.’
“‘There’s nothing builds them more rugged than a sailor’s life.’
“‘I appreciate that.’
“‘He’ll survive— inshallah.’
“‘Inshallah, perhaps, but I can’t guarantee it. Maybe one chance in ten.’
“‘It’s a risk I’m willing to take.’
“‘Not I.’
“‘You’ll have your price, by my life, whether he lives or dies.’
“‘What guarantee have I of that?’
“‘My word.’
“‘No, old man. I’ve dealt with Salah ad-Din the Cutter before.’
“‘I’ll give it to you up front.’
“‘Still, the death on my hands—’
“‘What are you squeamish for? You who spent twenty years in the cutting huts of Upper Egypt? You who’d do twenty or thirty little black lads a day? With the heat and the flies to exacerbate things?’
‘I’m not so young anymore.’
“‘Can’t keep down your old man’s gruel?’
“‘I’ve got the hereafter to think about.’
“‘Well, suppose we drag and crush him first and, after a day or two, if it doesn’t look good, we quickly stop the spread of infection with the knives.’
“‘Do it to him twice in other words?’
“‘Only if it’s necessary. To save his life.’
“‘And you’ll pay me up front?’
“‘I’ll give you the purse right now.’
I told Esmikhan how Salah ad-Din went then and made his wife give up the coins she was saving for a new sash. The only girdle she had to her name strained so thin in places you could see the color of her dress through the threads.
“They spoke idly after that, of market gossip. The next soul I saw was Salah ad-Din’s wife, she with the wide girth and thinning sash. She brought me a cup of wine. But because it had a strange smell and because I could tell she hadn’t forgiven me the loss of her coins yet, I decided to dump it out the window. I was asleep when they came for me—sheer boredom, I guess. But I was wide awake and struggling by the time they tried to strap me, naked and splayed, to the table in a windowless hut. The leather straps were black and stiff with blood.
“The second time I broke free of his grasp and managed to kick him, if not in the groin, at least close enough to count, Old Whiny said, ‘Salah, you fool. This fellow’s not drugged.’
“‘Of course he is. He’s strong and resilient, that’s all.’
“Another good kick.
“‘Oooh—! He’s not drugged.’
“‘I had my wife—’
“‘Maybe she drank it herself. Instead of getting her sash. Quick, have her brew more or he’ll break your corroded old straps while we work on him.’
“‘I told you he was strong. Mashallah, what a fighter!’ Salah ad-Din said, full of pride, as he hurried off to comply.
“‘Pfah! When I was in Egypt, we got new straps every six weeks or we didn’t work. The desert dryness and all.’ Old Whiny whined this to himself as consolation, for I managed to keep him at bay with only my legs free.
“But when Salah ad-Din returned, the two of them together got at least some of the opium wine past my teeth. They hadn’t the patience, however, to let it take full effect. As soon as they managed to get my stupefying legs bound, I suffered the pulling, yanking, then crushing of my very nature between two ribbed stones while yet half awake.
“Then, thankfully, oblivion set in.”
Next I told Esmikhan how, when at length I came to, I heard Old Whiny say, “‘Doesn’t look good. Not good at all.’”
“And Salah ad-Din: “Very well, old man. You win. Take it all off and see if you can save his blaspheming Christian hide.’
“This time when they returned me to the table, they lowered two of the legs on hinges so that my reeling