An Evil Eye

57

At night distant thunder rolled over the city, and lightning flickered behind the mountains of Asia; but the weather did not break. Beyond the city walls the crops had to be watered by hand, the more tender leaves protected by rattan screens. Tempers frayed in the bazaar.

At the sultan’s palace, Ibou, the chief black eunuch, laid his hand on the balustrade and squinted up the staircase. Two dozen shallow stone steps; a landing; another twenty steps. He must have climbed them twenty times a day, up and down, up and down, for these past three years; his hand fluttered to his heart. It was no doubt they that induced the strain.

These steps, and the girls, of course. They were young and impudent.

He began to climb: Besiktas seemed all stairs. At the old palace at Topkapi, one pavilion opened into the next, a stone encampment tumbling magnificently over acres of Seraglio Point. Now, in this great box of a palace at Besiktas, people were forever tramping up and down, peering out at windows, running into each other at awkward moments, and arguing over precedence. How could you tell which room was the greater, which apartment the more covetable? The girls talked of views these days, peeping and gazing out quite shamelessly, as if a little patch of sky was not enough!

“Ibou! I’ve been looking for you.”

The eunuch bowed. “I am at your service, Talfa hanum efendi.”

Talfa sniffed. “Why have you not listened to what I have told you? The dormitories are not clean. Yesterday I found Amalya and Perin wearing linen that would have disgraced a street gypsy. I go into their room and find clothing all over the floor. They tread upon it with their slippers.”

“It is a disgrace, hanum. I have made them pick everything up. They are much better today.”

“Are they in the laundry, then?”

Ibou’s eyes flickered. “Today, not. They say they are tired, Talfa hanum.’

“Tired, aga? How should they be tired, when they do so little?” She looked at him sharply. “You know how it is said, that a fish stinks from the head.”

Ibou’s eyes drooped. “I understand, hanum.” He gestured weakly to the stairs, the corridors. Of course he felt tired. In Topkapi, the harem apartments had been swept and scrubbed by the girls themselves. They shook out rugs in the courtyards; they polished the tiled floors until they glittered; they took brooms and swept out the cobwebs from the corners. When they opened a door they stepped out into the open air, and kept themselves as clean as cats.

At Besiktas the girls could barely go outside, unchaperoned; they could not open the windows, for fear of being seen. They swept the dirt into the corridors, where it blew back in again; and half the carpets were nailed down. It all looked very grand from the outside, no doubt, but Ibou knew better. Just the other day, he had reprimanded a girl for wearing a shift so grubby that she looked like a beggar-and she had the cheek to answer him back!

Sometimes he yearned for the old days in the library, where everything was still and in its place. Books were cleaner than women.

“I have been to the laundry, also,” Talfa continued. “Two of the other girls are washing in there. My girls.”

The chief black eunuch bit his lip. Talfa was royal by blood; she could take care of herself. It was these other girls who fell into slovenly ways. It all came of living in this box.

“Explain to these girls, Ibou aga, that you will inspect their rooms yourself every week from now on. They are not gozde. They are not favored by the sultan’s attention-nor ever will be, unless they learn to take their responsibilities seriously.” She bent forward. “Amalya is the worst. Let us see how she feels about slopping out for a month. Tell her this.”

“Yes, hanum. She will be very unhappy.”

“That is the point, Ibou. We cannot have these girls making the rules.”

“No, hanum. I shall tell her that this is your decision.”

She eyed the eunuch narrowly. “Your decision, aga. I may advise-but the girls are your responsibility. And Bezmialem’s, of course,” she added. “But the young valide seems to have a headache. Poor thing.”

The lady Talfa waddled off along the corridor.

Ibou put a hand to the lattice and peered out. He could see ships on the Bosphorus, and he sighed. Lately he had felt so tired. Wondering about the girls. Sleepless nights. Climbing these stairs.

He knew that he was afraid of Amalya. Of what she might do to him, in revenge.

He needed advice. But Ibou, the Kislar aga, did not know who to ask. He did not know who he could really trust.