Harem (21 page)

The carumasali glided silently through the water. Abbas had told him in the letter to look for his riding lights in the darkness and hope for the best. There would be no other boats trying to navigate Seraglio Point at that time of night.

The mist that clung to the water had made it both easier and harder; harder to for him to see them, but easier because they could not see him. They did not even dare breathe, every small sound carried over the flat water as if they were in a church.

Only the creak of timber and lines.

Then he saw it, a light blinking close by, and the helmsman pulled the tiller hard over. They could not come too close, not until they knew she was in the water.

He didn't care about the woman, for Gods sake, he hardly knew her. But he knew what this meant to Abbas. It was his hope of redemption. And in some strange way it was his hope also.

They all heard the splash, and for a moment he saw the
caïque
silhouetted against the mist, and then she was gone. The assassins dropped their oards in the water.

He heard Abbas say something to the men with him.

Then she came up, right beside them, gasping. At that moment the helmsman lit a lantern and shouted a command to his fellow, who hoisted the nets over the other side, making as much noise as he could about it. Abbas knelt down and reached out a hand for her, and dragged her to the side. The sailor let go of the nets and ran over to help him pull her onboard.

She lay there, blue and still. He thought she was dead and started to shake her only thing he could think of do. She vomited water on the deck.

Her face was a mess of kohl and paint. She looked pitiful, but at least she was breathing. She was cold and he wrapped her in a blanket. Hardly anything to stir a man to risk his entire life, he thought. Just a small thin girl, ringing wet. He held her to warm her up and wondered if she would still be alive when they made the shore.

A fresh breeze ruffled the Bosphorus, the cries of the muezzin calling the faithful to prayer. The tower of the Divan rose through the mist, sunlight glinting off the spire. A beautiful morning to die.

Did I do enough? He wondered. What if the knot I tied on the sack was too tight, what if she did not get out in time? What if Ludovici did not find her in the fog?

A messenger arrived and placed a scroll in his hands. He broke the seal and read it through quickly. It was from Ludovici. The goods had arrived safely and were in good order. He would put them in the warehouse until ready to ship on

He swayed on his feet, put a hand out to steady himself against the sill.

'Is the Kislar Aghasi unwell?' one the pages asked him.

Abbas nodded. 'The Kislar Aghasi is quite well,' he said and took the letter to the fire and burned it.

***

The Valide was restless and could not sleep. She roamed her apartments picking up vases and studying them, running her hands over the ceramics and the silks of the divans, as if trying to imprint each on her memory, so that she might remember it.

I can hardly remember a time when I was not here, she thought. I cannot even recall the day they came for me.

She went out to the terrace. It was cool, and there was a yellow stain to the sky over the Asian side. The sun would rise soon. I wonder if I will see it set, she thought.

'Are you all right, Crown of Veiled Heads,' one of her maid servants asked her.

'I have to go away for a while,' she said. She felt suddenly light headed. The strength went out of her and she wondered if any of it had been really worth all the trouble. No one will remember me when I am gone. At least I have given the Osmanlis a fine Sultan.

The room began to spin and she staggered. She heard her
gediçli
scream as she toppled to the floor. Oh this won't do, she thought. There's no dignity in this.

***

She had been propped up on pillows, while her servants hovered. Look at her, like a dried out husk. She was lost all in the bedclothes. No one ever looked so old as when they were dying. There was no artifice to support her now. Her
gediçli
had applied kohl to her eyes and put a little taplock on her head but it had only made her look even more ghastly. The Kislar Aghasi was there. He looked terrified, as well he might.

'Is she dying?' she asked him.

' My Lady, she cannot move or talk. She sleeps most of the time. Who knows when Almighty God will call her home?'

'She cannot talk?'

He shook his head.

'She he has no way of communicating with us?'

'We put a pen in her hand but she is unable to use it. The fingers on her left hand twitch a little, that is all. '

'Can she understand what is said to her?'

'I don't know. It appears so. She slips in and out of this world.'

Hürrem smiled. 'You see how quickly the world turns, Kislar Aghasi. Just the other night you were ready to defy me.'

'I should never defy you My Lady.'

'No, you never should. It would be unwise. In future mind your manners better. Your life is in my hands now.'

'Of course.'

'Where is the Sultan?'

'He has just left. He is most distressed.'

Hürrem went to the bed. 'You are sure she cannot speak? I would like to say goodbye to her.'

'She has had an apoplexy. It has taken away all her powers.'

Hürrem stared at the old lady. 'I want everyone out of the room,' she said to Abbas.

'My lady?'

He thinks I am going to put a pillow over her head, he thought. Look at her. I don't need to.

'The law says that the Kislar Aghasi and her
gediçli
should stay with her at all times.'

'Kislar Aghasi, do you remember what I just said to you?'

He rapped out a short command to the maidservants and ushered them out of the door. He hesitated.

'You too, Kislar Aghasi.'

He went out, no doubt praying that the Valide was still alive when he came back in.

***

Hürrem bent over the bed. 'They tell me you cannot speak,' she said to her. Saliva had pooled on her cheek and against the pillow, but her eyes were bright. 'That's it, open your eyes. Look at me. It's me, Hürrem.'

Yes, she understands me well enough, Hürrem thought.

'I am going to tell you a secret.' She moved closer so that her lips were close to the old woman's ear. 'Mustapha will never be Sultan. I promise you. Do you remember the time he fell ill and no one ever knew who poisoned him? I will tell you who did that. It was me. I found a way then and I shall do it again but next time I shall not fail. I am going to be the next Valide. And when I am I shall destroy your son and even in Paradise you will not find rest. What do you think of that?'

The old lady tried to move. Hürrem laughed at her. 'You didn't suspect. Perhaps you are not as clever as you thought you were. Kislar Aghasi!'

The Chief Black Eunuch rushed in. He must have been standing with his ear to the door. Never mind, he could not have heard her and would not dare say a word even if he had.

'What is wrong with her? I think she is having another seizure.'

There was froth on the old woman's lips and she was writhing as if she was trying to get off the bed. Abbas called for the
gediçli
and they tried to hold her down.

'What is happening?'Hürrem said.

'I don't know, I am not a physician, My Lady.'

'She looks like she is trying to say something,' Hürrem said. 'Does it look that way to you Kislar Aghasi? Something has upset her a great deal. I hope it was nothing I said to her. She looks like a fish flopping about in the bottom of the boat. It's unseemly. Tell your girls to try and do something will you?'

'They are doing their best.'

'You should send another message to the Lord of Life. He should be here if he finds it distressing or not. I do not think she is long for this world.'

'I shall do so at once.'

'I hope he gets here before she dies. It would be a shame for him to miss it.'

She gave the old woman's hand a last reassuring squeeze and went out.

'It was him wasn't it?' She stood at the water's edge staring at the lights flickering on in the palace. She was wrapped in a fur cloak but she could not stop shivering.

'Yes,' Ludovici said.

'What happened to him? It was my father, wasn't it?'

'Abbas got a letter. Lucia gave it to me and said it came from you. I had no cause to think otherwise. So in one respect I was the instrument of his downfall. He was lured to the Ponte Antico and taken to a ship in the harbor …' His voice trailed off.

'How did he not die after what they did to him?'

'He was lucky or unlucky depending on how you see it. I have been told by those who know about these things that there is a high mortality rate for those who are razored in this way. I cannot imagine what he has been through.'

'So my father did this to him?'

'It seems so.'

' And yet he still loves me?'

'It was hardly your fault, madam. You were innocent of this and yes it seems he has carried his love for you even here to this place.'

'How long did you know about this?'

' He has been here in the Harem for five years, I have been in Pera for three. But he only came to visit me when you arrived in the Harem. He asked me for help in getting you out but at the time he had no plan on how to do it. When I received his message I had only a few hours to act. Because of my business I was able to procure a small
caramusali
and the two Greeks I brought with me this morning to help rescue you.'

'I need to see him again.'

'I don't think he wants that.'

'But I have to. I did not even recognize him. That must have been excruciating for him.'

' Yes, I cannot imagine what that was like for him. But I cannot command him to come back here. I imagine that he does not want to see you, after what has been done to him. They tell me the excessive weight is something to do with … the operation, if we might call it that.'

'And the scar on his face?'

'He tells me that was something that happened in the struggle. It became infected afterwards and that is why he looks as he does.'

Julia hung her head. 'He was such a beautiful boy.'

'He still is.'

She smiled at that. 'What will they do him when they find out he has tricked the Sultan?'

'Knowing Abbas, they will not find out.'

'I hope not. And it was brave of you, also. to do what you did for me.'

'I did it for him. And the courage - I think the courage was all his. You know, in Venice, I always scoffed at him. I vowed that I should never fall in love with any woman. I thought it fanciful and weak and I tried many times to dissuade him from his pursuit of you.'

'You were right to do it. It would have saved him so much pain.'

'No, I was wrong.'

'How can you say that? Look at him now!'

'Don't pity him, he would hate that. And there is no need to pity him. No matter what they did to him, they could not take away his courage or his honour. He honoured you tonight and in doing so he has scolded me for my petty life. For all the women I have, I have never loved like he has. I am … envious of him. He knows more than I will ever know about what it is to live.'

Few slept soundly in the Eski Saraya. Sirhane lay on her side, her pillow wet with tears. Çehangir moaned and tossed in his bed, haunted by nightmares. Meanwhile Suleiman knelt distraught beside his mother's bed and when she died he uttered a small cry. Ibrahim thought he heard something, as he paced the terrace of his palace near the Hippodrome. Gülbehar thought she heard it, too.

It sounded like a ghost, or a warning. Mustapha shivered, as if a ghost had touched him. A shadow passed across the moon. He stopped to listen, but there was only silence. Perhaps it was just an owl, he thought.

Abbas stood at the window of his tiny cell and looked across the Golden Horn to Galata. 'I promise you I will love you forever,' he said.

If you love her until next week I will give you two gold ducats.

I feel sorry for you, Ludovici. You feel nothing inside. But one day you will, life will seek you out and make you feel again. As for me, I shall find the greatest part of me in loving truly.

She was safe tonight, sleeping sound in Pera. Oh I may not be a man any more but tonight I shall sleep sound in mine. Antonio Gonzaga robbed me of a lifetime in your arms, he thought. But unlike him at least I shall die a good man and there are not many complete men who can say that.

He took out the small velvet pouch that had arrived that afternoon from the Venetian quarter, sent by messenger. He opened the drawstring and emptied the contents into his palm.

Two gold ducats. For the first time since he arrived at the Harem he smiled.

There was snow on the gate of the Ba'ab-i-Humayun when Suleiman returned from the Lands of War. He rode stiffly, deaf to the cheers of the
Yeniçeris
and the enthusiastic crowds that lined the Divan Yolu to welcome him back.

Where was the glory? Suleiman thought. This time they had not even got as far as Vienna. Ibrahim had been stalled for over a month by a tiny garrison of soldiers at Guns, and the campaign that was to take Austria and lure the Holy Roman Emperor into a decisive battle petered out into a series of cavalry raids and retribution between his generals over who was to blame for the fiasco.

He returned in mourning. The Valide, his mother, was dead. Though he mourned her, a part of him felt strangely liberated. Even as he said his prayers for her he felt the burden lifting from his shoulders. There was no one who could scourge him with duty now.

The European campaign had been an exercise in futility; the interlude with the Italian
houri
had been a disaster. It was abundantly clear to him now who was his wisest counsellor, both on the battlefield and in bed. She was the only one he could really trust.

He had been away far too long.

Hürrem, bewitch me again.