My Name is Red (14 page)

And so it was on that Friday morning, I began to describe the book that would contain Our Sultan’s portrait painted in the Venetian style. I broached the topic to Black by recounting how I’d brought it up with Our Sultan and how I’d persuaded him to fund the book. My hidden purpose was to have Black write the stories-which I hadn’t even begun-that were meant to accompany the illustrations.

I told him I’d completed most of the book’s illustrations and that the last picture was nearly finished. “There’s a depiction of Death,” I said, “and I had the most clever of miniaturists, Stork, illustrate the tree representing the peacefulness of Our Sultan’s worldly realm. There’s a picture of Satan and a horse meant to spirit us far far away. There’s a dog, always cunning and wily, and also a gold coin…I had the master miniaturists depict these things with such beauty,” I told Black, “that if you saw them but once, you’d know straightaway what the corresponding text ought to be. Poetry and painting, words and color, these things are brothers to each other, as you well know.”

For a while, I pondered whether I should tell him I might marry off my daughter to him. Would he live together with us in this house? I told myself not to be taken in by his rapt attention and his childlike expression. I knew he was scheming to elope with my Shekure. Still, I could rely on nobody else to finish my book.

Returning together from the Friday prayers, we discussed “shadow,” the greatest of innovations manifest in the paintings of the Venetian masters. “If,” I said, “we intend to make our paintings from the perspective of pedestrians exchanging pleasantries and regarding their world; that is, if we intend to illustrate from the street, we ought to learn how to account for-as the Franks do-what is, in fact, most prevalent there: shadows.”

“How does one depict shadow?” asked Black.

From time to time, as my nephew listened, I perceived impatience in him. He’d begin to fiddle with the Mongol inkpot he’d given me as a present. At times, he’d take up the iron poker and stoke the fire in the stove. Now and then I imagined that he wanted to lower that poker onto my head and kill me because I dared to move the art of illustrating away from Allah’s perspective; because I would betray the dreams of the masters of Herat and their entire tradition of painting; because I’d duped Our Sultan into already doing so. Occasionally, Black would sit dead still for long stretches and fix his eyes deeply into mine. I could imagine what he was thinking: “I’ll be your slave until I can have your daughter.” Once, as I would do when he was a child, I took him out into the yard and tried to explain to him, as a father might, about the trees, about the light falling onto the leaves, about the melting snow and why the houses seemed to shrink as we moved away from them. But this was a mistake: It proved only that our former filial relationship had long since collapsed. Now patient sufferance of the rantings of a demented old man had taken the place of Black’s childhood curiosity and passion for knowledge. I was just an old man whose daughter was the object of Black’s love. The influence and experience of the countries and cities that my nephew had traveled through for a dozen years had been fully absorbed by his soul. He was tired of me, and I pitied him. And he was angry, I assumed, not only because I hadn’t allowed him to marry Shekure twelve years ago-after all, there was no other choice then-but because I dreamed of paintings whose style transgressed the precepts of the masters of Herat. Furthermore, because I raved about this nonsense with such conviction, I imagined my death at his hands.

I was not, however, afraid of him; on the contrary, I tried to frighten him. For I believed that fear was appropriate to the writing I’d requested of him. “As in those pictures,” I said, “one ought to be able to situate oneself at the center of the world. One of my illustrators brilliantly depicted Death for me. Behold.”

Thus I began to show him the paintings I’d secretly commissioned from the master miniaturists over the last year. At first, he was a tad shy, even frightened. When he understood that the depiction of Death was inspired by familiar scenes that could be found in many
Book of Kings
volumes-from the scene of Afrasiyab’s decapitation of Siyavush, for example, or Rüstem’s murder of Suhrab without realizing this was his son-he quickly became interested in the subject. Among the pictures that depicted the funeral of the late Sultan Süleyman was one I’d made with bold but sad colors, combining a compositional sensibility inspired by the Franks with my own attempt at shading-which I’d added later. I pointed out the diabolic depth evoked by the interplay of cloud and horizon. I reminded him that Death was unique, just like the portraits of infidels I had seen hanging in Venetian palazzos; all of them desperately yearned to be rendered distinctly. “They want to be so distinct and different, and they want this with such passion that,” I said, “look, look into the eyes of Death. See how men do not fear Death, but rather the violence implicit in the desire to be one-of-a-kind, unique and exceptional. Look at this illustration and write an account of it. Give voice to Death. Here’s paper and pen. I shall give what you write to the calligrapher straightaway.”

He stared at the picture in silence. “Who painted this?” he asked later.

“Butterfly. He’s the most talented of the lot. Master Osman had been in love with and awed by him for years.”

“I’ve seen rougher versions of this depiction of a dog at the coffeehouse where the storyteller performs,” Black said.

“My illustrators, most of whom are spiritually bound to Master Osman and the workshop, take a dim view of the labors performed for my book. When they leave here at night I imagine they have their vulgar fun over these illustrations which they draw for money and ridicule me at the coffeehouse. And who among them will ever forget the time Our Sultan had the young Venetian artist, whom He’d invited from the embassy at my behest, paint His portrait. Thereafter, He had Master Osman make a copy of that oil painting. Forced to imitate the Venetian painter, Master Osman held me responsible for this unseemly coercion and the shameful portrait that came of it. He was justified.”

All day long, I showed him every picture-except the final illustration that I cannot, for whatever reason, finish. I prodded him to write. I discussed the temperaments of the miniaturists, and I enumerated the sums of money I meted out to them. We discussed “perspective” and whether the diminutive objects in the background of Venetian pictures were sacrilegious, and equally, we talked about the possibility that unfortunate Elegant Effendi had been murdered for excessive ambition and out of jealousy over his wealth.

As Black returned home that night, I was confident he’d come again the next morning as promised and that he’d once again listen to me recount the stories that would constitute my book. I listened to his footsteps fading beyond the open gate; there was something to the cold night that seemed to make my sleepless and troubled murderer stronger and more devilish than me and my book.

I closed the courtyard gate tightly behind him. I placed the old ceramic water basin that I used as a basil planter behind the gate as I did each night. Before I reduced the stove to smoldering ashes and went to bed, I glanced up to see Shekure in a white gown looking like a ghost in the blackness.

“Are you absolutely certain that you want to marry him?” I asked.

“No, dear Father. I’ve long since forgotten about marriage. Besides, I am married.”

“If you still want to marry him, I’m willing to give you my blessing now.”

“I wish not to be wed to him.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s against your will. In all sincerity, I desire nobody that you do not want.”

I noticed, momentarily, the coals in the stove reflected in her eyes. Her eyes had aged, not out of unhappiness, but anger; yet there was no trace of offense in her voice.

“Black is in love with you,” I said as if divulging a secret.

“I know.”

“He listened to all I had to say today not out of his love of painting, but out of his love for you.”

“He will complete your book, this is what matters.”

“Your husband might return one day,” I said.

“I’m not certain why, perhaps it’s the silence, but tonight I’ve realized once and for all that my husband will never return. What I’ve dreamt seems to be the truth: They must’ve killed him. He’s long since turned to dust.” She whispered the last statement lest the sleeping children hear. And she said it with a peculiar tinge of anger.

“If they happen to kill me,” I said, “I want you to finish this book to which I’ve dedicated everything. Swear that you will.”

“I give my word. Who will be the one to complete your book?”

“Black! You can ensure that he does so.”

“You are already ensuring that he does so, dear Father,” she said. “You have no need for me.”

“Agreed, but he’s giving in to me because of you. If they kill me, he might be afraid to continue on.”

“In that case, he won’t be able to marry me,” said my clever daughter, smiling.

Where did I come up with the detail about her smiling? During the entire conversation, I noticed nothing except an occasional glimmer in her eyes. We were standing tensely facing one another in the middle of the room.

“Do you communicate with each other, exchange signals?” I asked, unable to contain myself.

“How could you even think such a thing?”

A long agonizing silence passed. A dog barked in the distance. I was slightly cold and shuddered. The room was so black now that we could no longer see each other; we could each only sense the other’s presence. We abruptly embraced with all our might. She began to cry, and said that she missed her mother. I kissed and stroked her head, which indeed smelled like her mother’s hair. I walked her to her bedchamber and put her to bed next to the children who were sleeping side by side. And as I reflected back over the last two days, I was certain that Shekure had corresponded with Black.

When I returned home that night, ably evading my landlady-who was beginning to act like my mother-I sequestered myself in my room and lay on my mattress, giving myself over to visions of Shekure.

Allow me the amusement of describing the sounds I’d heard in Enishte’s house. On my second visit after twelve years, she didn’t show herself. She did succeed, however, in so magically endowing me with her presence that I was certain of being, somehow, continually under her watch, while she sized me up as a future husband, amusing herself all the while as if playing a game of logic. Knowing this, I also imagined I was continually able to see her. Thus was I better able to understand Ibn Arabi’s notion that love is the ability to make the invisible visible and the desire always to feel the invisible in one’s midst.

I could infer that Shekure was continually watching me because I’d been listening to the sounds coming from within the house and to the creaking of its wood boards. At one point, I was absolutely certain she was with her children in the next room, which opened onto the wide hallway-cum-anteroom; I could hear the children pushing, shoving and sparring with each other while their mother, perhaps, tried to quiet them with gestures, threatening glances and knit brows. Once in a while I heard them whispering quite unnaturally, not as one would whisper to avoid disturbing someone’s ritual prayers, but affectedly, as one would before erupting in a fit of laughter.

Another time, as their grandfather was explaining to me the wonders of light and shadow, Shevket and Orhan entered the room, and with careful gestures obviously rehearsed beforehand, proffered a tray and served us coffee. This ceremony, which should’ve been Hayriye’s concern, was arranged by Shekure so they could observe the man who might soon become their father. And so, I paid a compliment to Shevket: “What nice eyes you have.” Then, I immediately turned to his younger brother, Orhan-sensing that he might grow jealous-and added, “Yours are as well.” Next, I placed a faded red carnation petal, which I’d fast produced from the folds of my robe, onto the tray and kissed each boy on the cheeks. Later still, I heard laughter and giggling from within.

Frequently, I grew curious to know from which hole in the walls, the closed doors, or perhaps, the ceiling, and from which angle, her eye was peering at me. Staring at a crack, knot or what I took to be a hole, I’d imagine Shekure situated just behind it. Suddenly, suspecting another black spot, and to determine whether I was justified in my suspicion-even at the risk of being insolent toward my Enishte as he continued his endless recital-I’d stand up. Affecting all the while the demeanor of an attentive disciple, quite enthralled and quite lost in thought, in order to demonstrate how intent I was upon my Enishte’s story, I’d begin pacing in the room with a preoccupied air, before approaching that suspicious black spot on the wall.

When I failed to find Shekure’s eye nesting in what I had taken to be a peephole, I’d be overcome by disappointment, and then by a strange feeling of loneliness, by the impatience of a man uncertain where to turn next.

Now and then, I’d experience such an abrupt and intense feeling that Shekure was watching me, I’d be so absolutely convinced I was within her gaze, that I’d start posing like a man trying to show he was wiser, stronger and more capable than he really was so as to impress the woman he loved. Later, I’d fantasize that Shekure and her boys were comparing me with her husband-the boys’ missing father-before my mind would focus again upon whichever variety of famous Venetian illustrator about whose painting techniques my Enishte was waxing philosophic at the moment. I longed to be like these newly famed painters solely because Shekure had heard so much about them from her father; illustrators who had earned their renown-not through suffering martyrdom in cells like saints, or through severing the heads of enemy soldiers with a mighty arm and a sharp scimitar, as that absent husband had done-but on account of a manuscript they’d transcribed or a page they’d illuminated. I tried very hard to imagine the magnificent pictures created by these celebrated illustrators, who were, as my Enishte explained, inspired by the power of the world’s mystery and its visible blackness. I tried so hard to visualize them-those masterpieces my Enishte had seen and was now attempting to describe to one who had never laid eyes on them-that, finally, when my imagination failed me, I felt only more dejected and demeaned.

I looked up to discover that Shevket was before me again. He approached me decisively, and I assumed-as was customary for the oldest male child among certain Arab tribes in Transoxiana and among Circassian tribes in the Caucasus mountains-that he would not only kiss a guest’s hand at the beginning of a visit, but also when that guest left. Caught off guard, I presented my hand for him to kiss. At that moment, from somewhere not too far away, I heard her laughter. Was she laughing at me? I became flustered and to remedy the situation, I grabbed Shevket and kissed him on both cheeks as though this were what was really expected of me. Then I smiled at my Enishte as though to apologize for interrupting him and to assure him that I meant no disrespect, while carefully drawing the child near to check whether he bore his mother’s scent. By the time I understood that the boy had placed a crumpled scrap of paper into my hand, he’d long since turned his back and walked some distance toward the door.

I clutched the scrap of paper in my fist like a jewel. And when I understood that this was a note from Shekure, out of elation I could scarcely keep from grinning stupidly at my Enishte. Wasn’t this proof enough that Shekure passionately desired me? Suddenly, I imagined us engaged in a mad frenzy of lovemaking. So profoundly convinced was I that this incredible event I’d conjured was imminent that my manhood inappropriately began to rise-there in the presence of my Enishte. Had Shekure witnessed this? I focused intently on what my Enishte was explaining in order to redirect my concentration.

Much later, while my Enishte came near to show me another illustrated plate from his book, I discreetly unfolded the note, which smelled of honeysuckle, only to discover that she’d left it completely blank. I couldn’t believe my eyes and senselessly turned the paper over and over, examining it.

“A window,” said my Enishte. “Using perspectival techniques is like regarding the world from a window-what is that you are holding?”

“It’s nothing, Enishte Effendi,” I said. When he looked away, I brought the crumpled paper to my nose and deeply inhaled its scent.

After an afternoon meal, as I did not want to use my Enishte’s chamber pot, I excused myself and went to the outhouse in the yard. It was bitter cold. I had quickly seen to my concern without freezing my buttocks too much when I saw that Shevket had slyly and silently appeared before me, blocking my way like a brigand. In his hands he held his grandfather’s full and steaming chamber pot. He entered the outhouse after me and emptied the pot. He exited and fixed his pretty eyes on mine as he puffed out his plump cheeks, still holding the empty pot.

“Have you ever seen a dead cat?” he asked. His nose was exactly like his mother’s. Was she watching us? I looked around. The shutters were closed on the enchanted second-floor window in which I’d first seen Shekure after so many years.

“Nay.”

“Shall I show you the dead cat in the house of the Hanged Jew?”

He went out to the street without waiting for my response. I followed him. We walked forty or fifty paces along the muddy and icy path before entering an unkempt garden. Here, it smelled of wet and rotting leaves, and faintly of mold. With the confidence of a child who knew the place well, taking firm, rhythmic steps, he entered through the door of a yellow house, which stood before us almost hidden behind somber fig and almond trees.

The house was completely empty, but it was dry and warm, as if somebody were living there.

“Whose house is this?” I asked.

“The Jews”. When the man died, his wife and kids went to the Jewish quarter over by the fruit-sellers’ quay. They’re having Esther the clothier sell the house.“ He went into a corner of the room and returned. ”The cat’s gone, it’s disappeared,“ he said.

“Where would a dead cat go?”

“My grandfather says the dead wander.”

“Not the dead themselves,” I said. “Their spirits wander.”

“How do you know?” he said. He was holding the chamber pot tightly against his lap in all seriousness.

“I just know. Do you always come here?”

“My mother comes here with Esther. The living dead, risen from the grave, come here at night, but I’m not afraid of this place. Have you ever killed a man?”

“Yes.”

“How many?”

“Not many. Two.”

“With a sword?”

“With a sword.”

“Do their souls wander?”

“I don’t know. According to what’s written in books, they must wander.”

“Uncle Hasan has a red sword. It’s so sharp it’ll cut you if you just touch it. And he has a dagger with a ruby-studded handle. Are you the one who killed my father?”

I nodded indicating neither “yes” nor “no.” “How do you know that your father is dead?”

“My mother said so yesterday. He won’t be returning. She saw him in her dream.”

If presented with the opportunity, we would choose to do in the name of a greater goal whatever awful thing we’ve already prepared to do for the sake of our own miserable gains, for the lust that burns within us or for the love that breaks our hearts; and so, I resolved once more to become the father of these forsaken children, and, when I returned to the house, I listened more intently to Shevket’s grandfather as he described the book whose text and illustrations I had to complete.

Let me begin with the illustrations that my Enishte had shown me, the horse for example. On this page there were no human figures and the area around the horse was empty; even so, I couldn’t say it was simply and exclusively the painting of a horse. Yes, the horse was there, yet it was apparent that the rider had stepped off to the side, or who knows, perhaps he was on the verge of emerging from behind the bush drawn in the Kazvin style. This was immediately apparent from the saddle upon the horse, which bore the marks and embellishments of nobility: Maybe, a man with his sword at the ready was about to appear beside the steed.

It was obvious that Enishte commissioned this horse from a master illustrator whom he’d secretly summoned from the workshop. Because the illustrator, arriving at night, could draw a horse-ingrained in his mind like a stencil-only if it were the extension of a story, that’s exactly how he’d begin: by rote. As he was drawing the horse, which he’d seen thousands of times in scenes of love and war, my Enishte, inspired by the methods of the Venetian masters, had probably instructed the illustrator; for example, he might have said, “Forget about the rider, draw a tree there. But draw it in the background, on a smaller scale.”

The illustrator, who came at night, would sit before his work desk together with my Enishte, eagerly drawing by candlelight an odd, unconventional picture that didn’t resemble any of the usual scenes to which he was accustomed and had memorized. Of course, my Enishte paid him handsomely for each drawing, but frankly, this peculiar method of drawing also had its charms. However, as with my Enishte, after a while, the illustrator could no longer determine which story the illustration was intended to enhance and complete. What my Enishte expected of me was that I examine these illustrations made in half-Venetian, half-Persian mode and write a story suitable to accompany them on the opposite page. If I hoped to get Shekure, I absolutely had to write these stories, but all that came to mind were the stories the storyteller told at the coffeehouse.