Jenny White - The Sultan's seal

“Your Highness, it has been a great pleasure to speak with you and I treasure your hospitality, but I must beg leave to return home or I’ll be late to dinner. Father doesn’t like me to be late.”

“Of course, of course. I’m glad to see you are a dutiful daughter. Fathers-they do expect so much of one. And you are expecting the magistrate to dinner tonight, aren’t you?”

“How did you know?” Sybil is flustered.

“You mentioned it the other day at Leyla’s.”

“Oh, of course.” Sybil beams and rises to her feet. “It was such a pleasant afternoon. Thank you very much.”

“Oh, before you go, my dear, I’d like you to see something. Come, come over here.”

Sybil follows Asma Sultan to an area of the patio screened by a stone lattice.

“I am going to show you something quite special. Not many people know about this. One of my mother’s protégés was an architect. She designed this especially for her. Arif Agha, go and steady Sybil Hanoum.”

The eunuch appears beside Sybil, takes her arm in his long, steel fingers, and looks expectantly at Asma Sultan. Sybil is uncomfortable and wants to leave, but the eunuch holds her arm tightly. When she pulls at her arm, his grip tightens.

“Don’t be alarmed,” the old woman says gently. Her hand glides over the carved stone and stops over a protrusion. “You see this lever here. When you pull it, an extraordinary thing happens.”

She pulls the lever and the part of the floor on which Sybil and the eunuch are standing begins to move downward with a low grinding noise. The eunuch lets go of Sybil’s arm. She runs to the edge and tries to catch onto the receding tiles.

“Isn’t this marvelous? This is a device that allows the women of the harem to fish and dabble in the sea without ever being seen by anyone outside.”

Sybil claws at the tiles, but can’t lift herself out. Soon the patio is far above her. She can see Asma Sultan’s head silhouetted against the sky. She is still explaining.

“You can swim in complete privacy. My mother spent time here, fishing. Remarkable, isn’t it? She said it reminded her of her girlhood, when she was free. After my father died, she was sent with his other women to live at the Old Palace. She never left there again. She told me she missed this spot most of all.”

“Please let me up, Your Highness. I would love to hear more about your mother. She sounds like a fascinating woman. Your Highness?” Sybil’s voice sounds hollow, reflecting from the cavernous walls.

“The seawater comes in through the grate behind you. You’re perfectly safe. No one can see you.”

“Please let me up now. My father will be worried. They’ll call out the guard if I don’t appear for dinner.”

Asma Sultan steps closer to the edge of the patio high above. “Arif Agha,” she calls down. “Another Frankish woman, Arif Agha. You’re not deaf. You heard her. She has the ear-and perhaps something else-of the magistrate.” She wheezes a laugh. “Haven’t you had enough? Your fate is tied to mine. That’s the way things are. You know what you have to do.” She pauses, peering down into the shadows, then continues in a wheedling voice. “Some things can’t be restored, Arif Agha, but others can.” Her voice turns hard again. “And there is much to lose.”

The eunuch listens spellbound, head tilted toward the sky, open-mouthed. Sybil thinks she hears him groaning. When she looks up again, the opening contains only sky.

Asma Sultan’s disembodied voice floats down. “The past is the vessel of the future, Sybil Hanoum. Just as I said.”

“I don’t understand. Why are you doing this?” Sybil yells.

There is no answer except the seawater sloshing through the ornate ironwork grill set into one end of the room. Sybil looks around at the high arched ceiling of the underground space. It is painted to resemble the sky, one side light blue with clouds, the other fading to night, decorated with tiny stars and a sickle moon. She can dimly see that the platform on which she and the eunuch stand is an island about fifteen feet square and rests just above the water.

The eunuch is pacing back and forth, his eyes never leaving the square of sky high above them.

Sybil turns and asks him in Turkish, “What is happening here? Isn’t she coming back?”

The eunuch stops; his gleaming eyes fix on Sybil. They hear the sound of oars splashing just beyond the iron grill, then receding.

“Do you know a way out of here? There must be a way up. I can’t believe the sultanas would let themselves be trapped down here at someone else’s mercy.”

She speaks to the eunuch in Turkish to keep her spirits up, even though he hasn’t said a word.

“I’m sure someone will come and get us. The embassy staff knows where I went.” Even as she says it, she is unsure whether she told the staff her exact destination. They might think I’ve gone to the palace, she thinks. But surely they would find Asma Sultan and ask about me.

A sudden realization chills Sybil: Asma Sultan could say she hasn’t seen me; that it was a mistake on my part; that I must have been invited by someone else. There’s no proof that Asma Sultan invited me. It was a verbal message delivered by a servant. But I was picked up by Asma Sultan’s eunuch. Everyone saw him. He will have identified himself at the embassy gate.

The eunuch looks up at the sky, his body tense, listening. Sybil kneels and looks over the edge of the platform. The water isn’t very deep. The underground walls are lined with marble reliefs of trees and flowers mottled with peeling paint. A small rowboat bumps against one far wall. She looks anxiously around for a way up or another lever, but sees only a marble stairway resting against the platform and leading down into the water. So that the women can swim, she thinks.

She paces about the platform, then sits at one end, trying to make conversation with the stubbornly silent eunuch. Above her, the square of sky slowly becomes streaked with pink, then blends more and more with the darker half of the ceiling.

Sybil is cold and her legs are stiff. Tired of inactivity, she bunches her skirts and folds them over her arm, stepping carefully onto the slick marble stair. When she has descended so that the water reaches her chest, her feet encounter the paved surface of the floor. Her skirts are drenched and heavy. She looks around at the eunuch, who hasn’t moved, then climbs partway up again, removes her skirts, and heaves them onto the platform. This time, there is less resistance as she pushes her way through the water to the boat. She can’t swim, so she is wary of a change in depth and pushes each foot forward carefully, but the floor is even and she reaches the boat without difficulty. Inside are the remains of a velvet carpet, silk cushions, and two oars. A brass lamp hangs from the carved prow. She pulls the boat back to the platform to examine it. She is shaking with cold. The eunuch squats and stares at her wordlessly.

“Well, we’ve found a boat, although I can’t imagine how we’ll get it past that iron grate.” Suddenly she looks down at the water. It is still at the same height. “We don’t have to worry about high tide, do we?” she asks anxiously.

The eunuch doesn’t respond.

“And we have a lamp. Let’s see if we can light it.”

She looks inside, then says excitedly, “Look, there’s oil in here.” In a small container in the base, she finds flint and lights the lamp. The eunuch turns away as if the light hurts his eyes. Sybil climbs into the boat and rows inexpertly to the wall. Holding the lamp high, she inspects every inch of it, fingers scrabbling among the flakes of paint, searching for a mechanism to make the platform ascend. Soon it is so dark she can no longer make out the eunuch on the platform, only the ghostly glow of his white robe.