Amin Maalouf - Leo Africanus

901 A.H.

21 September 1495 — 8 September 1496

When the honest women of Fez have to cross the flower market they quicken their step, wrap their veils more closely around themselves, and glance to left and right like hunted animals, because, although the company of myrtle or narcissus has nothing reprehensible about it, everyone knows that the citizens of Fez have the strange habit of surrounding themselves with flowers, both planted and picked, when they give themselves over to the forbidden pleasures of alcohol. For certain pious people, the very purchase of a perfumed bouquet became only a little less reprehensible than buying a carafe of wine, and the flower sellers seemed to them to be no better than the innkeepers, the more so as both were very often Andalusians, prosperous and dissolute.

Salma herself always quickened her pace as soon as she passed across the square in which the flower market was located, though less out of bigotry than out of a legitimate concern for her respectability. I had eventually noticed that she quickened her gait, and as if to amuse myself with a new game, pretended to challenge her to a race, trotting along by her side.

One day that year, as we were crossing the square, my mother quickened her pace. Laughing my head off, I began to run, but instead of holding me back as she usually did, she began to run in her turn, more and more quickly. As I could no longer keep up with her, she turned round for a moment, swept me up in her arms and ran on with even greater vigour, screaming a word into my ear which I could not catch. It was only when she stopped at the other side of the square that I understood the reason for her haste and the name she was calling: ‘Sarah!’

Gaudy Sarah. I still often heard her speak of the Jewess, but her features no longer said anything to me.

‘God Himself has sent you to this country,’ gasped Salma as she caught up with her.

Sarah gave her an amused pout.

‘That is what our rabbi says every day. As for me, I’m not so sure.’

Everything about her seemed bizarre to me: her pealing laughter, her many-coloured clothes, her gold-filled teeth, her voluminous earrings and above all the overpowering perfume which hit me full in the nostrils when she clasped me to her bosom. While I stared shamelessly at her she began to tell the tale, with a thousand gestures and a thousand exclamations, of what had befallen her since she had left the quarter of al-Baisin, a little before our own departure.

‘Every day I thank the Creator for having pointed me towards exile, because those who chose baptism are now victims of the most dreadful persecutions. Seven of my cousins are in prison and one of my nieces was burnt alive with her husband, both accused of having remained Jews in secret.’

She put me down on the ground before continuing in a lowered tone:

‘All the converts are suspected of continuing to be Jews; no Spaniard can escape the Inquisition unless he can prove that he is of “pure blood”, that is, that he can count no Jew and no Moor among his ancestors, as far back as his family goes. Even so, their King Ferdinand himself has Jewish blood, as has Torquemada the Inquisitor. May the flames of Hell pursue them until the end of time!’

Thus Sarah did not regret having fled to Portugal with her family, although she soon realized that only rich Jews could take up residence there, and then only on the further condition that they showered gold upon the king and his advisers. As for the poorer members of the community, they were soon to have to choose, as in Castile, between conversion and flight.

‘So I hastened to take ship for Tetuan, where I stayed several months. Then I came to Fez with my eldest daughter and my son-in-law, who had decided to set himself up here with an uncle who is a jeweller. My second daughter and her husband went, like most of our people, to the land of the Grand Turk, our protector. May the Most High prolong his life and grant him victory over our enemies!’

‘That is what we all devoutly hope,’ said my mother approvingly. ‘If God has the goodness to give us back our country one day, the Grand Turk will be His instrument.’

Revenge upon the Castilians was certainly one of Salma’s most cherished desires. But at that moment her thoughts were less concerned with the fate of Granada than with that of her own family circle. If she was showing so much joy at having found Sarah again it was because she remembered how successfully she had assisted her to get Muhammad back when he had nearly eluded her shortly before my birth. This time a magic potion would not suffice; Salma wanted to consult soothsayers, and as her mother was seriously ill and could not accompany her, she was counting on the reassuring presence of Gaudy Sarah.

‘How is your cousin?’ asked Sarah.

‘As God disposes him to conduct himself!’

The ambiguity of this formulation was evidently not lost on the Jewess. She put her hand on my mother’s arm. Glancing at me at the same time out of the corners of their eyes, they took a step aside and spoke to each other in low tones, so that I could hear only occasional snatches of the conversation. The words ‘Rumiyya’ and ‘sorcery’, perhaps also ‘drug’ kept appearing on Salma’s lips; the Jewess was attentive and reassuring.

The two women agreed to meet again in the same place two days later to go the rounds of the soothsayers. I knew about it that day because my mother had decided that I should accompany her. Perhaps she did not want to leave me with Warda; perhaps she judged it more fitting, in the eyes of my father and the neighbours, to take a child with her, as living proof of the honesty of her comings and goings. At all events, for a seven-year-old boy it was an experience as wonderful as it was unexpected, and, I must admit, sometimes agonizing as well.

Our first visit was to a clairvoyant named Umm Bassar. It was said that the sultan of Fez would consult her at each new moon, and that she had put a spell upon an amir who had threatened him, striking him blind. In spite of her renown, she lived in a house as modest as our own, situated in the perfume suq, at the end of a narrow arcaded gallery. We had only to push past a hanging to make our way inside. A black maidservant made us sit down in a small chamber before leading us down a dark corridor to a room which was only a little larger. Umm Bassar was seated on an enormous green cushion, her hair covered with a scarf of the same colour, fringed with golden threads. Behind her back was a tapestry with a picture of the twenty-eight tabernacles of the moon; in front of her was a low table on which there was a glazed earthenware vessel.

My mother sat opposite the clairvoyant and explained her business to her in a low voice. Sarah and I stayed behind, standing up. Umm Bassar poured some water into the vessel, added a drop of oil, and then blew on it three times. She recited several incomprehensible formulae, and then thrust her face towards the vessel, saying, in a cavernous voice:

‘The jinns are there; some come by land, others by sea.’

Suddenly she turned towards me and beckoned me:

‘Come closer!’

Suspicious, I did not move.

‘Come, don’t be frightened.’

My mother gave me a reassuring look. I came up to the table timidly.

‘Lean over the table!’

The sight was, I swear, astonishing enough. The dancing reflections of the droplets of oil on the polished surface of the amphora gave the impression of ceaseless movement. Looking at it for several seconds, and allowing one’s imagination free rein, one could make out all manner of beings and objects.

‘Did you see the jinns moving about?’

Of course I said ‘Yes’.