Tariq Ali - A Sultan in Palermo

‘Very well, Abi. I shall do as you wish. We have come to plead with you to persuade the Sultan to disinherit our husbands, remove their names from the land register and put everything in the name of your grandchildren. That’s all. If it will help we can produce witnesses who will swear on al-Quran that both Samir ibn Ali and Umar ibn Muhammad have been involved in conspiracies with the Amir against the Sultan. They are preparing for war.’

‘Is that true?’ he asked in a stern voice as he looked straight at them. It would be astonishing if the Amir of Siracusa were preparing a rebellion. They averted their eyes from his gaze and he knew then that they were lying. Why were they so intent on destroying the men who had married them? He knew the answer. They were both very stupid. They did not realise that when lands are seized from a disloyal family, the law does not discriminate between father and son. Everything is taken away.

‘And will both of you be prepared to confirm what you have told me under oath and in the presence of the Sultan?’

They nodded their assent.

‘Go to sleep now. I will reflect on your request and make a decision tomorrow.’

For the first time that evening, they thought that their plan would succeed. Foolishness has no limits. His wife had taken a violent dislike to both her sons-in-law and was bent upon doing away with them. She had convinced the girls of this and sent them to Palermo, loaded with false accusations.

Deep in thought, their father savoured the silence that followed their departure. The birds, too, had retired for the night. Only the sea was awake and the waves were growing noisy. He looked up at the sky. It was a clear, starry night. As he rose and walked to the edge of the terrace he saw the fireflies dancing in space. This always made him melancholy. They reminded him of the first evening, a dark winter’s night, he had spent with Mayya after they had declared their love for each other, when he was twenty and she five years younger. The crescent moon had already disappeared. As they saw the fireflies, she had laughed and started dancing.

‘Look, Muhammad,’ she had shouted, ‘look at me. I’m a firefly.’

He had sat and watched her until a sudden storm had erupted with thunder and freezing rain. He had taken her hand and they had run all the way back to the village. Before they parted he had held her close and kissed her lips.

He heard Ibn Fityan cough discreetly. ‘Time for bed, master?’

‘Yes. Come with me and press my feet.’

The eunuch followed Idrisi to the bedchamber where an attendant undressed him and gave him a robe for bed.

‘Did you know Thawdor’s youngest boy sailed on my ship?’

The eunuch did not reply.

‘You did. Why was I not informed?’

‘Thawdor felt it was best that way. He did not wish to trouble you.’

‘It’s your job to tell me everything. Is that understood? What are they saying in the qasr?’

‘They are saying the Sultan is ill and might not survive the year. They are saying that his youngest son is a secret Believer and will restore our people to the positions we deserve. They are saying that you, master, have an important role to play. The Nazarenes are pressing the Sultan to teach us a lesson. They talk of conspiracies and are advising him to destroy all the mosques in Palermo because they are the breeding grounds of rebellion. That’s what they’re saying.’

He did not wait for a reply because he saw that Idrisi had fallen fast asleep. He covered his master’s sleeping form with a sheet and tiptoed out of the room. But Idrisi was not asleep. He was thinking of the future. He knew the palace factions and their leaders, but he had always remained aloof from them. Now that his book was finished he would go to the Friday prayers and hear the khutba. Perhaps he should have gone to the palace after all.

When he woke at first light the next morning he looked out of the window to see if the fireflies had brought a storm with them, but there was no sign of wet earth and the sea appeared calm. He sent for his grandchildren and was surprised to learn that only the boys had been brought to see him. Samar’s son Khalid was fourteen, his cousin, Ali, two years older.

‘Wa Salaam, Jiddu.’

He hugged each of them in turn and asked them to sit on his bed. ‘We shall have breakfast here and while you eat I will ask questions about your riding and your tutors.’

But what he really wanted to know was about the boys and their fathers. And what he heard pleased him. In each case the father took a great deal of interest and spent several hours a week with his son. Ali spoke of how Khalid’s father had taught them to fire an arrow at a mark and hunt. Khalid recounted how they had been taught the poetry of Ibn Hamdis, which Ali’s father could recite from memory.

‘Do you like his poetry?’

Ali nodded vigorously, Khalid made a face. Their grandfather burst out laughing. ‘I see that Ali is a sentimental man, much given to romance, while Khalid is more interested in weaponry.’

‘Jiddu,’ replied Khalid, ‘Ali thinks we will be forced to leave Siqilliya one day, just like Ibn Hamdis. If that is so, what use is poetry? I think we must learn to fight so that we can defend ourselves. I will not see my family slaughtered like goats at festival time.’

Idrisi looked at them closely. He saw how carefully they ate the sheep’s-milk yogurt and bread that had been placed before them. Allah had been kind. The boys were tall and resembled their fathers. Ali’s ear lobes reminded Idrisi of his own father. He liked and approved of his grandsons. ‘Jiddu,’ asked Ali in a soft voice, ‘in your book do you explain why the mountain in Catania breathes fire? Last month the villagers who live below it packed their belongings and ran away. But after a few fireballs, the mountain went to sleep again and the villagers returned looking somewhat foolish. Why does it happen? My father says it’s because Allah is angry at the sins being committed by the Nazarenes against the Believers.’

‘If that were the case, my sons, why would he be punishing us? It’s our people who live in that region. I have not fully investigated this matter, but I am sure it has something to do with how this Earth came into being.’

‘But it was Allah who ordered the Earth to come into being,’ said Khalid with a trembling voice, which suddenly reminded Idrisi of Walid at that age, intense and questioning.

‘When your uncle Walid, who I hope will return home one day so that he can see both of you… when he was ten or eleven years of age we were in a large boat not far from Catania. And the fire-mountain became very active and the sea very rough and I thought we might not survive. But it did not last long and we came to shore safely. Walid asked the same question and I gave the same reply. And he then said what you just told me, young Khalid. So I told him a story that the Greeks used to tell in olden times about the fire-mountain. Are you interested?’

The shining eyes of his grandsons encouraged him to go on.

‘A long, long time ago, the Greeks did not believe that there was only one Allah. They believed in many different gods. The Sultan of their gods was Zeus, who lived on Mount Olympus together with his fellow-gods and goddesses. The people on Earth resented the power of the gods. Why should only they be immortal? Why should they get the best things on earth and transport them to Mount Olympus? So it came about that Mother Earth decided that two giant twins, the Aloeids, who grew six feet taller each year, should steal the food that made the gods immortal, banish them from Olympus and rule the world themselves. Not a bad idea, eh? They captured Ares, the god of war, in Thrace and locked him in an iron chest.