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I am well aware that this is a statement lacking in logic. In this my account I labour to serve truth; logic I leave to the schoolmen. She was smiling at me now and there sprang into my mind the unruly notion of yet another first time, and I stumbled in my discourse, saying I was not sure why they, why she, had wanted me to stay but I was glad that I had done so and would remember this evening for a very long time to come. I could think of nothing further to add to this, but only to thank them, which I did, with a full heart, and I raised my cup and drank to them and wished them luck.
Then Ozgur got to his feet and he smiled and looked at me fully, which I could not remember him doing before, and began speaking in his hesitant and strangely accented Greek. They had all wanted me to stay but it was certainly Nesrin who had taken my hand and she had decided this herself, why he could not tell, it would have to be asked from her. He was only a man, what did he know? There was laughter at this and Nesrin looked aside, but not as one displeased. In any case, Ozgur said, it was something only she among them could have done. But they all felt glad I had stayed and they thanked me for bringing them here and making their fortunes and they would never forget me.
Still on his feet, he glanced around him and said some words in a low tone, and the others rose and they all moved from the table and formed a line before me and they bowed all together as I had shown them how to do and they began counting, but aloud and in their own language. They did it exactly, perfectly, the bowing and the counting and the straightening up. And every one of their faces had a smile for me.
I was greatly moved by this because I knew it for an expression of friendship and respect and because by making a joke of the ceremony in that way they were seeking to show me that I had been in the wrong when I tried to compel them. And I had thought them savages. No doubt it was the fault of the wine but I felt some start of tears and thought of making another speech but decided to give them a song instead. I chose one written by a great hero of mine, the troubadour Bernard of Ventadour, born the son of a castle servant, whose talents won him honour in many courts and made his name famous.
When grass grows green and leaves show forth And trees are bright with blossom, And lark lifts up his voice, Such joy it gives me, Joy in my lady, and in myself joy…
As I sang I looked often at Nesrin and I saw by her face she was held by my singing, and this brought more tenderness and joy into my voice.
There was much applause when I finished and they asked for another song and would not be satisfied till I agreed. This time I chose one I had composed myself, very different in mood.
The one I most desire
Is cold towards me.
She does not summon me now.
Why is she so changed?
If she love me not with her body
At least let her show me kindness…
The heartbreak of this and the abjectness of it, and my heightened feelings, and Nesrin's attentive face before me, combined to break my voice a little as I sang – it was sometimes a fault in me when I sang before others that I allowed my feelings to come too close to the words I was singing and so the even tenor of the voice was threatened.
I did not sing more, though they wanted me to and loudly asked it. I could tell from their words and faces that my singing had moved them, the more so perhaps as they had not known of this talent of mine and so had been taken by surprise.
"This night stays in our memory for ever," Temel said, and he raised his cup to me and I touched it with mine and we drank together. I saw how they all enjoyed the wine, though the women drank less. I made some joking remark about the Prophet's forbidding of it, and they said they were not Moslems but Yazidis. This was a religion quite new to me and I was about to enquire into the tenets of its faith when it occurred to me that it was a question I might put to Nesrin, if ever I got the opportunity to engage her in talk when no one else was by.
The opportunity came sooner than expected. It was growing late, the gathering had been a happy one for all of us, and when we began to bid one another good night it was in friendly and affectionate fashion, both the men and the women reaching to take my hand and the men also patting me on the shoulder.
I do not know exactly how it came about, this was a night of blessings.
I waited for the others to pass first, Nesrin hung back a little, and so it happened that we two found ourselves alone together at the door and standing rather close. The time was very short if I wanted to keep her there – a matter of moments. I wished only to delay her, to delay the parting a little, I had no other thought. The Yazidis would not serve as a topic, this proximity had come by chance, it was not a moment for discussing religion. My slow-wittedness makes the blood rise to my face now, as I remember it and confess it. In my dumbness I nearly lost her, nearly let her leave in silence and rejoin the others, who I thought perhaps might be waiting outside. She herself said nothing. She looked at me briefly then looked away. After a moment she made a movement towards the door…
"How did you become such a marvellous dancer?"
She smiled a little and I had the feeling that she was relieved that I had found some words. "My mother… she also was a dancer. She teach me when I am a child, tall like this." She raised her hand to show me the height from the floor. "I start to dance when I start to walk."
"Your dancing is beautiful." Everything about you is beautiful, I wanted to say, your eyes, your throat, your hair. But I did not find the courage. It was the first time she and I had ever been alone together. I had often wished for this and imagined how it might be. But in that wishing I had always been ready of speech, at my ease, masterful – even lordly. I had not been this present Thurstan, tongue-tied, woefully lacking in address, gazing at a dancing girl with a nude stomach as if she were a princess in a courtly fable.
She waited a moment longer then passed through the door out on to the cobbled space before the gatehouse. There were guards at the gate and two lamplighters with their ladders against the i
"There was moonlight when first I saw you," I said. "Moonlight and firelight together. Why did you take my hand tonight? Why did you want me to stay?"
I saw her shake her head a little as if perplexed. "You do not know? It ca
I was obscurely disappointed by this explanation. Was it no more than that? I began to move in the direction of the stables where I had left my horse. "You do not tell me all the truth," I said. "You speak as if all of you had decided on it and you were the one chosen. But that is not so. I was there, I was watching. The others were already dancing and playing. You decided without them to come and take my hand. You decided alone."
She stopped at this and turned to me and tossed her head at me like an impatient pony. "I tell you what is true," she said. "I say what is in my mind. Thurstan Bey, you are important man and pass your days in a palace but there is much you not understand. I do not say who decided, I say why the others could not do it." There seemed to me a lack of logic in this, but her eyes had a light of battle in them and I did not feel equal to drawing her attention to this lack. And there was something else now occupying my mind. Absorbed as I had been in the talk between us, I realised only now that Nesrin was going the wrong way: instead of turning to rejoin her companions she had turned with me towards the stables. Did she know this? It was probably a mistake, she did not know the precincts of the palace very well, she might believe I was accompanying her when in fact she was accompanying me. Immediately I was beset with questions – always a weakness with me. What would a man of honour do? What would a man do who aspired to knighthood? What would Alicia expect of her splendid Thurstan? She would expect him to assume it was a mistake and point the mistake out with utmost promptitude. In that case Nesrin and I would part there and then, a thought I found difficult to endure. Or perhaps I could offer to escort her back to her sleeping quarters. But if it was not a mistake, what then? Nesrin would be wounded. Was it an ideal of knighthood to wound the weak and frail?