The Journeyer

shameful or sinister that would require concealment in a lot of vocal weeds. I did not know why Minister Pao should be speaking so haltingly. Neither did I know why I was being suspicious of that fractured oratory. But I was. He was saying something that I was not supposed to grasp. I was sure of it. And, as it turned out, I was right.

When I finally got loose of him that day, I went to my own rooms and to the closet which I let Nostril use for his pallet chamber. He was sleeping at that moment, though it was only midafternoon. I shook him and said:

“You have not enough work to do, slovenly slave, so I have thought of a job for you.”

In truth, the slave was lately having quite an indolent life. My father and uncle, having no need for him, had relinquished his services entirely to me. But I was so well served by the maids Buyantu and Biliktu that I employed Nostril only for such things as buying me a wardrobe of suitable Kithai-style clothing, and keeping it well stocked and in good order, and occasionally to groom and saddle a horse for me. Between times, Nostril did not do much roaming about or mischief making. He seemed to have subdued his former nasty habits and natural inquisitiveness. He spent most of his time in his closet, except when he ventured as far as the palace kitchens to seek a meal, or, when I invited him, to dine with me in my chambers. I did not allow that often, for the girls were clearly repelled by his appearance and uncomfortable in the role of Mongols waiting upon a mere slave.

Now he came awake, grumbling, “Bismillah, master,” and yawning so that even his dreadful nose hole seemed to gape wider.

I said sternly, “Here am I, busy all the day, while my slave slumbers. I am supposed to be evaluating the Khakhan’s courtiers by talking to them face to face, but you could do even better behind their backs.”

He mumbled, “I gather, master, that you wish me to snoop about among their servants and attendants. But how? I am an outlander and a newcomer, and my grasp of the Mongol tongue is still imperfect.”

“There are many outlanders among the domestic staff. Prisoners taken from every land. The servants’ talk belowstairs must be a Babel of languages. And I know very well that your one nostril is adept at sniffing out gossip and scandal.”

“I am honored that you ask me, master, but—”

“I am not asking. I am commanding. You are henceforth to spend all your spare time, of which you have an ample measure, mingling with the servants and your fellow slaves.”

“Master, to be honest, I am fearful of wandering about these halls. I might blunder into the Fondler’s precincts.”

“Do not talk back or I will take you there myself. Hear me. Every evening from now on, you and I will sit down and you will repeat to me every least morsel of tattle and tale you have heard.”

“About anything? Everything? Most of the talk is trivial.”

“Everything. But right now I am interested to know all I can find out about the Minister of Lesser Races, the Han lord named Pao Nei-ho. Whenever you can subtly turn the conversation to that subject, do so. But subtly. Meanwhile, I shall want everything else you hear, as well. There is no foretelling what tidbit may be of value to me.”

“Master Marco, I must make some respectful demur in advance. I am not so handsome now as I once was, when I could beguile even princesses to blurt their innermost—”

“Oh, that imbecilic old lie again! Nostril, you and all the world know that you have always been damnably ugly, and you never once so much as touched the hem of a princess’s gown!”

Undeterred, he persisted, “On the other hand, you have at your command two pretty maids who could easily employ their comeliness for come-hitherness. They are far better fitted for wheedling secrets out of—”

“Nostril,” I said patiently. “You will spy for me because I tell you to, and I need give no other reason. However, I will mention just this. It apparently has not occurred to you, but it has to me, that those two maids are very likely spying on my doings. Watching my every move and reporting it. Remember, it was the son of the Khakhan, on the orders of the Khakhan, who gave me the girls.”

I always spoke of them as “the girls” when speaking to others, because to use both their names every time would have been unwieldy, and I did not speak of them as “the servants” because they were rather more than that to me, but I would not speak of them as “the concubines” because that seemed to me a slightly derogatory term. In private, however, I addressed them separately as Buyantu and Biliktu, for I had early learned to tell them apart. Although when dressed they were identical, I now knew their individualities of expression and gesture. Undressed, although still identical even to the dimples in their cheeks, the dimples at their elbows and those especially winsome dimples on either side of the base of their spines, the twins were more easily identifiable. Biliktu had a sprinkle of freckles on the underswell of her left breast, and Buyantu had a tiny scar on her upper right thigh from some childhood mishap.

I had taken note of those things on our very first night together, and of some other things as well. The girls were both nicely shaped and, not being Muslims, were complete in all their private parts. In general, they were built like other mature females I had known, except that they were a trifle shorter in the leg and a trifle less indented at the waistline than, say, Venetian and Persian women are. But their one most intriguing difference from women of other races was the matter of their inguinal hair. They had the usual dark triangle in the usual place—the han-mao, they called it, their “little warmer”—but it was not a curly or bushy tuft. Through some quirk of nature, Mongol women—at least those I have known—have an exceptionally smooth escutcheon; the hair lies as flat and neat there as on the pelt of a cat. When earlier lying with a woman, I had sometimes amused myself (and her) by twining and twiddling my fingers in her little warmer; with Buyantu or Biliktu, I stroked and petted it as I would a kitten (and made her purr like one).

On my first night in my private apartments, the twins had made it plain that they expected me to take one of them to bed with me. When they bathed me, they also stripped and bathed themselves, and most fastidiously washed my and their dan-tian, our “pink places,” our private parts. When they had dusted me and themselves with fragrant powders, they slipped into dressing gowns of silk so sheer that their little warmers were still quite visible, and the girl I would come to recognize as Buyantu asked me, straight out:

“Will you be desiring children of us, Master Marco?”

Involuntarily I blurted, “Dio me varda, no!” She could not have understood the words, but evidently could not mistake the meaning, for she nodded and went on:

“We have procured fern seed, which is the best preventive of conception. Now, as you know, master, we are both of twenty-two-karat quality, and of course are virgins. So we have been speculating all afternoon as to which of us will have the honor of being first qing-du chu-kai—awakened to womanhood—by our handsome new master.”

Well, I was pleased that they were not, like so many virgins, dreading the event. Indeed, they seemed to have been, in a sisterly way, contending for precedence, for Buyantu added, “As it happens, master, I am the elder of the two.”

Biliktu laughed and told me, “By a matter of minutes only, according to our mother. But all our lives, Elder Sister has been claiming privilege on that account.”

Buyantu shrugged and said, “One of us must have the first night, and the other wait for the second. If you would prefer not to make the choice yourself, master, we could draw straws.”

I said airily, “Far be it from me to leave delight to chance. Or to discriminate between two such compelling attractions. You will both be first.”

Buyantu said chidingly, “We are virgins, but we are not ignorant.”

“We helped raise our two younger brothers,” said Biliktu.

“So, while bathing you, we saw that you are normally equipped in your dan-tian,” said Buyantu. “Bigger than boys in that respect, of course, but not multiplied.”

“Therefore,” said Biliktu, “you can be in only one place at a time. How can you pretend that we both could be first?”

“The bed is beautifully commodious,” I said. “We will all three lie together and—”

“That would be indecent!”

They both looked so shocked that I smiled. “Come, come. It is well-known that men sometimes disport themselves with more than one woman at a time.”

“But—but those are concubines of long experience, long past modesty, and of no embarrassing relation. Master Marco, we are sisters, and this is our first jiao-gou, and we will … that is to say, we cannot … in each other’s presence …