The Janissary Tree

Mahmut rocked about, his eyes closed.

“He said—hee hee hee—he said—ah ha ha—“Well in that case I accept the challenge and you can use your own handkerchief!” Hee hee hee!”

The Valide Sultan, who had not laughed for several years, felt carried along by her son’s laughter. It was many years since she had been to a party, but she knew how funny men could look together.

Sultan Mahmut simmered down first, with an occasional snort of hilarity interrupting his story.

“After that, I had to separate them. The Pole came away very politely. I talked to him, and let him go. Derentsov was snarling by the time I got to him—jabbered about infringement of his diplomatic rights and all that. I let him rant and then I said my piece about duels and the law, just as I’d told the Polish ambassador. I said that the mark of a civilised nation was its respect for the individual, and the individual’s respect for law, and that of course I understood that other nations had different principles, but that within the empire which I control duelling is forbidden. This, I said, is why we have laws—and laws, I added, that will be strengthened and clarified in a matter of days. In the meantime, I asked only for his apology.”

“And?”

“If his release had been dependent on his apology, valide, the Russian ambassador might still be waiting in that room. I took some mumbled words—curses, I’m sure—as a sign of contrition, and told him so. Then I suggested he go home, and walked out.”

“Flute, mon bravel You are very clever!”

The valide took her son by the ears, and gave him a kiss.

[ 80 ]

Before Yashim could recover himself, Eugenia had pointed with an imperious finger.

“You could try under the bed,” she said.

Yashim needed no second bidding. He fairly dived for the bed, and wriggled beneath it. He saw Eugenia approach the door in her bare feet; she plucked something from the bed as she passed. A silk peignoir swished through the air and swirled around her ankles.

There was a knock on the door. Yashim strained to hear, but all he could make out was Eugenia’s ‘nyet—nyet’ and a few murmured words. The door closed, and the feet stood again by the edge of the bed. Then the peignoir slid to the floor in a soft cloud, and the feet disappeared.

Eugenia was sitting in bed, right on top of him. She was waiting for her Turk to emerge. She wore a little smile, and nothing else.

Feeling ridiculous, Yashim scrambled to his feet and bowed.

“Forgive me, Excellency,” he said. “I lost my way. I had no idea—”

Eugenia pouted. “No idea, Monsieur Ottomane? You disappoint me. Come.”

She ran her hand down between her breasts. By the jewels, Yashim thought, she is lovely: lovelier than the girls in the sultan’s harem. Such white skin! And her hair—black as shining ebony.

She drew one knee up and the silk sheet rode up, exposing a long, slender thigh.

She wants me, Yashim thought. And I want her. Her skin: he longed to reach out and stroke it. He longed to inhale her strange, foreign fragrance, figure her curves with his own hands, touch her dark lips against his own.

Forbidden. This is the path of passion and regret.

This is where you cannot go. Not if you value your sanity.

“You don’t understand,” said Yashim desperately. “I’m a…a…” What was that word the English boy had used? It came back: “I’m a freelance.”

Eugenia looked puzzled.

“You want me to pay?” She laughed incredulously and shook her curls. Not only her curls. “What if I don’t?”

Yashim was confused. She saw the confusion on his face, and held up her hands.