Giulia, seeing my rage melt into resigned dejection, summoned fresh courage and her eyes glistened with tears as she replied, “It was for your own sake, beloved Michael. And then people believed in my for- tunetelling only because I was, as they thought, a virgin. If I’d betrayed my secret earlier you would have seduced me and then wearied of me, as others have done. I wanted to make sure; and now that you’ve grown accustomed to my eyes you must admit that from now on you could find no delight in ordinary women and their cheap love. Henceforth we will trust one another and have no secrets. And God help you if you so much as glance at another woman, now that I’ve consented to be yours.”
Mustafa ben-Nakir burst into loud laughter, though I could not imagine why, for Giulia’s eyes rested tenderly on me. I had never hoped that she could look upon me with such desire. And so I humbled my heart and said, “I forgive you, Giulia, and I shall strive to see you as you really are. It’s true that for me you’ve been transformed from a golden chalice to a cracked earthenware pot, but the hard crust of truth is more wholesome than the freshest wheaten loaf. Let us share this crust together.”
Giulia answered readily, “Ah, Michael, how deeply I love you when you speak and feel like this! But you have yet to learn how sweet a drink may be contained in a cracked earthenware pot. I think we need no further help from Mustafa ben-Nakir, who must have a great deal to attend to at the palace, so let us detain him no longer.”
She tried to thrust him forth, but he drew out his Persian book with the intention, no doubt, of declaiming an edifying nuptial poem. But Giulia drove him out at last, slammed the grille, locked it, and drew the heavy curtain. Her face glowed with passion as she turned to me, her eyes shone like contrasting jewels, and she was so breathtaking in her beauty that I could not but recall the disappointments she had caused me. I clenched my teeth and slapped her hard upon the cheek. She was so staggered at my action that she sank down powerless at my feet. Overwhelmed, I caught her head in my hands and kissed her-kissed her passionately and without ceasing-and we lay and loved all night.
When at length I lay resting, my swollen cheek on her breast, reason twoke and I said, “Giulia, we must think of the future. If you want ne as I want you, it will be best for me to free you from slavery and narry you according to the law of Islam. Thereafter you’ll be a free voman and at no one’s orders, even should I become the Sultan’s lave.”
Giulia sighed deeply, and this sigh was even more enchanting to ny ears than the quick, passionate breaths of approaching ecstasy. She cissed my cheek with her soft lips and said, “Ah, Michael, in my heart. always meant to make you marry me, at least according to the law ›f Islam. But you can’t know what joy you give me by saying this of ‘our own free will. Beloved Michael, my whole heart flows out to
She went on talking, but I slept, with her soft hair over my face. fext morning all went as planned. In the presence of the cadi and bur approved witnesses I first gave Giulia her freedom and then de-:lared that I took her to wife, repeating the first sura to confirm both tcts. Cadi and witnesses received lavish gifts, and Abu el-Kasim gave t banquet to which both known and unknown guests were bidden-is many as could find room in house and courtyard.
“Eat till you choke,” was Abu’s constant exhortation. “Eat till you jurst, and take no thought for a poor old man without even a child to;are for him in his old age.”
I ignored this customary lamentation, knowing that he could well ifford the entertainment and spare something for the poor as well, ind in my overflowing joy I sent some of the good food to the Spanish prisoners toiling at the demolition of Penjon fortress. Giulia received nany presents; Khaireddin himself sent her a golden comb with ivory:eeth and Andy gave her ten gold pieces. Looking at me doubtfully with his round gray eyes he said, “I wonder whether you’ve been wise n marrying this wayward woman? Her eyes alone are a warning, and [should be afraid lest my son inherit them.”
I thought he was envious of my happiness and perhaps even jealous}f Giulia, so I clapped him on the shoulder and said, “Have no fear, ny dear brother Andy. I’ve made my bed and will lie on it, and you mustn’t think that my marriage will part us. We shall be brothers as jefore. My house shall be your home always and I shall never be ashamed of having a simple fellow like yourself for a friend, even should my intelligence and learning raise me to a loftier position than you can ever reach.”
In my present gentle mood I was moved to tears by my own speech, and putting my arms about his broad shoulders I assured him of my friendship, until Giulia found me and caught me by the elbow. To the sound of drums and tambourines we walked together into the bridal chamber. But when I would have caught her in my arms she pushed me away telling me not to crush her lovely wedding dress. She then began to finger all the presents and count the givers until I was thoroughly weary, and only then did she let me kiss her and help her to undress. But her body was now known to me and could no longer give me the same joy. My head ached from the heavy incense, and once we were in bed I was content to lie with my hand on her breast and listen silently to her endless chatter.
It seemed to me that all this had happened before, and half in a dream I began wondering who she really was, and what it was that linked me to her. She came of an alien race whose language and way of thinking were different from mine. So immersed was I in my somber mood that I failed to notice when she ceased talking. But suddenly she raised herself in bed and stared at me with a look of fear.
“What are you thinking of, Michael?” she asked in a low voice. “Something unpleasant about me, no doubt.”
I could not lie to her, and answered with a shudder, “Giulia, I was remembering my first wife, Barbara- remembering how even dead stones came to life when we were together. And then she was burned as a witch, and so I feel very lonely in the world in spite of lying here beside you with your lovely breast under my hand.”
Giulia was not angry as I had expected; she stared at me curiously and her face took on an unfamiliar look. With a faint sigh she said, “Look into my eyes, Michael!”
If I had wanted to I could not have freed myself from those eyes, gazing at me under their lowered lids. She spoke in a low voice, and although I hardly listened to her I knew what she said, “You’ve doubted my ability to see things in sand, Michael, but as a child I could do the same with water. Perhaps I hardly know myself how much of it is genuine and how much pretense and imagination. But now look deep into my eyes as if into a bottomless well. Then answer me. Which lives in you now, your dead wife or I?”
I gazed and could no longer turn away my head. Giulia’s strange eyes seemed to grow to the size and depth of pools; I could feel my inner self open out and flow into their darkness. Time seemed to halt and then roll backward until all was one engulfing vortex. I seemed to be looking into the green eyes of my wife Barbara and to see her face full of ineffable, mournful tenderness. So real did she appear that I felt I might have touched her cheek. But I would not try.
I stared long at this face, while yet aware that Barbara had been dead many years and that her body had been burned to ashes in the market place of a German city. I was aware of pain-a pain so intense as to seem an ecstasy surpassing any bodily joy. For in seeing again one who had been reft from me by force and whom I had long mourned and missed, I perceived with agonized clarity that her face had nothing more to say to me-that it belonged to another world and another existence-and that I was no longer the man who had shared those two short years with her. My experiences and mistakes, my good and evil actions had raised an insurmountable wall between us, and she would not even have recognized me now. It was useless to recall her among the living. In my heart I had lost her, and forever.
I neither spoke her name nor put out my hand to touch her, and after a little time her yearning face faded into the grave countenance of Giulia. At this singular point in time something happened in my heart that made me feel I understood Giulia better than before, and I believed I really knew her. Then the mist faded; I lay once more in the familiar room and raised my hand to stroke her face. She closed her eyes and drew her brows together with a sigh.
“Where were you, Michael?” she whispered, but I could not answer her. Without a word I took her in my arms and in the warmth of her I knew the boundless solitude of the human heart. My anguish of soul was too keen for me to feel tenderness or desire. I shivered, comfortless. Passing my hand over that lovely body I thought how one day it would grow old, how the soft smooth skin would wither, the round neck shrivel, and the perfumed hair turn dull and gray. So also my desire would fade and dissolve into nothingness. If I loved her, I must love her simply for being the only creature in the world who was near to me, though even this might be a cruel illusion.
As summer neared its end, Khaireddin was satisfied that he had at last consolidated his position in Algeria, and he began to prepare the long-planned embassy to Sultan Suleiman. For as long as confirmation from the High Porte
