“My death...” Safiye began to realize.
“Yes, yes!” Murad said, and rose to flee the room. “Kill her!” he cried to the mutes. “Kill her first of all. I cannot endure her faithless presence in this world one moment longer.”
“I am condemned, then, on suspicion. Mere suspicion of. . .” She swallowed and picked up her defense as a reckless young soldier does his shield when he prepares to dive into battle. “Is not the vow of my eternal faithfulness enough for you, my love?”
Murad looked at her for the first time, seeing through the veils as a lover can see through any garment. He wavered on his fleeing feet. His head raised itself to nod in violent emotion. But then he tore his eyes away and shook his head instead.
“But all ten days,” Safiye said. “All ten days when I thought the world would end without you, Esmikhan and I were under the most careful protection of Veniero—Abdullah, the khadim here.”
I hadn’t the slightest desire to say anything in defense of Baffo’s daughter. But she had shifted the blame to me and I refused to take it, particularly not at the verge of death. I had to say something, with five pairs of mute eyes on me and only heaven to prove my innocence against the devilish enticement of her beauty, leaking even through veils.
“I have enjoyed the baths of Inonu,” I said, “and this puts me in memory of a way Allah may be called in to try the proof of guilt in this case. It is customarily reported that an innocent woman may walk through a bath full of men with no ill effect while the guilty—”
I looked at Sofia Baffo and she parted her veils ever so slightly to meet my stare. Her eyes over the film of silk were as hard as almond shells. I had to look away first.
“—The guilty have their shame exposed.”
Well, Baffo’s daughter’s galliard to the tune of “Come to the Budding Grove” just might bring a wind into a men’s bath strong enough to blow her skirts over her brazen head.
I felt rather than saw a shift of hope under Esmikhan’s veils beside me. She believed in the custom and would be willing to try it. A pain in my belly—above my scars—suddenly prayed she could. I cared not for my life, not for Baffo’s daughter. But all at once, I was fighting for my lady’s honor—and for her life. I urged: “My lords have heard of the custom, perhaps?”
I read my master’s face. He didn’t particularly believe in this superstition, but he was a man of violent justice. He did believe in allowing victims to prove their innocence when possible, and was willing to fight for that possibility when not readily granted. I also read a glance of gratitude in my direction. He appreciated that my quick thinking was helping him out of an unpleasant duty.
“That is an old wives’ tale!” Murad suddenly exploded. “Only foolish women and eunuchs would believe such prattle.”‘
I’d missed what had passed between Sofia Baffo and her prince. Perhaps Baffo’s daughter believed just a little too much in the wind of a man’s bath. I liked to think so, but liking didn’t help us around the fact that this proof of innocence was now rejected.
“I do not trust that eunuch,” Murad bit the words off fiercely. “I haven’t from the start. I should have killed him that first evening in the mabein at Kutahiya.”
I saw my master struggle to gain control from the brief flinch that lashing caused him. I was, after all, his responsibility. He touched the dagger that pointed at my heart.
Murad went on: “Besides. One eunuch against a dozen brigands. For ten full days. Brigands with no honor, with axes of their own revenge to grind. Even if he were a giant of a man, I cannot, I cannot believe this Abdullah could defend you.”
Yes, kill us all, I thought, bowing my head. I’ve wanted to die for six months and now—well, better late than never. Now is as good a time as any, than to face such continued insults from such as calls himself a man.
Beneath her borrowed veils, Safiye moistened her lips. It was an invisible gesture, but one that bound the magic of shared quilts even tighter between the two.
“My vows are of no use,” she said (and one could hear the delicious moistness of her pouting lips in those words). “Neither are the tokens of my body because, as Allah is my judge, you know I gave them all to you—gladly, joyfully—on the night of Idal-Adha.”
Murad turned from the memory with a moan as if it had struck him a physical blow.
“Save in that it yearns to return to yours as a pigeon to its roost, in my body there are no proofs,” Safiye reiterated. “And yet in Esmikhan’s there are.” She paused to let the meaning of her words sink in.
Then she continued: “My prince, your sister and I shared this trial together. And, by the mercy of Allah, we also share in the deliverance—unscathed, by my life. Prove my faithfulness by hers. Please. Marry her to the honorable Pasha as planned. Look for the tokens of virginity. I swear by my honor and hers, you will find them. Then you will know for certain that what I say is true.
“If the marriage bed is not stained, then, yes, you will have every right to kill us, all three of us, and with perfect conscience. If, however, you find the tokens present, you will know that our guardian, Abdullah, did not receive the wound on his arm in vain as he put his body between us and those who would have defiled us. You will know that by his diligence, and by the mercy of the All-Knowing One, we were spared the fate you imagine for us. You will know that you may reclaim us without shame or dishonor, but with twice the joy that was all
