In front of their eyes entire neighbourhoods went up in smoke. Rooms in which mothers had given birth, where circumcisions were celebrated, life was conceived and the sickly drew their last breaths – these places with the memories they held turned to cinders. Nothing remained except a lingering warmth and, strewn about on the ground, clothes, shoes, trifles, a piece of a brick that was once a wall. They came to a halt at a thoroughfare where the fire had hit the worst. Sinan, taken aback, asked to be brought down. As the Chief Royal Architect he had worked hard to prevent this calamity, having the streets paved, checking the buildings. All for naught.
There were Janissaries idling, humping cases, talking to people, but with leaden steps, almost reluctant. Sinan marched up to one of them – a man sitting on a piece of timber, gazing around dully.
‘Why aren’t you doing something?’
The Janissary, not expecting to be questioned and not recognizing the architect, snapped out of his reverie. ‘What?’
‘Why are you not helping the people?’
‘I am,’ said the man morosely.
Another Janissary edged nearer. He said they had not been quenching the flames because they were waiting to hear from their agha, who was sick in bed.
At this Sinan’s face darkened. ‘What orders do you need to hear? How can you hold off when the city is in flames?’
While Sinan was talking with the Janissaries, the mahout and the elephant, distracted by a sound, veered into a side street. Further down the road Jahan saw two women screaming at each other, beside themselves. From neighbours he learned they were the wives of a merchant who was away travelling. When the fire broke out, the women had run out of the house, grabbing their children, each assuming that the other had snatched the newborn baby.
Jahan looked at the burning building and at the crying women.
‘You wait for me here. I’m going in,’ he said to Chota. He wouldn’t dream of taking the elephant with him, knowing how scared he was of the flames.
Slowly, Jahan made his way towards the smouldering house. He took every step with the utmost care, listening out for the slightest sound. Once he crossed the threshold, the flames assaulted him from all sides. The upper storey above the front rooms had collapsed, but the building was still intact at the back. Jahan saw a brass candleholder and snatched it out of habit, even though it was of little worth. A few steps ahead he got luckier: an empty inkpot of gold and emerald. Coughing and rasping, Jahan fumbled through curtains of smoke, his eyes watering so much he could barely see where he was going. He dodged a burning timber that fell right down in front of him. The wood hit his shoulder, knocking him down. There was no way he could go any further.
Suddenly, a soft coil of flesh grabbed him by the waist and lifted him up.
‘Chota! How did you get here?’ Jahan exclaimed.
In lieu of a response the elephant led him towards the depths of the house – or what was left of it. Chota moved his ears as though catching an imperceptible sound. The animal’s sensitive feet must have been burning, but the mahout would not think of that until later.
Jahan could not open his mouth for fear of swallowing more smoke. Every breath hurt. Taking off his jacket, he wrapped it around his face. Chota shoved him from behind, gently but firmly. Hedged in by flames, Jahan lurched forward into the second room, then steadied himself. The elephant waited behind him.
There it was – the cradle. Its gauzy tulle covering must have helped the baby to breathe. Jahan grabbed the bundle, without checking whether the child was alive. With one hand the baby, clinging to life, clutched at Jahan. It had cried so much its voice was gone; its rosebud mouth was closed. Yet its strength was surprising, and it must have been contagious, too, for both Chota and Jahan were calmer now.
By the time Chota and Jahan emerged, the number of people watching on the street had tripled. Sinan and the apprentices, too, were there, having heard the story of the beast that had plodded into a burning house. The mother of the baby dashed towards them and plucked the baby away from Jahan. Then she began praying, laughing, thanking, crying, trying to kiss Jahan’s hand, Chota’s skin, all at once, with no fear of being trampled by the elephant.
Jahan tottered towards Sinan, who was greeting him with open arms. ‘I am furious at you …’ he said, ‘but proud, son, so proud.’
The apprentices embraced him. Even so, Jahan could feel a coldness exuding from them. He had outshone them, and this they hadn’t liked.
It turned out the Chief Janissary Agha had really been ill. Yet that was not the reason why he had delayed sending instructions to the soldiers. The army, demanding an increase in their pay, had seen the fire as an opportunity to prove how essential they were. As the Grand Vizier had been slow in granting the rise, the agha had been slow in giving the command to his Janissaries to put out the flames.
The mahout and the elephant headed to the master’s home, smothered in soot and reeking of cinders. Jahan wrapped Chota’s feet. Two of his nails were broken, bleeding. He had patches of burned skin all over. The scars from that night would remain and never heal.
Later on, from Sinan’s garden, Jahan stood gazing at the city below, wraiths of smoke whirling here and there. At dawn there were no birds chirping, no hearths crackling, no seagulls swooping; everything had plunged into silence. It had become nippy; the cold felt strange following the heat of the night.
After the fire died out, the extent of the devastation was clear. With the exception of the Jewish quarter, which was built of stone, street after street had been razed.
‘The fire was our teacher,’ Sinan said when they all gathered again. ‘He taught us a lesson.’
That same week Sinan went to the palace and obtained the permissions that he needed. Sleeping little, he drew plans. Streets would be enlarged by half a cubit on each side. There would be no house taller than two storeys. More brick and stone, instead of wood, would be used, he decided.
No sooner were the new rules introduced, however, than people began to defy them. The fire had been a teacher, true. But Istanbul, where forgetting was easier than remembering, never learned its lesson.
One evening Sangram came to see Jahan with a bowl of sutlach, just as he had done so many moons ago. He was very old and frail, and every now and then he shook his head uncontrollably, as if arguing with some invisible companion. Jahan took the treat, thanking him. As he watched him eat, Sangram asked, ‘Did you hear what Captain Crazyhead has done this time?’
Jahan almost dropped his spoon. ‘What?’
Captain Gareth’s fleet had run into an armada. In the ensuing combat the seaman bit the hand that had fed him all these years and turned traitor. Starting on the side of the Ottomans, he had ended toasting the Pope. Knowing he would be gutted alive if caught, he had fled the Ottoman territory. He could not return to Istanbul. Not that he minded. Having been given sanctuary by the papacy, he was quite content with his new banner, hunting for Ottoman sailors.
When Jahan heard this he was dumbstruck, flooded with disturbing memories. Captain Gareth was the sole reason he had ended up in the royal menagerie. It had been the man’s plan to disguise him as an animal-tamer and place him a stone’s-throw away from the riches in the seraglio. A plan that had worked seamlessly once the sailors in his command had got rid of the real mahout – hurled into cold waters, just like that. ‘Never liked the chap’s wits,’ the Captain had said by way of explanation, though Jahan never understood how he could have disliked this man, who spoke not a word of Turkish or English and stared at the waves all day long. Inside the hold they carried merchandise from Hindustan and a white elephant on the brink of death. Jahan was only a cabin boy, escaping his stepfather. He was a mere youngster from a town in Anatolia. What did he know about elephants? As he stood there, remembering all of this, another thought occurred to Jahan. Why was Sangram suddenly telling him about Captain Gareth?
‘So you knew …’ Jahan whispered.
‘How could I not?’ Sangram said. ‘You told
me you were from Hindustan. You spoke not a word of any of our languages and the stories you told made no sense.’
‘Why didn’t you inform on me? You could have told everyone, “This boy is an impostor, he is lying.” ’
Sangram smiled. ‘I was going to … but then I changed my mind. I didn’t want you to suffer. You seemed like you’d had your share of hardships – why bring more pain?’
Jahan stood up, kissed the man’s bony hand.
‘You were only a lad; now look at you,’ Sangram said, overwhelmed with tenderness.
Jahan bit his lip. How bizarre it was. While he had been running after things that were never going to happen and resenting life for the gifts it had denied him, there had been people supporting him without drawing attention to themselves. They had given and expected nothing in return.
Sultan Selim was determined to enjoy, revive and expand the menagerie. Unlike his father, who had barely acknowledged the existence of his animal subjects, the new sovereign took an interest in their lives. He often visited the wild beasts, sometimes on his own, mostly in the company of his courtiers. In particular, he was enthralled by the big cats – tigers, cheetahs and lions – and, for a reason unbeknown to anyone, had taken a shine to the ostrich. The apes aroused his curiosity with their arcane sounds and gestures. Yet it was Chota he loved best. He was fond of rides atop the elephant. To this end he had ordered a larger howdah with a foldable ladder to be supplied. Chota had been presented with a new headdress: bright turquoise, lined with golden tassels and adorned with peacock feathers. To Jahan’s dismay there was an equally and ridiculously showy outfit for him – a shimmering silvery jerkin with embroidered blue tulips and a white turban. The Sultan had a penchant for ornateness – both in himself and in those around him. He liked spending time with dwarves, mutes, buffoons, preferring their company to that of his viziers and advisers with their dreary talk.
A poet and an archer, Selim was a sad, troubled man, with a neck so short as to be almost non-existent, a florid complexion and shoulders rounded as though crushed under an invisible weight. He became Sultan at the age of forty-two, no longer in his springtime. All his life he had been waiting, praying and plotting for the Ottoman throne; yet when the moment came, he was not ready. Jahan thought of him as a flickering candlelight – nervous, erratic, awaiting the wind that would one day put him out.
His brother Bayezid – his biggest rival – had been executed in Iran, leaving Selim the sole heir. That must have gratified him, one would expect. Instead, it had turned him fretful. If princes could be killed so easily, and without any remorse or recriminations, whom could he trust in this world? He drank amply. He ate voraciously. He slept with the prettiest women. He went hunting – deer, duck, partridge, wild boar. Nothing quenched his thirst. One glance at his dress was enough to see the difference between him and his father. In his passion for opulence he adorned himself with rare gems, wore refined brocade, heady perfumes. He lined his eyes with kohl, which gave his gaze a hardness that didn’t quite match his personality. That his turbans, decorated with plumes in garish colours, were taller than Sultan Suleiman’s did not escape anyone’s notice.
His many women had many children. But there was one concubine who surpassed all others and became his wife – Nurbanu the Venetian, the enchantress. The name her mother had given her was Cecilia. She said she came from a family of high standing and would have lived as a noblewoman had she not been taken as a slave by the corsairs at the age of twelve. Unfriendly mouths completed the parts of the story she left out – that though fathered by a patrician, she was born out of wedlock. Nurbanu never gave up sending letters to her relatives in Corfu and Venice. She also wrote to the Bailo, the Doge, the Senate.
In response she not only received a round of correspondence but also gifts. Like Selim himself, Nurbanu cherished splendour. Recently, upon her request, she had been sent a pair of lap-dogs from Venice, with clipped, creamy coats, that never left her side. Funny creatures they were, barking at every moving thing, unmindful of their size. Before each meal their food was tried by a taster in case some wicked soul attempted to poison them. There were quite a few who would have liked to do so.
At nights, around the fireplace, the tamers talked about her, exchanging rumours and tall tales. The code that required everyone to be silent was still observed, but not as strictly as before. Though they were careful with their choice of words and used a secret tongue, they gossiped to their heart’s content. Other things changed, too. From the courtyard of the eunuchs to the tower of the Chief Physician, from the chambers of the princes to the dormitories of the Zuluflu Baltacılar, the Halberdiers of the Tresses, the seraglio rang with sound. Every noise that had been suppressed during the reign of Suleiman was now set free, eddying round the corridors.
On days when the weather was balmy the Sultan delighted in boating with his companions, eating and drinking as they glided round the Golden Horn, sucking on musk lozenges to sweeten their breath. Selim believed that as long as his Grand Vizier Sokollu held the reins the empire would run just fine. Although he was not capable of absorbing the intricacies of the state, there was a part of him that would rather have remained a poet, or an itinerant bard, had he not been confined to the throne.
The ulema hated his ways and accused him of being a sinner. The Janissaries berated him for not leading the army from battlefield to battlefield. The people compared him with his father, finding him weak and cursing the ghost of Hurrem – which still roamed the marble halls – for giving birth to no better. Selim placated them, making endowments, distributing riches, just so they would leave him alone. Thanks to his generosity, the nasty things that were said about him were washed away like writing on wet sand – only to be written all over again a short time afterwards.
Among Selim’s closest courtiers were poets, elegists and musicians. There was a poetess called Hubbi Hatun. She could recite for hours, her eyes closed, her voice rising and falling like a seagull in the gust. There were balladeers who knew songs from all corners of the empire and could sing in a dozen languages, sending their audience from bliss to despair, from despair to bliss. There was a painter who, when he got a bit tipsy, said some day he would use his own blood for the colour red.
Jahan knew them all. They strolled through the rose gardens in their easy-going fashion, after which they would stop by the menagerie, watching and feeding the animals. They were a raucous bunch that loved to feast and roister as much as their patron did. Their visits were sudden, random. It could be at any hour of the afternoon or the evening.
One Thursday, in the dead of night, the tamers woke up to the sound of music and laughter. They blinked at each other through sleepy eyes, struggling to fathom what was going on.
‘Where are the damn servants?’ a voice boomed in the dark.
Donning their garments, they rushed out, lined up. The Sultan and three guests were there – sprightly and, by the look of things, heavily drunk.
Selim bellowed, ‘Where’s the mahout?’
Jahan took a step forward, bowed low.
‘We’ve been looking for you. We wish to ride the elephant.’
‘Now, my Sultan?’
The question was met with bursts of tittering while the Sultan glowered. Jahan mumbled his apologies and hurried to the barn. Chota grumbled, not willing to abandon the land of dreams where he was stomping merrily. Half pleading half threatening, Jahan was able to bring him out and put on the howdah.
The Sultan, the musician, the poet and the minstrel climbed up. Jahan noticed the Sultan had gained weight; he puffed as he made his way. The servants who had come with them were carrying baskets loaded with food and drink. With ropes each basket was hoisted into the howdah. Chota lifted Jahan with his trunk and placed him on his neck. In this state they began their night-time promenade.
Jahan thought they would stay inside the imperial gardens, but, as they reached the outer gate, he heard Selim say, ‘Keep going, mahout.’
‘Where, my
Lord?’
‘Go, don’t stop until I tell you.’
The guards, their eyes wide with astonishment, moved aside to let them pass. Chota, still sleepy and in an ill mood, plodded at a snail’s pace, refusing to speed up despite Jahan’s prodding. Inside the howdah, they didn’t seem to mind. They were singing. The sound of a lute filled the air. They passed through the winding streets where nothing, not even a leaf or a shadow, stirred.
‘Mahout, stop!’ ordered the Sultan.
Jahan did as told.
‘Jump down!’
This, too, Jahan did.
‘Now catch!’
Giggling like children, they lowered a basket. Inside there was a wine bottle and a cup. The Sultan said, ‘Drink!’
‘My Lord –’
‘Come on. Do you have any idea how annoying the sober are to the merry?’
Jahan filled the cup and downed it. A peal of laughter followed. The Sultan, clearly amused, said, ‘Drink another.’
So it went. Before he knew it he had consumed the whole bottle. He asked Chota to pull him up, and, as the animal did so, Jahan’s head spun like a cartwheel. He sat there, his face blotchy, his anguish hidden, until he heard the Sultan say, ‘Tell me, mahout, have you ever been in love?’
Jahan said, a little uncertainly, ‘All I know about love is that it brings heartache, your Highness.’
From the howdah came the saddest melody, fluttering in the breeze like a feather from a bird long gone. The poet recited: Behold the beauty that expands the heart within the mirror of the rose –
In that moment Jahan thought that God, who must be watching them, would understand the pain and the fear that they felt for being so small, so perishable. He clapped heartily. His forwardness, which any other time would have brought trouble, was met with laughter and joy.
All at once a howling voice pierced the air. ‘What the hell is goin’ on?’