Beyond the Gate of Worlds Read online

  “She spent the night with the crown prince,” Michael blurted in misery.

  “Ah. Ah, now it comes out!” Sir Anthony was silent for a while. Then he glanced up sharply, his eyes bright with skepticism. “But how do you know that?”

  “I saw her leaving his palace at dawn, sir.”

  “Spying on her, were you?”

  “I just happened to be there. I didn’t even know it was his palace, until I asked. He came out himself a few minutes later, and went quickly off somewhere. He looked very troubled.”

  “He should have looked troubled. He’d just found out that he might not get to be king as quickly as he’d like to be.”

  “I don’t understand, please, sir.”

  “There’s word going around town this morning that the Emir has recovered. And had sent for his son to let him know that he wasn’t quite as moribund as was generally believed.”

  Michael recoiled in surprise.

  “Recovered? Is it true?”

  Sir Anthony offered him a benign, patronizing smile.

  “So they say. But the Emir’s doctors assure us that it’s nothing more than a brief rally ir an inevitable descent. The old wolf will be dead within the week. Still, it’s rather a setback for Little Father’s immediate plans. The news of the Emir’s unanticipated awakening from his coma must rather have spoiled his morning for him.”

  “Good,” said Michael vindictively.

  Sir Anthony laughed.

  “You hate him, do you?”

  “I despise him. I loathe him. I have nothing but the greatest detestation for him. He’s a cynical amoral voluptuary and nothing more. He doesn’t deserve to be a king.”

  “Well, if it’s any comfort to you, lad, he’s not going to live long enough to become one.”

  “What?”

  “His untimely demise has been arranged. His stepmother is going to poison him at the funeral of the old Emir, if the old Emir ever has the good grace to finish dying.”

  “What? What?”

  Sir Anthony smiled.

  “This is quite confidential, you understand. Perhaps I shouldn’t be entrusting you with it just yet. But you’d have needed to find out sooner or later. We’ve organized a little coup d’etat.”

  “What? What? What?” said Michael helplessly.

  “Her Highness the Lady Serene Glory would like to put her brother on the throne instead of the prince. The brother is worthless, of course. So is the prince, of course, but at least he does happen to be the rightful heir. We don’t want to see either of them have it, actually. What we’d prefer is to have the Mansa of Mali declare that the unstable conditions in Songhay following the death of the old Emir have created a danger to the security of all of West Africa that can be put to rest only by an amalgamation of the kingdoms of Mali and Songhay under a single ruler. Who would be, of course, the Mansa of Mali, precisely as your young lady so baldly suggested the other day. And that is what we intend to achieve. The Grand Duke and Prince Itzcoatl and I. As representatives of the powers whom we serve. ’ ’

  Michael stared. He rubbed his cheeks as if to assure himself that this was no dream. He found himself unable to utter a sound.

  Sir Anthony went on, clearly and calmly.

  “And so Serene Glory gives Little Father the deadly cup, and then the Mansa’s troops cross the border, and we, on behalf of our governments, immediately recognize the new combined government. Which makes everyone happy except, I suppose, the Sultan, who has such good trade relationships with Songhay and is on such poor terms with the Mansa of Mali. But we hardly shed tears for the Sultan’s distress, do we, boy? Do we? The distress of the Tiirks is no concern of ours. Quite the contrary, in fact, is that not so?” Sir Anthony clapped his hand to Michael’s shoulder. It was an obvious strain for him, reaching so high. The fingers clamping into Michael’s tender sunburned skin were agony. “So let’s see no more mooning over this alluring Ottoman goddess of yours, eh, lad? It’s inappropriate for a lovely blond English boy like yourself to be lusting after a Tlirk, as you know very well. She’s nothing but a little slut, however she may seem to your infatuated eyes. And you needn’t take the trouble to expend any energy loathing the prince, either. His days are numbered. He won’t survive his evil old father by so much as a week. It’s all arranged.”

  Michael’s jaw gaped. A glazed look of disbelief appeared in his eyes. His face was burning fiercely, not from the sunburn now, but from the intensity of his confusion.

  “But sir—sir—”

  “Get yourself some sleep, boy.”

  ' ‘Sir!"

  “Shocked, are you? Well, you shouldn’t be. There’s nothing shocking about assassinating an inconvenient king. What’s shocking to me is a grown man with pure English blood in his veins spending the night creeping pitifully around after his dissolute little Tiirkish inamorata as she makes her way to the bed of her African lover. And then telling me how heart sore and miserable he is. Get yourself some sleep, boy. Get yourself some sleep!”

  In the midst of the uncertainty over the Emir’s impending death the semiannual salt caravan from the north arrived in Timbuctoo. It was a great, if somewhat unexpected, spectacle, and all the foreign ambassadors, restless and by now passionately in need of diversion, turned out despite the heat to watch its entry into the city.

  There was tremendous clamor. The heavy metal-studded gates of the city were thrown open and the armed escort entered first, a platoon of magnificent black warriors armed both with rifles and with scimitars. Trumpets brayed, drums pounded. A band of fierce-looking hawk-nosed fiery-eyed country chieftains in flamboyant robes came next, marching in phalanx like conquerors. And then came the salt-laden camels, an endless stream of them, a tawny river, strutting absurdly along in grotesque self-important grandeur with their heads held high and their sleepy eyes indifferent to the throngs of excited spectators. Strapped to each camel’s back were two or three huge flat slabs of salt, looking much like broad blocks of marble.

  “There are said to be seven hundred of the beasts,” murmured the Chinese ambassador, Li Hsiao-ssu.

  “One thousand eight hundred,” said the Grand Duke Alexander sternly. He glowered at Li Hsiao-ssu, a small, fastidious-looking man with drooping musta-chios and gleaming porcelain skin, who seemed a mere doll beside the bulky Russian. There was little love lost between the Grand Duke and the Chinese envoy. Evidently the Grand Duke thought it was presumptuous that China, as a client state of the Russian Empire, as a mere vassal, in truth, had sent an ambassador at all. “One thousand eight hundred. That is the number I was told, and it is reliable. I assure you that it is reliable.” The Chinese shrugged. “Seven hundred, three thousand, what difference is there? Either way, that’s too many camels to have in one place at one time.”

  “Yes, what ugly things they are!” said the Peruvian, Manco Roca. “Such stupid faces, such an ungainly stride! Perhaps we should do these Africans a favor and let them have a few herds of llamas. ’ ’

  Coolly Prince Itzcoatl said, “Your llamas, brother, are no more fit for the deserts of this continent than these camels would be in the passes of the Andes. Let them keep their beasts, and be thankful that you have handsomer ones for your own use.”

  “Such stupid faces,” the Peruvian said once more. Timbuctoo was the center of distribution for salt throughout the whole of West Africa. The salt mines were hundreds of miles away, in the center of the Sahara. Twice a year the desert traders made the twelve-day journey to the capital, where they exchanged their salt for the dried fish, grain, rice, and other produce that came up the Niger from the agricultural districts to the south and east. The arrival of the caravan was the occasion for feasting and revelry, a time of wild big-city gaiety for the visitors from such remote and placid rural outposts.

  But the Emir of Songhay was dying. This was no time for a festival. The appearance of the caravan at such a moment was evidently a great embarrassment to the city officials, a mark of bad management as well as bad taste.

/>   “They could have sent messengers upcountry to turn them back," Michael said. “Why didn’t they, I wonder? ’ ’

  “Blacks,” said Manco Roca morosely. “What can you expect from blacks. ’ ’

  “Yes, of course,” Sir Anthony said, giving the Peruvian a disdainful look. “We understand that they aren’t Incas. Yet despite that shortcoming they’ve somehow managed to keep control of most of this enormous continent for thousands of years.”

  “But their colossal administrative incompetence, my dear Sir Anthony—as we see here, letting a circus like this one come into town while their king lies dying—” “Perhaps it’s deliberate,” Ismet Akif suggested. “A much-needed distraction. The city is tense. The Emir’s

  been too long about his dying; it’s driving everyone crazy. So they decided to let the caravan come marching

  “I think not,” said Li Hsiao-ssu. “Do you see those municipal officials there? I detect signs of deep humiliation on their faces."

  “And who would be able to detect such things more acutely than you?” asked the Grand Duke.

  The Chinese envoy stared at the Russian as though unsure whether he was being praised or mocked. For a moment his elegant face was dusky with blood. The other diplomats gathered close, making ready to defuse the situation. Politeness was ever a necessity in such a group.

  Then the envoy from the Teutonic States said, “Is that not the prince arriving now?”

  “Where?” Michael demanded in a tight-strung voice. “Where is he?”

  Sir Anthony’s hand shot out to seize Michael’s wrist. He squeezed it unsparingly.

  In a low tone he said, “You will cause no difficulties, young sir. Remember that you are English. Your breeding must rule your passions. ’ ’

  Michael, glaring toward Little Father as the prince approached the city gate, sullenly pulled his arm free of Sir Anthony’s grasp and amazed himself by uttering a strange low growling sound, like that of a cat announcing a challenge. Unfamiliar hormones flooded the channels of his body. He could feel the individual bones of his cheeks and forehead moving apart from one another, he was aware of the tensing and coiling of muscles great and small. He wondered if he was losing his mind. Then the moment passed and he let out his breath in a long dismal exhalation.

  Little Father wore flowing green pantaloons, a striped robe wide enough to cover his arms, and an intricately deployed white turban with brilliant feathers of some exotic sort jutting from it. An entourage of eight or ten men surrounded him, carrying iron-shafted lances. The prince strode forward so briskly that his bodyguard was hard pressed to keep up with him.

  Michael, watching Selima out of the comer of his eye, murmured to Sir Anthony, “I’m terribly sorry, sir. But if he so much as glances at her you’ll have to restrain me.”

  “If you so much as flicker a nostril I’ll have you billeted in our Siberian consulate for the rest of your career,” Sir Anthony replied, barely moving his lips as he spoke.

  But Little Father had no time to flirt with Selima now. He barely acknowledged the presence of the ambassadors at all. A stiff formal nod, and then he moved on, into the midst of the group of caravan leaders. They clustered about him like a convocation of eagles. Among those sun-crisped swarthy upright chieftains the prince seemed soft, frail, overly citified, a dabbler confronting serious men.

  Some ritual of greeting seemed to be going on. Little Father touched his forehead, extended his open palm, closed his hand with a snap, presented his palm again with a flourish. The desert men responded with equally stylized maneuvers.

  When Little Father spoke, it was in Songhay, a sharp outpouring of liquid incomprehensibilities.

  “What was that? What was that?” asked the ambassadors of one another. Turkish was the international language of diplomacy, even in Africa; the native tongues of the dark continent were mysteries to outsiders.

  Sir Anthony, though, said softly, “He’s angry. He says the city’s closed on account of the Emir’s illness and the caravan was supposed to have waited at Kabara for further instructions. They seem surprised. Someone must have missed a signal.”

  “You speak Songhay, sir?” Michael asked.

  “I was posted in Mali for seven years,” Sir Anthony muttered. “It was before you were bom, boy.”

  “So I was right,” cried Manco Roca. “The caravan should never have been allowed to enter the city at all. Incompetence! Incompetence! ’’

  “Is he telling them to leave?” Ismet Akif wanted to know.

  “I can’t tell. They’re all talking at once. I think they’re saying that their camels need fodder. And he’s telling them that there’s no merchandise for them to buy, that the goods from upriver were held back because of the Emir’s illness.”

  “What an awful jumble,” Selima said.

  It was the first thing she had said all morning. Michael, who had been trying to pay no attention to her, looked toward her now in agitation. She was dressed chastely enough, in a red blouse and flaring black skirt, but in his inflamed mind she stood revealed suddenly nude, with the marks of Little Father’s caresses flaring like stigmata on her breasts and thighs. Michael sucked in his breath and held himself stiffly erect, trembling like a drawn bowstring. A sound midway between a sigh and a groan escaped him. Sir Anthony kicked his ankle sharply.

  Some sort of negotiation appeared to be going on. Little Father gesticulated rapidly, grinned, did the open-

  close-open gesture with his hand again, tapped his chest and his forehead and his left elbow. The apparent leader of the traders matched him, gesture for gesture. Postures began to change. The tensions were easing. Evidently the caravan would be admitted to the city.

  Little Father was smiling, after a fashion. His forehead glistened with sweat; he seemed to have come through a difficult moment well, but he looked tired.

  The trumpets sounded again. The camel-drovers regained the attention of their indifferent beasts and nudged them forward.

  There was new commotion from the other side of the plaza.

  “What’s this, now?” Prince Itzcoatl said.

  A runner clad only in a loincloth appeared, coming from the direction of the city center, clutching a scroll. He was moving fast, loping in a strange lurching way. In the stupefying heat he seemed to be in peril of imminent collapse. But he staggered up to Little Father and put the scroll in his hand.

  Little Father unrolled it quickly and scanned it. He nodded somberly and turned to his vizier, who stood just to his left. They spoke briefly in low whispers. Sir Anthony, straining, was unable to make out a word.

  A single chopping gesture from Little Father was enough to halt the resumption of the caravan’s advance into the city. The prince beckoned the leaders of the traders to his side and conferred with them a moment or two, this time without ceremonial gesticulations. The desert men exchanged glances with one another. Then ithey barked rough commands. The whole vast caravan began to reverse itself.

  Little Father s motorcar was waiting a hundred paces away. He went to it now, and it headed cityward, emitting belching bursts of black smoke and loud intermittent thunderclaps of inadequate combustion.

  The prince’s entourage, left behind in the suddenness, milled about aimlessly. The vizier, making shooing gestures, ordered them in some annoyance to follow their master on foot toward town. He himself held his place, watching the departure of the caravaneers.

  “Ali Pasha!” Sir Anthony called. “Can you tell us what’s happened? Is there bad news?”

  The vizier turned. He seemed radiant with self-importance.

  “The Emir has taken a turn for the worse. They think he’ll be with Allah within the hour.”

  “But he was supposed to be recovering,” Michael protested.

  Indifferently, Ali Pasha said, “That was earlier. This is now. ’ ’ The vizier seemed not to be deeply moved by the news. If anything his smugness seemed to have been enhanced by it. Perhaps it was something he had been very eager to hear. “The carava
n must camp outside the city walls until after the funeral. There is nothing more to be seen here today. You should all go back to your residences.”

  The ambassadors began to look around for their drivers.

  Michael, who had come out here with Sir Anthony in the embassy motorcar, was disconcerted to discover that the envoy had already vanished, slipping away in the uproar without waiting for him. Well, it wasn’t an impossible walk back to town. He had walked five times as far in his night of no sleep.

  “Michael?”

  Selima was calling to him. He looked toward her, appalled.

  “Walk with me,” she said. “I have a parasol. You can’t let yourself get any more sun on your face.”

  “That’s very kind of you,” he said mechanically, while lunatic jealousy and anger roiled him within. Searing contemptuous epithets came to his lips and died there, unspoken. To him she was ineluctably soiled by the presumed embraces of that night of shame. How could she have done it? The prince had wiggled his linger at her, and she had run to him without a moment’s hesitation. Once more unwanted images surged through his mind: Selima and the prince entwined on a leopard-skin rug; the prince mounting Selima in some unthinkable bestial African position of love; Selima, giggling girlishly, instructing the prince afterward in the no doubt equally depraved sexual customs of the land of the Sultan. Michael understood that he was being foolish; that Selima was free to do as she pleased in this loathsome land; that he himself had never staked jmy claim on her attention more significant than a few callow lovesick stares, so why should she have felt any compunctions about amusing herself with the prince if the prince offered amusement? “Very kind,” he said. She handed the parasol up to him and he took it from her with a rigid nerveless hand. They began to walk side by side in the direction of town, close together under the narrow, precisely defined shadow of the parasol beneath the unsparing eye of the noonday sun.