Iron Earth, Copper Sky Read online

  ‘For the last time I tell you, shake off this abject fear. Be men! When you were soldiers you saw the world, the big cities, the men who live there like men. You saw the big wide seas. Have you ever given thought to what lies beyond those seas? Have you ever asked yourselves how the sun rises and sets, what is behind the sun? How the wireless works, how the bird flies? Have you ever thought of that?’

  Bear with the lash of his tongue if you can! Slowly the fear of Adil Effendi fades, to be replaced by a worse fear, an almost holy dread of Tashbash. When he opens his mouth to speak, people tremble as though his words would come true that minute. They avoid him. They would like to kill him. Even the children at play echo this dread.

  ‘That man Tashbash should be killed … That man Tashbash should be drawn and quartered …’ But no one ever touches him, as though the hand lifted against him would be paralysed in mid-air, as though even to draw near him with a wicked thought would be enough to burn a man to cinders.

  As his wife’s wound festered, Tashbash’s ravings grew wilder. And the more he raved, the more the villagers’ fear and respect grew. His voice, bitter and venomous, echoed in their ears night and day, crushing, overwhelming.

  Chapter 13

  Swiftly Hüsneh slipped out of bed and groped her way to the door. Outside, the snowbound night shone, palely translucent, earth and sky merged in a perfect whiteness. She speeded to the deserted hut. The fire was burning in the grate, and Rejep waiting for her. She threw herself at him hungrily. They never knew how they came together, their naked bodies taut in an ecstasy of sensual joy, twisting, sweating, copper-red in the flush of the flames, two human beings interlocked, wholesome, yearning, timorous, lusty. And she let out the cry she could not keep back.

  ‘I won’t stop here another day,’ Hüsneh repeated. She clenched Rejep’s hand. ‘The women are going to be struck barren here, and when spring comes the flowers won’t bloom and the green grass won’t sprout. There will be pestilence. Earthquakes will make a shambles of all our homes. We’ve got to get out quickly. Now! This moment! No one will ever find us. Look, I’ve brought a bundle. The night is clear and as calm as a spring night. If you won’t come, I’ll go by myself. Barren! Sterile! The women will be barren! And even if they do give birth, their children will be stillborn. No, I can’t live here any more. And you, what have you got to lose when you don’t even own a stick worth hiding from Adil? Now, now, quickly. Let’s escape.’

  Rejep was trying to talk to her, but she would not listen.

  ‘Now, now!’ she urged him vehemently. ‘Snakes will rain upon us, a hundred thousand red-eyed venomous snakes … The crops will wither, the cows will not fatten, the women will be barren! Come on, quick, quick …’

  ‘But in this snow, in the dead of winter … We’ll freeze to death. When the spring comes, then …’

  ‘There won’t be any spring. Come on, quickly, quickly!’

  ‘But Old Halil …’

  ‘He never died! They’d have found his frozen body if he had. Old as he is, he ran away in the teeth of the snow and winter. He knew. Come, come quickly.’

  ‘When the spring comes …’

  ‘It won’t come!’

  ‘When the snows melt …’

  ‘They won’t melt. Come on!’

  ‘But Old Halil’s body may be lying buried under the snow. That’s why …’

  ‘There isn’t any body to find!’

  Her bundle clasped in one hand, she tugged at Rejep with all her might, urgent, irresistible, as though they were hemmed in on all sides and must flee for dear life. Suddenly he was engulfed by her panic, hypnotized, ready to follow her into hell itself.

  They were outside now, running in the white luminous night that was like no other night. On the road, fleeing, not knowing how they had set out, unconscious of how they had come so far.

  Hüsneh kissed Rejep’s hands again and again, delirious with joy.

  ‘We’re going! We’re escaping from that hell! Shall I tell you something, Adil Effendi’ll be there tomorrow …’

  Rejep did not speak, he did not think, he let himself be led, bewitched.

  ‘Early, before sunrise he’ll be there and he’ll strip the village bare, not a crust of bread will he leave. We’d have died of hunger if we’d stayed there. Now they’ll all die of hunger …’ She pressed Rejep’s hand to her breast. ‘They’ll die! They’ll be struck barren …’

  They were nearly freezing when the sun rose. Turning to the east Hüsneh lifted her hands to the sky and prayed.

  ‘Thanks be to our saviour …’

  A golden flood gushed out from the east, lighting up the wintry steppe and the distant slopes and casting two long shadows over the snow. The shadows raced ahead, very black, furrowing the snow. They had come to the foot of Mount Tekech and still not a single village was in sight. Nothing was left now of Hüsneh’s exaltation. She was holding on to Rejep’s arm for dear life, utterly spent. But he had shaken himself out of his trance.

  ‘Don’t be afraid,’ he said. ‘I know there are villages behind that ridge. We’ll soon get there.’

  ‘But there’s a storm gathering,’ she said almost in tears. ‘And I can hardly stand up any more.’ She pointed to Mount Tekech. Black clouds were churning about its crest. ‘Look …’

  ‘It’s not so far,’ he encouraged her. ‘We’ll get there in spite of the storm.’

  ‘They’ll die, they’ll be barren,’ she kept muttering as she staggered forward. It gave her strength. ‘Barren, barren, barren!’

  ‘What, for God’s sake, are you saying over and over again?’ he asked.

  The sun was blotted out now.

  ‘Quick,’ she gasped. ‘Quick! Let’s not get caught in the storm.’

  It was growing darker and darker. There was not a bird or a beast, not a living thing on the wide steppe. They were alone, two human beings struggling against ruthless nature.

  Rejep was angry.

  ‘Barren, barren! Who’s going to be barren? Are you mad? God damn that village! God damn that Tashbash!’

  ‘But they will be barren, my Rejep,’ she insisted in a faint voice. ‘Barren. Are we getting near to any place?’

  The news was on everybody’s lips even before sunrise. Hüsneh’s mother flung herself on to the snow, thrashing about and shrieking with grief. As for Rejep he had no one to lament for him.

  There was a subdued effervescence all about the village. Tashbash was on the threshold of his house, seething, for he sensed the undercurrent of relish among the villagers.

  ‘May you sink to the bottom of the earth, all of you,’ he shouted suddenly. ‘It’s because of you that the poor things ran away in the dead of winter. They’ll never reach a village. You’ll find them dead and buried under the snow.’

  It was all around the village in an instant.

  ‘Dead and buried under the snow! Frozen to death …’

  ‘If we’d known that they were so much in love …’

  ‘Burning with so strong a passion …’

  ‘Strong enough to throw themselves into the wild winter night …’

  ‘Everyone knew that they were in love …’

  ‘That they met in that empty hut …’

  ‘But that it was so far gone! …’

  From the summit of Mount Tekech lowering clouds swirled eastwards over the steppe. A black wind was blowing ever more forcefully, the mad harbinger of the coming blizzard.

  ‘We must look for them.’

  ‘We must save the lovers …’

  ‘There’s a storm coming!’

  A couple of mounted men came forward. ‘We’ll find them,’ they said, and they galloped down into the valley.

  ‘I swear by all that’s holy,’ declared Hüsneh’s father, ‘I won’t say a word of reproach to them. Just let me have them back safe, and I’ll sacrifice my only calf for them. I’ll talk to them, laugh with them … Oh God, only save her!’

  By mid-morning it began to snow and by noon a freezin
g blizzard had blotted out the whole world.

  Tashbash’s anger swelled with the blizzard.

  ‘Better to throw oneself into the blizzard and die than live here!’ he shouted. ‘The flying bird itself shuns this village.’

  And he hurled terrible imprecations at the villagers.

  Chapter 14

  Such a blizzard had developed, lashing over earth and sky, that not a soul remained outside.

  It was Shirtless, watching the storm through a chink in his door, who saw him first. He rubbed his eyes and looked again unbelievingly, but the long thin figure had flitted past like a leaf borne on the blizzard. Then he saw it gliding back.

  ‘It’s Spellbound Ahmet, the poor idiot!’ Shirtless cried, his eyes glued to the chink. ‘He’ll freeze to death … But no, the peris will protect him. Maybe even now they’ve spread their wings over him …’

  The figure vanished again in the darkening storm and Shirtless crossed over to sit by the fire.

  ‘There’s only one way out and that’s to kill this Adil Effendi,’ he thought, stretching his legs wide. ‘The drawback is that he’s an old man. The noble race of Shirtless has severed countless heads, it has raised towers of skulls, but never has it lifted a hand against an old man. Yes, Adil ought to be removed from the face of the earth, and what’s more, when the Last Judgment comes, whoever had done it would be sent straight to Paradise and no questions asked. So it behoves me, the last representative of the noble Shirtless race, to finish him off, but …’ He called to his ten-year-old son. ‘My Son,’ he said solemnly, stroking his beard, ‘what is the race of Shirtless in this world?’

  The child trotted it out as though he had been wound up.

  ‘The Shirtless race is king of the kings of the mountains. And I am the last representative of this great race, friend of the poor, enemy of the aghas. The Shirtless race has always taken from the rich to give to the poor. The race goes back to the famous bandit Köroglu’s friend, the bravest of the brave, the son of the blacksmith, the man who crushed four horseshoes with his two fingers … It’s against all law that this Adil Effendi should go on living, but the ancient tradition of the Shirtless race forbids them to shed the blood of old men.’

  Shirtless drew his son to him with pleasure.

  ‘Well done,’ he said. ‘Ah, if only we could drink the blood of this Adil, the glory of the Shirtless race would ring up to the skies.’

  ‘Ohhoo! If he were just a little less old,’ the child bragged, ‘the house of Shirtless would tear him to pieces.’

  ‘Ah,’ his father sighed as he went back to the door, ‘what a chance the house of Shirtless is letting pass …’

  The child knew he must be silent now. He tiptoed to the ox and began stroking its long horns, for Shirtless, unable to stand the absence of his animals any longer, had brought them back home from the Peri Caves.

  He put his eye to the chink and what should he see but Spellbound Ahmet approaching his house! It’s the peris, he thought complacently. Spellbound, they said to him, you must go and visit the noble house of Shirtless.

  He opened the door quickly. ‘Welcome, brother,’ he called. ‘Welcome to the knightly house of Shirtless. It’s the peris have sent you, or you’d never cross anybody’s threshold.’

  The idiot stopped dead. His tattered clothing was white with snow.

  ‘Why don’t you come in, brother?’ Shirtless said, moving up to him. ‘Why …’ But Spellbound Ahmet’s gaze nailed him to the spot.

  ‘Dead and buried under the snow!’ Spellbound cried out suddenly. ‘Frozen to death … the lovers …’ He glared at Shirtless, and then went on in a low mocking voice: ‘Race of Shirtless, race of swine! Humbugs all of you! Got your name because one of your forefathers gave his shirts to the poor, did you? A lie! It was because he was so poor that he couldn’t buy a shirt in all his life. Knights, hah! When did your people ever own a horse? Humbugs! Cowards! Towers of skulls! Bah, when did you ever kill a fly? And why towers of skulls? Is that a thing to boast about? May your tongue dry up! For the sake of this child …’ He let out a long howl. ‘Gone are the lovers! Buried under the snow …’ He whirled about and vanished in the blinding blizzard.

  ‘He’s mad,’ Shirtless mumbled to his son. ‘Madmen tell a lot of lies. Everyone knows the Shirtless race has sown terror in these mountains for centuries. Madmen are like that …’

  Spellbound Ahmet drifted into Köstüoglu’s house.

  ‘Dead and buried under the snow,’ he cried. ‘Frozen to death are the lovers! And you, Köstüoglu, are alive, you slimy lazybones. Of what use is your life to anyone? Worse than Slowcoach Halil you are … Gone are the lovers! Dead and buried under the snow!’

  The next house he blew into like a cold gust was Slowcoach Halil’s. He found him still busy digging in the pit where he had hidden his belongings, picking at the earth as though with tweezers.

  Spellbound stood over him, watching. ‘May your task be easy,’ he said. Then, without warning he spat in his face. Slowcoach gaped at him, mesmerized. His blank gaze sickened the idiot.

  ‘Gone are the lovers! Frozen to death!’ he bawled, and threw himself out of the house.

  Köstüoglu and Halil were cousins and renowned for their sluggishness. Köstüoglu’s very gait was deliberate and prudent. He never stepped on an ant or an insect, or even on a dead leaf, and it was the same with Slowcoach. Köstüoglu would leave his house before dawn and reach his field at midday, and by the time he had yoked the oxen and ploughed a couple of furrows it was already evening. And it was the same with Slowcoach. When everyone else picked twenty kilos of cotton, these two would only manage a kilo apiece.

  When he came to Pale Ismail’s house, Spellbound was a frozen heap of snow. His long yellowish hair and beard, even his eyebrows were stiff with frost. At the sight of him the whole household was struck with fear.

  ‘Don’t be afraid, I won’t eat you,’ the idiot said slyly. ‘You’d better watch your horns, Pale Ismail. They’re growing. The Muhtar’s doing things to your daughter, but you, you don’t say a word. Oh no, you hope he’ll take her to wife. Just to be father-in-law to a Muhtar you’d give her to that man who’s got two wives already. Why don’t you marry her off to Veli’s son and gladden the poor lad’s heart? You’re wicked people, all of you, and this village will be struck by pestilences and floods. Gone the lovers! Dead and buried under the snow!’

  Nobody dared answer a word.

  Next he was inside Snappy Mustafa’s house.

  ‘Dead the lovers!’ he howled. ‘Buried under the snow, and you’re lying there, warming your balls before the fire! You’ve become a slave to that scoundrel of a Muhtar. You’re not a man any more, you toadeater!’

  Snappy Mustafa had a sharp temper. The idiot knew it well. He backed out of the house quickly and ran for dear life. ‘Holo hooo!’ he yelled. But Snappy caught up with him and dealt him such a blow that he was left sprawling on the snow. As soon as he came to, Spellbound threw himself into the nearest house and began all over again.

  Night was falling when he plunged into the Muhtar’s house. There he ranted on, raking up scandals dating from the lifetime of the Muhtar’s father. The idiot had an extraordinary memory. The Muhtar, who had visitors from a neighbouring village, was powerless to stop him.

  ‘As for you,’ Spellbound said finally, ‘you’ll die, and by the hand of Tashbash too …’ With that parting shot, he dashed out.

  Now he made for Tashbash’s house, but slowly, with reverent steps. He paused before the door and kissed it three times. Tashbash’s little boy let him in. By this time, he had become one large hoary mass of snow, with long icicles sticking out of his hair and beard. Meryemdje, who was sitting by the wounded woman’s bedside, stared at him, fascinated. It was the first time she had seen him since they had returned from the Chukurova. Long Ali, Zaladja Woman, Ökkesh Dagkurdu, Mangy Mahmut, Durduman and the Bald Minstrel were sitting about the hearth talking. Tashbash squatted silently in a corner, his back to the wal
l.

  Spellbound came up to him, his head bowed. ‘Gone are the lovers, dead and buried under the snow!’ he moaned, his voice a low bitter lament. Tashbash’s eyes filled with tears. Spellbound lifted his head and looked straight at him. ‘Spring will not come this year. Our crops will not ripen. Our women will be barren. Floods and earthquakes will wipe out the village. Curses and serpents will rain upon it. If it is still standing, it is thanks to you, o my Tashbash. For your sake …’

  He bent down and kissed the ground before Tashbash three times. Then he gave a sudden bound and was gone. The blizzard blasted in through the open door and the fire sizzled as snowflakes fell into it.

  It was not long before the whole village knew that Spellbound Ahmet, who had been cursing everyone all day long, had kissed the ground three times in the presence of Tashbash. That night they hardly slept at all, agog with speculation.

  Chapter 15

  Depend upon it, there’s something about this Tashbash. I’ll put both these hands into the fire and swear to it. Otherwise, why should God’s own fool, Spellbound Ahmet, the Peri King’s own son-in-law, prostrate himself and kiss the ground before his feet? And with such holy words too. And what about the terrible things Tashbash has been saying? Ever since the world began, only from the mouths of saints have such weighty words come …

  People could talk and think of nothing else but Tashbash. From a distance they watched his house surreptitiously, gripped by a growing dread. The children would tiptoe up to the door, holding their breath, then streak off, shaking with fear.

  Tashbash realized something was wrong, something that concerned him, but he did not know what. One day, he went out to go to Long Ali’s, but found himself forced to retrace his steps, unable to bear the looks of fear and suspicion that bored into his back.