Equal of the Sun (55 page)

A
fter Massoud Ali fell asleep, I bathed at the hammam, dressed in a black tunic and trousers, black robe, and black and brown sash, and walked to Pari’s house near the Ali Qapu. My head was pounding from my excesses of the night before, and the wound near my temple had swollen. Azar Khatoon opened the door clad in a dark mourning robe, her eyes red from weeping.

“I take refuge in almighty God,” she said, her voice trembling. A tear slid down her cheek and coursed over her beauty mark.

“Alas!” I said, stepping inside. “What can be said?”

We went into Pari’s birooni, which was large and empty. A hard white light poured through the windows, making me wince. Some of Pari’s ladies wandered in and out of her rooms like ghosts who could find no rest.

“How can they expect women to serve such a brutal court?” Azar asked, looking as vulnerable as if she had been struck. Her face crumpled, and she reached for me and cried into my robe.

Hearing steps behind us, we turned and saw Maryam, whose body sagged within her clothes. Her tangled blond hair hung limply near her face, and she had wept so much that the lower half of one eye looked full of blood.

“My poor, dear lady!”

“Was there a braver woman? A fiercer flower?” Maryam asked. Angry tears fell onto her cheeks.

“The loveliest roses are always plucked first,” said Azar.

The three of us were quiet for a moment, paralyzed by woe. Then Maryam’s lips split into a ghastly laugh. “Anwar told us earlier today that the shah-to-be has prohibited a ceremony for Pari. Neither will there be an official burial. We will never know where her body lies.”

She put her fists to her cheeks, and tears flowed over them. “I
won’t ever be able to visit her grave, sweep off the dirt, and adorn it with flowers and my tears. It will be as if she had never existed.”

“By the skull of the Shah!” I swore angrily. “Before they erase the woman we loved, let’s collect her letters, her poems, and her papers, and try to save them so that others may know her as we did.”

“What about her heirs?” asked Azar.

I thought for a moment. “Since she has no children, the law stipulates that her possessions must be divided among her brothers and sisters,” I said, realizing all of a sudden that Mohammad Khodabandeh would be included. “What a grotesque violation of propriety that the man who ordered her murder will inherit her property.”

I shouldn’t have spoken so forthrightly about the new shah, but in my grief, I didn’t care.

“Her poems will be valuable to those who loved her. Let’s work quickly,” I added.

The three of us occupied her writing room and began looking through her papers. We left untouched the copies of her official correspondence—the letters she had written to the wives of other rulers, receipts she had received or given, deeds of ownership. When we found a scrap of anything personal, such as a poem or a personal letter, we hid it in between the pages of a
Shahnameh
. But we had barely begun when we heard a ferocious banging on the knocker for women, which felt like nails being driven into my pounding head. Maryam started and grabbed Azar Khatoon’s hand, and the two women looked at each other in alarm.

I went forth and faced a group of eunuchs bearing shields and swords.

“Who are you?” I growled.

“We come from Khalil Khan,” said their leader. “Pari’s things now belong to him, so get out, and make sure the women leave with you before we invite the soldiers in.”

I tried to slam the door in his face, but he and his eunuchs pushed their way into the house. Their eyes came alive with greed when they saw the fine carpets, silver samovar, and antique lusterware there. I rushed to tell Azar, Maryam, and the other women, who looked terrified at the thought of Khalil Khan and his soldiers.
They covered themselves quickly and followed me out, and I accompanied them back to safe quarters within the harem, leaving the soldiers to plunder.

I was deeply aggrieved that I had not even been able to save Pari’s personal papers. Almost nothing would be left, not only to those who had loved her, but to history.

I went to Balamani in search of consolation and told him everything that had happened, including what I had learned about Mirza Salman’s betrayal. I was the only person at the palace who knew about it, other than the new Shah and his wife, and I wanted Balamani’s advice on how to discredit Mirza Salman.

“But first I would like to slash his neck like a chicken’s.”

Balamani eyed me as if I were a deranged dog. “Has someone smacked you in the head? He is the second most powerful man in the realm. You had better look to your own neck instead.”

“Am I in danger?”

“I don’t know. God be praised, as a clever vizier you are worth your weight in turquoise. Now our job is to convince those around Mohammad Khodabandeh that you are loyal. I will speak with Anwar. You need to do your part by singing the praises of the new Shah.”

It was exactly the type of thing I had advised Pari to do, and it filled me with dread.

“Don’t let your feelings for the princess impede what you must do,” Balamani chided. “What is wrong with you? Why is your heart so bruised?”

“It is a matter of justice,” I said angrily. “It riles me to see men winning high position because they’re bullies and blackguards, while they send Pari to an early grave.”

“She played a man’s game and fell with honor. Your only mistake was that you loved her.”

“A man has to love someone.”

“Perhaps you are no longer suited to palace life.”

“What else is there for me? I have no male family and no other employ.”

“I know.”

“I miss her. I keep thinking I hear her voice.”

“Are you forgetting your place? Your job is to serve the shah, no matter who it is.”

“Balamani, please stop. You sound like a sycophantic slave.” I turned away in disgust.

Balamani grabbed my sash, bringing me to a halt.

“I intend to say whatever is required to save you,” he said, and in his eyes I saw the goodwill of a longtime friend.

Because there was to be no public mourning ceremony, there was no place to grieve. Nor could I speak about Pari except in whispers because it was dangerous to show such partisanship for an executed princess. My grief felt as explosive as gunpowder packed in a cannon. Now I was mourning two treasures, Khadijeh and Pari, and thoughts of one would lead me to thoughts of the other until my heart felt pounded blue.

The palace women asked me repeatedly to describe what had happened to Pari. I told the story without sparing the details so that everyone would know how the princess had been butchered.

The younger women were frightened by the story. “That is what happens when you act like a man,” Koudenet said, a shiver running through her. “She should have married and contented herself with raising a family.”

Sultanam, who had come from Qom for her son’s coronation, was more thoughtful: “If she hadn’t been so powerful, they would have sent her into exile. She terrified them.”

To compound my grief, the loss of Pari’s patronage meant that my plans for bringing Jalileh to court had turned to dust. I suspected that if I wrote my cousin the truth—that my patron had died—she would give up hope and sacrifice Jalileh. Instead I gathered all the
money I had and sent it as a gift, describing it as a foretaste of the reward I would provide when I was able to bring my sister to Qazveen. I wrote to Jalileh separately, hinted at my difficulties, and urged her to resist their marriage plans.

This fresh defeat upset me deeply. If Jalileh were to suffer more bad luck, there would be no reason for me to awaken in this world. But I had no idea what I could do to save her.

The day we went to Forty Columns Hall to witness Mohammad Khodabandeh taking the crown, I felt nothing but cynicism. A slightly different group of mullahs and nobles than the last time approached the throne in order of highest rank and kissed the feet of the man who would henceforth be known as Mohammad Shah. When Mirza Salman strutted self-importantly to the throne in his dandified clothes, a burst of loathing seized me like the trembling that comes from the plague. As I swore loyalty to the Shah with the others, I dared to glance into Mohammad Shah’s dark eyes. They looked vacant and empty of feeling.

In the days after the coronation, the few remaining princes, the nobles, and the highest-ranking palace employees began to be summoned one by one to see the Shah and given their posts and promotions. Anwar instructed me to report to him until it was my turn, which was likely to take weeks. He told me that my interim assignment would be to read the princess’s mail, which was still arriving at the palace in great quantities, and to inform him of any important news. For the sake of courtesy, I was also to write to correspondents of significant rank and announce her death; otherwise, they would be insulted that their letters had gone unanswered. “She was unparalleled,” Anwar whispered to me sympathetically, “and all of us who served her know the truth, even if it must die with us.” He told me to work in the company of the palace scribes, where I would find abundant supplies of paper, ink, and reed pens, and would be spared the grief of working in the princess’s old quarters in the palace, which in
any case were about to be occupied by members of Khayr al-Nisa’s family.

I arrived at my posting the next day shortly after the morning prayer. Once I had conveyed my orders from Anwar, I was welcomed into the large, light-filled office by Rasheed Khan, the chief of the scribes. He gave me a wooden lap desk and showed me how to request supplies. I thought I saw sympathy in his weary, red-rimmed eyes.

Massoud Ali fetched and delivered all the letters that had come for Pari after her death, which had been held by the chief palace courier. Although it had been only a few weeks since her murder, it took Massoud Ali several trips to bring them in. He still looked wan with grief.

“Want to play backgammon later, my little radish?”

“All right,” he said in a dull voice, and I knew he was just trying to please me. How it pained me to see him suffer! I swore to myself that I would try to get him assigned to me permanently at my new posting so that I could watch over him every day.

I stared at the pile of letters. The dry white paper made me think of Pari’s bones whitening somewhere under the earth. I could hardly bear to touch the pulverized linen and hemp, but as I was now under the scrutiny of Rasheed Khan and his staff, I assumed a workmanlike demeanor and began my task.

The first letter I opened was from a prostitute Pari had met once when she had gone to the shrine of Fatemeh Massoumeh in Qum to honor that holy sister of the Imam Reza. The letter, which had been written by a scribe that the prostitute had hired, reminded Pari where they had met and that the princess had given her money to start a new life. The prostitute had spent the money on felt and tools and had started a business making felt blankets for horses. After two years of hard work, she had developed a small stream of income that allowed her to quit her old profession. She thanked Pari for her belief in her goodness, and promised to say prayers for her every week at the shrine.