White Bird
Three days later Ali received a formal invitation to the palace. He waited in a hallway outside a door with two muscled guards, nervous and excited at the same time. After returning the ‘stolen goods’ to the Sultana he had no opportunity to see how it turned out. The entire episode was kept quiet while a cover story was invented by the Sultana and her closest advisors. Now able to talk to her in private for the first time in days, Ali expected to be brought up to date. The only thing he knew for sure was that the grand wazir had been arrested and jailed.
The Sultana was an unusually lovely woman, but this morning, in this light, she was absolutely striking. She was standing near a gilded cage feeding a white turtle-dove, her favorite pet. The bars were textured to resemble bamboo and the water troughs were blue-green enamel.
“Ali, Good Ali, do you know much about birds?”
“I know about wild birds, about falcons and hawks.”
“This one is quite tame.”
She slid opened the golden door.
The dove looked out but stood fast on her perch.
“You see, Ali, how sad it is? She can’t leave. She’s grown too accustomed to her cage.”
The Sultana walked to the balcony and looked out over the city. Tall deodars and palm trees bowed their heads over the tile rooftops in submission to the heat of day.
“You know, I’m closing the herb shop. The woman with the twisted lip is going to do a disappearing act. She’s not needed any more.”
“Not needed?”
“Not any more. You see, I’m out of a job. My brother is going to become Caliph. I’m no longer going to be Sultana.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I was only a fill-in, a temporary solution. The advisors and tribal chieftains liked my work, but my brother was born to be Caliph, like my father. It’s more than just a secular post; it’s religious and requires a man. More than that, my brother was from my father’s first wife, and is a Muslim.”
“I was raised a Christian,” said Ali, “but in India I studied under a Sufi mystic. There’s something I like about it.”
“Anyone can be raised to be anything. But in the end we all pick and choose a personal religion for ourselves.”
Baheera fed the bird a spray of millet, and looked longingly over the city again.
“My mother was a Christian and my father was a Muslim. I’m half and half.”
“So that’s why you defended the other two faiths so vehemently.”
“All three are related, and all religions deserve respect, no matter what they are or how few followers they have.”
“So you’re out of a job because you’re a member of two faiths.”
“That’s right.”
“I’m out of a job myself. I’ve sent in my resignation to “S”.
“Really? What will you do with yourself with all that time on your hands?”
“I intend to keep busy. I’ll oversee a coffee plantation…somewhere, Sumatra or Java near the Sunda Strait. I have an old friend, a Dutchman, who’ll help me get started. What about you?”
“I want to travel and paint landscapes and nature. Java is green isn’t it? And Sumatra, don’t they have tigers? They’re both in the tropics and surrounded by water.”
“Java has more kinds of green than you can imagine, and blood-red sunsets and blue-turquoise seas, not to mention white-coral beaches littered with exotic shells. And they say in Sumatra that yellow tigers run down moonbeams on the dark nights.”
Ali waited for his words to have their effect and then continued.
“Oh, before I forget....this is for you.”
Ali gave her the paint set. Baheera’s eyes brightened when she saw it was vintage and had no idea it was ancient.
“Ali, I have something for you too. See here!”
Baheera unwrapped a velvet cloth and placed a dagger with a lion’s-head pommel and ruby eyes in his hand.
“I want to reward you for saving my brother, and being such a good friend to the woman with the twisted lip.”
“The woman was a good friend to me. She was educated, not ivory-tower style mind you, but practical. She was truthful and kind, and when I think of it…charming. For a poor woman she had more generosity of spirit than any other woman I’ve ever known. I’ll miss her.”
“We’ll both miss her.”
Then Baheera’s voice took on a quality as seductive as Japanese silk.
“You don’t have to miss her forever, Ali. You may cross paths in the future. One can never tell about such things. When are you leaving?”
The turtle-dove hopped one perch closer to the door of the cage.
“At the end of the week. I’m boarding the steamer Tankedere, first to the Sunda Strait and then to Batavia.”
“In that case I’ll just say au revoir, not adieu. Besides, we may have a chance to talk again.”
Ali took the Sultana’s hand, but as he was about to give it back she pressed his a moment longer, and the look in her eyes whispered volumes of things unsaid. Walking down the marble hallway, he experienced complete silence, with the exception of a fluttering sound, which Ali in his foolishness ascribed to his heart.
Ali was mistaken. It was the wings of a snow-white dove taking flight for the first time in years, from the cage to the balcony, then over the treetops and spiraled minarets where holy men called the faithful to prayer.
©StevenHunley2017
https://youtu.be/ry4lwMGBP1Q Sam Bush White Bird