The Stone Woman (31 page)

‘I
T WAS THOUGHTFUL OF
Nilofer to send me to you. I’ve brought my easel and my oil paints. I’ll paint you as I talk. I hope you don’t mind. It’s not going to be easy to get the colours right. You must have noticed me trying to mix them for the last hour. You look so different when the sun hits you directly. When I first heard about you from Halil, he described you as a goddess, but you’re just a large rock. I’m not even sure whether you were ever carved. Perhaps you were. There are a few traces here and there. Could this have been the remnant of a woman’s breast? Perhaps. That makes you more interesting. I think I’m going to paint you just as I see you. The colour is not exact, but I’m going to start.

What do you think of this family, Stone Woman? Do they ever mean what they say? I’m beginning to wonder why I ever got married. Halil is a nice man and he understands me. I have no complaints, but I can no longer bear his touch. I never enjoyed intimacy with him and I feel I’ve done my duty by producing two healthy boys.

It was so painful when they were born, Stone Woman. I thought my agony would never end. I lost so much blood that the midwives began to whisper to each other in worried tones. I thought I was going to die. None of my maternal emotions would come to the surface. I felt nothing. I was just a frightened girl and it didn’t help when I found a child being placed on each breast. It was a strange sensation. I felt like an animal. If two women had not been found to breast-feed my boys I would have sunk slowly into oblivion, but much of the worry was, mercifully, removed from me. I don’t think I was intended to me a mother, Stone Woman. I feel affection for these little boys, but I am not overwhelmed by love for them any more than I was for their father.

Did you say something, Stone Woman? I could have sworn I heard you ask why I married him. The dilemma confronting me was simple. Either I found someone of my own choice in Istanbul or returned to Cairo and faced the humiliation of having a man imposed on me by my mother, just as all my childhood friends had. I would rather have died.

My mother was completely opposed to the idea of my being an artist. It was my father who encouraged me. I learnt German so that I could go and study art history in Vienna, but my mother threatened to commit suicide and my father, foolishly, chose to believe her. She never really cared much for me. She had four sons who were all “settled in life”, as she used to say. They were married. Their wives had produced children. Why couldn’t she leave me alone? The agreed compromise was that I could study in Istanbul, because the Caliph of Islam resided here. One of my sisters-in-law who, like the others, is very fat, but unlike them is not so stupid, wrote and warned me that my mother was busy assembling suitors for the great day. Stone Woman, I panicked.

I discussed the problem frankly with my friend Maria, the Countess Galfalvy. She advised me to accept Halil’s offer. She knew this family of old and said they were quite unconventional in their own way and would never obstruct my career. I was young and Maria had become a mother to me. So I accepted her advice. He seemed a very nice man. When I looked at him closely to see which part of him I could paint, it was his expressive and meaningful eyes that appealed to me. Unlike most men of my acquaintance, he did not like hearing the sound of his own voice. I felt he would never be unkind to me. He was not the man I had been looking for all my life, but that was because I did not think of men, only of being a painter. When I was still in Cairo, my friends would point to good-looking boys and giggle. I was unmoved by these encounters.

After I was married I found sexual intimacy very intrusive. I knew it had to be done. I had to lie down and let him put his little stick into me, but Stone Woman, I promise you: there was no enjoyment in this for me. None. When I told some women friends they thought there was something wrong with me and I grew tense and unhappy. There was no lack of passion on his part, but his touch simply left me cold. When I felt the need to be touched between my legs, I preferred to help myself. It was far less messy and much more pleasurable. I confessed this to my closest friend in Istanbul, who is also a painter, and she joked that it was like preferring the first rough sketch to the finished oil painting. I thought of this remark for a long time and it almost made me abandon oils.

I have not been intimate with Halil for three years now, ever since the children were born. I do not feel the urge to find another man. In fact I do not feel any urge that needs another person to fulfil it. I am content with my work.

One day I told some of this to Maria, imagining she would be horrified, but to my surprise, she understood perfectly. She told me some women are passionate and others are not. She herself had been very passionate in her life with Count Galfalvy, but she was lucky. She told me there was nothing to be ashamed of in this situation. Then she looked at me closely and asked me a question that, believe me, Stone Woman, shocked me deeply. Maria asked if I preferred physical contact with other women to intimacy with men. I must have gone red in the face because she burst out laughing and told me not to worry if that was the case. Istanbul was full of women who preferred each other and it was not a big problem.

I was so shaken by her question that I avoided her for a few weeks. My studio was still at the top of her house so I couldn’t keep away for ever. One day when I arrived to paint I found a young woman waiting for me. She, too, was from Cairo and came with a letter from my father. She was the daughter of one of his most valued customers (my father, Stone Woman, is a merchant of antiques) and wanted to be a painter. She was spending a few months in Istanbul with her uncle prior to her departure for Florence.

Rachel, some years younger than I was, deserved to be in Florence. She had a beautiful face framed by thick, golden red ringlets, the loveliest face I had ever seen. At that moment I knew what I wanted most in this world. I wanted to paint Rachel. I wanted to paint that face in very great detail, not missing a single freckle. And, Stone Woman, I wanted to paint all of her both with and without clothes.

I showed her Istanbul. I took her to the oldest parts of the city. I sat with her on the edge of the water as the Golden Horn shimmered in the light of the full moon and we sipped the most delicious Istanbul coffee I have ever tasted.

I took her home. She saw the twins and held them in her arms. She met Halil, who liked her and was pleased I had found a friend. I asked to paint her and she was flattered and agreed. She was in Istanbul for one whole month and I painted every curve, every line of her face and body. She would not undress for me, but I imagined what was hidden underneath the folds and she was amazed at my accuracy.

Then she left for Florence. We wrote to each other regularly. She described the hills around Fiesole, the light just before sunset and just after dawn, the work she was doing and how much she missed my company. She wrote of seeing a painting, studying it for nearly an hour, trying to work out how many times the master had changed his mind, how many layers of paint had been used. She turned around to discuss it with me and became sad because I was not there looking at it with her. I was often overcome by an urge to leave everything here and join her in Florence, but Maria Galfalvy advised caution and I bowed to her experience. Instead, I would disappear with my sketchbook and draw Rachel as I pictured her in different parts of Istanbul. She lived in Florence for three years.

Now she has returned to Cairo and the leeches are gathering. Each mother wants Rachel for her son, which is not surprising. Her father is a wealthy Jew; she is very beautiful. There is an inevitability about her fate that fills me with melancholy. I am tired of living without her, Stone Woman. I will return to Cairo with my children. Rachel will have some of her own. We will console each other and paint each other and find a studio in Alexandria for the summer months when Cairo becomes unbearable.

And what of Halil? He will survive. He will find another wife, someone who will love and give him the pleasure he never had from me. I gave him two sons. I think I have done my duty.

I wish you could see this canvas. I have drawn you as a giant rock, Stone Woman, but only now do I see how much your eyes resemble those of Rachel.’

“W
HO IS THAT NOISY
son of a donkey?”

Emineh thought the remark was directed at Orhan and started giggling, but it was not the children who had disturbed my uncle. It was a very hot day and Uncle Memed had decided, wisely, to take his afternoon siesta out of doors in the shaded part of the garden, where the sea breezes make the heat tolerable. I was sitting in a chair next to him trying to make sense of Auguste Comte. The children were playing some stupid game, aiming unripe walnuts at each other from a distance.

What had wakened Uncle Memed was the noise of a carriage and strange voices from the front terrace. A gardener was walking towards us followed by a strange apparition. Uncle Memed raised himself and glared at the two men.

The gardener pointed towards me and retreated. The apparition gave Memed and me a slightly awkward bow and began to speak in the worst French I have ever heard in my whole life.

“I arrived a few weeks ago in Europe from New York. I have a packet to deliver to Madame Sara, the wife of Iskander Pasha, but I am under very strict instructions to deliver it only into her hands.”

Petrossian had appeared out of nowhere, annoyed that a stranger had breached our privacy. I told him to organise some refreshments for our visitor. I decided to put on my most sophisticated French accent.

“I will inform my mother of your arrival and see if she can receive you presently. What is your name, monsieur?”

“Er, Joseph Solomon, but Jo will do. Everyone calls me Jo.”

“Petrossian, please show Monsieur Jo to the reception room.”

As they walked away, Memed guffawed. “I’m glad you’re making him sweat in the punishment room.”

The name the Baron had given the ballroom after Yvette’s visit had become a long-running joke in the household.

“Did you notice,” my uncle continued, “how ugly he was? I mean really ugly. A perfect match for one of Kemal’s daughters. Come on, Nilofer, let us matchmake a little mischief. We shall tell Kemal’s wife that a new Sultan, a Sultan of money, has arrived from New York by the name of Jo the Ugly.”

I laughed. Memed was cruel, but accurate. It was not simply that Jo Solomon was ill at ease with himself. The suit he wore was far too tight and the armpits of the jacket were soaked. That in itself was unforgivable. What made it worse was that he was large and fat, with a plump, placid and pockmarked face dominated by a bulbous nose, reminding me of the diseased cucumbers discharged by our vegetable gardener into the sea. Was Jo the Ugly in need of a dowry? That was the question of the moment. If the answer was an affirmative, we might send him back to New York with a bride.

At first I took him to be a jeweller bringing a gift for my mother from Uncle Kemal, who was always sending us presents. But I realised that he was too badly dressed to be a messenger. And then I knew. He must be the son of Suleman.

What did that packet contain? I threw my dignity into the sea and ran towards the house, just in time to join my mother who was sedately descending the stairway. Before I could warn her that the visitor might be my half-brother, Petrossian threw open the door of the punishment room and amazed me by announcing in a grand voice and very good French accent: “Madame Iskander Pasha et Madame Nilofer Selim Pasha.”

We giggled at his audacity, but entered into the spirit of the comedy and, taking each other by the arm, swept grandly into the ballroom. Jo Solomon was impressed. Petrossian had understood his mentality very quickly. Jo the Ugly bowed to my mother.

“I am delighted you could receive me, madame. This is a very fantastical room. What a great palace you have here! I am Joseph Solomon, madame, and I have a packet which I was instructed by my late father to hand to you and you alone.”

Sara paled considerably. “Your late father?”

“Yes, madame. Suleman of Damascus, as you once knew him. He never ceased to speak of your family’s generosity.”

My mother sat down on the sofa and demanded some water. She looked at Jo the Ugly carefully. It was obvious that his presence angered her.

“I am sorry to hear that Suleman has passed away. You look nothing like him.”

Jo the Ugly handed the packet to my mother.

“He never stopped reminding me of that, madame.”

She moved to the seat near the window as I gave Jo the sickliest smile I could manage. He smiled back and at that moment I really felt ill. His mouth was maggot-infested. All his front teeth were stained a strange brownish-yellow and every single one had decayed at the edges. This was inhuman. I was relieved when Salman walked in, on Uncle Memed’s recommendation, to see this person for himself, as he later told me. I excused myself and went and sat with my mother at the other end of the room.

She had her back to Jo the Ugly and Salman and was weeping in silence. I put my arms around her. Silently, she handed me the letter she had just finished reading.

My dearest Sara,

Our capacity for self-deception is infinite and I have suffered all my life as a result. This is a letter of explanation, Sara. I will write the truth. It is futile for a dying man to do otherwise.

For the last six months I have been slowly dying. The doctors have no cure because they have no idea what beast is devouring my insides. It’s too late to regret that I became a painter rather than a physician. Who knows? I might have cured myself. Perhaps what is eating me is my own remorse, which has never left me since that fateful morning I boarded a ship destined for Liverpool and New York.

By the time you receive this letter I will be dead and buried. It is now over thirty years since I left Istanbul. Do you remember what you said to me that morning when I told you how desolate I felt? You gave me a cold, deadly smile and said: “You leave me with a broken heart, but a heavy purse, Suleman. I am sure one will take care of the other.” I never forgot those words. How could you be so vicious, Sara? And so accurate.

Your father was generous. You were angry. I knew you wanted me to say that if there was a danger of our children being born with an ailment then we would not have any, but I was frightened that you might grow to resent me later and become bitter because I had prevented you from becoming a mother. This last sentence occurred to me only now, Sara. It’s not the truth. Once you acquire the habit of speaking untruths, it is difficult to do otherwise, even for a dying man, but I am determined to break the habit here and now.

After all these years I still find it difficult to accept that I was so easily swayed by your father’s generosity. You accused me of cowardice and treachery for betraying the love you had so freely given me. You were not wrong.

I do not believe your parents invented the story of the disease to stop our marriage. My own father confirmed that it was a serious problem, though my mother was equally insistent that there was nothing definite and that many marriages had resulted in children who were fine. She accepted, however, that it was a risk.

It is no consolation to either of us now, but I want you to know that all my life I have regretted leaving Istanbul. I wish I had taken the risk, Sara. I wish. I wish. Your Uncle Sifrah tells me you have a beautiful daughter. That makes me especially happy. I have not had the same luck. I know what you’re thinking. Ugliness produces ugliness, in character as well as features. As you will have noticed, the bearer of this letter may have some qualities, but he is certainly not pleasing to the eye. He takes after his mother’s brothers who are shysters and rogues, growing rich by robbing their own people.

In Damascus and Istanbul we tended to help each other. Not in this hell. When I first arrived here with “a broken heart, but a heavy purse”, I was recommended to stay with a family of Polish Jews who had escaped here ten years ago from the pogroms against their people. I took the kindness I was shown by this family at face value. They were very nice to me as they attempted to relieve me of the heavy purse and soothe my wounded heart. They pressured me into marrying their oldest daughter, Tamara, and once I had succumbed (it was convenience, desperation and loneliness, Sara, nothing more; it never affected my love for you) I found that my purse was getting lighter by the day. I hired a studio and started painting portraits. Slowly my fame spread and when Mr Rockefeller asked me to paint him, I realised I would be comfortable for the rest of my life. But what good is material comfort, Sara, when one’s emotional and spiritual cupboard is bare?

All the time I was suffering at the thought of having lost you, I wished you nothing but happiness. My own pleasures were casual, usually in my studio with some of the women who liked to pose for me. I found the lure of young flesh irresistible.

I had to find a different venue when my wife and her brothers burst in one day and surprised me with a woman. They did not harm me, but they marked the poor girl for life by carving her left cheek with a knife. I remember thinking of you after that incident and wondering what you would think if you could see how low I had sunk.

I write you all this so you know that life has punished me enough for the mistake I made thirty years ago. In this packet you will find the sketches I did of you in Istanbul and which I always treasured and used to inspect in secret to ease the misery and remember our time together. It was short, but it was the happiest period of my life. Remember that day in your father’s library when you found the story of the Prophet Bilan and the Moabites and we laughed and laughed? That is another thing that disappeared from my life. Laughter.

I am also sending you a tiny oil portrait I painted of you from memory. Your child or grandchildren might like it as a memento. They are my last gifts to you, Sara. I hope you will forgive me.

Suleman