And the Ear Sometimes Loves Before the Eye

While we were passing one of the evenings of Ramadan in talk of the bygone days, when the veil was widespread among the various classes and communities, and of the change that has come over our life — we Easterners — my dear grandmother smiled and began to nod her head, her eyes lowered to the floor, as though she had remembered one of those charming anecdotes of hers with which she was accustomed to regale us from time to time. We asked her the reason for her smile and the source of her musing; she lit a cigarette and said:

— "I have remembered a strange incident that took place in the city of Hama in the days of Ottoman rule over the country, when Ismail Effendi was mutasarrif of that city. The events of the incident occurred while I too was living in Hama, for your grandfather, God rest his soul, held a post there. The story has just now passed through my memory because it bears directly on the veil; and you know that man is ever eager to know the unknown among matters and things. A man will exert his utmost effort, and sometimes expose himself to many dangers and troubles, for that end — especially if 'woman' is the pivot of that unknown!.. And I believe that men's longing to know women, their preoccupation with them, and their tracking of their footsteps were great, and wrapped in a halo of forbidden magic, in the days when women went veiled — unlike our condition today, when women have become exposed to the eyes of every beholder! The common proverb spoke truly: 'Everything forbidden is desired.'

As for Ismail Effendi the mutasarrif, he was known at the time for his intense passion for beauty, for music, and for everything delightful in life, along with his great activity and his leaping vitality. Those who kept his company in Turkey shortly before his marriage say he was one of the dissolute young men; yet he was blessed with a partner for his life of great beauty and delicacy. When he came to occupy the post of the mutasarrifate in Hama he brought her with him, being then the father of two boys. There I had occasion to make her acquaintance, and we exchanged visits over a long while; she too was famous for her love of everything charming and beautiful. And one morning I was startled by news I would scarcely have believed, had your grandfather not been in the mutasarrif's residence at the very hour it happened!"

Here we all asked with one voice:

— "And what happened, pray?"

Our beloved grandmother answered, smiling and threatening:

— "You shall learn what happened at the end of the story. Listen to it patiently, without interrupting me — or I shall hold my tongue!"

And she went on:

— "You must know that the events of this story took place fifty years ago, when houses were without the conveniences of modern building — that is, when the baths were in the marketplaces, for people at large. One evening Iffet Hanim, the mutasarrif's wife, went out to bathe with her maidservant. Supper time came, but she had not returned home; Ismail Effendi grew uneasy and sent someone to ask the reason for her lateness. After a little the messenger came back saying that 'the Hanim Efendi' had not yet finished her bath and would return in half an hour.

Ismail Effendi was astonished at this excuse. And when his wife came in, her face flushed with the redness the heat of the bath had left upon it, he asked her in wonder:

— 'May God make it a blessing, Umm Anis! But tell me — since when do you spend five hours at the bath?'

Iffet Hanim answered him:

— 'I shall tell you my tale; give me a moment.'

The two sat down, each trying to conceal what was within: Ismail Effendi trying to conceal his vexation, and Iffet Hanim trying to conceal her delight! And suddenly she began:

— 'Abu Anis, before I entered the bathing chamber I met a houri from the houris of Paradise — a lady more beautiful than any my eye has ever fallen upon; and the meeting with her, and listening to her sweet talk, made me forget the passing of the hours. I saw her when I sat down to rest in the outer court of the bath, before the pool of water; she was laying her towels and clothes in a place near me. She has, Abu Anis, a charm that no human being can resist — even I, I, a woman: I found myself greeting her first, and she returned my greeting in a voice of wondrous cadence; and no sooner had she turned toward me than I understood that God is able to gather all beauty in a single woman. We sat talking, and I learned that she is the daughter of Onbashi Kamil Said; she married a cousin of hers years ago and was granted two little girls, but cruel fate struck her with its arrows in the very flower of her youth: a year ago it robbed her of her provider, the father of her two girls. So the poor thing went back to her father's house, to taste the bitterness of straitened living and to share its hardship with her parents and her brothers. I pitied her state and joined her in her weeping, for she fell into my heart in the place of a dear sister, or a darling daughter, or call it what you will... Ah, Abu Anis, the savagery of the days!! I wished I could bring her home with us, to cheer her and to delight in her radiant face and her angelic beauty; but she is chaste of soul to the furthest bounds of chastity. And I seemed to notice that she grew shy and confused when she learned that I was the mutasarrif's wife, because of the poverty of her condition and the shabbiness of her clothes. I am certain, my dear, that if you had seen her, and watched her weep and smile at one and the same time, you would have forgotten yourself and the passing of the hours! Never before have I seen a human being whom weeping makes more beautiful, as it does her! We stayed in unbroken talk until the sunset call to prayer roused us from our absorption in conversation; then I invited her to bathe in my private chamber. And when we had finished, not even your asking after the cause of my lateness kept me from accompanying her in my carriage to her father's house on the Orontes Avenue, for I could not bear that so fresh a flower should walk alone in the night. And so I brought her home, and came back half intoxicated from the effect of this meeting.'

Iffet Hanim told her story to her husband with warmth and eagerness, and did not hide from him at all that she had conceived for this lady a deep fondness that set the strings of her heart trembling...

Ismail Effendi listened to his artless wife's talk with great attention. And when she had finished, he asked her, cheerful and joking:

— 'And what, pray, is the name of your new friend? How old is she — and is she fair or dark?'

The poor woman answered at once, her features glowing with satisfaction at his interest in the one she loved:

— 'Her name is Tharwa, my dear. Her age, from what I could see, is between twenty-four and twenty-six. She is fair, filling the heart with gladness; she has two green eyes shaded by long chestnut lashes; and as for her long, flowing hair and her slender figure, I can find no words for them — she is a marvel! A marvel of grace, of modesty, and of beauty.'

At this Ismail Effendi bowed his head a little, and then said:

— 'Very well; that being so, there is no harm in your inviting her and her mother to visit you, and in helping them materially and morally, if possible. And now come, let us take our supper; and I advise you to sleep at once afterward, for you are tired in body and in mind.'

And so Umm Anis did: she gave herself up to slumber after supper, hoping that some lovely dream would caress her. As for Ismail Effendi, he received the habitués of his house, to pass the evening with them as usual."

My grandmother could not but light a second cigarette, and we humored her in it, in great eagerness to learn the outcome of the story. Then she went on, in her sweet, captivating way:

— "At about eleven o'clock at night, by the reckoning of your days, Ismail Effendi sent his servant to the house of Onbashi Kamil Said, summoning him to come at once. The onbashi soon arrived, panting, and Ismail Effendi met him in a reassuring tone and said:

— 'I am sorry to disturb you at such an hour, but I wished to reward you for your good conduct and your faithful service by raising you, from this moment, to the rank of lieutenant.'

The old onbashi fell at the mutasarrif's feet in gratitude, his tongue stammering out phrases of thanks. The mutasarrif raised him up gently, and when he had sat down and drunk his coffee, turned to him and asked:

— 'And now, Lieutenant, I have a simple request of you. I hear that you have a young daughter who lost her husband a year ago. Will you accept me as a son-in-law?'

Upon the first surprise there followed a second, of harder impact; the girl's father was at a loss, no longer knowing whether he was dreaming or awake. Yet that did not keep him from saying:

— 'I am at your command, my lord; it is a great honor for me that you should marry my daughter. But she has two small girls, and she is still in mourning dress for her cousin; nor do I know whether she wishes to marry again or not.'

Ismail Effendi answered him in the tone of a vexed commander:

— 'You can bring your influence to bear on your daughter — and since when have girls had a say in the matter of their marriage?! As for her two girls, I count them my own dear daughters. And since you have agreed to this request of mine, in which lies the happiness of you all, I shall present you now with the young woman's dowry before my two friends here present, whom I count as two witnesses. And since I believe that the best of good deeds is the promptest, I shall have the marriage registrar brought to draw up the contract at once — for I mean to marry your daughter tonight!'

The new lieutenant was thunderstruck, and could not utter a word, for the tone in which the mutasarrif had addressed him cut off every path of objection. And after the registrar had come and the marriage been contracted, the qaimmaqam rose, my dears, and the commander of the gendarmerie rose, to congratulate the mutasarrif and the lieutenant together. Thus the two of them had attended the strange celebration and stood witnesses to the marriage contract. Then the mutasarrif ordered his coachman to make ready the carriage to carry his new father-in-law to his house, where he was to wake his daughter from her sleep and bring her to the house of her new husband.

Ismail Effendi passed a splendid night at the side of the woman he had loved before ever he saw her; and in the course of it he lavished much praise on Iffet Hanim's refined taste..!

And on the morning of the next day, he entered the room of his first wife — she whose life's course had been overturned while she lay sunk in the world of dreams...

She woke at the tread of his feet, and he addressed her at once:

— 'God give you a happy morning! Did you see your new friend Tharwa in your dreams? What would you say if I sent someone to bring her to you this very moment?'

Iffet's cheeks flushed, and she answered reproachfully:

— 'We talked of Tharwa yesterday, and that is enough. Yes, Abu Anis, I wish with all my heart to see her again today; but I do not want you to mock me as you did just now. God is beautiful and loves beauty!'

He answered her in earnest:

— 'No, I am not mocking you — God forbid! And God is indeed beautiful and loves beauty, as you said. So come with me a moment to my room, that I may show you a precious gift that reached me this morning from the Sultan.'

And he led her to his room, where he asked her to kiss Tharwa — her new sister... Iffet Hanim did not take the affair in anger, nor did she hesitate to kiss Tharwa, and afterward to surround her with every care and solicitude. And the two lived together for nearly twenty years, during which Tharwa bore seven children, among them three girls who took much of their mother's charms..."

And my grandmother added:

— "Beauty works like magic on the souls of some people. And the veil is among the things that heighten beauty's splendor. There is no better proof of the famous verse — 'And the ear sometimes loves before the eye' — than the story of my friend Iffet Hanim, God sweeten her memory; for she was good of heart, limited of mind, and ignorant that beauty holds a great power before which every power dwindles and every dominion melts away. Oh, the foolishness of women, when they describe to their husbands the charms of other women!.."