Harvest of Rubies (16 page)

“Nothing! He is wonderful. His lordship took his falcon with him to Ecbatana this time. Caspian and the falcon are not the best of friends, and Lord Darius takes turns bringing one or the other on his trips.”

I studied the dog’s massive frame, its stocky shoulders, its long thighs and shanks. He returned my gaze with apparent intelligence, his black broad muzzle held in a dignified pose that seemed to look down on me. I frowned. “This is a dog trained for war and the hunt. Why is he not in the kennel being cared for by the groundskeeper?”

Pari dropped her voice. “There is no groundskeeper. Teispes has discharged him, as well as a host of other servants, claiming there is no need for them with my lord away so often. There is only a handful of servants left. Some are his spies and a more useless bunch of workers you have yet to see. There are a couple of old retainers that he has not dared discharge, and Teispes runs them ragged. You should see this place. It’s a disgrace.”

I was beginning to like this steward less and less. As Pari and I traipsed through the house in search of him, the mastiff following us like a conscientious guard, I began to understand Pari’s outrage. Although the house was magnificent in size and structure, dust covered every surface. Agate and lapis lazuli floors had not seen a broom for a month at least. In one room I actually found mouse droppings on the wool carpets.

There was one unexpected benefit to our fruitless search: it forced me to grow acquainted with my prison. With so few people about, I had a freedom not afforded to most aristocratic women, and was able to examine every unlocked room of my husband’s sprawling home at my own leisure. Cedar pillars, carved cornices, embroidered hangings, gold and silver tables, and latticed windows made this palace a jewel of beauty. Though much smaller than Persepolis, it contained an element of charm that was lacking in the king’s own palace.

In the corner directly opposite my chamber we discovered a lush set of apartments facing east, filled with light pouring through the windows. As soon as we stepped in, I knew it belonged to Darius. For one thing, no speck of dirt besmirched any surface. Someone had kept these rooms pristine. I imagined even Teispes dared not abandon Darius’s own rooms to filth. For another, the apartment was exquisitely decorated with riches from around the world: textiles from Egypt, carved ebony furniture from India, gold from Sardis, urns from Ionia, tapestries from Babylonia. These rooms reflected my husband’s vast travels.

The distinct stamp of his personality present in every corner of the room made me uncomfortable and I withdrew quickly. I knew he would feel that I was violating his privacy by being there.

But having entered in, I could not banish his image from my
restless mind. Without my volition I recalled his words to me my first night there.
Do you know, I thought you sweet and honest and brave when I first saw you
. I had focused so much on his belligerent accusations that I had forgotten the only kind words he had said to me during that encounter. For a short while, when he had originally met me, he had liked me. He had thought I possessed admirable qualities. He had thought me
sweet
.

What might my life be like if my husband had continued to think of me in such terms—to think of me as honest and brave?

I could bear this thought even less than the bitter accusations he had hurled at me. There was too much loss in it. The sum of my stupidity and his misdirected suspicions had robbed me too well. To escape the dark sorrow of my conclusions, I picked up the pace of our tour through the rest of my husband’s home, making Pari and the dog hurry behind me in their effort to keep up.

To my relief, I found a measure of order in the kitchens. A woman with bony shoulders and wide hips rose as we walked in. She was smooth-skinned and could not have been more than thirty-five, though her long face made her appear older.

“Don’t you bring that dog into my kitchen,” she said in a raspy voice, raising her wooden spoon and pointing it at Caspian for emphasis.

“Ah, cook, this is my lady Sarah,” Pari interjected.

The woman gave me a measured look and with shock I realized that she had a stone marble for one eye. I did my best not to stare. She bowed her head with a motion so quick it would have been lost on me if I had not been watching her with such close attention.

“Right then. Don’t you bring that dog into my kitchen,
my lady.”

I nodded to Pari and she led Caspian out. “As the kitchen seems to be one of the few clean places in this palace, I can see why you wouldn’t want a dog in it.” An awkward silence was the only reward I received for my attempt at conciliation. I tried again. “I wanted to thank you for the delicious meals you have provided for me.”

“I do my best with what I’m given.”

I was taken aback by her biting tone. At first I bristled, thinking her hostility directed at me. Then it occurred to me that in the span of the past several weeks I had not eaten meat above once a week. Often the food consisted of vegetables and grains. The cook managed to make it palatable, even delicious. But for a lord’s house, the fare was too modest.

“You do not receive a sufficient allotment of what you need? Like meat and fowl and rare spices, as befits Lord Darius’s table?”

“I made no complaint.”

“I’m aware of that. I am also aware that you do a marvelous job with what little you are given. The fault is not yours.”

The rigid shoulders began to droop. “Lord Darius deserves better. He owns more sheep and cattle than a man could count, and yet fresh meat has not passed the threshold of this kitchen once this week.”

“Are you the only cook working here? Do you have no help?” The idea seemed ludicrous. At Persepolis there were two hundred and seventy-seven cooks plus an additional thirteen cooks who specialized in dairy dishes, twenty-nine kitchen helpers, and seventeen beverage preparers. Granted, this was no Persepolis, but it was still a nobleman’s palace. The lack of a multitude of cooks was an outrage.

“The steward has assigned one of his servants to part-time kitchen duty. I prefer to work without his help. Our numbers
are so diminished that I can manage alone. It’s more difficult when Lord Darius and his full retinue are here.”

I remembered Pari telling me that Teispes’s hired servants acted as his spies and could not blame the cook for preferring to work alone. “I understand. I’ll see what I can do. Do you know where I can find the steward?”

“He left this morning. Said he wouldn’t be back until evening.”

I nodded and turned to take my leave.

“My lady,” she called, and handed me a bone. “For the dog. It’s been cooked clean. But he’s still bound to enjoy gnawing on it.”

I smiled. In spite of her awkward sharpness, a kind heart beat inside that scrawny chest. “May I ask your name?”

“Shushan.”

“That’s an unusual name.” Shushan was the Persian pronunciation for the citadel of Susa.

“Born there, that’s why. My parents served in Lord Vivan’s household from the time he was a young man. They were traveling with him from the north when my mother went into early labor. They made it to Susa just in time for me to be born there.”

“They must have a soft spot for Susa then.”

“The humorous part is that Lord Vivan came up with the name. My father said that he was covered in sweat at the thought of a woman giving birth on the side of the road. He was so relieved when we made it to Susa and the safety of his palace before I made an appearance that he rewarded my mother with a gold coin. You can understand; he was no more than twenty-five at the time. It’s on account of him that I’m still alive,” she said.

Fascinated, I asked, “He saved your life?”

She pointed to her false eye. “Accident. It happened the last
year of King Xerxes’ rule, when I was still a child. I was playing swords with one of the servant boys and his stick slipped and jabbed my eye.

“Instead of sending me to the town physician, Lord Vivan gathered me in his own arms and galloped to the palace, demanding the services of a royal physician. No one dared refuse the cousin of the king. An Egyptian physician tended me. He said I would have died if not for Lord Vivan’s quick response. My lord even paid for a false eye,” she said, pointing to the painted marble that occupied her eye socket.

“How did you become a cook?” I asked. Usually, men occupied that post; certainly no women became the kind of chief cooks that Shushan seemed to be in this household. Having occupied a masculine post myself made me wonder about Shushan’s story.

“It took months for me to recover from my wound. One summer day, they brought my bed outside into the garden to cheer me. I lay in bed and watched a servant girl washing clothes in the sun. I felt so wistful at the sight, thinking I would never be of any use with only one eye. Lord Vivan happened to observe me; he would sometimes come and visit me during my time of convalescence.

“‘Shushan, I make you a promise,’ he said. ‘When you are better, you can do whatever you wish in my service.’ He was as good as his word. I always wanted to work in the kitchens. When he found out, he apprenticed me to his best cook.”

I thought about these stories. My father-in-law, who scorched me with his frowns on my wedding, had seized up with worry over the possibility of a servant woman birthing a child outdoors. He had cared for a wounded peasant child with the same fierce protectiveness he would have shown a child of his own. He had opened the doors of high employment
to a woman who would have been scorned by another person of rank.

“How came you to work for Lord Darius?”

She beamed. “My lord always favored my cooking. It didn’t matter to him that I was a woman, and blind and bony besides. He made me promise that I would become his chief cook as soon as he set up his own household. His father grumbled that Lord Darius had stolen his best cook, but it was all in fun. He would have given my lord the moon, if he had but asked.

“We used to have such magnificent feasts in the old days whenever Lord Darius was in residence. And then, at the end of the feast, he would sometimes call me to him and introduce me to his great guests. He said he was proud of me.”

I could see that Shushan doted on my husband, and was baffled by this picture of him, which showed him as a generous and loving master. I did not like to think of him in those terms; it was more comfortable believing him to be harsh and unreasonable.

Hearing the dog barking outside, I grew concerned that he might, in his enthusiasm, burst back into the kitchen and annoy Shushan. Waving the bone, I said, “My thanks, Shushan,” and was startled to catch her in the act of smiling.

I realized that I had made my first sally toward friendship in my husband’s home. Suddenly the thought of abandoning my bed was not so overwhelming.

G
et this creature off me,” I cried, huffing around the mastiff’s long tongue, which was trying to plant wet kisses on my face. Avoiding another enthusiastic lick, I pushed him away. He weighed as much as a large man. “I don’t have any treats for you.”

Pari laughed. “He isn’t looking for food. He wants attention.”

It was clear that Caspian was used to human companionship and affection. Most Persians were hunting mad and spent prodigious time in the company of their animals. Next to their children and families and the empire, they loved their horses best. Many extended that love to their hunting dogs as well. From Caspian’s peremptory expectation of affection, I concluded the mastiff enjoyed Darius’s particular attachment. I was amazed that Teispes had dared to mistreat him.

“Let’s take him for a walk in the garden.” As soon as I mentioned the word
garden
, Caspian began to whine and bounded
forward, then rushed back to lick my hand, then leapt ahead again.

“It figures. The dog understands Persian better than his master,” I grumbled.

It was a glorious day. Blue skies stretched over us like a ceiling carved out of turquoise. I breathed the fresh air and felt my soul coming back to life.

Darius’s formal gardens had been designed in the traditional style, cut into four enormous parks by means of two long intersecting avenues. A long man-made stream ran along the center of one of the avenues. We chose a side lane that led us through a fruit orchard. Pink and white blossoms perfumed the air. Pari reached for a cluster of them and wove them into my hair.

I was no gardener, but I could see that in spite of its beauty, the orchard showed signs of inattention. Piles of leftover leaves from the previous autumn still remained decrepit and wrinkled at the base of tree trunks. Weeds grew with abandon. And yet the orchard must have once been well maintained, for the trees appeared strong and healthy. Again I was puzzled by the state of this palace, at once so rich and strangely neglected.

Caspian bounded toward me and began to bark. I found a smooth stick on the ground and threw it for him to fetch. As he approached it, I began running behind him, crying, “Race!” and before I knew it, Pari, the dog, and I were running like carefree children through the trees, the sound of barks, hollers, and laughter mingling with one another. The blossoms flew out of my hair and landed on the ground; I squashed them under my feet as I ran past, unable to avoid them. Their scent rose up more pungent for being crushed, sweetening the air.