The Janissary Tree Read Free Page B

because of the cauldron, and
because the grooms were unhappy about the state of the horses. I was the first
one to look inside. I am a military man, I've seen dead men before. And"--he
hesitated--"I had already begun to suspect what I might see.
    Yashim
said nothing.
    "I
gave nothing away. I ordered the horses out and had the doors barred. That's
all."
    Yashim
pinged the cauldron with his fingernail. It gave a tinny sound. He pinged
again.
    The
seraskier and he looked at each other.
    "It's
very light," Yashim remarked. They were silent for a moment. "What do you
think?"
    "I
think," said the seraskier, "that we do not have much time. Today is Thursday."
    "The
review?"
    "Ten
days. To find out what is happening to my men."
    5
    ****************
    It
had been a difficult morning. Yashim went to the baths, was soaped and
pummeled, and lay for a long time in the hot room before returning home in his
freshly laundered clothes. Finally, having explored the matter in his mind in
every way he could think of in an effort to draw a lead, he turned to what he
always considered the next best thing.
    How
do you find three men in a decaying, medieval, mist-benighted city of two
million people?
    You
don't even try.
    You
cook.
    Getting
up, he moved slowly over to the other side of the room, which lay in darkness. He
struck a lucifer and lit the lamp, trimming the wick until the light burned
steadily and bright. It fell on a neat arrangement of stove, high table, and a
row of very sharp-looking knives, suspended in midair by a splice of wood.
    There
was a basket in the corner and from it Yashim selected several small, firm
onions. He peeled and sliced them on the block, first one way and then the
other. He set a pot on the stove and slipped enough olive oil into it to brown
the onions. When they were turning, he tossed in a couple of handfuls of rice
that he drew from an earthenware crock.
    Long
ago he'd discovered what it was to cook. It was at about the same time that
he'd grown disgusted with his own efforts to achieve a cruder sensual
gratification and resigned himself to more stylized pleasures. It was not that,
until then, he had always considered cooking as a woman's work: cooks in the
empire could be of either sex. But he had thought of it, perhaps, as a task for
the poor.
    The
rice had gone clear, so he threw in a handful of currants and another of pine
nuts, a lump of sugar, and a big pinch of salt. He took down a jar from the
shelf and helped himself to a spoonful of oily tomato paste, which he mixed into
a tea glass of water. He drained the glass into the rice, with a hiss and a
plume of steam. He added a pinch of dried mint and ground some pepper into the
pot and stirred the rice, then clamped on a lid and moved the pot to the back
of the stove.
    He
had bought the mussels cleaned, the big three-inch mussels from Therapia, up
the Bosphorus. He opened them one by one with a twist of a flat blade and
dropped them into a basin of water. The rice was half cooked. He chopped dill,
very fine, and stirred it into the mixture, then tipped it into a dish to cool.
He drained the mussels and stuffed them, using a spoon, closing the shells
before he laid them head to toe in layers in a pan. He weighted them down with
a plate, added some hot water from the kettle, put on a lid, and slid the pan
over the coals.
    He
took a chicken, jointed it, crushed walnuts on the flat of the cleaver, and
prepared Acem Yahnisi, with pomegranate juice.
    When
everything was done he picked up a swan-necked ewer and very carefully washed
first his hands, then his mouth, his face, his neck and, lastly, his private
parts.
    He
took out his mat and prayed. When he had finished, he rolled up the mat once
more and put it away in a niche.
    Soon,
he knew, he would have a visitor.
    6
    ****************
    STANISLAW
Palewski was about fifty-five years old, with a circle of tight gray curls
around his balding pate and a pair of watery blue eyes whose expression of
beseeching sadness