Twilight in Babylon (4 page)

“After dinner, sir.”

“Plenty of time.”

He touched the girl on the arm, and she looked at him. “Do you like sweets?”

“Sweet? Dates?”

“Dates are sweet,” he said.

“Beer?”

He laughed. “Beer can be sweet. Do you like beer?”

“I like beer a lot!”

He laughed again. “Kalam, have some of the light, sweet beer delivered. Elsa does it best.”

“The Scampi Stand?”

“Yes. Send over some scampi, too.”

They were walking on a street made of hard clay. Buildings lined both sides of it, and in the buildings people did marvelous things. A thousand scents touched her nose, most of them she didn’t know. If this wasn’t Dilmun, it was almost as good. It had to be.

Flowers and children and women and laughter and singing and cooking food and shouting… she’d never seen so many new things.

But she had seen even more impressive sights.

I must have
really
hit my head,
she thought.
That is why I hear this voice, my voice, saying things I don’t completely understand. But I know them.

She felt dizzy again.

“Here we are,” the bearded man said.

“I will return shortly,” the clean-faced Kalam said, and ran down another street.

“Step inside,” the bearded man said to her.

The door opened, and she stepped into a small garden. Empty. Where were the thirty thousand humans?

“Wash your hands,” the man said, pouring water from a clay jar into a basin. He rinsed his hands and face, then dumped the dirty water into a plant and poured some more water into the basin. “For you.”

She washed her face and hands and dumped the water. It was brown with dirt.

“You can set your things down,” he said. “They’ll be safe.”

She set down the
guf
skin and laid the knife on top of it. The tablet with her sheep she kept in her hand.

“Let’s see your sore,” he said. “Come into the light.”

The house, taller than a palm tree, was like a box with the center cut out, right over the garden. The bearded man sat on a stool and beckoned her to sit on the ground between his knees. She winced as he moved her hair around, and clumps of dried mud fell on her shoulders and breasts. “Does it hurt?”

“Not much.”

“How did you get this?”

“I… I don’t know.”

“What do you remember?”

She chewed her lip as images flashed in her mind: white hands, long fingers that were the color of fleece, mixing flour and water and leavening. A fire, the feelings about it were safe, secure. A haven. Then pain in the head. Resignation. “A fire,” she said slowly. “Blue light. A black tunnel.” She shrugged. “I woke up in the water.”

“There were other people?” he said, still touching her head. “A fire? You don’t look like you were in a fire. Though something did give you a crack on the head. It’s not healing very well.”

The fire was such a hazy memory, but it came with her head hurting. A falling star, trailing blue light. “I don’t remember. I—I can’t make sense of it.”

Ningal patted her on the shoulder. “I think you have the forgetting sickness. Happens often enough with head sores. You’ll recall soon enough. Turn around.”

She did, and looked up into his face.
“Hello, Sean Connery,”
she said.

He frowned, his pointed eyebrows rising higher. “Speak again?”

She shook her head.

“Were those curses? Are you possessed, female?”

She shook her head. “No, no, I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

He stared at her. “No matter,” he said at last. “It’s just that I’ve never heard those words before. We keep lists of all the words we know, because we are compiling a list of all the lists.” He smiled. “This concept is over your muddy head, isn’t it?”

She nodded slowly.

“What is your name?”

She stared at him.

“How are you called?”

She continued to stare.

“Did you lose your family? Your husband? Parents?”

“Everyone,” she said. “I lost them all. I’m alone, all alone.”

“Don’t weep,” he said. “It’s not my intent to upset you, I just need to find out how to classify you, what kind of refugee. Luckily you have sheep. You are wealthy, so you’ll be allowed to stay. You can pay for food and water.”

“Call me Chloe.” Part of her seemed to cry out in protest, but the name she’d never heard before, fit. Chloe. Alive and fresh and green—all good things. A blessing to have such a name. The protests faded away.

“Clo-ee?” he said.

She nodded.

“I wonder what mud god that name is supposed to honor,” he mused. “Do you know?”

She shook her head.

“What did you do in your village, Chloe? Besides herding, I mean.”

“I took care of the sheep, the goats. I had vegetables. Barley fields. I can make beer.”

“Beer making and tavern keeping are always useful skills. Can you spin? Felt? Weave?”

She nodded, but it was a slow, hesitant movement. “I think so.”

The door opened and Kalam came in. A half dozen people with parcels followed him. “Go with Kalam,” the bearded man said to Chloe. “Do you need anything else?”

“Pomegranates,” she said. “Their skins, if nothing else. I know it’s spring, but—”

The bearded man looked into Chloe’s face. “I’ll get them.”

She smiled. “Thank you.” She followed Kalam out of the garden and into a long, narrow room. Her eyes took a minute to adjust to the darkness.

“This is a copper tub,” he said to her. “Get in it, and the slave will wash you.”

She didn’t know what it was about his tone, but it made her backbone stiffen. He left the room, and she took off her skirt, hid her tablet in its folds, and climbed into the tub. The water was warm, warmer than the Euphrates in the spring, but not as hot as the Euphrates in the summertime.

“The Euphrates!” she said out loud, as if she’d never heard the word before. “Sacred dung!”

*      *     *

“By Sin, what a change! Come, come. Here are your pomegranate husks,” the bearded man said.

Chloe walked in, aware that bathing and shaving had given her every advantage.
Men love beautiful women, and men fear smart women, but a beautiful smart woman can have the world in her lily white palms.
It was a voice in her head; an accent she’d never heard and words that weren’t like her own. But it was comforting; it made her smile. “Thank you,” she said to him.

“Fetch the female some beer,” the bearded man said over his shoulder. Two young boys brought in a jar that stood as tall as her waist and set it between her and the bearded man. The boys gave each of them footstools, thrust drinking tubes into the neck of the jar, and gave one to Chloe and one to her host.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t believe I know your name?”

“Ningal,” he said. “Seventh son of a son from the First Family, but I gather you know little about them, being from the marshes.”

“No, I’m afraid I don’t.”

“Drink up,” he said, slurping on the beer. “It’s good.”

The brew was sweet and heavy, instantly refreshing. “It’s delicious,” she said. “I don’t know these flavors.”

“The ale-wife who makes this brew is famous for her mixture of spices. I particularly like this cinnamon and cloves with honey beer. It doesn’t go well with food, but it’s tasty before or after a meal.”

“It is,” Chloe agreed.

Ningal leaned back in his chair, and the sunlight fell on his chest and legs. He might be white-bearded, but his body was strong and well-defined, his skin still supple even though it was tanned as dark as leather. “As I told you, I would like you to make a report to the
lugal.
Maybe even more, perhaps to the two houses who rule the commonwealth, just to give them an idea of what kind of damage we’re facing.”

“What does it matter to you?” she asked, sipping her beer.

“What?” he said, turning his ear toward her.

“Why does it matter to the thirty thousand humans here, what happened on the marsh?” she said, louder.

“We buy our cattle from small villages like yours, we need to know if there is going to be less supply so we can make alternative plans. Also, it’s necessary to calculate the taxes on those clients who own property in those fields. The commonwealth gets a percentage. And,” he said with a sigh, “we have to figure if the commonwealth will be supporting extra humans who can’t support themselves. That has been our lot recently. Too many humans. Mostly, though, we care because that is what humanity is.”

She leaned forward, listening.

Ningal smiled at her. “What makes us different here in Ur is not because we know Ziusudra is alive and well, or because we read and write. It’s because we are aware we’re not the only ones on the Plain of Shinar. Others might need help, care. We are the more affluent, thus it is our responsibility to help our kin.” He sat forward, looking at her.

“You know we are all kin, don’t you? Even though your eyes are different colors and mine are black, or you are tall and graceful as a willow and I’m shorter and wiry as copper, we are kin. One mother, one father to us all. That is the humanity, that is the spark of the divine in each of us which we must protect.” He sipped from his beer. “When a brother thinks he’s more divine than his brother, it is the seed of trouble.”

Images flashed through her mind, so fast and so saddening she felt as if she’d been hit in the face. Brother against brother, cousin fighting cousin, splits because of gods worshiped or economic policies embraced. Planes, bombs, boats, guns. Blood, everywhere.

“Chloe, are you well, female?” Ningal asked.

She met his gaze.

“You turned as white as river foam. Does your head hurt?”

She turned the drinking tube away from her mouth. “I’m fine. It’s just a lot to take in at once.” So many things in her head that she didn’t know, but she understood. Words with pictures filled her with such emotion, of places and humans she’d never even guessed. But she knew it, knew them. The foreignness was familiar. Chloe turned the tube to her again, and took a small sip to cleanse the bitterness from her mouth.

“Forgive me a justice’s ramblings,” Ningal said. “You must be hungry, tired, I brought all of those people to groom you, but you know how to do it yourself, obviously—What do you need? Want?”

A Big Mac and an order of fries.
She kept her mouth tightly shut. “I need to take care of my sheep,” she said, rising with the bag of pomegranate peels.

“Of course, should someone go with you?”

“No, I will be fine,” she said. The tablet of her sheep was tied into her skirt, which, though dirty and scratchy, was hers. “I’ll be back soon.” She slipped out the door into the street. It joined with the other, the big street that led past the multicolored hill, beneath the gate, and out to the grazing grounds. The clumps of people seemed to pay less attention to her this time, and Chloe felt a little more at ease. But there were so many!

Outside the gate a few shepherds watched the sheep, but casually. Chloe saw that animal skins were rigged on posts, making a fence around the territory. She walked up to a reclining shepherd. He was carving something with a small knife and didn’t look up. “I’m here to see my sheep,” she said.

“Which ones are yours?”

“That one and that one,” she said, pointing. “They have only been here a few… hours.”

He glanced up at her from beneath interwoven eyebrows. “I remember. Eight and four and one. What are you going to do?”

“Mark them.”

He grunted and continued his carving. Chloe took her pomegranate peels to the water and opened a small vial of sesame oil for which she’d traded her fish-blade knife. With bleats and baas, she called her flock and chased them down to make her mark on them. It was almost twilight by the time she hurried beneath the archway, down the main street, and into the quiet lane on which Ningal lived. The people had started cooking fires in the streets, eating their meals and entertaining themselves in the open.

They have no homes, she thought. If not for Ningal, she would be one of them, crouched in the filth of the street trying to sleep.

Kalam opened the door for her. His gaze took in the bright yellow of her palms and the mud stains on her knees and chest. “There is water still in the tub,” he said.

“Thank you,” she said, and walked quickly through the courtyard and into the room.

As she stepped from the tub—again—there was a knock on the door. “Come in. Enter,” she said.

“The tradesmen await you,” a girl said.

Chloe picked up her skirt, then discarded it in favor of a clean sheet with which to dry her body. She trailed the girl and found herself in a well-lit room. The people who had followed Kalam in were there, waiting.

Cloth and bangles, bottles and brushes, they were all laid out for her to see. The tablet with her sheep was in her hand, but she had nothing left to bargain with. She looked over her shoulder and saw Kalam by the door. He was looking at marks on a tablet, one similar to what she had. The artisans didn’t speak, but they watched her look at their things. Finally, she slipped over to Kalam. “Excuse me, but… I have no way of paying these people for their goods.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, not looking up.

“I have to,” she said. “My flock is fine—”

“Unless you are devoted to the
guf
skin you brought, Justice Ningal is willing to buy it from you.”

She turned her back to the tradesmen and whispered to Kalam. “I don’t know the value of things.”

He glanced at the wealth of merchandise spread across the room. “For the
guf
skin, you can buy all of this and five more sheep, pay your taxes, and feast daily for months.”

“From the trade of a skin?” But as she said it, she recalled that a
guf
skin was made of the hides of at least four oxen, tanned and weathered, then stitched together and treated with bitumen for waterproofing.

They were invaluable to anyone who wanted to travel the river south, for he would construct a wooden frame, line it with the
guf,
and have a quick means of transportation. Once at his southern destination, he would dismantle and sell the wood, where it was in great demand, then fold up the
guf
for his next journey.
Gufs
were often passed through families as part of funeral goods or wedding gifts. “Of course,” she said, as she turned back to the offerings.