tailor who told me the following tale.
‘There once came to his shop a wealthy man who was about to be married. This man ordered a luxurious set of wedding clothes. The tailor was honoured and overjoyed and went out to celebrate with his family.
‘It so happened that the bridegroom had a lover, a married woman from the city. Each visit she made to him he vowed would be the last. But he never seemed to be able to broach the subject of their rupture before their clothes and their words had dissolved between them and they were left only with their lovemaking.
‘Ignorant of this, the tailor began to order the finest fabrics for the wedding clothes. But as he set to work on the new garments, the cloth simply melted away as he cut it. Again and again he chalked out designs–but each time the same thing happened, until all of the valuable cloth had disappeared.
‘When the bridegroom came to collect the clothes he was furious to discover they were not ready, and demanded an explanation.
‘“I think the explanation lies with you,” replied the tailor. “Since your wedding clothes refused to be made, I can only suppose you are not ready to wear them. Tell me this: what colour are the eyes of your bride-to-be?”
‘The bridegroom thought hard, but the image of his lover stood resolutely between him and the eyes of his betrothed, and he was unable to answer.
‘“Next time you come to me for clothes,” said the tailor, “make sure you are prepared to wear them.”
‘With that, the young man left the tailor, called off his marriage, and left the city.’
The tale hung in the air for a while, and dispersed.
‘What do you say, scholars, to the tailor’s story?’ asked the king.
‘Sire, it is a fine story, constructed according to our traditions, and possessing all the thirteen levels of meaning prized in the greatest of our writings.’
‘My son, what do you think?’
‘There is no doubt,’ replied the prince, ‘that this fellow is accomplished in the realm of fantasy.’
The king looked pained.
‘I myself feel that the tailor has proved himself to be a man of the greatest integrity and probity. Such a man will never seek to advance himself through untruth. Tailor, I can see there has been a series of culpable misunderstandings as a result of which you have suffered greatly. Tell me what you would like from us.’
‘Sire, I am sunk so low that all I can ask for is money.’
‘Consider it done. We shall settle all your debts. Please go with this man, my accountant Salim. He will tell you what papers you need to provide and will give you all the necessary forms to fill in. We are heartily sorry for the difficulties you have had to encounter. Go back to your village and resume your life.’ Mustafa the tailor was anxious to leave the city, whose streets had by now become poisoned with his memories. But he did not wish to return to his village. It seemed too small to contain the thoughts he now had in his head.
He took up residence in a distant seaside town where he made a living sewing clothes and uniforms for sailors. In the afternoons, when his work was done, he would sit by the shore looking into the distance, and tell stories to the masts of boats that passed each other on the horizon.
Faces were in shadow. The ceiling lights were far above their heads, and not all of them still worked. You could not really tell what people were thinking. Perhaps the game was slightly outlandish, perhaps it was not for everyone. Some would surely fall asleep–or pretend to do so. There would be a loner who would stroll off, unnoticed, to the gloomy recesses of the arrivals hall only to discover there a listless and yet thoroughly absorbing interest in the health warnings posted on the wall, the rows of leaflets outlining visa requirements, tobacco and alcohol allowances, and the lists of objects prohibited in hand luggage. Surely!–for in everyone’s head there were still so many Issues of purely private concern that twitched distractingly, that flickered behind the glass of vacant stares.
She spoke with authority:
Next!
She was broad and tall, she sat back in her seat with some abandon, hands on the back of her head, elbows wide. The kind of person who liked groups, not afraid to rally people she had only just met. There was an ease about her: she had already taken off her high heels. There were smiles all around but she did not give up.
Who will be next?
THE MEMORY EDITOR The Second Story
IN THE CITY of London there was once a wealthy stockbroker who had three sons. Even when they were all still young, everyone could see that while the first two sons were able and hardworking, the youngest, Thomas, had his head in the clouds.
Thomas liked nothing better than to bury himself in history books and read of how the world was before. He thrilled at the struggles of Romanovs and Socialists and put his face close to black-and-white photographs of firebrand Lenin and little haemophiliac Alexei, trying to envisage the lives that hid behind the scratched surfaces and foreign-seeming faces. He read of places that were now summer holiday destinations where millions were killed just a few decades ago, and wondered at how death had in that short time become so exotic. He could never quite become accustomed to the idea that people were growing old long ago when the world was so much younger; so he knew he had not truly understood the scale of time.
One day Thomas sat in his customary reading seat in the Islington Public Library, not two minutes from the monumental black front door of his father’s Georgian townhouse that sat in a serene row of precisely similar houses on Canonbury Square. He read of the slow rot in the Ottoman Empire, of schemes hatched in Berlin, London, and St Petersburg to divide the imperial carrion, and of Bulgarian and Romanian revolutionaries studying poetry and explosives in Paris. The library was still save for a few occasional page-turners and the strenuous silence of the librarian who wheeled a cart of books and re-shelved them under Crime and Local Interest. Thomas thought of Thrace and Thessaly.
An old woman entered the library and sat down next to him. She lowered herself slowly into her seat and began to lay out things: a raincoat (on the back of her chair), a handbag, an umbrella in a nylon sleeve, a stick, a set of keys, a Tupperware lunchbox. The ritual was so deliberate that Thomas could not shut it out of his head, and he wished she had not chosen that particular place.
He tried to concentrate on sensational insurgencies and brutal massacres but now she had unwrapped the tin foil from her egg sandwiches and the smell was banishing the past. NO EATING said the big bright sign with the green logo of the Borough of Islington: Thomas looked hopefully around for someone who might enforce the rule, but suddenly there was no one else there. The old woman began to mash her bread noisily with toothless gums and he stole at her what was calculated to be an intimidating glance. He saw that she was blind.
‘I can see’–she hesitated, as if playing with his thoughts–‘you don’t like me being here.’ She spoke loudly, oblivious to the silence of the library. Thomas felt ashamed. She was fragile and tiny.
‘No it’s not that. It’s just–’
‘You don’t think I should eat egg sandwiches in a library. Luckily there’s no one here to catch me!’ She shot him a conspiratorial grin. ‘And anyway,
