The Long Trip Home: In Ancient Places

From grey, wintry London they had taken trains through to Cadiz in the far south of Spain. Following the coast toward Cape Trafalgar they made their way to the southernmost Punta Marroqui. Reaching Tarifa, they crossed the narrow straits and stepped into the place she had so often dreamt of, Morocco, Al Mamlakah al Maghribiyah.

Landing up at Tangier, they went straight to the train station, booking seats for Marrakech (time enough to see Tangier on the return). Along the coastline the train car was breezy and warm with salt wind.

At Casablanca, Dar-el-Beida, they turned slightly east, toward the lovely Atlas Mountains. Alef told her of one last wish of Nabokov, to chase a rare white Atlas butterfly there.

Marrakech, a sand mirage in the steady, hot sun, glimmered on the horizon as they clicked and rocked across the rail lines sharing their lunch of tabouleh, dates, and lime water.

They arrived just after noon, found high rooms in a quiet side street, and stretched out to rest and calm down.

Many of the lanes led nowhere and she would find herself back again in the exotic magic of the singing, flutes, wild drumming, charmers and their sprites.

The sun continued on, drying the sand, bleaching the colors of walls and shop displays, burning so far and so near, warming the blue-black swaddling of the babies in arms and of their watchful mothers and fathers, of their solemn grandmothers' indigo, and the night blue of the Berber wanderers.

In time, the sun also moved on and slipped into the sea. Evening fell in cool shadows.

It felt as if some weight had lifted from their arms and legs as their rooms slowly cooled. A breeze paid some mischievous, sprightly visit to their quarters, spinning round and leaving again as quickly as it had carried in the scents of couscous, kebab, olive oil, onion, bstilla pastry, almonds, melon, honey, and coffees.

She felt a slow coursing of fresh energy through her limbs. She smiled and stretched, happy to have so much open time ahead with no one checking her clock.

Hours later, after a lovely supper with her friends and not a little wrangling with traders and tinkers at the souk marketplace, she found her way alone, wandering the side alleys for something that drew her in. Many of the lanes led nowhere and she would find herself back again in the exotic magic of the singing, flutes, wild drumming, charmers and their sprites. The noise and din of knife sharpeners, tinkers, barterers, mixed with an endless glimmer and colour of street traders in trinkets, carpets, fabrics, brass, silver, and earthen glazed cooking vessels. It all felt so familiar to her, as she had seen and heard these things in her dreams.

Finally, after a last assault by a very handsome man with a fine silver ewer of mint tea, she slipped into a cool lane that was quite unique in its stillness.

Walking slowly along the winding little lane she peered into a shop from time to time, sure she would find what she was after. But each one confronted her with glances and stares as if to say, "Miss, he is not here."

She continued on, following her instincts of ancient places. At the very point of nearly turning back, she spied along a whitewashed wall a colourful canopy that barely sheltered an old gentleman. He was wrapped in a night blue djellaba. His bright white beard, neatly clipped, just shined at the edge of a loose, pointed hood. He appeared to be napping there, ensconced at the edge of the alley, seated on a great cushion covered over by a darkly patterned carpet. Her heart stirred for a moment, and she stood still, taking in the image.

In some gap between her intention and her assent to intuition, she found herself seated beside the old gentleman, a soft old cushion between her and the luminous wall, sitting underneath the canopy, the old gentleman talking to her in a Berber dialect she had never heard.

She looked up and down the lane. She saw nothing and no one. It was actually higher on a slight hillside than she had realised. She had filtered out the old fellow's speech, thinking there was nothing there for her. But as she looked back at him, she saw a small brass lamp burning at a tiny table at his side, and as he read from a rustic, printed booklet, she also realised that he was speaking to her in English.

"Bsmillah...great blessing to you. Yes, I am here in this lane off the Djema el-Efna market streets for these thirty years. I am an old storyteller."

She looked at him in the lamplight, leaning onto the long, rounded cushion between them to hear him better.

He appeared to be napping there, ensconced at the edge of the alley, seated on a great cushion covered over by a darkly patterned carpet.

He looked up slightly, not toward her, no longer reading yet he spoke in the same reading voice. "Here, let me take your hand. I have a story. I open with a few words from our old Berber speaking. If you care for the story, then I may accept some token of your understanding..."

She lifted her hand toward him, rested it in his, and as he rinsed her fingers in a few drops of water he spoke in his Berber again. She slowly felt as if she were making a promise, as if in the promise she was also being given the lane, the town, the countryside, its children and chickens, its households and secrets, its long history and hopes.

He veered again from the Berber into English, telling her of her home, telling her of her dreams, telling her of those long-forgotten threads of innocence, experience, and insight that were her life. He wove them so beautifully, one through the other, that she softened in the cooling light of the alleyway, grateful for the shadows to let her tears fall freely.

After some time, she was aware that he was no longer speaking. Her hand was resting still on the cushion but he was again absorbed, so it seemed, in the rustic little booklet.

She had so lost track of time that as she quickly checked her watch she gasped a little to see that it was eleven o'clock. On impulse, she gathered her things ready to leave that moment.

"Time is a token of understanding," he said as he continued reading, "yes."

She looked back, knowing that she would see no face, nor expression. She suddenly blushed so deeply, from burning cheek to breast, that she was again grateful for the shadows, even deeper now.

"Sir," she spoke, "I give you my warmest thoughts and wishes..."

She felt a current flowing there beneath the canopy as he closed the booklet and looked up the alleyway.

"Yes, one pure wish is better than every last dirham in Morocco, gathered together by the children and thrown by them, laughing, into the sea..."

She cried out, against her will, a slight desperate cry, then wept again softly, letting the time of her little wristwatch go its own way.

After she had gathered herself again, she slipped her hand down into her blouse, retrieving a small wallet hanging from a very thick cord. She lifted it out and, opening it, took out a small black velvet sack she had brought for her visit. Running her fingers down its length, she felt the softness and brushed it, counting three tiny facetted stones deep at the base of the dark sack. She reached over toward the old gentleman, gently placing the sack on the table beside the booklet. He touched her hand, turning it upward and holding it so gently he placed a small square wallet of the softest blue Moroccan there.

A fixity of place and the turning of time dispersed as she rose to walk down the alleyway. She retraced her steps, finding herself once again crossing through the same market streets, walking in a deep, unbroken stillness amid subtle currents of sandalwood, mint, and roses.