Chimera by John Barth Read Free Book Online Page A

Shah Zaman said conversationally as she struggled, “your only power at present is what I choose to give you. And fair or not, I choose to give it.” He smiled. “Let her have the razor, my friends, and take the rest of the night off. If you don’t believe that I deliberately put myself in your hands from the first, Dunyazade, you can’t deny I’m doing so now. All I ask is leave to tell you a story, in exchange for the one you’ve told me; when I’m finished you may do as you please.”
    The mamelukes reluctantly let her go, but left the room only when Shah Zaman, still stripped and bound, repeated his order. Dunyazade sat exhausted on a hassock, rubbed her wrists, pinned up her fallen hair, drew the gown more closely about her.
    “I’m not impressed,” she said. “If I pick up the razor, they’ll put an arrow through me.”
    “That hadn’t occurred to me,” Shah Zaman admitted. “You’ll have to trust me a little, then, as I’m trusting you. Do pick it up. I insist.”
    “You insist!” Dunyazade said bitterly. She took up the razor, let her hand fall passively beside the hassock, began to weep.
    “Let’s see, now,” mused the King. “How can we give you the absolute advantage? They’re very fast, those guards, and loyal; if they really are standing by, what I fear is that they’ll misconstrue some innocent movement of yours and shoot.”
    “What difference does it make?” Dunyazade said miserably. “Poor Sherry!”
    “I have it! Come sit here beside me. Please, do as I say! Now lay that razor’s edge exactly where you were going to put it before; then you can make your move before any marksman can draw and release. You’ll have to hold me in your other hand; I’ve gone limp with alarm.”
    Dunyazade wept.
    “Come,” the King insisted: “it’s the only way you’ll be convinced I’m serious. No, I mean right up against it, so that you could do your trick in half a second. Whew, that gooseflesh isn’t faked! What a situation! Now look here: even this advantage gripes you, I suppose, since it was given instead of taken: the male still leading the female, et cetera. No help for that just now. Besides, between any two people, you know—what I mean, it’s not the patriarchy that makes you take the passive role with your sister, for example. Never mind that. See me sweat! Now, then: I agree with that Genie of yours in the matter of priorities, and I entreat you not only to permit me to tell you a story, but to make love with me first.”
    Dunyazade shut her eyes and whipped her head from side to side.
    “As you wish,” said the King. “I’d never force you, as you’ll understand if you’ll hear my story. Shall I tell it?”
    Dunyazade moved her head indifferently.
    “More tightly. Careful with that razor!”
    “Can’t you make it go down?” the girl asked thickly. “It’s obscene. And distracting. I think I’m going to be sick.”
    “Not more distracting than your little breasts, or your little fingers… No, please, I insist you keep hold of your advantage! My story’s short, I promise, and I’m at your mercy. So:
    “Six years ago I thought myself the happiest man alive. I’d had a royal childhood; my college years were a joy; my career had gone brilliantly; at twenty-five I ruled a kingdom almost as prosperous as Shahryar’s at forty. I was popular with my subjects; I kept the government reasonably honest, the various power groups reasonably in hand, et cetera. Like every king I kept a harem of concubines for the sake of my public image, but as a rule they were reserved for state visitors. For myself I wanted nobody except my bride, never mind her name, whom after a whole year of marriage I still loved more than any woman I’d ever known. After a day’s work in the durbar, bidding and forbidding et cetera, I’d rush in to dinner, and we’d play all night like two kittens in a basket. No trick of love we didn’t turn together; no myth of gods and nymphs we didn’t