A Djinni Named Conscience
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“He must have scrubbed it out in the morning,” muttered the merchant to himself, so that the jeweller, the feeble Venetian, would not hear him. For the jeweller valued his reputation more than profit, though he knew to bargain not worse than Jammal himself.
“So this wee thin plate of gold costs in your opinion a dinar? And eight kurushes on top of that? Is that so, my dear?”
“Yes, my dear! This thick plate on a triple chain costs much more! Yet my honourable client doesn’t know how to look at the article at all! Either you’re looking at the plate but forget about the chain or you’re looking at the chain but forget about the plate. Also, not eight kurushes but nine, in case you’ve forgotten the price. I’ve taken off one kurush for you in the very beginning, or have you forgotten this too? Maybe you should bind your turban better so that the words that enter your ear don’t fly out from the other one?”
For a minute or two the merchant was pondering: should he get offended with the jeweller or not? And was it possible, because of this offence, to get a reduction of another kurush or two for this bauble? No, not likely. It was his own fault: he’d played forgetfulness too diligently. It was too late to get offended. And he still needed a gift for his second wife. Women love jewellery, while he hadn’t given anything to Rubike for a long time. Plus, the price was quite reasonable, to tell the truth.
“You’ve convinced me, my dear. Let’s agree on a dinar and eight kurushes and a half...”
“Why, just listen to him! This is pure squandering! All right, all right, only for you, my dear, I’ll take off this miserable half-kurush. Maybe you’d like to look at these new strings of beads?..”
However, at home Jammal met only disorder and trouble. Still in the doorway his junior wife Fatima rushed to him, hurrying to rat: Rubike, pretty but crotchety, had quarrelled with the senior wife, Balah; the quarrel quickly developed into a fight, and as a result there was harmed the Chinese vase with dragons that the master of the house would like to feast his eyes upon while smoking a hookah. Of course she, Fatima, had tried to bring the senior wives to reason, but how can one angel manage with two shaitans, Allah’s wrath on both their heads...
The merchant didn’t listen further. His beloved vase, as it became clear, was not just “harmed” – it was broken into tiny pieces. “Rubike did it!” the junior wife didn’t fail to remind from behind his shoulder, skilfully using the chance to aim the husband’s rage at her main rival.
And this time she was indeed successful.
“Ungrateful one!” shouted Jammal furiously to Rubike who stiffened before him in fear. “I spend a whole twenty dinars to please you, while you repay me with foul ungratefulness for my love and care! Here, instead of your gift!” In a fit of temper he threw the chain with the plate into the brightly burning hearth.
Rubike cried out in grief.
“Get out, in the name of Allah!” Jammal showed his wife the door imperiously, and she hurried to go away, sobbing. While the merchant, to calm his soul, put near him the silver hookah, filled beforehand with the best Kashgar teryak, lit it up and reclined tiredly on the pillows, sucking at the ivory mouthpiece.
What a day it was today!
Yet the day continued to please him with surprises. Hardly had Jammal the time to make a pair of blissful inhalations, when from the hearth there began flowing unheard-of bluish-green smoke. “The teryak took effect somewhat early this time!” wondered the merchant listlessly. “And that’s odd: there’d been mostly houries and cups of wine before ...” Meanwhile the smoke kept flowing, gradually condensing in the corner and gaining the features of a human being. A strong-built male, about forty by his appearance. Here he stands, looking around. The foreigner was dressed only in a loincloth with a fringe, while his legs were lost in a foggy mist giving no possibility to understand whether the weird guest had them at all, or if his upper part was hanging in the air resting only on some vague support. “No, this is not a houri. So be it...” thought the merchant Jammal philosophically.
“Thank you, my saviour; may your days be prolonged, may they be filled with the light of righteousness, and may the One in whose name you have set me free bless you!”
“That means – Allah, praise him,” specified the merchant, just in case. And he glanced severely at the vision: “Just try to blaspheme here!”
“Of course, of course!” the phantom hurried to agree.
Quite satisfied with the answer, Jammal started examining the uninvited guest.
An eagle-like nose, thick brows. Curly hair was glistening with streaks of grey. The same height as the merchant himself. Except for the legs... Nothing peculiar, on the whole. The merchant lost interest in the vision almost at once and reached again for his hookah, awaiting houries and wine. And this one – let him disappear quickly.
However, the phantom didn’t hurry to disappear. He trod in the corner, looking around. Squinted at the master of the house expectantly.
“Go, go, dear,” Jammal waved his hand lazily.
“Alas,” objected the vision. “You have liberated me, and now I must repay you for your kindness.”
“Liberated? Where from?!”
“I have been imprisoned by Suleiman ibn-Daud, let them both rest in peace, into an enchanted amulet. But you have let the blessed flame touch the walls of my prison, and you have spoken the Words of Liberation! Now I am free! Believe me, Abd-al Rashid will repay you, oh my benign saviour.”
“The Words of Liberation?” the merchant, who hadn’t expected from the phantom such independence, was taken aback.
“ ‘Get out, in the name of Allah!’ ” explained the vision willingly. “I assume Heaven itself has enlightened you, oh wisest of the wise!”
“But what you are, the shaitan take you!” the merchant was raging.
“Don’t swear, oh most respectable one. I am the djinni Stagnash Abd-al-Rashid, which means ‘the Slave of Justice’. I am the seventeenth son of the Red King of the Djinn, Kulkash the Originally Three-Headed. And I have taken an oath to repay the one who would save me. And the djinn’s oaths are unbreakable.”
“All right. Do it, repay me,” permitted Jammal indulgently. This was for the first time that he saw a djinni in his teryak dreams, and it was even interesting. The merchant got ready to observe miracles. “So what shall we do? Shall we ruin a city? No, I’m in a good mood now. Build a palace for me, that will do.”
“But I cannot build palaces,” the djinni became saddened just like a human being.
“Eh, old fellow... Shame on you. Upon my word, shame on you. Well, Allah take the palace. To explain afterwards how I’ve got it, where I’ve got the money to buy it... And surely they’ll yet levy taxes to the treasury. Better bring me a caravan with gold. Two or three caravans at once, so that you won’t run unnecessarily. With young beauties, with silk and wool, with Indian spices...”
“But I have no caravans,” the djinni, depressed, interrupted Jammal.
“What does it mean – no?! Are you a djinni or what?! Haven’t you vowed to fulfil my wishes? So do it!”
“I have vowed to repay you, not to fulfil your wishes, oh my saviour. Were I the slave of this plate, this would be another thing. While I am only the Slave of Justice. But I shall fulfil my oath, be sure of it!”
“So by what means are you going to repay me?” Jammal had already understood that he couldn’t get rid of the djinni so simply. He even began to doubt that Stagnash Abd-al-Rashid was only the fruit of his imagination and the teryak smoke. What if... no, nonsense! The merchant had never believed in fairy tales. Even in his childhood.