The Pillars of Hercules

Fifteen minutes later, we were in the middle of the souk and I was utterly lost. Following Ali, I had not paid any attention to landmarks, and so I stayed as close to him as I could. We passed carpenters and barbershops and shops selling bolts of silk and finished clothes, bakeries, jewelers, tourist curio shops selling dead scorpions (“for good luck”), amber beads, crimson coral made into beads and necklaces, old muskets, brassware, inlaid boxes, carved boars’ tusks and more.

Seeing these robes, the Benedictine monk garb of the Berber, covering body and head, like a monk’s cowl, I contemplated going into Algeria as Sir Richard Burton would have done—as he did do in Mecca, totally in disguise, in the forbidden place that was dangerous to any unbeliever. But Burton spoke fluent Arabic, and he would have learned Maghrebi Arabic for such a venture, and his cojónes were of a legendary size.

“We’re almost there,” Ali said, turning a corner.

Just around the corner was a colorful shop, larger than any other, and stacked with carpets. Ali greeted the smiling man in the doorway.

“You’re just in time,” the man said in Italian—he spoke it even better than Ali. “Everything closes in twenty minutes.”

We hurried upstairs and I was offered a soft drink. I said no thanks, since I knew that accepting any sort of gift in a carpet shop would obligate me—a cup of coffee, a drink, food; anything.

“Where are the Berbers?” I asked. Somehow I had been expecting a compound where scores of men in robes were muttering encouragement for me to examine their carpets.

“There—there.”

He motioned me past a bed. Very large, with inset mirrors and ivory carvings, it stood against one wall, like a museum piece.

“The king’s bed. Why is it so large?” the manager said. “He slept there with his four wives. But when Tunisia became modern and got rid of kings they also got rid of polygamy, and we bought the bed. As you can see, it is very beautiful and very expensive. Fine work.”

“Please sit down,” Ali said. “Time is short.”

But it was only noon and we were in a carpet shop. I said, “I don’t understand why time is short.”

“The promotion—the carpet sale,” the manager said.

“What promotion? I thought the Berbers were going home with their carpets. Where are the Berbers?”

“Please look,” the manager said, growing irritable.

Small nimble men began unrolling carpets—lots of them, and the carpets were tumbling at my feet, being flapped apart and stacked. They were all colors, all patterns and sizes, rugs, prayer mats, kilims, runners. The manager was narrating this business, saying that this carpet was red because it was a marriage carpet, and this one was blue because blue was a favorite Berber color, and this was a kilim that was the same on both sides—see? And this carpet had a design to ward off the evil eye.

“Is there an evil eye in Tunisia?” I asked.

“There is evil eye in the whole world,” the manager said. “Which one do you like?”

“The red one, the blue one, this one—they’re all nice.”

“This is five hundred dollars. This is nine hundred dollars. This is—”

“Never mind.”

“You want to buy this one?”

“No.”

“Four hundred—what do you say? Go on, make me an offer.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“You can’t think. You have to buy it by noon. When the promotion ends.”

Now, much too late, I realized that I had been hustled; so I resisted.

“I’ll come back.”

“You can’t come back. What do you offer me?”

“Nothing right now. Maybe tomorrow.”

“No! No!” he said. “There is no time. Just say a number!”

Just say a number? Hearing that, I laughed. The manager got angry and muttered harshly to Ali, who whispered back at him, and they began bickering in whispers, and every so often the manager howled, “Not much time!”

I thought: I am a fool. I am sitting here with one man howling and the other whispering and a third and fourth still unrolling carpets. I got up to leave. I said I would come back.

“You can’t come back—you can never come back!” the manager screamed at me, still in Italian—Mai, mai! Never, never!

Back in the twisting passageways of the bazaar, Ali—who was somewhat subdued—said, “Let’s say hello to my father,” and stopped in front of a perfume shop. There was no one in the shop. Ali snatched a vial of perfume.

“Jasmine! Special to the Berbers!”

“Not today.” I wondered whether he would persist.

“This is a present. No money! Take it!”

“I am afraid it will spill in my pocket,” I said, and defied him to answer this.

He shrugged and turned as the perfume seller, who was not old enough to be Ali’s father, entered the shop and exchanged greetings with him.

I walked away, but Ali was next to me. He said, “So, how much will you give me for taking you around?”

“I don’t want to be taken around.”

“I just took you around. What about baksheesh for everything that I showed you.”

“For everything that you showed me?” I said, thinking: Here is another pair of mammoth cojónes. “Nothing.”