Books: Hassan: The Story of Hassan of Baghdad and How He Came to

J >> James Elroy Flecker >> Hassan: The Story of Hassan of Baghdad and How He Came to

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And suddenly turning a corner I came upon the market,
which was like a garden full of girls in splendid clothes
grouped in groups like flowers in garden beds and some like lilies, naked.
I ran around the market to find Pervaneh and all the women laughed
at me aloud, and behold there she stood; she who had never worn a veil before,
the only veiled woman in all the market, for she had sworn to bite off
her lips if her master would not veil her: but I knew her
by the beauty of her hands, and I cried: "O dealer, the veiled woman
for a thousand dinars!" And the dealer laughed in the way of dealers
at the presumption of my offer and demanded two thousand,
and so I purchased for gold the blood of my own heart,
and she lifted her veil and sang for joy and hung upon my neck,
and all the slave girls clapped their hands.

But at that moment there entered into the market a negro eunuch,
so tall and so disgusting that the sun was darkened and the birds
whistled for terror in the trees. And all the dealers and the slaves
bowed low before him. Coming to my dealer, he cried: "Why dost thou
sell slaves before the Caliph has made his choice?"

Then turning to to Pervaneh, he said, "Go back to thy place."
And I cried, "She is my purchase." But the eunuch said,
"Hold thy peace; I take her for the Caliph."

And suddenly two guards seized Pervaneh, and I drawing my sword
was about to hew the eunuch into a thousand pieces,
Pervaneh made a sign to me, and looking up I saw I was surrounded
by men at arms. And Pervaneh cried in the speech of my country,
as they carried her way: "I will die, but I will not be defiled:
rescue me alive or dead, soon or late, and avenge me on this Caliph,
may the ravens eat his entrails!"

That is my story, and for this reason I will nail the Caliph
down in his coffin, bound and living and with open eyes.

CALIPH
(In horror) Bound and living, with open eyes! Thou devil!

MASRUR
Is that all the story?

JAFAR
Will you tear up the Empire for the honour of a girl?

CALIPH
(In fury) And set your worthless passion in scale against
the splendour of Islam!

RAFI
Is this Haroun the splendour of Islam? Is the prosperity
of these people, a rosy slave in his serai, or their happiness,
a fish in his silver fountain?

JAFAR
God will frustrate thee.

RAFI
If he will. Farewell, my guests. I go to avenge Pervaneh,
and to wash Bagdad in blood.

JAFAR
And what of us?

RAFI
It is well be used that you are my guests, for you are rich and proud,
and eminently deserve destruction. But you are safe in his room
as in an iron cage; you will only hear, as in a dream, the crash
of the fall of the statue of tyranny.

CALIPH
(Rushing to intercept him) By the thick smoke of Hell's Pit
and the Ghouls that eat man's flesh, you shall not go,
and we shall not stay.

RAFI
Look twice before you touch me!

(He leaps behind the archway. The BEGGARS and the WOMEN are now
lined close to the wall of the room and the GUESTS are isolated
in the centre. From behind every pillar appears an ARCHER
with bow drawn taut directed on the startled GUESTS.)

CHORUS OF BEGGARS AND DANCING GIRLS
Today the fools who catch a cold in summer
Will fly for winter in the windy moon.

To-day the little rills of shining water
Will catch the fire of morning oversoon.

To-day the state musicians and court poets
Will set new verses to a special tune.

Today Haroun, the much-detested Caliph
Will find his Caliphate inopportune.

RAFI
(Silencing the SINGERS with a wave of his hand;
to the GUESTS) Did not someone ask me why this house was called
the House of the Moving Walls?

CALIPH
I asked the question.

(Sheets of iron with a crash covering the apertures of the arches.
The four GUESTS are completely walled in.)

RAFI, BEGGARS AND WOMEN
(From behind the iron partitions with a shout) Answered!

JAFAR
This is a disastrous situation!

(The BEGGARS Tramp out to martial music.)

VOICES OF THE BEGGARS
(Retreating)

Today Haroun, the much-detested Caliph,
Will find Caliphate inopportune!

JAFAR
(Listening at the wall) They have all left the room.
At least we are alone. Let us shout, they may hear us from the street.

MASRUR
(Banging on the wall) Eyyah! Help, help, men of Bagdad!
The Caliph is in danger! The Caliph is in prison!...
Come up and save the Caliph, the Master of Men, the Shaker of the World!...
(Silence.)

CALIPH
There comes no answering cheer...

JAFAR
I had forgotten the height of this room above the streets:
and on either side stretches the empty garden of this house!

(The CALIPH, JAFAR and MASRUR rush around as though trying to find
a way out of their prison, and banging on the iron walls.
HASSAN takes his seat on the carpet.)

CALIPH
Allah! and this room is a box within a box like a Chinese toy.
And that man will surprise my soldiers in the chill of dawn,
and sack my palace and burn Baghdad. He will discover my identity
and bury me alive!

JAFAR
Alas, Master! What shall we do?

CALIPH
Thou dog! Thou dirt! Thou dunghill! Thou dustheap!
Did I make thee Vizier to ask counsel or to give it?
Find out what we shall do! Thou hast let me fall into a trap,
and now dost quiver and quake and shiver and shake like a tub of whey
on the back of a restive camel: my kingdom is reduced from
twelve provinces to twelve square cubits: my subjects from
thirty millions unto three, but Bismillah! one of my subjects
is the Executioner, and Mashallah! another one merits execution:
and Inshallah! if thy head doth not immediately devise
a practical scheme of escape it shall dive off my shoulders
and swim across the floor.

JAFAR
What shall happen, shall happen. But here is one who is occupied
in meditation, and is aloof from the circumstances of the moment:
let us invite him to Council.

CALIPH
Ho, thou Hassan! What occupies thy spirit?

HASSAN
I am examining the square of carpet. It is of cheap manufacturer,
inferior dye and unpleasant pattern.

CALIPH
Art thou a carpet dealer?

HASSAN
No, sir, I am a confectioner,

CALIPH
And I am the Caliph.

HASSAN
As my heart surmised. O Commander of the Faithful!
(Performs the ceremonies prescribed.)

CALIPH
Canst thou give me one gleam of hope of salvation,
Hassan the Confectioner? If not, Masrur shall cut off all our heads,
beginning with thine, I dare not fall into that man's hands alive.

HASSAN
But I dare! O spare me, spare me! What of the man who put me
in the basket? He will know where we are, and come to our rescue.

CALIPH
No good--no good. I would rather depend on the mercy of Rafi
than on the whim of Ishak. Masrur, unsheathe. There is no hope.

HASSAN
Thy pardon on thy servant: there is hope! Behold the light!

(Points to crack between bottom of the iron wall and floor,
towards the balcony.)

CALIPH
By the seven lakes of Hell, we are not mice!

HASSAN
A mouse could not pass. But what, O Master, of a message?

CALIPH
A message?

HASSAN
Written out black on paper, and dropped into the street.

CALIPH
Ho, Jafar, thou art a fool to this man! Take out thy pen and write.
Warn the Captain of the Soldiers. Warn the Police. Describe our position.
Offer the the Government of Three Provinces to the man who picks
up the paper. Write clearly, write quicker. Time's flying.
Write, and we are saved. Write for the Salvation of Bagdad;
write for the safety of Islam! O Hassan, the Confectioner,
if we are rescued I will fill my mouth with gold!

(JAFAR having written on a long roll of paper, they thrust it in the crack.)

HASSAN
No: at the corner here, where there is no balcony and the wall
drops straight into the street.

(MASRUR pokes out the paper with his sword.)

CALIPH
And now how shall we employ the time of waiting for our deliverance?

JAFAR
I shall meditate upon the mutability of human affairs.

MASRUR
And I shall sharpen my sword upon my thigh.

HASSAN
And I shall study the reasons of the excessive ugliness of the pattern
of this carpet.

CALIPH
Hassan, I will join thee: thou art a man of taste.

SCENE II

(See ACT I, last Scene)

Again, the street outside the house--the Street of the Fountain,
with the balcony of RAFI and the balcony of YASMIN opposite.
Cold light before dawn.

(On the steps of the Fountain, two tired MENDICANTS asleep.
One slowly rubs his eyes and looks round him.
A paper comes floating down. One tired MAN lazily catches it.)

FIRST LOITERER
Here comes a new chapter of the Koran falling down from heaven.

SECOND LOITERER
Is it written, Abdu?

ABDU
It is written, Ali.

ALI
Read what is written, Abdu.

ABDU
I cannot read. Am I schoolmaster?

(Folds paper, puts it in his belt, and prepares to sleep again.
Several interesting ORIENTALS pass by.)

ALI
Abdu!

ABDU
I sleep.

ALI
I can read: give me the paper.

ABDU
I am asleep: get up and take it from my belt if you want it,
Ya Ali, I am heavy with a great sleep, like a tortoise in November.

ALI
Ya Abdu, I am too languishing to move. It is a paper and it is written.
It does not matter. To-morrow or the next day it will be read.

ABDU
To-morrow or the next day I shall wake and pass it to you.

(Interval: more interesting ORIENTALS go by.)

ALI
(With sudden inspiration) Blow me the paper, Abdu.

ABDU
Alas, Allah sent thee to trouble the world!

(ABDU blows the paper over. ALI with infinite difficulty spells it out,
murmuring:)

ALI
Ha, alif, alif, re wow wow 'ain jeem--ah, ye blessed ones in Paradise,
is it thus ye write a jeem? Nun--but art thou a nun,
O letter, or a drunkard's qaf? Verily an ape has written this
with his tail: I have the second line. (With a start)
Ho, Abdu, whence came this? Do not pretend to sleep. Answer me.

ABDU
From the sky: how do I know?

ALI
Let me look at the sky. (Rolls on his back and stares upward)
I tell you, Abdu, a mighty joker has flung this from the balcony.

ABDU
Allah plague him and his pen and thee! Is there no peace in the world?

ALI
Here it is written, and do thou listen, O Abdu,
for this is the strangest of the strange writings that are strange:
"Whoever findeth this paper, know that the Caliph is in the house above,
a prisoner, and his friends prisoners, and in the extremity of danger,
he and they, with all Bagdad. Let the rescue be swift and sudden,
but above all secret. The iron walls must be lifted from beneath.
And send a man at once to the Guard, O fortunate discoverer,
to warn them to protect the palace against the Beggars of Bagdad,
and thou shalt be made Governor of Three Provinces.
Signed,
Jafar, the Vizier."
(Bursting into laughter) Three Provinces, well I know
their Three Provinces! Some rich young reveller hopes to play a game
with poor old Ali, even as a game was played on the son of Abdullah,
whom they dressed as a woman and placed in the Grand Vizier's Harem,
and his reward came hailing down on his toes. (In a lower voice.)
And I tell you, Abdu, what if the Caliph were in the house
and his friends? What if this were true? Who would believe me?
Who am I to rescue the Caliph? I never meddle in politics.

ABDU
May the great gripes settle on thee and on the Caliph and the mother
of the Caliph. Shall I not sleep? And now there comes a disturbance
down the road. Ya, Jehannum, the Police!

(CHIEF OF POLICE with ISHAK)

ISHAK
I tell you, I do not know precisely where I left them.
It was somewhere in this quarter. It may have been this balcony
they went to or that, but there are a thousand balconies.
It was above a fountain, but there are a million fountains.
I tell you they always come back. Have you not already twenty
such scares as these for the safety of the Caliph?

CHIEF OF POLICE
Never and on no preceding occasion has his exalted name
been so long delayed in his return to the palace.
The day is dawning.

ISHAK
I tell you, if you do find him you will get no thanks,
O man of arms. Will you dare to unstick the Ruler of the Moslem World
from the embrace of his latest slave girl or dash the cup of pleasure
from his reluctant hand?

CHIEF OF POLICE
I tell you, if you do not find him, man of letters, I will have you
impaled upon a monstrous pen.
(Seizes him.)

ISHAK
Thou beastly, blood-drinking brute and bloated bully,
take off thy stable-reeking hands.

CHIEF OF POLICE
Yallah, these poets. They talk in rhyme.

ALI
(Who has risen and salaamed, advancing) I pray you, Sirs,...

CHIEF OF POLICE
O thou maggot! Darest thou address us?

ALI
I pray you only regard...

CHIEF OF POLICE
I pray you only remove, or I will split you from the top.

ISHAK
Do you not see that he has a paper, and that his manners are superior
to yours, O Captain of Police? Let me look at thy paper....
Ah--ah. Whence came this, O virtuous wanderer?

ALI
From that balcony, may thy slaves be forgiven!

CHIEF OF POLICE
This is a very important clue. Let us break in the door.

ISHAK
There is no door. But first of all send word to the Palace Guard.

CHIEF OF POLICE
(To a soldier) Ali
(To the other ALI, who runs and says: Excellence, I hear and obey)
Not thou, fool. Did Allah make the name Ali for thee alone?
Who art thou that I should address thee? Are there not ten thousand Alis
in Bagdad, and wilt thou lift up thy head, O worm, when I say Ali?
(To POLICEMAN) Here is my ring. Take this paper,
and run with all thy might and show it to the Captain of the Palace Guard.

POLICEMAN
I hear and obey. (Starts off.)

ISHAK
(Stopping him) Wait!

CHIEF OF POLICE
What right have you to stop my man, you bastard son
of a quill-bearing barn-fowl?

ISHAK
Since when had a bludgeoning policeman the practical good sense
of a thought-breathing poet? Tell them, Ali, to send a few men
with levers and ladders.

CHIEF OF POLICE
It is well ordered: run, run, Ali!

ISHAK
You other Ali, who brought the paper...

ALI
Master?

ISHAK
How long is it since any paper was thrown from the balcony?

ALI
How do I know time? The time to go to market and buy a melon.

CHIEF OF POLICE
By the great pit of torment, this swine-faced has had the paper
a good hour! By the red blaze of damnation, thou maggot, why didst thou
not run with this at once to the Palace Guard?

ALI
I had a great fear, and I thought it was a jest.

CHIEF OF POLICE
A jest! Rivers of blood, a jest! The life of the Caliph of Bagdad, a jest?
The safety of the Empire a jest! I knew thee a traitor from thy face.
I will teach thee jesting. I will teach thee fear.
Ho, Mahmud, Zia, Rustem, down with his head and up with his heels.

ALI
(As his feet are looped into the pole to receive the bastinado)
Ya, Abdu, you had the letter first, it is yours. Will you not claim it
and the reward. Alas, that the Governor of Three Provinces should
be treated thus!

ABDU
Do I meddle in politics? Hit him hard, O Executioner,
for he is a great disturber of peaceful citizens.
But as for me, O Ali, lest my sleep be troubled by thy groaning,
I will make my way a little further on. (Exit)

(The EXECUTIONERS proceed with their work, but stop on entrance
of CAPTAIN OF THE MILITARY with SOLDIERS.)

(On the balcony opposite house where CALIPH is imprisoned
appears YASMIN.)

YASMIN
Look, look, Selim! there's a man being beaten.

SELIM
Come in quick! this is a riot or some trouble; come in quick,
and shut the shutters fast.

YASMIN
You are a valiant protection indeed for frail-as-a-rose ladies
in danger's hour.

(They remain at window.)

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
(To CHIEF OF POLICE) Sir.

CHIEF OF POLICE
Sir.

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
(Saluting) Captain of the Victorious Army, at your service.

CHIEF OF POLICE
(Saluting) Chief of the August Police, at yours.

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
(Bowing) I am honoured.

CHIEF OF POLICE
(Bowing) I am overwhelmed.

ISHAK
Come, Sirs, brush away, I implore you, the cobwebs of ceremony
with the broom of expedition.

CHIEF OF POLICE
Sir, when men of action meet, the place of the man of letters
is inside his pencase.
CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
A moment! Ere we proceed, Chief of Police, may I ask why this man
is undergoing punishment?

CHIEF OF POLICE
Since your excellency deigns to enquire, for urgent reasons of police.

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
They must have been very urgent indeed before you would permit
such an inopportune disturbance outside the very house where
our Lord the Caliph is imprisoned. You have seriously impaired
our chances of a speedy and effective rescue.

CHIEF OF POLICE
(Drawing his sword and whirling it about) Thou melon head,
thou, thou dung pig, thou brother of disaster, get thee hence
with thy knock-kneed band of fatherless brigands, ere I have thee
arrested for unnatural crime.

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
Out with thy sword, thou big-bellied snatcher up of burglars,
thou manacler of little boys, thou terror of the peaceful market,
I will teach thee to insult the slaughterers of the infidel host.

ISHAK
(Interrupting the COMBATANTS) Is this a time for indecent brawling?
Quick, where are the ladders?

A SOLDIER
(Pompously) In the rear, Sir, in the rear.

(The ladders are brought along.)

CHIEF OF POLICE
(To POLICEMAN) Place a ladder.

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
(To SOLDIERS) Place a ladder.

(Each goes up his ladder at the same time: bang at wall and are answered:
shout for levers which are procured, and assistance which speedily arrives.
The iron wall is lifted up, and CALIPH and the REST disclosed seated
peaceably awaiting their deliverance, the lamp still burning.)

CHIEF OF POLICE
My royal master!

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
August Lord.

CHIEF AND CAPTAIN
(Together) I have saved thee, Master.

(Each attempts to seize the CALIPH.)

CHIEF OF POLICE
Honourable Police!...

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
Honourable Military!...

CHIEF OF POLICE
It has been the high privilege of this grovelling slave to rescue
the Lamp of the World! I shall carry him down.

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
Permit me to observe, O fire-spitting Battle Cleaver,
that I was the first up this ladder, and though I tremble to obscure
the Sun's Brilliance with my dirty little hand,
yet it is I who have the prior claim.

(MASRUR pushes them aside, and assists the CALIPH down the ladder.
JAFAR and HASSAN follow. Shouts of "Long live the Caliph" from all
the people gathered in the street. The SOLDIERS salute.
The CALIPH raises his hand. Silence.)

CALIPH
Is my Palace safe?

MASRUR
O Lord and Master, we pray so.

CALIPH
And my people?

JAFAR
Around thee, O Lord and Master.

YASMIN
(From her balcony) By the Prophet, here is Hassan with the Caliph!

CALIPH
Are we all saved?

MASRUR
All, by the providence of Allah.

JAFAR
And the wisdom of Hassan.

CALIPH
And the Guard warned?

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY
All warned and at their posts, my Lord.

CALIPH
Allah, deliver our enemies into their hands. Let Hassan come to me.

HASSAN
(Prostrating himself) Master!

CALIPH
(Raising him) Rise, Hassan. This Hassan, yesterday a stranger,
has to-night by his skill and invention, saved my life and rescued
this city from a greater peril than my death.

CROWD
May it be far!

CALIPH
Therefore here and now, in the presence of all, I nominate Hassan to my court,
to hold rank among my subjects second to none save to Jafar, my Grand Vizier.

YASMIN
(Who has been at her balcony with SELIM) O Allah!

CROWD
Honour to Hassan. Honour to Hassan.

HASSAN
Master, I sold confectionary in the market.

JAFAR
Thou shalt now confection the sweets of prosperity.

ISHAK
(To HASSAN) Why, Hassan. You are the man with the broken lute.

CALIPH
Is that the voice of Ishak?

ISHAK
It is the voice of Ishak that has often sung to you.

CALIPH
Why did you abandon me, Ishak, and flee into the night? I do not know
I shall forgive you.

ISHAK
I was weary of you, Haroun-ar-Raschid.

CALIPH
And if I weary of you?
ISHAK
You will one day or another, and you will have me slain.

CALIPH
And what of this day that dawns?

ISHAK
Dawn is the hour when most men die.

CALIPH
Your death is granted you, Ishak; you have but to kneel.

(A red glow on the horizon.)

ISHAK
(As he kneels calmly) Why have they pinned the carpet of execution
on the sky?

MASRUR
It is the Caliph's dawn.

JAFAR
Thy dawn, O Master!

ISHAK
Thy dawn, O Master of the world, thy dawn;
The hour the lilies open on the lawn,
The hour the grey wings pass beyond the mountains,
The hour of silence, when we hear the fountains,
The hour that dreams are brighter and winds colder,
The hour that young love wakes on a white shoulder,
O Master of the world, the Persian Dawn.

That hour, O Master, shall be bright for thee:
Thy merchants chase the morning down the sea,
The braves who fight thy war unsheathe the sabre,
The slaves who work thy mines are lashed to labour,
For thee the waggons of the world are drawn--
The ebony of night, the red of dawn!

CALIPH
Sheathe thy sword, Masrur! Would you kill my friend?

MASRUR
I hear and obey.

CALIPH
I must go swiftly to my palace. But to you, Ishak, I leave
the care of this man you sent up to me in the basket,
who proved the salvation of Bagdad. Teach him the ceremonies
and regulations.
Is my chair ready?

MASRUR
Ready, Lord and Master.

(Exit CALIPH in chair, and JAFAR and CROWD. ISHAK signs to those
who would kiss HASSAN's feet to leave him.)

YASMIN
(On balcony opposite. Giving SELIM a great clout on the ear)
Go, leave my sight, you fool. I shall burst with fury.
You made me insult Hassan, and now he is going to court.

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