The Storyteller of Marrakesh Read Online Free Page A

mountains as well as from the desert as far south as Tan Tan and Tafraoute. Pilgrims are good for my line of business: they prefer the magic of make-believe to their own dreary reality. They go for epic tales, with plenty of digressions to postpone the return to the quotidian.
    I usually wait until I have at least eight listeners. As a rule of thumb, the larger the audience, the greater their credulity. Then I begin to speak very softly so that my words, as if melting into the air, promise an unimaginably intoxicating voyage. To travel thus is to live a dream. My story forms the vortex, which, for the space of the evening, delivers the peasant, the sharecropper and the drover from their dull and cheerless existences. Gradually my voice rises to offset the noise of the Jemaa. I find my rhythm and settle into a steady cadence. By nightfall, my audience is mesmerized for the rest of the journey.
    That evening, to my right, a father and his four sons had begun to pluck subtle Andalusian melodies on their ouds and violins. Farther away, a group of Gnaoua musicians had set up with their long-stemmed guitars and iron clanging hammers. They were accustomed to performing for hours on end, inducing in their listeners a trancelike state akin to ecstasy. Tonight they were accompanied by three fiery youths who danced in white-stockinged feet, gyrating their heads in time to fixed rhythms. After a brief interval, however, the Gnaoua moved to a better spot near the centre of the square, leaving me with the more appropriate stringed Andalusian accompaniment with which to launch my tales and sustain their mystery. The Andalus were from the north, near Tangier, and they played with superb finesse, their mournfully introspective tunes dissolving into the air, leaving no trace save the barest intimations of longing.
    Inspired, I took out the customary piece of ambergris from my jellaba, filling the air with its fragrance. I slid off the hood of my cloak, tilted my head to one side, and strained to hear the voices that I knew would soon resound through me. My listeners gathered. I placed my collection box on the ground, the bejewelled hand of Fatima on its lid glinting its blessings. Studying my audience, I noted their faces – their eyes and gestures and expressions – to determine the level at which to pitch my story. Then I took a deep breath and commenced speaking.

‌ The Strangers
    My tale, I began, is entirely true, like life itself, and, therefore, entirely invented. Everything in it is imagined; nothing in it is imagined. Like all the best stories, it is not about conventions, plot or plausibility, but about the simple threads that bind us together as human beings…
    With that relatively brief and straightforward prologue, I went on to talk about El Amara, the crimson city, crucible of so many dreams. I was just getting into my stride, my voice taking on the lilting stridency of the practised storyteller, when I noticed a restlessness on the part of my audience, many of whom were craning their necks to make out what was going on behind them on the northern edge of the square.
    I followed their gazes.
    That was the first time I saw them.
    That was the first time I saw the two foreigners.
    They had emerged into the open space of the Jemaa from the direction of the Rue Derb Dabachi, from within the souks, and their entrance instantly caused a lull in the commotion of the square. All eyes, including mine, swivelled in their direction. The more modest amongst us immediately cast down our glances, as if abashed. Others, more bold, continued to stare and to follow them hungrily with brazen eyes. There was something about the intrusiveness of our collective response that left me ashamed. It was as if we were already implicated in their story, as if it were part of our own biographies, and hardly in the most complimentary of ways.
    Perhaps it had to do with the woman’s beauty, which was the first thing that everyone noticed.