Free Altai: A Novel by Wu Ming

time and money had Nasi invested in me? Too much for him not to go all the way with me, or too little for me not to be expendable?
    We turned into an alleyway, and things suddenly changed. In a moment we had passed from the noise and color of the main thoroughfare to the shadow and quiet of a short, narrow backstreet of houses crammed against one another. One of the guards knocked on a little door. It was opened by an even littler man, a dwarf, with a blue turban and a long beard, white jacket and trousers, red slippers.
    The man who had been tailing me until then addressed the little man in Greek, in a tone that seemed curt and contemptuous. The man let us in.
    Inside, another surprise: an elegant residence. Light from chandeliers fell on fine carpets; trays with glasses of tea rested on low tables beside cushions and divans; and on solid wooden surfaces were tastefully arranged objects, decorated bowls and statuettes. Beyond that first room, an open door led to a flight of stairs.
    The little man gestured to me to go up. I looked at my guards, one after the other. They glanced at me with impatient agreement, as if to say, “What are you waiting for? We haven’t got all day.”
    I practically ran up the stairs, reaching a corridor at the top. In a doorway, with the light behind it, a female outline. I narrowed my eyes and saw that she was already undressed, as naked as the day she was born. I walked over to her and pushed her down on a wide, low bed. The sheets smelled fresh, and so did she. A lamp to my right, a tumble of dark hair, skillful hands unbuttoning and gripping me. I spread her thighs, but too late.
    I cursed in a low voice, looking down at my member, flaccid and empty, at semen smearing my belly and my cock. Semen that had spurted quickly and furiously, just giving me time to take my pants down. Semen that had freed itself without waiting for me. It had freed itself, leaving me in chains. While the woman got up I felt embarrassment and doubt speaking to one another, saying something to each other, or slipping away, suddenly, vanishing.
    I was still wearing my turban. And beneath my turban, inside my head, the echo of a shriek. The cry of a monkey, or a guffaw.
    Someone, somewhere in the depths of my mind, was laughing at me.

16.
     
    My return to captivity was slow and pathetic. My guards jeered at me silently, taunting me in their thoughts, and so did the women who crowded the street. I felt hundreds of eyes on me, as if they knew where I came from and how little of a man I had proved to be.
    As on the way there, my escort baffled me with twists and turns and dead ends, until I got home exhausted. Home, I said, because that was what I thought by then. Efrem’s house was my only refuge, prison though it was.
    Once I was through the door, Efrem gestured to me to be quiet and follow him. He led me across the internal courtyard, opened a side door and stood in the doorway waiting for me to come in.
    A dark, strong-looking man was waiting for me on a high-backed chair. Bearded, unturbaned, dressed as powerful men dress the world over. “ Salud i Beraha ,” he said. “Sit down, we have to talk.”
    In front of him were a little table and another chair. In the room around us, everything was vague. I could have spent crucial hours there, without remembering a single detail, whether it was luxurious or plain and bare. Reluctantly, I sat down.
    “I call myself Moisés Navarro. I hope you like this city.”
    I remember that he kept his hands in his lap, resting on the elegant fabric of his gown. On his finger he wore a little ring, a ruby the color of blood. The light from the window bisected his face, so that his eyes stayed in the gloom and his mouth seemed to belong to someone else. I watched it moving and formulating words. “Efremwill bring us coffee.”
    “Spare me the formalities,” I replied in Italian. “Tell me exactly what you’re interested in, and let’s get it over with.”
    Navarro clicked his