The King’s Fool

Mahi Binebine

Translated from the French by
Ben Faccini

First published as Le Fou du roi by Editions Stock, Paris, in 2017

First published in Great Britain in 2020 by

MacLehose Press

An imprint of Quercus Publishing Ltd

Carmelite House

50 Victoria Embankment

London EC4Y 0DZ

An Hachette UK company

Copyright © Editions Stock, 2017

English translation copyright © 2020 by Ben Faccini

The moral right of Mahi Binebine to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

Ben Faccini asserts his moral right to be identified as the translator of the work.

This book is supported by the Institut français (Royaume-Uni) as part of the Burgess programme.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

EISBN 978 0 85705 823 2

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

www.maclehosepress.com

For Papa

Poor clown! What endless, impossible pain there is in the merriment of the buffoon! What a dreadful job laughter is!

VICTOR HUGO, Choses vues

1

EVERYTHING SEEMED NORMAL, BUT it was not. A moonless night, embroidered with pale stars, cloaked two figures in the vast courtyard of the palace. Sidi moved slowly along paths dotted with lanterns, bordered by trees – orange, almond, doum palms. I kept close, slightly bowed, a touch obsequious, as required when escorting the king. Night-flowering jasmine infused the humid July air. Sidi held his aching belly with both hands, letting out occasional groans. The invisible beast gnawing at his bowels barely gave him a moment’s respite, and he was finding it harder to stand up straight. It was painful to watch him suffer, but I refrained from showing it. I forced myself to crack a few jokes – that was my job, to make my master laugh. Sidi was not in the mood. He scarcely listened, his face a knot of wrinkles which looked as if they had grown deeper all at once.

Everything seemed normal, but nothing is normal when the lion is on its knees and its claws have become useless splinters of wood; when the dying fire in its eyes inspires more pity than fear; when its gaze has turned inwards to the depths of its defeated body; when the roars of yesterday are no more than faint echoes of a life burned at both ends, heavy with every kind of excess: bitter regrets, un-acknowledged defeats, resounding half-victories, great joys and sorrows, sacrifices and misgivings, too – a tumult through which angels and demons dance to the Grim Reaper’s tune.

Everything seemed normal, but I could feel a tightness in my chest. I prayed, day and night, that God would free my master of his illness and, if needed, inflict me with it on his behalf. I was willing to take on his sickness, the spasms in his guts, the shooting pain in his sides. Had I not been the king’s devoted servant for thirty-five years, his enduringly resourceful entertainer, his appointed theologian – despite his role as Commander of the Faithful? His literary consultant, too: his only fount of knowledge when it came to the dazzling world of poetry, a witness to the days when the Arabs waged war in verse, when grammarians argued for months about intonation and declensions, about a trifling accent; an era when mathematical and astrological equations were the closest we came to religion . . . blissful times that now felt as though they had never existed.

Everything seemed normal, but your humble servant knew otherwise. I, Mohamed ben Mohamed – the scum of Marrakesh’s rancid effluence, the least likely man ever to have rubbed shoulders with the elite, an escapee from the deepest sewers of humanity – I was there on that July evening, a few steps behind my moribund master, my head still reverberating with the doctor’s dire verdict: “In two or three days we’ll all be orphans.”

Sidi’s attention was grabbed by an unusual light in the gift room: a vast storeroom where thousands of presents, the residue of the king’s innumerable parties, were piled up, still in their original wrapping paper.

“Come,” the king said. “Let’s go and see what’s up.”

“It’s late, Sidi. The night is chilly. We should go back.”

“Not before I catch the fiend who’s robbing me before I’m even in my grave,” he grumbled, pushing ahead.

“Someone must be cleaning, Sidi, that’s all.”

“At this time of night?”

I didn’t reply. The king seemed bent on getting to the bottom of the matter.

When you walk through the palace at night, you would be wrong to imagine that you are alone. Dozens of spying eyes follow you, watching your every move. I know what I’m talking about. For decades, I’ve lived behind these walls glinting with mosaics, in these gardens studded with fountains that gurgle the same song at each twist in the path. It seemed incredible to me that someone would be foolish enough to steal from the very heart of the royal household. Yet we all knew the king was a shadow of his former self, and as a result some presumed they had the right to attempt the most foolish things.

We limped our way towards the northern wing of the palace, climbed some steps, headed down a long, vaulted corridor only used by the staff and saw the door to Ali Baba’s cave ajar. Sidi gave it a gentle nudge, peered through the gap and stood still. Then he silently set foot inside. I slipped in behind him. The scene that met our eyes was enlightening to say the least, and would have been unthinkable only weeks previously. The hem of his djellaba held up to form a bundle, an old slave was busy scooping up precious caskets, felt-lined coffers and objects of all kinds. He must have been hard of hearing not to have noticed our arrival, but when Sidi cleared his throat, the man spun round and nearly passed out at the sight of the king standing right there before him. Petrified, shaking, the slave appeared to be trying to speak, yet no sound would leave his mouth. His ebony skin turned purple, its shininess exaggerated by the sweat streaming down his forehead in a sheen of terror. Given Sidi’s reputation, I didn’t give the brazen idiot much of a chance. If he was lucky, the fearsome fire slaves in charge of punishments would send him packing with a hundred lashes. Proper whips, too, made from plaited oxtail, dipped in ice-cold water. One crack of these whips was retribution enough. I didn’t dare think of the alternative. But the king was unpredictable. No-one could guess how he would react. He could crush a man for a trifle just as he could forgive the most serious of offences.

We had further proof of it that evening.

“Hurry up,” he said to the thief. “Get on with it, and scarper! If the guards catch you, you’ll end up with a noose around your neck.”

The slave did not know which way to turn, unsure whether to believe his master or not. As he remained rooted to the spot, I leaned over, rummaged through his upturned djellaba, removed what seemed to be an expensive watch case and slipped it into my hood.

“At least have the decency to share some of your spoils, fat arse. Now get a move on before Sidi changes his mind!”

Noticing the beginnings of a smile on my master’s weary face, I added, “Consider yourself lucky that Sidi’s in a good mood this evening. As a matter of fact, if I were you, I’d ask him for another favour.”

The slave stared at me in disbelief. The king had begun to smile now.

“I don’t know. Request a transport licence of some kind,” I said. “A franchise to sustain you in your dotage?”

“What kind of franchise?” The king chuckled.

I leaned towards the slave and whispered, “A railway franchise.”

“A railway franchise, Your Majesty,” the poor man stuttered.

The king guffawed, reawakening the pain in his sides, but it didn’t stop him. He laughed on and it was as if a cloud of butterflies had taken flight.

“I think an airline franchise might suit our man better,” I said, grinning. Then I turned to the slave. “Go on, get out of here, you’ve earned your treasure.”

We watched him stagger away, a trickle of urine in his wake.

Sidi remained a while longer in that vast storeroom weighed down by a mountain of gifts he had never had the time nor the inclination to unwrap. This abundance brought him no pleasure at all. We both knew he had no need for any of it where he was heading. Letting the slave walk free, however, had cheered him no end.

“Come,” he said, his voice calm. “Let’s go.”