A Mind at Peace Read Online Free PDF Page A

from her embrace and simply abandoned himself to that peculiar twinned state of one weary of body who’d fallen asleep in warm, aromatic water, afraid of drowning on one hand, yet unable to resist the numbness of sleep on the other. Never before had he experienced this. His body, which had previously felt nothing beyond simple arousal, opened as if to an entirely new realm; within a state of intoxication, moments of pure delight continually settled in utterly mysterious and unfamiliar vertices of his body. Internally, he felt a delicious feeling of being expended that recalled certain final stages of sleep, and what’s more, these hot embraces and caresses themselves bore desire for depletion. The moment it reached its pinnacle, one of consciousness lost, when he practically merged with his surroundings, his body, ravished by fatigue and anguish, suddenly slipped into unconsciousness. Oddly, as soon as sleep overtook him, he always had the dream of the previous night, when he’d passed out, and he saw his father with the large crystal lantern; but since the dream occurred within the torment of an initial experience, it roused him frequently and violently. Thus his inner suffering united with the ecstasy emanating from the woman’s figure and overwhelmed his whole being, and he became a grotesque creature doubled in body and meaning.
    Toward daybreak he awoke fully to find himself in the arms of the woman, his jaw resting against her diminutive chin, in complete command of his senses with every ounce of his being, when her eyes suddenly opened with unnerving insistence. To avoid her gaze, he shut his eyes again, and rolled anxiously toward his mother.
    His second memory wasn’t as convoluted. Around midafternoon, the carriage they rode left the rest of the column far behind. He was with his mother, three women, and two younger children. She was also there, crouched just behind the sprung seats.
    The carriage driver announced that they’d approached B., constantly glancing inside the wagon. Mümtaz realized quite well that the driver’s need to chat and provide details had to do with her. But she didn’t say a single word either to him or to the mounted gendarme, who wouldn’t alter his horse’s gait beside them, or to anyone for that matter. Her moans of the previous night had ceased. Mümtaz was delirious with the desire to look at her, but because he didn’t dare turn his head, he couldn’t even see his mother. As night fell, he was intimidated by the woman’s presence, and from time to time, as she let her shoulder press against his, the sensation became rather merciless.
    The contact was startling, devoid of the warm intensity of the night before, yet laden with memory; involuntarily, Mümtaz wanted the heat to approach, and within such anticipation, his shoulder nearly went stiff. During one spell of anticipation, his eyes fixed on the driver’s turquoise-beaded leather whip, waiting emptied of thought, he remembered his father with a distinct agony that far exceeded anything he’d ever felt, agony ready to hurdle every separation, diminishing every distance between them. He’d never see him again. He’d withdrawn from life forever. Mümtaz would never forget the moment of this epiphany. Everything lay spread before his eyes, in plain sight: The turquoise beads on the tip of the rawhide whip glimmered gloriously as they caught the autumn sunlight, some of them midair, some of them on the haunches of the horse before him. The horses sauntered, tossing their manes. From the top of a telegraph pole ahead, a broad-winged bird took to the air. Everything was mute in the washed-out landscape except for the sound of the wagons and the cries of a three-year-old girl; he sat next to the driver; the woman from the night before, who’d held him until morning and ignited mysterious desires in his naïve body, sat behind him; and just opposite her was his mother, who had no idea what was transpiring or, what’s more,