10th Night: The Porter and the Three Ladies of Baghdad (Part 2)
The porter has eaten his fill, and the price of dinner is about to come due. Inside the house of the three ladies, everything is backwards: the first weeps through song, the second is beaten with palm rods and faints, and the third dips bread in makkun so bitter it is called mustard then laps water with the tongue of a dog. The porter begs to ask questions and is forbidden, again and again, but three merchants dressed as dervishes and three one-eyed calenders arrive with the same hunger for answers and behind them, riding by night in disguise, comes the Commander of the Faithful himself, Harun al-Rashid, who pays in gold for the privilege of what the sisters are about to confess. Every scar in that house has a story, and tonight before the singing turns to sorrow again the sisters begin to tell them. Continue the story that began in Baghdad. The King is leaning in. The dawn is coming. Are you? "She lowered her voice, and the ladies began to speak. Outside, the first pale light crept toward the Tigris and did not arrive."
