The Palace of Dreams Read online

  Rather to Mark-Alem’s surprise, the senior civil servant actually took the letter. Even more amazingly, for the visitor had begun to think he would never take his eyes off the door, he opened the envelope and began to investigate its contents. Mark-Alem scrutinized him all the time he was reading in the hope of finding some clue in his face. But instead, something happened that he found really terrifying, filling him with the kind of faint but rapidly mounting panic that is often produced by an earthquake. And what Mark-Alem was feeling was indeed caused by a kind of upheaval. For as he read the letter, the official with the morose expression had slowly risen from his chair. The movement was so slow and so smooth it seemed to Mark-Alem that it would never end, and that the formidable official on whom his fate depended was going to turn into a monster of some kind before his very eyes. He was on the point of yelling, “Never mind! I don’t want the job. Give me back my letter. I can’t bear to watch you uncoiling like that!, ’ when he saw that the process of standing was now over and the official was finally upright.

  Mark-Alem was astonished, after all this, to find his host was of merely average height. He drew a deep breath, but once more his relief was premature. Now that he was standing, the official began to walk away from his desk at a pace as deliberate as before. He was making for the middle of the room. But the man who’d brought Mark-Alem here seemed unsurprised, and moved aside to let his superior pass. Now Mark-Alem felt quite reassured. The man must just be stretching his legs after sitting down for too long, or perhaps he suffered from piles, or gout. And to think, Mark-Alem said to himself, I nearly let out a howl of terror! My nerves really have been in a terrible state recently!

  For the first time that morning he was able to face his interlocutor with his usual self-assurance. The official still had the letter of recommendation in his hand. Mark-Alem was expecting him to say, “Yes, I know all about it—the job’s yours,” or at least to give him some hope, make him some promise for the next few weeks or months. His many cousins wouldn’t have exerted themselves for nothing, moving heaven and earth for over two months to arrange this appointment. And perhaps it was more important for this functionary, by whom he’d been so unnecessarily terrified, to remain on good terms with Mark-Alem’s influential family than it was for Mark-Alem himself to get on the right side of him. As he watched him Mark-Alem was now so much at ease that for a moment he felt his face might break into a smile. And he’d have allowed it to do so if he hadn’t suddenly been shattered by a new and horribly unexpected development. The official carefully folded up the letter of recommendation, and just as Mark-Alem was expecting some kindly comment, tore it across, twice. Mark-Alem shuddered. His lips moved as if to ask a question or perhaps just to get some air, but the official, as if he hadn’t done enough already, went over and threw the pieces into the brazier. A mischievous flame spurted from the ash-choked embers, then died away leaving scraps of blackened paper.

  “We don’t accept recommendations at the Tabir Sarrail,” said the official in a voice that reminded Mark-Alem of a clock chiming through the dark.

  He was petrified. He didn’t know what he ought to do— stay there, decamp without more ado, protest, or apologize. As if he had read his thoughts, the man who had brought him here silently left the room, leaving him alone with the official. They were now face-to-face, separated by the brazier. But this didn’t last long. With the same interminable movement as before, the official moved back to his place behind the desk. But he didn’t sit down, He merely cleared his throat as if preparing to deliver a speech, then, glancing back and forth between the door and Mark-Alem, said:

  “We don’t accept recommendations at the Tabir Sarrail. It’s completely contrary to the spirit of this institution.”

  Mark-Alem didn’t understand.

  “The fundamental principle of the Tabir Sarrail resides not in being open to outside influences but in remaining closed to them. Not in openness but in isolation. And so, not in recommendation but in its opposite. Nevertheless, from today you’re appointed to work here.”

  What’s happening to me? thought Mark-Alem. His eyes, as if to make sure again of what had taken place, took in the remains of the letter, lying in ashes on the sleeping embers.

  “Yes, from this moment on you work here,” said the official again, having apparently noticed Mark-Alem’s appalled expression.

  He drew a deep breath, spread his hands out over the desk (which Mark-Alem now noticed was covered with files), and went on:

  “The Tabir Sarrail or Palace of Dreams, as it’s called in the language of today, is one of our great imperial State’s most important institutions… .”

  He was silent for a moment, scrutinizing Mark-Alem as if to assess how far he was capable of taking in the meaning of his words. Then he went on:

  “The world has long recognized the importance of dreams, and the role they play in anticipating the fates of countries and of the people who govern them. You have certainly heard of the Oracle of Delphi in ancient Greece, and of the famous soothsayers of Rome, Assyria, Persia, Mongolia, and so on. Old books tell sometimes of the beneficial effects of the seers’ predictions, sometimes of the penalties incurred by those who rejected them or accepted them too late. In short, books record all the events that have ever been told of in advance, whether or not they were actually affected by the forecast. Now this long tradition undoubtedly has its own importance, but it pales into insignificance beside the operations of the Tabir Sarrail. Our imperial State is the first in the history of the whole world to have institutionalized the interpretation of dreams, and so to have brought it to such a high degree of perfection.”

  Mark-Alem listened in bewilderment. He still hadn’t quite got over the previous emotions of the morning, and this matter-of-fact flood of abstruse phrases crowned all!

  “The task of our Palace of Dreams, which was created directly by the reigning Sultan, is to classify and examine not the isolated dreams of certain individuals—such as those who in the past were for one reason or another granted the privilege, and who in practice enjoyed the monopoly, of prediction through interpretation of divine omens—but the ‘Tabir’ as a whole: in other words, all the dreams of all citizens without exception. This is a vast enterprise, beside which the oracles of Delphi and the predictions of all the hordes of prophets and magicians in the past are derisory. The idea behind the Sovereign’s creation of the Tabir is that Allah looses a forewarning dream on the world as casually as He unleashes a flash of lightning or draws a rainbow or suddenly sends a comet close to us, drawn from the mysterious depths of the Universe. He dispatches a signal to the earth without bothering about where it will land; He is too far away to be concerned with such details. It is up to us to find out where the dream has come to earth—to flush it out from among millions, billions of others, as one might look for a pearl lost in the desert. For the interpretation of that dream, fallen like a stray spark into the brain of one out of millions of sleepers, may help to save the country or its Sovereign from disaster; may help to avert war or plague or to create new ideas.

  “So the Palace of Dreams is no mere whim or fancy; it is one of the pillars of the State. It is here, better than in any surveys, statements, or reports compiled by inspectors, policemen, or governors of pashaliks, that the true state of the Empire may be assessed. For in the nocturnal realm of sleep are to be found both the light and the darkness of humanity, its honey and its poison, its greatness and its vulnerability. All that is murky and harmful, or that will become so in a few years or centuries, makes its first appearance in men’s dreams. Every passion or wicked thought, every affliction or crime, every rebellion or catastrophe necessarily casts its shadow before it long before it manifests itself in real life. It was for that reason that the Padishah decreed that no dream, not even one dreamed in the remotest part of the Empire on the most ordinary day by the most godforsaken creature, must fail to be examined by the Tabir Sarrail. And there’s another imperial order that is still more fundamental: T
he table drawn up after the dreams of every day, week, and month have been collected, classified, and studied must always be absolutely accurate. To this end not only is there an enormous amount of work to be done in processing the raw material, but it is also of the utmost importance that the Tabir Sarrail should be closed to all external influence. For we know there are forces outside the Palace which for various reasons would like to infiltrate the Tabir Sarrail with their own agents, so that their own plans, ideas, and opinions might be presented as divine omens scattered by Allah among sleeping human brains. And that is why letters of recommendation are not allowed in the Tabir Sarrail.”

  Mark-Alem’s eyes involuntarily shifted to the burned paper now quivering on the embers.

  “You’ll be working in the Selection department,” the official went on in the same tone as before. “You might have begun in one of the less important sections, as most new employees do, but you’re going to begin in Selection because you suit us.”

  Mark-Alem glanced furtively at the quivering remains of the letter, as if to say, “Haven’t you gone yet?”

  “And remember,” said the other, “that what’s expected of you above all is absolute secrecy. Never forget that the Tabir Sarrail is an institution totally closed to the outside world.”

  One of his hands rose from the table and wagged a menacing forefinger.

  “Many, both individuals and whole factions, have tried to infiltrate us, but the Tabir Sarrail has never fallen into the trap. It stands alone and apart from human turmoil, outside all competing opinions and struggles for power, impervious to everything and without contacts with anyone. You may forget everything else I’ve just told you, but there’s one thing, my boy, which, I repeat, you must always bear in mind. And that’s secrecy. This isn’t a piece of advice. It’s the order of orders in the Tabir Sarrail… . And now, get to work. Ask in the corridor where the Selection department is. The people you’re going to work with will have been told all about you before you get there. Good luck!”

  Out in the corridor Mark-Alem was at a loss. There were no passersby from whom he might ask the way to Selection, so he started off at random. Scraps of what the senior official had said were still ringing in his ears. What’s happening to me? he thought, shaking his head in an attempt to clear it. But instead of dispersing, the echoes of the words he’d just heard only clung to him all the more obstinately. He even had the impression that in this wilderness of corridors they ricocheted off the walls and colonnades, acquiring a resonance even more sinister than before: “You’ll be working in Selection, because you suit us… .”

  Without knowing why, Mark-Alem began to walk faster. “Selection.” He kept repeating the word in his mind, and now he was alone it struck him as sounding very odd. He caught a glimpse of a figure a long way away down the corridor, but couldn’t tell whether it was receding or approaching. He was tempted to call out to it, or at least wave, but it was much too far away. He walked faster still, almost ready to break into a run, shout, do anything so as to overtake the man who now seemed to him to represent his only chance of salvation in this endless corridor. As he hurried along he heard the sound of heavy footsteps somewhere to his left. He slowed down and listened. The footsteps, rhythmical and threatening, were coming from a side corridor opening into the main one. Mark-Alem turned and saw a group of men marching along silently, carrying large files. The covers of the files were the same color as the cupolas and the ushers’ uniforms—pale blue with a tinge of green.

  As the group passed him, Mark-Alem asked timidly, “Please, could you tell me how to get to Selection?”

  “Go back the way you came,” answered a hoarse voice. “I suppose you’re new here?”

  Mark-Alem had to wait for the other to get over a fit of coughing to be told that the fourth corridor on the right would take him to the stairs leading up to the second floor, and that he should ask for further instructions there.

  “Thank you, sir,” he said.

  “Don’t mention it,” replied the stranger.

  As he moved on, Mark-Alem heard him still coughing desperately and finally gasping, “I think I must have caught a cold.”

  It took Mark-Alem more than a quarter of an hour to find the Selection offices. The people there were waiting for him.

  “I suppose you’re Mark-Alem,” said the first clerk he came across, before he’d had time to speak.

  He nodded.

  “Come with me,” said the other. “The boss is waiting for you.

  Mark-Alem followed obediently. They went through a series of rooms where dozens of clerks sat at long tables, poring over open files. None of them showed the slightest interest in either him or his guide, whose shoes clattered on the floor as he walked.

  Like the others, the boss sat at a table with a couple of files open in front of him. The man escorting Mark-Alem went up to his superior and whispered something in his ear. But Mark-Alem had a feeling the boss hadn’t heard. His eyes went on devouring the closely written pages in one of the files, yet Mark-Alem had a fleeting impression that on the edge of his glance there lurked, like a dying wave, the outer fringe of something fearful, though its epicenter was far away.

  Mark-Alem hoped his escort would whisper to the boss again, but he showed no inclination to do so. He just stood there calmly, waiting for his superior to finish with the file.

  He had to wait some time. It seemed to Mark-Alem as if the boss would never look up; as if he himself would be stuck there indefinitely, perhaps until office hours were over, or even longer. The whole room was plunged in silence. The only sound was the faint one made by the boss when he turned a page. At one point Mark-Alem noticed he’d stopped reading and was just staring vaguely at the file. He seemed to be thinking over what he’d just read. This went on for some time, perhaps for as long as the time he’d spent actually reading. Eventually the boss rubbed his eyes as if to remove one last mist from them, and looked up at Mark-Alem. The fearsome wave, which had already lost much of its force when Mark-Alem first saw it, had now completely disappeared.

  “Are you the new one?”

  Mark-Alem nodded. Without more ado the boss stood up and began to walk between the long tables. The other two followed. They went through several rooms which Mark- Alem sometimes did and sometimes didn’t think he’d been through before.

  When he saw a table in the distance with an unoccupied chair behind it and an unopened file on top, he realized this must be his place. And sure enough, the boss stopped and pointed at a spot between the table and the empty chair.

  “That’s where you’ll be working,” he said.

  Mark-Alem looked at the unopened file with its bluish cover.

  “The Selection service occupies several rooms like this,” said the boss with a sweep of his arm. “It’s one of the most important departments in the Tabir Sarrail. Some people think Interpretation is the essential department. But it isn’t. The interpreters like to think they’re the aristocrats of this institution, and affect to look down on us selectors. But as you must know, this is pure vanity on their part. Anyone with the least gumption can see that without us here in Selection, Interpretation would be like a mill without any wheat. We’re the ones who supply them with all their raw material. We are the basis of their success.”

  He waved a dismissive hand.

  “Oh well … You’ll be working here, so you’ll see for yourself. I believe you’ve already been given the necessary instructions. I don’t want to overwhelm you on your first day, so I shan’t go into detail now about all your duties. I’ll just tell you what you need to know to start with, and you can pick up the rest as you go along. This is the chief room in Selection.”

  Another of the sweeping gestures.

  “Between ourselves, we call it the Lentil Room, because this is where the dreams are first sifted. In other words, this is where it all starts. Here in this very room …”

  He blinked as if he’d lost the thread of what he’d been saying.

  �
��Well,” he went on after a moment, “to be quite accurate I ought to say the first sifting is done by our provincial sections. There are about nineteen hundred of them all over the Empire. Each one has its own subsections, and all these cells do a preliminary sorting before they send the dreams to the Center. But the sorting they do is only provisional. The real selection begins here. Just as the farmer separates the wheat from the chaff, so we separate the dreams that contain something of interest from those that do not. It’s this winnowing process that is the essence of our Selection. Do you see?”

  The boss’s eyes were growing brighter and brighter. His words, which had come with difficulty before, now crowded on him faster than he could formulate his ideas, and he kept speaking faster and faster as if to try to make use of them all.

  “Yes, that’s the principal aim of our work,” he repeated, “to eliminate from the files any dreams that are devoid of interest. To begin with, all those that are purely private and have nothing to do with the State. Then dreams caused by hunger or satiety, cold or heat, illness and so on?in short, all those that are connected with the flesh. Then come the sham dreams, those that never really happened but have been invented by people to further their ambitions, or by myth-omaniacs or provocateurs. All these three categories have to be weeded out. But that’s easily said! It isn’t so easy actually to identify them. A dream may seem to be purely personal, or due to trivial causes like hunger or rheumatism, when in fact it’s directly relevant to matters of State—probably more so than the latest speech by some member of the government! But to recognize that takes experience and maturity. One error of judgment and everything can start to go wrong, do you see? To cut a long story short, ours is very highly skilled work.”

  He now abandoned irony and adopted a more easy tone to explain to Mark-Alem what his practical duties would be. There was still a trace in his eyes, however, of previous tension.

  “As you’ll have noticed,” he went on, “there are other rooms beside this one, and in order to get a better idea of the work you’ll be called upon to do you must spend a day or two in each of them. Then, when you’ve acquired an overall idea of what Selection is, you’ll come back here to the Lentil Room, where you’ll find the work all the easier because of your initiation. But that won’t begin until next week. Meanwhile, you’ll make a start here.”