Officially sanctioned houses of pleasure existed too, well away from the homes of the elite. They clustered in the oldest part of the city, where cleanliness and conformity were less rigidly enforced, and where the unacknowledged poor congregated. Places which respectable citizens, fearing to walk, would visit in carriages with shaded windows.
A particularly notorious street ran adjacent to the docks. The bordellos lining it were said to cater for every taste. Consequently it was one of the few places where the highest and the lowest mingled.
The many establishments the street had to offer ranged from the dismally sordid to the gaudily opulent. One particular building, narrow, tall and outwardly unremarkable, fell somewhere near the middle of this spectrum. Like the others it was always open for trade, as the demand for its services was by no means restricted to the hours of darkness. But around noon few women were working and there was only a trickle of clients. This was a time when the burghers who covertly owned the business saved money by not employing minders.
A visitor to the house, once past its heavy front door, would be aware of shabbiness and neglect. Reasonably luxuriant long ago, the interior was now down at heel. Wall hangings depicting erotic scenes from antiquity and legend were faded. Woodwork was chipped and in need of varnish, rugs were threadbare. The faint odour of rot wasn’t quite hidden by incense.
Creaking stairs led to several storeys in like condition, each with half a dozen or so client chambers. On the top floor there were just two rooms, both with their doors shut.
The bigger of the two was very much the same as all the other rooms in the building; grubby and in need of decoration, though a few personal possessions gave a little character to its austerity. Its main item of furniture was a large bed.
A man and a woman occupied it. Naked, entwined.
Mumbling endearments spiced with obscenities, he thrusted feebly. He was old, near bald, with a pepper and salt beard. He had saggy, veined skin and a paunch, and perspired copiously.
The woman under him was putting on a performance, only able to pretend she was enjoying the act because she’d learnt how to disassociate, to put her mind somewhere else.
She had light olive skin and jet black hair. She was strong-featured, handsome and smooth-limbed. But at twenty-eight summers Tanalvah Lahn was growing long in the tooth for her profession.
His exertions seemed to last forever, breath laboured, bony fingers digging painfully into her shoulders. She caught a whiff of his body odour – unwashed flesh and old sweat – and turned her head to one side, keeping a fixed smile.
At last he climaxed and she matched his cries and moans with fake responses. Relief was her strongest emotion, mixed with a revulsion she tried hard not to show.
He rolled off her, panting, red-faced. She hoped he wasn’t going to have a seizure. That was always bad for business. He lay wheezing, a trickle of drool snaking from the corner of his mouth.
‘You were wonderful,’ she lied huskily.
He returned a similarly barren compliment, his interest in her already fading.
She got up, glad to move away from him. On a wobbly cabinet beside the bed stood an earthen basin filled with cold water. She dipped a cloth in it and washed herself. The client rose too and started to dress. She dried off and reached for her own clothes, wriggling into them hurriedly, anxious to be rid of him.
As he put on his garments their finery began to reveal his status; the distinctive livery of a senior bureaucrat. He had a fancy title which, like his name, she’d instantly forgotten.
‘So, how long have you been doing this?’ he said, negotiating buttons.
It was surprising how often they came out with that question. She suspected his curiosity was feigned, like that of all the others, and he probably only spoke to fill an otherwise awkward silence.
‘The governors marked me out at birth. I began work at first blood.’
He winced at her explicitness. Like most men, she reckoned, he didn’t want to think about the workings of a woman’s body, just make use of it. He covered his embarrassment with flattery. ‘Ah, that explains your expertise, my dear.’
She could have told him she never had a choice about the path she trod. Or how sick of it she was. Instead she flashed him a practised, non-committal smile.
A muffled thump and rumble came from the next room. It sounded like Mahba had a lively customer.
‘Have you never wanted to do anything else?’ Tanalvah’s client asked.
It was another standard question. Doubtless to be followed by the time-worn
Let me take you away from all this
that would be forgotten as soon as he’d gone. He was irritating her. She just wanted him to leave. ‘Look,’ she said, not bothering to keep the annoyance out of her voice, ‘it’s been good, but time’s -’
A shrill scream rang out next door. There were more thuds, and the sound of something breaking.
‘Mahba!’ Tanalvah exclaimed.
She slipped her hand under a cushion for the thin-bladed knife she kept there. Then she rushed out, leaving her alarmed client hopping with one foot in his breeches.
On the landing she rapped on the door of the next room. The only reply was another round of bumps.
‘Mahba!’ she called, beating the door with her palms. ‘Are you all right?
Mahba!
’ There was no answer and it had gone quiet inside. Tanalvah’s client joined her. ‘Help me!’ she pleaded. ‘Break down the door!’
The bureaucrat regarded her timidly. ‘Surely in this sort of place, with your kind of people, you have to expect -’
‘You old
fool
!’ she snapped. ‘My friend’s in there and I need your fucking help!’
‘I say, there’s no call for -’
A lock rattled, the door slowly opened a crack.
‘Mahba?’ Tanalvah whispered.
What she saw was a middle-aged man of distinguished appearance. Dressed, though dishevelled, he wore an abashed expression. He didn’t speak. Nor did he try to stop her when she reached out and pushed against the door. As it swung further inwards she saw that his white shirt was stained red.
‘What’s happened?’ she said. ‘What have you done?’
He only stared at her.
She shoved past him. He didn’t resist.
The room was in a shambles, its occupant’s few belongings scattered across the floor. A chair was overturned, a broken jug lay on the tattered carpet, a window drape hung by threads.
Tanalvah barely registered any of that. What she saw was Mahba, stretched out on the bed, for all the world like a broken doll, limbs at crazy angles, eyes open, staring. There was a cord wound tight around her neck. Her mouth was partly open, her swollen tongue protruding. Her face was tinged blue, what Tanalvah could see of it through the blood and rising bruises.
‘Mahba!’
She flew to the bed, discarding her knife. Frantically she began shaking her friend, slapping her cheeks, calling her name. She looked up at the bloodstained man and repeated, ‘What have you
done
?’
He spoke then, trying to sound in control, but he couldn’t hide the wavering tone of his voice. ‘Look… this doesn’t have to be a problem.’
‘What?’
‘She shouldn’t have struggled,’ he came back defensively. ‘It was only a bit of fun. That’s what she’s paid for, isn’t it?’
‘She’s dead. Mahba’s
dead
! What kind of…
fun
is that?’
‘We can come to an arrangement,’ he snivelled, pulling out his money pouch with a trembling hand.
‘Arrangement? You killed my friend, you bastard!’ Her dark eyes flashed angrily.
His whining self-justification suddenly evaporated. Genuine wrath took hold of his features. It crossed her mind that he might be ramped; she knew some used it for heightening sexual pleasure. He came nearer, still nervous but his gaze intense.
‘Listen, slut,’ he snarled, ‘I’ve got contacts. I can make things really difficult for you. I’m talking about big trouble.’