Balthasar's Odyssey (48 page)

Domenico: “Who said anything about waiting or coming back? Come out to sea with us, and in the morning you can check everything. Feel it, count it, taste it.”

I could hear the quiver of fear in Sayyaf's voice all the better because I couldn't see him.

“I didn't ask to check the goods. I trust you. I just wanted to look at the cloth to see how much I could sell. But it doesn't matter. I don't want to hold you up. You must be in a hurry to get away from the coast.”

Domenico: “We're away from the coast already.”

Sayyaf: “And how will you unload the merchandise?”

Domenico: “Better ask yourself how we're going to be able to unload you!”

“How?”

“I wonder!”

“I could come back in a small boat.”

“I'm not so sure.”

“Do you mean to keep me here against my will?”

“Oh no! No question of that. But nor is there any question of your taking one of my boats against
my
will. You must ask if I'll kindly lend you one.”

“Will you lend me one of your boats?”

“I'll have to think it over.”

I then heard the sound of a brief altercation. I guessed that Sayyaf and his henchman had tried to run away, but the sailors surrounding them soon overpowered them.

I almost felt sorry for Marta's husband. But not for long.

“Why did you send for me? What do you want of me?” he said, with a last vestige of courage.

Domenico didn't answer.

“I'm your guest. You asked me on to your boat, and now you try to take me prisoner. Shame on you!”

Some imprecations in Arabic followed. The Calabrian still said nothing. Then, slowly, he started to speak.

“We haven't done anything wrong. We haven't done anything more than an angler does. He casts his hook, and when he hauls in a fish he has to decide whether to keep it or throw it back in the sea. We cast our hook, and the fat fish bit.”

“And I'm the fat fish?”

“You're the fat fish. I don't know yet if I'll keep you on the boat or throw you back in the sea. I'll let you choose. Which would you prefer?”

Sayyaf said nothing. Presented with such alternatives, what could he say? The sailors standing round were laughing, but Domenico made them stop.

“I'm waiting for an answer! Do I keep you here or throw you in the sea?”

“On the boat,” grumbled the other.

It sounded like resignation, capitulation, and Domenico recognised it as such.

“Good, now we can talk properly. I recently met a Genoese who told me an odd story about you. Apparently you're holding a woman prisoner in your house, and you beat her and ill-treat her child.”

“Embriaco! That liar! That scorpion! He's already been to my house with a Turkish officer, and they saw that I wasn't ill-treating her. Anyhow, she's my wife, and what happens under my roof is my business!”

It was at this point that Domenico called me.

“Signor Baldassare!”

I emerged from my hiding-place, and saw that Sayyaf and his henchman were sitting on the ground, leaning against some ropes. They weren't tied up, but a dozen or so sailors stood around ready to knock them down if they tried to get up. Marta's husband shot me a look that seemed to hold more menace than contrition.

“Marta's my cousin, and when I saw her at the beginning of the year she told me she was pregnant. If she and her child are well, no one will hurt you.”

“She's not your cousin, and she is well.”

“And her child?”

“What child? We've never had any children! Are you sure it's my wife you're talking about?”

“He's lying,” I said.

I intended to go on, but a kind of dizzy spell made me have to lean against the nearest wall. So it was Domenico who continued.

“How can we tell you weren't lying?”

Sayyaf turned to his companion, who confirmed what he'd said.

“If you have told the truth, both of you,” said the Calabrian, “you'll be at home tomorrow and I shan't bother you again. But we must be sure. So here's what I suggest. What's your name, you?”

“Stavro!” said the henchman, looking in my direction. I recognised him now. I'd only caught a glimpse of him before, when I went to Marta's husband's house with the janissaries. He was the man Sayyaf signed to to go and fetch his wife, while I was shouting and bawling. I meant to behave differently now.

“Listen to me, Stavro,” said Domenico, suddenly less disagreeable. “I want you to go and fetch Signor Baldassare's cousin. As soon as she's confirmed what her husband says, they can both go. As for you yourself, if you do as I tell you you needn't even come back on board — just bring her back to the beach tomorrow evening and we'll come and fetch her in a boat. You can just go home, and you'll have nothing to fear. But if by any mischance the devil should put it into your head to deceive me, just remember that there are 600 families on this island who live on what I pay them. And that the highest authorities are beholden to me too. So if you talk too much, or if you disappear without bringing the woman back to us, I shall pass the word and you'll be made to pay for your treachery. And the blows will come from where you least expect them.”

“I won't deceive you!”

As they launched the boat again, with Stavro in it and three sailors to escort him to the shore, I asked Domenico if he really thought the fellow would do what he'd been asked. He seemed quite confident.

“If he just disappeared without more ado, there's nothing I could do. But I think I've put the fear of God into him. And what I've asked him to do won't cost him anything. So he may very well do as he's told. We'll soon see!”

We're out at sea again, and nothing seems to be stirring on the island. Yet somewhere behind one of those white walls, in the shade of one or other of those tall trees, Marta is getting ready to come to the beach. Has she been told I'm here? Or why she's being sent for? She's dressing, making up her face, perhaps even putting a few things in her bag. Is she anxious, frightened, or full of hope? Is she thinking of her husband at this moment, or of me? And her child — is it with her? Did she lose it? Has it been taken away from her? At last I shall know. I shall be able to bandage her wounds. I shall be able to make amends.

Night's starting to fall, and I go on writing without a light. The boat is moving cautiously towards the island, though it's still some way off. Domenico has stationed a sailor called Ramadane, from Alexandria, at the top of the mast. He has the keenest eyes of all the crew, and it's his job to watch the beach and signal anything suspicious. It's because of me that everyone has to take excessive risks, but none of them shows any resentment. I haven't caught a single look of reproach or sigh of irritation. How on earth can I ever repay them?

We're getting nearer the coast, but the lights on the island still seem as faint as the furthest stars in the sky. Of course, we can't light any candles or lamps on board ship. I can hardly see the paper I'm writing on, but I go on all the same. But tonight writing doesn't give me as much pleasure as usual. On other days I write to record events, or to explain myself, or to clear my mind in the same way as one clears one's throat, or so as not to forget, or even just because I promised myself I would. But tonight I cling to the pages as if to a buoy. I haven't anything to tell them, but I need them near me.

My pen holds my hand. What does it matter if I dip it just in the black of the night?

Off Katarraktis, 30 November 1666

I didn't think our reunion would be like this.

I, eyes screwed up, on the boat; she, the dim glow of a lantern at midnight, on a beach.

When the lantern started moving from right to left to right like the pendulum of a clock, Domenico ordered three men to launch the dinghy. They were to use no lights and be very careful, scanning the coast to make sure there were no traps or ambushes.

The sea was rough and noisy, but not raging. The wind was from the north, and already typical of December.

On my cold lips, salt and prayers.

Marta.

How near she was, and yet how far still. The dinghy took a lifetime to reach the beach, and then stayed there for another lifetime. What were they doing? What could they be talking about? It's not difficult to take a person on board and then come back again! Why didn't I go with them? No, Domenico wouldn't have let me. And he'd have been right. I haven't got the practical experience that his men possess, nor their equanimity.

Then the dinghy did come back towards us. The lantern could be seen on board.

“God! I said no lights!” Domenico muttered.

As if they'd heard, they put out the flame. Domenico heaved a loud sigh and patted me on the arm. “By my ancestors!” Then he ordered his men to get ready to head out to sea as soon as we'd picked up the dinghy and its occupants.

Marta was hauled on board in a highly unceremonious manner — with the aid of a rope to which a plank was attached for her to stand on. When she'd been hoisted up far enough, I helped her step over the rail. She'd given me her hand as if to a stranger, but as soon as she was safely on deck she began to look round, and although it was dark I could tell she was looking for me. I said one word. Her name. And she took my hand again, clasping it quite differently now. She'd obviously known I was there, though I'm still not sure whether it was her husband's henchman who told her or the sailors who picked her up from the beach. I'll find out when I have a chance to speak to her. No, no point — we'll have so many other things to talk about.

I'd imagined that when we were reunited I'd take her in my arms and hold her tight for a long, long time. But with all those bold mariners round us, and her husband still on board, waiting to be tried by our court of pirates, it would have been in bad taste to seem too intimate or eager. So the surreptitious pressure of her hand on mine, in the dark, was the only evidence of our closeness.

Then she felt unwell, so I told her to cool her face by holding it in the spray. But she began to shiver, and the sailors said she ought to stretch out on a mattress in the hold, under some warm blankets.

Domenico would have liked to summon her straight away, to find out what had become of the child she'd been carrying, to pronounce judgement and then sail back to his home port.

But she looked ready to give up the ghost, so he resigned himself to letting her rest till the morning.

As soon as she was lying down, she fell asleep — so fast I thought she'd fainted. I shook her a bit to make her open her eyes and say something. Then I felt ashamed of myself and came away.

I spent last night propped on some bags of mastic, trying without much success to get to sleep. I may have managed to drop off for a few minutes just before dawn.

During this seemingly endless night, while I was neither fully awake nor fully asleep, I was assailed by the most horrible thoughts. They terrify me so much I hardly dare write them down. But they arose out of my greatest joy.

I found myself wondering what I ought to do to Sayyaf if I found out he'd done Marta, let alone the child she'd been carrying, any harm.

Could I just let him escape unpunished? Shouldn't I make him pay for his crime?

Anyhow, I thought, even if Marta's husband had had nothing to do with the child's death, how could I go off and live with her in Gibelet, leaving Sayyaf behind to keep mulling over his revenge and return one day to haunt us?

Could I sleep easy in my bed knowing he was still alive?

Could I sleep easy in my bed if I —

Should I kill him?

I, kill?

I, Baldassare, kill? Kill a man, whoever he is?

And to start with, how does one set about it?

Me, creep up to someone with a knife in my hand and stab him through the heart? Or wait till he's asleep for fear he might look at me? No! God, no!

What about paying someone else to …

What am I thinking? What am I writing? Lord, let this cup pass from me!

It seems to me I shall never sleep again, either tonight or any of the nights that remain to me!

Sunday, 5 December 1666

I shan't re-read the last few pages — I might be tempted to tear them up. I wrote them, but I'm not proud of them. I'm not proud of having contemplated sullying my hands and my soul. And I'm not proud of having decided against it, either.

While Marta was still asleep, and to assuage my impatience, I wrote down the thoughts that visited me before dawn on Tuesday. Then, for the next five days, I wrote nothing. I even considered, once again, abandoning my journal. Yet here I am again, pen in hand, perhaps because of the rash promise I made myself at the start of my journey.

I've had three attacks of mental disarray, one after the other, in the last week. The first came when Marta and I were reunited. The next, in the confusion that followed. And after that, the fury, the spiritual storm that's raging in me now, shaking and battering me as if I were on deck in a gale with nothing to cling on to, lifting me up every so often, only to throw me down harder.