The Sword of Damascus (24 page)

And now I was back. I felt good, not least because of the kava smell. What memories that brought back! I raised my walking stick and knocked it twice very hard on the granite slabs of the dock. Time was when half a dozen porters would have come running. Time was, though, when I didn’t turn up on the docks dressed as some closed-purse Jew. The one porter who did eventually slope over gave me a nasty grin and pointed over at the main gate leading from the docks. Keeping what dignity I could, I frowned back at him and turned to where Edward sat on the dockside with our things.

‘I’ll be just a moment,’ I said. From what little I could see of him, he seemed too cowed by the full bustle of civilisation to have noticed my own embarrassment.

Over by the gate, there was an execution in progress. This had attracted a moderate crowd, including, for some reason, just about all the dock porters. I glanced at the young man who’d been nailed to the cross. Since he looked as if he’d been racked and scourged first, it was hard to say how long he’d been up there. From the voiceless movement of his lips, though, and from the impression I’d been able to form of the weather, he might have been there a day. Despite the colour his skin was turned, it was unlikely he’d been up there much longer – he still had enough strength in his arms to keep himself from hanging forward off the cross. I looked harder and pursed my lips. The bastard executioners had put a platform just under his feet.

I don’t imagine you’ve ever seen a crucifixion, my dear Reader – they were abolished wherever the Christian Faith was established by the Great Constantine. They have been brought back, though, wherever the Saracens have conquered. Since its first use by the Carthaginians, the punishment has been much the same. You fix two lengths of wood in the shape of a T – the cross shape is a refinement made by the artists of the early Church. You nail the victim’s wrists to each end of the top length, and his ankles to the down length. If it’s done fairly, he shouldn’t last much beyond evening, though cool weather can stretch out the agony. And the agony is extreme. You see, if he wants to breathe properly, the victim has to pull himself upright. With nails through his ankles, he can’t do that for long. So he sags forward. That makes breathing hard, and he must try again to get upright. The continual movement on the cross, and the sun, soon wears the victim out. Look at Jesus Christ. He lasted barely any time at all; this being said, his legs had been broken to hurry things along. But this poor bugger had been given a support for his feet. That and the weather might keep him going for days. Everyone in the crowd knew that. So did he. If he was no longer screaming, or twisting about, he was still conscious, his lips moving in some voiceless prayer. Even without Joseph’s arrow, poor Tatfrid had been luckier than this. Nothing barbarians can do will match the refinements of a civilised punishment.

There was a steady muttering in Syriac from the crowd about the unfairness of the execution. Several men comforted a sobbing woman. The Saracen guards stood about the cross, edgily fingering their swords. Just before them, some scrubby brown creature stood looking over at the public sundial. As I was about to ask again for a porter, he cleared his throat with ceremonial relish and struck a pose.

‘By orders of His Highness Meekal, Governor of Syria,’ he cried in Syriac, ‘you behold one who has dared wage war on God.’ He repeated himself in Saracen and then in a kind of Greek. As he finished, someone with an even browner face, though a clean turban, stood forward with a sheet of papyrus.

‘But the recompense of those who fight against God and His apostles,’ he read in the strained squawk the Saracens use for recitals of what their Prophet is claimed to have said, ‘and study to act corruptly in the earth, shall be that they shall be slain, or crucified, or have their hands and their feet cut off on the opposite sides, or be banished the land. This shall be their disgrace in this world, and in the next world they shall suffer a grievous punishment.’ He didn’t bother with the Syriac translation – the two languages are pretty close anyway – but went straight into an astonishingly corrupt Greek.

‘It is the will of God!’ someone breathed into my bad ear. Someone behind me whispered that it was murder, and that Meekal the Damned would be repaid seven times seven in the world to come.

I resisted the urge to ask what crime had been committed. This was none of my business. Instead, I knocked my stick again on the paving stones. Everyone, including the unfortunate on the cross, looked in my direction. One of the foreman-porters came forward. He looked at my robe and gave a half bow.

‘Those three moderately large boxes over there are mine,’ I said in Syriac. I pointed back to where Edward was still keeping a nervous watch over our things. ‘Do you know the Golden Spear Inn?’ The man nodded. ‘That’s where I want everything carried. You can also arrange a carrying chair for me.’ I thought, then added, ‘No – make that two chairs.’ I tossed him a silver coin and waited for his much lower and more respectful bow. I turned and went back over to Edward. He was staring at the execution. I ignored him and had a final look at the ship that had brought us here. The customs officials had now finished their searches, and were pointing out faults in the documentation of the few idiots who hadn’t known the appropriate tariff of bribes. It would have been nice to see the whole ship impounded. But the Captain was no fool. The Exarch of Africa had sealed his documents. That was as good for these officials as it had been for the Imperial blockade.

Our chairs carried at shoulder height, we moved slowly into the crowded, wealthy streets of Beirut. As in Caesarea, I’d warned Edward not to look about with his mouth open. But it was difficult not to be overwhelmed by the place. After so many years in the West, even I had forgotten how glorious a city still in full order could be. Of course, there had been changes. The long row of emperors had been taken down from their plinths that lined the main street. The bronze letters had been carefully prised from all the past victory and commemoration monuments. In place of all this, huge green banners fluttered from almost every public building. Every one of these carried pompous inscriptions in Saracen about the present and the coming Triumph of the Faith.

We stopped awhile by what had been the Church of Christ the Redeemer. The swarms of other chairs and of wheeled traffic had stopped easy access through the central square. I squinted in the powerful light and looked at what had been built as a smaller version of the Great Church in Constantinople. The golden cross had been taken down, and the mosaics above the entrance were painted over. No one would be allowed to know in future that it had been the gift of the Great Justinian after an earthquake had levelled the much older church there. Men with huge, dark beards stood outside, washing their hands and feet before going in. One of them looked up at me with grim hostility. Except his face was much darker, he might have been a big, ferocious Jew. I looked away and, fanning myself, peered instead at what had once been the main library. It was a couple of hundred yards across the square, and was largely a blur. I wondered if there were any books still in there worth reading.

But what of it if there weren’t? The cloud cover had now broken up into great puffs of whiteness, and the sun shone down on us. I was back in the civilised world. Once more, I sniffed in the welcome smells of Beirut.

‘My Lord,’ Edward cried softly in English. I waited until the carriers had brought our chairs closer together. ‘Why are all those men wearing blue crosses?’ He nodded over towards one of the smaller churches.

This hadn’t had its use converted, and I could see the black robe and beard of the priest, who was glowering across at the mosque. I looked hard at the crowd of men, all dressed in white, who were talking and waving on the steps of the church.

‘Those are Greeks,’ I said. ‘No – it’s better to call them the Orthodox. The locals call them Greek, but most actually speak Syriac.’ That wasn’t much of an answer, and the boy was looking at me to continue. ‘Virtually all the Syrians are Christian,’ I added, ‘but most are heretics of one kind or another. Like the Jews, they all have to pay tribute to the Saracens as members of a tolerated but despised faith. However, only the Orthodox minority are required to distinguish themselves in the streets by wearing a special badge.’ I was now making an effort to see about me. I pointed over to my left. ‘Look at that one over there,’ I said. ‘See how he’s got out of his chair to bow to the Saracen riding past on the black horse? That sort of thing pisses the Orthodox off no end. Then again, they do get full toleration – which is more than they ever granted to anyone in their own day.’

I heard the spattering of stones against masonry. I wasn’t up to seeing where this was or who had thrown them. But I recognised well enough the sudden and intent stillness of the “Greeks” and Saracens as they looked across the square at each other, and the quickening of the chairs and other traffic as the crowds of pedestrians began to thin out. We were almost out of the main square when an armed Saracen on horseback got in our way and stopped there. The head carrier looked nervously back at me. I ignored him, and gave the Saracen a long, haughty stare. I thought for a moment I’d have to lose face in front of Edward. But I had no badge of disgrace on my clothing. There was no telling who I might be. After a short look at me, the man scowled and got out of our way.

‘My Lord! My Lord!’ the innkeeper cried in Greek as our chairs came to a stop beside the entrance to the Golden Spear. So our stuff and my scribbled note had got there in good time. ‘But we had no letter,’ he cried. ‘After so many years, we assumed that you—’ He broke off diplomatically and creased his face into a smile. Unless he was being very diplomatic indeed, there was a chance he’d not heard the news of my fall. ‘We had no letter, and your normal rooms are occupied by another. But’ – he smiled again and bowed – ‘but for you, My Lord, all things can be arranged.’ He turned to one of his people and rapped out a stream of rapid Syriac. I acknowledged their renewed bowing with a lordly wave.

Edward now walking behind me, I was carried through the gate into the entrance hall. As I was helped down into a padded chair, someone presented me with a cup. I sniffed at the heated contents and sipped. It was an infusion of ginger and garlic with honey sweetening. It tasted reasonable. But I gave a puzzled look at the innkeeper. My eyes had now grown used to the gloom, though, and I could see round the little hall. Where was the icon of the Virgin? Where the silver cross in the place where, centuries before, the household gods would have sat?

‘Zacharias?’ I began.

He cut in. ‘I am known now, My Lord, as Zakariya,’ the innkeeper said with a pious leer. ‘I rejoice in my conversion to the True Faith of God.’ He looked heavenward, and haltingly uttered the Saracen words: ‘There is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is His Prophet.’

Oh dear, I thought, there’ll be no wine in this house! But I smiled and nodded. Why not convert? It saved him from the Infidel Tax. And it would surely mean no more of the enthusiastic if ill-informed sermons he’d used to preach to all his guests against the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon. I was less happy about the delicate enquiry regarding my own ‘conversion’ at the hands of the Caliph Omar himself. I stood up swiftly and gripped at Edward to avoid falling over.

‘That was half a century ago,’ I said hurriedly. ‘And it wasn’t so much a conversion as a diplomatic understanding.’ I turned the conversation to family matters. It seemed that Zakariya’s old wife had walked out on him when he converted. He’d replaced her with four others, each a quarter his own age, and these had now given him a whole litter of sons. I cut short his opening remarks on the unity of God with a toothless smile and congratulations on his good fortune.

But whoever had been occupying my rooms was now kicked out. It was simply a matter of making them ready for me with all proper haste. While this was done, two black slaves took hold of my chair and carried me towards a door at the back of the hall for a tour of the enclosed garden.

‘But where is the fire, My Lord?’

I laughed as Edward looked round, confusion on his face. ‘My dear boy,’ I said, pulling him back out of English into Latin, ‘we are now deep within the civilised world. You’ll find nothing so vulgar in houses of quality as a hearth or a brazier. Observe.’ I kicked off one of my slippers and stepped forward on to the tiled floor. I pointed at Edward to do the same. ‘You see, there is a single fire outside the main building. From this, heated air is sent through ducts underneath the floor and inside the walls. There’s never a wisp of smoke to spoil your clothes or get in your eyes; no chance of suffocation while you sleep; none of fire. Why, ten years ago, when I was here, there was a snowstorm that took everyone by surprise. Out in the streets, the poor were losing their toes to frostbite. In here, I even had one of the windows open. But this is nothing. Let me show you the bathing rooms and latrine attached to this most luxurious suite. You’ll find both hot and cold running water.’

I would have taken him over to the window that looked out to the garden. Not even in Ezra’s house had he seen how pieces of glass could be set into a lead framework that allowed light in while blocking both noise and draughts. But it was now that I saw the jug and cups placed discreetly on a table before one of the smaller sofas. Zakariya might have got himself a new religion: he’d not forgotten how to make his guests feel at home. I turned to the slave who’d come in with us.

‘My compliments to your master,’ I said in Syriac. ‘I will sleep until evening, when I’ll have a light dinner in here. Before I nod off, however, do have a clerk sent in. I have some letters to dictate.’ I looked at Edward. He was staring up at the high ceiling with its painted view of clouds and a rainbow. Once we were alone, I could feel, he’d start asking how much this place would cost. ‘Get someone who knows Latin to take the boy on a tour of the city,’ I said. ‘If the museum is still there, I want him to see the paintings of the Great Alexander. After that, I want him taken to the brothel beside the Church of Saint Eustachia – or whatever the place may now be called. Limit his drink there, and don’t let him gamble.’ I sat down and reached for the jug.