After a time, the blue door opened. "Here!" called a fat man in a close-fitting brown garment; his hair and clothing were powdered almost white with flour. He took one look at us and shouted, "Be gone! Away with you!" Before we could move or speak, he pulled in his head again, slamming the door behind him.
"A most unfriendly man," observed Didimus. He made to knock on the door again, but Gunnar stepped forward, indicating that he should step aside. Motioning for Tolar to stand at the door, he knocked sharply.
We waited and Gunnar knocked again, using the handle of his knife this time, and almost rattling the door off its hinges. A moment later the man, angry now, thrust his head out. "You! Stop that! I told you to be gone!" He made a dismissive gesture with his hand.
Quick as a flick, Gunnar seized the baker by his fat wrist, yanked him through the doorway and out into the street. The baker sputtered in outrage and spun around, but Tolar had swiftly stepped behind him into the doorway and was now blocking his retreat.
"My friend," I said. "We have business with you."
"Liar!" snarled the man. "I bake for the emperor alone. Neither pagani nor barbari taste my bread. Now, get you gone before I call the scholae!"
"These men also serve the emperor," I told him flatly. "He has sent them to you to collect our bread allowance."
"Again, I call you liar," the baker sneered; his face had turned very red and he seemed about to burst. "I have never seen you before. Do you think it is so easy to steal bread from me? I am not like those others who give the politikoi to anyone who asks and then charge the state exorbitant fees. My bread is honest bread and I am an honest man!"
"Then you have nothing to fear from us," I said, trying to soothe him. "The men you see before you serve in the barbari bodyguard. They have come to fetch the politikoi, as you say, for the ships escorting the trade delegation to Trebizond."
The fat baker stared at me. "I am Constantius," he said, calming somewhat. "If you are from the emperor, where is the sakka?" He thrust out his hand, palm upward.
"What is that?" I asked.
"Thieves!" the baker cried. "I thought so! I knew it! Be gone, thieves."
"Please," I said, "what is this sakka?"
"Ha! You do not know politikoi; you do not know sakka! If you were indeed Farghanese," he sneered, "you would know what it is. I would not have to tell you."
Gunnar followed this exchange with a perplexed frown on his face, watching every move carefully, his hand ready on his knife.
"We are emperor's men," I insisted, "but we have never done this before. The ways of Byzantium are new to us."
"The sakka is given you by the logothete to tell me how much bread to allow," said the baker. "You do not have one, so you get no bread. Now, get out of my way. I have wasted enough time with you."
Understanding came to me at once; I reached into my belt and produced the small square of parchment Gunnar had given me. "This is the sakka you require, is it not?"
Constantius snatched the parchment from me, glanced at it, and shoved it back at me. "It is impossible. I do not have so much bread. Come back tomorrow."
"We need it today," I said. "Is there some other bakery to which we can go?"
"There are other bakers," Constantius replied stiffly. "But it will do you no good. No one has so much bread ready to carry off at once."
"Can you bake it?"
"Of course I can bake it!" he cried. "But I cannot do it all at once. If you want so many loaves you must wait."
"We do not mind waiting," I said.
"Wait then," he snarled. "But you cannot wait here. I will not have barbari lurking outside my bakery. It is not seemly."
"Of course," I agreed. "Tell us when to return and we will come back when you are ready."
"The four of you?" he wondered. "You cannot carry so much."
My heart sank. "Why? How much bread is it?"
Glancing at the parchment once more, he said, "Three hundred and forty loaves."
"We will bring more barbari to help us," I replied. "We will fetch them now."
"You say you have ships," said Constantius. "Where are they?"
"In Theodosius Harbour," the boatman replied.
"It is not far," the baker observed. "I will bring them to you when I have finished."
"There is no need," I told him. "We would be most happy to carry-"
"No, I insist. Leave it to me," he said. "This way I know you do not sell them on the way back to your ships."
"Very well, I only thought to save you trouble. We would be most grateful for your service. There are Danish ships-longships, four of them."
"They are easy to find." He ducked his head, then turned abruptly. Tolar made to block the door.
"Let him through," I said. "This man has work to do on our behalf." Tolar moved aside, allowing the baker to pass.
Constantius disappeared into his bakery once more, calling, "I am an honest man, and I bake an honest loaf. You will see me at the harbour-but do not look for me before sunset!" With that, he slammed the door again.
"What has happened here?" wondered Gunnar.
I explained to him all that had taken place. He listened, shaking his head. "I should not have wagered so much money," he said gloomily. "Sunset is a long time. Hnefi and the others are certain to return to the ships before us."
"You are forgetting that we have the sakka." I then explained the purpose of the small, but all-important square of parchment he had given me, and which I had just passed on to the baker. "No one will give them bread without it."
"Heya!" said Gunnar, his frown turning to a grin and spreading wide. "I should have wagered more."
"Gunnar Big-Boast," chuckled Tolar.
"Unless Hnefi swiftly learns to speak Greek," I added, "they will not soon realize their error. By the time they think to find us, we will have the bread aboard the ships."
"Very shrewd, my friend," observed Didimus. "You are a very Hercules of the intellect. I salute you." He thrust his hand in the air in a rough rendition of the imperial salute. "Now then, as we dare not linger here, I will take you wherever you wish to go."
"Please, could you take us to the Great Palace? There is someone I must see."
"I will take you, never fear," replied Didimus, "and then I will take you to the Hagia Sophia, and you will light a candle for me that the All-Wise God will give me shrewdness like yours. Follow me."
36
The guards at the Great Palace turned us away. None of them had ever heard of Justin, but they knew he was not of the gate contingent, for there had been no new appointments for more than a year. One of them suggested, however, that he might be part of the inner-palace scholae. "You could look for him there," the guard told me.
"If you will kindly tell me where to go, I will do as you advise," I replied, and was promptly told that it was impossible unless I had official business beyond the gate.
"But my business is with the Scholarae himself," I explained.
"No one is allowed into the inner-palace precinct without a formal summons," the gateman insisted. I thanked him for his help and resigned myself to leaving the city without seeing Justin again.