Only the eparch appeared ill-pleased with the komes's behaviour in the affair. I found him just after midday in the room he used for holding council. "Eparch," I said, moving to where he sat, fists balled on the arms of his chair, "you asked me to tell you when Nikos returned. He is here now."
"Tell him I wish to see him at once."
I turned and started away, but Komes Nikos came sweeping in the door at that moment, full of zeal and assurances. "We will find the ewer, never fear," he said. "I have men searching throughout the city. I have every confidence that it will soon be returned."
"What of the dignity of our guests?" demanded the eparch. "Will that also be returned?"
"You are aggrieved, eparch," observed Nikos. "I assure you, I am doing all to resolve this unfortunate incident."
"I am aggrieved," replied the eparch tartly. "I am angry. The offence to our guests was unpardonable. The amir was gracious enough to accept my assurances that the matter would be most seriously pursued."
"So it is," the komes said. "You have my every pledge. The perpetrators shall be apprehended and brought to justice. If you will heed a word of counsel, I think you put too much trust in the Danes. They are the ones who should be held responsible for this. If not for their negligence, this crime would not have been committed."
"How so?" demanded Nicephorus. "They remained at their posts throughout-exactly as you placed them. Even the slaves say no one entered or left the house once the Danes had taken their positions. I think we must look elsewhere for the perpetrators."
Nikos started to object, but the eparch dismissed him with an exasperated flick of his hand. "You may go, Komes Nikos," he said. "Go and give your assurances to the magister and his monkey. I am certain they will be more easily persuaded. Go! Leave me. I wish to think."
The komes affected offence at this brusque treatment. "If I have displeased you in some way, eparch, I am sorry. I would only remind you that it is, after all, a most delicate and unusual situation. We must proceed with all caution and circumspection."
"Yes, yes. I am certain of it," he replied, his irritation increasing. "Go then, cautiously and circumspectly, by all means. But go."
Nikos stalked from the room. The eparch watched him go, and then said, "You heard him, Aidan?"
"Yes, eparch."
"He said the ewer would soon be returned. I wonder where they will find it-in the kitchen, or in the stable?"
"Eparch?"
"He is dirty with this. I know it." Turning to me, he said, "Thank you, Aidan. You may go. I am tired. I will lie down now."
He rose wearily from his chair and walked to the door, paused, and said, "Can I trust you, Aidan?"
"I hope you can," I told him.
"Then I will tell you something," he said, motioning me to him. As I stepped near, he placed a fatherly hand on my shoulder-the gesture reminded me of Abbot Fraoch. Putting his mouth to my ear, he whispered, "Beware the komes, Aidan. He has marked you for an enemy."
This did in no way surprise me. Still, I said, "I believe you, eparch. But why should he think me an enemy?"
He offered a thin, mirthless smile. "Because you have penetrated his duplicity. Discovery is what he fears most of all; it is the one thing treachery cannot abide."
40
The golden ewer came to light a day or two later-found, they said, in a ditch outside the city walls. It was undamaged, for the most part, save for a dent in one side, and a bent handle which looked as if someone had tried to pull it off. King Harald growled when I told him of the treasure's recovery. "It was dropped where they knew to find it," he snarled.
The jarl had taken a sour view of the event from the beginning. He held that the theft impugned his honour and that of his men, and insisted the raid had been created solely to disgrace him. "There were no thieves," he argued. "Once the amir arrived, no one entered or left the hall. No one came near."
"Perhaps the thieves were already inside the house," I suggested. "Perhaps they were hiding."
"Heya," he agreed. "The thieves were inside the house. That is so. On Thor's beard, the jar was never stolen."
"But I saw it. I was there. They rushed in and took it."
"Nay," he replied, his voice a low rumble. "Did you ever hear of a thief parting with such a treasure once he had it in his hands? I never did."
"Maybe they feared pursuit," I suggested. "They hid it in the ditch and hoped to come back for it later-when no one was looking."
The barbarian king shook his head firmly. "The time when no one was looking was when they threw it away," the jarl replied, and I was forced to admit that in matters of stolen treasure, his knowledge and experience were far superior to mine.
Gunnar and Tolar had their own views. "Who profited from the theft?" Gunnar asked pointedly. "Find that man, and you have caught the thief."
In the event, those responsible for the supposed raid were never found; and, since the ewer was recovered, the search was halted and speculation ceased. Interest turned instead to the peace talks between the eparch and the amir which commenced a few days later. They alternated meeting places, sometimes within the city, and sometimes in the Arab camp. Sometimes the magister and certain prominent citizens took part, sometimes various merchants from Constantinople, and sometimes only the eparch and amir alone but for their interpreters and advisors. I also attended a few of these discussions, but found them exceedingly dull.
Winter deepened around us all the while; the days, though chill and often damp, were never cold. Nor did it snow, except for the high tops of the mountains far to the north and east. Sometimes, a southern wind would stir the leafless branches and the day would be almost warm. Even so, with the approach of the Christ Mass, Trebizond began to shake off some of its seasonal lethargy. I noticed a steady stream of newcomers arriving in the city. When I remarked on this to one of the merchants-who, by virtue of having traded gemstone and marble in Trebizond for twenty years, was sometimes included in the eparch's delegation-I was told this was but a trickle that would eventually become a flood.
"Just wait and see," he said. "By Saint Euthemius's Day there will not be an empty room in the whole city. Every doorway will become a bed. You watch. It is true."
We at the abbey, like every holy community, honoured certain saints with feasts on particular days: Saint Colum Cille's day was special to the monks at Kells. And though there were many eastern saints unknown in the west, it still seemed odd that any day should be more highly regarded than the Christ's Day Mass. "I had no idea the saint's day was so well observed here," I told him.
"Some come for Euthemius's feast, I suppose," he allowed with a shrug of indifference. "But most come for the fair."
I had heard this word before, of course, but his use of it was strange. Upon inquiring, I was told that a fair was a gathering, not unlike a market, where people might buy and sell, and also enjoy special entertainments and diversions over many days. "The Trebizond fair is well known," the merchant assured me. "People come from the far ends of the empire and beyond just to attend-Christian and pagan alike, everyone comes."
He spoke the truth with no exaggeration. For the Christ Mass came and went, strictly observed, yes, but stiffly and with very little warmth. I did attend a Mass, out of curiosity rather than desire, and I could not find it in my heart to pray. The worship seemed perfunctory to me; even the singing lacked interest. All in all, I thought it a dismal observance-though, perhaps my own feelings of desolation coloured my perception; I was still bitterly disappointed with God, and in no fit mood to regard the birth of his son, to whom I was no longer speaking.