‘Well,’ one of his colleagues interrupted with an oily smile, ‘if that’s where you’re headed, you shouldn’t be starting from here.’ He stood up and looked at me from within the folds of his black hood. The pinched face was glowing with some loathsome skin disease. I looked upwards and pretended not to hear Edward’s obscene mutter beside me. He’d understood enough from the name of the inn and from the tone of the reply.
‘There were men here not long ago,’ the first tooth gatherer said. He took the coins from the tooth pouch where he’d put them and looked closely at them. I ignored the hint and waited for further and better particulars. ‘They were armed,’ he added at last, ‘and they said they were looking for an old man and a blond boy.’ He pointed at the golden curls that showed beneath Edward’s hat. ‘They had a Greek look about them. If they lay hands on you, they’ll have your heads up on poles before you can say “knife”.’ He laughed again and went back about his work.
I tried not to stiffen. At once, the street had lost all its post-massacre sadness. I looked at the row of silent buildings, and at the high, blank wall of the church. How far was it back to the inn? I could hear nothing. But Edward’s ears were sharper than mine, and he was looking intently along the street. I could see he was feeling again for his knife. I put on a friendly smile and was glad I’d come out in my best silk. I held my purse up and let the coins within jingle slightly.
‘Would it trouble you, O bearer of interesting news,’ I asked, ‘if I were to beg you to hurry to the nearest main street and engage a closed carrying chair?’ He gave me a dubious look. I opened my purse and took out a half solidus. The gold gleamed bright in the sunshine.
‘It is outrageous!’ Zakariya wailed as his people helped me from the carrying chair. ‘Is there no excess beyond these dogs of infidels?’ There was a splash of blood on the lower part of his tunic, and his left arm was grazed up to the elbow. But he suddenly remembered himself, and trailed off into a long mutter about how it all reflected badly on the respectable Christians who counted among his very best friends. Without troubling myself to ask, I gathered he was referring to the later massacre outside the bookseller.
I turned and looked at the inn’s heavy gate. Though shut and barred now, it couldn’t keep out the sound of renewed shouting in the streets. Zakariya saw the questioning look on my face.
‘But didn’t My Lord hear the proclamation?’ he asked with a nasty smile.
I listened with my good ear to the undoubted screams that drifted through the gap at the bottom of the gate.
‘Well, My Lord,’ Zakariya said, ‘the news is that His Highness the Governor of Syria has decreed that any more terror attacks in Beirut are to be punished with the execution of all the Greeks. Yes, men, women, children – dragged from their homes and slaughtered in the street!’ He giggled and looked heavenwards. ‘You can be sure I’ve already done my duty.’ He pointed at the blood on his tunic. ‘That Greek filth down the road won’t be undercutting me again,’ he said proudly. ‘These Greeks, I can tell you, have met their match in Governor Meekal,’ he added in the voice he normally reserved for his sermons. ‘And it’s about time they learned their place in the new Syria. Alexander’s dead. The Romans are gone. The Empire is nothing. We talk to the tax collectors in Greek, and that’s it.
‘Yes, Governor Meekal doesn’t put up with no crap. He’s just the man to drive through change – but then, My Lord will surely know all about that!’ he ended with a repeat of his nasty smile.
I ignored him and looked at Edward. I could see he’d heard the commotion outside clearer than I had. But, not knowing more than a few words of Syriac, he’d have no excuse to run upstairs for another balcony inspection of the bloodshed.
‘My Lord will forgive me, though,’ Zakariya said, pulling himself completely back into order. ‘You have a visitor. He’s been waiting in your audience room since shortly after you went out this morning.’
I nodded. I’d already seen the horse and grooms being hurried through the side entrance. I left Edward to pay off the chairmen. My stick made a slow tapping on the tiles as I went on alone towards my suite. I’d manage the stairs by myself.
The young man rose politely as I walked into the room.
‘Peace be upon you, My Lord,’ he said, bowing low. ‘I am Karim, son of Malik.’
A most well-proportioned young man – perhaps barely into his twenties – he spoke Saracen with the graceful fluency of a native. I thought quickly, trying to recall who Malik might have been. But I’d known too many of them. Still, the emblem on his gold headband told me who had sent Karim.
‘And may the blessing of our Common Father descend upon you,’ I replied in his own language. He’d stretched a point by addressing me as another of the Faithful – unless my ancient dealings with Omar were now being taken more seriously than I’d ever intended them to be. Just to be on the safe side, I’d meet him more than halfway. I sat down and rebalanced my going-out wig. I waved him back into his own chair. He smiled at me, his teeth a dazzling white against the brown of his face. He smiled – and, at the same time, was looking very oddly at me. I wondered for a moment if I’d put my wig on the wrong way again. But Edward would surely have pointed that one out to me.
‘I trust My Lord was not inconvenienced by the troubles that afflicted our streets this afternoon,’ he asked, now in a stilted Greek.
I tried to work out his position from the cut of his clothes. However, while the better class of Saracens hadn’t yet given up on their desert clothing, they were moving increasingly to the same grade of white silk and the same close fitting. I smiled my thanks for his enquiry as to my safety.
‘Not at all,’ I said, still in Saracen. ‘It was a regrettable incident that I do not look forward to witnessing again. But you may be assured of my own safety throughout.’ I fell silent as the door opened, and trays of refreshments were brought in. It was all quickly arranged, and we were alone again. I sat forward.
‘I hope you will not think it an unpardonable departure from the custom of your people,’ I said, ‘if I rely on you to pour out two cups of that deliciously hot kava juice.’
The young man smiled back at me, and reached forward for the little brass pot. I took up my own cup and sipped delicately.
‘I trust His Majestic Holiness the Caliph is well,’ I opened again. ‘I hardly need say how honoured I am to receive one so eminent among his servants.’
‘Nor we,’ came the reply, ‘to have as our guest the Great and Matchless Alaric. You will perhaps forgive the length of time it has taken us to learn of your presence. His Highness Meekal sent me over the moment he received the news.’
I smiled again. I sipped again. A shame, really, my stay here was ended. I’d just got these rooms as I wanted them to be.
Chapter 33
White and solid in the sunshine, the walls of Damascus loomed before us. I leaned forward and tapped the shoulders of the head bearer. When he turned, I motioned him to line up my chair beside Edward’s. His mouth slightly open, he was already taking in the scale of the wealth and power of this new Imperial capital. And it was an impressive sight. Apart from the obvious defence, one of the things you buy from fortification architects is that sense of awe that is in itself a form of defence. I wondered if Edward had even seen the three plumes of smoke drifting upwards from a hundred yards or so inside the gate we were approaching. Probably, he hadn’t.