by R P Nathan
“Yes. Fine.”
She nodded gratefully, plugged in and started cleaning. How to proceed? I wondered, opening the Polidoro journal in front of me at random again and gazing at it. Perhaps I could show the code to Robert and see what he thought. But he was a fool at the best of times and in any case I didn’t want to get too many people involved. I imagined again my vision of the cross and thought I really didn’t want to share it unless absolutely necessary.
“Sorry,” she said banging into me. She switched the vacuum off and then cowered by my side. “Sorry.”
“That’s OK.” Her presence close to me was suddenly appealing. She was flushed from the exertion and abashed from knocking against me. Perhaps there was something to be said for docility after all. I felt the familiar rush of desire.
“That Italian, no?”
I looked at her bemused.
“That book. It Italian, no?”
“Yes, yes.” I held up the journal. “Let me show you.” She moved closer to me and I put a guiding and innocent hand round her slim waist to point at the book. She was warm and her scent was like a pheromone to me.
“I am trying to decipher a code. You know what decipher means?”
She looked at me and shook her head, her big eyes blinking.
“I am trying to understand what all these letters mean.”
She nodded as though she understood and looked at me admiringly. “You very clever man,” she said staring into my eyes for a moment, captured by my gaze, but then away again immediately. She turned away from me and I felt a thrill run through me as my hand glanced over her waist and her arm and her bottom. “The vacuum is full,” she said looking rather flustered. “It not suck any more.”
“You need to take the plastic canister out and empty it.”
“I see.” She knelt down next to it and I could see the curve of her breast in the singlet she wore. Smaller than I would have normally liked but, as with the rest of her, suddenly imbued with her subservient appeal. She fiddled with the Dyson with studious intent, then suddenly a catch sprang open and the canister which she had been pulling on flew straight at her, showering both the carpet and herself with dust.
“Sorry, sorry.” Her voice sounded close to tears, as she scrabbled to get as much fluff as she could back into the container. She shook her head in frustration and took the canister into the kitchen to empty it. She re-emerged a minute later still agitated. She put the canister back in place and then proceeded to finish the vacuuming, cleaning up the mess she had made.
“Very sorry,” she said when she had finished, her head bowed.
I was sat still at the table. “That’s fine Francesca,” I said giving her four pounds.
“I only did hour and half.”
“That’s OK,” I said generously. She smiled meekly without looking at me. Her face, arms and singlet were covered in dirt from the vacuum cleaner. “Look, you can’t go home like that. You’re filthy. Take a shower before you leave.”
She looked at me appreciatively. “You very kind.”
“Not at all,” I said just reaching out and touching her benignly on the hip; the thigh. “You’ll find a clean towel on the shelf.”
“You very kind. Thank you.”
I watched her padding into the bathroom lost in my thoughts; and then, coming crashing through them, was the answer to my problem.
“Patrick!” I slapped a hand against my forehead. How could I have been so stupid? Patrick would be the perfect person for this. Mathematical problems were like air to him. He would crack this code like it was nothing. Plus I had not yet returned his call from a few days ago so had the perfect excuse to ring him. I reached for the phone and was about to dial his number when I caught a fragment of a hummed refrain from the bathroom. I couldn’t place it: sombre, stately, the Magnificat by Vivaldi perhaps? It made me think of her, the water washing over her. The smell of steam drifted through to me, warm, moist, fuelling the flames of my desire.
The humming stopped and I heard the shower being turned off. The bathroom door opened a fraction and Francesca poked out her head. Her dark hair clung to her neck and cascaded over the otherwise naked shoulder which was also visible. She had the air of a Boticelli. Dripping with water she was suddenly quite mesmerizingly beautiful.
“I no could see the towel.”
My throat was suddenly dry. “On the shelf like I said. There should be a pile of them.”
She blinked at me, her long eyelashes fanning her startling emerald eyes. And then she let the door slowly open on her. Smiled at me. “Why you not come in here and help me find it?”
I grinned at her in return, deciding the call to Patrick could wait an hour or so. I slipped out of my clothes and walked naked over to her, ready to assist in any way I could.
Chapter 23
Summer 1571, Cyprus
Girolamo Polidoro
5 August 1571
Four days after the surrender, Captain Bragadino informed me that he would be taking a party of men to the Turkish camp. The Pasha had requested they meet so he could offer personal congratulations for his handling of the defence of Famagusta. My master said that I was to accompany him and to first help him dress. He would wear his purple robes of office as magistrate and carry the red umbrella which denoted his rank as commander of the city. I myself wore my best remaining tunic with the faded brocade for the Captain General had instructed me that we should put on a show of finery such as we could. And indeed when I stepped out into the main square, in which were gathered the captains and nobles and servants and townsmen who were to accompany us, there was so much show of colour and quality of cloth that it was as though the dark days of the siege had never happened.
The chiefs of the party, along with my master the Captain General, were Astorre Baglione, Louis Martenigo, John Anthony Quirini and many others. Of the high ranking generals in the city only Laurence Tiepolo stayed behind and the city was left in his charge whilst we were gone.
We walked from the city out through the Limisso gate and the shattered ravelin. At a bowshot from the walls we were met by some of Mustafa Pasha’s highest ranking officers with a troop of cavalry. With all due ceremony they guided us the league or so to the Pasha’s camp. A courtyard area had been formed from the beaten earth. On two sides were the tents of the Turkish soldiers, on a third the ground became strewn with rocks, and on the fourth was a great tent in gleaming white material at least sixty feet wide and I know not how deep, and this was the pavilion of the Pasha.
We were led into the courtyard by the cavalry and there we were met by a troop of Janissaries in ornate uniform. They were astonished to see such a resplendent host appeared before them. The Janissaries requested that we remove our weapons as this was a meeting under a flag of truce.
Captain Bragadino, Astorre Baglione, Nestore Martenigo and Antonio Quirini then walked to the front of the camp to the large pavilion which formed the Pasha’s residence. I asked my master whether I might walk with him to serve him in some way but he replied that there was no need. The task was a simple one, to pay respect to the Pasha and submit to him formally the keys to the City of Famagusta.
“In any case,” he said. “You shall have ample chance to serve me in the future.”
And my heart leapt for I had been concerned about what would happen when we returned to Venice, Captain Bragadino being from a fine family and thus having an army of servants from which to choose. I thanked him profusely and for a moment he put his hand upon my shoulder and in his affection for me I felt as close to tears as on the day he had saved my life.
So my master and the others walked to the entrance of the Pasha’s pavilion. A pair of Janissaries with halberds stood in front of the entrance curtain but stepped aside as they approached and then they disappeared from view.
We others waited in the courtyard. It was late afternoon and though the sun was close to setting it did nothing to lessen the heat which had been unbearable all day. A light wind had picked up also so
that the dust at our feet whipped around us. But we stood there still, our collection of men who still had legs to walk: Italians and Greeks and Albanians. And all the whiles, the inscrutable Janissaries watched us, dressed in their turbans and their fine uniforms.
After we had stood there for almost an hour I heard a groan from beside me and turning I saw Giuseppe swaying on his feet, his whole body ashiver as if gripped with an ague. I stepped to him and caught him in my arms as he fainted clean away. I laid him carefully on the ground and kissed him on the forehead as he was my dearest friend. His eyes opened but they were filled with tears. “I am a useless half man,” he whispered to me. “I should have died that day with Count Sigismondo. Like this I am fit for nothing.”
“Aye,” I said drawing out my skin of water and making him drink a few drops. “But you will be, my friend. You will serve Venice again as will I. Our time will come. Until then you must rest and be strong. I command you to lie there and sup on my water as you need it.” I stood back up and smiled with one of my fellows for Giuseppe was well liked amongst all who knew him.
The sun had set by now and it was darkening quickly as was the way in that part of the world, when there came from the pavilion the sound of voices raised in anger. We looked at each other unsure as to what the argument might be as relations since the truce had been cordial enough. The voices turned to shouting. Immediately Janissary guards ran out from the pavilion barking orders in the tongue of the Turks at the other soldiers standing around the camp. In the growing darkness which had not yet been lit by any torch there was the chilling sound of many swords being drawn.
“What is afoot?” I asked Francesco Bognatelli who was close to me and whom I had fought alongside often in the past months.
“Some mischief of the Turks, to be sure.” He was a tough man, a man of resilience, but he looked uneasy in the half-light.
And still the raised voices from the pavilion continued and the Janissary guards stood amongst us more roughly with their swords drawn and all the time it got darker and darker.
And then from the pavilion came a great commotion and a host of Janissaries and other Turks emerged bearing torches and dragged behind them were our brave captains Astorre Baglione and Nestore Martenigo bound about the arms. An immediate cry went up from us in the courtyard at seeing our lords so disadvantaged, and we rushed forward to overturn this foul treachery. But in a flash the Turks were upon us.
Francesco was struck on the naked arm by a scimitar. I ran to protect him but the Janissary who had done it saw me coming at him in the flickering torchlight. He caught me a blow in the shoulder and I felt the blood immediately flood from me. I took a step back. Francesco was on his knees and the Janissary finished him right there bringing his wicked blade down on him with great force. I knew that my hour of death was surely upon me when suddenly I stumbled backwards and fell flat on the ground. Giuseppe – for it was him who had pulled me – was knelt beside me and whispered, “This will be my last service for Venice and for you. Do not forget me, my friend.” And in a single movement he stood and turned into the path of the oncoming Janissary who had killed Francesco. The Turk cut Giuseppe down with a single diagonal blow and he spun and fell, my friend, into my arms so that he lay face down upon me and his blood and my blood flowed together over my face and hair.
I closed my eyes and lay there with him, my childhood friend dead upon me, waiting for the Janissary to kill me too. But minutes passed and I realised that in the confusion and the darkness he had thought me dead already because of the blood which liberally covered my face and so paid me no further heed and thus was I spared. I knew it was cowardice not to rise up and challenge the Turk in battle. Yet I own I was too scared to open my eyes for fear that I would be seen and because of the screams and shrieks which filled the air. I listened helplessly as the perfidious Turks cut our men down, who had come to them in good faith and under a flag of truce, and I feared greatly for our kinfolk and women in particular who had already embarked upon the galleys the Turks had sent for us.
So I lay there, but when the sounds of movement and screaming about me had diminished I dared open one eye a space. The courtyard was lit only by the torches carried by the Janissaries and thus the full display of the killing was curtailed. Yet the carnage about me was still terrible to behold, a scene of catastrophe: the bodies of my friends and the good men of Famagusta were rudely strewn in a bloody carpet upon the floor, butchered by the enemy. I could not weep for the anger that was in me. Of our leaders I could only guess that they too were dead, but of my dear master Captain Bragadino I had no idea what had befallen him and prayed only that his death had been merciful and speedy; and when weeks later I learned his true terrible fate, I cursed myself for not being at his side to defend him in his hour of need.
The Janissaries were over on the far side of the courtyard and hence this was the area lit by their torches at present. I saw that those fiends, not content to kill under the treachery of a white flag, were now further defiling the bodies of our brave men and severing their heads and throwing them in a pile outside the entrance to the Pasha’s pavilion. I realised that I was in great danger for they were moving methodically through the dead.
Yet for the moment my location had cover of darkness, so risking all, I crawled out from under Giuseppe, sat up on my haunches and readied myself to run. But when I looked on the face of my dead friend, who had given his life for me, I swore that the Turks would not parade his head for their fancy. So I grasped him under the arms and pulled him as best I could away from the lights in the courtyard and the Turks and the horror of that which I had seen. And I thought all the time that the guards would spy my escape but that if they did I was prepared now for death. But God was with me and I moved unseen to the edge of the courtyard and then further away, on through the outskirts of the camp, until I was amongst rocks and so hidden from direct sight.
There I rested for my shoulder was paining me sorely and it was only after some minutes that I moved off again dragging Giuseppe with me under the cover of darkness, my way lit by the stars only. Though my progress was slow, the sounds from the camp grew gradually quieter until I thought I had come almost a mile, though in which direction I could not have said. By my reckoning a full three or four hours had passed since the massacre. I was weary, and could go no further so I crawled into the cover of some boulders, lay down beside Giuseppe’s body and slept.
6 August 1571
When I awoke the sun was already high and I could feel the burning heat of the day. My face was painful and the blood crusted over me formed a mask which made it difficult even to open my eyes. I licked my lips and tasted the dry salt taste there and realised at once that I had great thirst and that I must find water soon or die. I felt the agony of my arm and a great weariness though I had slept several hours.
I knew that I had to move on for fear of being caught in the open and so with great difficulty I sat up and immediately realised I was too late. Squatting in front of me were four Turks, their horses behind them held by a fifth. And they were watching me. I thought for a moment to get to my feet and attempt to either fly or fight with them but my body was too weak and I thought it perhaps God’s kindness to me that I could do no more and so I moved closer to Giuseppe’s body and waited.
One of the Turks approached and I shied like a coward when he reached into his robes. I feared he would pull out a knife and cut me for sport before killing me as I had heard was their cruel wont. But he merely produced some effects of mine: a container of salt, a leather pouch, and this journal which I had about me always, and I realised that they must have searched me whilst I was sleeping. He waved these at me and addressed me in correct Italian, “Are you from Famagusta?” I nodded for I thought it pointless now to dissemble. “You were at Mustafa Pasha’s camp?” I said yes. He looked back at his men and they looked on me gravely. “There was much killing there, yet you escaped?”
“My comrade took a blow for me and died in my stead.”
He nodded, understanding, and muttered some words in Turkish to his men. They talked amongst themselves a moment before he turned to me again. I feared he was at last going to kill me or worse, return me to the camp. Finally though he spoke:
“Much has happened which should not have happened. Too many have been killed already and the blood spilt last night was unworthy of both victor and vanquished. Yet there could be worse to come, for the Pasha Mustafa has set his heart on some terrible vengeance and he cannot be persuaded against it.” He sighed heavily. “But Allah, in his mercy, is all-seeing and will not allow such cruel acts to go unpunished.”
I was much surprised by his words and his gentle tone. He handed me back my effects. “We will bury your comrade and then we will escort you to the hills where you may seek refuge in one of the villages there. In this small way can we make amend for the disgrace which Mustafa Pasha has brought upon us.”
He stood and in his height and bearing I could see now that this was some Turkish prince before me. He motioned to his men and they helped me to my feet. They buried Giuseppe where we were for there seemed no reason now to take him further and then they gave me water to drink and with which to wash my face which had become sore from the blood and the dirt. Finally one of them dressed my wounds with gentle hands and applied herbs which were unfamiliar to me but were wonderfully fragrant and gave me immediate relief from the pain in my arm. Then they helped me onto one of the horses behind this Turk who I took to be some kind of doctor, so skilled was he, and we rode all of us two leagues till we reached the start of the hills and then further on until we were at the outskirts of a large village. There they lowered me carefully from the horse, gave me food and wine and water to take with me and bade me farewell. I watched them as they rode away, moved and uncertain at such kindness.
◆◆◆
In the village I was looked after by a Greek family. Whilst I was recovering news arrived of the final days of suffering of my good and kind master. Of this I shall not write for it caused me to weep openly and the pain of it and of my inability to prevent it will never leave me.