Fortunes of War

by Olivia Manning

  Lister, his voice thin, cried: ‘This isn’t right. Where are we? Where are we?’

  Angela stopped at a curio shop and began to pick over antique fire-arms, their butts decorated with silver and brass and semiprecious stones. When she said: ‘One of these might frighten Bill’s wife,’ Lister limped on in disgust.

  ‘We’re lost,’ he said. ‘We’ve taken the wrong turning,’ and he looked for someone who might give them directions. A camel passed, shaking its tasselled head; donkeys were pushed through spaces too small for their loads. Female beggars, their faces covered with black and white veils, plucked at his arm and he shied away, thinking they were lepers. At last a man in a European suit came round a corner and Lister stopped in front of him. The man was a Greek. Finding that Lister understood modern Greek, the man began to rage at him then, suddenly becoming all courtesy and smiles, directed him to the basilica.

  ‘What was that about?’ Angela asked.

  ‘Oh, he was complaining about police interference. He said no person of decent feeling would go near the basilica this year. It’s his opinion that if people want to be trampled underfoot, no one has a right to stop them. Anyway, he thinks we should go through the Via Dolorosa.’

  In the Via Dolorosa a procession was advancing slowly over the spacious, creamy flagstones, led by a bespectacled cardinal in magenta canonicals. Lister saluted and the cardinal bowed towards him.

  ‘Who was that?’ Harriet whispered.

  Lister replied with modest satisfaction: ‘Spellman. Friend of mine.’

  They came into the Greek quarter which was strangely clean, empty and silent. Immense black coffin lids stood upright by the doors of undertakers and small shops were filled with silk vestments and olive wood camels. There was a scent of incense in the air and Lister said: ‘At last.’

  Somewhere, hidden by the buildings that crowded about it, was the basilica. They found it at the bottom of a narrow turning. Seeing the great, carved door amidst the crumbling splendour of the façade, Lister gave a shout of triumph: ‘Here we are, and not a soul going in. We’ll have the whole place to ourselves.’

  But the door was shut. A barrier had been erected across it and two policemen sat in front of it. They observed Lister with a contemptuous blankness as he took out his tickets and advanced upon them. The door was not an entrance; it was an exit. Lister and his party must return to the Via Dolorosa and start again.

  Lister stood for a moment, stunned, then tried to pull rank. He claimed friendship with the Greek Metropolitan and with Cardinal Spellman. He said he knew the Chief of Police. He said the ladies were tired and one of them had been very ill. The police could not be moved. Ticket-holders, like everyone else, must enter by the main door.

  Lister, who had advanced so confidently, now limped back with a pained and foolish air. Reaching his guests, he said in a low voice: ‘Damned self-important nobodys. Just as I told you. Everyone despises them so they try to get their own back. Bunch of conchies, most of them. Shipped out here because they’re no good for anything else. One of them was a ballet dancer. Think of it, a policeman ballet dancer!’ Lister tried to laugh and Harriet was sadly aware that he had suffered such defeats all his life.

  The din around the main door was heard long before they found the way to it. Almost at once they came up against a closely packed crowd and could go no farther. Lister, trying to push through, demanded passage for ticket-holders. No one moved.

  A Greek in the back row turned to tell him that people were wedged together for half a mile or more. Some had been waiting since dawn. Some had been there all night.

  ‘But why are they waiting?’ Lister asked: ‘Why don’t they go into the church?’

  ‘Because the door’s locked and there’s a barrier across it. A police barrier,’ said the Greek, spitting his contempt.

  ‘How long are they going to keep us here?’

  He was told they would have to remain till the Armenian patriarch arrived. The door belonged to the Armenians, the patriarch kept the key, and only he had the right to unlock it.

  While this talk went on, more people had arrived so Lister’s party had ceased to be at the back of the crowd and now was in the midst of it. As those at the rear tried to push forward, the English visitors were wedged into a solid mass of bodies and Harriet, more frail than the others, could not free her arms. Her face was pressed against sweaty clothing and she had to rise on tiptoe to get air to breathe.

  More and more people arrived and as the pressure grew, some of the older women began to moan, fearful of what would happen when there was a move. A batch of Greek soldiers, finding the way blocked, tried to prise themselves into the crowd with their elbows. Eyes were struck, arms came down like hammer blows on heads and shoulders, and there were screams of pain and wrath. A woman began to pray and others took up her prayer. The screaming, the prayers of the women, the moans of those held prisoner and gasping for breath, caused waves of panic to pass backward and forward through the congested bodies.

  Angela clung to Castlebar. Harriet, crushed and nearly senseless, remained upright simply because there was no room to fall. Lister, pressing his arm in between her body and the one behind, gripped her round the waist and catching her elbow on the other side, whispered: ‘When the rush starts, hold on to me.’

  There was a cannonade of hisses and enraged insults and word came back that the Armenian patriarch was about to unlock the door. Lister, a head taller than those about him, laughed and said: ‘The old fool’s skipped inside pretty quick. Scared out of his black socks. Now! Keep hold of me!’ But the door was shut again and the enraged Greeks shouted: ‘Break down the barrier!’ As a drive like a battering ram struck the rear of the crowd, one old woman began to call on God and her cry was taken up by men as well as women. People pleaded: ‘Let us out. Let us out,’ and Harriet, clinging to Lister, felt the same primitive urge to call on God, the last resort of them all.

  The barrier crashed down. The crowd toppled forward and as the police shouted warnings and the Greek soldiers howled as though rushing into battle, Lister gathered Harriet into his arms and shouted to her: ‘Stay upright. Whatever you do, don’t let them knock you down.’

  People pelted past them, striking against them like rocks rushing downhill. One furious blow knocked Harriet out of Lister’s arms but he caught her wrist as she fell and held on to her until she was afraid the bone would break. Then another blow sent them spinning together into a curio shop. Crashing through the candles that hung over the doorway, scattering rosaries, crucifixes, olive wood boxes, baskets of Jericho roses, they fell into a corner with a table on top of them.

  Shaken but unhurt, they were helped up by the shopkeeper who said: ‘The police will pay for this. They caused this trouble, so we’ll make them pay.’

  ‘And serve them bloody well right,’ said Lister.

  Laughing and forgetting to limp, he kept his arm round Harriet as they made their way to the churchyard where the soldiers were breaking up a paling intended to keep the visitors in an orderly queue. The police had taken themselves off, leaving the Greeks free to smash whatever could be smashed. The front of the basilica, riven by age and earthquakes, was held up by wooden struts and these, too, were attacked until a priest came out and demanded a stop.

  There was no sign of Angela and Castlebar. ‘How will they get in?’ asked Lister anxiously as he brought out his tickets, but no one was taking tickets. Inside the porch, a black-clad Armenian monk stood guard over the Armenian door, fiercely observing everyone who passed through it. Inside the church there was chill and quiet. To add to the drama of the occasion, all the candles had been extinguished and the place was in darkness. As Harriet and Lister made their way blindly forward, they were met by a major-domo with a silver-headed stick. Finding they had tickets, he conducted them in a formal manner to the chairs reserved for distinguished visitors. So far the only distinguished visitor present was Angela. She had lost Castlebar and Lister was sent off in search of him.

>   Angela had seated herself in the centre of the front row and Harriet, discomposed by the fall, sank down beside her. There were about fifty chairs, placed in a square and roped in with a heavy cord. Outside the cord, a mass of people stood together, awaiting events. For the first half an hour, they waited patiently, then the soldiers and young men, growing restless, began to climb the scaffolding that shored up the interior walls. Boredom produced noise and the noise grew as time passed. Occasionally someone, seeing himself more privileged than the rest, attempted to breach the cordon and sit on the empty chairs. Some were sternly ordered back to the crowd, others, for no obvious reason, were allowed to remain. An Egyptian family, the father in a fez, was left undisturbed while an old, fat Greek, gasping, sweating and pleading, was helped to a chair by one major-domo and thrown out by another.

  After a long interval, Lister returned with Castlebar, both men smelling strongly of arak. They sat on either side of the two women and at first were circumspect, quietly gazing at the monument of gold and coloured marbles that was said to mark the burial place of Christ. Lister told them that the rotunda over it, shored up by girders and struts, had been placed there by the Crusaders. They returned to silence. Fifteen or twenty minutes passed then Castlebar, beguiled by the twilight, put his arm round Angela and Lister fumbled for Harriet’s hand. Harriet, grateful for the protection he had afforded her, let him hold it for a while. Lister was kind but, thinking of his fat, pink face, his ridiculous moustache, his wet eyes and baby nose, she told herself that kindness was not enough.

  The church was now so full that people were taking places in the topmost galleries and some had managed to join the poor Abyssinians on the roof. Faces were pressed against the small windows in the dome. The young men on the girders climbed higher to allow others to take their places. The most adventurous went up and up until one slipped and fell screaming to the crowd below. The girders, hung with a weight of humanity, creaked and shuddered and some of the women shouted warnings and the young men shouted back. Gradually losing all restraint, the congregation talked and laughed and began to sing Greek songs.

  Lister’s hand was plump and small with small, fat fingers, an enlarged baby’s hand, that seemed to Harriet much too soft. He was not more than thirty but was deteriorating early. Defeat, though he resented it, had got its hold on him and Harriet felt sorry for him. She, too, could be kind and when he squeezed her hand, she squeezed back. Lister whispered: ‘You may get a better-looking one but a more loving one, you’ll never find.’ Harriet laughed and slid her hand away.

  The hubbub came to an abrupt stop. A minor procession was entering the church. Representatives of leading Greek and Christian Arab families, all male of course, were making a circuit of the sepulchre, the more prosperous in dark suits and pointed, patent leather shoes, the very poor in dirty galabiahs.

  ‘A ruffianly lot,’ Lister whispered as rich and poor went round with no sense of status, linking fingers and smiling at each other.

  Seeing three people led to the doorway of the sepulchre, Lister became grave: ‘My goodness, look who we’ve got here! Prince Peter and Prince Paul. The woman is Peter’s Russian wife. He’s a nice chap; looks like an English gent.’

  Harriet, turning her head away from Lister’s arak smell, saw a group of English officials being led to the chairs, among them a woman she had seen somewhere before. But where? The woman chose to sit by herself in the front row. Harriet watched her as she took her seat. She had a large crocodile handbag which she placed on her knee, putting her hands on it as though to shield it from all comers. This gesture confirmed Harriet’s certainty that the woman was known to her. Some occasion when there had been a similar shielding of an object stirred vividly at the back of her mind but would not present itself. The occasion, she knew, was associated with unhappiness. She felt the unhappiness again, but that was all. The occasion itself eluded her.

  She remained puzzled until distracted by the excitement around her. The major-domos were clearing a passage for the Greek patriarch. Using their silver-headed sticks, they pushed and prodded people out of the way. The congregation moved, if it moved at all, unwillingly, craning necks for a sight of the great figure of the day.

  As he appeared in the doorway, a shout of welcome filled the church and he stopped, making the most of his entry, then moved slowly forward. In robes of white brocade, wearing a large, golden, onion dome on his head, the patriarch held himself with dignity, his white beard parted from chin to waist so all might see the display of gold and gems that covered his chest. The priests behind him were in cloth of gold, some of it ragged with age, some new and gleaming. After the priests, came the choir boys. They were singing, mouths opening and shutting, but the sound was lost in the general din. After the choir boys, it was just anyone who happened to own a religious banner. These rearguard upstarts were treated with little respect. The crowd closed in on them, swamping them, throwing down their banners which they used as weapons to keep the mob at bay.

  The patriarch, with an eye open for press photographers, pulled back his beard and arranged his jewels whenever he saw a camera. The procession was to go three times round the church but in the third round, all was confusion. The patriarch himself was untouched but his retinue had degenerated into a rabble of shouts, scuffles and blows. Arriving intact at the door to the sepulchre, he shook hands with the royal visitors then, mounting the steps to the door itself, he stood benign and smiling, while acolytes removed his onion dome and outer robes, leaving him in a black cassock, a humble priest like any other priest. Then came the search for matches or any means of making fire. He lifted his arms and the acolytes patted him lightly on either side. No matches were found.

  The search completed, the door to the tomb was unsealed. The patriarch, with two priests to act as witnesses, entered the sepulchre. The door was shut. There was silence as everyone awaited the miracle.

  ‘How long will it take?’ Harriet whispered.

  Lister nodded portentously: ‘A decent interval.’

  It was scarcely that. There were two smoke-blackened holes through which the fire would appear. As it shot out, a wild paean of joy bellowed from the crowd. A man had waited at each hole to seize the cylinders that held the fire and at once, as the church vibrated with the yells of the faithful, the fire was passed from hand to hand. The cordon was broken and the congregation, stumbling over chairs and falling against the distinguished visitors, rushed forward, holding out candles and tapers to receive the fire. All inhibitions were lost in the intoxication of the miracle. The patriarch had brought them the divine gift of fire.

  Faintly above the uproar, the church bells could be heard pounding away, telling the world the miracle was accomplished and bringing down the plaster from the ceiling. Bunches of lighted candles were given to the men on the scaffolding and passed up and up to the topmost balconies and out to the Abyssinians on the roof so, in no time, the whole interior of the church was festooned with light.

  Two enormous, painted candles, guardians of the tomb, lit only on this special occasion, spouted enormous flames. Dark outlying chapels became bright with the fire and the crypt, where Helena had discovered the true cross, threw a refulgence from the depths.

  Harriet, caught up in all the excitement, jumped on to the seat of her chair and stood among a dazzling swirl of lights.

  The door of the sepulchre opened and the patriarch, his hands full of lighted candles, burst forth just ahead of the witness priests who, holding him on either side, ran him from the church and out of sight.

  But that was not the end of the ceremony. A sort of burlesque or harlequinade followed the miracle. Priests in tattered, grimy robes now walked round shaking poles from which hung silver plates surrounded by bells. After the priests came men with boys perched on their shoulders. The boys had whips and lashing out, struck anyone who could not dodge away from them. The men on the scaffolding leant forward to lunge at the boys and two of them lost their footing and went down among the crowd.
>
  A new, less pleasing animation had come over the scene. The royal visitors prepared to leave and the English thought it best to follow them. As Harriet stepped down from the chair, the woman at the end of the row glanced towards her and she knew it was Mrs Rutter.

  Mrs Rutter did not recognize Harriet. Their only meeting had been brief. With her jewel case on her knee, she had sat near Harriet in the train going to Suez. She had been in the queue moving on to the Queen of Sparta when Harriet saw Mortimer and Phillips. By now she should have been half-way to England.

  She hurried towards her friends and Harriet went after her, catching her up in the church porch.

  ‘Excuse me.’

  Mrs Rutter, turning and seeing what she took to be a stranger, frowned to discourage her: ‘Yes?’

  ‘Surely you are Mrs Rutter?’

  ‘I am Mrs Rutter, yes.’

  ‘We went to Suez in the same carriage. I was with Marion Dixon and her little boy.’

  Mrs Rutter let out her breath and, lifting a hand to ward Harriet away, she went at a half-run out to the churchyard where her friends awaited her. Disturbed and puzzled, Harriet pursued her and caught her by the shoulder.

  ‘Mrs Rutter, please, you must tell me why you are here. You boarded the ship for England, didn’t you? Then how did you get back? Is Marion here, too?’

  ‘Don’t speak of it.’ Mrs Rutter had lost what colour she had and her voice was hoarse: ‘I can’t speak of it. I don’t want to speak of it. Go away,’ then seeing Harriet’s perplexed face, she relented a little: ‘Anyway, I can’t speak of it here.’ She moved over to the churchyard wall and leant against it as though about to faint.

  The casualties of the ceremony — two men on stretchers, one shrouded in death — lay nearby but she seemed unaware of them. Her friends, standing apart, stared at Harriet, realizing there was something very odd about the encounter.