Birthright

by Alan Gold

  “And are we not a target now? Have we not always been a target? Your target!”

  “What are you talking about? You’re my friend,” insisted Shalman.

  “You lied to me!”

  Shalman did not have to ask what Mustafa meant. He knew it in his bones.

  “You lied to me,” Mustafa repeated, his voice lower, resigned, and filled with a strange sadness. “You lied. It was you. On the airfield. It was you . . .”

  Shalman’s mind scrambled for words. “You have to understand—”

  “I understand very well.”

  Shalman pressed on desperately. “When you first brought me here, I spoke to you of Gandhi, the Indian man who said that an eye for an eye will leave the whole world blind.”

  “Gandhi is not an Arab. Nor a Jew. We don’t think in this way. Our way is to fight. An eye for an eye . . . And we all have to take sides. We all have to be true to our blood.”

  “But Mustafa, our blood is the same! Isn’t that what we were learning in the cave, digging treasures from the earth? My blood is the same as your blood. Can’t you see that?”

  “It doesn’t matter. You have your people. I have mine. There can only be trust, and how can I trust you when you murdered one of our children and lied to me?”

  Antioch

  1098

  THE PUS OOZED from the infected boils on the duke’s penis, and though he took great pride in its enormity, it seemed to shrivel and retreat from Nimrod’s probing before he put on the bandage.

  The doctor had long been treating the duke’s afflictions, but now, on the Crusade, on open roads where hygiene was unknown, Nimrod’s skills were insufficient. The duke let out a bellowing cry, though the Jewish doctor’s hands were steady as he cleaned the infection and applied an unguent to the wounds.

  “Dear God! This suffering had better be at an end when we take Jerusalem or so help me!” the duke yelled.

  Nimrod ignored his master. It was no longer the physical health of the duke that worried Nimrod so much as the state of his mind. The itching from the disease he’d caught from the prostitutes was causing him madness at night. In France, Nimrod ensured that the prostitutes took a vaginal lavage before they were introduced to the duke, and that he used a specially concocted oil before he entered the women. This had kept him relatively pox-free. But since the duke had been in the company of all the other nobles, sharing God knew how many camp whores, and because of the lack of water to wash adequately on the road, hygiene had deteriorated and his health was suffering. The consequences of the whores he’d lain with after they crossed the Alpine Mountains into the lowlands of the Italian people were evident. And God only knew what fresh diseases he’d picked up since they’d entered the land of the Turk and raped all of the women who prayed to Mohammed for help. Nimrod had no idea what diseases such women would carry in their bodies, and daily he prayed that he could make the itching in the duke’s penis disappear.

  “Give me wine!” roared the duke.

  Nimrod handed Henri the wineskin from beside the bed and watched as the big man greedily swallowed, partly out of thirst and partly out of pain.

  The campaign had, as Jacob predicted, started with great excitement and song. Enthusiasm quickly dissipated once thirst, hunger, and blistered feet took hold. Some of the soldiers and camp followers had lasted barely a few weeks before drifting off in the night, presumably to return to their homes, or to settle into a village where they’d met some wench.

  The duke tried to keep his men enthused with declarations of riches and glories of battle, even rehashing the Church’s proclamation of the cleansing of sins for those who would see the campaign through. He was a man of considerable motivating force, but Nimrod could see that the inspiration would be unlikely to last should they not find victory and plunder soon.

  As the Crusade progressed south and east toward Jerusalem, the cities and towns leading to Constantinople had come and gone, the heathen Mohammedans driven out, and the pressure on King Alexios the First Komnenos relieved.

  Now the great city of Antioch loomed before the diminished throng and became a much-needed beacon of hope for the Crusade as a place that would fulfill the promise. But the walls of Antioch were so wide and high and long that it was impossible for the Crusader army, far smaller than that which had set out from Paris and led by quarreling commanders, to stem the flow of supplies into the city. The siege seemed destined to last indefinitely, as the Turks threatened to send reinforcements.

  And Nimrod was fearful of what he had seen. War was brutal and the casualties had been grave; more so on the citizens of the towns and cities they ravaged than the soldiers at arms, but the Crusaders were suffering nonetheless.

  Nimrod had seen barbarism he could not wipe from his memory. He had seen heathen men boiled to death in the great camp cauldrons and children impaled on spits to be roasted and devoured by Crusaders driven mad by hunger. And Nimrod had seen his own people caught up in the conflict between Christians and Muslims as Jacob’s prophecy came to pass—the Crusaders saw little that differentiated Jews and the followers of Mohammed. As he tried to sleep at night, Nimrod often found himself wondering why he could not speak up against such atrocities—all these men, Christians, Muslims, and Jews, were children of Abraham; all died with their faith in the same God. The guilt of his silence weighed upon him.

  As he finished his task and drew the bedsheet over the duke’s legs, Nimrod knew he was being watched. He did not need to turn to know that Michel Roux stood behind him.

  “Leave us, Jew,” said Roux, but Nimrod was already collecting his medicinal tools and salves and shuffling toward the door, averting his eyes.

  Chevalier Roux filled Nimrod with fear. He represented everything that darkened men’s hearts. The duke kept him close as a brutal warrior and leader of his cavalry, but Nimrod feared the power that Roux craved. He was not of significant noble birth and could never hope to claim the duke’s title or estates save by sword and cunning, and Nimrod felt in his heart that he was quite capable of succeeding, especially as the duke’s health was failing. Before the Crusade, Nimrod had attempted to delicately counsel the duke on the dangers of such men as Roux, but war made them more valuable than in peacetime, so Nimrod had stifled his concerns.

  Nimrod made his way through the torchlight and drunkenness that was the camp after dark to the small tent that he shared with Jacob. He made this walk with a heavy heart as he knew that this night would likely be Jacob’s last. The old man was suffering greatly, and there was no medicine that Nimrod possessed that could alter the passage of age.

  “Slaughter is coming,” said Jacob, whispering as he struggled to breathe. “You must leave, Nimrod. Be away from here before the slaughter comes.”

  “I cannot. I serve the duke,” said Nimrod as he wiped Jacob’s brow. The Crusade had taken its toll on the duke’s treasurer. He had performed his duty carefully, managed the duke’s accounts, paid the soldiers, and maintained the most meticulous records of any in the campaign. When they had left France, the duke had made clear his orders concerning the treasury that Jacob was to oversee.

  “All that is plunder will be given immediately to you as my treasurer. And in God’s good time, a fifth part of what we take from the heathen will be divided among the men. Earls, barons, and chevaliers will be allotted a fifth part of that fifth part. The Church will be allotted another fifth part, and two fifth parts will be retained by me in recompense for my service to the Holy See.”

  Jacob had followed these orders perfectly. The duke had made it clear to his Crusaders that there would be a price to pay for failing to be honest in the account of what they had taken.

  Nimrod recalled well the words delivered by the duke from the back of his horse before they set out. “Any Crusader who steals plunder for himself will suffer the most horrible of deaths for all eternity. Your headless body will be left in a ditch, and you will not be buried in consecrated ground. You will never go to heaven but instead will be consigned
to the hottest flames of hell, where your flesh will burn for ten thousand years. For I will not tolerate any crimes during this Crusade. You are soldiers of the cross; you are soldiers for Jesus; yours is a holy and God-ordained mission. So what you steal from us, you steal from God Himself, and for that blasphemy you will die.”

  It had been Nimrod who advised the duke on the phrasing. Nimrod had a way with words. Yet now, after he’d seen the carnage of what such men of God had reaped, the words tasted as bitter as bile.

  Nimrod had kept the duke’s health and Jacob had kept the duke’s accounts. But the strain of the journey had stolen Jacob’s health and threatened to leave Nimrod on his own.

  “You have not seen what I’ve seen . . .” Nimrod feared the old man’s words would slip into incoherence and delusion, but they maintained clarity even as Jacob closed his eyes for a memory. “The terrible massacre that went before this Crusade. They came for us, for our people. This fate will come again . . .” The cough returned, stealing any further words from Jacob’s lips.

  Nimrod knew the stories of the expulsion and massacre of the Jews from the cities of Europe. Since he had found his place and purpose in the court of the duke of Champagne, such stories had felt far away. And yet now, as he himself was a part of the destruction being wreaked upon the East, as he had watched what men could do to other men, as Christians slaughtered Arabs in the name of a peace-loving God, the stories felt very close to home. And Nimrod was without anyone to trust.

  Jacob’s words softened and slid into a soft babble. Nimrod held the old man’s hand and waited, listening softly to his breath as it became a hiss and then a rattle and then nothing.

  • • •

  Soon after Jacob died, the great walls of Antioch were finally breached. It wasn’t might of arms that allowed the Crusader army to flood into the massive city in the height of summer but, rather, simple bribery. The commander of the south tower had been paid a massive sum of silver to open his gates, and the siege that had appeared to be unending was now over in an orgy of looting and killing, the walls of the city intact. Yet the revelry was short-lived as the former besiegers became the besieged and a fresh Muslim army arrived, preparing to take back the city so recently captured.

  The armies met in the open field outside the city and clashed like two mighty mailed fists. The army that would win would not be the strongest or best armed but the force that could be held coherent in the chaos. In the end it was the Muslims who broke ranks as internal power struggles drove whole cohorts to quit the field and return to their tribal lands.

  The Crusaders were left holding the bloodstained ground as stories circulated among the men of the Holy Lance having been found in the city as a sign from God, or even that a host of saints had been deployed on to the battlefield to drive back the heathens.

  To Nimrod, observing the carnage, it was nothing more than the winds of war that, on this day, had blown in the favor of the Crusaders but tomorrow may well blow back in their faces.

  Since the death of Jacob, the duties of the duke’s treasury had fallen to Nimrod. But he had no head for numbers, and the scope of the task, now that Antioch had been conquered and the Muslim army broken, was beyond him. He attempted to follow Jacob’s accounts, tried in vain to understand the conflicting reports of the duke’s men as to what amounts had been taken and what must be recorded, and all the while he listened to the screams of the city as it cried out in pain.

  Nimrod bundled the day’s scrolls of accounts under his arm and shuffled off toward the rooms the duke had taken up in the wreckage of the city’s palatial buildings. He kept his face down, his eyes on the ground, and tried to block out the world around him. The last remaining prisoners were being rounded up; Saracens were herded together like cattle and put to the sword. Yet it was impossible to tell if they were soldiers, stripped of their scimitars and clothes, or innocents collected up in the fever of fighting.

  As Nimrod walked, he heard words in a language none of the soldiers around him spoke, causing him to lift his head in surprise.

  The words were a mix of English and Hebrew. Nimrod found himself looking across the flagstone courtyard to see a roughly bearded and wiry man pulling with all his feeble might at the grip of two Crusader soldiers who held him fast. “I am not a Saracen! I am not a Turk! I am not a soldier. I am just a merchant.”

  The soldiers continued to pull the man, and he changed his language from English and Hebrew into German, then Arabic. Nimrod, without consciously choosing to change direction, turned toward the man and the knights. It was only when he came close enough that Nimrod saw the pockmarked face and flame-red hair of Michel Roux.

  Then the man spoke in faltering French. “I am Jewish, not Muslim. I am a friend to the Crusader. I want only to trade. I have wealth and I can—”

  Roux lashed out with a mailed fist straight into the merchant’s chest, forcing the wind from his lungs and causing him to cough and then fall painfully silent.

  “Jew or Muslim, you are a godless heathen, and you’ll die like the rest. Take him away!” he ordered, and the knights on either side of the man heaved him around with his feet dangling above the flagstones.

  Nimrod involuntarily raised a hand to stop the knights, and the scrolls fell to the ground with a clatter. The movement caught the attention of the soldiers and Roux, and all three turned to Nimrod. Caught in their glare, the doctor was compelled to speak.

  “This man . . . what has this man done?”

  Roux looked at Nimrod, baffled by his audacity. But Roux remained silent.

  “This man . . . he is a m-merchant?” Nimrod stammered.

  “Jew? Merchant? What of it?” sneered Roux.

  “He may have—” Nimrod’s words caught in his throat as he crouched to gather up the scrolls, which threatened to blow away in the wind. “He may have skills that the duke . . .”

  By now Roux was upon Nimrod, so close that the doctor could smell the man’s putrid breath. He felt Roux’s metal-clad hands grab at his shirt and all but heave him off the ground.

  “By what right do you question me?” Roux said, his voice menacing.

  “I am tasked by the duke . . . this man might be . . . we should speak first with Duke Henri and—”

  Roux hefted Nimrod backward, throwing him flailing through the air and crashing to the ground. His head collided with the flagstones and his sight flooded with swirling colors. He put his hands to the ground to push himself up just in time to see Roux stand over him with his sword ready to end his life.

  But the blow didn’t come. Nimrod heard the thundering voice of the duke.

  “What in God’s name is going on here?”

  Nimrod opened his eyes to see Roux still clutching the sword and, behind him, the Jewish merchant staring with panicked eyes at the scene.

  “Roux, what is the meaning of this?” demanded the duke.

  “Just a prisoner, my lord,” said Roux, his gaze turning to the merchant still held by the soldiers.

  “And why is my doctor on the ground? Why are my accounts scattered in the dirt?”

  Nimrod scrambled to his feet and, snatching up what parchments he could, said, “A merchant, my lord, this man is a merchant.”

  “And what is that to me, old fool!” said the duke.

  “He is a collaborator, working with the Saracen, and he will be put to the sword,” Roux shouted, not wishing to be outflanked by the old Jew.

  “I am not. I am a merchant, I have money, and I—”

  “Silence!” shouted the duke. “Nimrod, why is this man of concern to you?”

  “Since the death of your treasurer, Jacob, my lord, I have been unable to do my work. I am not skilled at figures. This man, though, is a merchant, and were we to spare his life, he could be useful.” Nimrod walked over to the side of the man. “This man is clearly not a Turk nor an Arab. He may be of value to you, my lord.”

  “Value?” The duke pointed a gloved finger at the merchant. “Value to me?”

  Nim
rod quickly spoke before Roux had a chance to speak. “This man will ensure that the Church and your estate are paid their due from the plunder. This man has value, my lord.”

  The duke pondered Nimrod’s words and paced forward to put a hand on the Jewish doctor’s shoulder. To Nimrod’s surprise, the duke leaned down and whispered in his ear, “Yes. I need a treasurer. And I also have great need of a doctor. He may sleep in your tent.” He turned to Roux. “This Jew belongs to Nimrod the doctor. He shall be entrusted with my accounts.”

  And without looking back, the duke strode away. The soldiers let the merchant go, and he quickly drew himself away from them and toward Nimrod.

  Roux eyed them both coldly. “Mark my words, Jew,” he spat at Nimrod. “You are in the duke’s sight for now, but you had better pray you die before he does, Christ killer, for once he’s gone, you and your new merchant will be mine, to dispose of as I wish. And on that day, you’ll have wished you’d died here, in Antioch, with my sword piercing your godless heart.”

  And with that, Roux spun on his heel and stormed away, followed by his guards.

  The man whose life he had just saved turned to Nimrod. “Simeon. My name is Simeon, son of Abel. And I thank you.”

  Nimrod looked the man up and down with weary eyes. “I sincerely hope you are good with numbers, Simeon. For both our sakes.”

  Moscow, USSR

  January 19, 1948

  GOLDA MEIR LOOKED the very archetype of the Jewish grandmother. Her elegant dark blue twinset, white top, pearls, and gray hair tied in a matronly bun gave her a nonthreatening air that defied her determination and political savvy. Like a mountain lion, she looked benign as she walked along the street, but anybody who crossed her risked the worst mauling imaginable.

  Formally, she was head of the Jewish Agency for Israel and charged with political negotiation with the British. More pragmatically, she was a fund-raiser, building networks of donors to fund the soon-to-be-established Jewish nation of Israel. Nobody could extract vast sums of money from American and European Jews like Golda. When she spoke, people felt guilty if they didn’t give, especially when she reminded the comfortable and assimilated Jews that Israel was their birthright. In a more subtle reality, Golda was a deft diplomat, weaving international alliances. Of all her roles and motivations, it was this that brought her to Moscow.