by Harold Lamb
At this, however, Tamerlane began to pay more attention to a topaz ring that he turned and twisted upon a sinewy hand.
Fearing that his tale was lacking fire, Clavijo began to exaggerate as was his want, until he was boasting hugely. Tamerlane scowled under bushy brows, first at the speaker, then at the ring. Finally he held up his hand for the Spaniard to see.
"Behold, Frank, a magician's stone," he said gruffly. "The topaz turns purple when anyone lies to me. I always watch it and it has served me well."
Superstitious, as all men of his time and race, Clavijo stared in dismay. Indeed his round face turned a very good shade of purple. His flow of words dwindled as he scanned the topaz and fancied that it changed color.
This might well have been due to the twilight that was falling upon the great pavilion.
"Frank," observed the conqueror, "you come at a good time. My army is mounted for war against the Sultan Bayezid. He has preyed upon my subjects in lesser Armenia, and I have offered him terms by which he may save his head. We will hear what he will reply."
To hear the sultan who was the scourge of Christendom mentioned as Tamerlane might speak of a slave added fuel to Clavijo's active imagination.
"If there is a battle, you will see a goodly sight," repeated the old conqueror. "Does my son the King of Spain fight battles or is he a dog of a merchant like the Venetians?"
Clavijo essayed a reply, glanced at the topaz ring which seemed to him to be now a deep purple indeed, and the last of his courage oozed from him. Breaking from the Tatar warriors who held his arms, he fell on his knees.
"Mercy, great lord," he bellowed. "Oh, mercy. Grant me royal clemency if I have offended. Make me a captive, but spare my life!"
This being interpreted, Tamerlane smiled. "Verily," he said shortly, "the Frank is frightened by my face. Nay, Timur the Tatar has harmed no ambassador. Fear not, but join in our feast."
He signed to the men who held the visitors. Soranzi, a-tremble with anxiety, took this to be a signal for their destruction. Without waiting for the speech to be translated, he flung himself at the Tatar's feet, embracing his slippers.
"0 King of Kings," he cried, "my companion has lied, even as your wisdom has suspected. He is naught but a seeker after gold, disguised as an envoy. The gifts that pleased you were mine. I will pay more. Do not believe this traitor when he says that I am a merchant, for he is a liar-"
Surprised by this outburst, Tamerlane turned to the interpreters with a scowl.
"Now the fat is in the fire," sighed Bembo.
Tamerlane pulled at his thin mustache, his small black eyes darting from one to the other. He surveyed his topaz ring and grunted. There was something wolfish now in the stare of the Mongol warriors.
Rudolfo swore under his breath and Soranzi did not cease to moan his fear. Since the attack by the riders at the Gate of Shadows his dread had grown upon him. That afternoon he had seen captives of the khan hauled through the camp in cages, like beasts.
"The gifts were mine," he repeated over and over, holding fast to the Tatar's slipper.
"Then you are not ambassadors sent to Tamerlane?"
"Nay." Clavijo and Soranzi were answering in one breath when Gutchluk knelt and addressed his lord, saying that the Franks had purported to be merchants before their capture.
Tamerlane was a man who never minced words and hated deceit. He was about to speak when there was a bustle in the outer porticos. A man flung himself from an exhausted horse, crying-
"A courier for the khan!"
Those who had crowded about Clavijo and his party gave back at this, opening a lane between Tamerlane and the newcomer, barely visible in the half-light of evening, who bowed thrice and knelt before the dais.
"0 King of Kings," the horseman cried in Arabic, "I have beheld the answer of the sultan. He has struck off the heads of the Tatars' envoys and placed them at the gate of Angora. Thus Bayezid has made answer to you."
The old Tatar's face grew dark and veins stood out on his forehead. He caught his sword from its sheath and swung it over the head of the unfortunate messenger who remained quietly kneeling.
Then the khan checked the sweep of his blade midway and stood staring out into the dusk, his face a mask of anger. Yet when he spoke, his words were measured and deep.
"Aye, there will be a battle." He looked down at the courier. "You are a brave man. Take twenty horses and go, that your face will not remind me of the deed you bespoke."
Replacing his sword, Tamerlane ordered that the army be ready to march on the morrow. For the first time Clavijo noted the great bulk of the Tatar and the fact that he was lame. In his youth, during an affray with the Seljuk Turks, Tamerlane had been beaten from his horse and cast to earth with three ribs broken and a mangled side.
Turning back to his chessboard, he observed the Europeans who still remained held by their guards.
"Come with my court, liars and merchants," he said grimly. "Instead of jugglers and musicians, you will amuse me, for I will pass judgment upon you then."
Chapter XI
The Thunderbolt
Two weeks before Tamerlane's audience with the Christians, the stars traced the outline of the river Khabur in Anatolia, two hundred miles west of Tamerlane's camp. Down the river toward the flat roofs of the town of Angora drifted a small skiff, only half-visible in the glittering light from the stars, which seemed intensified by the heat of the windless July night.
But the stars were eclipsed by the myriad torches and lanterns of Angora and the illumination of ten thousand tents clustered about the Turkish town.
Bayezid, his court, and his army held festival. Angora, an unfortified trading town, yet served admirably for mobilizing the army of the Ottomans and Seljuks. Galleys had come from Greece, where the Crescent ruled, to land their loads of Moslems on the Anatolian shore across from Constantinople; the mamelukes had sent their splendid cavalry hither from Alexandria; the veteran main army of the sultan had been withdrawn temporarily from the conquest of Constantinople.
So Angora was filled with the warriors of a dozen kingdoms. Forbidden wine flowed freely and revelry held the courtyards and roofs. The sultan knew how to hold the loyalty of his men by pleasure and by generous pay, which reinforced the natural fanaticism of the Moslems and the devotion of the janissaries-that formidable mass of soldiery recruited from Christian child slaves raised by Moslem teachers.
The skiff drifted with the current of the river to the jetties of the town, already crowded with native craft. Michael Bearn raised himself cautiously, clutched the side of a fishing-boat, and climbed to the jetty.
"Who comes?"
A sharp challenge rang from a pair of spearmen standing at the shore end of the dock. Michael stiffened, then advanced carelessly.
"A sailor," he made answer in his good Arabic, "from the Byzantine coast. I have heard that the great sultan is here and I have come to look upon his face."
A lantern was brought from an adjoining hut and the two spearmen looked him over casually. Michael's skin was burned a deep brown by the sun and he had secured a short cloak that concealed the outlines of his stalwart body. His leather tunic and bare knees bore out the identity he claimed.
"Does a son of a dog think to look upon the favored of Allah?" gibed one of the Moslems. "Stay-you have been a slave on the galleys."
The soldier's sharp glance had noted the scars on Michael's wrists where the irons had pressed.
"Aye," assented the Breton; "a galley slave." He tapped his stiffened arm. "But useless, my lord warrior. I have been freed in a battle."
His pulse quickened, for he knew the strict discipline of Bayezid's army-despite the appearance of revelry-and was aware that every precaution was being taken, now that the battle with Tamerlane was impending.
"You are no true follower of the prophet," said the sentry sharply. Michael's curls, escaping from under his loose cap, revealed that he was not one of the orthodox Moslem peoples.
"Your wisdom is fine
as a rare gem," acknowledged he. "I am a Christian who has not seen his own country for many years. My lord warrior, I pray you let me pass into the town where there is wine to be given away and sweets made of grapes and flour and butter. I have not eaten for two days."
This was strictly true. Michael's tone was that of the hopeless slave addressing his guards. The sentry sneered and ran his hand under Michael's cloak to make sure that he held no weapon, and then fell to cursing his own fate that kept him from the feasting. Michael made off.
At the river gate of the town he was confronted by the head of a Mongol-one of the envoys from Tamerlane-caked with dried blood, stuck upright upon a spear. The crowd of soldiery and townspeople surging through the gate paused to spit at the wax-like features and to heap insults on the Tatars.
Michael was carried in with the throng, but now his eyes held a new light and his lips were hard with purpose. He knew for the first time the certainty of conflict between the sultan and the khan.
At the river's edge, upstream, he had bought his new cloak with a few silver pieces and the cap to match. He had cast away his sword to carry out his character of freed galley slave.
Now Michael was among the alleys of Angora over which the crescent standard hung. He glanced indifferently at the lighted balconies where costly rugs were hung and at the magic lantern pictures that Arabs were displaying in darkened corners. He heard the distant chant of fanatical imams, exhorting the Moslems in the mosques.
Asking his way from a drunken sipahi, he approached the walled gardens where Bayezid and his court held feast.
The heat grew instead of lessening that night. The glimmer of heat lightning more than once darkened the gleam of the stars. This the imams, crying from balcony and courtyard, announced as a good omen.
"The Thunderbolt will strike!" they said. "The world trembles."
The heat impelled Bayezid and his divan-the councilors who feasted with him-to leave the torrid rooms of the house, where they were guarded by a double line of Ottoman infantry, and to seek the gardens where an artificial lake shaded by cypresses offered moderate comfort.
On this lake was a floating kiosk of teakwood inlaid with mother-ofpearl, its roof fragrant with flowers, with curtains drawn back to allow free passage to the air.
Bayezid, flushed with the stimulus of bhang and opium, lay back on his cushions, idly watching the play of torchlight reflected in the lake. The grandees were intent on a spectacle of women and boys who danced in iridescent garments of moghrebin and chrysoliths at the edge of the garden by the kiosk.
These feasts had been ordered by Bayezid, who felt himself at the summit of his power. Now he surveyed the splendor around him through halfclosed eyes.
"We will make a welcome," he murmured, "for the Tatar boor. News has come to me that he advances with his power upon the Khabur."
They nodded assent-sheik, malik, and caliph.
"When he comes to the Khabur," went on Bayezid, "I will have a hunt declared. My troops will aid me in the pursuit of game. That will show the Tatar how much we esteem him."
Some of the councilors looked more than a little startled. It was no light thing to hunt game in the presence of Tamerlane's army. And Bayezid had ordered the Mongol envoys slain, wantonly, as it seemed.
The man who was called the Thunderbolt turned sleepy eyes to the dark face of the Sheik of Rum, in whose country they were encamped.
"Give orders for ten thousand beaters to be mustered from the town. It is my will."
The official prostrated himself and muttered:
"Tamerlane has forty thousand infantry and twice that number of riders, 0 Guardian of the Faith. Will you pursue the beasts of the field when such a host stands across the river?" He plucked up courage from the sultan's silence. "Bethink you, Star of the East, there is but one cloud upon the face of your sky-Tamerlane. You have gained the Danube; Constantinople will be yours as Greece is now-then the rest of Frankistan. And, when Tamerlane falls, Iran, Tatary, and India-"
"Sheik," Bayezid smiled, "have you forgotten my spies in the Tatar camp?"
In this manner was it ordained by the sultan that they should mock Tamerlane. Festival was to be held in the town, even when the Tatar horsemen occupied the opposite bank of the Khabur. The bulk of the Seljuk knights-the pick of the host-was to be kept in its tents by the town.
The councilors, hearing this, wondered whether ceaseless conquests had not affected the mind of Bayezid. But the leaders of the mamelukes and janissaries smiled, saying that they were invincible and-some beasts to be slain must be first trapped.
Michael Bearn, sitting among the cypresses on the farther bank of the lake where there were no guards, watched the feast of Bayezid until dawn reddened the sky across the river and the call of the muezzin floated over the roofs of Angora.
He was studying again the brilliant assemblage of grandees that he had seen at times from a distance during his captivity. He noticed the councilors start up from their cushions. By the fading light of the torches he could see them staring up at the sky.
Almost at the same time he heard a sound-a shrill cry that was more like a scream. It rose from one side of the miniature lake, swelled, and dwindled swiftly.
Michael knew the cry of herons and waterfowl. This was different. It was more like the scream of a horse in pain. Yet it had sounded a hundred feet above the kiosk. A shout reached his ears from the kiosk, a bowshot away.
"The warning of Tamerlane!"
Guards were running here and there about the lake. Torches advanced along the shore toward him from the palace. It was no time to sit wondering about the source of the queer sound in the air. Broad daylight would be upon him in a moment.
Cautiously Michael began to crawl through the willow thickets of the lakeside, toward a gully by which he had gained his point of vantage. The light was strong enough for him to see his way.
He stumbled over something projecting from the ground and found that it was an arrow. With some difficulty he pulled it out, for his curiosity had been aroused by its weight.
Instead of a point, the shaft terminated in a hollow steel cylinder, perforated in the sides. Michael weighed it in his hand and chuckled. Such an arrow as this, sent from a powerful bow, would emit a loud whistling sound when passing through the air. In fact it had been the passage of this shaft that he had just heard.
The arrow was plainly of Tatar make and Michael guessed that some man of Tamerlane's, hidden in the rushes across the lake, had sent it as a warning to Bayezid. He thrust the shaft under his cloak, and, hearing footsteps approaching, made his way down the gully.
For several days thereafter Michael was very busy. He frequented the bazaar, heard the news of the preparation for the sultan's hunt, and out on the plain of Angora behind the town saw regiments of janissaries drilling constantly.
And he noticed another head on the Angora gate-posts-an old Tatar fisherman who had been seen more than once dragging his nets in the river. Under the head a large bow had been placed.
Michael guessed that the man who had fired the whistling arrow would not report his feat to Tamerlane.
He heard great emirs say openly in the town that Bayezid was drunk with power and with wine. Litters of Moslem women and captives from Georgia and Greece were passing constantly through the streets.
The finest cavalry of the sultan was encamped a league behind the town, apart from the rest of the army. Angora was continually a-throng with merrymakers, as if the fast of Ramadan had just been broken.
Knowing the inexorable discipline of the Ottoman army and the merciless cunning of Bayezid, Michael doubted the evidence of his senses. This was no idle laxity or sport such as the Thunderbolt was accustomed to use in pleasuring his men.
Even when Tatar horsemen were seen, swooping about the plain across the river, there was no sign of any preparation made to meet Tamerlane.
But when Michael made his way down to the riverbank one cloudy night, he found the boats that were drawn up on shore f
illed with men, and out in the center of the Khabur he could discern the black bulk of guard ships moving back and forth.
"Bayezid waits!" He laughed silently. "Aye, and thus he waited at Nicopolis! I begin to see the answer to the riddle. And now, for a visit to the sentry post that welcomed me at the jetty. Grant the same two janissaries be on watch; the hour is the same."
Dawn revealed two unexpected things to the officers of the janissaries who commanded the guard at the riverfront.
On a small dock two spearmen lay bound and gagged beside an extinguished lantern. The white woolen turban, the kaftan, and bow of one were gone.
And one of the guard boats reported that its steersman was missing. A janissary, the men of the galley said, had come on board when they were putting out from the shore-a warrior who declared that he knew the river and was skilled in managing a galley. He had carried a bow.
Before an hour had passed, so the tale was repeated, this helmsman had disappeared from the craft, taking with him the steering oar. They had not heard him fall overboard. But at the end of the hour they heard a whistling arrow, shot into the air from the other side.
Michael's penetration of the Ottoman lines had been comparatively simple because the Turk guards-not yet drawn up in battle order-had not looked for a foe from within.
One of the sentries he had found at a distance from the lantern and had stunned with a blow on the forehead. The other, running toward the slight noise, had been easily overcome by the powerful Breton.
Michael exulted in the fact that his right arm was once more serviceable after a fashion. Stripping one of the guards of tunic, cloak, and cap, he had gained access to a galley.
Not trusting as yet to his right arm, he had taken the steering oar with him when he dropped over the stern of the galley to swim to the farther shore.
Here, to disturb further his late companions and to test his arm, he had let fly the cylinder-headed arrow over the river.
Now he began to run up from the bank of the Khabur, casting aside his cloak as he went and unwinding the cumbersome turban. It would not be very long, he knew, before he would encounter Tatar patrols and he did not wish to be cut down as a janissary.