by Harold Lamb
Michael had gained what he had come for. He had guessed the riddle of Bayezid's inaction and the revelry in Angora. An ambush was being prepared for Tamerlane.
The Tatars were to be beguiled into an attack and a trap was to be set for them on the river.
Michael studied the stars overhead and shaped his course by them, shaking his head as he made out a crescent moon on the horizon. He would be late for his rendezvous with Bembo.
Chapter XII
Tamerlane Decides
It was the night set for the Tatar attack. The Lame Conqueror had been riding slowly among his host, listening as was his wont to the talk of the warriors about the campfires. Tamerlane, what with his age and the pain of his old injuries, seldom slept.
When the middle watch had ended and quiet had fallen in some degree on the Mongol army, he retired to his small tent and lay down on the plain mattress that served him for a bed. He read slowly, because of his poor sight, the annals of his ancestors and the tales of past battles written down by the chroniclers.
The plan of attack for the coming day had been decided upon, and every khatun had his orders, which in turn were transmitted to the tumani-the commanders of a thousand and to the khans of the hundreds. Tamerlane, however, was restless. News had reached him from the fisherfolk of the river that the Turkish grandees were at revelry, and Bayezid himself had ordered a hunt, even within sight of the Tatar array.
This puzzled the Conqueror.
Impatiently he ordered his ivory and ebony chessboard set before him, then brushed it aside, for there was no one in attendance who could play the mimic game of warfare as Tamerlane desired. He lifted his broad head and signed to a Mongol archer at the tent's entrance.
"Bring hither the Franks. I will pass judgment upon them."
It would amuse him, perhaps until dawn, to probe the souls of the Christians from the end of the world who had tried to throw dust in the eyes of the Conqueror of the World.
He surveyed them grimly as they knelt before him, their finery rumpled by the confinement of the past few days. Fear was plainly to be read in their white faces-save that of Bembo. The jester was a philosopher.
Bembo was thinking that Clavijo's Grand Cham had proved to be a strange sort of monarch indeed. Steel and wool that clad Tamerlane's long body were hardly the silks and chrysoliths about which the Spaniard had boasted.
The brazen city of Cathay had become a city of tents. The gold house of the khan was constructed, so Bembo perceived, of bull's hide. And instead of winning wealth, joined with perpetual life, they had been deprived of their own goods-or rather Soranzi had-and bade fair to earn a swift death.
The others had not failed to remind Bembo that Michael Bearn had not appeared as he had promised. To this the jester returned only a wink.
He had recognized Michael in the courier who had come in native attire from Angora. He knew that Michael was in the camp and would seek him out.
The moon was already five days old.
"Does this Frank," Tamerlane observed to the interpreters, indicating Soranzi, "confess that he is a merchant and a thief?"
At this Soranzi, reading Tamerlane's harsh countenance, broke forth into feverish words, which the interpreters explained to their lord.
"Aye, sire. 0 Great Khan. Splendor of the World! 0 monument of mercy and essence of forgiveness! 0 Conqueror of Asia. Grant but one small iota of mercy to your slave."
Tamerlane nodded, unsmiling.
"I will. See yonder weapons?"
"Aye my lord." Soranzi's eyes widened at sight of jewel-inlaid scimitars and gold-chased helmets and silver camails hung upon the walls of the tent.
"They were taken from my enemies, merchant-thief. It will now be the duty of your life to furnish and cleanse the spoil that I shall take. Dog, do you understand? You may smell of the riches you may not taste. Pocket but one zecchin of this store and your bowels shall be let out with a knife. Go, to your work."
Soranzi trembled and could not refrain from a frantic plea.
"But my goods?"
"Begin by writing down an account of them-for me."
The Tatar was not lacking in a rough sense of humor. He was naturally merciless, yet he had no love of torture. A man without a god, a man fash ioned for dealing destruction, he could still tolerate another man's faith in God, and he admired courage.
"You say that you are a warrior." He addressed Rudolfo, who was watching him in sullen dread. "Good. You have seen my ranks and the camp of my foe the sultan. Tell me how your Frankish would plan the battle."
Rudolfo licked his lips and tried to speak out clearly, but his voice quivered. He described the order of battle of the Italian mercenaries-skirmishing by irregulars, the entrenchment of pikemen behind abatis, the feints and countermarches that produced the bloodless battles of his knowledge.
This recital Tamerlane ended with a grunt of anger.
"I did not ask you how your children played. I will have you placed with the Tatar boys and girls tomorrow by the river, where you may see a battle."
Glancing contemptuously over Clavijo, he stared at Bembo's sad face and gay attire.
"What kind of man is this?"
The jester rose and bowed ceremoniously.
"I am your cousin, 0 King," he stated cheerily.
Tamerlane frowned, puzzled.
"Because," pointed out the jester, "I am maimed for the fight, whereas you are lame for the flight."
"If you are maimed, you are useless and need not live."
"So be it," agreed Bembo. "I am not afraid. Nevertheless, I would fain set eyes upon my other cousin who is only maimed in the arm."
"Who is that?" asked the matter-of-fact khan.
"A wiser man, Messer Tamerlane, than all of us put together."
Tamerlane looked around as if to mark this other Frank. He noticed a helmeted emir who salaamed within the entrance of the tent.
"The other Frank," announced the newcomer, as Tamerlane signed for him to speak, "seeks admittance to the presence of the Lord of the East and West."
Two archers of the guard held Michael Bearn by the arms. Bembo and Rudolfo-Soranzi and the Spaniard had been dismissed-stared at him in surprise.
He had grown leaner, his face blackened by the sun. Around his shoulders was a rich fur kaftan and silk trousers covered the tattered bindings of his legs.
The emir who had announced him bowed again before Tamerlane.
"0 Kha Khan, we know not this man. Yet, because of his claim, we could not refuse him admittance." The officer glanced at the silent khan and pointed to Michael. "He claims that he is to play with you at chess-as you play it."
In contrast to the flowery etiquette of Bayezid's court, Tamerlane, who was impatient of ceremony, always encouraged direct speech. Now he frowned at Michael as if trying to recall something that escaped his mind.
"I have come to play," assented Michael gravely, "the game that the great khan plays. It is known to me."
Tamerlane's brow cleared. Michael had spoken in his good Arabic, and with this the Tatar, who liked to read the Moslem annals, was familiar. The Lame Conqueror made a practice of treating well all scholars, astronomers, and men of learning whom he took prisoner.
"You are a bold man," he said. "Three days ago when you came to me as a courier from Angora I ordered that you should not let me see your face again. I gave you horses. Why did not you ride hence?"
Bembo had known that Michael was the horseman who had reached the purple tent in the plain three days before. As Michael had not greeted him at that time Bembo had kept silent, trusting that what his friend did was for the best.
The jester did not know what a desperate game his friend was playing nor that Michael, having heard that evening of Bembo's plight, had resolved to stake their lives on a single throw.
"Because, 0 Kha Khan," the Breton rejoined, "it came to my ears that you lacked a man to play at shahk* in the manner of Tamerlane, which is not that of other men of feebler minds."
&nb
sp; The khan weighed this in silence, then motioned for the emir, the captives, and interpreters to withdraw to the farther side of the tent, in the shadow. He signed for the two archers to kneel at either side of the chessboard which lay in front of him under the flickering candles.
"So be it," he assented grimly. "Frank, set up the men. Your daring earns you the chance. If you have deceived me, and cannot play as you profess, these two dogs of mine will cut you in two. Your countrymen, Frank, have deceived Tamerlane. Beware lest you do likewise."
It was a long speech for the blunt Tatar to make. He was interested. His small black eyes gleamed as he watched Michael squat on his heels before the board. Only the Persian, the Grand Mufti, Nuruddeen Abderrah- man Esferaini, who had come to Tamerlane from Baghdad, and the Chinese general of Khoten had been able to cope with the Conqueror on the enlarged board and with the double number of pieces.
Now Tamerlane set up his men swiftly on his side of the board and motioned for Michael to do likewise.
Bembo, whose ready wit had grasped much of what was happening, knew that his friend could not play even the simpler game of chess as brought to Venice by the crusaders of the century before. So the jester grimaced and bit his thumb, invoking the lion of Saint Mark to Michael's aid.
The Breton fingered the array of miniature gold warriors, fashioned in the likeness of tiny horsemen, archers, elephants and rohks-castles-and with a single large effigy of a king. He knew neither the pieces nor their moves.
"Break off the head of one of your arrows," he ordered an archer.
The warrior hesitated, glancing at his chief, and then obeyed. Michael laid the wooden shaft carefully across the board midway between him and Tamerlane.
Then, smiling, he set up the pawns along his side of the arrow's shaft, and behind them the knights. Taking the thin gold chain given him by Contarini from his throat, he placed it near his end of the board, and within its circle the castles and the towering figure of the king.
In the clear space behind the gold circlet he stood up the jeweled castles. Tamerlane surveyed him fixedly, evidently growing angry. The Tatar's pieces had been set up in the orthodox fashion, very different from the queer array of the European's men.
"Explain!" he barked.
Michael touched the arrow. "The Khabur river." His finger rested on the tiny pawns. "Ships and archers." He pointed to the gold circlet. "Angora and its troops. Bayezid, the king who is the prize of the game." Last he indicated the castles. "The sultan's heavy cavalry on the plain of Angora."
Leaning forward, he ran his finger along the gold pieces-his own were silver. "The army of Timor the Lame, Conqueror of India, and the Caliphate." He looked at the impassive Tatar. "This is the game that you play, 0 Kha Khan. And there is no other in the world today who can play it with you-save Bayezid the Sultan. His pieces will I play as he has planned. It is for you to make the first move."
The lines in Tamerlane's withered face deepened and his black eyes snapped.
"You are a spy!"
"Perhaps. You may call me so." Michael's thin nostrils quivered, and the smile left his face. "I have been in Angora. I heard the whistling arrow fall. Before that for three years I marched with Bayezid."
Tamerlane did not shift his gaze. "Proof!"
Thrusting his hand under his kaftan, Michael drew forth the long folds of a janissary's turban, spotted in places with blood. He pointed to the scars on his wrists.
"A slave, 0 Kha Khan." He touched again the gold chain. "A gift for service rendered at Nicopolis where the host of Frankistan was broken by the craft of the sultan. Ten thousand Christians were slain there, after they had been taken captive."
To this Tamerlane seemed indifferent. One religion, to him, was the same as another. He was trying to judge Michael's purpose. His interest in the strange maneuver of the Christian upon the chessboard still held him passive.
Bembo plucked at the arm of the watchful condottiere.
"See you, Rudolfo, Cousin Michael holds the Chain in leash, but methinks 'tis a thin, silken leash whereby our lives hang-"
Decision had come to Tamerlane.
"You are an enemy of the Ottoman."
"Slavery under the Ottoman crippled me." Michael's gray eyes lighted. He had risked much to lead Tamerlane to make the statement that, spoken first by Michael, must be received with natural suspicion. "His men slew my brothers-in-arms. I have waited six years to strike a blow against him who is the greatest foe of my faith. I have heard in the Angora palace Bayezid boast that he will set your head, 0 Kha Khan, upon a spear before the Gate of Paradise at Damascus. Yet you alone can humble Bayezid. Will you let me serve you?"
"How?" It was typical of Tamerlane that he did not ask what reward the other might expect. Those who aided the Lame Conqueror received kingdoms; those who failed, death; unless flight saved them, which was seldom.
"It is for the Kha Khan to move." Michael smiled again and motioned at the chessboard. "The sultan's men have caught a flying pigeon that bore one of your messages to Tatary saying that you would force the passage of the Khabur at Angora and drive Bayezid before you."
"True. The dog hunts. Aye, after he has seen my army. Disaster will come upon him for that effrontery, and the slaughter of my envoys." Tamerlane's eyes glowed fiercely. "Our Tatar hearts are mountains, our swords the whirlwind. We count as naught the numbers of our foes. The greater numbers, the greater glory for our chroniclers to write. Aye thus will Tamerlane move, at dawn-"
His gaunt, callused hand swept Michael's array of chessmen off the board in a single motion. Michael still smiled. He had won his throw.
"So," the Breton said, "did the Christian host at Nicopolis attack. Tamerlane has grown blind, and his wisdom is dust before the storm of the Thunderbolt."
The dark blood flooded into the forehead of the Kha Khan. Veins stood out on his forehead and the yellow around the black pupils of his eyes grew red.
"Think ye, slave, Christian cur-" his deep voice cracked. "Think ye, sucking child, the horsemen of Turan and Iran are like to the mongrels of Frankistan?"
His great hand clenched and writhed in front of the eyes of the younger man who drew back before the vehemence of the Tatar's wrath. The two watchful archers gripped Michael's arms, and Bembo sighed mournfully.
"Is it thus," said Michael swiftly, "that Tamerlane plays at shahk? You have made your move. I have not made mine. And Bayezid will make such a move. Do not doubt it, my khan."
The cold rebuke of the Christian wrought upon Tamerlane's anger and he became silent-as motionless as a snake coiled to strike.
"Aye," snarled Michael, twisting in the grasp of the archers, "your horsemen will sweep across the Khabur, my khan. They will carry the line of boats Bayezid has drawn up along the farther bank and filled with archers, hidden from your sight. Aye, my lord khan. Your warriors of Turan and Iran and the Horde will not be stayed by the trap that Bayezid has set for them in the tents on the shore. Within the tents is an entrenchment of lances sunk into the ground. It will not check your myrmidons."
He laughed in the face of the old Conqueror.
"And then, verily, your Tatars will carry the town. By midday they will have beaten back the sipahis stationed on the crest of the Angora plateau. Aye, Timur. But then what? Your ranks will be faced by forty thousand fresh cavalry-the janissaries. Aye, and by the mamelukes, hidden in the valleys beyond-the pick of Bayezid's army."
The black eyes of Tamerlane were riveted on Michael's face.
"More than that," cried Michael, "the line of boats will be ablaze, my Conqueror. Casks of naphtha are hidden within them, to be set alight. Your men will find no water to drink upon the plain of Angora; the river is foul. Your back will be to the river. Bayezid will turn aside from his hunt, which is meant but to cast dust in your eyes, and set his heavy cavalry against your tired and thirsty followers. By nightfall the riders of Turan will be slain or in the river. Aye, there are war galleys awaiting you, around the upper bend of the Khabur. Your men
have never fought against the Turkish ships."
At this Tamerlane brushed his hand across his nearsighted eyes, and a hissing breath escaped his hard lips.
"Bayezid revels-to make you the blinder," concluded Michael bitterly. "He ordered your emissaries slain, to anger you to attack. In this manner, not otherwise, will he make of your name a mockery, 0 Kha Khan, and of your empire-dust."
For the space of several moments there was complete silence, while a dozen men hung upon the next word of the old Conqueror.
Instead of speaking, Tamerlane rose and limped to the tent entrance, while the guards fell back with lowered heads. He glanced at the stars, marking the hour, and at the dark masses of men assembling under the wan gleam of the new moon, low on the horizon.
"Take the captives hence," he said at last to his attendants, "save the Frank in the kaftan. Summon Mirza Rustem, my grandson, Mahmoud Khan, and the noyons. Take through the camp the new command of Tamerlane; my men are to sleep. The order of battle is to be changed."
Alone with Michael and a single servant in his tent, Tamerlane signed to his cup-bearer to fill two bowls with wine.
Obeying the request which was virtually a command, Michael bent one knee, touched the cup to his chest and forehead and put it briefly to his lips. The Tatar emptied his with a single gulp.
"Have you a thought," he asked bluntly, "how this sultan who has set a trap may be caught in his own deceit?"
Michael looked at the old Tatar thoughtfully, and smiled, reading the purpose under the other's words.
"Does a sparrow," he countered, "give counsel to a falcon-when the hood is removed from the eyes of the falcon?"
If he had made a suggestion, it would in all probability have been futile and would have opened him to the suspicion of being, after all, a secret agent of Bayezid, who had many such.
"Aye, if Tamerlane commands!"
"Then send a hundred of your horsemen to cut out a river galley, to learn whether the boats be not manned and equipped as I said. Dispatch another hundred up the Khabur, to locate the war galleys that I have seen."