The Ruby In Her Navel

by Barry Unsworth

  Naturally, I paid no attention to this nonsense of his. I had clear ideas by now of what I wanted them to wear. I looked at the quality of the pieces he had brought, and their colours, and found both good. I explained to him the combination of black and red and silver I had in mind. I went into detail with him, particularly in regard to the women.

  They were to wear a close-fitting bodice of black sarsenet and a fine crimson damask for the long skirts and these must be very low at the hips and cut in a curve, so as to expose the abdomen when they whirled to unwind the silver sashes. They would not be wearing undergarments and the lights would be set in the wall behind them, so that the lower parts of their bodies would be easily glimpsed through the thin stuff of the skirts. Then if they went backwards on to their hands, as the Greek trader had seen them do, Holy Mother! I felt a loosening in my nether parts. My unruly imagination had brought about in my own loins the very stage of exaltation I was hoping to elicit in those in my royal master.

  And this so soon after my pure and worshipful musing on the Lady Alicia!

  The shame of this did something to restore me to order, but I was glad when the interview with the tailor came to an end. He went to return his pieces to the storeroom, promising to take the measures that same afternoon, and I returned to my desk.

  XII

  However, I was not destined to go further with the royal renewals that morning. I had hardly returned when the doorkeeper came to announce a visitor, a man by the name of Leonardo Malfetta, who came on urgent business, or so he said. The doorkeeper was that same Sigismond who had caused trouble on the ship, but he smiled on me now, and inclined his head. I asked after his family and told him to come to me if he heard anything about Mario and he said he would do so.

  This Malfetta was a merchant, a Genoese, and he was already known to me slightly, because he had once done, or attempted to do, a favour to us, by introducing some acrobats and rope-walkers that he had brought from Naples. He had even parted with a sum in payment of their passage and their maintenance in Sicily. His idea had been to gain a favour in return from our diwan; he was seeking a concession to export the cotton and hemp that are cultivated at Giattini. He had failed in this, as the trade was in the hands of a company of merchants from Amalfi and there was a charter already in existence. His Neapolitan acrobats never appeared at court and this had been by my decision. They were accomplished, certainly, but the time was not opportune, because Negro acrobats from Africa had performed for the King not very much before, and they had made a human pyramid of twelve persons and had also been ropewalkers, so Malfetta's people had nothing new to offer. If they had been allowed to perform, even though he had met with refusal in the matter of the concession, Malfetta would probably have said nothing about the money he had spent, regarding it in the light of an investment for favours in the future. But in the circumstances he had felt justified in making a claim on us for reimbursement. This had been met, but in part only, because the claim had been greatly exaggerated – one would have thought he had lavished a fortune on these poor acrobats from the streets of Naples. There had been dispute at the time and at first I thought he had come to renew this, and my heart sank.

  Certainly he had dressed with care for the visit: red, tiara-shaped silk cap with a jewelled clip, pale-blue wide-sleeved silk gown, slashed at the shoulders to show the embroidered linen of his tunic below. But this finery served only to emphasise the grimness and stiffness of his face, with its small, deepset eyes and long nose and a mouth that was like a thin cut in a lemon. His two attendants he left outside the door, and came stalking in, no less arrogant for having been required to consign his sword to Sigismond before entering. He eyed Stefanos haughtily for a moment or two, then said, "My words are for you only, Signore."

  Stefanos left without waiting to be asked, without glancing at Malfetta, saying to me that he had matters to attend to.

  "Well," I said, " how can I be of service to you?"

  "You permit a great deal from your clerk. He did not so much as give me good-day."

  I said nothing to this. After a moment Malfetta allowed himself a smile and a truly calamitous smile it was: he had a face not constructed for smiling, the features seeming to resent the call made on them, cracking painfully only when they could resist no more. "It is a trifling matter," he said. "I hardly like to trouble you with it, but I thought your help might save me time that could then be spent on more important things."

  "Please be seated," I said, and I waited while he took the chair on the other side of the desk.

  "Some months ago," he said, "I had occasion to borrow a sum of money. It was a time of temporary difficulty, from which I am now happily recovered. However, this man, this money-lender, is making trouble for me."

  "What was the debt?"

  "Five hundred ducats."

  "Full silver?" I asked, and he nodded. It was a sizeable sum. "A Jewish money-lender?"

  "No, a Berber. His name is Zenega Waziri. Perhaps you know the man?"

  "No, I do not know him." In fact I knew little of the Berbers of Palermo, other than that a good number had taken refuge here in recent years, having been driven from their lands by the Arabs.

  Malfetta seemed disappointed. "If you knew him you would know what a scoundrel he is. He has that thick-lipped, flat-nosed look that some of them have. Negro blood there, without a doubt. He insists that I have not returned the money, when I have friends, men above suspicion, men of rank, who are ready to come forward and swear that they saw this money being handed back, principal and interest."

  "And the paper, the contract, which you drew up together at the time of borrowing the money? Waziri must have returned this to you at the time you repaid the debt. He should also have given you a note, dated and signed, to acknowledge the repayment."

  "There is the rub, you see. I suppose I was distracted at the time. I must have had my mind on other things." He paused, shaking his head. "A man cannot be thinking about money every moment of his life, can he? Of course, Waziri, being a man without religion, does not understand this.

  We humans are midway on the ladder between angel and beast, so we are told. But it seems to me there are ladders for every kind and they each have their scales. Just as one beast may be superior to another, so it is with men. I would put Berbers on the lowest rung, along with Negroes.

  Let them fight, and let the loser fall down among the beasts."

  It was his second reference to Negroes. He was a vindictive man and I wondered if the greater success of the Negro acrobats, in outshining his Neapolitans, had turned him against the race as a whole. His dislike for Berbers was easier to comprehend…

  "So Waziri still has the contract, and you have nothing to show in proof of repayment?"

  "That is so, unfortunately, yes."

  "And now he is pressing you for the money?"

  "He has no shame. He is hoping to get the money twice over."

  "Well, I see the plight you are in, but I do not see how we can be of help to you. It is a matter for the courts."

  Malfetta leaned forward. "That is precisely why I have come to you. The Douana of Control has the ear of the judges, everyone knows that, especially in cases to do with contested wills, disputed debts, and so forth. Now judges are as various as other men. There are some with a very barren notion of justice, basing everything on scraps of paper, not admitting as relevant the excellent witnesses, Christian witnesses, that a man of my standing is able to bring forward. There are others with a broader view, who will accept the word of a man of honour against that of pagan Negroes. The trouble is, we do not know whose court we will end in. I thought you might steer my case in the right direction."

  I remained silent for some moments, not quite knowing how to reply. I had no intention of doing as he asked and squandering what influence we had on such a case. Five hundred ducats was a very considerable amount of money. This Waziri would be a man of substance, if he could lend money on that scale. The Berbers kept together, there
might be a family strong enough to cause trouble. Malfetta, on the other hand, could not do us harm, at least none that I could see. However, there was no sense in making an enemy of him, if it could be avoided.

  The pause had been long enough for Malfetta to work up a degree of virtuous indignation. "Think of it," he said. "It almost defies belief.

  A judge, professing to be a Christian of the Roman liturgy, will find in favour of a godless immigrant, ignoring the testimony of his own co-religionists! But it cannot endure long. This generation of vipers, these corrupt judges, will be swept away. People of the Latin rite are more and more numerous in Sicily, every day sees greater numbers."

  "But surely these are immigrants too."

  "Holy Mother of God, what are you saying? They are not immigrants, they are settlers. They are members of our community, people like us, people you can trust – in fact I never have dealings with anyone else."

  "Except when borrowing money."

  "Our religion forbids the breeding of money, we leave that to baser creeds."

  Malfetta was attempting smiles no more. His face bore a look of great sincerity. But sincerity is not to be trusted, I had learned that in my time at the Diwan of Control if I had learned nothing else: a man is never more sincere than when he earnestly wants to be believed. What would Yusuf do? He was still my model. He would engage Mafetta in discussion of a more general nature, reach some accord of opinion, part on amicable terms so that his good offices would be taken on trust without his needing to make assurances, then do nothing.

  "In the Sicily of today," I said, "a judge should be of all religions, or none. But I do not believe it is primarily a matter of religion.

  Judges are attentive to documents because documents have material existence and the law does not, so they save themselves from nullity by grasping one, like clutching at a straw in a sea of abstraction. It can be anything, a witness, a weapon, a wound. And proceeding from this…"

  What had begun as a means of distracting him ended by engaging my interest, there was paradox in it, this importance of the object in a system so codified. "Even proof itself is thought of as weight or mass,"

  I said. "We speak of the burden of proof, onus probandi, and this comes from the law of the Romans, which we have inherited. The weight of proving a controversial assertion falls on the shoulders of him who makes it. I would be interested to hear your opinion on this."

  "It is Waziri who is making the controversial assertion," he said.

  "No, excuse me, it is you. Waziri is simply demanding that you fulfil your agreement."

  "But I have fulfilled it."

  "Listen," I said, "a document is not a controversial assertion, and Waziri has the document."

  "Ah, so we come back to that."

  I think he saw that he was not getting far with me, for he now played what he clearly felt to be his winning card. "You owe me something, your douana."

  "How is that?"

  "Do you mean to say you have no memory of it? I hired a group of acrobats of phenomenal skill and brought them here at my own expense, thinking they might give entertainment to the court. I was greatly out of pocket in that business."

  "Excuse me, you were not out of pocket. Your expenses were repaid in reasonable measure. In the end, as I remember, you professed yourself satisfied."

  "Well, one doesn't want to haggle, a man of my standing. After all, one is not a putter-on-of-shows."

  I had not been greatly sympathetic to his cause before, but it was these last words that set me against him. So ill-natured was he that he would belittle even the one he asked for favours. I said, "Was it you or another that haggled till we were all out of patience?"

  "It is the pains I went to," he said. "I did not mind the losses to my purse."

  "You suffered no losses to your purse."

  "It was not the money that was important to me, it was the desire to be of service. That is all I ask in return, a gesture of good will. Of course, I would be ready to show my gratitude. Should we say one twentieth part of the debt?" He tried his smile again. "Depending, naturally, on the outcome of the hearing."

  I now began to be heartily sick of this conversation. Why was I endlessly taken up with venal persons and malodorous concerns? How had it come about? The image of Alicia came to my mind. I thought of that moment of recognition, the moment she had looked at me and pronounced my name. If she could see me now, involved in this squalid talk of debts and favours, would she still think me so splendid?

  "Malfetta," I said, "our diwan cannot be of practical help to you but I can offer you some advice. It would be most unwise of you to let this matter come before a court. The judge will find it difficult to understand why you did not obtain the documents of release from the creditor. He may well find it puzzling that you went accompanied by a number of friends when you repaid the debt. It is not common practice, is it?"

  "I asked them to accompany me for fear of being robbed on the way. I was carrying a large sum of money."

  "He may also think it strange that, if you were so accompanied, none of those with you thought to ask Waziri to render up the contract, they were all in the same state of distraction as yourself."

  Malfetta was looking at me narrowly. "I do not like your tone," he said.

  "You appear to be doubting my word."

  "No, what I am saying is that the judge is likely to doubt it. If he finds against you, you will have to pay the cost of the hearing as well as the debt, and any you call as witness will cut an extremely bad figure. You made a mistake in not making sure the contract was annulled.

  A man must pay for his mistakes."

  Malfetta got to his feet. He was looking at me now with scowling displeasure, an expression much better suited than smiling to the general cast of his countenance. "Who is this judge that finds everything strange?" he said. "Is he a Berber? He does not exist, he is an invention of your own, you hide behind him to avoid doing me a service."

  This was too much. I rose in my turn and stood looking across the table at him from my greater height. I said, "You think unwillingness to offend derives from fear? It is so with you because that is all the manners you have. But it is not so with me. Do you doubt it?"

  He was silent, he would not go so far; perhaps he was surprised by the fierceness of my looks and words. But I was ashamed now at having borne with him so long, it was shame that kept me angry. I wanted to provoke him to a quarrel. "I have listened with patience to this tale of yours,"

  I said, "but I will not tolerate your insults."

  But he would not take me up on it, even under this imputation of falsehood, though there was murder in his eyes as he looked at me. "You will pay dearly for this," he said, and with that he went from the room, leaving me, after that rush of anger had abated, far from satisfied with myself. Once again I had failed to bear myself with the restraint that is proper in a servant of the state. I had made an enemy of Malfetta, and a bad enemy he might well prove to be. In fact, all I had succeeded in doing was to make the world more dangerous for me.

  I felt the need to be alone for a while, in a place where no one would look for me. I went quickly down the stairs and out into the narrow, uncovered passageway that follows the line of the outer wall and leads to a gate on the south side of the palace not much used and guarded by one man only, who raised the grid for me. I followed the bank of the rivulet that flows alongside the street of the Benedettini. The current ran fast still, though May was all but over, and there were martins flying low over the water. I came soon within sight of the church of San Giovanni degli Eremiti and I entered by the western door. It was cool inside and the light was muted. There was a scattering of people in the nave, some sitting, some kneeling. I went into the presbytery and from there entered the little courtyard which also belongs to the mosque that adjoins the church, and which was a favourite place of mine. It is the only church in Palermo, and perhaps in all Sicily, which is joined in this way to a mosque. Our King had ordered it to be built alo
ngside the mosque and ordained it so that Christian and Moslem could pass freely and without hindrance each to his own place of worship, and in this he had showed the wisdom and spirit of tolerance that made me proud to serve him. It was for this reason that I loved this church best of all those in Palermo. On the other side of it, that farthest from the mosque, there was an abbey of the Benedictines.

  There was no one in the courtyard at this hour, and I sat in the shade of the portico for a little while till the peace of the place had worked on my spirits and Malfetta's baseness had receded to that region where such qualities had their dwelling, a region I always tried to feel was far distant, though knowing full well that it lay round any corner.

  With recovered calm I began again to think of Alicia, of our meeting and our talk together. Thoughts of her came always in the same way, from a misty surface, the mist rent asunder by little shocks of memory, and always with a sense in me of pleasurable helplessness, of being subjugated by the detail of it, her eyes, her smile, a gesture she had that I had known in the girl and found again in the woman, a way of touching her hair at the temple above the right ear, very lightly, as if she were herself, for that moment, distracted by some thought from the past. To these memories of her that were real, I added others that could not be so, the shape of her foot, the texture of the skin at the nape of her neck, invented memories, but they did not come accompanied by desire, they were elements of her wondrous existence, they seemed like the proof of it. The more fully I could create her in my mind, the more of substance I could give her, the more I could believe that we would meet again.