by Harold Lamb
When the archaeologist produced his photograph of the solitary peak, Mar Shimun clapped his hands and dropped his pipe and exclaimed.
"He says there is a lake on a mountaintop, and therefore this must be the birthplace of Saint George!"
Reverently the priests passed the photograph around the table again, looking with interest at the miracle of a picture of the birthplace of their patron, made as if from the sky. Father Hyacinth studied it curiously. Although Jacob watched them without seeming to do so, he could detect nothing but sincere wonder in their sunburned faces.
Jacob made a point of going to the small church with Father Hyacinth. It proved to be, like most early shrines, a crypt in the rock of the cliff, at the rear of the building. The priest parted heavy, soiled curtains, to disclose the altar lit by seven candles.
The rock walls, smoothed and polished, supported by two massive stone pillars, showed a lighter square—a space from which a metal plaque might have been pried. But there was no other sign of the plaque seen there by Sir Clement.
The altar revealed only worn embroideries and tarnished silver vessels. Moving past it slowly, Jacob searched the surface of the rock behind it with his eyes. No crack or opening showed. He had wondered if there might be some inner chamber or tunnel at the entrance of which the plaque had been set.
What caught his interest was the painted decoration of the altar wall. Obscured by smoke and worn by age, dim figures were visible, incised and painted upon the stone. Jacob made out a flock of sheep in the foreground and the forms of a young man and woman in light draperies. The man might have been an apostle or the shepherd of the flock. Jacob could not imagine what the woman might be.
"Saint George?" he asked.
"Mar Giorgios." Father Hyacinth held back the entrance curtain impatiently.
But all the priest's evident unwillingness to display the possessions of Darbatash could not keep Jacob from visiting the library the next day. He was curious to see if there would be a trace of this Eastern saint among the books, as there had been behind the altar. And he was not disappointed.
The library of the monastery proved to be a very large closet serving to keep paper dry, rather than a reading room. The only furnishing was a carpet, the only light a candle, and the only ventilation the open door. One of the younger priests was copying an Armenian text laboriously, using a small brush on a sheet of scraped lambskin. Jacob, taking his time, noticed that the manuscripts were all in Asiatic scripts, which he could not read. It grieved him that Daoud had not been willing to help him here.
After a search, Jacob drew out a massive Acta Sanctorum and a Golden Legend by Voragine. To these he applied himself, using the light of the Armenian's candle. For long hours he read through the dry narratives of saints and martyrs, following out a train of thought so elusive it was little more than a whim. He stopped only when the candle's flame flickered down in a pool of grease and the smoky air became unbreathable.
Now, cross-legged on his carpet, he gazed out the oval entrance of the cell at a silver-gray bustard floating above the sea of mist and communed with himself on the subject of Saint George. From the carpet the square blank face of that legendary warrior looked up at him, unperturbed. Stripping off the husk of a pomegranate, Jacob dug into the juicy seeds with his fingers.
Saint George. Saint George for England. . .the patron of that land as Patrick had been of Ireland. Saint George and the dragon. . .the favorite warrior-saint of elder Russia. The order of his cult was still given commanders of soldiers, although it might be called a medal now. But the original George was different—he had lived and fought a battle of his own. And he had actually lived not so far from here, more than fifteen centuries ago, in the reign of the Emperor Diocletian.
George had been the carefree son of one of the best families near here, an officer of the Roman legions, in love with a girl no older than himself. Then he had changed his mind—the Acta Sanctorum said he had seen a vision—and he had got out of uniform to wander around, apparently seeking peace. The two lovers had done that. Except for the girl, it had been very much like the act of that other Roman, Paul of Tarsus.
At the end of long wars on this mountain frontier Giorgios seemed to have been content after he left his family and the army. Then a proclamation of the Emperor Diocletian had been posted in the province, ordering the destruction of the churches of the Christian refugees in the east. One of these proclamations had been displayed in the village where Giorgios was staying. When he had read it, he pulled it down and tore it up, and so became guilty of the crime of laesa majestas. He was put to death and the woman died with him, and their bodies were burned together. Before that, said the Acta, Giorgios had spoken to the people, who had named him as a martyr.
Jacob wondered if he had really made any oration. Somehow
Giorgios seemed to have been a soldier who did things rather than talk about them. Even after his death, people fancied that he had power; they called him bearer of the standard. Nothing was said about a dragon.
A standard, a shrine, a prophecy, Sir Clement had said might be found in Araman. Was this church of Mar Giorgios above the clouds actually the place they had been seeking for? Did these monks of Mar Giorgios cast bronze in the shapes of ancient implements they found in the hills, as they made sandals and wine after old methods?
Jacob did not think so. Mullah Ismail would not be influenced by a command from Mar Shimun.
Feeling the need of talking to Daoud, Jacob took his cane and edged his way along the narrow stone shelf between the caves. He found the archaeologist stretched out on his sheepskin coat, staring at a spider on the wall.
"Miracles!" Daoud only half listened to his friend. "These churches and mosques, they all have a story about some miracle worker. If they have no story, they invent one." Restlessly he sat up, pouring some water from a jar down his throat in the manner of a tribesman. "One thing only you say makes sense. We have come to the end of this road."
"And the German, Vasstan, seems to have been here. That photograph may mean nothing at all. But we know he has been here." Jacob added, "I think Father Hyacinth recognized the photo, and he seems to have the run of this region."
"I think they all recognized the mountain, these monks of Mar Giorgios! But what did they tell us? That it was the birthplace of Mar Giorgios!"
"They didn't invent the legend."
For a while Daoud maintained a moody silence. "No," he said savagely. "Of course they didn't. Where did the legend come from? Oh, there was some man named Giorgios who did something. The legend itself is much earlier than these professional worshipers. Look at this shrine"—he waved his hand at the rear of the cell—"where the first dwellers prayed. What is on it but fire? Lighting a fire on a height is an act of reverence to the sun. Life comes from the sun. This church is a cavern toward the east. Perhaps it was a shrine of the earliest Aryans, a wayside shrine, when a road went past here. The east is where the sun rises. What is the other, older name of this church—the Gateway to the Fire?"
Jacob nodded thoughtfully. If a road had gone by here in some forgotten time, when this place had been known as the gate, there must be a track leading on from it. And if so, the monks would be aware of it. Granting that there was a sanctuary beyond—whether called Araman, as the driver Badr had believed, or the birthplace of Saint George, these same monks might be reluctant to admit strangers to it.
This reasoning Daoud accepted instantly. "Quite. The thing to do, Jacob, is to find an observation point, as you soldiers call it."
About that the Kurd had an idea. "From the top of this cliff we might see what lies to the eastward."
Neither of them had observed any trace of a path up the three-hundred-foot wall of rock, scarred by clefts. Nor did the monks make the ascent. "While you were tracking down Saint George in the books, Jacob, I have been watching the goats. They climb it, and they all take the same way up. Tomorrow morning I shall try to follow them."
Soon after sunrise, when the
workers of the monastery went out to the fields, the restless Kurd was ready for the climb, which Jacob could not attempt. With a small sack of food slung over his shoulder he started up the slope of rubble, saying that he would be back before dark to report. Then he swung up to the face of the rock, climbing easily along a path invisible from below.
Apparently, however, this track was clearly defined, because Daoud never paused as he traversed the cliff, disappearing at times behind outcroppings, to emerge higher up. Nor did he linger at the summit. Waving to Jacob, he pointed behind him and vanished.
Many of the monks gathering fruit in the orchard near Jacob had watched the ascent. As Jacob threaded his way back to the gardens, the cassocked figure of Father Hyacinth intercepted him, carrying a woven basket of pomegranates. With a shy greeting he offered one to his guest, and after a minute broke his habitual silence. "The mountains know their friends, Monsieur Ide."
To this Jacob assented silently. Something seemed to be troubling the sunburned priest and impelling him to guarded speech. "Those who dwell apart in the mountains are of the camaraderie, and the doors of the heights are open to them. Yes, the paths and the steps are known to them."
It was an odd phrase—those of the comradeship, or fellowship. It touched a word in Jacob's memory.
"There is more than one path?" he asked casually.
The priest glanced at him. "The mountain sheep who dwell here do not take the same way as the horse who intrudes," he murmured. Then he pointed to the wall of rock behind them. "That is not a good way to take."
He excused himself saying that he had herbs to gather.
For a while Jacob watched children collecting leaves in the mulberry grove beyond the gardens. By fellowship, Father Hyacinth might have meant no more than the dwellers in the monastery; but Sir Clement had seen a similar word inscribed on the plaque now missing from the church—from the way of the wanderers, those who are not of the fellowship, should turn aside.
As nearly as Jacob could make out, the silent priest had warned him, and especially Daoud, not to go on from the monastery. By the same token there must be some way through the cliff known to these dwellers of the heights. Jacob's curiosity was roused by Father Hyacinth's actions after leaving him.
With a small bag slung over his shoulder, the priest made his way out along the foot of the cliff, past the last fields and grazing sheep. If he was picking herbs, he did not linger about it. His tiny black figure moved purposefully northward through the rubble of rock and was lost to sight behind a turn in the cliff. Although Jacob kept that point under observation until darkness closed in, he did not see Father Hyacinth return.
Nor did Daoud put in an appearance that night.
When sunset flooded the cliff the next evening without a sign of the two missing men, Jacob abandoned his watch with a growing sense of unease. It oppressed him as he drank in silence the wine the monks poured for him at supper. They were kind, these men of the mountain, but they knew no English, and Jacob could not share his misgivings with them. He told himself that Daoud, a skilled climber, must have followed some lead far to the east. At the same time, the Kurd might be lying with a broken leg twenty miles away.
Too restless to sleep, Jacob went out for a final look around, and stopped abruptly in the act of lighting his pipe. It was full starlight. Gusts of wind swept the monastery height, driving shredded mist past him. Through the mist the arc of a new moon gleamed above the sea of cloud. And over the rush of the wind he heard the chiming of a bell. Yet there was neither bell tower nor bell in the monastery of Mar Giorgios.
Then, as he listened, he heard a faint wailing cry, high-pitched as the hail of a mountain watchman. Although he waited until he had smoked out his pipe, the hail was not repeated. Nothing moved around him.
Restlessly Jacob turned back to the one light that glowed. It was in the deserted library—a candlewick smoking pungently in grease, left there apparently for him. It was as if he had been led back to the familiar books again. In that moment a sense of failure struck into him. He had accomplished nothing, except to read up on a curious legend. The secret of the mountains and Sir Clement's quest lay farther away than at Riyat.
He coughed in the smoke. The bad air made his head swim, but he did not want to leave the light and the familiar books. One he picked up at random, and tried to read. Remembering Sir Clement's written message, he thought of opening the envelope. Then he told himself that he could not do that until he had come to some conclusion of his own, and he had learned nothing.
"The total sum of nothing," he muttered, watching the candle flame sink into its grease, stifling his breathing. "I'll wait out tonight and start after Daoud tomorrow with the two horses. If I can't get over the cliff I'll try to go around, in the direction Father Hyacinth took."
The door flung open, and Michal ran in. He heard her voice, "Jacob!" Within reach of him she stopped, as if a barrier had touched her.
Yes, there she was with her small handbag, and a fur coat over her slim shoulders, her eyes holding his. "The cannon were real this time, Jacob! It wasn't your waterfall. I couldn't stand it when the artillery came within range at Riyat."
Jacob laughed, feeling the breath of cold air, of ghostly cold air. Michal was promenading with Mr. Parabat in the garden she had refused to leave. She was not here where the dying candle glowed red.
"Jacob, it's really deteriorating. The fighting—and we are cut off unless Sir Clement can persuade the Mullah to let us through. He has written, but he is not hopeful. Badr brought me up, and we saw a light flash——" With a quick breath she stopped. "Jacob, why don't you answer me?"
She was watching him, her eyes wide, her sensitive mouth quivering. "You have had wine for dinner, Jacob." She smiled at him. "Grinning like a Cheshire cat in all this smoke."
That was very funny, Jacob thought. When she put her arm quickly through his and drew him toward the door, he led her out to the garden, where the new moon shone over the sea of mist. By the faint moon gleam Michal was still visible beside him. So he told her how the moon was a lantern, lighting up this cloudy sea.
"Yes, Jacob," she assented.
Through the dim garden he led her to the steps cut into the rock of the cliff where it rose sharply. There was no one in the garden, of course, but the two of them. This woman who had been hostile only to him in the guesthouse at Riyat, who belonged to Riyat and luxury, was holding to his arm, stumbling in her high-heeled slippers.
"Are you quite sure you know where you are going?" she asked, as if worried.
"To my cell, Michal."
Now that the fumes of smoke were out of his head, Jacob could see clearly. The sky had resumed its normal dimensions but he still felt a sense of wonder that this woman would be climbing the steps to his cell, only asking if he knew where he was going.
In the narrow cave a wood fire glimmered within the niche, outlining the silver basin and the wine jar. Michal stepped in uncertainly, bumping her head against the sloping wall, murmuring, "What is all this?"
"The fire," said Jacob clearly, "burns on the altar of the sun god."
Michal looked at it and smiled. "Well, it's nice to have, anyway, Jacob."
Loosening her coat, she glanced curiously around the cell, at his saddlebags and blankets. When he poured out a cupful of wine and offered it to her, she drank it gratefully. "And that's good, too, Jacob."
He had expected her to be amused by the primitive cell, to ask where she could be put up that night, to call for Badr and her luggage. Instead, she warmed her hands at the fire, then went to the entrance. She sat in quiet on the embroidered quilt, gazing out of the cell entrance.
The flames of the fire died down and he could barely make out her face. "It's strange to be above the clouds," she said. Close to him she stayed, not stirring, and he knew that she was afraid. The night of the storm she had been afraid. When he touched her, and brushed the light hair back from her face, he could feel the pulse in her throat. He could not tell what she was t
hinking, because she did not speak. She only held tight to his hand, looking past him at the open sky.
Then, as if tired, she lay down, her head resting on her arm, her face turned to him but hidden even from the star gleam. When his hand pressed against the softness of her throat, he heard her quick breath and felt her stir. She pushed aside the fold of the heavy fur coat. His arm held her down, shaking with the force of the hunger in him, until he felt her mouth warm against his, opening under his touch, her head lying against his arm, the warmth in her like a fever in him that grew with every motion until it drained the weariness and weakness from him. Michal's body beneath him pressed to him, her arms holding him.
Jacob waked. He lay still. His body, relaxed and sensitive in every nerve, felt Michal's smooth flesh against his. He had heard her breathing for long. She was sleeping, the tangle of her hair under his cheek, her hand holding tight to his arm around her. In her quiet breathing there was no sign of fear.
Gray light outlined the cave's entrance when Michal woke, with a sense of being called. Aware, then, of the man beside her, she lay still, letting herself relax in the stillness around her, marveling at the feeling that she was not alone. Since she could see almost nothing, she listened.
Somewhere outside the cave and far above her wind was rising with the dawn. With it she heard another note, melodious and reverberating. That would be a bell, far off. And what bell would peal at sunrise except a church bell? That was nice, Michal thought.
Quietly—and she could be very quiet when she wished—she edged away from Jacob and dressed herself without disturbing him. Pouring herself a cup of wine, she drank it, not because she wanted it but because there was nothing else to drink. Then for a space she was busied with her comb and compact mirror, yet glancing more often at the sleeping man who was not now withdrawn from her in pride and hostility. Relaxed, he slept like a boy. He had shared nothing with her before and certainly he had shown no gentleness to her, yet they had been drawn together by something more than desire—something that was unknowable. Michal did not question it. She only wanted this day to be a day of happiness.