The Last Crusaders: Blood Red Sea (37 page)

Stanley tried not to tense, and spoke in his most perfect Venetian Italian. ‘Indeed, sire. Most regrettable.’

‘Was there much water damage?’

‘I believe some.’

Joseph Nassi smiled. ‘There was none. I know you four, you are Knights of St John.’

Forks and goblets stopped halfway to their mouths. Then Smith quickly laid down his fork and reached for the knife. Stanley slammed his hand down upon the back of Smith’s so that the goblets jumped. Dona Gracia gave a soft scream.

Joseph Nassi said with a sharp note of command, ‘Gentlemen,
please
.’ He turned in his chair and had quiet words with the steward. A moment later the doors were opened and the armed guards departed.

Smith relaxed slightly.

In came a musician.

‘Play outside, in the hall,’ ordered Nassi. ‘We do not wish to hear you, but we wish no one to hear us either.’

The musician, thin and pale as a weed starved of sunshine, bowed very low and sorrowfully, his lute held at arm’s length, and then retired. A few moments later, he and his three fellow musicians began a plangent madrigal outside the door.

Joseph Nassi smiled around. Smith laid his fork on his plate and his hands on the table. ‘Forgive my rashness,’ he blurted.

‘My husband will have his little jokes,’ said Dona Gracia, her voice soft and low. Smith looked at her, and under that thick black beard, Nicholas could have sworn he saw a blush.

It was a strangely intimate dinner, just Nassi and Dona Gracia, the four knights and Nicholas himself. This would be the only time in his life, he thought, when he would have dinner with a king! A Jewish king too, like Solomon and David. Life was a dream.

They were eating with the enemy, whom they would have fought to the death two days ago. Yet the food was delicious – lamb followed the fish – and Nicholas drank more of the fine wine and felt light headed and ludicrously merry, for all the bloodshed of the past weeks, the dead bodies, the stench of the hospitals. He knew what it was. It was sweet, strong Cyprus wine, and the animal joy of the survivor, stronger than any guilt.

A steward refilled his goblet again. He turned to Dona Gracia.

‘More wine for you?’ He hesitated and then risked, ‘Your Majesty?’

She laughed. ‘How ridiculous,’ she murmured. ‘But you know, the terrible thing is, I think I could grow to like it.’ She sipped her wine. ‘
Your Majesty
indeed. You are a charmer, young knight.’

‘I’m not a knight,’ he said.

‘No? Then what?’

‘A gentleman adventurer.’

‘Indeed?’ She arched her beautiful eyebrows and said no more.

‘No,’ Joseph Nassi was saying, leaning forward on the table, ‘there was no summer flood at Venice, and that was not an old Venetian proverb I gave you. In fact it was Aramaic, the language of Jesus. But we hear there
was
nearly a massacre of sorts at Nicosia. There were four Knights of St John, two Italians and two Englishmen if we hear correctly, who stood in the way of the late Governor Dandolo driving my people out of the town. To be mown down by the Turkish guns between the lines.’

They said nothing. He seemed to know everything. Nicholas even wondered, a little blurrily, whether Nassi had contact with Abdul of Tripoli. Who could say?

Nassi said, ‘The Knights of St John have not always been so kind to the Jews. Nor were the Templars of old.’

‘It is true,’ said Giustiniani. ‘All men are fallen.’

‘Among my people we use the phrase “The Righteous among the Nations” for those Gentiles who risk their lives to save a Jew.’

‘You do those four fellows too much honour,’ said Smith. ‘It was a street skirmish in Nicosia, a small, ugly thing. Little more than schoolyard bullying.’

‘Nevertheless,’ said Nassi, ‘my people are so accustomed to being bullied, it always comes as a pleasant surprise to have a Gentile stand alongside us.’ He held out his hands. ‘Come, let us not quarrel. The story of the Jews and the Christians is not always a happy one, but there are beacons of light. This deed of yours – this street skirmish, you call it – I call it a righteous deed in the sight of God. Tell me your names.’

Still they hesitated, though all there knew they could judge this extraordinary Jew already. He was both cunning and open hearted, a bewitching mix of lightning intelligence, manipulation, charm and sincerity. Joseph Nassi, who sat at the right hand of Selim the Sot himself.

‘Fra Pietro,’ said Giustiniani finally.

And then they all gave their first names, until Nicholas, who firmly announced, ‘Master Nicholas Ingoldsby of the Country of Shropshire in England, and rightful heir to the estate of my father, Sir John Ingoldsby, knight.’

Smith glared at him, Stanley sighed, Dona Gracia touched her napkin to her mouth to hide her smile, and her husband regarded him with amusement and curiosity.

‘Very well,’ he said. ‘One day you will have your reward, in this world or the next.’

Nicholas made himself slow down on the wine and eat more. It was a delightful dinner, now he felt sure they were not to be stabbed or poisoned.

Joseph Nassi was as entertaining a host as they had ever known. He risked drily disparaging remarks about Lala Mustafa himself – ‘sitting in lonely triumph in his tent,’ he said, ‘having his feet rubbed down.’

And he amused them with a lengthy tale about how he cornered the beeswax market. Dona Garcia leaned towards Nicholas and murmured, ‘Do say if my husband is boring you.’

‘On the contrary,’ he said, ‘I have always had an intense fascination with beeswax.’

Her eyes danced. This young Englishman!

‘We had two bad summers,’ Nassi was explaining, ‘and the bees did not fly. I asked about the orchards of Bursa, and the bees weren’t flying there either. Truly, a schoolboy could have worked it out. I could have bought up fruit as well, but it does not store so well. And so I, Joseph Nassi, sinister and mercenary Jew as I am, bought up as much beeswax on the open market as I could, at the going rate, cheating nobody. The following year there was inevitably a shortage, the price doubled, tripled, and I made a fair but handsome profit. At which many indignant voices were raised, saying, See the Jew, how he stuffs his pockets!’

He sighed. ‘In truth, money does not interest me. I am only interested in what it can buy. Safety for myself, my family, my kin. For the wandering Jews have no abiding city. Only our Bible: our portable Jerusalem. We have no armies, no war galleys, no land of our own. We must live by our wits, as God intended.’

‘Since we are being so open with each other,’ said Giustiniani, ‘tell us, sire. What will come next? Do we need to fear? How can there be peace?’

Nassi spoke carefully. ‘Of course I cannot make you privy to Ottoman state secrets. But there are those, will always be those, who wish for an Islamic Caliphate to stretch from eastern horizon to west. I do not think the Sultan Selim himself wishes this.
I
do not wish this.’ He smiled faintly. ‘What room would that leave for my own people?’

Giustiniani said, ‘We hear you have a bold plan to repopulate Palestine with Jews?’

‘How well informed you are, for humble travellers!’ said Dona Gracia.

‘It is true,’ said Nassi. ‘The Sultan has gifted me the Lordship of Tiberias, including the village of Saged, ancient centre for the study of the Kabbalah. A subject close to my heart. We have rebuilt Tiberias’ walls, irrigated, planted mulberry groves to develop a silk industry – though so far, I confess, few Jews have been prepared to
quit Christendom, with all its difficulties, for a new life in a hard land. But it may come yet.

‘Meanwhile, Christendom herself needs to bring about some final confrontation with the Ottoman Empire, on equal terms.’ He popped a grape into his mouth. ‘Some accommodation, some
balance
, must be found in the Mediterranean. A balance of power. Then we can all have peace.’

When they left, Joseph Nassi returned their weapons to them, and assured them they would not be harmed within the city.

Dona Gracia held her hand out to be kissed. It was sweetly scented, orange oil perhaps, and as he kissed, Nicholas glanced up and his eyes met hers, dark and dancing.

I am drunk, he thought, as he weaved after his comrades down the street. What a fool.

‘You know,’ Stanley was saying, ‘though he is an operator straight out of Machiavelli’s rule-book, and close adviser to Selim, and clearly the brains behind this entire Cyprus operation, which for the Turks, after all, has gone so smoothly – yet I cannot help but like this fellow.’

‘For a Jew,’ said Smith, ‘perhaps he is not all bad.’

‘His heart is not in Cyprus,’ said Giustiniani, ‘but Palestine. Even Jerusalem itself.’

‘Also sacred to the Mohammedans,’ said Mazzinghi.

‘And to
me
,’ said Smith.

That candlelit dinner was a strange and magical interlude between two horrors. The power of Joseph Nassi to charm, to make peace, could not embrace everyone. Lala Mustafa still had his grievances, and the mummified body of his son in a lead casket.

‘Hear me now,’ said Bragadino, his voice more grave than they had ever heard it. The tone of a man who has made a decision which is not merely important but fateful. ‘We believe that Joseph Nassi is a just man, and will rule Cyprus fairly. But let us not be deceived. Christendom has suffered a terrible loss. Without some desperate act, it will barely realise it. There will still be no Holy League. Next year the Turks will push further west, and further. They will attack small heroic Malta again, and Sicily. There will be no stopping them. And so I am going now as summoned, to the tent of Lala Mustafa, a cruel and vindictive man. And I shall insult him in such a way that he will kill me.’

They were stunned and silent.

‘By my sacrifice, Venice will be brought into the war.’

‘Sire,’ said Stanley, ‘if the loss of Cyprus could not rouse Venice, how will your death?’

‘I believe it will,’ said Bragadino. ‘Because of my sons. They will rouse Venice, for they are powerful characters. Though it sounds a little absurd,’ he looked down, ‘I had a dream last night. I saw my sons breathe out vengeance upon the heathen like the sons of an Old Testament king slain in battle. So I am going now to my death. On my walk there, I shall take pleasure in thinking up the
foulest insults I can heap upon a Turkish head. This will provide entertainment and distraction as I go.

‘But you must promise me this. You will get back to Venice with the story. I know not how. But you have done special service, Smith and Stanley. I know you have travelled in strange and Orient lands, you are more than ordinary soldiers. You have picked locks, opened dungeon doors, you speak many languages, wear many disguises, know how to handle weapons of which I have never even heard . . .’

Stanley tried to protest, ‘It is not that easy, My Lord,’ but Bragadino raised his hand.

‘I know this. You need not deny it. Not now, not to an old man going to his death.’

Stanley felt his eyes blur despite himself. In the fallen world there was still nobility, like fire in the dark.

‘So. Promise me only this, you will get to Italy. Tell my story. Rouse the Lion of Venice.’ Bragadino rose too, and stood like an old greying lion himself. ‘Rouse that mighty Lion! Let her shake out her golden mane and roar! And let the Turk know that at last he has brought ruin upon himself, with his vaunting ambition and his false creed. And his empire will come to dust, like all empires of this world.’ His voice softened again. ‘Let me not die in vain.’

Then Stanley seized the old man’s right hand in his own mighty hands and clasped him as he would his father, and said, ‘You shall not. By God, old comrade, you shall not.’

At Vespers on 5th August, Bragadino went to take the keys of the city to Lala Mustafa with all solemnity. He went with a small retinue of unarmed advisers.

Lala Mustafa’s was a large, plain white tent with horses tied outside. No ostentation. He made them wait, and then they were admitted before him. They saw a man of small stature, grey moustache, short grey hair brushed back hard off his lined forehead, and cold hard eyes.

‘You are welcome,’ he said, voice flat. He took the proffered keys. No drinks were brought.

Bragadino gave an insultingly faint bow. ‘It has pleased Almighty God to permit you this victory. This
temporary
victory.’

‘It is the will of Allah. If you had acknowledged this earlier, many lives could have been spared.’

‘Including your son’s. If you had not come conquering other people’s lands, your son would not have died.’

Stanley thought he saw those cold, hard eyes waver a little. But the mouth was compressed hard.

Bragadino pressed on. ‘Cyprus so far must have cost you twenty thousand men—’

‘A wild exaggeration.’

‘But you will lose many more. How many sons have you left?’

The cold eyes burned. Grief, hatred, and fury that this whipped dog of a governor should dare to humiliate him before his generals.

‘Have a care, my friend,’ he said.

‘I have many,’ snapped Bragadino. ‘Why are we here? Can we now depart, and leave you to your treasure?’

‘Where are the Muslim pilgrims?’

This was an unexpected turn.

‘The fifty pilgrims on the haj? We know you took them prisoner.’

He meant the fifty pilgrims captured at sea by the Chevalier Romegas. This was difficult. Bragadino couldn’t tell Lala they had converted to Christianity and were ready to sail west. His fury would know no bounds. He would demand they were handed over, and then kill them all as apostates from Islam, in accordance with the law of the Koran.

‘They were all killed in the bombardment,’ said Bragadino.

‘
All
? All fifty, clean killed? Not one even injured?’

‘All killed,’ he said, ‘by a single ball. A most unusual occurrence.’

The cold eyes glittered. ‘You mock me, Christian.’

‘Indeed not, sire. They were all killed, and then they were drowned at sea, then they were burned to death in a great fire, and then . . .’ He laid his hand on his heart. ‘We ate them.’