The Saracen: Land of the Infidel by Robert Shea (best fiction books to read .TXT) 📗

Anjou, there is only one course open to me. I will resign my command of the ambassadors' guards."[118]

Simon stared into de Verceuil's eyes, and the cardinal's eyelids fluttered. In the silence Simon heard a blackbird calling in nearby olive trees.

I never wanted to come here. I let Uncle Charles talk me into it. I do not mind the danger. And it would be exciting to outguess a hidden enemy who is trying to murder the Tartars. But I cannot endure the way this man humiliates me and my friends. I will go back to Gobignon now.

"You must not let a bit of fatherly correction wound you so deeply, Count," said the cardinal, his voice still deep and dirgelike but no longer full of scorn. "I would never suggest the Count of Anjou had made a mistake in choosing you for this post."

Fatherly! What a disgusting thought!

But Simon could see that his resigning worried de Verceuil. Uncle Charles wanted Simon to guard the ambassadors, just as he had wanted Sordello to head the archers. He had his reasons. And de Verceuil did not want to cross Charles d'Anjou.

Friar Mathieu laughed gently, and patted Simon on the shoulder. "If you please, be kind enough to change your mind about resigning. All of us are aware that you have carried out the task with intelligence and zeal. Is that not right, Your Eminence?"

"Of course," said de Verceuil, his mouth puckered and sour. "Count, I would have you present these Tartar dignitaries to me."

"I will be happy to interpret for you, Your Eminence," said Friar Mathieu. De Verceuil did not answer him.

As they crossed the vineyard, the cardinal stretched out his long arm and said, "I have brought musicians, jongleurs, senators of Orvieto, men-at-arms, two archbishops, six bishops, an abbot, and many monsignors and priests." A long line of men stretched down the road into the nearby woods. Most of them wore various shades of red; a few were in cloth-of-gold or blue. The points of long spears flashed in the sunlight. Banners with fringes of gold and silver swung at the tops of poles. Seeking protection from the mid-August heat, men walked horses in the shade of the woods.

Beyond the treetops rose a distant pedestal of grayish-yellow rock crowned by a city. An astonishing sight, Orvieto.

"The Holy Father will be meeting us at the cathedral and will say a special mass of thanksgiving for the safe arrival of the ambassadors," said de Verceuil. "I want the entry of the Tartars into Orvieto to impress both the Tartars themselves and the pope and his courtiers."[119]

"Monsters!"

"Cannibals!"

Rotten apples, pears and onions, chunks of moldy bread, flew through the air. Small stones that did not injure, but stung. And worse.

The shouts and missiles came from both sides of the street, but always when Simon was looking the other way, so he could not see his assailants. The people crowded in front of the shops were mostly young men, but women and children were scattered among them. They wore the dull grayish and brownish garments of workers and peasants. The street-level windows behind them were shuttered, and the doors were closed tight. That was a sure sign, Simon knew from his Paris student days, that the shopkeepers expected trouble.

From the Porta Maggiore, the main gate where they had entered, the street curved toward the south side of the town. Though the upper stories of many houses overshadowed the street, there was room enough for the procession to move along, four horses abreast, and for the unruly people to gather on either side. Approaching the south wall of the city, the street made a sharp bend to the left, and Simon had lost sight of the Tartar emissaries behind, who were—What a mistake!—being carried in an open sedan chair. Were they being pelted with garbage?

Why were the people of Orvieto doing this? True, everyone in Christendom had heard wild tales of the Tartars. That they were monsters with dogs' heads. That they bit off the breasts of women. That they stank so abominably they overcame whole armies just with their smell. That they were determined to kill or enslave everyone on earth. There were churches where people prayed every Sunday to be delivered "from the fury of the Tartars."

But it had been over twenty years since the Tartars had invaded Europe, and even then they had come no farther than Poland and Hungary. Why should these people of Orvieto turn so violently against them now, when they came in peace?

Undoubtedly someone was stirring them up.

Hang de Verceuil and his orders, Simon thought. I should be with the ambassadors. If someone wants to kill them, this would be a perfect chance.

He tugged on the reins of his palfrey, pulling her head around. "Make way!" he shouted, spurring his horse back the way he had come. Men-at-arms with spears and crossbows cursed at him in[120] various Italian dialects, but they opened a path, pushing back the people. Thierry rode a small horse in Simon's wake.

"Imps of Satan!" came a shout from the crowd. "The Tartars are devils!"

Simon scanned the faces below him. Some looked angry, some frightened, many bewildered. No one looked happy. The cardinal's hope for an impressive entry into Orvieto had been quite dashed, and Simon felt a sneaking pleasure at that.

Passing the corner where the procession had turned, he saw again a building he had passed earlier, a formidable three-story cube of yellow stone with slotted windows on the ground floor and iron bars over the wider upper windows.

And there is a man who looks happy.

He was standing in sunlight, leaning out from the square Guelfo battlements on the roof of the big building. His hair was the color of brass, his skin a smooth brown, such as Simon had seen on pilgrims newly returned from the crusader strongholds in Outremer. The blond man gazed down on the jostling, shouting crowd, smiling faintly.

As Simon rode past him, their eyes met. Simon was startled by the intensity of the other's gaze. It was as if a wordless message had crossed the space between them. A challenge. But then the blond man looked away.

The Tartar ambassadors, seated side by side in a large sedan chair, were farther up the street. Here, Simon noticed with relief, the crowd had fallen quiet. Perhaps curiosity about the Tartars, with their round brown faces and many-colored robes, had overcome whatever had roused these people against them. Then, too, the Tartars were surrounded by their Armenians marching on foot, curved swords drawn, as well as by Simon's knights on horseback, and Venetian crossbowmen. The archers' bows, Simon noticed, were loaded and drawn. Who had ordered that?

De Verceuil on a huge black horse—no palfrey this, but a powerful charger—rode up to Simon. "Why did you not remain in the forefront? What is going on up ahead?"

Without trying to defend himself, Simon described the disturbance.

"Could you not control the rabble?" de Verceuil growled, and turned to take a position beside the Tartars' sedan chair.

Simon's face burned, and his hands trembled as he stared after de Verceuil.[121]

When they passed the yellow stone building, Simon looked up and saw the blond man still there on the roof. The man was staring down at the Tartars with that same burning look he had thrown at Simon, but there were no weapons in the hands that gripped the battlements.

Simon heard a slapping sound and an angry cry. He turned to see de Verceuil, his right cheek smeared brown.

God's death! Someone threw shit at him! And hit him right in the face.

The cardinal, his face distorted as if he were about to vomit, was staring at the stained hand with which he had just wiped his cheek.

There was laughter from the crowd, mixed with angry cries of "Bestioni! Creatures from hell!"

For an instant Simon felt laughter bubbling up to his lips, but cold horror swept all amusement away as he sensed what was about to happen.

De Verceuil turned to the nearest crossbowmen, who had not suppressed their own smiles.

"Shoot!" he shouted. "Shoot whoever did that!"

The smiles remained fixed on the faces of the Venetians as three of them aimed their already-loaded crossbows at the crowd. They did not hesitate. This was not their city; these were not their people. They were fighting men who did as they were ordered.

People screamed and shrank back against the shuttered doors and windows.

Three loud snaps of the bowstrings came at the same moment as Simon's cry of "No!"

He shouted without thinking, and was surprised to hear his own voice. His cry echoed in a sudden and terrible quiet.

Screams of agony immediately followed. People darted away from the place where the crossbowmen had aimed, leaving that part of the street empty.

Empty save for three people. Two of them screamed. One was silent—a young man who half sat, half lay against the stone wall of a house. Blood was pouring out of his mouth and more blood was running from a hole in his chest. Simon saw that the blood was coming in a steady stream, not in rhythmic spurts, which meant the fellow's heart had stopped. A glance at the white face told Simon the dead youth could be no more than sixteen.

Beside the boy, a woman knelt and wept. She was plump and[122] middle-aged, perhaps his mother. Her white linen tunic was bloodied.

"He did nothing!" she cried. "Oh, Jesus! Mary! He did nothing!" There was a plea in her voice, as if she might bring the boy back to life if only she could persuade people of his innocence.

The other cries came from a man who stood about a yard from the dead boy. The bolt had gone through his left shoulder just above the armpit and pinned him to the oaken post of a doorway. He wanted to fall, but he had to stand or suffer unbearable pain.

"Help me!" he begged, casting pain-blinded eyes right and left. "Help me!"

Simon jumped down from his horse, throwing the reins to Thierry, and ran to the man. He put his left hand on the chest and pulled at the flaring end of the quarrel with his right. He could not move it. The bolt was buried too deeply in the wood. The man's forehead fell against Simon's shoulder, and he was silent. Simon hoped he had fainted.

Now Simon saw where the third bolt had gone. Six inches of it, half its length, was buried in a wall a few feet to Simon's right. The wall was made of the same grayish-yellow stone Orvieto was built on.

The crossbow bolt in the man's shoulder was thick and made of hard wood. Simon had nothing that would cut the man loose without hurting him even more. He looked up and down the street. It was quite empty now, except for a few people watching from a distance. The procession had gone on. He glanced up and saw that the blond man had left his place on the roof.

Friar Mathieu knelt beside the dead young man, one hand moving in blessing, the other resting on the shoulder of the weeping woman.

De Pirenne and Thierry, both mounted, the equerry holding Simon's horse, looked at him uncertainly.

"Go, Alain!" said Simon impatiently. "Stay with the Tartars."

He himself was neglecting his duty, he thought, as de Pirenne galloped off. But now that he was trying to help this poor devil, he could not abandon him.

"Can I do anything, Monseigneur?" Thierry asked.

As Simon was about to answer, he saw a middle-aged man wearing a carpenter's apron.

"Messere, can you bring a saw?" he called. "Hurry!"[123]

It seemed hours before the man returned with a small saw with a pointed end and widely spaced teeth. He held it out to Simon.

Simon wanted to shout at the carpenter, but he took a grip on himself and said patiently, "You are bound to be better at sawing than I. Per favore, cut away the end of the crossbow bolt so we can free this man."

Gingerly at first, then working with a will, the carpenter sawed off the flaring end of the bolt with its thin wooden vanes. The pinned man awoke and was sobbing and groaning.

Once the protruding part of the bolt was sawed away, Simon took a deep breath, wrapped his arms around the sobbing man, and pulled him away from the wall. The man screamed so loudly that Simon's ears rang; then the man sagged to the ground. Blood flowed from the wound in his shoulder, soaking his tunic. Blood coated the stump of the bolt, still stuck in the door post. Simon dropped to his knees beside the wounded man. A pool of bright red widened rapidly on the flat paving stones.

Now what do I do with him? I must get back to my duty.

He spoke with the carpenter. "Press your hand on the