Balthasar's Odyssey (11 page)

I was thinking not only of my friend's father and the Impatient Ones in Aleppo, but also of Marta.

Then Maïmoun wondered whether people in Noah's day were just as divided between those who applauded the Flood and those who were against it.

At that we started to laugh, and laughed so heartily that our mules took fright.

29 September

From time to time I cull a few verses at random from the book by Abu-l-Ala that an old bookseller in Maarra put in my hands three or four weeks ago. Today I came upon these lines:

I made haste to read this passage to Maïmoun, and we exchanged silent and meaning smiles.

A Christian and a Jew led along the path of doubt by a blind Muslim? But there is more light in his dimmed eyes than in all the sky over Anatolia.

Near Konya, 30 September

The rumours about the plague have not, alas, been denied. Our caravan has had to skirt round the town and set up its tents to the west, in the gardens of Merâm. The camp is crowded, because a lot of families from Konya have fled here from the epidemic, to be in the healthy air amid the streams and fountains.

We arrived towards noon, and despite the circumstances there's an air — I was going to say a sort of holiday air about the place, but it's more like that of an improvised picnic. Everywhere vendors of apricot juice and cordials clink their glasses invitingly, washing them later on at the fountains. On all sides there are booths whose appetising fumes draw young and old alike. But I can't help gazing at the town nearby: I can see its walls, with their towers, and guess at its domes and minarets. There different fumes rise up, hiding and darkening everything. That smell doesn't reach us, thank God; we sense it, and it makes our blood run cold. The plague; the fumes of death. I put down my pen and cross myself. And then go on with my story.

Maïmoun, who joined our party for the midday meal, spoke at some length to my nephews, and for a little while to Marta. The atmosphere was such that we couldn't avoid talking about the end of the world, and I noticed that Boumeh knew all about the predictions in the Zohar concerning the Jewish year 5408, our 1648.

“‘In the year 408 of the sixth millennium',” he said, quoting from memory, “‘they who rest in the dust shall rise up. They are called the sons of Heth.'”

“Who are they?” asked Habib, who always likes to oppose his brother's erudition with his own ignorance.

“It's the usual name for the Hittites, in the Bible. But what matters here is not the actual meaning of the word Heth so much as its numerical value in Hebrew — which is 408.”

Numerical value! I get angry whenever I hear the notion mentioned! Instead of trying to understand the significance of words, my contemporaries prefer to calculate the value of the letters that make them up. And these they manipulate to suit their own ends — adding, subtracting, dividing and multiplying, and always ending up with a figure that will astonish, reassure or terrify them. And so human thought is diluted, and human reason weakened and dissolved in superstition!

I don't think Maïmoun believes in such nonsense, but most of his co-religionists do, and so do most of mine, and most of the Muslims I've had occasion to talk to. Even wise, educated and apparently reasonable people boast of their acquaintance with this science for simpletons.

I express myself all the more vehemently here because during today's discussion I didn't say anything. I just looked incredulous whenever anyone mentioned “numerical value”. But I took care not to interrupt the debate. That's how I am. That's how I've always been, ever since I was a child. When a discussion is taking place around me, I'm curious to see where it will end, who will admit he's wrong, how all the people involved answer or avoid answering the others' arguments. I observe and enjoy what I learn, and I register everyone else's reactions without feeling impelled to express my own opinion.

During the talk at noon today, while I was provoked into silent protests by some remarks, other things that were said interested or surprised me. As when Boumeh pointed out that it was precisely in 1648 that
The Book of the One True Orthodox Faith
was published in Moscow, referring without any ambiguity to the Year of the Beast. Was it not because of that book that Evdokim the pilgrim took to the road and passed through Gibelet?; and his visit was followed by a whole procession of scared customers through my shop. So it might be said that it was in that year that the Beast entered my life. Maïmoun's father used to tell him that something significant had happened in 1648 but no one had recognised its importance. Yes, I don't mind admitting that something may have started in that year. For the Jews and for the Muscovites. And also for me and mine.

“But why was an event announced in 1648 that's supposed to take place in 1666? That's a mystery I can't understand!” I said.

“Nor can I,” agreed Maïmoun.

“I don't see any mystery,” said Boumeh, with irritating calm.

Everyone waited with bated breath for him to go on. He took his time, then went on loftily:

“There are eighteen years between 1648 and 1666.”

He stopped.

“So?” asked Habib, through a mouthful of crystallised apricots.

“Don't you see? Eighteen — six plus six plus six. The last three steps to the Apocalypse.”

There followed a most ominous silence. I suddenly felt that the pestilential vapour was approaching and closing in on us. Maïmoun was the most pensive of those present: it was as if Boumeh had just solved an old enigma for him. Hatem bustled round us, wondering what was the matter: he'd caught only scraps of our conversation.

It was I who broke the silence.

“Wait a moment, Boumeh!” I said. “That's nonsense. I don't have to tell you that in the days of Christ and the Evangelists people didn't write six six six as you would today in Arabic: they wrote it in Roman figures. And your three sixes don't make sense.”

“So can you tell me how they wrote 666 in the days of the Romans?”

“You know very well. Like this.”

I picked up a stick and wrote “DCLXVI” on the ground.

Maïmoun and Habib bent over and looked at what I'd written. Boumeh just stood where he was, not even glancing our way. He just asked me if I'd never noticed anything particular about the number I'd traced. No, I hadn't.

“Haven't you noticed that all the Roman figures are there, in descending order of magnitude, and each occurs only once?”

“Not all of them,” I said quickly. “One's missing ...”

“Go on, go on — you're getting there. There's one missing at the beginning. The M — write it! Then we'll have ‘MDCLXVI'. One thousand six hundred and sixty-six. Now the numbers are complete. And the years are complete. Nothing more will be added.”

Then he reached out and erased the figure completely, muttering some magic formula he'd learned.

A curse on numbers and on those who make use of them!

3 October

Since we left the outskirts of Konya behind, the travellers have been talking not of plague but of a curious fable, spread by the caravaneer himself, which so far I have not thought worth reporting. If I do so at present it's because it has just had an exemplary ending.

According to our man, a caravan got lost a few years ago on the way to Constantinople, and ever since then it has been wandering miserably around Anatolia, the victim of a curse. From time to time it passes another caravan, and its disoriented travellers ask to be told the way, or else put other, very strange questions. Anyone who answers by so much as a single word calls down the same curse on himself, and must wander with the others for ever.

Why was the caravan the object of a curse? It's said the travellers of which it was composed had told their families they were going on a pilgrimage to Mecca, whereas in fact they planned to go to Constantinople. So Heaven is supposed to have condemned them to wander endlessly without ever reaching their destination.

Our man declared he had met the phantom caravan twice, but had not let it take him in. No matter how much the lost travellers crowded round him, smiling, plucking at his sleeve and trying to cajole him, he pretended not to see them. And so he managed to elude the spell and continue his journey.

How can the ghost caravan be recognised? asked some of our more nervous companions. It can't be recognised, said our caravaneer: it's just like an ordinary caravan, its travellers are just like any other travellers, and that's precisely why so many people are misled and get bewitched.

Some of our people shrugged when they heard this story, while others seemed scared and kept scanning the horizon to check that no suspect caravan was in the offing.

I, of course, was one of those who lent no credence to these tales. Witness the fact that although they have been spreading back and forth the whole length of the caravan for three days, I didn't think it worthwhile to mention such a vulgar fiction in these pages.

But today at noon we did pass another caravan.

We had just stopped by a stream for the midday meal. Servants and other attendants were busy gathering twigs and lighting fires when a caravan appeared over a nearby hill. In a few minutes it was almost upon us, and a whisper ran through our ranks: “It's them — it's the phantom caravan.” We were all transfixed. A strange shadow seemed to darken our faces, and we spoke very softly, staring at the new arrivals.

They seemed to draw near unnaturally fast, in a cloud of dust and haze.

When they were close by, they all dismounted and hurried towards us, apparently delighted at finding some fellow human beings and a cool spot. They advanced bowing and smiling broadly, and uttering greetings in Arabic, Turkish, Persian and Armenian. Our people were ill at ease, but no one moved or stood up or answered. “Why don't you speak?” the others finally demanded. “Have we offended you somehow?” Still none of us made a move.

The others were already turning away, vexed, when suddenly our caravaneer let out a shout of laughter, which was immediately topped by an even louder guffaw from the other caravaneer.

“Curse you!” said the latter, coming forward with open arms. “You've been telling your tale about the ghost caravan again! And they swallowed it!”

Then everyone got up and started to embrace the others and invite them to share their meal, by way of excuse for the misunderstanding.

That incident is the only topic of conversation this evening. All of our travellers pretend they never believed the story. But the fact is, when the other travellers approached us, everyone went pale and no one dared speak to them.

4 October

Today I was treated to another fable, but this one doesn't make me smile.

At breakfast time a man came to see me, shouting and waving his arms. He claimed my nephew had been making up to his daughter, and he threatened to settle the matter in blood. Hatem and Maïmoun tried to calm him down, and the caravaneer added his efforts to theirs, though he must really have been delighted to see me embarrassed in this way.

I looked round for Habib, but he'd disappeared. I saw this as an admission of guilt, and cursed him for having put me in such a situation.

Meanwhile the man kept shouting louder and louder, saying he'd cut the culprit's throat and sprinkle his blood on the ground in front of the whole caravan to show everyone how tarnished honour is made clean.

A growing crowd gathered around us. This was different from the quarrel the other day with the caravaneer. Now I could not hold my head high, nor did I wish to emerge victorious. All I wanted was to nip the scandal in the bud, so as to be able to complete the journey without endangering the life of any of my party.

So I lowered myself so far as to go over to the fellow, tap him on the arm, smile, and promise him he'd be given satisfaction, and his honour would emerge from this business as unsullied as a gold sultanin. I should say in passing that a sultanin is not a paragon of purity: the emptier the Ottoman treasury becomes, the more the coin is debased. Even so, I made the comparison deliberately. I wanted the fellow to hear the word “gold” and realise I was ready to pay the price for his honour. He went on bellowing for a little longer, though not so loudly, as if emitting only the echoes of his last rantings.

Then I took his arm and drew him aside from the rest. Once we were out of earshot, I proffered more apologies and and told him in so many words that I was prepared to pay compensation.

While I was entering into this sordid bargaining, Hatem came and tugged at my sleeve, begging me not to let myself be duped. Seeing this, the other fellow resumed his lamentations, and I had to tell my clerk to let me settle the business in my own way.

So I paid up. One sultanin, together with a solemn promise to chastise my nephew severely and prevent him from ever hanging around the young woman again.

It wasn't until the evening that Habib presented himself, accompanied by Hatem and another traveller I'd seen them about with before. All three assured me I'd been swindled. According to them, the man to whom I'd given the gold piece was not a grieving father, and the girl that was with him was not his daughter at all, but a trollop well-known as such to the whole caravan.

Habib claimed he'd never visited her, but that's a lie — I even wonder if Hatem didn't go with him. But I think they were telling the truth about the rest. I gave each of them a good box on the ears, just the same.

So there's a travelling brothel in this caravan, frequented by my own nephew — and I didn't even notice!

I've been in business all these years, and I still can't tell a pimp from an outraged father!

What is the use of my scrutinising the universe if I'm incapable of seeing what's under my very nose?