Baudolino (34 page)

"But the universe is made like the tabernacle, and so if I explain to you what the tabernacle was like, I am explaining what the universe is like. Why can't you understand something so simple? Look..." And he made a drawing.

It showed the form of the universe, exactly like a temple, with its curving vault, whose upper part remained concealed from our eyes by the veil of the firmament. "Below the ecumen extends, that is, all the inhabited earth, which, however, is not flat, but rests on the Ocean, which surrounds it, and rises through an imperceptible and continuous slope towards the extreme north and towards the west, where a mountain stands, so high that its presence escapes our eye and its peak is lost in the clouds. The sun and the moon, moved by the angels—to whom we owe also rain, earthquake, and all other atmospheric phenomena—pass in the morning from east towards the south, in front of the mountain, and illuminate the world, and in the evening they reascend towards the west and disappear behind the mountain, giving us the impression of sunset. And so, while for us night is falling, on the other side of the mountain it is day, but that day is seen by no one, because the mountain on the other side is desert, and no one has ever been there."

"And with this drawing we're supposed to find the land of Prester John?" Baudolino asked. "See here, Zosimos, our agreement was your life for a good map, but if the map is no good, then the conditions change."

"Calm down. Considering that, to depict the tabernacle as it is, our art is incapable of showing everything that remains covered by its walls and by the mountain, Cosmas drew another map, which shows the earth as if we were looking down on it from above, flying in the firmament, as the angels see it. This map, which is kept in the Bucaleon, shows the position of the lands that we know, included within
the frame of the Ocean, and beyond the Ocean, the lands inhabited by man before the Flood, where, after Noah, no one has ever set foot."

"Once again, Zosimos," Baudolino said, putting on a ferocious face, "if you think that by talking to us of things you won't let us see—"

"But I see these things, as if they were here before my eyes, and soon you will also see them."

With that haggard face, made all the more pathetic by the bruises, his eyes shining with things that only he could discern, Zosimos was convincing even to those who distrusted him. It was his strength, Baudolino explained to Niketas, and in this way he had hoodwinked him before, and was hoodwinking him now and would continue to do so for several more years. He was so convincing that he wanted even to clarify how it was possible, with the tabernacle of Cosmas, to explain eclipses also, but eclipses didn't interest Baudolino. What convinced him was that with the true map perhaps they could really set out in search of the Priest. "Very well," he said, "we'll wait till this evening."

Zosimos had one of his monks serve some cooked greens and fruit, and when the Poet asked if there was nothing else, he answered: "Frugal food, uniformly regulated, will quickly lead the monk to the harbor of his invulnerability." The Poet told him to go to the devil, then seeing that Zosimos ate with great gusto, he looked more closely into the dish of greens and discovered that the acolytes had concealed there, just for Zosimos, some nice chunks of fat lamb. Without a word, he exchanged plates.

So they were prepared to spend the day waiting when one of the acolytes entered with a stunned expression and reported what was happening. In the night, immediately after the ritual, Stephen Agiochristoforites, with a squad of armed men, went to the house of Isaac Angelus, near the Pribleptos monastery, the shrine of the Famous Virgin, and called for his enemy in a loud voice to come forth; or, rather, he shouted to his own men to break down the door, seize
Isaac by the beard, and carry him out head down. Isaac then—though according to report he was hesitant and fearful—decided to risk all or nothing: he seized a horse in the courtyard and, sword drawn, scantily clad, a bit ridiculous with his two-colored cloak that barely reached his loins, suddenly rode out, catching his enemy by surprise. The Agiochristoforites didn't have time to draw his own weapon when Isaac, with a single blow of his sword, split his enemy's head in two. Then he turned to the now bicephalic Stephen's henchmen, slicing the ear off one of them, as the others ran away in fear.

Killing the emperor's trusted aide was an extreme act, and demanded an extreme remedy. Isaac, revealing a great sense of how the populace should be dealt with, dashed to Saint Sophia, demanding the asylum that tradition granted homicides, and loudly implored forgiveness for his own misdeed. He tore off what little clothing he had on as well as the hairs of his beard; he displayed his still-bloody sword, and, while he was asking for mercy, suggested he had acted in self-defense, reminding all of the crimes of the slain man.

"I don't like this story," Zosimos said, distraught because of the sudden death of his grim, dire protector. Less likable still would be the news that arrived subsequently, hour by hour. Isaac had been overtaken at Saint Sophia by illustrious figures including Johannes Doukas; Isaac continued to harangue the constantly swelling crowd; towards evening a great number of citizens had gathered around Isaac in the church to protect him though some were beginning to murmur that it was time to put an end to the tyrant.

Whether Isaac, as Zosimos's necromancy asserted, had long been preparing his coup, or whether he happily exploited a misstep by his enemies, it was clear that the throne of Andronicus was now tottering. It was equally clear that, in this situation, it would be madness to enter the royal palace, which could at any moment become a public shambles. All agreed that it was necessary to await the outcome of events at Katabates.

The next morning half the citizenry was out in the streets calling
in loud voices for the imprisonment of Andronicus and the raising of Isaac to the imperial throne. The populace attacked the public prisons, liberating many innocent victims of the tyrant, men of illustrious name who immediately joined in the uprising. But by now it was not so much an uprising as a revolt, a revolution, a seizure of power. The citizens, in arms, ranged through the streets, some with sword and buckler, some with clubs or sticks. Some of them, including many imperial dignitaries, who had concluded that this was perhaps the right time to choose a new autocrat, lowered the crown of Constantine the Great, which hung over the main altar of the church, and crowned Isaac.

Swarming from the church in fighting mood, the crowd lay siege to the imperial palace; Andronicus put up a desperate resistance, firing arrows from the top of the highest tower, the so-called Kentenarion. But he had to give in to the now imperious fury of his subjects. It was said that he tore the crucifix from his chest, took off his purple sandals, stuck a pointed barbarian-style cap on his head, and proceeded, through the labyrinths of the Bucoleon to board his ship, taking with him his wife and the prostitute Maraptica, with whom he was madly in love. Isaac triumphantly entered the palace. The crowd overran the city, attacked the mint or, as it was called, the Golden Lavabos, entered the armories, and turned to sacking the palace churches, tearing ornaments from the holy images.

Now Zosimos, at every new rumor, trembled more and more, since it was already being said that, once an accomplice of Andronicus was identified, he was put to the sword. On the other hand, Baudolino and his friends also considered it unwise to venture at this time into the corridors of the Bucoleon. And so, unable to do anything but eat and drink, our friends spent a few more days at Katabates.

Until it was learned that Isaac had moved from the Bucoleon to the Blachernae palace, at the far northern tip of the city. This perhaps made the Bucoleon less protected and (since there was nothing left to sack), fairly deserted. On that same day, Andronicus was captured on
the shore of the Euxine and was brought before Isaac. The courtiers had kicked and beaten him, torn out his beard, knocked out his teeth, shaved his head; now they cut off his right hand and flung him into prison.

When news arrived that in the city joyful dancing and festivities had sprung up at every corner, Baudolino decided that in the confusion they could head for the Bucoleon. Zosimos pointed out that he might be recognized, and the friends told him not to worry. Arming themselves with every instrument they had at their disposal, they shaved his head and beard, while he wept, considering himself dishonored by the loss of those insignia of monastic venerability. In fact, hairless as an egg, Zosimos appeared totally without chin, his upper lip protruding, his ears pointed like a dog's, and, Baudolino observed, he looked more like Cichinisio, an idiot who roamed the streets of Alessandria shouting obscenities at the girls, than like the accursed ascetic he had so far passed himself off as. To adjust this deplorable effect, they sprinkled him with cosmetics, and at the end he seemed a freak, a character that in Lombardy children would have followed with taunts and a shower of rotten fruit, but in Constantinople it was an everyday sight, Baudolino said, like going around Alessandria dressed as a vendor of
sirasso,
or ricotta as it is also called.

They crossed the city and witnessed the passage of Andronicus, more mangy-looking than the mangy camel on which he had been hoisted; he was almost naked, with a foul clump of bloody rags on the stump of his right wrist, and clotted blood on his gaunt cheeks, because they had just gouged out one of his eyes. Around him the most desperate of the city's inhabitants, whose lord and autocrat he had been for so long, sausage-makers, tanners, and the dregs of every tavern, collecting like swarms of flies in spring around a horse turd, struck his head with their clubs, stuffed ox excrement in his nostrils, squeezed sponges soaked in cow piss over his nose, thrust skewers into his legs; the milder threw stones at him, calling him rabid dog and son of a bitch in heat. From a brothel window, a prostitute emptied a pan
of boiling water over him. Then the crowd's fury increased further; they pulled him down from the camel and hanged him by his feet from the two columns beside the statue of the she-wolf giving suck to Romulus and Remus.

Andronicus behaved better than his tormentors, not emitting a moan. He confined himself to murmuring "
Kyrie eleison. Kyrie eleison,
" and asked why they were breaking a chain already shattered. Once he was strung up, a man with a sword neatly cut off his genitals, another stuck a spear in his mouth, impaling him to his viscera, while still another impaled him through the anus. There were also some Latins present, who had scimitars and moved as if they were dancing around him, slashing away all his flesh, and perhaps they were the only ones entitled to vengeance, given what Andronicus had done to those of their race a few years before. Finally the wretch still had the strength to raise to his mouth his right stump, as if he wanted to drink his blood, to make up for the blood that he was losing in great spurts. Then he died.

Having fled that spectacle, our friends tried to reach the Bucoleon, but when they were near, they quickly realized that it was impossible to gain entry. Isaac, disgusted by all the looting, had now set his guards to protect it, and anyone attempting to pass that defense was executed on the spot.

"You can get by in any case, Zosimos," Baudolino said. "It's simple: you enter, get the map, and bring it to us."

"What if they cut my throat?"

"If you don't go, then we'll cut it."

"My sacrifice would make sense if the map were in the palace. But, to tell you the truth, the map isn't there."

Baudolino looked at him as if unable to comprehend such shameless behavior. "Ah," he roared, "and now at last you're telling the truth? Why have you continued to lie until now?"

"I was trying to gain time. Gaining time isn't a sin. For a monk, wasting time is a sin."

"We'll kill him here on the spot," the Poet said. "This is the right moment, in this massacre nobody will notice. Let's decide who strangles him, and it's over."

"One moment," Zosimos said. "The Lord teaches us how to abstain from the deed that is not profitable. I lied, true, but for good reason."

"What good?" Baudolino said, exasperated.

"My own," Zosimos answered. "I had every right to protect my life, since you meant to take it from me. Monks, like cherubim and seraphim, must be all covered with eyes, or—this is how I interpret the saying of so many of the desert fathers—they must exercise wit and cleverness in the face of the enemy."

"But the enemy those fathers of yours were talking about was the devil, not us!" Baudolino cried.

"The stratagems of devils are different: they appear in dreams, they create hallucinations, they conspire to deceive us, they transform themselves into angels of light and they spare us to make us feel a false security. What would you have done in my place?"

"And what will you do now, you filthy Greekling, to save your life once again?"

"I will tell you the truth, as is my habit. Cosmas's map does really exist, and I have seen it with these eyes. Where it is now, I don't know, but I swear that I have it in my head as if it were printed there...." And he tapped his brow, now free of hair. "I could tell you, day by day, the distances that separate us from the land of Prester John. Now, obviously, I cannot remain in this city, and you have no reason to stay here either, since you came for me and now you have me, and for the map, which you don't have. If you kill me, you'll have nothing. If you take me with you, I swear by all the holy apostles that I will be your slave and I will devote my days to tracing for you an itinerary that will lead you straight to the land of the Priest. Sparing my life costs you nothing, except a mouth to feed. Killing me, you lose everything. Yes? Or no?"