Elisabeth Kostova - The Historian

“And he read us the following:

Your Excellency, Lord Abbot Maxim Eupraxius:

A humble sinner begs your ear. As I have described, there was great controversy in this company since our mission failed yesterday. The city is not a safe place for us, and yet we believed we could not leave it without knowing what has become of the treasure we seek. This morning, by the grace of the Almighty, a new way opened, which I must record for you here. The abbot of Panachrantos, hearing from the abbot our host, his good friend, about our sore and private distress, came to us at Saint Irine in person. He is a gracious and holy man of fifty years old, who lived his long life first in the Great Lavra at Athos and now for many years as monk and abbot at Panachrantos. Upon coming to us, he held council alone with our host, and then they spoke with us in our host’s chambers, with complete secrecy, all novices and servants being dismissed from the chambers first. He told us he had not heard before this morning of our presence here, and upon hearing it had come to his friend to give him news which he had not shared earlier, wishing never to endanger him or his monks. In brief, he revealed to us that what we seek has been transported already out of the city and into a haven in the occupied lands of the Bulgarians. He has given us the most secret instructions for our safety in traveling thither, and has named for us the sanctuary which we must find. We would fain wait here a while, to send word to you and receive your orders in this matter, but these abbots told us also that some Janissaries of the sultan’s court have come already to the patriarch to question him about the disappearance of that which we seek. It is most dangerous now for us to linger even a day and we shall be safer even in our progress through the infidel lands than we are here. Excellency, forgive our willfulness in setting out without being able to send for instructions from you, and may God’s blessing and yours be upon us in this our decision. If it is necessary, I shall destroy even this record before it can reach your hands, and shall come to tell you with my own tongue, if it be not cut out first, of our search.

The humble sinner Br. Kiril

April, the Year of Our Lord 6985

“There was a deep silence when Turgut had finished. Selim and Mrs. Bora sat quietly, and Turgut rubbed his silver mane with a restless hand. Helen and I looked at each other.

“‘The Year of Our Lord 6985?’ I said finally. ‘What does that mean?’

“‘Medieval documents were dated from a calculation of the date of the Creation in Genesis,’ Helen explained.

“‘Yes.’ Turgut nodded. ‘The year 6985, by modern reckoning, is 1477.’

“I couldn’t help sighing. ‘It’s a remarkably vivid letter, and obviously full of great concern about something. But I’m out of my league here,’ I said ruefully. ‘The date certainly makes me suspect some connection with the excerpt that Mr. Aksoy found earlier. But what proof do we have that the monk who wrote this new letter came from the Carpathians? And why do you think this is connected with Vlad Dracula?’

“Turgut smiled. ‘Excellent questions, as usual, my young doubter. Let me try to answer them. As I told you, Selim knows the city very well, and when he found this letter and understood enough of it to see that it might be useful, he took it to a friend of his who is the keeper of the ancient monastery library at Saint Irine, which still exists. This friend translated it for him into Turkish and was very much interested in the letter because it mentioned his monastery. However, he could find in his library no record of such a visit in 1477-either it was not recorded or any documents about it disappeared long ago.’

“‘If the mission they describe was a secret and dangerous one,’ Helen pointed out, ‘they would not have been likely to record it.’

“‘Very true, dear madam.’ Turgut nodded at her. ‘In any case, Selim’s monastic friend helped us in one important matter-he searched the oldest church histories which he has there and discovered that the abbot to whom this letter is addressed, this Maxim Eupraxius, was late in his life a great abbot on Mount Athos. But in 1477, when this letter was written to him, he was the abbot of the monastery at Lake Snagov.’ Turgut uttered these last words with a triumphant emphasis.

“We sat in excited silence for a few moments. Finally Helen broke it. ‘”We are men of God, men from the Carpathians,“’ she murmured.

“‘I beg your pardon?’ Turgut gazed at her with interest.

“‘Yes!’ I took up Helen’s line. ‘”Men from the Carpathians.“ It’s from a song, a Romanian folk song Helen found in Budapest.’ I described to them the hour we’d spent turning through the old book of songs at the University of Budapest library, the fine woodcut at the top of the page of a dragon and a church hiding among trees. Turgut’s eyebrows rose almost to his shaggy hair when I mentioned this, and I rummaged quickly in my papers. ‘Where is that thing?’ A moment later, I’d found my handwritten translation among the folders in my briefcase-God, I thought, if I ever lose this briefcase!-and I read it aloud to them, leaving silences for Turgut to translate for Selim and Mrs. Bora:

They rode to the gates, up to the great city.

They rode to the great city from the land of death.

“We are men of God, men from the Carpathians.

We are monks and holy men, but we bring only evil news.

We bring news of a plague to the great city.

Serving our master, we come weeping for his death.“

They rode up to the gates and the city wept with them

When they came in.

“‘Ye gods, how peculiar and frightening,’ Turgut said. ‘Are all your native songs like this, madam?’

“‘Yes, most of them,’ Helen said, laughing. I realized that in my excitement I’d actually forgotten for two minutes that she was sitting next to me. With difficulty I forced myself not to reach a hand out to grasp hers, not to stare at her smile or the wisp of dark hair against her cheek.

“‘And our dragon at the top, hidden among trees-there must be a connection.’

“‘I wish I could have seen it.’ Turgut sighed. Then he slapped the edge of the brass table so suddenly that all our cups rattled. His wife put a gentle hand on his arm, and he patted it reassuringly. ‘No-look-the plague!’ He turned to Selim and they exchanged a rapid fire of Turkish.

“‘What?’ Helen’s eyes were narrow with concentration. ‘The plague in the song?’

“‘Yes, my dear.’ Turgut combed his hair back with his hand. ‘Besides the letter, we found one other fact about Istanbul in this exact period-something my friend Aksoy already knew, actually. In the late summer of 1477, in the hottest weather, there was what our historians call a Little Plague. It took many lives in the old Pera quarter of the city-what we call Galata, now. The bodies were impaled through the heart before they were burned. This is rather unusual, he says, because normally the bodies of the unlucky ones were simply burned outside the city gates to prevent further infection. But it was a short plague and did not take so many people.’

“‘You think these monks, if they were the same ones, brought plague to the city?’

“‘Of course, we do not know,’ Turgut admitted. ‘But if your song describes the same group of monks -’

“‘I have been thinking of something.’ Helen set her cup down. ‘I cannot remember, Paul, if I told you about this, but Vlad Dracula was one of the first military strategists in history to use-how do you say?-illnesses in war.’

“‘Germ warfare,’ I supplied. ‘Hugh James told me.’

“‘Yes.’ She tucked her feet under her. ‘During the sultan’s invasions of Wallachia, Dracula liked to send people who were sick with plague or smallpox into the Ottoman camps disguised as Turks. They would infect as many people as possible before dying there.’