Barry Unsworth - The Ruby In Her Navel

I had heard these words before. I could not for the moment remember where. Perhaps it was no more than imagination on my part, but his eyes seemed to stray more frequently to the level of the table, which was also the level of my waist, where the bag of gold dinars would be, nestling under my cloak. "The train is set," he said. "A spark is all that is needed now."

I had it now: they were the very words Yusuf had used in sending me forth: it must have been Lazar who penned the report. That he should use the words again now was an offence to intelligence. Did he think I was so gullible?

"Pardon me," I said, "the Hungarian cavalry has been massing on the border for a very long time now. Who can remember a time when they were not massing on the border? They were massing on the border when you and I last talked together. Also at that time a spark was all that was needed. My King has grown weary of waiting for this spark. Until it comes you will see no sparkle."

I was pleased with this witticism, which had come to me on the spur of moment, and I let this pleasure show on my face. "No spark, no sparkle,"

I said.

"What do you mean?" Lazar's eyes were melting no longer, they were as hard and bright as jet stones.

"No shine of gold in other words. We have disbursed money from the royal coffers for five years, so far without any result that we can see.

The time has come to call a halt. Our hope in this is to make you see the gravity of the matter. So far we have paid for promises. Now we will pay only for results. But we will pay well, better than before, if you can raise the people in numbers great enough to turn Manuel Comnenus from his designs on Sicily."

He was scowling at me now in such an ugly fashion that I eased well back in my chair so that I was beyond the sweep of a knife. I did not think it likely he would make such a move, he was a man in hiding, but it is better to take precautions; I once saw a man slashed across the forehead in this way, over a dispute at cards, without the assailant even rising from his chair.

"So that is all it means to you," Lazar said. "Our Serbian blood will flow in streams so that Manuel Comnenus might turn his eyes from Sicily."

"You knew this already, do not pretend otherwise now. Our interests are not the same, but they come together here. Your freedom is our safety."

I was already regretting my forthrightness. He knew it, yes, none better. But our stated reason had always been friendship for Serbia. "We must have something to show for the money we have spent before we spend more," I said.

"Holy Mother of God," he said and he banged his fist on the table. "It is madness to deny the money now, when we are on the brink. Only two weeks ago our people assassinated a Provincial Governor."

"Yes, word of it came to us. A knife between the ribs in a remote region near the Bulgarian border. He was not killed for patriotic reasons. He was killed because he had come to enforce the collection of taxes. That is your idea of a spark?"

Lazar stood up abruptly. "I have come all the way from Belgrade only to hear my people insulted."

"I too have travelled far," I said.

"I will report this to my council. I will report your words and manner.

This betrayal of us will seriously delay the rebellion."

With this he flung away from me and disappeared down the steps. As a parting shot it was not effective – the rebellion was seriously delayed already. But I had no satisfaction in this thought or any other that came in my mind as I sat on there, after his departure. I had lied about my reasons for joining those kneeling penitents, I had lied with the oil fresh on my lips, and Lazar had anticipated me in the lie, thus associating both of us together in it. Contrary to my instructions and my own resolutions, I had shown pleasure in refusing the money and even smiled at my own poor joke; I had spoken sarcastically of the Hungarian cavalry and the killing of the tax-collector, and too openly about the King's reasons, always a mistake, even when they are known on every hand. Yusuf would not have approved of my conduct, had he witnessed it – and he would get Lazar's account if the reports from Belgrave continued.

But it was not fear of Yusuf's displeasure that troubled my spirit now.

Dislike for Lazar, yes. But as I stared before me with the sour taste of the wine still in my mouth, I was aware of a deeper dislike – for the stranger who sat alone here, and for the work he did.

There was nothing now to keep me in Bari. I did not relish the prospect of that long journey back over land, and there was no need for it now. I decided to ride only as far as Taranto and take ship from there. But before leaving I wanted to see the Madonna Odegitria, which Stefanos had told me of, he being very devout and full of knowledge. He had said she was kept in a chapel behind the church of San Sabino, which was now being rebuilt after damage suffered during the wars with the Saracens. I wanted very much to see her, since it is the truest likeness anywhere to be found, both in face and form, having been made from a drawing of her by the Apostle Luke, which he did in the time before the Crucifixion – she did not allow any more drawings of herself to be done after, because of her great grief.

However, I was destined not to see her likeness that day, and in fact I have never seen it. I asked twice for the way but the streets that led to the church were narrow and meshed closely together and to a stranger's eye they looked all alike. I took a wrong turning and found myself at a market of vegetables and fruit, with roofless stalls that took up most of the short street, and beyond them a sight of the sea. I was about to ask one of the stall keepers for the right way when I was caught up in a throng of pilgrims, who suddenly appeared from I know not where, I think from the direction of the harbour, they were jubilantly singing as if in joy at having landed safely. There was a sound of piping among them and a jingling of bells, and it seemed that all the dogs of Bari had joined them, barking and cavorting in a state of great excitement. Added to this were the angry shouts of the stall keepers, whose trestles were in danger of being overturned.

I was swept some way on the loud tide of these pilgrims and then, to get free of them, turned into a street on my right-hand side that led away from the sea. This brought me after some time to an open space, where there were the ruins of a fort, or perhaps only a fortified house, I could not tell. Not much was left of the walls but there were two low, rounded arches and some fragments of a floor mosaic. In my search for the chapel of the Madonna I had climbed higher than I knew. Beyond the walls and a narrow waste of thistle and wild oats the sea was visible, but it lay well below.

The jingling and the singing and the barking died slowly away and were succeeded by a silence that settled round me. The sea was unmarked, there was no wind, no movement in the grasses of the open ground. This calm, after such turbulence, was strange, rare in a town the size of this one. It seemed like a blessing, a visitation. I went through into the square of ground where the building had stood, stepping over the walls where they were low enough. There was a scutter of lizards on the sunwarmed stone, and a cat the colour of cinnamon walked slowly along the wall on the side farthest from the sea.

How long I stayed alone there I do not know. A sort of dreaming state descended on me, as if I had passed through some narrow gate and found sanctuary here. My mood, which had been sombre since the meeting with Lazar, lightened now and I began to think more kindly of myself and the part I had played. There was the picture that acted on my mind like touching a talisman, and I summoned it now, the shining silver of the King's barge that I was helping to keep afloat on the dark water.