the public executioner who was charged with the task botched the job and left the future doge of Venice with some vision left. Ithink he can’t have been totally blind because he couldn’t possibly have achieved what he did if he hadn’t been able to see at all. A blind man in his position would have to have had absolute trust in at least a handful of people, and trust, as I have said …’ Again, his voice trailed off.
‘But nobody knows for sure,’ said Marlow quietly.
‘None of the accounts written at the time agree.’ Haki rummaged on the desk until he unearthed a small brass handbell, and rang it. It emitted a tinny sound which didn’t seem loud enough to penetrate beyond the room’s walls, but apparently it did, for Haki explained: ‘I’m ringing for tea. I want some even if you don’t. All this talking …’
A young man in a white jacket appeared with a brass tray holding a pot with an elegant spout, a smaller one, three tulip-shaped glasses filled with steaming tea, a bowl of brown sugar lumps, and some dried white figs stuffed with walnuts. Haki popped a lump of sugar behind his upper front teeth and took up a glass. He slurped noisily and happily through the sugar. ‘Better!’ he said.
Marlow followed suit, without the sugar. Graves found the glass too hot to hold comfortably.
‘Forgive me,’ said Haki. ‘You aren’t used to it. There are napkins on the tray.’ He passed her one.
‘Adkins and his team,’ he resumed, ‘were fascinated by the skill, given his age and disability, which Dandolo showed in manipulating an entire foreign, powerful army and diverting it from its true goal – Jerusalem – to direct it against the main trade rival of Venice – Constantinople – under the thinnest of pretexts. Of course he was helped by our natural propensity for greed and gain, but he was asking them to attack fellow Christians, and they weren’tjust any bunch of mercenaries – they were a crusading army, which had the blessing and the encouragement of the pope himself. The whole thing had been pretty much Innocent III’s idea in the first place anyway.’
‘And did he succeed?’ asked Graves.
‘Yes,’ added Marlow. ‘At the expense of breaking the back of what remained of the Greek empire.’ He thought for a moment. ‘And
how
did he do it? That’s what Adkins and Co. were trying to find out.’
‘I’m not sure that I follow your train of thought,’ replied Haki. ‘But what I have to say is relevant. What was left behind, as the victors parcelled out the land between them amid much squabbling and more bloodshed, was a fractured and unstable political structure – a kind of pastiche of what it was like in Western Europe at the time, little kingdoms wrangling with each other, nobody turning his back on anybody. It was a kind of vacuum, and – even though it took another two hundred and fifty years – it laid Europe open to us, the Turks. The Muslims.’
‘A vacuum which Dandolo was responsible for,’ said Marlow.
‘Yes. Not, I think, that he would have cared.’ Haki sipped his tea. ‘Sacrificing the future for short-term gain is nothing new. And in every department of our lives, plenty of us don’t mind who else we hurt, as long as we get what we want – whether it’s a new business or a new lover. People do what they want to do. No one has any control over what anyone else chooses to do with his or her own life, no matter how much we sometimes like to think we have. Acceptance can be a bitter thing.’ Hedrained his steaming glass and grimaced. ‘Already getting cold,’ he remarked. ‘More?’
They shook their heads.
‘Do we know if the archaeologists found anything which answered their questions? Anything in the tomb?’ persisted Marlow. ‘Their disappearance is linked to something they found in the grave.’
Haki agreed. ‘I think they discovered more than they bargained for.’
‘What?’
‘Dominance of the Mediterranean trade and the routes to
‘But nobody knows for sure,’ said Marlow quietly.
‘None of the accounts written at the time agree.’ Haki rummaged on the desk until he unearthed a small brass handbell, and rang it. It emitted a tinny sound which didn’t seem loud enough to penetrate beyond the room’s walls, but apparently it did, for Haki explained: ‘I’m ringing for tea. I want some even if you don’t. All this talking …’
A young man in a white jacket appeared with a brass tray holding a pot with an elegant spout, a smaller one, three tulip-shaped glasses filled with steaming tea, a bowl of brown sugar lumps, and some dried white figs stuffed with walnuts. Haki popped a lump of sugar behind his upper front teeth and took up a glass. He slurped noisily and happily through the sugar. ‘Better!’ he said.
Marlow followed suit, without the sugar. Graves found the glass too hot to hold comfortably.
‘Forgive me,’ said Haki. ‘You aren’t used to it. There are napkins on the tray.’ He passed her one.
‘Adkins and his team,’ he resumed, ‘were fascinated by the skill, given his age and disability, which Dandolo showed in manipulating an entire foreign, powerful army and diverting it from its true goal – Jerusalem – to direct it against the main trade rival of Venice – Constantinople – under the thinnest of pretexts. Of course he was helped by our natural propensity for greed and gain, but he was asking them to attack fellow Christians, and they weren’tjust any bunch of mercenaries – they were a crusading army, which had the blessing and the encouragement of the pope himself. The whole thing had been pretty much Innocent III’s idea in the first place anyway.’
‘And did he succeed?’ asked Graves.
‘Yes,’ added Marlow. ‘At the expense of breaking the back of what remained of the Greek empire.’ He thought for a moment. ‘And
how
did he do it? That’s what Adkins and Co. were trying to find out.’
‘I’m not sure that I follow your train of thought,’ replied Haki. ‘But what I have to say is relevant. What was left behind, as the victors parcelled out the land between them amid much squabbling and more bloodshed, was a fractured and unstable political structure – a kind of pastiche of what it was like in Western Europe at the time, little kingdoms wrangling with each other, nobody turning his back on anybody. It was a kind of vacuum, and – even though it took another two hundred and fifty years – it laid Europe open to us, the Turks. The Muslims.’
‘A vacuum which Dandolo was responsible for,’ said Marlow.
‘Yes. Not, I think, that he would have cared.’ Haki sipped his tea. ‘Sacrificing the future for short-term gain is nothing new. And in every department of our lives, plenty of us don’t mind who else we hurt, as long as we get what we want – whether it’s a new business or a new lover. People do what they want to do. No one has any control over what anyone else chooses to do with his or her own life, no matter how much we sometimes like to think we have. Acceptance can be a bitter thing.’ Hedrained his steaming glass and grimaced. ‘Already getting cold,’ he remarked. ‘More?’
They shook their heads.
‘Do we know if the archaeologists found anything which answered their questions? Anything in the tomb?’ persisted Marlow. ‘Their disappearance is linked to something they found in the grave.’
Haki agreed. ‘I think they discovered more than they bargained for.’
‘What?’
‘Dominance of the Mediterranean trade and the routes to
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