The rest of the day and the evening became a time they would remember for the remainder of their days.

"You must come to my rooms for refreshment," Mirdin said.

It was the first time he had asked them to his home, the first time they opened their private worlds to one another.

Mirdin's quarters were two rented rooms in a joined house hard by the House of Zion Synagogue, on the other side of Yehuddiyyeh from Rob's neighborhood.

His family was a sweet surprise. A shy wife, Fara: short, dark, low-a.r.s.ed, steady-eyed. Two round-faced sons, Dawwid and Issachar, who clung to their mother's robes. Fara served sweetcakes and wine, obviously in readiness for the celebration, and after a number of toasts the three friends went forth again and found a tailor who measured the new hakim for his black physician's robes.

"This is a night for the maidans!" Rob declared, and at eventide they were in a dining place overlooking the great central square of the city, eating a fine Persian meal and calling for more of a musky wine which Karim scarcely needed, being drunk on physicianhood.

They dwelled over each question of the examination, and each answer.

"Ibn Sina kept asking me questions about medicine. 'What are the various signs obtained from sweat, candidate?... Very good, Master Karim, very complete ... And what are the general signs that we use for prognosis? Will you now discuss proper hygiene for a traveler on the land and then on the sea?' It was almost as though he were aware that medicine was my strength and the other fields my weakness.

"Sayyid Sa'di bade me discuss Plato's concept that all men desire happiness, which I am grateful, Mirdin, that we studied so completely. I answered at length, with many references to the Prophet's concept that happiness is Allah's reward for obedience and faithful prayer. And that was one danger dealt with."

"And what of Nadir Bukh?" Rob asked.

"The lawyer." Karim shuddered. "He asked me to discuss the Fiqh regarding punishment of criminals. I couldn't think. So I said that all punishment is based on the writings of Mohammed (may he be blessed!), which declare that in this world we all depend upon one another proximately, though our ultimate dependence is always on Allah now and forever. Time separates the good and pure from the evil and rebellious. Every individual who strays will be punished and every one who obeys will be in complete consonance with G.o.d's Universal Will, on which Fiqh is based. The command of the soul thus rests wholly with Allah, who works to punish all sinners."

Rob was staring. "What does that mean?"

"I don't know now. I didn't know then. I saw Nadir Bukh chewing the answer to see if it contained meat he hadn't recognized. He seemed about to open his mouth to demand clarification or ask further questions, in which case I should have been doomed, but then Ibn Sina asked me to expound upon the humor of blood, whereupon I gave back his own words from the two books he has written on the subject, and the questioning was over!"

They roared until they wept, and drank and drank again.

When finally they could drink no more they staggered to the street beyond the maidan and hailed the donkey coach with the lily on the door. Rob sat in the driver's seat with the pimp. Mirdin fell asleep with his head in the ample lap of the wh.o.r.e named Lorna, and Karim rested his head upon her bosom and sang gentle songs.

Fara's quiet eyes were round with concern when they half-carried her husband into his rooms.

"He is ill?"

"He is drunk. As are we all," Rob explained, and they returned to the coach. It carried them to the little house in Yehuddiyyeh, where he and Karim dropped to the floor as soon as they were inside the door, falling asleep in their clothes.

During the night he was awakened by a quiet rasp of sound and knew Karim was weeping.

At dawn he was awakened again, by the rising of his visitor.

Rob groaned. He should not drink at all, he thought gloomily.

"Sorry to disturb. I must go and run."

"Run? Why, on this of all mornings? After last night?"

"To prepare for chatir."

"What is chatir?"

"A footrace."

Karim slipped out of the house. There was the slap-slap-slap as he began to run, a receding sound, soon gone.

Rob lay on the floor and listened to the barking of cur dogs that marked the progress of the world's newest physician, roaming like a djinn through the narrow streets of Yehuddiyyeh.

48.

A RIDE IN THE COUNTRY.

"The chatir is our national footrace, an annual event almost as old as Persia," Karim told Rob. "It's held to celebrate the end of Ramadan, the month of religious fasting. Originally-so far back in the mists of time that we've lost the name of the king who sponsored the first race-it was a compet.i.tion to select the Shah's chatir, or footman, but through the centuries it has drawn to Ispahan the best runners of Persia and elsewhere and taken on the qualities of a great entertainment."

The course began at the gates of the House of Paradise and wound through the streets of Ispahan for ten and one-half Roman miles, ending at a series of posts in the palace courtyard. On the posts were hung slings, each containing twelve arrows and a.s.signed to a specific runner. Every time a runner reached the posts he took an arrow from his sling and placed it in a quiver on his back, then he retraced his steps for another lap. Traditionally the race began with the call to First Prayer. It was a grueling test of endurance. If the day was hot and oppressive, the last runner to remain in the race was declared the winner. In races run during cool weather men sometimes finished the entire twelve laps, 126 Roman miles, usually collecting the final arrow some time after Fifth Prayer. Although it was rumored that ancient runners had achieved better times, most ran the course in about fourteen hours.

"No one now living can remember a runner who finished in less than thirteen hours," Karim said. "Al Shah has announced that if a man finishes in twelve hours or less, he will be awarded a magnificent calaat. In addition he will earn a reward of five hundred gold pieces and an honorary appointment as Chief of the Chatirs, which carries with it a handsome annual stipend."

"This is why you've worked so hard, run so far every day? You think you can win this race?"

Karim grinned and shrugged. "Every runner dreams of winning the chatir. Of course I would like to win the race and the calaat. Only one thing could be better than being a physician-and that is being a rich physician in Ispahan!"

The air turned, becoming so perfectly moist and temperate that it seemed to kiss Rob's skin when he left the house. The whole world seemed in full youth, and the River of Life roared day and night with snowmelt. It was foggy April in London but in Ispahan it was the month of Shaban, softer and sweeter than the English May. The neglected apricot trees in the little yard burst into whiteness of stunning beauty, and one morning Khuff rode up to Rob's door and collected him, telling him Al Shah wished his company on a ride that day.

Rob was apprehensive about spending time with the mercurial monarch, and surprised the Shah had remembered his promise that they would ride together.

At the stables of the House of Paradise he was told to wait. He waited a considerable time; eventually Al came, followed by such a retinue Rob could scarcely credit it.

"Well, Dhimmi!"

"Majesty."

Al Shah waved off the ravi zemin impatiently and they were quickly into the saddle.

They rode deep into the hills, the Shah on a white Arabian stallion that fairly flew with easy beauty, Rob riding behind him. Presently the Shah settled into an easy canter and waved him alongside.

"You are an excellent physician to prescribe riding, Jesse. I have been drowning in the s.h.i.t of the court. Is it not pleasing to be away from all people?"

"It is, Majesty."

Rob stole a look behind them a few moments later. Far back, here came the entire world: Khuff and his guardsmen, keeping a wary eye on the monarch, equerries with spare mounts and pack animals, wagons that rolled and clanked as they were dragged over the rough open ground.

"Do you wish a more spirited animal to ride?"

Rob smiled. "It would be a waste of Your Majesty's generosity. This horse is suited to my mastery, Excellency." Actually, he had grown fond of the brown gelding.

Al snorted. "It is clear you are no Persian, for no Persian would lose an opportunity to better his mount. In Persia riding is all, and man-children emerge from their dames with tiny saddles between their legs." He dug his heels exuberantly into the Arabian's flanks. The horse sprang past a dead tree and the Shah turned in the saddle and fired his enormous longbow over his left shoulder, roaring with laughter when the great bolt of an arrow missed its mark.

"Do you know the story behind this exercise?"

"No, Sire. I saw it done by hors.e.m.e.n at your entertainment."

"Yes, it is often performed by us, and some are excellently skilled at it. It is called the Parthian shot. Eight hundred years ago, the Parthians were just one of the peoples of our land. They lived east of Media, in a territory that was mostly terrible mountains and an even more terrible desert, the Dasht-i-Kavir."

"I know the Dasht-i-Kavir. I crossed a bit of it to come to you."

"Then you know the kind of people it would take to live on it," Al said, reining the stallion strongly to keep it by the gelding's side.

"There was a struggle for the control of Rome. One of the contenders was the aging Cra.s.sus, governor of Syria. He needed a military conquest to equal or surpa.s.s the exploits of his rivals, Caesar and Pompey, and he decided to challenge the Parthians.

"The Parthian army, one-quarter the size of Cra.s.sus' dread Roman legions, was led by a general named Suren. It consisted mostly of bowmen on small, fast Persian horses and a tiny force of cataphracts, armored horse soldiers wielding long, deadly lances.

"Cra.s.sus' legions came straight at Suren, who retreated into the Dasht-i-Kavir. Rather than turn north into Armenia, Cra.s.sus gave chase, plunging into the desert. And something wonderful happened.

"The cataphracts attacked the Romans before they had a chance to complete their cla.s.sic defensive square. After the first charge the lancers withdrew and the archers moved in. They used Persian longbows like mine, more powerful than the Romans'. Their arrows pierced Roman shields, breastplates, and greaves, and to the amazement of the legions, the Parthians kept loosing arrows accurately over their shoulders as they retreated."

"The Parthian shot," Rob said.

"The Parthian shot. At first the Romans kept their morale, expecting the arrows soon would be depleted. But Suren brought in new supplies of arrows on baggage camels, and the Romans couldn't fight their customary war at close quarters. Cra.s.sus sent his son on a diversionary raid and the youth's head was returned to him on the end of a Persian lance. The Romans fled under cover of night-the most powerful army in the world! Ten thousand escaped, led by Ca.s.sius, future a.s.sa.s.sin of Caesar. Ten thousand were captured. And twenty thousand, including Cra.s.sus, were killed. Parthian casualties were insignificant, and since that day every Persian schoolboy has practiced the Parthian shot."

Al gave the stallion his head and tried it again, this time shouting with delight as the arrow slammed solidly into the bole of a tree. Then he raised his bow high in the air, his signal for the others in the party to come up.

A thick rug was carried to them and unrolled and over it soldiers quickly raised the king's tent. Soon, while three musicians softly played dulcimers, food was brought.

Al sat and motioned for Rob to join him. They were served b.r.e.a.s.t.s of various game fowls baked in savory spices, a tart pilah, bread, melons which must have been kept in a cave through the winter, and three kinds of wine. Rob ate with pleasure while Al tasted little food but drank steadily, all three wines.

When Al ordered the Shah's Game a board was brought at once and the pieces set up. This time Rob remembered the different moves but the Shah had an easy time defeating him thrice in succession, despite having called for more wine and quickly dispatching it.

"Qandra.s.seh would enforce the edict against wine drinking," Al said.

Rob didn't know a safe reply.

"Let me tell you of Qandra.s.seh, Dhimmi. Qandra.s.seh understands-wrongly, wrongly!-that the throne exists princ.i.p.ally to punish those who overstep the Qu'ran. The throne exists to enlarge the nation and make it all-powerful, not to worry about the mean sins of villagers. But the Imam believes he is Allah's terrible right hand. It is not enough that he has risen from being the head of a tiny mosque in Media until he is Vizier to the Shah of Persia. He is distant kin to the Abbasid family, in his veins flows the blood of the Caliphs of Baghdad. He would like one day to rule in Ispahan, striking out from my throne with a religious fist."

Now Rob could not have answered had the words been there, for he was stricken with terror. The Shah's wine-loosened tongue had put him at highest risk, for if Ala, sobering, should regret his words it would be no great task to arrange the witness's swift disposal.

But Al showed no discomfiture. When a sealed jug of wine was brought, he tossed it to Rob and led him back to the horses. They made no attempt to hunt but simply rode through the lazy day and grew hot and nicely tired. The hills were bright with flowers, cuplike blossoms of red and yellow and white, on thick stalks. They weren't plants he had seen in England. Al couldn't tell him their names but said each came not from a seed but from a bulb like an onion.

"I am taking you to a place you must never show to any man," Al said, and led him through brush until they were at the ferny mouth of a cave. Just inside, amid a stench like slightly rotting eggs, was warm air and a pool of brown water lined with gray rocks blotched with purple lichens. Already Al was undressing. "Well, do not tarry. Off with your clothes, you foolish Dhimmi!"

Rob did so with nervous reluctance, wondering whether the Shah was a man who loved the bodies of men. But Al already was in the water and a.s.sessing him unabashedly but without l.u.s.t.

"Bring the wine. You are not exceptionally hung, European."

He realized it would not be politic to point out that his organ was larger than the king's.

The Shah was more sensitive than Rob had credited, for Al was grinning at him. "I don't need to be made like a horse, for I can have any woman. I never do a woman twice, do you know that? That is why a host does not hold more than one entertainment for me, unless he gets a new wife."

Rob settled gingerly into hot water odorous with mineral deposits, and Al opened the wine jug and drank, then leaned back and closed his eyes. Sweat sprang from his cheeks and forehead until the part out of the water was as wet as the portion of his body that was submerged. Rob studied him, wondering what it was like to be supreme.

"When did you lose your maidenhead?" Al asked, eyes still closed.

Rob told him of the English widow who had taken him into her bed.

"I, too, was twelve years old. My father ordered his sister to begin to come to my bed, as is our custom with young princes, very sensible. My aunt was tender and instructive, almost a mother to me. For years I thought that after every f.u.c.king came a bowl of warm milk and a sweetmeat."

They soaked in contented silence. "I would be King of Kings, European," Al said finally.

"You are King of Kings."

"That is what I am called."

Now he opened his eyes and looked directly at Rob, an unblinking brown stare. "Xerxes. Alexander. Cyrus. Darius. All great, and if each was not Persian by birth, they were Persian kings when they died. Great kings over great empires.

"Now there is no empire. In Ispahan, I am the king. To the west, Toghrul-beg rules over vast tribes of nomadic Seljuk Turks. To the east, Mahmud is the sultan of the mountainous fasts of Ghazna. Beyond Ghazna, two dozen weak rajahs rule in India but they are a threat only to one another. The only kings strong enough to matter are Mahmud, Toghrul beg, and I. When I ride forth, the chawns and beglerbegs who rule the towns and cities rush outside their walls to meet me with tribute and fawning compliments.

"But I know the same chawns and beglerbegs would pay the same homage to either Mahmud or Toghrul-beg if they should ride that way with their armies.

"Once in ancient days there was a time like now, when there were small kingdoms and kings who fought for the prize of a vast empire. Finally only two men held all the power. Ardashir and Ardewan met in single combat while their armies watched. Two great, mailed figures circling each other in the desert. It ended when Ardewan was bludgeoned to death and Ardashir was the first man to take the t.i.tle Shahanshah. Would you not like to be that kind of King of Kings?"

Rob shook his head. "I want only to be a physician."

He could see puzzlement on the Shah's face. "Something new. All my life no one has failed to take an opportunity to flatter me. Yet you would not exchange places with the king, it is clear.

"I have made inquiries. They say that as an apprentice you are remarkable. That great things are expected when you become hakim. I shall need men who can do great things but do not lick my a.r.s.e.

"I will use guile and the power of the throne to stave off Qandra.s.seh. The Shah has always had to fight to keep Persia. I will use my armies and my sword against other kings. Before I am through, Persia will be an empire again and I shall truly be Shahanshah."

His hand clamped Rob's wrist. "Will you be my friend, Jesse ben Benjamin?"

Rob knew he had been lured and trapped by a clever hunter. Al Shah was recruiting his future loyalty for his own purposes. And it was being done coldly and with forethought; clearly, there was more to this monarch than the drunken profligate.

He would not have chosen to be involved in politics and he regretted riding out into the country that morning. But it was done, and Rob was very aware of his debts.

He took the Shah's wrist. "You have my allegiance, Majesty."

Al nodded. He leaned back again, into the heat of the pool, and scratched his chest. "So. And do you like this, my special place?"

"It is sulfurous as a fart. Sire."

Al was not a man to guffaw. He merely opened his eyes and smiled. Eventually he spoke again. "You may bring a woman here if you like, Dhimmi," he said lazily.

"I don't like it," Mirdin said when he heard that Rob had ridden with Al. "He is unpredictable and dangerous."