Yashim followed his friend into a small, low-ceilinged room, lit by two long windows. Against the opposite wall stood an elaborate chimney piece, decorated with sheaves of carved shields and the bows and arrows of a more chivalric age; in the grate a fire glowed dully. Palewski threw on another log and kicked the fire; a few sparks shot up. The flames began to spread.
Palewski threw himself into a massive armchair and motioned to Yashim to do the same.
“Let’s have some tea,” he said.
Yashim had been in this room many times before; even so, he looked about with pleasure. A mottled mirror in a gold frame hung between the louvred windows; beneath it stood Palewski’s little writing desk and the only hard chair in the room. The two armchairs, drawn up to the fire, were leaking their stuffing, but they were comfortable. Over the fireplace hung a portrait in oils of Jan Sobieski, the Polish king who lifted the Turkish siege of Vienna in 1683; two other oils, one of a man in a full wig on a prancing horse, and another family scene, hung on the wall by the door, over a mahogany side-table. Palewski’s violin was perched on it. The further wall, and the alcoves by the fire-place, were ranged with books.
Palewski reached forwards and yanked once or twice on a tapestry bell pull. A neat, Greek serving girl came to the door and Palewski ordered tea. The girl brought a tray, and set it down on the charpoy in front of the fire. Palewski rubbed his hands together.
“English tea,” he said. “Keemun with a trace of bergamot. Milk or lemon?”
The tea, the fire and the rich tones of the German clock on the mantelpiece soothed the Polish ambassador into a better mood. Yashim, too, felt himself relax. For a long while neither man said anything.
“The other day you quoted something to me—an army marches on its stomach. Who said that? Napoleon?”
Palewski nodded, and pulled a face. “Typical Napoleon. In the end his armies marched on their frozen feet.”
Not for the first time, Yashim promised himself to probe Palewski’s attitude to Napoleon. It seemed a combination of admiration and bitterness. But instead he asked: “Does anything about the way the Janissaries named their ranks strike you as significant?”
“Significant? They took titles from the kitchen. The colonel was called the soup cook, wasn’t he? And there were other ranks I remember—scullion, baker, pancake maker. Sergeant-majors carried a long wooden ladle as a badge of office. As for the men, to lose a regimental tureen in battle—one of the big cauldrons they used for making pilaff—was the ultimate disgrace. They had the provisioning sorted out. Why the Janissaries?”
Yashim told him. He told him about the cauldron, about the man trussed ready to roast, the pile of bones and wooden spoons. Palewski let him speak without interruption.
“Forgive me, Yashim, but weren’t you in Istanbul ten years ago? They call it suppression, don’t they? Laughter can be suppressed. Emotion. But we’re talking about flesh and blood. This was history. This was tradition. Suppressed? What happened to the Janissaries wasn’t even a massacre.”
To Yashim’s surprise, Palewski was scrambling to his feet.
“I was there, Yashim. I never told you this, because no one -not even you—would have wanted to know. It’s not the Ottoman way.” He hesitated, with a rueful smile. “
Yashim shook his head. Palewski raised his chin.
“June the sixteenth, 1826. Sunny day. I was over in Stamboul on some errand or another, I forget,” he began. “And boom—the city explodes. Kettles drumming on the Etmeidan. Students in the medreses, humming like ripe cheese. Get back, I think. Down to the Golden Horn, grab a caique, tea on the lawn and wait for news.”
“Tea?” Yashim interjected.
“It’s a figure of speech. Rather like the lawn. But never mind: I never made it here. Golden Horn. Silence. There were the caiques, drawn up on the Pera side. I waved and capered on the landing stage, but not a miserable soul stepped forward to ferry me across. I tell you, Yashim, it made the hairs prickle on the back of my neck. I felt as if I’d been quarantined.
“I had a rough idea of what was brewing. I thought of some of the pashas I knew—but then, I thought, they’d have trouble enough without me tagging along. To be honest, I wasn’t sure it was wise to be barricaded into some grandee’s mansion at the moment of crisis, which we all knew was coming. Guess where I went instead.”
Yashim creased his brow. I know just where, old friend, but I won’t spoil it. “A Greek tavern? A mosque? I don’t know.”
“The sultan. I found him in the seraglio, at the Circumcision Kiosk—he’d just arrived from Besiktas up the Bosphorus. Various commanders with him. The Grand Mufti, too.” Palewski gave Yashim a long, hard look. “Don’t talk to me about suppression. I was there. ‘Victory or death!’ the pashas shouted. Mahmut took the Holy Standard of the Prophet in his two hands. ‘Either we win today,’ he said, ‘or Istanbul will be a ruin for cats to prowl through.’ I’ll say this for the House of Osman: it may have taken them two hundred and fifty years to make the decision, but
