The Janissary Tree

He remembered how it flexed and buckled like the flanks of galloping horse. As if the air itself was thick as water. It was a moment that seemed like an eternity.

It gave him ample time, then, to seek the hollow and roll up into it.

Like a man entombed. But not dead. Breathing through an aperture in the rubble. Working the rubble gradually from head to toe like a worm coming up for the dew.

The grating overhead was now invisible. The sapper could see it, though, by moving his head just a fraction of an inch. By using the light that no one else could see.

He raised his chin. This was the time.

Patience was all that mattered.

Obedience was all that mattered.

People would die. People had to die.

Only death could sanctify the empire’s rebirth.

Only sacrifice could cleanse and protect the holy shrines.

The four pillars of the Karagozi.

The assassin felt in his pouch. He touched the ground with the palm of his hand.

And then, like a cat, he began to move.

[ 52 ]

Yashim leaned forward and fixed his eyes on page thirty-four of Les Liaisons Dangereuses. But it was no use. The book had been open on the same page for half an hour.

Whose law would it be? Would it be like the Prankish laws, which allowed the Greeks to have a country but denied the same convenience to the Poles? And would it work as well in the highlands of Bulgaria as in the deserts of Tripolitana?

The necessary leap? Perhaps. A single law for everybody, regardless of their faith, their speech, their parentage. Why not? He doubted that such a thing was sacrilegious, but then…plenty of others would think it was.

As he resolved these questions in his mind, Yashim won—dered who else, precisely, knew about the Edict. The sultan and his viziers, of course. High-ranking dignitaries like the seraskier himself, no doubt. The religious leaders —the Mufti, the Rabbi, the Patriarch? Probably. But the rank and file -priests and imams, say? No. And not the common people of the city. For them it was to be a surprise. As it had been for him.

He snapped the book shut, and closed his eyes, leaning back on the divan.

In the past few hours he had thought this through a dozen times. There was going to be trouble, he could be sure of that.

But there was something else, wasn’t there?

Something he knew was there, like a face in the crowd. Something he’d missed.

[ 53 ]

The man sat suddenly upright.

The assassin thought: he smells me. It made things more interesting. He’d been trained to infiltrate like an odour, not as a man. Now the odour clung to him.

The man sniffed.

Click.

Very slowly the man got to his feet. A knife in his hand.