The Bellini Card

117

“Disobeyed you?”

“I told you I would summon you when the time was right. But yesterday you visited the Old Palace. Topkapi. You spoke with the valide.”

Yashim put his scoop under the flow of water and let it fill.

“We discussed a book, Resid.”

“You are supposed to be in Venice, remember? The sultan ordered you to go.”

“You asked me to stay, my pasha.”

Resid’s eyes were like gimlets. “Don’t try me, Yashim. I am the slave of the padishah. His lightest wish is my command.”

“There must be some mistake. Maybe I misunderstood.”

“Impossible. The sultan’s order was very clear. You were to go to Venice. But you are here.”

“Yes, my pasha. I am here.” He poured the water over his head. He rubbed a hand through his hair. “The ship docked yesterday.”

“What ship?”

“The packet from Trieste.”

Resid said nothing, but the scoop he was lifting stopped in midair.

“We are all slaves of the padishah, Resid.”

Resid let the water trickle onto the floor. “Really, Yashim, this is so interesting.” There was something gravelly in his voice, and Yashim wondered if it might be fear. “Did you-succeed?”

“I believe so, in a way.”

“In what way, Yashim?” The young vizier turned his scoop gently between his fingers. “You found the painting, perhaps?”

“Yes, Resid Pasha. I did.” Yashim put his scoop under the spigot and watched it fill again. “The portrait of Mehmet the Conqueror,” he said, raising his voice slightly above the bubbling water. “Among other things.”

“Other things?”

“Letters.”

“Letters. A pity that you decided to go to Venice, after all. I warned you it was a dangerous city.”

Yashim stared at Resid.

“It’s not a worry, Resid Pasha. I’m safe home now, in Istanbul.”

Resid filled his cupped hands with water and splashed it over his face. “I wish I could share your confidence, Yashim. One hears so often these days of accidents, if not banditry. Perhaps we should try to install more lighting, as I hear they have in Venice? Security in the city, however, is not my concern-I deal with foreign affairs.”

“Curiously enough, it is those very foreign affairs of yours that give me confidence,” Yashim said with a gentle smile. “One particular affair, at least.”

Resid’s own smile was bland and fixed. “And what-affair-might that be, Yashim lala?”

“One that a certain Duke of Naxos had with the Contessa d’Aspi d’Istria. As an affair, I gather, it was one-sided, and largely epistolary. Though of course I may be wrong.”

Very slowly, Resid picked up the scoop. He held it in his hand, empty.

“I’m sorry to hear you say that, Yashim. At home, or abroad, my loyalty is to the sultan and to his good name.”

“Even a sultan may be judged by the company he keeps, Resid.”

A masseur arrived and knelt at Yashim’s feet. Yashim waved him away.

“You drag the sultan into this?” Resid hissed. “I expected better of you, Yashim.”

“The sultan? No. Abdulmecid wasn’t a part of this.” Yashim let the water patter into his open palm. “You should have let me go, Resid. Your Tatar wasn’t good enough.”

“My Tatar?”

“He’s dead, Resid. Who was he, anyway? A relative of yours perhaps?”

“You question me?”

Yashim sighed. “Not really, no. After all, you couldn’t have sent me, Resid Pasha.”

“You? What could you have done?”

“A service to the sultan. That’s what I do, Resid. My training. My talent. But in this case, my services were not required.”

Resid said nothing.

“Last year,” Yashim went on, “the sultan sent an envoy to Vienna. In Trieste he develops a slight malady, which keeps him there a few days. I’ve checked, Resid. The dates of his mission to Vienna are on the record.”

He poured the water over his head.

“In Venice, it’s Carnevale. Parties, drinking, gambling. Everyone is in disguise. The Duke of Naxos arrives. The name is cleverly chosen. It sounds faintly familiar to the Venetians-remember? But it means so little, except to the man himself. Perhaps he’s thinking of Joseph Nasi, the last man to genuinely hold the title. An influential adviser to Suleyman, in his old age, and then to Selim, his son. No friend to Venice, either.”

“Go on.”

“The Contessa d’Aspi d’Istria draws her own conclusions. The imperious young visitor writes her a letter. Carla is a snob-she imagines that the Duke of Naxos is Abdulmecid. She’s quite charmed. So, apparently, is his cicerone.

“Later on, when someone discreetly offers the Bellini portrait to the sultan through the calligrapher Metin Yamaluk, this envoy suspects it is her. He’s grander now. A pasha. He has farther to fall, so he needs someone he can trust. Someone in the family. He sends a Tatar to Yamaluk, to make sure, but the calligrapher is an old man with a weak heart, and the Tatar kills him. Maybe that was an accident-I think it was.”

“You only think so? Why so uncertain now, Yashim lala?”

“There’s no evidence either way. But I think it was an accident because it was so ill omened. For you.”

“For me?”

Yashim sighed. “You were the Duke of Naxos, Resid.”

“And you think the omens were proved?” Resid gave a tight little laugh. “It’s not over yet, Yashim lala. Go on.”

Yashim shrugged. “Why bother? You know as well as I do that you were afraid. You were afraid that if the contessa started to negotiate with the sultan, the truth would come out. So you decided to kill her, and everyone else associated with that game of cards.”

Resid gave a strange smile. “So, the contessa is dead. Thank you for that, Yashim.”

Yashim cocked his head to one side. “No, Resid. She didn’t die, because I stopped the killer.”

“I see.” Resid blinked. “The indefatigable Yashim.”

“No, no. I’m very tired, Resid.”

Resid leaned forward. He brought his sweating face to within a few inches of Yashim’s.

“It’s a new regime, Yashim lala,” he hissed. “New men. The sultan’s young, like me-but I have experience he needs. A new regime. And, Yashim, just between ourselves, I control it.”

Yashim said nothing.

“Fetch me the letter,” Resid burst out. “Fetch it and save your skin. Or go away and die, if you prefer.” He leaned back against the marble wall. “Barbieri died. So did Eletro, and Boschini. Maybe the contessa’s next, after all. And do you know? Nobody cares.”

Yashim stood up. “You’re right, of course. It’s only Pappendorf who’ll be surprised. I suppose the Austrian ambassador thought you were delivering him the sultan.”

“What do you mean?”

“Ruggerio was an informer. He told the Austrians that the Duke of Naxos was Abdulmecid, so Pappendorf came to you, didn’t he? With a threat to expose the sultan-and an offer of cooperation. He expected you to manage it, I suppose. Blackmail at a high level. You went along with it, of course, to avoid suspicion falling on you. You and the Austrians, together, could eradicate the evidence against the Duke of Naxos. No one would ever know he’d been to Venice at all. The Austrians would help by giving your assassin a free hand, but in return they expected to own the sultan. How surprised they’ll be to discover that all they own is you.”

“I control affairs,” Resid said grimly.

“For how long, Resid?” Yashim asked. “Viziers come and go, don’t they? Sometimes they go gracefully, with blessings, to retirement and old age. But you’re too young to retire safely. You’d live too long and know too much.”

“I control affairs.” His voice shook.

“The Austrians might not think so, Resid. They bought a sultan. You have delivered-who? A man who bungles a simple killing even when everyone’s straining to look the other way.”

Yashim got to his knees. His face was set. “The palace is a little world,” he said. “You wouldn’t be the first vizier to forget that the people, too, have a voice. I saw them, Resid, when they gathered around the great tree. It wouldn’t take much, I think, when the people learn that you sold your sultan’s name to protect your own.”

Resid was staring at him, his mouth open.

“The trouble with advisers is that they get things wrong. Even Joseph Nasi, I recall, got it wrong from time to time. The good thing about them is that they’re dispensable.

“You, Resid, promised everyone your loyalty and your good faith. The people, with your pieties. The sultan, with loyalty. The Austrians, with a leash on the sultan. There’s a diagram we both know, where the background changes as you move. But com’era, dov’era: you’ve disappointed even me.”

A memory flashed into Yashim’s mind, something Carla had said. “When it’s all gone, Resid, honor is all we have left.”

He stood up and walked out without looking back.