The Great Siege

10

The Ottoman galleys pulled away into a gale, a churning sea beneath and louring sky above, and few there doubted that Allah was angry with them for having failed to conquer this wretched island in His name. As they left the accursed island behind the seas grew ever rougher. Fighting spurs were ripped from the ships, masts and oars snapped asunder, rigging tore and sagged, men spewed, the wind howled, and rainwater and seawater drenched all. And somewhere out there, they said amongst themselves — somewhere out there, fearless of any storm, there still lurked that most ferocious of all Christian sea captains, the Chevalier Romegas.

On some of the ships a strange light was seen, dancing blue and white on the shuddering mast-tops, hissing audibly and malevolently, a sign that terrified them. A Christian among them who had turned Turk and corsair because it paid better suddenly found that he was crossing himself. His comrades seized him and held knives to his throat and demanded to know what was happening.

‘The flames on the tops,’ he muttered. ‘Among the Christians, it is called St Elmo’s fire.’

They let him drop, and stood aghast. Truly they were damned.

The once Grand Fleet slipped into Constantinople under cover of darkness, in silence but for the slow rise and dip of tired oars. A forest of shattered masts, of stinking galleys, ruined and shamed. Of the forty thousand who had sailed, fewer than ten thousand returned. Of the corsairs and cut-throats who had joined from the African coast, from Egypt and Tripoli and Algiers, hardly any returned at all.

Suleiman decreed, as only the Lord of the Universe can, ‘Malta Yök. ’

Malta Is Not.

Mustafa and Piyale were removed from their commands, but to general surprise, both kept their heads. All of the city went into mourning. Few had not lost a brother or a cousin in the disaster. A number of Christians and Jews were stoned or stabbed to death in impotent vengeance.

Yet the work of conquest could not stop. It was the Will of Allah that Islam should reign supreme over all the earth. Suleiman vowed — Malta Yök notwithstanding — to lead another army the following year, in person, and this time he would slaughter every man, woman and child on the island. He ordered fifty thousand oarsmen and forty thousand soldiers to be ready by the following March.

In time they heard of the news across Europe. Church bells rang out and people danced in the streets of Lisbon and Amsterdam and Munich and Rome and Vienna. In time they would hear even across the great divide of Christendom, and celebrate in Moscow and Kiev. And weeks later, in the old Christian heartlands of the Levant, oppressed now for a millennium, there would also be secret rejoicing at the victory of the true faith, among the Maronites and the Copts of Syria and Egypt. For the mighty sword of Islam had been broken, shattered in pieces by a small, ill-defended but unimaginably courageous Mediterranean rock, no more than two or three hours’ walking from side to side. Yet even amidst their celebrations, anxiety would remain. As if they knew the war of the world had only just begun.

Celebrations were more grave on Malta itself.

The guns fell silent, the miraculous rain washed the streets clean, and the people breathed again. They looked around and saw their shattered city as if for the first time, and the farmland beyond stripped of livestock, untended now for four long months under the broiling sun. Any sense of victory was tempered by how much labour would be needed to rebuild their beloved island. There were no dances or bonfires in those rubble-strewn streets, their houses overthrown as if by almighty hand or earthquake, but only humble thanksgiving.

A slow hymn arose from the rubble, at once mournful and yet inexpressibly triumphant. The voices of men and women and children, unaccompanied, singing in their ancient language, voices high and low, young and old commingled. It was inexpressibly moving to hear it arise from the ruins. It was one thing for a people to love their proud and beautiful city, if that city was gilded and magnificent Venice or Genoa — but quite another for them to love this barren rock so deeply. Smith turned to Stanley and Nicholas with tears in his eyes and said, ‘If you love a thing, you fight for it. But if you fight for a thing, in time you come to love it.’

And it was true. The knights themselves had so loved their lush and beautiful island of Rhodes, island of butterflies and roses, and so despised this substitute of Malta, so mean in comparison. But now they loved it as ardently as the people themselves. Love grows in the hardest ground.

‘Malta of gold, Malta of silver, Never will we forsake you, Never will we forget you, Made precious with our blood …’

It was the small, weary, steadfast song of a people whom even the greatest army on earth could not break. They came up the street towards their church, where nothing awaited them, no precious paintings or treasures or even a living priest. Only the consoling silence of God. Barefoot and ragged and half starved, skinny arms raised to the sky, they were going to give thanks. They held their heads high and raised their tear-streaked faces to the blue heaven, a dusty black column of old men tottering on olive sticks, widows with veils raised, children arm in arm, helping each other as they limped along, a boy with a bandaged leg, a little girl with one hand. All sang.

The knights thought their hearts would break. And then on impulse one knight sank down on his knees at the side of the street, and bowed his head in all humility to the people passing by. This people with the hearts of lions. The knight was La Valette. Jean Parisot de la Valette, 48th Grand Master of the impeccably aristocratic Order of the Knights of St John.

Then one by one, all the knights did as he did. All down the street, the stony ground rang with the clank of poleyns and greaves as the noblest sons of European chivalry, hair matted, beards filthy, beribboned in bloody bandages, sank down and bowed before a troop of dust-covered peasantry. They closed their eyes and rested shaggy, blood-encrusted forelocks on their clasped fists, holding their swords before them like crosses set in the ground, like knights in midnight vigil before the Cross.

What an Island of Heroes they had fought for and died for. What a high honour it had been. Suleiman should see this, the Magnificent, the Lord of the World, Padishah of the Red Sea, the White and the Black. Then at last he might be humbled. For such a people as this could never be destroyed.

Later that night, a message came from La Valette. The relief force from Sicily, under Don García de Toledo, had landed on the north of the island at Mellieha Bay. They had not been able to sail earlier, because of bad weather.

Then La Valette gave a rare laugh.