Three Arched Bridge

43

HASTE WAS EVIDENT EVERYWHERE: in the works on the Ujana, in the pace of the heralds, and even in the flight of the storks, which, having pecked at the beams of the bridge for the last time, set off on their distant migrations that no rivers or bridges obstructed.

Even the news coming from the Orikum base was gathered in haste and was contradictory. It was said that the aged Komneni was dead but that his death was being kept secret because of the situation at Orikum. All kinds of other things were whispered. It was said that the great Turkish sultan had withdrawn into the interior of Asia to meditate in complete solitude about the general affairs of the world, and that this was the reason why the Turks seemed to have fallen asleep.

There was no sign of them. But one day, at the end of the week, another dervish was seen, wandering across the cold plain’ a solitary figure amid the winds. Like all itinerant dervishes, he was barefoot and dust-covered, and perhaps for this reason seemed to have ash-colored rags instead of hair’ and hair instead of rags. He paused at the first arch of the bridge, fell on his face in front of the victim, and intoned an Islamic prayer in a deep and mournful voice. Then he disappeared again, I do not know where, across the open plain,