Rakóssy Read online

“Where is Kamal going?” Denis said.

  “Taking the long way home.” The left corner of Rakóssy’s mouth drew down. “I hope he gives Mustafa my especial regards.”

  “Now will you tell me what’s going on?”

  “I brought you here to learn. The only way you can learn is to keep your eyes open and your mouth shut.”

  “I don’t speak Turk, and you—”

  “Now, that’s one thing you learned, isn’t it?”

  Denis flushed.

  “Let’s go home,” Rakóssy said. “It’s going to rain.”

  Mustafa said, “Sometimes, Kamal, I think that your use to me is extremely limited.”

  He looked at Kamal across the stretch of empty room, snorted, and looked out the window at the mountains, brilliant against the clear, rain-washed sky.

  “I don’t see what I could have done,” Kamal said.

  “Kamal,” Mustafa said. “Kamal, you are very dear to me, as dear to me as my brother. I could not love you more if you were braver, or stronger. But wiser, Kamal. Just a little wiser?”

  “Enlighten me, my lord.”

  Mustafa gathered up his robes and hurled himself into a chair. “You should, very simply, have let Malencz arrest him.”

  Kamal thought this over. He shut his eyes. “I see.”

  “Yes. You were in a position to destroy Rakóssy in a single stroke. You could have taken him prisoner, handed him over to Malencz, and asked of Malencz one simple favor in return. My brother. And why did you not pursue this wonderfully bold, dramatic, Turkish design?”

  “I didn’t think of it.”

  “Why?”

  “My lord, I beg your pardon for my failure.”

  “Do you know why, Kamal? Because Rakóssy started to give you orders, and you, Kamal, you would rather take orders than do anything else in the world.”

  Mustafa shot out of his chair. He went to the window and poured a cupful of clean mountain water from the ewer on the table there.

  “And Rakóssy knows it,” he said. “He knows you, Kamal, as well as your own father knows you. Kamal, aren’t you ashamed?”

  Kamal’s eyes were clamped shut. “My lord.”

  Mustafa drank the last drop of the sweet water. He turned and without a word flung the cup through the window. He waited, serene, until he heard the cup smash on the gravel of the courtyard below.

  “Someday,” Kamal said without opening his eyes, “you are going to hit someone doing that.”

  “Ah, Kamal, permit me to apologize. I have taxed you beyond your strength, demanded more of you than it is in your power to give. Go. You pollute my brain.”

  Kamal slunk out.

  Mustafa slouched into his chair. He propped his feet on the stool.

  “Rakós’,” he said, “Rakós’, what are you trying to do with us?”

  There was something here that he thought he should try to understand. Rakóssy had deliberately provoked Malencz. Possibly he had underestimated his ability to do so. Possibly he had not thought that Malencz would try to arrest him. It was a very serious thing to do. If Malencz and Rakóssy were near open war, Mustafa could extend his operations against Malencz. There was little chance of a change in Rakóssy’s style.

  “Rakós’,” Mustafa said, “damn your soul. If you have one.”

  He had to get Harun back. He lifted one hand to the little silver bell on the table beside him. A slave answered the ring.

  “Send Abdul Mohammed here,” Mustafa said. “Immediately.”

  “János, wake up.”

  Rakóssy opened his eyes. He turned his head and looked out the window. It was bright and windy outside.

  “János?”

  “Come in. Ivo?” Rakóssy got out of bed. The floor was cold. He sat on the bed and pulled his feet up under him. He roared for Ivo, his servant, and raked his fingers through his hair.

  Denis came to the foot of the bed. “There’s a messenger here from Cliff’s Eye.”

  “So you wake me up.”

  “It’s important, he says. Besides, you’ve had enough sleep.”

  Ivo brought Rakóssy’s clothes. He put water on to heat and got out a razor. Rakóssy dressed, swearing at the chill of the floor. “What happened to my rug? Bring me my boots. And my belt.” He cuffed Ivo. “Hurry up before I take a whip to you.” He stamped his feet into his boots and sat down while Ivo strapped on his spurs. Denis stood uncertainly by the door.

  “I’ll tell you when I’ve had enough sleep.” Rakóssy shoved him out of the way. Ivo held out his doublet. Rakóssy thrust his arms into it.

  “Do you want me to shave you, my lord?”

  “No. You’re a born butcher. Get out of here. Get my rug back. Tell Anna I want breakfast in the great hall, and it had better be hot when it gets there. Denis, come with me.” He took his swordbelt from the peg by the door, buckled it around his middle, and pounded out.

  “Don’t worry, Ivo,” Denis said. “He’s just—”

  “It’s all Mari’s fault,” Ivo said.

  “Who’s Mari?”

  “Denis!” Rakóssy shouted.

  Denis went out after him.

  Rakóssy went straight to the great hall and flung himself into a chair. The hall was long, narrow and not very well lit. He looked up at the crossed halberds over the hearth and the painted coat of arms. Ivo jogged in with a covered dish. He pulled over a little table and set down the dish. Rakóssy took away the napkin and looked down at the meat and eggs. “Where’s my milk?”

  Ivo left at a run. Denis came through a side door with the Turk messenger. Rakóssy was prodding the meat with his dagger. He looked up.

  “Abdul Mohammed.” Rakóssy pointed at a chair with his elbow. “Mustafa loses no time.”

  Abdul Mohammed grinned. “On this matter, no.” He spoke Turk.

  “Speak Magyar,” Rakóssy said. “My brother has no Turk.”

  “As you will.” Abdul Mohammed glanced at Denis. “My master thinks perhaps you had a reason for making poor Kamal to be a fool.”

  “For that, no.”

  “But you have Harun.”

  “Down in the dungeons.”

  Ivo came in with the milk. Rakóssy drank it and sent him for more.

  “Ransom,” Rakóssy said. “Nothing more.”

  “Oh? And what can Cliff’s Eye offer the Lion of Hungary?”

  “Don’t call me that.” Rakóssy wiped his chin and the two days’ growth of his beard. “I want three thousand bezants.”

  Abdul Mohammed blinked.

  “Three thousand,” Rakóssy said.

  “Dinars.”

  “Bezants.”

  “That’s a lot of money.”

  “He has it.” Rakóssy took the second cup of milk and drank half of it. “He got that much at least from the sack of Belgrade, and where would he spend it?”

  “Yes. I am to see Harun and know that he is well.”

  “As you wish.”

  “My master will accept the terms, then. He will bring the ransom here, to the point of exchange, on that day.”

  Rakóssy pushed away the dish. “Tell him that I shall personally count every bezant. Denis, take Abdul Mohammed down to the dungeons. Take Arpád or Alexander with you.”

  “Yes, János.”

  They left him. He sat with his head resting against the back of the chair. He shut his eyes. Within a few moments he was fast asleep.

  Malencz’s eldest son supervised the exchange. Some fifty of Malencz’s men lounged on the slope below Hart Castle, and a hundred Turks sat their horses in orderly rows opposite them. In the space between, the exchange was conducted with bored formality.

  A hundred yards west of the point of exchange, Mustafa himself on his white-footed chestnut mare watched Rakóssy count gold bezants into leather sacks. Arpád, Rakóssy’s second-in-command, stood nearby, looking now and then at Harun. Both Kamal and Denis were with Peter Malencz overseeing the exchange of prisoners.

  “As sticky-fingered as any Jew,” Mustafa
said.

  Rakóssy dropped the last bezant into the last leather sack. “With reason,” he said. He straightened and held out his hand. “Ten short. Give me them.”

  “Alas,” Mustafa searched his clothes. “I don’t seem to have that kind of money anywhere with me. Perhaps we can leave it on account.”

  Rakóssy snapped his fingers.

  “Rakós’,” Mustafa said, “your major failing — aside from a lack of breeding, education and religion — is that you want — and completely, I’m afraid — a sense of humor.” He shook his head. “Of all the gifts that Allah has given men, surely the finest and the most consoling in this vale of pain . . .”

  He paused and eyed Rakóssy. “No. A pity.” He took a handful of bezants from his sash and dropped them, one by one, into the trampled grass. “Ten,” he said. “My fool of a brother, if you please.”

  “Arpád.”

  Arpád cut Harun loose. Rakóssy was staring at the gold, shining in the beaten grass.

  “The horse,” Mustafa said.

  “She wasn’t part of the bargain,” Rakóssy said. “I like her.”

  Harun put two fingers in his mouth and whistled. The black mare lifted her head and came slowly forward, her reins trailing. She passed Arpád and Harun and thrust her head under Rakóssy’s arm.

  “One would expect better taste of a beast of her breeding,” Mustafa said. He called to Kamal to bring another horse. Kamal jogged over almost at once. The exchange was finished, and Malencz’s men were riding off. Levolt of Kutess stood watching them.

  Rakóssy mounted the black mare. Mustafa said, suddenly, “What will you do with your new treasure, Rakós’?”

  “I’ll shoe my horses with it for the ride into Cliff’s Eye.”

  Kamal was staring at Rakóssy. Harun mounted. Mustafa wheeled his horse. The chestnut mare moved with short, neat steps, like a dancer. Her scarlet trappings swayed. The little bells on her harness rang like silver. Rakóssy glanced once at Kamal and nodded absently. He listened to the bells and watched the fluttering of the tassels on the mare’s saddle cloth. The Turks galloped away. The sound of the bells died softly.

  “What are you thinking about, János?”

  “None of your business.”

  Zoltan,” Denis called. He rode over to the side of the road and dismounted.

  The priest stood up. “Good morning, Denis. Are you riding alone? Your brother will be very angry.”

  “To hell with him,” Denis said. “Where have you been?”

  “Down there.” Zoltan nodded to the village. “The headman was sick. He wanted the last rites, which I administered.” He put his hand on the sack beside him. “Well. How do you like Hungary again?”

  “I’ve been back almost a month.”

  “Ah, but you’ve been on the move. It’s a beautiful spring, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. Are you in a hurry?”

  “No. I have to say Mass tomorrow morning.”

  Denis laughed. “I won’t keep you that long. I just wanted to talk to you.”

  “About your brother.”

  “Well, yes.”

  “Denis, I gave up trying to save your brother a long time ago. I rarely see him. I never talk to him.”

  “Save him?”

  “His soul, Denis. His famous soul.”

  “Why famous?”

  “Well.” Zoltan sat down again. He leaned over and picked a flower and put it behind his ear. His cassock was tucked up between his legs, and his calves were ridged with muscle and old scars. “The people in the village think that he sold his soul to the Devil for a charmed life and fortune in battle. The Turks, I’m told, believe so too. I think it’s possibly the only point of agreement between them.”

  “Peasant superstition.”

  “Perhaps. But superstitions have their roots in truth, sometimes. You’ve been away, Denis. You came back just in time for the fighting season.”

  Zoltan twined grass between his fingers. He looked off at the valley and the tangle of huts and gardens.

  “He is much like your mother,” Zoltan said at last. “Restless, impious, arrogant, and cold. He has some virtues which your mother, if you’ll pardon my saying so, did not have.”

  “Mother was very strange.”

  “So she was.”

  “But János is stranger.”

  Zoltan braided the grass. “Not really.”

  “He almost got us into terrible trouble at Vrath. Count Malencz was furious.”

  “My lord doesn’t think that Malencz does enough against the Turks. He hates Malencz.”

  “I don’t think he knows what he’s doing.”

  “Oh, yes. Yes, he knows what he’s doing. Sometimes I think that everybody in the world is traveling through a dark cloud, and they do things expecting something quite different than they should. Your brother knows exactly what he’s doing and what will happen. Perhaps it’s another thing the Devil gave him. I have great confidence in your brother.”

  “Confidence? In János?”

  Zoltan got up and started toward the castle. Denis led his horse along beside Zoltan.

  “He’s very capable,” Zoltan said. “Look up there. He keeps one hundred ten knights in Hart, and almost thirty servants. The knights do nothing but fight. They don’t herd. They don’t garden. They must all be outfitted and mounted and the horses must be tended, too. Your brother probably doesn’t know exactly how many peasants live on his land, but it can’t be more than five or six hundred. He protects them from the Turks so that they can support themselves, he sees that the Gypsies and the Jew traders come through here, and he supports his knights and his castle servants and the horses, without taxing his people a single head of cattle, a single lamb, or an old carrot. He’s very capable.”

  The gate of Hart Castle opened. A dozen knights rode out and jogged down the hill. Several women followed them, walking, carrying baskets on their arms. They were going down to the gardens by the stream, Denis knew, to tend them and to gather vegetables. He watched the knights turn west, riding at a trot.

  “They’re going to raid,” Zoltan said. “They’ll bring back a herd of Malencz’s sheep and cattle. If they were hunting they’d have bows. The hunting isn’t very good anymore. Some say the Turks drove off the game.”

  Denis said nothing. He wondered how Zoltan knew and how Zoltan, a priest, could condone it.

  “We eat better and more often, in the hard season, than most of Malencz’s people,” Zoltan said. “It’s hard to be a zealot on a full belly.”

  “I’ve heard it just the opposite.”

  “Zealots love to starve.”

  They went through the gate. Rakóssy was standing next to the pump, supervising while three sweating men fixed the pulley. He looked over, saw Denis, and waved. He looked back at the pump. Denis called a stableboy to take his horse. He went over to Rakóssy. His heels clicked on the paving stones of the courtyard.

  “Up early, little brother.”

  “I wanted to ride.”

  “Oh? New sport in Italy? I told you once that you have to take somebody with you when you ride.”

  “I wasn’t going far. Just down to the village.”

  Rakóssy started toward the stable. Denis said, “Where are you going?”

  “Check the stable for winter damage.” Rakóssy nodded back at the pump. The men there were drawing up the old rope. It was wet and filthy and covered with slime. Things grew on it.

  “Everything inside the walls needs to be mended, patched or replaced,” Rakóssy said. “The whole place is falling to pieces.”

  “It looks better than before I left,” Denis said. “I always remembered it as cooler and wetter.”

  “That’s because it was down by the stream.”

  “There are more people to take care of it now.”

  Rakóssy grinned. “Where were you going?”

  “Nowhere special.”

  “Don’t ride alone. It’s dangerous.”

  “I didn’t remember.�
�

  “Naturally.”

  They went into the stable. Denis looked around. Rakóssy swung the door on its hinges.

  “What happened to the dogs?” Denis said. “Lightning, and Red — we used to have a whole pack.”

  Rakóssy tapped the wooden stable door. He took a piece of chalk from his doublet and marked an X on a rotten panel.

  “They died off,” he said. “I don’t hunt. I sent the falcons to the King.”

  “That’s a shame.”

  Rakóssy went farther into the stable. He looked up at the wooden ceiling, at the wide crossbeams. “Does that beam look sagging to you?”

  Denis squinted at it. “A little,” he said.

  “We’ll have to put a prop under it.”

  The walls of the stable were of stone; the horses were hitched to iron rings set into the walls. Only Rakóssy’s black mare had her own stall. Denis said, “That’s a lovely horse.”

  “Pure Kohl Arab. Mustafa had her brought up from Constantinople under a full guard.”

  Rakóssy poked and shoved at the props, studied the beams, and made chalk marks on those to be replaced.

  Denis said, “How did you get her?”

  “Levolt offered to sell her to me.”

  “That’s how you knew Harun was in Kutess.”

  “Yes.”

  Denis looked down toward the end of the stable and laughed.

  “You still have the cats.”

  “They catch mice.”

  “Look at that.”

  Rakóssy turned. A big orange cat was lying on the rump of the last horse, fast asleep. The horse was dozing. The cat was sprawled comfortably over the horse’s slacked hip.

  Denis said, “That’s beautiful.”

  Rakóssy went down to the rack at the end of the stable and took down a long whip. He shook it out, worked it over near the horse, and cracked it. The horse leapt awake. The cat, startled, dug in her claws to keep from slipping. The horse neighed shrilly and bucked. The cat clung with all four paws. The horse kicked out violently. The cat leapt down and streaked for the hayrick.

  Rakóssy laughed and coiled up the whip. Denis said, “That was cruel.”

  “I wanted to see what she would do,” Rakóssy said. He went to the frightened horse and calmed it down. “Bring me that pitch pot.”