Authors: Vladimir Bartol
“There isn’t a ruler who’s a match for Sayyiduna.”
“Did you hear him refer to himself as the new prophet?”
“Didn’t we know that already?”
“But in that case how can he serve the Egyptian caliph?”
“Maybe it’s the other way around.”
The fedayeen instinctively gathered in their usual place atop the wall. They stared at each other, pale-faced, none of them daring to speak first.
Finally Obeida broke the silence.
“Suleiman and Yusuf are lost to us now,” he said. “We’ll never see them in this world again.”
Naim’s eyes teared up.
“Do you know that for sure?”
“Didn’t you see the eunuchs carry their bodies away?”
“Are they in paradise now?”
Obeida gave a cautious smirk.
“They sure seemed to be convinced of it.”
“And you aren’t?” ibn Vakas asked.
“Sayyiduna said so. I can’t doubt it.”
“It would be a crime to doubt,” Jafar added seriously.
“It feels like everything is empty now that we’ve lost them,” ibn Vakas said disconsolately. “First ibn Tahir left us, and now them.”
“What’s happened to ibn Tahir? What’s keeping him? Is he in paradise now too?” Naim asked.
“Only Allah and Sayyiduna can say,” ibn Vakas replied.
“It would be so good to see him again,” Naim said.
“I’m afraid he’s taken the same path as his traveling companions,” Obeida suggested.
“The strangest thing, Your Excellency,” Captain Abu Jafar told the emir Arslan Tash on returning from Alamut to camp, “is not that the youths carried out their master’s order so quickly. After all, what other choice did they have with such a cruel commander? What amazed us most—horrified us, even—was the unthinking joy with which they leapt at death. If Your Excellency could have seen how blissfully their eyes shone when he announced they would be going straight to paradise when they died! Not even the shadow of a doubt could have troubled their hearts. Their faith that they would return to the paradise they had already been in once before must have been more solid than the cliffs beneath Alamut. My aides can confirm all of this for you.”
Lost in thought, the emir Arslan Tash paced back and forth inside his tent. He was a tall, handsome man. It was evident from his carefully groomed appearance that he loved the joys of life and its comforts. His features expressed concern. He wasn’t the slightest bit pleased with Hasan’s answer. One after the other, he looked each of his three emissaries in the eye. He asked them, “Are you sure you weren’t the victims of some trick?”
“We’re positive,” Abu Jafar replied. “Suleiman stabbed himself barely five or six paces away from us. And all of Alamut saw Yusuf jump from the parapets.”
Arslan Tash shook his head.
“I just can’t believe it. I’ve heard of sorcerers in India who appear to make miraculous things happen. They throw a rope up in the air, for instance, and the rope remains suspended. Then the sorcerer’s assistant starts climbing up the rope. When he’s climbed up quite high, the sorcerer gives a command. The rope drops and the assistant comes crashing to the ground. The sorcerer sets a basket over the corpse. He recites a few prayers and then, when he lifts the cover, the assistant pokes his head out, hale, hardy and smiling. The whole episode turns out to have been an illusion.”
“There was no such sorcery at Alamut. The knife was buried up to its hilt in Suleiman’s heart. His clothing was spattered with blood.”
The emir fell silent again and pondered. All of this seemed more than mysterious to him.
Then he spoke.
“Whatever the case, I order you to keep as silent as a tomb about everything you saw and heard at Alamut. The men could resist or mutiny if they found out what kind of enemy they’re facing. The grand vizier is on the march, and he’s not going to be amused if we fail to carry out his orders.”
Abu Jafar’s aides exchanged worried glances. On their way here they had described their audience at Alamut to several colleagues.
The emir didn’t notice their exchange of glances. He was pacing around the tent, preoccupied.
“What on earth could the Ismaili commander have meant when he hinted that he knew something about the grand vizier that I would only learn about in six or even twelve days?”
“I’ve told Your Excellency everything he said,” Abu Jafar replied.
“Most likely he just meant to scare me. What could he know about the grand vizier that I myself don’t know? That he’s en route to Isfahan? That he’s planning to move on Alamut after that?”
He swung his arm in frustration.
“Just my luck to get the dubious honor of taming these infidels! What kind of honest opponent is this? He hides in fortresses, avoids open battle, poisons ignorant minds with strange fairy tales and turns them into dangerous fools. How am I supposed to get my hands on that?”
“All right, then. You’re dismissed!” he said a short time later. “I’ll take your report into consideration. Just keep it quiet.”
The emissaries bowed and left.
The emir dropped onto some soft pillows, poured himself a full cup of wine, and drank it down in one draught. His face brightened. He clapped. Two beautiful young slave girls came out from behind a curtain. They sat down next to him and embraced him. Soon Alamut and its cruel master were forgotten.
By contrast, his men were all the more animatedly discussing the experience of the three emissaries at Alamut. The news had swept through the entire camp like a cyclone. When Abu Jafar and his aides came back out of the emir’s tent, his friends showered him with questions. He raised a finger to his lips and whispered that the emir had given them strict orders to keep as silent as a tomb about everything. This meant that the officers retired to a separate tent, put a guard out front, and then spent hours discussing in depth everything the emissaries had been able to say.
The enlisted men discussed the Alamut events in their own way.
“The master of Alamut could be a true prophet. He started with only a handful of men, just like Mohammed. Now there are thousands fighting in his ranks.”
“The Ismailis are adherents of the party of Ali. Weren’t our fathers too? Why should we fight with men who remain faithful to the teachings of their fathers and ours?”
“The Prophet wasn’t as powerful as the master of Alamut. Sure, he could travel to paradise. But could he also send others there, alive?”
“They said that both of the youths who killed themselves in our emissaries’ presence had already been in paradise. Otherwise, how could they have gone to their deaths so enthusiastically?”
“As long as I’ve lived, I’ve never heard of anything like this. Does it make any sense for us to fight such a powerful prophet?”
“You’d think the Ismailis were Turks or Chinese for the sultan to declare war on them. They’re Iranians like us, and good Muslims.”
“The grand vizier wants to get back in the sultan’s good graces. That’s why he’s sent us to attack Alamut, so he can look important and needed. We’ve seen this kind of business before. We weren’t born yesterday.”
“It’s a lucky thing that our emir is such a smart man. He isn’t in any hurry. When it gets cold, we’ll just leave for our winter quarters in the south.”
“Of course, it would be stupid for us to fight with an enemy that nobody hates.”
Wordlessly, the grand dais accompanied Hasan to his chambers. The supreme commander was clearly exhausted. He tossed the white coat off his shoulders and lay down on the pillows.
The grand dais remained standing.
“Do you know who I miss having here today?” he said, finally breaking the silence. “Omar Khayyam.”
“Why him of all people?”
“I can’t say exactly. I’d just like to talk to him.”
“Is your conscience bothering you?”
Buzurg Ummid gave him a penetrating look.
Hasan instinctively rose. He looked inquisitively at the grand dais. He didn’t answer the question.
“Do you know that on that night when you went to the gardens where the youths were, I suggested to Abu Ali that we kill you and throw you off the tower into Shah Rud?”
Hasan instinctively grabbed the handle of his saber.
“Yes, I suspected something. Why didn’t you carry out your plan?”
Buzurg Ummid shrugged his shoulders. Abu Ali could only stare at him, dumbstruck.
“Until now I regretted not carrying it out.”
“You see? That’s probably why I started missing Omar Khayyam so much. But don’t think it’s because I’m afraid. I just wish I could have a good talk with somebody.”
“Go ahead, speak. We’ll listen.”
“Let me ask you a question. Is a child’s delight in his colorful playthings real joy?”
“What’s the point of these digressions again, ibn Sabbah?” Buzurg
Ummid said with obvious annoyance. “Just tell us straight out what you were planning to say.”
“You said you’d listen to me.”
Hasan’s voice was once again hard and determined.
“My intention was not to justify my actions. I only wanted to explain them to you. Obviously, a child’s delight in his colorful toys is just as genuinely felt as a grown man’s pleasure in money or women. Viewed from the perspective of any individual, every pleasure that he feels is a real, genuine pleasure. Each of us is happy in his own way. So if the prospect of dying means happiness for someone, he’ll delight in death just as much as another delights in money or a woman. There are no regrets after death.”
“Better a live dog than a dead king,” Abu Ali muttered.
“Dog or king, they’ll both have to die. Better to go as a king.”
“Since you’ve assumed that power, you can say that you rule over life and death,” Buzurg Ummid said. “But I’d rather be a dog in the road than die like your two fedayeen did.”
“You haven’t understood me,” Hasan replied. “Has anyone prescribed that sort of death for you? Your situation is infinitely remote from theirs. What was the summit of happiness for them would fill you with sheer horror. And can you be sure that whatever is the ultimate happiness for you wouldn’t be sheer terror for somebody else, or viewed from a different perspective? None of us can have an overview of our actions from all perspectives. That was the exclusive province of an all-seeing god. So grant me that everyone is happy in his own way!”
“But you intentionally deceived the fedayeen! Where did you get the right to treat people who are devoted to you like this?”
“I take that right from the knowledge that the supreme Ismaili motto is right.”
“And you can speak of an all-seeing god practically in the same breath?”
At this, Hasan straightened up. He seemed to grow by a full head.
“Yes, I did speak of some all-seeing god. Neither Jehovah, nor the Christian God, nor Allah could have created the world we live in. A world in which nothing is superfluous, in which the sun shines just as gently on the tiger and the lamb, the elephant and the fly, the scorpion and the butterfly, the serpent and the dove, the rabbit and the lion, the blossom and the oak, the beggar and the king. Where both the just and the unjust, the strong and the weak, the smart and the stupid fall victim to disease. Where happiness and pain are blindly strewn to the four winds. And where the same ending awaits all living beings—death. Don’t you see? That’s the god whose prophet I am.”
The grand dais instinctively stepped several paces back. So that was the core of this strange man, that was the “madness,” that burning conviction
that had unerringly led him to the point where he now stood? So he secretly really did see himself as a prophet? And all his philosophizing was just a decoy for the minds of doubters? And maybe for himself as well? So that in his faith he was closer in spirit to his fedayeen than to the Ismaili leaders?
“So you believe in a god?” Buzurg Ummid asked in an almost timid voice.
“As I have said.”
An enormous abyss opened up between them.
The grand dais bowed in parting.
“Carry out your duties. You are my successors.”
He smiled at them in farewell, as a father smiles at his children.
Once they were out in the corridor, Abu Ali exclaimed, “What material for Firdausi!”
“That brings the fourth act of our tragedy to a close,” Hasan said to himself when he was alone again.
That evening he summoned Obeida, Jafar and Abdur Ahman to see him. Abu Soraka conveyed his order to the three of them.
This occasioned a ferment throughout the quarters of the fedayeen. When Obeida heard what awaited him, his brown face went ashen. He looked around like a wild animal seeking a way to escape from some looming danger.
Abdur Ahman was afraid too.
“Why on earth has Sayyiduna summoned us?” he wondered.
“Most likely he’s planning to send you to paradise, now that Suleiman, Yusuf and ibn Tahir are gone,” ibn Vakas replied.
“Are we going to have to jump off a tower or stab ourselves too?”
“You’ll have to ask Sayyiduna that.”
Jafar received the order with calm obedience.
“Allah is master over our life and death,” he said. “And Sayyiduna is his representative.”
Abu Ali met them in front of the building of the supreme command and led them up the tower to Hasan.
After Abu Soraka informed the fedayeen of their appointment, he anxiously sought out Manuchehr. He found him atop the wall, in the midst of inspecting some pitch vats. He called him aside.
“What do you think, Emir, about the death of the two fedayeen?”
“Sayyiduna is a powerful master, my friend.”
“Do you agree with what he’s doing?”
“That’s something I don’t think about, and I advise you to do the same.”
“But are these methods going to make us a match for the sultan’s army?”
“Only Sayyiduna knows that. All I know is that we couldn’t hold out against them for long with just the forces at hand.”
“All this still makes me shudder.”
“Somebody else may be experiencing the same shudder. Emir Arslan Tash, for instance.”
“So you think Sayyiduna achieved his goal?”
“Something tells me we can put our trust in him. The things we experienced today at Fortress Alamut have never happened before in all of history.”