The Silver Chalice (41 page)

“He thinks it is me,” explained Chimham. “What a pity that the tunic was new. But it had to be sacrificed. Better to lose a piece of cloth than to have your face trampled to nothing. I have seen
that
happen.”

He then walked toward the camel with an air of confidence, chirping and calling him by name. “Good Bildad! Brave Bildad! My fine Bildad!” he said. The camel, trembling a little, stood perfectly still.

“Keep away from him!” cried Basil, who had been appalled by the fury of the exhibition. “He will tear you to pieces!”

“No, it is quite safe now.” Chimham spoke with confidence and continued to approach the camel. “He has vented his spite, and in that funny little lump of brain of his he is quite satisfied. He is sure he has paid off the score. I am someone different. He does not care about me at all.”

Basil watched, nevertheless, with considerable apprehension and was prepared to rush to his new friend’s assistance if the need rose. Chimham had been right, however. He stepped up into the
rakhala
, the concave saddle with elevated pommel that camel men used. Reaching out a foot, he touched the neck of the now quiet Bildad. The camel groaned, raised his muzzle to whine piteously, then began to rise from his kneeling position.
“Khikh!”
called Chimham, and the animal started off without any hesitation.

“My good fellow!” cried Chimham. He turned his head to look back. “What a strange old
buzzud
he is. I have no idea what fancied injuries he had been storing up, but I have never seen him in such a tantrum before. It is all over and forgotten now. We will be the best of friends, he and I.”

The second incident concerned Basil and occurred some hours later. The sun had climbed higher and higher into the sky until it was directly overhead and its rays beat down with merciless intensity. Basil became dizzy with it. He was barely able to retain his seat in the saddle and had to cling to the high pommel with almost lifeless fingers. Chimham was in the lead and was impervious, seemingly, to the devastating heat.

Basil was on the point a dozen times of suggesting that they stop to rest, but pride held him back. He had said in volunteering that he could
withstand the physical hardships and he did not want to give in as quickly as this. Once in desperation, as he felt himself reel sickly in the saddle, he said: “Chimham, have mercy on a poor beginner! Is it not time to rest?” When his companion did not respond or turn back to look, he realized that he had formed the words with his lips but had not spoken them.

An eternity seemed to pass, an eternity spent in a steaming caldron. Basil clung to the pommel with his numb fingers and managed to keep from falling. It was clear to him, however, that sooner or later he would lose consciousness and drop from his high elevation to the ground. It would be a dangerous fall, for Ezer was a lanky animal with legs of unusual length. The sand, moreover, had been swept by winds and beaten down by the passage of countless caravans. There were rocks by the side of the trail, sticking jagged teeth out of the scanty underbrush. Nothing could be done about it; he had lost all capacity to act, even to speak. There was nothing to be done but cling to the saddle and wait for the inevitable.

“Someone else will finish the Chalice,” he thought. He had left with the others the model he had made for the frame. He was not entirely satisfied with it and intended to improve upon it in many ways before casting it in silver; but it was beginning to take on substance and form and sometimes, when he studied it with the enthusiasm that will swell up inside a creator, he had been carried away with its beauty. With the frame were the clay models of the figures. It should not be hard, he reflected, for whomever they might select to complete it from the stage where he was leaving it.

Then it seemed to him that he was aboard a ship. It was careening ahead at a furious rate and he was hanging to the side. The rate of progress was so violent that he was jerked back and forth and collided with objects of such fixity that he rebounded painfully from them. He heard the voice of Chimham from somewhere in the far distance shouting desperate instructions, but his mind was unable to grasp them. Even if he had been able to comprehend, he lacked the power to do anything about it.

The ship came to an abrupt stop, and he realized that he had parted company with it. He was hurtling through the air, and the thought flashed through his mind that this would be the end, the end of everything. He was reconciled to the idea of death. It would bring release from the agonies of travel and escape from the pitiless sun.

When he landed, it was in a pool of water. It was not deep, and he
plunged through to the bottom, striking the mud with a jolt that he felt through his whole body. For a moment he made no effort to move, taking a physical pleasure in the sudden coolness. Then the instinct of preservation caused him to struggle to a standing position. He discovered then that the water was only deep enough to reach his knees.

The shock of the immersion had cleared his brain. He looked about him and saw that the water into which he had been thrown was a small pool in a palm-fringed oasis. Ezer had already sunk to his knees at the edge and was drinking voraciously.

Chimham was riding up in furious haste and waving his arms. “Get him out!” he shouted. “He must not drink before eating. It will kill him!”

Basil dragged his feet out of the clinging mud and struggled to the shore. Ezer whimpered in protest when he was hauled away from this spot of great delight.

“Did you lose control of him?” asked Chimham, riding Bildad up to the line of the trees but no farther. “I shouted to you, but you paid no attention.”

“I think I lost consciousness,” said Basil humbly. “The heat was more than I could stand. I am afraid we shall have to make a stop here. I feel limp and useless.”

Chimham looked up at the sun and then nodded his head. “We kept at it too long. My friend, when you feel yourself going this way, you must let me know. After all, you are new to this kind of thing; and better men than you have been unable to stand the heat of the midday sun. I can see you are all puffed up with foolish pride and do not like to give in. Let me tell you this: pride is the poorest kind of cloak against that devouring sun god up there above us.” He looked around the oasis and nodded with satisfaction. “This is a perfect resting place. I am feeling the need of it myself.”

Basil had enough strength left to walk to the shelter of the nearest tree. He sank down with a sigh of complete weariness. “I am afraid I can do nothing about pegging the camels out,” he said.

“There is little to be done.”

“Why did Ezer run away like that?” asked Basil, too tired to raise or turn his head.

“He smelled the water. Camels cannot resist it; they start off pell-mell for it at the first whiff. It takes a strong arm on the curb chain to hold them in. I should have warned you of that. Well, no harm seems to have been done. Get off to sleep now. You will waken up a new man.”

“This life is terrible beyond all description,” said Basil as he and his companion sat at supper beside the Antioch Road under the walls of Aleppo. It was a plain meal they were eating: a square cake of a doughy substance, which Chimham cut into wedges with his dagger, some dates and dried grapes and a moldy piece of cheese.

“It is indeed terrible,” agreed Chimham, his mouth full. “And also it is beautiful.”

“I am unable to see the beauty of it. Do you follow this life by choice?”

The other man nodded. “I ran away from my home as a boy to become a camel man. I shall never leave it. When my time comes, I shall be buried by the side of the trail under a single stone, and the howling of hyenas will be my requiem. I ask nothing better.”

It was incomprehensible to Basil that anyone could live such a life by preference. He had become thin and his face was drawn and deeply lined. His skin was several shades darker.

“The sun strikes like the blow of a hammer,” he said. “I can feel it beating down on my head all day long. Clang, clang, clang! It never stops. I sink into the saddle under the cruelty of it. It seems like a malignant god who has sworn to drive me mad. Every time we start out, I take a look at it blazing away so hatefully up there and I say, ‘Today you will win. I can stand no more of you.’ ”

“You have never suggested a delay or an earlier halt,” commented Chimham, raising a piece of cheese to his mouth on the point of the dagger.

“Not yet. But I have been close to doing it a thousand times.”

“Well,” said the camel man cheerfully, “we are getting to the end of it. By this time tomorrow night we will be within sight of the walls of Antioch. We must be at least four days ahead of the caravan.”

Such a fierce longing took possession of Basil for the shelter of cool stone walls and the sanctuary of trees where his enemy could not reach him that tears came into his eyes. “What a blessed life it would be,” he said with a deep sigh, “to live in a cave, a dark cave with moisture dripping from the walls and an underground pool. Or in a temple with stone walls and pillars. Or on top of Mount Hermon in a house covered with snow!”

“You are wrong,” said Chimham. “The sun is the best friend man has. Every morning when I wake up I say a prayer to him. I say, ‘When Joshua commanded you to stand still, why didn’t you become stationary up there in the sky?’ The moon is a sorry substitute, although I am compelled to say that I have enjoyed many pleasant hours by its pale light.” He turned and motioned over his shoulder in the direction of the Aleppo gates. “I heard something back there. A band of Arab bandits have been on the prowl hereabouts. They have picked off some stragglers from caravans passing through. The guard on the gate said we should not venture out alone. Old Zimiscies, who owns the khan, said the same.”

Basil frowned doubtfully. “If we attach ourselves to a large caravan we will lose a lot of time. Can we afford to do it?”

“Can we afford to lose our lives?”

“The danger of that would not be very great.”

Chimham brushed a hand across his lips as a sign that he had finished his supper. With deft movements he wrapped up the remains of the meal and attached the bundle to his saddle. “I think we are likely to slip by them in the dark. I do not like to risk the loss of the reward I have been promised if we get to Antioch first. I am ready to take the chance if you are.”

They discussed the matter at some length and found themselves agreeing that the danger was not great enough to warrant them in delaying their arrival at Antioch. “Bandits prefer to work in the early morning and again just before dark,” said Chimham. “Sometimes they will see where a caravan has camped and attack it later, but generally they have a reluctance about the night hours. By dawn we should be far enough west to be well out of danger. I say, let us risk it.” Basil nodded. “Then it is settled.”

They sat in silence for several moments. “These camels belong to you,” remarked Chimham.

Basil was startled. “It is true. I bought them from Adam ben Asher. But how did you find out?”

“He told me before we left that I need not consider myself responsible to him for them. I hope you drove a hard bargain with him.”

“No,” answered Basil. “I paid him what he asked.”

A look of intense pain crossed the face of his companion. “By the earth and my head!” he cried. “That was a great mistake. I am sure he cheated you.”

“I know he did. He boasted of it to my face. I did not care. All I desired was to close the deal with as few words as possible.”

“Do you know that Adam hates you?”

“I am sure he does. And I hate him. My dislike of him equals my hatred of the sun. I link them together in my mind; the great, burning face of the sun and the sneering countenance of this vain, loudmouthed Adam.”

Chimham studied him intently for several moments. Then he nodded in a sudden decision and reached for the small bundle of his clothing, which lay on the ground beside him. It proved to be a single cloth wrapped around a collection of articles of such great value and variety that Basil sat up straight and looked at them with amazed eyes.

“What loot is this?” he asked, staring at the sparkle of precious stones on the white of the cloth. “Have you robbed a temple?”

“When I was a boy I saw a conjurer put his head in the mouth of a lion,” declared Chimham. “That is what I am doing now: I am placing myself in your power. No, my friend, this is not loot. I do some trading myself. All these articles I expect to sell to merchants in Antioch.”

Basil reached out a finger and touched the smooth surface of a ruby as though doubting its reality. “I do not understand,” he said with a frown. “Why do you work as a mere camel driver when you carry such wealth as this?”

“To engage in trade a man must go from place to place. Could I afford to fit out a caravan myself? Let me explain the situation to you. The only safe way to transport goods is by caravans of such size that raiders do not dare risk an attack. This puts trade in the hands of a very few men. Joseph of Arimathea was the richest of them all, although your father in Antioch was one to reckon with. A little man, desiring to have his share, must do as I do. I hire myself as a driver and I carry goods secretly from one place to another, trading with merchants of the East who themselves lack the resources of the great caravan owners. They trust me with goods to offer dealers of their own size in Jerusalem and Caesarea and Antioch. I am paid a share of the profits on all sales I make. As I have no difficulty in finding buyers, I do very well.

“I break a rule of the road in doing this,” he went on. “No camel man is allowed to do any trading on his own account. If Adam knew what I am doing, he would seize everything I have and then he would have me beaten out of the caravan. After that I would be on a list and I would be as much of an outcast as a leper with a bell around his neck.” He indulged in a broad grin of self-congratulation. “Yes, I do very well. Some time
ago I decided that, as I was taking such risks anyway, I might as well take more. I buy some goods myself now and take the chance of selling them. My profit on these sales is—well, it is quite colossal.”