Veritas (Atto Melani) (41 page)

“But we knew most of this already,” I objected. “What we really want to know is why the Golden Apple has that name. Otherwise we’ll never understand why the Turks talked
about it to Eugene of Savoy, and why they said they came
soli soli soli
, which is to say all alone. And we’ll never truly understand what Dànilo said before he
died.”

“Just a moment,” Populescu protested. “I haven’t finished.”

The story actually began, he explained, in the year 1529, during the first great siege of Vienna by the Turks. The date was familiar to me by now: in that year the armies of Suleiman the
Magnificent had set up their general headquarters on the plain of Simmering, where Maxmilian was later to create the Place with No Name.

“As everyone knows,” said Populescu, “after the long siege Suleiman’s army had to give up the idea of conquest and go back home because of an exceptionally early and
harsh winter, and the cold was too much for the Ottomans in their tents.”

Suleiman then pointed out to his men the bell tower of St Stephen’s, which could be seen very clearly from the Turkish camp. The Sultan could have given the order to destroy it by cannon
fire, but instead said: “This time round we have to renounce the conquest of Vienna. But one day we will succeed! On that day, the tower you see will become a minaret for Mahometan prayer,
and alongside it will rise a mosque. For this reason I want the tower to bear my own sign as well!”

And so Suleiman had them make a massive ball of pure gold, big enough to hold three bushels of grain, and sent it to the Viennese, offering an exchange: if they hoisted the ball to the top of
the bell tower of St Stephen, Suleiman would refrain from destroying it by cannon fire. The Emperor agreed, and the ball was placed on the top of the tower.

“That is why Vienna has been known ever since as the Golden Apple of Germany and Hungary,” concluded Populescu.

“But I found out something else,” intervened Opalinski. “I questioned an Infidel stableman of Ofen, which is to say Buda in Hungary, who in turn had spoken to the interpreter
in Agha’s retinue, Yussuf, also from Ofen.”

There was a murmur of approval, mixed with concern: one of the group had succeeded in getting information directly from the feared Ottomans.

“It wasn’t easy,” Janitzki stated. “At first he was very diffident. He didn’t speak a word of Italian or German, and only understood a little
lingua
franca
, the Ottoman jargon imported to Constantinople by Venetian and Genoese merchants.”

Opalinski had approached the Infidel stableman, invoking Allah several times by way of greeting, in order not to arouse any suspicion, and had then started with the questions: but the other man
had not been taken in and had asked at once:

“Say, Turque, who be you? Be Anabaptist? Zuinglist? Coffist? Hussite? Morist? Fronista? Be pagana? Lutheran? Puritan? Bramin? Moffin? Zurin?”

“Mahometan, Mahometan!” Jan had given the obvious answer to his diffident interlocutor, concerned to know whether he was of another religious faith.

“Hei valla, hei valla,” the stable-keeper said, seeming a little reassured. “And what your name?”

“Giurdina,” lied Opalinski.

“Be good Giurdina Turk?” the stable-keeper asked, with one finger raised, wanting to make certain of the Pole’s loyalty to the Sultan.

“Ioc, ioc,” he reassured him.

“You not be plotter? You not be cheat?”

“No, no, no!”

At which point the Infidel had started up:

This was the traditional greeting in
lingua franca
, indicating complete trust in the interlocutor. From now on Opalinski could ask any favour he wanted from the Infidel
stable-keeper.

“Tch,” Populescu snorted impatiently with a touch of envy. “You’ve made it quite clear how learned you are and we admire your infinite knowledge. Now please get to the
point!”

According to what Opalinski had learned from the Agha’s interpreter, thanks to the good offices of the stable-keeper, as soon as Suleiman’s army left Vienna, Ferdinand, the
Emperor’s brother, had a holy cross placed on top of the ball. When Suleiman heard this, he flew into a rage and announced a new invasion. And so, putting enormous pressure on the
Sultan’s coffers and those of his financial backers (already ruined by the failure of the siege), the Turkish army in 1532 invaded Styria and ravaged it. Luckily, once again he failed to
enter Vienna; in fact, he did not even get there: the fortress of Gün in Styria, and its heroic commander Nicklas Jurischitsch, although fully aware they faced a certain and horrible death,
chose to resist to the bitter end and so, paying with their own lives, they succeeded in saving the capital. The imperial army commanded by Charles V in person arrived and drove Suleiman back,
inflicting on him a loss of ten thousand men.

“It was truly a fortunate year, that 1532,” sighed the Greek Simonis, delighted at the account of the defeats of the hated Ottomans. “The imperial forces, commanded by the
Genoese Andrea Doria, freed Patrass from the Turks along with other cities in southern Greece. Ah, what glorious times! Rejoice, Penicek!”

And Penicek, obedient as usual to the commands of his Barber, began to laugh.

“But not like that,” Simonis upbraided him, “with pleasure and satisfaction!”

So Penicek mimed contentment: he nodded and shook his fists in a pathetic little performance while they all mocked him.

“More!” ordered the Greek.

Penicek got to his feet, continuing the same gestures, until Opalinski, sniggering, gave him a thwacking kick in his behind. The poor Pennal, who was already lame by nature, fell heavily to the
floor.

“He knows Italian as well,” I observed.

“Yes, but he’s not part of our little Bolognese group. He studied at Padua, this dunce, and you can tell!” sneered Opalinski.

However, the Emperor, Opalinski went on, when Penicek, thoroughly humiliated, took his seat again, judged it wiser to remove the holy cross from the golden ball and to make a peace treaty with
the Sultan. Ever since then the ball has been the symbol of Vienna for the Turks, and their objective.

“Just a moment, there’s something wrong here,” I objected. “Simonis, you told me that for the Ottomans the Golden Apple means not only Vienna but also Constantinople,
Buda and Rome. But if I remember correctly, Constantinople was conquered by the Turks several centuries ago.”

“Yes, in 1453,” answered Koloman and Dragomir in unison; clearly between one amorous adventure and another they had found the time to learn a few historical dates.

“And so long before Suleiman besieged Vienna, in 1529,” I remarked. “Simonis, you explained that the Golden Apple indicates the objective of the Ottoman conquest. So why
indicate Constantinople as the Golden Apple, if that name only came up during the later siege of Vienna, when Constantinople had already been conquered?”

“Simple: because in Constantinople too there was a gilded ball,” Koloman intervened. “As you know, I asked the monks, who always know everything. In the Augustinian monastery I
spoke to an Italian monk, who was evangelist and confessor to the Turkish prisoners of war who had asked to convert to the True Faith.”

According to what the monk had told Koloman, it all went back to an ancient Byzantine legend, when the ancient statue of Emperor Constantine used to stand in Constantinople. Some claim that the
statue was of the Emperor Justinian. Whichever it was, the statue, all gilded, stood opposite the imposing church of St Sophia, on a great column. In his outstretched left hand the Emperor held an
orb, also of gold, and pointed it threateningly towards the East.

It was a kind of warning to the people in the East. It was intended to signify that he, the Emperor, held power, symbolised by the orb, in his hand and they could do nothing against him.
According to some the orb was surmounted by the holy cross: an Imperial Orb, therefore, rather than a Golden Apple.”

Other Turkish prisoners, continued Koloman, had told the monk that the statue in front of St Sophia was of the Madonna, not of Justinian or Constantine. It stood on a green column, and in her
hand the Madonna held a miraculous stone of red garnet, as large as a pigeon’s egg. They say that the stone was so splendid it lit up the whole building, and travellers came to see it from
every country, also because at the foot of the green column the holy remains of the Magi had been buried. But during the night of the birth of the Prophet, as the Turks call Mahomet, the statue of
the Madonna collapsed.

“And the garnet stone?” we all asked.

“The monk told me that according to some people it’s now at
Kizil Elma,
which is to say the Golden Apple. Others claim it was stolen and taken to Spain. Yet others say it
was walled up in the side of St Sophia that looks towards Jerusalem.”

We looked at one another, a little confused.

“I still don’t understand,” I declared. “And it’s not clear who Eyyub and the forty thousand martyrs were, the ones poor Dànilo talked about.”

“Maybe some Pontevedrin rubbish, which has nothing to do with the Golden Apple,” conjectured Opalinski.

“We’ll have to get more information,” said Populescu. “Maybe my brunette at the coffee shop can help us: you know, she told my fortune!”

“Does she read hands?” asked Koloman.

“No, coffee grounds. For the first time I saw how it’s done.”

The young woman had served Populescu a good cup of boiling coffee, telling him not to drink it all, but to leave a little at the bottom. And then our friend followed her instructions: holding
the cup in his left hand, shaking it three times he stirred the mixture up again, and then drained the contents into the saucer, and finally passed the cup to the Armenian woman. After scrutinising
and interpreting the vague shapes that the coffee had left at the bottom, the young woman gave a clear and unequivocal response.

“The trumpet, rectangle and mouse came up,” said Populescu, all excited.

“And what does that mean?” asked Opalinski.

“The trumpet indicates great changes on account of a new love.”

“It’s true, love changes people,” Koloman mocked him. “You’re always so much like yourself that not even your fingernails grow!”

“Very witty. Then the rectangle: it means great erotic activity, and that hits it right on the nail.”

“Why, have you been raped?” asked Simonis.

“Cretin. You should have seen how my little one looked at me, while she explained the rectangle to me. It was as if she were saying: you’ll see what we can get up to . . .”

“All right, Nostradamus,” said Koloman with a sceptical smile, “and the mouse?”

“Well, that’s the least favourable of the three signs but, judging from the rubbish you come out with, that’s right on the nail as well. In fact it means: watch our for your
friends.”

“But you haven’t got any!” exclaimed Koloman, while the whole group burst into ferocious laughter, which was the last straw for Populescu.

“Laugh away, but I hope my little brunette in the coffee shop .. .”

“Hope away, she’ll never go with you,” sneered Koloman.

“Nor with you: she hates the stink of armpits.”

We took our leave of Koloman and Opalinski, not without paying them for the work carried out so far, and then took some rapid refreshment with Penicek and Dragomir in a nearby
taphouse (chicken soup, fried fish, mixed dumplings, boiled meat, roast capon and wild cockerel). Then I prepared to travel back to Porta Coeli.

Instead Simonis surprised me with an unexpected piece of news:

“We must hurry, Signor Master, Hristo might already be waiting for us,” he said, inviting me to climb back onto Penicek’s cart and ordering the Pennal to set off towards the
great space of the Prater.

“Of course, Hristo. But didn’t you say that he would join us at the meeting?”

“You must forgive me this little lie, Signor Master. As you saw, he didn’t come. But it’s not that he couldn’t. The fact is that he didn’t want to talk in front of
everyone.”

“Why on earth not?”

“I don’t know. I saw him briefly this morning and he told me that that’s what he preferred, because there is something he finds suspicious.”

“And what is it?”

“He didn’t tell me. But he did mention that he thinks the real meaning of the Agha’s sentence is all hidden in the words
soli soli soli.
”

“And why?”

“He said that’s it to do with checkmate.”

“With checkmate?” I said with a mixture of surprise and scepticism. “In what sense?”