“Then welcome is he, as well,” said Kubilai, nodding amiably to me. “But the priests, friend Nicolò, do they follow behind you, uu?”

My father and uncle explained apologetically, but not abjectly, that we had failed to bring the requested one hundred missionary priests—or any priests at all—because they had had the misfortune to return home during the papal interregnum and the consequent disarray of the Church hierarchy. (They did not mention the two faint-hearted Friars Preachers who had come no farther than the Levant.) While they explained, I took the opportunity to look closely at this most powerful monarch in the world.

The Khan of All Khans was then just short of his sixtieth birthday, an age which in the West would have counted him an ancient, but he was still a hale and sturdy specimen of mature manhood. For a crown, he wore a simple gold morion helmet, like an inverted soup bowl, with nape and jugular lappets depending from its back and sides. His hair, what I could see of it under the morion, was gray but still thick. His full mustache and his beard, which was close-trimmed in the style worn by shipwrights, were more pepper than salt. His eyes were rather round, for a Mongol, and bright with intelligence. His ruddy complexion was weathered but not wrinkled, as if his face had been carved from well-seasoned walnut. His nose was his only unhandsome feature, it being short like those of all Mongols, but also bulbous and quite red. His garments were all of splendid silks, thickly brocaded with figures and patterns, and they covered a figure that was stout but nowise suety. On his feet were soft boots of a peculiar leather; I learned later that they were made from the skin of a certain fish, which is alleged to allay the pains of gout, the only affliction I ever heard the Khakhan complain of.

“Well,” he said, when my father and uncle had finished, “perhaps your Church of Rome shows a cunning wisdom in keeping close its mysteries.”

I was still holding my newly formed opinion that the Khan Kubilai was like any other mortal—as evidenced by his posturings for our benefit during the proceedings of the Cheng—and now he seemed to validate that opinion, for he went on talking, as chattily as any ordinary man making idle conversation with friends.

“Yes, your Church may be right not to send missionaries here. When it comes to religion, I often think that none is better than too much. We already have Nestorian Christians, and they are ubiquitous and vociferous, to the point of pestilence. Even my old mother, the Dowager Khatun Sorghaktani, who long ago converted to that faith, is still so besotted with it that she harangues me and every other pagan she meets. Our courtiers are lately desperate to avoid meeting her in the corridors. Such fanaticism defeats its own aims. So, yes, I believe your Roman Christian Church may well attract more converts if it pretends to stand aloof from the herd. That is the way of the Jews, you know. Thus the few pagans who do get accepted into Judaism can feel flattered and honored by the fact.”

“Oh, please, Sire,” my father said anxiously. “Do not compare the True Faith with the heretic Nestorian sect. And do not equate it with the despised Judaism. Blame me and Mafio, if you will, for our error of timing. But at any and all other times, I sincerely assure you, the Church of Rome holds open its warm embrace to enfold all who desire salvation.”

The Khakhan said sharply, “Why, uu?”

That was my first experience of that particular one of Kubilai’s attributes, but I was often to remark it thereafter. The Khakhan could be as congenial and discursive and loquacious as an old woman, when it suited his mood and purpose. But when he wanted to know something, when he wanted an answer, when he sought a particle of information, he could suddenly emerge from the clouds of garrulity—his own or a whole roomful of other people’s—and swoop like a falcon to strike to the meat of a matter.

“Why?” echoed Uncle Mafio, taken aback. “Why does Christianity seek to save all mankind?”

“But we told you years ago, Sire,” said my father. “The faith which preaches love and which was founded on Jesus, the Christ and Savior, is the only hope of bringing about perpetual peace on earth, and plenty, and ease of body and mind and soul, and good will among men. And after life, an eternity of bliss in the Bosom of Our Lord.”

I thought my father had put the case for Christianity as well as any ordained cleric could have done. But the Khakhan only smiled sadly and sighed.

“I had hoped you would bring learned men of persuasive arguments, good Brothers Polo. Fond as I am of you, and much as I respect your own convictions, I fear that you—like my dowager mother and like every missionary I have ever met—offer only unsupported asseveration.”

Before my father or uncle could profess further, Kubilai launched into another of his periphrases:

“I do indeed remember your telling me how your Jesus came to earth, with His message and His promise. That was more than one thousand and two hundred years ago, you said. Well, I myself have lived long, and I have studied the histories of times before my own. In all ages, it seems, all sorts of religions have held out promises of worldwide peace and bounty and good health and brotherly love and pervading happiness—and some kind of Heaven hereafter. About the hereafter I know nothing. But of my own knowledge, most of the people on this earth, including those who pray and worship with sincerest faith and devotion, remain poor and sickly and unhappy and unfulfilled and in utter detestation of each other—even when they are not actively at war, which is seldom.”

My father opened his mouth, perhaps to comment on the incongruity of a Mongol deploring war, but the Khakhan went on:

“The Han people tell a legend about a bird called the jing-wei. Since the beginning of time, the jing-wei has been carrying pebbles in its beak, to fill in the limitless, bottomless Sea of Kithai and make solid land of it, and the jing-wei will continue that futile endeavor until the other end of time. So it must be, I think, with faiths and religions and devotions. You can hardly deny that your own Christian Church has been playing the jing-wei bird for twelve whole centuries now—forever futile, forever fatuously promising what it can never provide.”

“Never, Sire?” said my father. “Enough pebbles will fill a sea. Even the Sea of Kithai, in time.”

“Never, friend Nicolò,” the Khakhan said flatly. “Our learned cosmographers have proved that the world is more sea than land. There do not exist enough pebbles.”

“Facts cannot prevail against faith, Sire.”

“Nor against adamant folly, I fear. Well, well, enough of this. You are men in whom we placed our trust, and you have failed that trust in not fetching the priests requested. However, it is a custom here: never to dispraise men of good breeding in the presence of others.” He turned to the Mathematician, who had been listening to those exchanges with an expression of polite boredom. “Master Lin-ngan, will you kindly retire, uu? Leave me alone with these Masters Polo while I chastise them for their nonfeasance.”

I was startled and angry and a little uneasy. So that was why he had had us present in the Cheng to observe his capricious judgments—to have us already fearful and trembling even before we heard his judgment on us. Had we come all this weary way only for some frightful punishment? But he surprised me again. When Lin-ngan had gone, he chuckled and said:

“There. All the Han are notorious for their swift conveyance of gossip, and Lin-ngan is a true Han. The whole court already knew of your priestly mission, and now it will be told that our conversation concerned nothing else. Therefore, let us proceed to the nothing-else.”

Uncle Mafio said, smiling, “There are numerous nothing-elses to speak of, Sire. Which first?”