More overpowering than Acre’s stink was its noise. In every alley wide enough for a sitting rug to be spread, there were vendors, shoulder to shoulder, squatting behind little heaps of trashy merchandise—scarves and ribbons, shriveled oranges, overripe figs, pilgrims’ shells and palm leaves—every man of them bellowing to be heard above the others. Beggars, legless or blind or leprous, whined and sniveled and clawed at our sleeves as we passed. Asses, horses and mangy-furred camels—the first camels I had ever seen—shouldered us out of their way as they shuffled through the garbage of the narrow lanes. They all looked weary and miserable under their heavy loads, but they were driven by the drumming sticks and bawled curses of their herders. Groups of men of all nations stood about conversing at the top of their lungs. I suppose some of their talk dealt with mundane matters of trade, or the war, or maybe just the weather, but their conversations were so clamorous as to be indistinguishable from raging quarrels.
I said to my father, when we were in a street wide enough for us to walk abreast, “You said that you were bringing trade goods’ on this journey. I did not see any merchandise put aboard the Anafesto in Venice, and I do not see anything of that nature now. Is it still on the ship?”
He shook his head. “To have brought a pack train’s load of goods would have been to tempt the innumerable bandits and thieves between us and our destination.” He hefted the one small pack he was carrying at that moment, having refused to relinquish it to any of the porters. “Instead, we are carrying something light and inconspicuous, but of great trading value.”
“Zafràn!” I exclaimed.
“Just so. Some in pressed bricks, some in loose hay. And also a good number of the culms.”
I laughed. “Surely you will not stop to plant them, and wait a whole year for the harvest.”
“If circumstances require, yes. One must try to be prepared against all contingencies, my boy. Who has, God helps. And other journeyers have traveled on the three-bean march.”
“What?”
My uncle spoke. “The famed and feared Chinghiz Khan, grandfather of our Kubilai, conquered most of the world in exactly that slow-marching manner. His armies and all their families had to cross the entire vast extent of Asia, and they were far too numerous to have lived off the land, whether by pillaging or scavenging. No, they carried seeds for planting, and animals fit for breeding. Whenever they had marched to the limit of their rations, and beyond the reach of their supply trains, they simply stopped and settled. They planted their grains and beans, bred their horses and cattle, and waited for the harvest and the calving. Then, again well fed and well provisioned, they moved on toward the next objective.”
I said, “I heard that they ate every tenth man of their own men.”
“Nonsense!” said my uncle. “Would any commander decimate his fighting men? He might as sensibly command them to eat their swords and spears. And the weapons would be about equally edible. I doubt that even a Mongol has teeth capable of chewing another warrior Mongol. No, they stopped and planted and harvested, and moved again, and stopped again.”
My father said, “They called that the three-bean march. And it inspired one of their war cries. Whenever the Mongols fought their way into an enemy city, Chinghiz would shout, ‘The hay is cut! Give your horses fodder!’ And that was the signal for the horde to go wild, to plunder and rape and ravage and slaughter. Thus they laid waste Tashkent and Bukhara and Kiev and many another great city. It is said that when the Mongols took Herat, in India Aryana, they butchered every last one of its inhabitants, to the number of nearly two million. Ten times the population of Venice! Of course, of Indians such a diminution is hardly worth remark.”
“The three-bean march sounds efficient enough,” I conceded, “but intolerably slow.”
“He who endures, wins,” said my father. “That slow march took the Mongols all the way to the borders of Poland and Romania.”
“And all the way to here,” added my uncle. We were just then passing two swarthy men in clothing that appeared to be made of hides, much too heavy and hot for the climate. To them Uncle Mafìo said, “Sain bina.”
They both looked slightly startled, but one of them responded, “Mendu, sain bina!”
“What language was that?” I asked.
“Mongol,” said my uncle. “Those two are Mongols.”
I stared at him, then turned to stare at the men. They were also walking with their heads turned, looking wonderingly back at us. The streets of Acre teemed with so many people of exotic features and complexions and raiment that I could not yet distinguish one kind of foreigner from another. But those were Mongols? The orda, the orco, the bogle, the terror of my childhood? The bane of Christianity and menace to all Western civilization? Why, they might have been merchants of Venice, exchanging a “bon zorno” with us as we all promenaded on the Riva Ca’ de Dio. Of course, they did not look like merchants of Venice. Those two men had eyes like slits in faces like well-tanned leather … .
“Those are Mongols?” I said, thinking of the miles and the millions of corpses they must have tramped across to get to the Holy Land. “What are they doing here?”
“I have no idea,” said my father. “I daresay we will find out in good time.”
“Here in Acre,” said my uncle, “as in Constantinople, there seem to be at least a few persons of every nationality on earth. Yonder goes a black man, a Nubian or an Ethiope. And that woman there is certainly an Armeniyan: each of her breasts is exactly as large as her head. The man with her I would say is a Persian. Now, the Jews and Arabs I can never tell apart, except by their garb. That one yonder has on his head a white tulband, which Islam forbids to Jews and Christians, so he has to be a Muslim … .”
His speculations were interrupted because we were almost run down by a war horse ridden at an uncaring canter through the tangled streets. The eight-pointed cross on the rider’s surcoat identified him as a Knight of the Order of the Hospital of San Zuàne of Jerusalem. He went past with a noise of jingling chain mail and creaking leather, but with no apology for his rudeness and not even a nod to us brother Christians.
We came to the square of buildings set aside for Venetians, and the porters led us to one of the several inns there. Its landlord met us at the entrance, and he and my father exchanged some deep bows and flowery greetings. Though the landlord was an Arab, he spoke in Venetian: “Peace be upon you, my lords.”
My father said, “And on you, peace.”
“May Allah give you strength.”
“Strong have we become.”
“The day is blessed which brings you to my door, my lords. But Allah has led you to choose well. My khane has clean beds, and a hammam for your refreshment, and the best food in Akko. Even now, a lamb is being stuffed with pistachios for the evening meal. I have the honor to be your servant, and my miserable name is Ishaq, may you speak it with not too much contempt.”
We introduced ourselves, and each of us thereafter was addressed by the landlord and servants as Sheikh Folo, because the Arabs have no p in their own language, and find it difficult to make the sound when speaking any other. As we Folos were disposing our belongings about our room, I asked my father and uncle, “Why is a Saracen so hospitable to us, his enemies?”
My uncle said, “Not all Arabs are engaged in this jihad—which is their name for a holy war against Christianity. The ones here in Acre are profiting too much from it to take sides, even with their fellow Muslims.”
“There are good Arabs and there are bad,” said my father. “The ones now fighting to oust all Christians from the Holy Land—from the entire eastern Mediterranean—are actually the Mamluks of Egypt, and they are very bad Arabs indeed.”