Tom Swan and the Head of St. George Part Five: Rhodes Read Online Free PDF

torchlight as marble—heavily veined grey marble. From ancient Greece.
    ‘It is fascinating,’ Swan said. ‘But I have to be at dinner in the hall. Shall we go back?’
    ‘Yes,’ Salim said, with some relief. He led the way, apparently unconscious of Swan’s careful movements behind him.
    Spring came early in Greece. The flowers burst forth, so that the fields outside the town were like intricate Persian carpets, with tiny flowers each a different colour as far as the eye could see.
    The first ship in from Italy brought news of a great peace. There was immense excitement in Rome, and Nicholas V, the Pope, was convening a great council to declare a crusade to rescue Constantinople.
    Swan heard all this over a cup of wine. He walked quickly back to his barracks and found Fra Tommaso – only to have his bubble of militant Christian enthusiasm burst by the old man’s cynicism.
    ‘Peace between Sforza and Venice – certainly. I’d heard of it before we cleared Ancona,’ Fra Tommaso said. ‘Peace in Italy? I suppose it’s possible.’ He laughed. ‘A crusade? Honestly, young man, where do you get these notions? No one in Europe actually cares about the loss of Constantinople! The Italians want to make money, the French want to make war, the English … perhaps want to make beer. The Emperor, may his name be praised, is busy trying to make certain there won’t be a crusade, and trust me, that will be his view right up until Mehmet marches to the gates of Vienna.’
    Swan sagged. ‘Oh.’
    ‘Listen, boy, you’ve been listening to all the Burgundians and the Frenchmen. They’re eager for a crusade. Good for them – it’s not their cargoes that the Turks will seize. But without a fleet – a fleet of both Venice and Genoa – there is no crusade. Eh?’
    ‘So now what happens?’ Swan asked. ‘We’re ready for sea.’ He thought of the awesome labyrinth under his feet, barely explored.
    ‘As to that – what happens now is that you and I take our ship down to Alexandria, to pay our loving respects to the Mamelukes, who are every bit as much Muslims as the Turks but are preferred by his Holiness. Understand?’ He laughed again.
    ‘No,’ Swan said.
    ‘Good. We’ll sail in the morning. Get your kit aboard.’ Fra Tommaso waved his hand.
    Alexandria was everything that Swan thought a city should be. It was huge – unbelievably big, really, with so many different markets and bazaars that the Englishman wandered from morning until night while the order’s delegation met the Sultan and paid their respects – and some kind of secret tribute.
    After a day as a Christian tourist, Swan decided to see the city as a co-religionist. He had the clothes – all his Turkish clothes had been with Peter, and he liked the idea of going as a Turk, which would prompt fewer questions about any accent there might be to his Arabic. He went ashore in his military gown and changed in the public privy behind the beachfront bazaar. He rolled his Christian clothes into a tight bundle and placed them in the bottom of the small leather bag he carried. Dressed as a Christian, every move he made would be reported.
    Especially a visit to a brothel.
    Dressed as a Turk, he wandered through the waterfront souk, waiting to be challenged. But no such thing took place. Instead, he received a great deal of fawning, and he developed a following of a crowd of small boys, whom he pleased by buying them sweets.
    A woman took the sweets away from one boy and threw them in a pile of dung.
    ‘You know what the Turk wants you for,’ she spat in Arabic that he wasn’t supposed to understand.
    The boys all fled.
    Swan shook his head and continued through the string of markets.
    Alexandria was a dream city – a city almost two thousand years old, and built for trade. The magnificent harbour was packed with Genoese and Venetian shipping, as well as a scattering of French ships and – of all things – an English ship, the Katherine Sturmy. He almost