by Katz, Yoram
Jeanne smiled that disarming smile of hers. “I fully understand. I believe we can reach an agreement that will accommodate both of us.”
“Fine,” Luria relaxed in his chair. “I, too, believe we are going to have no problems here, but these things must be said. Let us begin. We have all the time in the world. I am listening.”
“Thank you,” said Jeanne. “I’ll begin by telling you about my family.” She rolled back her chair and crossed her legs, somewhat impairing Luria’s concentration. “Well,” she began, “the de Charneys come from Normandy, France. The first de Charney we have a record of is Jules. He was a young cavalry officer in the service of William, Duke of Normandy, also known later as William the Conqueror. Jules fought side by side with the Duke in the battle of Hastings in 1066, when William defeated the army of Harold II, King of England and changed the course of English history.”
Jeanne glimpsed at Luria’s face to make sure she did not lose him. History was never Luria’s forte, but from his expression one could imagine that William the Conqueror and the battle of Hastings were household names with him.
“In this battle, Jules saved the Duke’s life. William, who soon became William I of England, never forgot his debt to the bold cavalry officer and with a gesture of endearment, young Jules, now Jules de Charney, won a title and an estate in Normandy. Since then, our family tree has included a wide variety of public figures and free traders, but mostly army officers. De Charneys served in the crusades, helped defeat the Holy Roman Empire in the Thirty Years War, served the great King Louis IV, fought the English during the Seven Years War in India and North America, participated in the French Revolution, and served under Napoleon Bonaparte, Napoleon III and in the two World Wars of the 20th century. In short, my family’s story is a lesson in French history.” Jeanne paused for a moment and smiled. “I hope this history lesson has not worn you down. This was just the background. I am now coming to what brought me here.”
“I find your story fascinating,” said Luria. “Please continue.”
Jeanne smiled again. “I am a student, and I am working on my master’s degree in French History. A few months ago, I had to come up with a subject for my thesis. I chose to focus on one of Napoleon’s unsuccessful campaigns – his Holy Land Campaign, the one in which he was defeated in Acre. I chose this subject because one of the de Charneys actually participated in this campaign, and I was hoping to discover in the family archives something I could use in my thesis. With this in mind, I drove to the old de Charney estate in Normandy, to visit my uncle Claude, who lives there. In the cellar of the house, we have piles of boxes filled with letters and documents, some of which are very old – a real treasure trove for a historian. With the help of Louis, my beloved cousin, who volunteered to assist me, we started digging into the dusty boxes. After a few days of hard work, we found something.
“It was a pack of crumbling letters from 1799, sent from Captain Pascal de Charney of the expeditionary force of General Napoleon Bonaparte in Egypt, to his father Roland in France. Some letters were sent directly from Egypt, and some were written in the Holy Land and sent to France via Cairo. This was fantastic stuff and as soon as I started reading it, I knew I struck gold. There were descriptions of important battles and methods of warfare. There were some new, juicy details about Napoleon’s generals and their intrigues… in short, everything I could dream of. I had all I needed for my thesis and more. And there was something else that greatly aroused my curiosity, perhaps this is the woman in me…”
Jeanne picked up her bag, fumbled inside and pulled out a brown envelope. “In this envelope I have an English translation of a letter sent by Pascal de Charney to his father. It will take a few minutes of your time, but I would like you to read it before we continue our conversation.” She handed him the envelope.
Luria fished out a few printed pages, leaned back in his chair and began reading.
9. North of Acre – May 18th, 1291
Hanging on to a wooden board and swinging among the waves, Yaakov was numb with terror. He heard people screaming for help somewhere far away. Occasionally, when the board was climbing up the waves, he could glimpse back to where the ship had gone down. Tiny figures of people were scattered there, trying to cling to whatever they could find, in order to prolong their miserable lives if only by a little while.
Not long after the ship had left port, advancing slowly for lack of good wind, the deceiving sea started raging in a frightful storm. The ship, which the greedy Sicilian had packed beyond capacity, struggled a bit and then capsized, taking with it most passengers and leaving the rest to suffer the terror of certain death by drowning. No help could be expected. A ship or two, passing in the distance, were too crowded to risk an extra load.
When the ship capsized, Yaakov was thrown further away than most of the others. His head banged against a big wooden board that was floating nearby, and he nearly passed out. The board must have belonged to a piece of furniture or a bed, and had a few cleats protruding from it. Yaakov climbed on it, untied his belt and tied himself to one of those cleats. Next, he produced the cloth bag he still had on his body, pulled out of it a prayer shawl – a tallit, rolled it and used it to fasten himself to another cleat. He then raised his head and looked around.
He knew that under the circumstances he should consider himself lucky, but he sure was not feeling lucky. Swept uncontrollably in the water, he was scared to death. He was a pawn in the hands of mighty forces, for which he, Yaakov, the little Jew from Acre, was but a tiny wood shaving to play with.
The only thing he could do now was to mumble some confused prayers to the Creator of the universe to have mercy and save him from sinking into the abyss, like He did for Jonah in his time. As the waves were swinging the wooden board up and down, Yaakov gazed around him, trying to see through the water spray. Blood trickled from his forehead into his eyes, and further blurred his vision. Through the blur, he suddenly noticed something. He strained his eyes.
It was a human body.
Yaakov guessed it must have been one of the unlucky drowned passengers, but as the body swept closer he noticed movement.
The man was alive!
The man was still trying to swim, but his strength was ebbing and Yaakov noticed that the water around him was stained brown-red. He rowed with his hands and drew a bit closer. For a moment, he hesitated what to do next but then, the man raised his head and opened his eyes. Their gazes crossed, and Yaakov realized he knew this pair of gray-blue eyes.
It was the Templar who had saved his life just a few hours ago.
Yaakov was not sure what to do. A Templar knight was not the sort of company a Jew could feel comfortable with. However, Yaakov owed his life or whatever was left of it to this man and, gentile or not, his heart did not permit him to abandon him to die. He took hold of one of the cleats with his left hand and extended his right. Somehow, the man managed to grasp it. It was an immensely trying ordeal for both, and the heavy mail the knight was wearing under his garments did not make any of it easier. The wooden board was on the verge of capsizing a few times but eventually, in some inexplicable way, Yaakov found himself still on it, with the oversized gentile, robbed of his last remains of vigor by the immense effort, lying helplessly by his side.
The Knight’s tunic was divided into two wings, which went from his waist down to his knees. Yaakov put this design, originally meant to facilitate riding, to good use. He fastened the knight by his tunic’s wings to two cleats protruding from each side of him, thus hitching him safely onto the board. Having rolled the tunic back, Yaakov could see the ugly gaping wound in his left thigh, with blood spurting from it. Yaakov was no medic, but his life experience had taught him a thing or two about taking care of the wounded, and he knew that if he did not stop the bleeding, the man would soon hemorrhage to death; he had to act fast.
He pulled out again his cloth bag, which was now almost empty without the tallit, and retrieved from it two little leather boxes, each attach
ed to long, narrow leather straps – his tefillin[xii], which he got from his father for his Bar Mitzvah.
He put the part intended to be worn across the forehead back in the bag and was left with the part intended for the left hand. He proceeded to wrap the long strap around the Templar’s thigh, just above the wound, and firmly tightened it. The knight groaned in pain and lost consciousness. A few minutes later he came to. His eyes drilled into Yaakov's, and his lips trembled.
“I know who you are, Jew,” he whispered with great effort, his voice barely audible over the sound of the waves. “I thank you. You are a good man. The Lord will repay you.”
“I owe you my life…” said Yaakov.
The knight tried to speak up but was finding it difficult. “Listen to me, Jew,” he whispered. Yaakov brought his ear closer to the man’s mouth, so he would be able to hear him above the roar of the sea. “I have a request from you…” moaned the Templar. “I want you… to do something for me…”
He cried in pain, muttered a few incoherent words, which Yaakov could not understand, and then closed his eyes and lost consciousness again. Yaakov checked the improvised tourniquet. He tightened the strap a bit more. The bleeding almost stopped now.
Long minutes passed, with Yaakov doing his best to keep them both afloat on the small raft, which went on swinging up and down the waves. He noted gratefully that the waves were somewhat subsiding now.
Suddenly, the knight groaned and Yaakov turned to look at him. Once again, he was staring into those eyes.
“What is your name, Jew?”
“Yaakov.”
“Thank you, Yaakov.” The man’s voice was fading away. “Please… by the name of God, do as I asked of you…” his voice degenerated into a murmur.
Yaakov did not understand. “What did you say?” he queried. “I did not hear… I do not know what your request is…”
The man did not seem to hear him at all. His lips were trembling, and he was trying to say something. Yaakov bent over him, his ear touching the dying man’s mouth, but he heard nothing. A full minute passed by.
“Strange are the ways of the Lord,” said the Templar suddenly with great effort and then added in Latin, “Non nobis Domine, non nobis, sed nomine tuo, da gloriam.[xiii]"
He grew still but his eyes remained open, staring at Yaakov.
* * *
It was just before dawn when Yaakov woke up. He touched himself, groping anxiously. His entire body felt bruised and wounded. He was aching in parts of his body he never knew existed, his eyes burned and his head felt very heavy. He touched his forehead and let out a cry of pain. He then sat up with an effort and looked around him. He was sitting on a sea shore. The sea was still now. Stones, plunks and all sorts of debris were scattered around chaotically.
Where am I?
Then, in a flash, the events of the past day came rushing back. The synagogue, the Saracen, the Templar, the port, the sinking ship…
Not far away he saw the wooden board which had saved his life, and noticed a large object on the ground next to it. Yaakov tried to stand up but found it too difficult. He crawled on all four towards the board, and examined the object lying there. It was the Templar, lying on his back with his face covered by the wings of his tunic. Yaakov hesitated for a moment and then struggled with the cloth which covered the head like a shroud, pried it loose and pulled hard at it. The knight’s head rose for a second and immediately dropped, its back hitting the moist sand with a thud. The gray-blue eyes were wide open and staring at Yaakov, but the man was not moving. The Templar was dead.
Yaakov was surprised at his emotions. He felt genuinely sorry for this stranger, with whom fate had taken so much trouble in entangling his life, in such an odd way and within such a short span of time. He retreated and sat upon the sand next to the dead Templar, trying to assess his situation.
He did not know where he was. It must have been north of Acre. Was he near Tyre? Sidon? He had no idea. In any case, his chances of reaching a safe haven were slim. Where could a Jew find shelter in this time and place? If he had some valuables with which to buy help… but he had handed everything to that abominable Sicilian, de Flor. A thought flashed through his head. He struggled with it for a while but soon made up his mind. This was no time for vacillations.
He got up on his feet. It hurt, but he was encouraged to find out that the pain was not intolerable. For a while, he just stood there, swaying on his feet, until he managed to stabilize himself and take a few steps forward. When he reached the body, he got down on his knees and touched it, fighting an instinct which held him back. Yaakov was a Cohen[xiv] and the dead were impure, untouchable for him. He fought to ignore that and reminded himself that this was Pikuach Neffesh[xv]. Somehow strengthened by this thought, he proceeded to tear whatever was left of the tunic and felt it with his hands, searching. When he was convinced there was nothing of value there, he cast it aside and started groping the body with both hands.
The dead man’s torso was protected by his mail of small metal rings, which Yaakov found difficult to remove. Fortunately, it had some slack, so he rolled it up as far as he could and pushed his hands underneath it, feeling the garment under the mail. For some time, he fumbled his way around, embracing the dead knight in the process, with the effort exhausting and the whole scene sickening him. Eventually, he felt something around the left armpit and managed to pry it out. He crawled a few steps aside to examine it. It was a small, swollen leather bag. Yaakov opened it. It was full of gold coins.
He crawled back to the body, once more overcoming his nausea, and pushed his hands inside, now towards the right armpit. His reasoning was immediately rewarded - there was some swelling there too. After a short struggle, he managed to pry the object loose and pull it out. He moved aside again and sat down to take a look at his booty.
It was a cylindrical package, which somebody had taken real good care to wrap in treated, waterproof leather. This reminded him of something. He put the package down on the sand, rose to his feet and started searching on his own body until he found what he was looking for. He pulled out the package he had been carrying since the morning of the previous day and which, incredibly, was still there, and laid it on the sand next to the other one. They were almost identical. Both packages were cylindrical, of similar size, and both were carefully bound in waterproof leather. This was not a good time to open them and he concealed both under his wet clothes.
What should he do now? How could he get to a safe place? Where would he find a Jewish community? He was starting to comprehend the magnitude of the predicament he was in.
The sun now rose above the horizon in the east, and suddenly Yaakov knew what he had to do. He returned to the body, knelt down and untied the tourniquet from the dead man’s thigh. ‘These tefillin are defiled with the impurity of the dead,’ he thought. ‘God forgive me.’
He rose to his feet and took a short walk to distance himself from the corpse. He turned south south-east, supposedly towards Jerusalem, and wrapped himself in his wet tallit. He then pulled out of his bag the other part of the tefillin and tightened it around his head. Next, he proceeded to wrap the blood soiled ex-tourniquet, the strap of the tefillin of hand, around his left arm and hand. He took care to end it by wrapping it through his fingers, creating a shape similar to the Hebrew letter ‘Shin’, standing for ‘Shaddai’ - one of the names of God, with the small black box positioned on the back of his hand.
When he finished, he closed his eyes and prayed the Morning Prayer with the rising sun.
10. The de Charney Letters, 1799
Germinal 30th, Year 7 of the French Republic,
(April 17th, 1799)
Tiberias.
* * *
Luria raised his head. “What are these strange dates?” he wondered.
“The French revolutionists introduced a new calendar, which started with the founding of the Republic on September 22nd, 1792,” said Jeanne. “In their calendar they had twelve months of thirty days each
, with every month divided into three weeks of ten days. In my translation, I added the dates according to the Gregorian calendar.”
“A ten-day week?” Luria was amused. “That’s quite creative.”
* * *
Dear Papa,
The events that have taken place here since the last time I wrote to you, could fill volumes. Exactly one year has passed since the day we sat together in our warm, lovely home in Normandy. I am a different person now, much changed from the boy who sat opposite you that day. After what I have been through this year, I am starting to understand your words about the significance of family and the importance of faith… we will probably talk a lot about this when, God willing, I am back home safe and sound.
I will now tell you in brief of some of these events, and I will also dwell upon the specific subject that is close to your heart.
On Germinal 8th (March 28th), the first assault upon the walls of Acre began. The Cavalry, under the command of General Murat, was assigned peripheral security tasks, so our part of the fighting was insignificant. However, from where I stood I could see what was happening and with the accounts I later got from my friends, Gaston, the Grenadiers officer, and Bernard, who is a staff officer at the supreme commander’s headquarters, I have formed a clear picture of the battle.
Papa, this was not a day we would wish to remember.
Acre is commanded by Ahmed al-Jazzar (meaning Ahmed the butcher), an old Mamluk with a reputation to match his nickname. The city resides on a small peninsula and is protected by a wall, surrounded by a dry, yet deep, moat.
The assault started at first light with our guns shelling the northeastern corner of the wall. Ever since the disaster at Abukir[xvi] last year, the British have had absolute control of the sea. Now, the damned British, who had appeared from nowhere, captured the heavy guns which were on their way to us by sea, and we were left with limited and ineffective artillery against the defenders of the city. Now our guns were being used against us, and we also suffered from the guns of the English ships, at anchor in Acre’s port.
