The town cannot support such a host, so unofficial camps spring up. Tent bivouacs carpet the riverbanks, mount the foothills, sprawl across the Plain of Sorrows, which seems, at last, to have overthrown its name. Every tailor and bootmaker east of Artacoana has trekked in for the celebration, hoping to earn ten years’ wages in twenty days. Barbers shave men’s skulls for luck. Charcoalers hawk fuel in ribbon-cinched bundles from the backs of their two-wheeled carts; swordmakers set up bichees; stalls in hundreds squat chockablock with fullers, haberdashers, cloth benders, tin- and iron- and bronzesmiths. Alms-beseeching amputees share shops with tattoo artists; snake-handlers split their quarters with peddlers of jute, nazz, and bhang. Boys work the lanes, packing bronze vessels of hot chai on their backs, dispensing cupfuls from spouts set about their waists. One thing Afghanistan does not lack is fish. Speckled and brown trout in tons are towed down from mountain streams by dhuttie pole-boatmen in ingenious wicker floats, the fish still alive in the water. No accommodations remain in the city, so camel trains set up shop at the edge of the desert. A tent bazaar sprawls over hundreds of acres, offering Median vests and shoes, Damascene daggers, quilted aghee caps, and Parthian tunics. Fortune-tellers read the future in cast stones; astrologers scribe it down from the skies. Peddlers of gimcracks and geegaws work in pairs, one bearing before him a great jingling gibbet from which dangle in hundreds finger and toe rings, bracelets, anklets, necklaces, fetishes, amulets, and charms, while his confederate jigs at his side, flogging their common wares. Souvenir images of the bride and groom are painted onto cups and dishes, woven into carpets, lacquered upon trays, and stitched into pennants, prayer bells, and skullcaps; you can buy likenesses of Alexander and Roxane upon beads and coins, cowrie shells, scarves, and undergarments. Troupes of actors and acrobats, jugglers, contortionists, mountebanks, and professional fools put up impromptu shows; poets recite; rhapsodes sing; philosophers edify. I never saw so many amateur orators. One crackpot after another declaims his deranged doctrine atop a stone in the marketplace; within one tented kennel I count half a score, haranguing crowds whose expressions range from zeal to stupefaction. A stroll across the city discovers yogis from India, ascetics from Cos, self-mutilators from Khumar. I watch one sadhu pierce both cheeks with a dozen iron kebab sticks, grinning all the while. His basket brims with coppers from the Macks; apricots and black plums from the Afghans. A girl swallows swords, another contorts her body to set her soles atop her skull. Brazier-men sell sheep brains, poached in the skull; swine’s hooves; bull’s testicles on beds of steaming rice. You can buy eyeballs and knuckles, shrunken skulls, rawhide strings of tusks and teeth, ears and fingers, charms against death and disfigurement, poems to bring love, fortune, happiness; lubricants and asphyxiants, emollients and aphrodisiacs, potion and lotions, emetics and panaceas. I see the same halt fellow chuck his crutches three times in one day. From Babylon have come kite-masters; their paper carp soar aloft on the Afghan gale. Long life, Alexander and Roxane! The union of king and princess will constitute the country’s most glorious day since the birth of Zoroaster-Macks jubilant to be getting out, Afghans ecstatic to see them go.
Meanwhile, hundreds of jurgas and tribal councils are being held. Clemency is the order of the season. The theme of a fresh start animates all.
The weddings, as I said, will be celebrated in the Persian manner. Preliminary events will take place over five days, culminating with the actual marriage on the fifth. Five is the number of love in Persian numerology. Everything in the ceremony must be divisible by five. Five hundred prisoners will be pardoned, five thousand slaves set free. The same number of kites will soar over the palace on the wedding day, and twice five thousand white doves be released at the nuptials’ height.
The ceremony uniting Alexander and the princess Roxane will take place at sunset, the start of the day in the Persian convention. A military tattoo will precede the wedding; it will take place on the plain and be viewed by the dignitaries, Mack and Afghan, who will then mount to the citadel, where the actual ceremony will be performed. When the rites are concluded and the kites and doves have flown, the festivities will begin; they’ll last all night, even after the bride and groom retire at dawn, and into the next day, when the various clemency rites will take place. As for our company, we will rehearse one last time at midmorning, then dine and prepare our uniforms, weapons, and armor. We’ll bathe and have a final barbering, beards trimmed, teeth waxed.
Several days before this, a memorial column is dedicated to the fallen of Greece and Macedon. The ceremony takes place at dawn. Elias’s name and Lucas’s and Tollo’s, with sixty-nine hundred others, have been carved into the stone. Our own Stephanos has composed the valedictory ode:
IN THE COMPANY OF SOLDIERS
In the company of soldiers
I have no need to explain myself.
In the company of soldiers, everybody understands.
In the company of soldiers,
I don’t have to pretend to be a person I’m not
Or strike that pose, however well-intended, that is expected by those who have not known me under arms.
In the company of soldiers all my crimes are forgiven
I am safe
I am known
I am home
In the company of soldiers.
Funeral games accompany these rites. Hundreds come out. The mood is solemn but gay. The Corps of Engineers has built a hippodrome, four stades down and back, round a turning post. The horse races are meant to be all-Greek and Macedonian, so as not to affront the natives, whose participation might be seen by their fellows as honoring the outlanders’ dead. But in the event, so many Bactrian and Sogdian camps ring the racetrack, since there’s no place else to sleep, and these fellows are such keen horsemen, that they are invited too. I myself enter, riding Snow. We win one heat and come third in the next, but in the end campaign fatigue has worn my poor mare to tatters. We finish dead last in the next and join the throng of spectators. I am standing in line with Flag outside the wagering tent when I spy a familiar spin gar, “white beard,” the Afghan term for old man.
Ash, our muleteer of Kandahar, who hired out to me the female porters for the crossing of the Hindu Kush.
I cross to the villain and clap him on the back. “By Zeus, I thought the constables had rounded up all criminals!”
He turns with a gap-toothed grin. “Then how,” he says, “can you remain at large?”
We embrace like brothers. The proverb holds true, that even mortal foes find amity with enough passage of time. “What brings you here, Ash?”
“Mules. What else?”
We find a place out of the crush and catch each other up on the news. “No women this time?” I ask. He elevates both palms to heaven.
Flag tells Ash about me and Shinar.
The old man roars at this jest.
“No, it’s true!”
It takes an oath to heaven to make Ash believe. He twists his beard, trying to remember. “Which one was she?”
“The one you beat. The one I bought from you.”
“God preserve us!” Again the palms to heaven. “This country has made you madder than I thought.”
Flag tells him of Lucas and Ghilla, of their child, and of Lucas’s end. Ash goes sober. “He was a good fellow. May his soul find peace.”
Ash shares a tent, he says, about a mile up the river in the great camp of the Panjshiri. “Dine with me, my friends.”
We can’t. We have to rehearse for the military parade that precedes the wedding. We make plans with Ash, though, to meet again the day of the horse races. As he takes his leave, the old brigand catches my arm.
“Her brother is here, you know.”
He means Shinar’s. I have dreaded this. With so many allied Afghans gathered for the wedding, Baz could be anywhere. He could be in our own camp.
“Where?” Flag demands.
“He serves with the Sogdian lancers attached to the brigade of Hephaestion-he and two of his cousins.
” Ash describes a bivouac several miles out on the plain. “Brother and kin seek to put right the shame brought on their family by your deliverance of his sister. I have heard him speak of it. I did not know you were his object.”
I ask Ash how seriously he takes this.
“One must fear these violent young bucks,” he says, “and fear their wenches more, for A’shaara binds them as pitilessly as an eagle’s claw holds a dove.”
I know what Flag is thinking. Pay the old man, find the brother. Kill him. Part of me favors this. But our own Mack code of philoxenia, “love for the stranger,” forbids shedding the blood of my bride’s clan-and the kinsmen of my infant son.
Besides, I see a chance sent by heaven.
“Now is the Ten Days of Forgiveness, isn’t it, Ash?”
Indeed, he says, such a time may not come again for years. I turn to Flag. “We met with Shinar’s brother before, remember? He never wanted this feud. His heart isn’t in it. He’d leap at the chance to set it aside.”
I feel hopeful for another reason. My son’s birth date is Artemisius 19. This is Annexation Day back home, the anniversary of Apollonia’s incorporation into Greater Macedonia. In my town on that day, every dwelling will be flying the lion standard; the lanes will be filled with dancing. There, too, debts will be forgiven. A good omen.
I ask Ash what we need to do.
“Leave it to me,” he says.
A tribal council must be convened. The clansmen will embrace this prospect. It will be great entertainment; they’ll jabber about it for years. I must appear in person, Ash says, and beseech forgiveness for my crimes.
“Forgiveness, my scarlet ass!” says Flag.
But Ash knows what he’s talking about. “These dussars, ” he says, using the term for rubes or bumpkins, “will take great joy in debating your appeal, Matthias. You must play the part. It may cost you money.” He means reparations. Blood lucre, like to absolve a murder. “Do you have it?” he asks.
“Enough,” says Flag, “for a villain like you to skim his cut.”
But I am heartened.
“You’re welcome to whatever you can claim, Ash. And so is Baz, the brother.”
What is money for anyway? Only to get what you need-or keep away what you dread.
“How soon,” I ask, “can we set this thing up?”
53
The jurga takes place the night before the wedding. A quorum, it seems, cannot be convened earlier because so many of the tribal participants, who are hired troops serving under Alexander, must rehearse during the daylight hours for their companies’ parts in the military review that will precede the morrow’s nuptials. This is fine with Flag and me. Our outfit has to prepare too.
Stephanos lets me out of final rehearsal, so I can get my papers in to the Corps Quartermaster, permitting Shinar and me to be married with the fourteen hundred in the collective ceremony. This rite will take place at the same sunset hour as Alexander and Roxane’s wedding, but outside the fortress gates in the new Greek-style amphitheater that has been carved into the slope of Bal Teghrib, the site where our king first addressed the corps after its crossing of the Hindu Kush.
Flag and I ride out to the Afghan camp. The time is an hour before sunset. Ash is supposed to meet us, to serve as escort and guarantor. He’s nowhere to be found. We grab one of our shikaris instead, a grizzled mountaineer named Jerezrah, to present our dashar, our request for admittance. Alas, the fellow turns out to be of the Agheila, one of the Panjshiri tribes with whom our hosts, who are Pactyans as well but of another order, are at war. They won’t let him in. Now Ash appears. He has been waiting all along, it seems, wondering what is keeping Flag and me. He takes over. Appealing to the spirit of the Days of Forgiveness, he convinces our hosts to permit entry to Jerezrah. Only now Jerezrah’s chapped at the insult and won’t go in. “I have known these bandits all my life,” he says, turning on his heel. “They are as dirty and disreputable as ever.”
Flag, Ash, and I enter the camp. It seems that every rock-hopper for a hundred miles has got noise of the event, and they have congregated eagerly to attend it. They’re a savage-looking pack, armed to the eyeballs, unbarbered for months. Every man carries an elaborately fringed and feathered quirt, whose whip-end he sets before him on the earth when he sits, holding the butt lightly between his fingers, so that when the whole assembly has taken up positions in a circle, the riding-crops all point to the center and all jiggle rhythmically, tapping on the dirt. The spectacle is colorful and, in its way, quite charming.
The mob has now formed up before the chief’s pavilion, a goatskin structure supported by multiple timber columns and fronted by an enormous tent portico, whose entry is carpeted with rugs laid on the earth. We are shown our place. We sit. The sun slips behind the mountains; at once the night air stings with cold. Ash folds his knees on my right. Chiefs and elders sit directly across from us, with Shinar’s brother and cousins standing behind them. No greetings are exchanged, nor is the least notice taken of our arrival. This is customary, says Ash. It is called the “settling in,” when the parties acquaint themselves in stages, by their mutual presence, without direct speech.
The circle buzzes with social jabber. Everyone chatters except Flag and me. Now great brass bowls of water are brought, not to drink but to wash our right hands in. An excited yipping ascends. At once a mound of rice, mutton, and peas appears, trucked in on a four-handled barrow. Everyone digs in. Flag and I do, too, fearing to offer offense if we demur, even though we’ve just bolted a gutbusting supper back at camp. The brother and cousins do not sit. They don’t eat. They maintain their posts immediately behind the headman. I have no idea what this means. Their demeanor is sullen and combative; they stand with arms folded. When the mountain of rice has been devoured, which takes no more than ten minutes, the men begin debating, in Pactyan, the issue of Shinar and her violation of the code of A’shaara. No one invites me or Flag to speak, nor even glances in our direction. The chief and elders keep up a dialogue of their own of abundant mirth, apparently having nothing to do with our case. Passion animates the debate; at one point several clansmen have to be separated, nearly coming to blows. All hands are having a wonderful time.
Suddenly, as if by some signal that everyone can hear except Flag and me, all palaver ceases. Brother and cousins are called forward. They sit, facing me. “Toumah!” bawls an interpreter. “Speak.”
I do. I address the brother and cousin.
“Nah! Nah!”
The master of ceremonies corrects me. I’m supposed to plead my brief to the elders.
I make my case in Greek, with Ash translating. When I finish, a second round of debate begins. Again the headmen pay no attention. Several actually get up and leave, to relieve themselves I assume, returning to resume their animated converse. The period ends. Now Shinar’s brother Baz gets up to speak.
I would feel better if he were more angry. Instead, his manner is flinty and dour. He addresses the elders and the tribe, not me. When he gestures in my direction, which he does infrequently, his voice rises in register. I understand enough Pactyan to reckon that he hates me less as an individual, or for any injury I have personally inflicted upon him, than as a representative of the corps of Macedon, the detested invader. I am to him all aliens, all Macks. He hates us with a crimson passion.
Ash speaks into my ear. “Don’t take this too seriously. The man is good.”
Baz finishes his harangue to the elders and the tribe. Now he turns to me. In terms of cold and stony truculence, he reads out an indictment that would blanch the mane of Zeus. I make out three words from their repetition: “honor,” “insult,” and “justice.”
The brother finishes.
“Now,” prompts Ash, “offer money.”
Start low, he advises. I do. It’s not working. I ante nearly half my total bonus, three years’ pay. I’m getting nowhere.
“I add,” I say, “my horse.”
The congress erupts. Quirts jiggle exuberantly. Tr
ibesmen rap each other with the backs of their right hands (to use the palm, or the left, would constitute a mortal insult). By magic my mare materializes, led by Afghan grooms. The throng surrounds her, five deep. Give these bandits their due; they know horses. From their animated jabbering, it is clear that Snow meets with their approval. I glance to Baz and the cousins. Clansmen are swatting them merrily. It looks good, Flag says. “These sheep-stealers are showing your boy respect.”
He’s right. Men continue congratulating Baz. Certainly no stain of dishonor remains in their eyes.
Offering my horse proves a brilliant stroke. Greedy as the Afghan is, gold holds less appeal for him (since he has so few opportunities to spend it) than articles of honor, such as the armor or weapons of an enemy, and more so his warhorse, particularly if that animal is a superb specimen like Snow in the prime of her fighting years. To acquire such a prize is almost as satisfying as murdering the foe himself.
“Have we got a deal?” I ask Ash.
Indeed, says he. Except for another hour of haggling over bridle and tack. Ash has taken over; he negotiates for me. “Give them everything,” I say. “Who cares?”
“Never! They will despise you and the animal if we don’t fight for this.”
In the end, Ash preserves my armor and weapons.
Now comes a second meal.
“Ash,” says Flag. “Get us the fuck out of here.”
The deal is struck. Shinar’s brother will give up his claim to vengeance under the laws of tor and A’shaara. I will recompense him with my horse and the agreed-upon indemnity.
I want to get this over with. But the amount I’ve pledged is too big to deliver in gold (I don’t have a tenth of it anyway). It will have to be an army draft, and acquiring that will take all night and most of tomorrow, if I’m lucky, to procure through the Quartermaster.
The Afgan Campaign Page 25
