Free Balthasar's Odyssey by Amin Maalouf Page A

confrontation without losing face. Of course I had to look him in the eye, to disguise my weakness and make him think I was sure of myself.
    That said, there was also a moment when I was no longer afraid. When I stopped being a merchant and took on the spirit of a conqueror. Brief as that moment was, I’m proud of it.
    Was it my will-power that brought about the decision? Or was it the intervention of the Arab in the head-dress? Perhaps I ought to thank him… Yesterday I didn’t want to approach him, in case people thought I’d been at a loss and he’d saved the situation for me. But today I did look for him, and I couldn’t find him.
    I keep thinking about him, and because I’m not engaged in any contest now, and this notebook isn’t an arena and I’m not surrounded by spectators, I can say here that I was immensely relieved when he took a hand: my victory is partly his, and I am somewhat in his debt.
    What could he have said to our caravaneer to make him give in?
    I almost forgot to say that I, together with my nephews, my clerk, the “widow”, and about a dozen other travellers, duly went to the Church of the Gross. For the first time, Marta was wearing a coloured dress — a blue one with the neck edged in red. I’d seen her in it as a girl, when she went to church in Gibelet on feast days with her father the barber. Up till then, ever since she joined us on our journey, she’d always worn black — out of bravado, because her in-laws objected to it. She must have decided the gesture was no longer necessary.
    All through the celebration of the mass, the men kept looking at her — some furtively, others openly. But as God is my witness, it didn’t bother me, and I didn’t feel the slightest twinge of jealousy.
    16 September
    A Jewish jeweller from Aleppo, Maïmoun Toleitli by name, came to see me this morning. He’d heard how learned I was, he said, and was eager to meet me. Why hadn’t he approached me before? I asked. There was an embarrassed silence. I realised at once that he’d preferred to wait until after Holy Cross Day. So far, admittedly, when some of my co-religionists meet a Jew, they feel obliged to act in a very hostile manner towards him, as if such behaviour constituted a just revenge and an act of great piety.
    I explained tactfully that I wasn’t like that, and that if I’d insisted on staying on for a day in Alexandretta it was not to demonstrate that my religion was more important than other people’s, but simply to insist on being shown some respect.
    â€œQuite right,” he said. “With the world the way it is …”
    â€œYes,” I agreed. “If it had been different, I’d have demonstrated my doubts rather than my beliefs.”
    He smiled, then lowered his voice to say:
    â€œWhen faith preaches hate, blessed are the doubters!”
    I smiled back, and lowered my voice to say:
    â€œWe are all lost sheep.”
    We spoke for only about five minutes, but it was enough to make us brothers. Our whispered exchanges generated the spiritual kinship no religion can create, and no religion can destroy.
    17 September
    Today our caravaneer decided to make us depart from the usual itinerary and go round by the bay of Alexandretta. He claims a fortune-teller told him he’d have his throat cut if he went through a certain place on a Thursday, so the delay I’d insisted on forced him to change our route. The other travellers didn’t protest. What could they have said? You can argue about a difference of opinion. You can’t argue about superstition.
    I said nothing, for fear of causing another incident. But I suspect the rogue of re-routing the caravan for some nefarious purpose. Especially as the inhabitants of the village he took us to have a dreadful reputation. As wreckers and smugglers! Hatem and my nephews bring me all sorts of rumours. I tell them to be careful.
    My clerk