THE GOLDEN TAPESTRY

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The Beginning of an Adventure Novel, and a Treatment

CHAPTER I

He lay upon his face in the wet sand, a tall old man in shabby clothes, and looking down at the body, Ballantyne knew it had begun again, but this time he did not know why.

It was an austere face, judging by the side of it he could see, with a high-bridged nose and prominent cheekbones, a face worn and old, but strong with lines of character and determination. Poor, he might have been, but this man had been proud also.

Glancing swiftly to right and left, then along the rim of the cliff above, and seeing no one, Ballantyne lifted the edge of the worn coat and checked the pockets….They were empty. The coat, no doubt purchased secondhand years before, bore no label.

Gently, Ballantyne lifted the old man’s hands, for the hands of a man are revealing, and often tell more than his face or the few odds and ends his pockets may contain. These were strong hands, calloused but agile. Ballantyne had seen those callouses before. These were the hands of a weaver, a weaver of rugs.

The dead man was unknown to Ballantyne, but the three stab wounds in the kidney indicated the hand of Mustafa Bem. In Samarkand, Damascus, and Kashgar, Ballantyne had seen similar wounds, and he needed no autopsy to know the blade had been long and thin, the blows hard-driven and slanted sharply upward.

Yet Bem took no action without orders. Somehow this old man had incurred the displeasure of Leon Decebilus, and soon so might Villette Mallory unless Ballantyne moved with extreme care.

Villette Mallory was alone, and unaware the man she had so recently met, Leon Decebilus, was one of the most ruthless criminals in the Near East. No matter the mask of refinement and culture he might have assumed, Decebilus was a ruthless and violent man, intolerant of interference and utterly without scruples.

Ballantyne stood up, and then walked quickly away from the body and mounted the cliff by a rarely used path. The last thing he wished was to become involved in an investigation by provincial authorities.

When his eyes cleared the edge of the cliff, Ballantyne paused and swept the area with a swift, practiced attention. Assured that he was unobserved, he went up quickly, and proceeded to stroll carelessly along the ancient path that skirted the cliff’s edge.

The narrow beach where the body lay was on the shore of the Gulf of Izmit, known in classical times as the Gulf of Nicomedia, in Asiatic Turkey. Some fifty miles from Istanbul, the former capital of the once-great Byzantine empire, the Gulf was off the beaten track.

Whatever the reason for this man’s death, it had to be big, for Leon Decebilus no longer involved himself in petty crimes—the thief, spy, panderer, blackmailer, and murderer had come into wealth and power.

Even the law moved warily where he was concerned, for he was an international figure with friends in high places, and he had been shrewd enough to implicate or involve them in his own dealings, involve them to such a degree that their fortunes depended upon the success of his.

The dead man obviously had been unaware of the risks involved in dealing with Decebilus, a fatal disadvantage in such affairs. That certainly could not be said of Ballantyne, but what of Villette Mallory? Did she recognize the manner of man Decebilus was? Could she?

Ballantyne swore bitterly and impatiently, and he was not an impatient or bitter man. He knew why he was getting involved, but he did not understand what was behind the curious chain of events that had led him to this place.

He was involved because of Villette. You are, he told himself, a silly romantic fool. No, a guilty fool. And guilt is never a good reason to dig yourself in deeper.

He was a man who lived by his wits, he told himself. He liked this explanation better. Wherever Decebilus showed his hand there was a profit to be made and where there was a profit he could make it as easily as Decebilus. Well, almost.

—

Turning from the track along the cliffs, Ballantyne walked through the short grass and up the slight slope to the ruins. The area was known as Eski Hissar, Turkish for “old castle,” but the Byzantine tower for which it was named was only one among the many ruins along the Gulf of Izmit.

They were unimpressive ruins, without boldness or beauty: a few crumbling walls, scattered stones, and grass-covered mounds. The walls that remained were often constructed of stones from still older walls; even the most ancient ruins in sight had been built from the stones of others.

On the crest of the hill not far away, tall cypresses marked the tomb of Hannibal, and from that vantage point one could look over the slope below and see an incredible maze, design interwoven with design, the outlines of walls invisible on the ground itself.

Seating himself among the ruins where he could observe without being observed, Ballantyne took the camera strap from his shoulder and placed the camera beside him on the grass.

A camera, he had discovered, automatically marked one as a tourist, and tourists were apt to be regarded as harmless, somewhat blundering and gullible creatures inclined to go almost anywhere. The camera was a visible passport to almost anywhere but a military zone.

To Ballantyne all ruins were interesting, and from time to time he emerged from such ruins with a stone tablet, an ancient vase, or even a fine stone head. Discreetly removed and even more discreetly disposed of, such odds and ends had solved his financial difficulties on more than one occasion. But today he was not scouting such a midnight dig—there was larger game afoot. The dead man had affirmed that suspicion.

Ballantyne settled back to wait. Warm and lazy under the sun, the slope from where he waited was freshened by a gentle breeze from off the Sea of Marmara and the Gulf. If life had taught him nothing else, it had taught him patience.

Yet when the gray car appeared, he felt a premonitory chill. It left the village and came slowly along the goat track, a track rarely used by carts, never by cars. The Renault grumbled cautiously along the crumbling edge of the cliff toward the ruins.

That they returned at all to where the body had been left was evidence of their concern. The track they followed led only from the nearby village to the pastures beyond. Yet it might be possible, if one were a skillful driver, to follow the track along the shore, over the ridge, and then by a woodcutter’s trail through the dark patch of forest beyond. A dirt road somewhere over there connected with the highway from Ankara to Istanbul. No car had made the trip but in years past it had occasionally been done by carts.

He watched the gray car coming slowly along the track; his own position concealed him and he had chosen it for that reason. He was known to both Barbaro and Mustafa Bem.

Across the blue waters of the Gulf he could see the thickly wooded shores that ended in the promontory known as Boz Burun, and at the farthest point on the southern horizon he could just make out the peak of the Bithynian Mount Olympus. The closest town was the fishing village Gebze, but, as with many places in this corner of the world, history complicated the simplest of things. Gebze had once been Libyssa, the spot where Hannibal had spent his last years, hiding from the power of Rome. It was there, in 183 B.C., he had taken poison to avoid capture.

Yet, he had fooled them at last, in one respect at least, for the vast treasure he was known to have with him disappeared when he died. Vanished also were the hollow bronze statues, gods sacred to Phoenicia and Carthage, which he had brought with him from Crete to Nicomedia.

More than one adventurer, wandering soldier, goatherd or peasant had entertained himself with the thought of what he could do if he found that treasure, yet the story was but one of many told along this coast. War and trouble lead men to conceal their riches, always with a plan to return and recover them, but slavery, imprisonment, or death have a way of intervening. How many such treasures might lie buried within a hundred miles of Istanbul? Or even within the city itself?

The gray car had stopped some forty yards off, near the ragged boy who tended a flock of goats that grazed among the ruins. Mustafa Bem got out of the car, looking as lean and savage as ever, and called to the boy.

“Have you seen a blue Maserati? A blue car driven by a woman?”

The boy walked toward them, accompanied by his sheepdog. “There may have been a car. I was far up the hillside.”

“Where does this road go?”

“It does not go. It is always here. For twelve years I have been coming here and the road is always as it is.”

“Where does it end, boy?”

“The road has an end? Each road leads to another, yes? So all the roads of the world begin here at our feet.”

Mustafa Bem grew impatient. “Do people come here? Strangers, I mean?”

The boy shrugged. “Why should they come? Here there are only the grass and my goats.”

“The blue car…did it go on?”

“There are only pastures and forest beyond. I was with the goats. Perhaps the blue car went back when it discovered this was not a road for cars.” Mustafa Bem returned to the Renault and talked to someone within.

The air was clear and their voices could be heard, but Ballantyne could no longer distinguish the words. He had not heard the woman’s car or seen it, but neither would have been possible during the time he had spent on the beach. Had he missed his chance…?

Mustafa Bem got into the Renault and drove on, but no great distance, for where the track ran past the base of the ruined tower the cliff’s edge was of crumbling rock. Only a fool would try to go further unless on foot, and for a minute or two the issue was in doubt and Ballantyne watched them in amusement. At last they backed up, turned around, and started back.

There was a route through the ruins, a route Ballantyne had himself located when he scouted the area on his first visit. Ballantyne had the tactician’s distaste for a cul-de-sac. Was it not Plautus who said that not even a mouse trusted himself to one hole only?

The goatherd seemed concerned only with his flock, but Ballantyne was sure the boy also watched the car. He was a thin boy of something around twelve years, with large, expressive eyes and an olive skin. Yet he wore his rags with a savoir faire that went beyond mere assurance. Ballantyne had seen the boy on each of his previous visits and they had nodded to one another in passing but they had not talked.

When the gray Renault disappeared in the direction of Istanbul, the boy walked to where Ballantyne sat among the ruins. Squatting upon his heels, the boy looked where Ballantyne was looking.

“You see something?”

“I look at the sea…sometimes at the ruins.”

“The sea?”

“I find it beautiful. The ruins, also.”

The goatherd scarcely glanced at the time-blackened stones. “The ruins are no good, even for goats. The roofs have fallen in.”

The boy glanced again at Ballantyne. “Why do you look at the sea and not at the goats? I think the goats are more beautiful than the sea. Look at them!”

To please the boy, Ballantyne turned to look at the goats. Some two dozen of them browsed or reclined upon the hillside. The boy seemed pleased that Ballantyne appeared to agree.

“They are not my goats,” he explained, “but someday I shall own goats. Perhaps as many as these. Then you shall see beauty! They shall be as white clouds upon the green sky of the hillside.”

He glanced at the camera, leaning over it, curiously. “You have a machine. What is it for?”

“To make pictures. I shall want some pictures of the sea and of the ruins.”

“Of the goats, too?”

To please him, Ballantyne agreed. “Yes, and of the goats, too.”

The reply seemed to satisfy the goatherd on that score, but he still seemed restless and puzzled. Gravely, they exchanged introductions. The boy’s name was Rashid. Ballantyne waited, aware of the boy’s curiosity, and aware that in some way he himself was undergoing examination.

There was something here the goatherd failed to comprehend. He broached the subject to Ballantyne as one gentleman to another. “You make pictures of the sea, the sky, and the ruins. Of the goats, too. Why do you do this?”

“To catch their beauty, and to hold it. Then I can look whenever I like.”

“But why a picture? They are here! You can see them without a picture.”

“For you they are here, for you they will remain, but I shall go away and it is good to have something with which to remember. I shall look many times at the picture and will see all this as I knew it today.”

“You need a picture for this?” The boy was astonished. “I remember without a machine. I can remember the goats, each one of them.” He considered the problem, and suddenly his expression brightened. “Ah, then! The machine is your memory! It is very strange to remember with a machine.”

Neither of them spoke for several minutes, each in his own way marveling at the wonders of the world. “I have heard men speak of this,” the boy said, “that you have machines for everything. I should not like that.”

Ballantyne watched the changing light on the sea and the shore. If the Maserati had come and gone it was not his plan to remain longer, but the conversation left him dissatisfied. He had an amusing feeling that he had, somehow, been bested.

He offered the boy a cigarette, which was accepted gravely.

“You have been here before,” the boy said.

“Several times.”

“Not many come to the ruins. Most who do merely look and go away.” The boy lit his cigarette and puffed shrewdly, cupping it in his hand as do those who smoke much in the wind. “I think you come for a reason, and I do not think it is because of the machine or the pictures.”

The kid was observant and he had something to say that he hadn’t gotten around to yet. Ballantyne watched the white puffballs of cloud over the far, wooded shore.

“You have a woman?” the boy asked, finally.

“No.”

“No woman? It is good for a man to have a woman.”

“No doubt.” It was a conclusion Ballantyne had no wish to debate. “And you? Do you have a woman?” He asked the question in all seriousness.

It was accepted in the same manner. “No, I am young for a woman and they can be much trouble.”

The comment seemed to explain much. The boy smoked in silence and Ballantyne waited for him to speak.

“Do you have goats at home?”

“No,” Ballantyne confessed, “I have no goats.”

“A camel, perhaps?” Rashid was giving him every chance to prove himself a man of substance.

“No, I have no camel.” Inspiration came to him. “Once I owned two horses.”

Rashid pondered the matter. “It is good to have horses, but a horse is like a woman. It is unproductive. If you have a horse or a woman you must also have goats.”

“I think you come here for a reason and I do not think it is because of the machine.” Rashid repeated himself. Ballantyne said nothing but the boy seemed to be arriving at a decision. “There is a woman who comes to this hillside,” Rashid said. Then glancing at Ballantyne as if to challenge his disbelief, he added, “A woman with a rug.”

When the quarry is sighted the hunter moves with caution. Ballantyne waited for several moments before he asked, “She sits on a rug?”

“She looks at a rug. She sits on the grass, or sometimes on the stones. She is very beautiful,” he added, “and not old.” Then reluctantly, “She is more beautiful than the goats.”

It was a compliment of the highest order. “That cannot be,” Ballantyne said positively. “How could a woman be more beautiful than goats?”

“It is difficult to believe,” Rashid admitted.

A dead weaver…a woman with a rug. A pattern was emerging.

“She comes often?”

“She is here now.” Rashid got to his feet. “She has much trouble, this woman, and she has no man.”

“You protected her from the men in the gray car,” Ballantyne suggested. “I know them, and they are evil men.”

Rashid looked at Ballantyne with interest. “You speak Turkish then?”

“I am a man of many tongues.” Ballantyne paused, and then he took the plunge, knowing what icy depths lay before him. “I will help her if I can.”

“Come, I will show you.”

The woman was Villette Mallory.

The magazines called her “The Incomparable Villette,” and whether it was modeling the latest design from Christian Dior or Jacques Fath or dropping a playful wink while presenting a cut-glass bottle of perfume, the term suited her.

On this day she wore a gray suit and a blouse of pale blue, and her hair, a dark auburn, was tied with a scarf of the same shade as the blouse. Her eyes were green and her cheekbones high, the bone structure of her face delicate yet strong.

This moment was what Ballantyne had come for. And, he feared, so had the old man on the beach.

“My friend Rashid has come to me with the story of a beautiful woman who sits among the ruins and looks at a rug. Being a romanticist, naturally, I came.”

“A romanticist?”

“A romanticist when I think of women, Madame, a realist when I deal with them.”

She measured him with cool eyes. He was a tall, athletic-looking man, something more than thirty. He was tailored well, if casually, but there was something indefinably down-at-heel about him, the sense that his fortunes had ebbed and flowed like the tides.

“Who are you?”

Rashid squatted upon his thin, bare heels and looked upon Ballantyne with dispassionate eyes, as if to say, “You know nothing of goats, let us see how you do with a woman.”

“It is a question I have often asked of myself, Madame, but who can reply to such a question? Born of woman, I am a man…possessing no fortune and no family; it has been left to me to live by knowing, and if I have no wit, Madame, I have at least wits, and I live by them.”

She wore no makeup today and was even more beautiful than he remembered, but it was not a cool classical beauty. There was some humor that showed in her eyes, but there was sadness too.

“One more thing I have, that is curiosity, and curiosity opens windows upon the world. And…I know something of rugs.”

Something happened then, for her eyes were suddenly no longer green, but hazel, almost yellow, like the eyes of a leopard in the jungle.

“Do you know me, then?”

“Let us say that I have seen you several times before this….Madame was in Honfleur, at the Auberge du Cheval Blanc. You were motoring along the coast and you had stopped for lunch. The food there is quite good.”

“And there have been other times?”

“Twice in the Mouski marketplace in Cairo. The first time I sat at an adjoining table listening to your voice and enjoying your profile. The Marquis was quite annoyed.”

“And the second?”

“I sold you an antique ring…a lovely green stone.”

Her eyes were cold. “I remember the stone. It was fake.”

“It was, Madame, and I regret it, but at the moment I had nothing else to sell. I would make it up to you if you would let me.”

“I think you are a thief, if not worse.”

“One lives as one can.”

Ballantyne seated himself on the wall facing her. He was, she reflected, a graceful man for one so lean and tall. He handled himself like a fencer or a boxer.

“For example,” he said, “by this time Madame has guessed that my being here is no accident. I came to meet you.”

“That’s absurd. How could you know I would be here? Or that having been here, I would come again?”

“It was a slight gamble, but there are few secrets in the East, Madame, and as I have said, I am a curious man.

“For example, your husband, the late Maharajah of Kasur, was an ardent sportsman. Suddenly, on the eve of an important polo match, he withdraws. His withdrawal was a serious blow to the chances of his team, and he was known as an honorable man. Nothing but a matter of life and death could cause such a last-minute withdrawal.

“Then came the news of his death in a plane crash while en route to Istanbul. Why the sudden flight? Why Istanbul?

“These questions sharpened my curiosity, and as I have said, there are no secrets in the East. I heard rumors, made discreet inquiries.

“Your late husband, like many others, had lost his estates when India and Pakistan were divided. He settled large sums of money on old family retainers…he was forced to modify his way of living…and still he owed many debts.

“Then a most curious thing. This Maharajah who had only a small income by his former standards recently assured his creditors that all would be paid…within a month.”

“So?”

“So one could only assume that he expected, somehow, to come into a quite large sum of money from some hitherto undisclosed source. Then the unexplained flight to Istanbul, so I asked myself…was the money here?

“There was also a disturbing story. That in deciding to fly here the Maharajah knew that he caused his own death. The whisper was that had he not died in the plane crash he would have died in another way, and soon.”

“Why would anyone wish to kill him?”

“That was what I asked myself. But behind many murders there is a matter of money. Somehow, in some way, he was coming into money and somebody else wanted it. It is as simple as that.”

She was thoughtful, but finally she asked, “Do you have a name?”

“I am called Ballantyne.”

“Merely Ballantyne? Nothing else?”

“If you must have more, I am Michael Surendranath Ballantyne. My mother was of a Rajput family of an ancient line. She named me for a great teacher, a scholar. I fear I have not lived up to her hopes.”

“My husband was a Rajput.”

“I know….That is among the reasons I am here today, along with the ring.” He paused. “Ballantyne is enough. Throughout Asia they know that name.”

“I am impressed.”

“You need not be. I am a dealer in chance, a liaison man, a go-between, an arranger of meetings. I said that I live by my wits, but it is equally true that I live by whom, and what, I know.”

Her handbag, a large one, lay open on the rock before her, the open side within easy reach of her hand.

“For example, you have a gun in your bag. You will not need that for me, but keep it close. Today you lunched with Leon Decebilus.”

“So?”

“He is a thief, and a master of thieves.”

“I doubt if he would spy on me so obviously as you have done.”

Ballantyne turned to the goatherd. “A gray car came along the track a short time ago. What did they wish to know?”

“They asked if I had seen a blue car with a woman driving it.”

“You see? The men in that Renault were Mustafa Bem and Barbaro, and where they are, Decebilus is. They are his men.”

Her eyes were cold. “I am sure you are mistaken. We have mutual friends. Mr. Decebilus is a financier, a respected man.”

“If you said ‘feared’ rather than ‘respected’ I would accept that.” He nodded toward the cliffs. “Walk down to the shore and you will find a tall old man in shabby clothes lying dead upon the sand. He was killed by Mustafa Bem. You are in greater danger than you realize.”

She looked startled. “A dead man? Down there?”

“Do you know this old man?”

“With a scarred jaw?” She was thoughtful. “About sixty? In a worn black suit?

“He came to my hotel the day I arrived and wished to buy a rug from me. He said it was for sentimental reasons, that an ancestor of his was the weaver.”

He looked at her seriously. “Madame? How many rugs have you sold in your lifetime?”

“Rugs? Why, none of course.”

“You do not think it strange that immediately after you arrive in town a man comes to your hotel room and wishes to buy a rug from you?”

“Strange? Of course I thought it strange. But my husband—everyone wants something and many think he is still wealthy.”

“You did not agree to sell the rug?”

“I refused. He started to argue so I closed the door in his face.”

“But you did see him again?”

“He must have followed me. He was outside the Abdullah where we went for dinner.”

“And you mentioned it to Decebilus?”

“I may have. In fact, I am sure that I did. After all, the man had followed me. Decebilus was amused.”

“No doubt. But now the man is dead. You see no coincidence in all this?”

She was silent, and Ballantyne glanced at the ridge and the cypresses at Hannibal’s tomb. From the track they were hidden, but an observer up there on the ridge, especially if he had field glasses, could see anyone here. In fact, he could see the three of them even without glasses…and no doubt the blue car was close by.

“Whatever it is,” Ballantyne continued, “that your husband knew, you may be sure Decebilus knows also, or some of it. And you may also be sure that the knowledge concerns money, for Decebilus is interested in little else.”

Villette looked away from him toward a wedge of blue sea visible through a notch in the ruined wall. Her husband’s sudden trip…without explanation…it was so unlike him. And the rug? It was possible that Ballantyne was right, but what, then, of Leon?

She had known the name of Leon Decebilus for years, it seemed. Friends returning from Monte Carlo, St. Tropez, and Paris had mentioned his name as they mentioned the names of Onassis, Pignatelli, or King Farouk.

When they met…quite by accident…they had talked briefly. Then they had lunched together, and last evening there had been dinner.

He was a brute. Instinctively, she knew that, but a fascinating brute. He dressed with extreme care…with too much care. His manners were perfect, too perfect again…as they are apt to be when acquired late in life and not from childhood. Yet there was also a bizarre touch: the rings on his fingers, one huge one on his left hand, two slightly smaller rings on his right.

He had been gracious. He had offered his car, even a chauffeur, anything she might require. He offered his sympathy for her loss; he had not known the Maharajah, but had known of him.

Who had not heard of Dhyan Jai Rathore? She had known of him for several years before they met. Their pictures were often in the same magazines, he gambling in Monte Carlo…attending the movie festival at Cannes…fishing in the Bahamas. He was exotic, a Rajput, educated at Cambridge, a man with a gift for friendships and for sports. If “Jay,” as his friends called him, was known for something in particular, it was making the most demanding feats like climbing mountains, blazing across the finish line at Le Mans, or leading a champion polo team look easy and fun. After her first year in New York it was almost fated they would meet.

Her success had been spectacular. A farm girl from Oklahoma, she had started modeling for Neiman Marcus in Dallas but quickly moved into the world of New York and Paris fashion. She photographed well from any angle and wore clothes with an easy grace. The ready wit for which she had become famous was rather a gift for quick, deft characterizations, a quality inherited from her father. Though never an actress, her ability to banter and poke fun at herself had made her a favorite on TV variety programs.

She had never been sure whether she really loved Jay. From the first they had fitted into each other’s lives easily and naturally. They liked each other and liked many of the same things, and he was at home anywhere. She had been happy with him, he seemed to love her, and when he had proposed she accepted.

Ballantyne interrupted her thoughts. “Your husband gave you no clue to his secret? Could it have something to do with the rug?”

“The rug that the man wanted to buy? It is a prayer rug…but what could a rug mean? I think it was just a talisman, a good-luck piece. I know it had been in Jay’s family for years.”

“A prayer rug, a rare one, can be worth as much as a valuable painting. And, believe me, I’d rather have one. I could talk for a year on the subject of rugs. But…”

Ballantyne was thoughtful. All he had said of rugs was true, yet somehow it did not make the kind of sense he was seeking. If Decebilus wanted something it would be worth millions, not thousands. Was it then the prayer rug of some religious leader? Something of importance in the Moslem world? He could think of no story of that sort, but such a rug might exist.

“Do you have the rug with you?”

She paused, still suspicious. “Not today. Jay asked me to keep it for him in Paris. When he wired me to meet him in Istanbul, he asked me to bring the rug…not under any circumstances to forget it.”

Villette turned to him suddenly. “What do you expect to get out of this, Ballantyne? You have admitted you sold me a stone that was not genuine—why should I trust you?”

“You need not trust me. Go to the police. Ask for Hamid Yalcinkaya, only him. Tell him what has happened, tell him of me, of the man on the beach, then get on the first plane and fly back to the United States.”

All Ballantyne could do was make his play. “Or you can see this through,” he said. “See it through with me…or with Decebilus. You will choose one of us, because he will give you no alternative and I will try to take it from him…whatever it is. I, however, will accept any deal you think is fair—a bargain, if you ask me.”

She arose suddenly. “I must go.” She extended her hand.

He took it, touching the fingers lightly with his lips. “Do you know the Pandeli?” he asked. “In the old town? Lunch with me there tomorrow…at twelve?”

She studied him coolly, then assented. “Very well, Ballantyne. At twelve.”

“And in the meantime…be careful.”

She started away, then hesitated. “Do not forget that I have a pistol.”

“Your eyes, Madame, are the greater danger.” He bowed, smiling a little.

She laughed. “Ballantyne, I think you’re a nineteen-karat phony. You would lie in your teeth for money or a woman.”

“Madame…let me assure you. Your money is safe with me. Until tomorrow, then?”

The blue Maserati had been hidden in an angle of the wall. She pulled the car from its place of concealment and, with a rasp of exhaust, started slowly back toward the track.

Rashid moved up beside Ballantyne, and there was no childishness in his face. “Treat her well. She is my friend. If not”—he drew a dagger from among his rags—“I shall have your heart.”

The words were theatrical, the gesture boyish, borrowed no doubt from some story heard in the marketplace. But some stories are not to be taken lightly, for they form the instruction and discipline of a people, and the goatherd, boy though he was, meant what he said.

“And do you take care,” Ballantyne warned, “if you are questioned, to know neither of us.”

—

A man could walk almost as fast as a car could be driven along the goat track, so he reached the village only a few minutes behind the Maserati. His battered Land Rover awaited him, hidden in a ruined camel shed.

The Maharajah…or Jay, as Villette called him…was dead. And it appeared the only one who might keep Decebilus from attaining what he wanted was Villette herself.

Nor had she taken Ballantyne’s warning seriously enough. There are some who will believe nothing ill of those they meet socially…and there are many who will accept anyone who has the money to put up a good appearance and be introduced by the right people. Leon Decebilus appeared to be what he wished people to see him as: the operator of a number of freighters and tankers, of a small airline, and, through various associations, several nightclubs and restaurants in Cairo, Alexandria, Athens, and Aleppo.

That Villette knew and understood men, Ballantyne had no doubt. A beautiful woman becomes habituated to using her beauty, learns subconsciously, at least, that men are not only willing but eager to serve her. Her smile, her frown, her graciousness—all these can be used, almost without thinking, on all ages and types of men. None of this would have any effect on Decebilus.

Prostitution had long been one of the sources of his income…the first stable source. Refugees were his stock in trade and with the shifting of borders, wars and civil wars, supply was never an issue. His orders shipped women, like so many head of cattle, from Marseilles to Genoa, Cairo to Tangier, Alexandria. He had no desire that could not be satisfied merely for the promise, or the threat, of a transfer from one better or worse brothel to another. There was no experience he could not have, or had not already had, for safe passage for a family or one more dose of heroin or hashish. Villette Mallory was a beautiful woman, but she would need to rely on other qualities if she was to defeat Decebilus.

—

Ballantyne drove swiftly and with the knowledge of many roads, and as he drove he worried over the problem as a dog worries a bone. He had too little, all too little with which to work.

The sudden, unexplained flight of the Maharajah and his subsequent crash. The arrival of Villette in Istanbul, and the quickly arranged meeting with Decebilus. The man who came to Villette to buy a rug and was immediately murdered. It all meant something, yet what it was he could not guess.

To put a period to the matter, Mustafa Bem and Barbaro had followed Villette to the ruin, inquired about her. Had they followed her to kill? Or merely to watch?

Until he knew more, Ballantyne would assume that Villette’s rug was the joker in the deck. He had to get a look at it, one way or another.

—

By the time the outskirts of Istanbul were reached, Ballantyne was close behind the Maserati. Or rather, he was close behind the car that followed the Maserati.

The battered Volkswagen had appeared from nowhere in the vicinity of Kartal, falling in behind the blue car, but clinging too close for a man experienced at his job.

Ballantyne had been watching for the Renault, not a Volkswagen, and when he realized it was following Villette, he drew up during a crush of traffic and studied the driver.

He was a stranger, yet hauntingly familiar. A narrow face, badly pocked, with a pointed beard and a trimmed mustache. The man’s shirt collar was greasy, the upholstering of the car torn and old. At the instant Ballantyne came abreast of him, the man’s coat gaped somewhat, revealing the butt of a heavy pistol.

Falling back to a discreet distance, Ballantyne watched the Volkswagen trail Villette into the sweeping drive that led up to the looming modernist rectangle of the Istanbul Hilton.

The stranger locked the Volkswagen, then almost ran to catch up as Villette went through the doors.

Parking alongside the car, Ballantyne took time for a quick glance inside. An ancient cardboard valise, a few old newspapers, and a paperbacked American novel. Whoever the man was, he apparently could read English.

Walking swiftly toward the hotel, Ballantyne stopped just in time to keep from being run down by the gray Renault. Behind the wheel was Barbaro, beside him Mustafa Bem.

They drew up, and Mustafa Bem darted for the doors. Neither had paid any attention to Ballantyne.

CHAPTER II

Following Mustafa Bem inside, it became immediately obvious that although Bem knew the stranger, the stranger did not know him.

The driver of the Volkswagen turned to glance back toward the entrance at the moment Mustafa Bem stepped through, and although the latter turned sharply away, the Volkswagen driver paid him no attention. In turning away, Mustafa Bem came face-to-face with Ballantyne.

“So!” His eyes flared. “The wolves gather!”

Indicating the driver of the Volkswagen, Ballantyne replied, “Decebilus must be hard up to bother with such as that.”

“He is no business of yours! Stay out of this!”

“Tell Dice that I’m in town, will you? He will be pleased, I am sure.”

“He wishes nothing to do with you, Ballantyne, and consider yourself fortunate, for the next time he gives the word I shall kill you.” And then he added, “And do not call him Dice. You know he doesn’t like it.”

Ballantyne strolled away and going to a booth, bought a newspaper. The dark-eyed girl who took his money scarcely moved her lips as she said, “Leon Decebilus is staying here.”

Ballantyne’s face revealed nothing, but he was startled. For years Decebilus had stayed nowhere but at the Parc Oteli, formerly the town’s leading hostelry. Could the sudden change mean that he wished to be near Villette?

“No,” the girl whispered when he asked if Decebilus’ arrival was unexpected, “he reserved a suite just one week ago today.”

The same day the Maharajah of Kasur reserved his rooms. “Thanks.” He glanced at the paper. “Tell Johann I wish to see him.”

“He expected you. He is in the barbershop.”

The fact that Decebilus had reserved his suite on the same day as the Maharajah might be pure coincidence, but Ballantyne did not believe it for a moment. It was another small link in the chain of evidence tying Decebilus to the visit of the Maharajah and Villette.

Suddenly a man was beside him, a slender blond man with a saturnine expression, neatly dressed in a dark suit and a snap brim hat. The man paused to light a cigarette, but as he lifted the match it served to cover the words he spoke from the corner of his mouth. “The Scylax is lying in the port of Galata.”

“Thanks, Johann.”

“Arrived last night…in ballast.”

The blond man walked away and Ballantyne stared at his newspaper with unseeing eyes. The Scylax, named for an ancient Greek navigator of the Indian Ocean, was a freighter of Decebilus’ Green Star Line. To bring the freighter in ballast to Istanbul represented a contradiction for a shipping man as shrewd as Decebilus; it would not pay to sail empty unless some very valuable cargo was expected.

There were many pieces of the jigsaw, but fit them together as he might, they refused to represent any intelligible picture. And here in the lobby of the Istanbul Hilton were several of the pieces.

Obviously the man in the Volkswagen wanted to watch or speak to Villette Mallory…and just as obviously, Mustafa Bem was here to watch for her…or for the Volkswagen man.

Ballantyne had a theory that the way to defeat a careful enemy was to keep his plans from developing, and Leon Decebilus was a planner, a conniver. Shrewd, careful, and unemotional during the early stages of planning, Decebilus left little to chance. Yet if his plans became disturbed or frustrated, he was inclined to become enraged. And when aroused he gave way to fits of fury and brutality that could be shocking, a fact known to but few of those who now surrounded him. Ballantyne knew it, of old, and it was a gap in Decebilus’ armor that could be exploited. It was a very dangerous gap, however.

Ballantyne had succeeded in outmaneuvering Decebilus on two previous occasions, each time by forcing him to move before he was ready. When such men move hastily they make mistakes, and the mistakes of others belong to the man prepared to seize what opportunity has offered.

Now Ballantyne made such a move. Crossing the room, he walked directly up to the driver of the Volkswagen, and as he did so, he saw Mustafa Bem turn sharply toward him, a hand half-lifted as though to prevent the meeting.

“My friend,” Ballantyne said quietly, “you are in great danger. Unless you are very careful you will be killed as was”—suddenly Ballantyne knew he was right—“as was your brother.”

“Brother?” The Volkswagen man stared blankly at Ballantyne. “I have no brother.”

“Perhaps your father, then? A tall old man in a black suit?”

The man grabbed his sleeve. “What are you saying? Where is he?” The voice echoed in the glass and marble lobby.

Heads turned. Mustafa Bem, his face pale with shock, had headed toward the exit. He had, however, to pass them in reaching it.

“He lies dead on the sands below Eski Hissar,” Ballantyne said, speaking so only the Volkswagen man could hear, “of three knife thrusts in the back.”

The man’s face was yellow and sick. “You are lying!” he gasped hoarsely. “It cannot be true!”

“You may see for yourself.”

“The woman! That foul—!”

“She had nothing to do with it. He was killed by a man sent by Decebilus.”

“Decebilus!” Again people turned to look.

“It was he who gave the order,” Ballantyne said. Then, turning, he pointed at Mustafa Bem, who had just edged past them, and said, “But there is the man who actually killed your father!”

Mustafa Bem sprang for the entrance and the Volkswagen man leaped after him.

There was a wild scramble at the door as people rushed to either get out of the way or to see what was happening. Ballantyne stepped back, watching.

Behind him a cool voice said, “You are a fool, Ballantyne, a pitiful fool.”

Turning, Ballantyne looked into the eyes of the one man he really had reason to fear.

It was Leon Decebilus.

He was three inches over six feet with black hair and intensely black, piercing eyes. His cheekbones were high, the bone structure of his face massive. He wore a dark suit of excellent tailoring and material.

“You could stay out of this,” Decebilus suggested, “and we could forget the past.”

“You might forget it, Dice. I would not.”

Ballantyne saw a dark flush of anger under the swarthy skin at Ballantyne’s use of the old nickname.

“I never liked you, Ballantyne. You interfere with me and I shall have you killed.”

“Again?”

“You were lucky before. I could have you taken away, then drowned or burned.”

“Aboard the Scylax?”

Ballantyne saw the jump of fury in Decebilus’ eyes, and for an instant he thought the man would strike him. Instead, Decebilus hissed, “Stay out of this!” and turned sharply away.

—

Ballantyne went out into the night, stopping under the portico, the roof of which was the architect’s interpretation of a flying carpet. He shook a cigarette out of the pack in his shirt pocket.

Suddenly he saw the Volkswagen man coming back up the drive. He was perspiring freely and Ballantyne stopped him before he could reenter the hotel.

“I would stay out of there if I were you. They will have you arrested.”

The man stared at him from great, anguished eyes. “You are my friend, I think….Why?”

“You have given me no cause to be otherwise, and Decebilus is my enemy. It is as simple as that.” He paused, then added, “Look, you are in trouble. Your father died because of the rug.”

The man showed no surprise at the mention of a rug, accepting the connection without comment. “You are sure he is dead?”

“Three stab wounds in the back. It is the method of Mustafa Bem.”

“I shall kill them all,” the man said gloomily. “My father was a good man.” He looked up at Ballantyne. “He knew nothing of the rug until I told him. But for me he would still be alive.”

“Do not blame yourself—we are all in God’s hands.” After an instant and keeping his manner casual, Ballantyne said, “Tell me about it.”

He held his breath, expecting anger, suspicion, or that the man would walk away from him, but the Volkswagen driver was preoccupied with his own grief. “It was a dream. An impossible dream.” He turned large, sad eyes upon Ballantyne. “Ours is a poor family; it has always been a poor family.

“We are weavers, and weavers have their own tales, whispered among themselves, stories half-real, half-fantasy, stories of rugs and magic and legend. To tell a tale comes naturally to a weaver, you understand?”

“It was the story of a rug?”

“Yes, and a story of my family and a knot, a knot that only we know how to use.”

“A knot? You mean a weaver’s knot for a rug?”

The man started to speak, then stopped abruptly, seeming to realize what he was about to do. He turned sharply and stared at Ballantyne, his eyes hard with suspicion. “You are not my friend! You want the secret for yourself!”

“I can tell what you wish Madame to know. I can speak to her for you.”

“No! I will tell nobody!”

“Decebilus knows.”

“It is impossible! Only a weaver could know! Only a weaver from—!”

He broke off and strode away, his skinny legs covering the ground in long strides.

Ballantyne swore softly. He had been close, very close…to what he had no idea, but it might have supplied him with part of what he needed to know.

The sun had gone down beyond the Sea of Marmara, beyond the crumbled ruins of ancient Troy. He stood where he was, enjoying the cool air and the pleasant evening, trying to imagine what the story might be. He thought of the storytellers in the Old City, not far from where he himself lived. Which would be most likely to know and which the most likely to tell a foreigner if he did?

He must move with extreme caution, for every step he took now was a danger. Leon Decebilus had never liked him, but for the past few years he had actively hated Ballantyne, hated him because of all the men Decebilus had known, Ballantyne was the only one ever to have seen him weak and frightened. Had it not been for Ballantyne, Decebilus would now lie dead under the searing desert sun.

“Ah, Mr. Ballantyne!”

Ballantyne turned to face Hamid Yalcinkaya. He was a man of medium height, extremely well built, with fine shoulders and a strongly made face. An officer of the police, he was also much more than that, for he acted as a liaison man between the highest powers in the government and the police. Whenever he took an interest in a case, it was sure to have international or political overtones.

“Hello, Hamid. Late for you to be out, isn’t it? I mean, a growing boy and all that.”

“I could go to sleep earlier, Ballantyne, if I was sure of just what you were doing. Not that I enjoy being suspicious of an old friend, but I know you too well.”

Ballantyne hesitated. Hamid might have just the information he needed, but the man was shrewd and from anything Ballantyne might say he could construct some idea of what was involved. Ballantyne had no wish to cause an old friend trouble; nor did he wish to be troubled by him.

At this stage he was not altogether sure whether he was thinking of Villette first, or of himself. To protect her from harm was a debt he owed: The few dollars he had bilked from her in Egypt had literally saved his life…but when it came to a treasure or a new source of profit, if such existed, he would have to do some thinking.

“Now how do I keep you from sleep? I am out here only for a bit of fresh air.”

“You should have found the air at Eski Hissar invigorating enough.”

Ballantyne straightened his tie. So they knew about that? A little frankness then…just a little.

“Well, she didn’t say no.”

“Did she say yes?”

“No.”

Hamid chuckled. “The lady is very beautiful, and very expensive, no doubt. I mean no disrespect in saying that, only her friends spend freely, I believe.”

“You mean Leon Decebilus?”

“Old friends, aren’t you? You and Decebilus?”

“Neither of us would use the term.”

“And yet, you carried him out of the Empty Quarter. Three days, I believe, on your back.”

“I should have left him there.”

“You should have been a Turk. A Turk would have left him right where he was.”

Hamid glanced at the tip of his cigarette. “What was all that inside just now? That business with Mustafa Bem?”

“Keep the enemy worried, keep them afraid of what you know, of what you might do.”

“It is a philosophy of which we Turks approve, though perhaps not in our best hotels….But why Decebilus? And just at this moment? Is it only because of the beautiful lady from America? Or is there something more? Something of which I should know?” Hamid paused. “How, for example, does it connect with a certain plane crash in Iran and the death of the lady’s husband?”

“What do you know about that?”

Hamid shrugged a shoulder. “It was no accident, if that is what you mean. Someone planted a bomb in the tail. Very accurately timed to explode over one of the wildest regions in the Elburz Mountains.”

“And you tied it to Leon Decebilus?”

“If we could connect it to him he would be under arrest. To you, my friend, I shall admit this much, no more. There were indications.”

“There was a shift of hotels, and a suite taken near that reserved by the Maharajah, is that what you mean?”

“More than that. Tell me, Ballantyne, did you know the Maharajah of Kasur?”

“Only by reputation.”

“Would you say he was an impulsive man? A dreamer? I mean, was he impractical?”

“No…I saw films of him driving in the Le Mans race, and I’ve read of him playing golf and polo. A realist, I would say, a very cool, hardheaded man, but with imagination.”

“I see.”

Ballantyne was watching the place where his car was parked. Was that a moving shadow? Or a trick of the eyes?

“What is she like?”

“Intelligent. She’s been courted around Paris and Cannes by a lot of playboys, but she’s more levelheaded than you might suspect.”

“She was a model?”

“I’m guessing she could go back to it. She has something a girl is born with if she has it at all. Women always look to see what she is wearing that gives her that look, but it’s the lady, not the clothes. She traveled a good bit following her business as a model, but she invested a little money in Broadway shows and a couple of them did very well. Being a beautiful girl, she meets everybody sooner or later. That’s about the size of it.”

“Did she tell you all this?”

“We met only today. We were introduced by a goatherd.”

“Rashid?”

Hamid never missed a trick. Ballantyne’s surprise must have shown in his face because Hamid smiled with obvious satisfaction. “Oh, yes! I know Rashid. In fact, he reported a murder. A weaver named Yacub…stabbed to death, out at Eski Hissar.”

Like the Ottomans of old, Hamid must have informers everywhere. Ballantyne made his decision suddenly: When in doubt, be frank.

He explained in detail his visits to Eski Hissar, hoping to meet Villette, his discovery of the body, his recognition of the wounds. And then he repeated what Villette had told him, that the dead man had followed her to the Abdullah. He did not mention the rug.

“Have you any idea why?”

“You’re joking. Men always follow Villette. Only…she mentioned his following her to Decebilus.”

“You’re not suggesting he was killed because of that?”

“I suggest nothing. I comment, that is all.”

He glanced toward his car once more, but saw no movement there. “Can I drop you somewhere, Hamid?”

“I have my own car.” Yet Hamid made no move to go; he lingered, as if about to say something, then at last when he dropped his cigarette to the pavement he said only, “He has not changed, Ballantyne. Decebilus is the same.”

“They tell me his fingers reach even into the government, to the police.”

“If they do, I should like to know it.” Hamid glanced at Ballantyne. “They do not reach to me.”

“If it was shown to me in black and white, I still would not believe it,” Ballantyne said.

“Thank you. Thank you, my friend.” Hamid turned and walked away. He looked hard, capable, and tough. Hamid was a true Turk, and it would never do to underestimate him.

Ballantyne started for his Land Rover. He was thinking of what might be done before morning, for whatever was to be done must be done quickly. Decebilus was not one to waste time.

The VW had been replaced by another, larger car. Ballantyne dug out his key, his eyes sweeping the other vehicles, searching for that movement he had seen. He heard the whisper of clothing behind him…too late.

A knife-point pricked his back, and a car door opened behind him, the car parked directly alongside his own. The knife must have been put against his back through the window of the car. If that was so, when the door opened for the man to emerge the knife must be for a moment withdrawn while he moved it around the window frame.

Ballantyne stood very still, trying to judge from where the knife-blade was how tall the man might be. It was not Mustafa Bem, but a shorter man.

“Don’t move!” the voice growled, in English. The pressure of the knife-point slackened and Ballantyne spun swiftly, hands shoulder high, knocking the knife-hand aside.

His attacker lunged out of the car but Ballantyne jerked a knee into his groin and knocked him back into the car seat. Then he slammed the door on the man’s leg.

The man screamed.

People around the hotel stopped, staring toward the parking lot. Ballantyne climbed into the Land Rover and backed out, taking his time. He could hear his attacker moaning and cursing, but he ignored it. Turning his car, he drove unhurriedly away.

—

When Villette Mallory closed the door behind her, she stood for long minutes with her back against it, her eyes closed. No matter how desperately she fought the feeling, she was frightened.

The poise that was so distinctly a part of her was endangered by the frightening realization that she was broke…and in a foreign country where she had no friends.

She had always earned a good living, but she had lived too well and there had seemed no end to the money or the opportunities. Planning for the future, saving, had seemed something she could put off for a while. Despite her reputation as a glamor girl, despite how easy it had been to accept the attention and the pay, she had never been truly comfortable in that world. There was a darkness at its core, a corruption that made her uneasy.

When Jay had come along she was at a low ebb, emotionally. She had almost despaired of finding the sort of man she wanted, the sort toward whom she was naturally attracted.

Like many another girl who becomes a success in the world of fashion, motion pictures, or the theater, she had not realized how much it would limit her choice of men. Instead of meeting more men when she became famous, she met fewer…fewer she actually trusted, at least.

Too many were alcoholic playboys, veterans of a handful of unsuccessful marriages; still others were simply not interested in women at all, or were those who pretended an interest for protective coloration. Many men merely thought she was unapproachable, others assumed she was too approachable, but among them she found no men of character.

Not, at least, until she met Jay. His fortunes had been up and down so many times that he had no illusions left. Born into fabulous wealth in one of the poorest countries in the world, when India was torn asunder he had rebuilt what was left of his inheritance, enough to allow him a comfortable living. More than money, it was his dominance on the polo field and in the Team Lotus cars at Le Mans and Monaco that had kept him in the public eye. He had a love of life and a great trust in himself and the hand of fate.

When his investments in Cuba had been lost to the revolution, he found himself on the verge of going broke again. Villette was concerned—she had passed up another contract when they married. She made arrangements to fly to Paris to see what work was available.

But Jay had laughed. “There’s nothing to worry about,” he had said. “I’ve still got the rug.”

“The rug?”

“It’s a long story. And it will be quite the adventure for us.”

Later he had commented on it again. “There’s millions in it, but it will take some doing.”

He was excited by whatever plan he was making, but then he was off with the team and their ponies to India…and while there something had gone terribly wrong.

Now Jay was gone, and if she was to believe Ballantyne, he had been murdered.

She moved away from the door, and as she undressed and prepared for a shower, she considered the situation as coolly as she could.

Jay dead…He had been so filled with energy and the desire to do things that it was hard to conceive of the idea that he was gone.

COMMENTS: Dad left behind a bewildering array of revisions of this particular story. In trying to create a single coherent vision of his best ideas, I have combined the most complete material from five of the nine or ten drafts into the version that you have just read.

All of these drafts seem to originate from a very short short story, one that seems like an autobiographical vignette, called “By the Ruins of El Walariah,” first published in Yondering, The Revised Edition. It is merely an amusing conversation between a Moroccan boy and a young traveler, a man like Louis might once have been. It contains no hint that it ever could or would attempt to transform itself into a thriller.

I can only assume that was this story’s original incarnation. It is the simplest version, and stylistically it feels like a part of the “Yondering era,” stories that Louis wrote in the 1930s and ’40s before his mainstream career took off. At some point later on, he seems to have gotten the strange idea to turn that particular story into a treasure-hunt adventure.

The next step in the evolution of this narrative seems to be the following concept, one that does not use either the Moroccan (El Walariah) or Turkish (Istanbul) locations. These notes read:

Ali Brogan is a bit of the flotsam of the Middle East. He lives by his wits, and usually lives well, but occasionally he fails to come upon the needed opportunity.

He knows a multitude of things. Most of it is highly useless knowledge, and he has a horror of work. Wherever he is, he gets along, and always with a weather eye for the chance.

In Samarkand he overhears a conversation about a rug…a very rare rug, indeed, and woven into it is a map indicating the presence of a buried treasure.

Let’s say Ali sees a man killed and finds the rug. He carries it off, then an attempt is made to buy the rug from him. He studies the rug with great care, can find nothing, only the design in the center strikes him as a bit off pattern (in one corner, rather) and has a faintly familiar appearance.

He goes to a woman who knows most things and discovers to whom the rug belonged, and gets some of the story from her, an old lady. One thing she says rings a bell.

The elderly lady with whom he deals was once married to a nobleman of Turkish or Arabic background….She was an adventuress, but a shrewd and beautiful woman in her youth. Now an old lady with little money left she is still the grand dame, and still as gifted in her way as always. Ali has an admiration for her which he cannot keep secret, and he gives up his own profit for her.

Perhaps the design on the rug gives a map of a ruined building outside Samarkand. He is a crook who is outsmarted by his own sentimentality.

That idea led to a draft of the story that is much more like the chapters of The Golden Tapestry that you have just read. It included the characters of the shepherd boy, the mysterious and beautiful young woman, and some Bad Guys who want something she has. This draft was, like “By the Ruins of El Walariah,” set in Morocco. Subsequent versions, however, make the jump to Turkey and incorporate Hannibal’s treasure and the whole cast of characters; in fact, there is very little difference between the next nine drafts. Dad made small adjustments, the timing of some of the events, figuring out how to best establish certain bits of information, and that is about it. In one draft, Ballantyne is named Baliran and he experimented with some different names for Jay, the Maharajah of Kasur.

He wrote one of these drafts in the first person from Ballantyne’s point of view…then realized that was a mistake, that he needed to allow his audience to witness a number of scenes where Ballantyne could not be present. The first-person perspective made the delivery of that information difficult, and led to some extremely awkward expositional dialogue.

There were so many rewrites that I could see the storytelling begin to deteriorate; even as he got certain aspects of the plot nailed down, he began to take others so much for granted that he glossed over them, probably because he knew them too well by then. Louis did not like rewriting for this exact reason—unless a writer truly enjoys revision (and he did not), too many drafts can suck the life out of a story before it ever gets going.

It is very rare to see Louis sweating a bunch of little details like he did in these drafts. Usually, he was very self-assured about what he was doing and forged ahead with certainty. Even though he gave up on The Golden Tapestry, it seems like this is a pretty solid concept. Ultimately, he did get all those troublesome details nailed down in one version or another, and as you will see, he had a version of the entire story mapped out. Possibly Louis’s biggest issue when it came to rewrites was that he didn’t bother to do a careful analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of each draft. That, combined with the lack of a secretary (or a word processor!) to quickly shuffle all the good bits together, may have caused some of these story concepts to be left behind.

The bulk of these “Istanbul drafts” seem to have been written in 1960 and ’61, the same era when he wrote the first version of The Walking Drum and tried to develop several other ideas to break out of the Western genre. Only one novel, Sackett, was published in1961, and it ended up being a lean year. That was also the year I came along, and Mom and Dad were forced to move because their apartment building didn’t allow children.

Eventually, they bought a house, and it’s my guess that the financial pressure of the failed attempts to broaden his style, then my being born, plus the down payment on the house was what pushed him to accept the deal to write the novelization of the movie How the West Was Won, which came out in 1962.

At some point it seems Louis tried to sell The Golden Tapestry as a motion picture, no doubt feeling he could afford to go back to it if he had a buyer set up. No deal was ever made, but at least we will get the benefit of being able to read a treatment that suggests how the story might have developed and then ended if he had written the full novel.

As you read through the treatment below you may notice slight differences from the chapters of prose Louis wrote. Although the outline allows us to see what the overall structure of the story would have been like, I believe it was written fairly early in the process; the outline gives us the best overview, but the two chapters of prose you have just read are an indication of how he would have continued to work out the details in a more complete and sophisticated fashion.

---

THE GOLDEN TAPESTRY

Outline of a Novel

CAST OF CHARACTERS:

BALLANTYNE: He knows who is bribing who from Delhi to Istanbul, from Cairo to Samarkand…he knows where the power and influence lie, and who to see about getting things done.

His father was an Irish-American adventurer who came out to the Middle East with a bridge construction company and stayed on as an oil prospector. His mother was a Eurasian girl of good family, and Ballantyne, except for a few short periods in the States and in Europe, has grown up in the East.

His experience has been varied and colorful; he speaks a dozen languages, most of them fluently; he knows the argot of the beggars and the thieves; and he has wires out to all parts of the East where the only secrets that exist are the ancient ones. The bazaars, the coffee shops and wine shops teem with gossip.

At thirty-three he is good-looking, rugged, quick to make a fast buck or a fast lady, and is a good man in a fight, but a better one at talking himself out of them.

He makes his living by acting as liaison man for oil companies in their dealings with Arab sheiks and other tribesmen, as a local contact for motion-picture companies, for archaeologists, etc. Occasionally, when he noses about old ruins he comes up with a fine head, a plaque, or a vase…and he knows who will pay best for what he has found.

He speaks fluent Turkish, Arabic, Hebrew, Hindi, Persian, English, and French; he speaks a smattering of Russian, Chinese, Bengali, German, and Greek.

They know him in Aleppo and Isfahan, in Kashgar, Srinagar, Damascus, and Bagdad as a fast operator, but one whose word is good, whose courage is unquestioned.

He has had frequent dealings with LEON DECEBILUS.

—

VILLETTE MALLORY: Born in Pawhuska, Oklahoma, on a ranch, she was singing on various radio stations in the vicinity when only fourteen; at sixteen, passing as older, she was a model for Neiman Marcus in Dallas; at seventeen she had gone to New York and had become within a few months one of the best-paid models in the country, her income had moved up to five figures, and she was known as “The Incomparable Villette.”

She is beautiful, bright, and quick in conversation, and she knows how to take care of herself. Even with all her glamor and the romance that has become attached to her name she is a very regular gal who has never forgotten where she came from.

She has been courted without much success by an assortment of international playboys, visiting nobility, Texas millionaires, and the usual names that make up cafe society.

She had met the Maharajah of Kasur, a sportsman noted for his polo playing, race driving, etc., but a very regular guy who lost most of what he had when Pakistan split with India, and who divided much of what remained among relatives and some old family retainers.

Villette is not in love with him, but she does like him very much and they have become engaged. He has told her, and at first she believed he was joking, that he was not worried about money. He said he had a rug that would make his fortune…a prayer rug.

Villette knows a good deal about the world and about men, but she has never encountered the kind of trouble represented by LEON DECEBILUS.

—

LEON DECEBILUS: Tall, strong, and with a superficial polish that quickly disappears when he grows angry. His voice grows rough, his language changes.

“Decebilus” is a name he uses; his own name is unknown, and he himself may never have known it. His nationality is equally indefinite, except that he comes from the Levantine coast.

He has been a thief and a pimp, a smuggler and a runner of guns and other contraband. He has but one loyalty, to himself, is egocentric and cunning. He has the shrewdness developed from practice and from the peoples who live in the marketplace. He is a completely ruthless man, totally unimpressed by beauty. He still operates a chain of whorehouses throughout the ports of the Eastern Mediterranean, and women mean nothing to him. He takes them when he wants them, discards them when he wishes.

Villette, accustomed to coping with men without too much trouble, finds herself completely at a loss with him, a thing she does not sense at first.

Decebilus is interested only in money, and over the years, through murder, blackmail, and a series of fast operations he has become a financial leader in the Near East. He owns a line of decrepit freighters and tankers, a small airline operating in the Middle East, and various other enterprises.

He uses bribery, threats, and blackmail to get what he wants, but being absolutely ruthless and willing to kill or destroy anything in his way, he is a man feared wherever he appears.

He is handsome, dresses with great care in suits tailored in London. His outward manners and good taste are visible everywhere except that he constantly wears three large rings on his right hand, two on his left. His good taste in clothes is an acquired thing….Personally he would prefer something more garish, but he has learned. Only in the rings is this aspect visible. Yet the veneer is thin. When angry the change is shocking.

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RASHID: A goatherd who is twelve years old going on forty; young in one sense, he was never young in another; he has listened well over his few years, and has observed the comings and goings of men. He will have more to do in the story than the brief outline of the action indicates.

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MUSTAFA BEM and BARBARO: Sharp tools for the cutting hand of Decebilus, they supply his “muscle” when he does not wish to be involved.

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YUSUF: An old man who has lived long in Istanbul and for whom life holds no mysteries. He knows much of rugs, the rugs of Persia, Turkey, Bokhara, India, and China…he knows the myths and legends woven into the rugs, even some of their origins, for each rug is itself a puzzle, and the motifs may be borrowed from China that appear in a Persian or Turkish rug, or vice versa. Long ago his family were retainers of the Maharajah of Kasur, and like him, he is a Moslem.

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HAMID: A cool, hard-bitten, and thoroughly honest police officer; formerly of the Army, he knew Ballantyne in Korea, where the latter functioned as an intelligence officer and liaison man because of his command of languages. They mutually respect each other, but Hamid has always been a little suspicious of his friend. Hamid has a complete dossier on Decebilus but no opening for an arrest. Hamid is, however, more than a mere officer of the police…he is a liaison man between the police and the national government.

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YACUB & KHALID: Father and son, who know the secret of the rug and have searched for it as have their fathers and grandfathers before them.

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ZAIDA: Who has her own ideas about Ballantyne, Decebilus, and the rug. She is dark, slender, exotic, and is brought into the picture by Decebilus but decides to double-cross him and get the rug for herself.

LOCALE:

Algiers, Casablanca, and Hong Kong have been the subject of successful motion pictures, but Istanbul, formerly Constantinople, has never been used as it should have been. The harbor, the Golden Horn, the Bosporus, are indescribably beautiful and photogenic. The Old City, with its ancient walls which still stand, its mosques and minarets, is romantic and exciting.

During spring, summer, and fall the air is usually startlingly clear and the sky blue as it only is in the Greek islands, southern Italy, or Istanbul’s vicinity. The average temperature in July and August is 72 degrees. Istanbul is 16 hrs. by air from New York, 5 hrs. from Paris.

The best view of the Golden Horn, long famed as one of the most beautiful harbors in the world, is from the cemetery at the end of the bay.

The city is divided into three parts: the Old City, and then across the famed Galata Bridge over the Golden Horn is the modern city, and some old suburbs. Across the Bosporus (the fare across by ferry is about five cents) lies Asia.

Pop. about 1,200,000, and a mixture of all nationalities in the world. The city was founded in the 9th century B.C.

The Istanbul Hilton is the city’s luxury hotel, new, bright, and smart. The Parc used to be the lushest spot in Europe and was a hangout for correspondents and adventurers. In the Chez Afrique, a subterranean nightclub off the Street of Spices, von Papen used to meet his secret agents. Every street has its own story; many of them have thousands of stories.

The Seraglio Palace, which used to be the harem of the sultans of Turkey and the Ottoman Empire, is now a museum. It is a maze of rooms and passages, and part of the chase sequence in this story takes place there. It covers acres and acres of parks and buildings, is picturesque and exciting.

The Sunken Palace is one of the ancient cisterns built beneath the city (miles of these still exist, most of them forgotten long ago) to supply the city with water in time of siege. This one looks more like a vast cathedral than a cistern, and has 12 rows of 28 columns to hold the vaulted roof, 336 columns in all. But this is only one of the cisterns. It still contains water, and part of the chase takes place there, by boat and torchlight.

The Grand Bazaar has 92 streets and thousands of shops selling everything in the world. Not so mysterious-looking since the fire of some years back, but still an interesting place, always crowded and busy.

The Tin Village is a collection of shacks and huts built of old sheet metal, oil barrels, packing cases, etc. Gypsies live there.

The Gulf of Izmit and Eski Hissar is roughly fifty miles from Istanbul by a good road.

The Pandeli, mentioned in the story, is a romantic place in the Old Town, and the best food of the Turkish variety. There are a lot of good eating places in town. The Abdullah, also mentioned, is very good and considered the best in town.

Istanbul is a hotbed of intrigue, and visitors are there from every country in the world. The Turks are a hardy, rugged people who have fought the Russians many times in their history and any Turk believes he can whip any four Russians and is quite ready to prove it. Their government is friendly to ours and has been so for a long time.

The Istanbul Hilton is located in the heart of the city in a lovely park, and alongside the lobby is a promenade overlooking a garden terrace, a reflecting pool, swimming pool, cabanas, tennis courts, and the gardens.

There are a lot of theaters, good music, etc. The city has nearly 500 mosques, some of them extremely beautiful. There are miles of good beaches, and the place has a romantic flavor all its own.

BRIEF OUTLINE OF ACTION:

BALLANTYNE discovers the body of an old man in a worn black suit on the shore near Eski Hissar, and the man has been murdered by three knife wounds in the kidney. This use of the knife is a trademark of MUSTAFA BEM, the right-hand man of LEON DECEBILUS, formerly known as “Dice,” a name he would like to forget. Decebilus has in the past been a thief, a panderer, and a murderer….He is now a shipping magnate and financier.

Few recall his criminal background, or that his success was founded more upon blackmail and murder than upon financial cunning. The few who do remember prefer to keep silent.

Ballantyne waits among the ruins and sees a Renault come along the goat track. Mustafa Bem gets out and talks to RASHID, the goatherd, asking about a blue car with a woman in it. Rashid professes to know nothing, and they leave.

The boy comes over and after some talk with Ballantyne, introduces him to VILLETTE MALLORY.

VILLETTE was to have met her fiancé, the Maharajah of Kasur, in Istanbul, but he was killed in a plane crash en route. She has beautiful clothes, and almost no money. She is living on her jewelry, which she has pawned bit by bit, and other than that has only a rug, a prayer rug given her by the Maharajah, who told her to keep it at all costs, that it would make them rich. She had thought of the rug as more of a good-luck piece than anything else but there have been several attempts to take it from her and she is no longer so sure it is only that.

The only person she knows is an old man who keeps a shop in the Grand Bazaar, known as YUSUF, and her fiancé has assured her that he is trustworthy. She has no one to turn to except him, and he is a relatively poor man.

Ballantyne, a fast operator where a buck is concerned, has arrived at some conclusions of his own, which explains his presence among the ruins at Eski Hissar. Actually, he knows nothing of what is going on except that something is happening. He has learned a few things and drawn some conclusions.

The Maharajah, an internationally famous sportsman, suddenly canceled, without explanation, an all-important polo game on the eve of the game, and took a flight for Istanbul.

The plane exploded in midair over Iran and the Maharajah is killed. There is some doubt about how the plane came to explode.

Leon Decebilus, long known to Ballantyne, arrives suddenly in Istanbul and occupies a suite opposite that of Villette Mallory. Heretofore Decebilus has always stayed at the Parc.

A beat-up old freighter, owned by Decebilus, has come from Greece in ballast and is anchored in the Golden Horn; it is not attempting to load a cargo but is instead waiting….Why?

The Maharajah, who lost his estates during the split between Pakistan and India, is nearing bankruptcy, but before flying for Istanbul assured his creditors they would all be paid in full within the month.

It is obvious that the Maharajah expects to come into money in Istanbul and that Decebilus is aware of it.

Rumors are coming through on the grapevine, but nothing tangible. Not until Rashid spoke of it had Ballantyne heard of the rug.

Always keenly aware of any opportunity to turn his hand to making a fast buck, Ballantyne discovers that Villette is driving to Eski Hissar each day, and begins to haunt the place to meet her, and to discover what she is doing there. It is an unlikely place for such a girl to be.

Villette has lunched and dined with Decebilus, and Ballantyne warns her about him. He asks if she does not think it strange that he was so quick to arrange a meeting on arrival. She replies that men always meet her when she arrives anywhere, and if they did not she would change her perfume…or her coiffure.

She doubts his warnings until she hears him mention the dead man on the shore. She recognizes the description as that of a man who had come to the hotel and tried to buy the rug from her…a fact she had mentioned to Decebilus when the man followed her to her meeting with Decebilus at the Abdullah.

She had mentioned it…and now the man was dead.

She doubts the connection but she is uneasy. She agrees to lunch with Ballantyne but she will also see Yusuf…whom Ballantyne also knows.

Ballantyne observes that Villette is followed to Istanbul and to the hotel by a man in a battered Volkswagen whom Ballantyne later recognizes as having a strong resemblance to the murdered man.

Following his policy of pushing the opposition until they make mistakes, Ballantyne promotes trouble between Mustafa Bem and the man in the Volkswagen, whom he correctly supposes is son to the murdered man.

Villette meets Decebilus for dinner, but though she’s discounted Ballantyne’s suspicions she is wary when the subject of the rug arises and Decebilus suggests that to avoid future trouble she dispose of it. In fact, he would buy it himself.

When she refuses, he drops the matter. Later, speaking as a “friend,” he warns her.

Ballantyne, meanwhile, has been visited by Hamid, the police officer. It turns into a fencing match. Hamid likes Ballantyne but does not altogether trust him. Hamid also has received the rumors Ballantyne has been getting. He is alert to something going on.

Villette returns to find her suite ransacked.

Hamid then appears to ask about the death of the Maharajah. They are cooperating with the Iranian authorities in the investigation. Hamid inquires about her association with Decebilus.

She meets Ballantyne at the Pandeli and she is followed to that place. Evading their pursuers they go to Yusuf’s shop and find him murdered, the shop a shambles.

As Ballantyne and Villette are about to leave the shop, Mustafa Bem and Barbaro appear. Ballantyne keeps them occupied while Villette escapes with the rug, which the searchers had failed to find.

Thoroughly frightened, she narrowly eludes a man who grabs at her, escapes down an alley, and hiding in a doorway, sees three men consult, then dash off in separate directions.

She is stalked along the Step Street, and people seem to be watching her or pursuing her everywhere. At last, frantic with fear, she runs into the Tin Village. Around her are people who look at her with utterly emotionless eyes, strange faces, savage faces, empty faces. At last she falls, and is helped up…by Ballantyne.

They are stalked through the cisterns, through the Sunken Palace, and then by a secret way under the Seraglio Palace itself. Coming up inside, they manage to join a party of tourists and file out with them. They get to Ballantyne’s car and escape into the country, driving to Eski Hissar.

From a point near Hannibal’s tomb they stop, take the rug, and open it for study. It is late afternoon.

The secret of Hannibal’s treasure is woven into the rug. Ballantyne studies the pattern, explains something of the symbols, many of them very ancient, as he goes along. Yet he cannot solve the problem. Somewhere here there is a key.

Villette recalls that Yusuf’s hand lay on the rug, which he had simply spread on the floor amongst many others instead of hiding it, as he lay dying. Was it accident that his hand lay at a certain position? Or had he, in dying, tried to tell them something?

His hand had lain upon the lamp hanging in the prayer arch of the rug.

Carefully, they examine it. The treasure, they know, is the treasure of Hannibal, and that it is somehow connected with his tomb at Eski Hissar….

And then they see. The design woven into the rug, the design of the lamp, is also the key to the treasure, for it is the design of the ruined walls that lay scattered below them!

And plainly indicated is the place of the treasure.

Excited by their discovery, they start running down the slope toward the ruins.

Rashid is gathering his goats, but he ignores them. They call to him, but he walks on, never turning his head.

Warned by the boy’s actions, they stop. It is too late.

Having lost them in town, Decebilus and his men returned to where the old weaver had tried to contact her. They step from the ruins, and they have guns.

Ballantyne tries to bargain. Let them go and they will give up the rug. Decebilus is too shrewd. He knows the rug holds the secret, woven into it long ago, and if he is willing to forfeit the rug, Ballantyne must have solved the mystery of the weaving.

Decebilus has no intention of struggling to solve a problem when a man who has the solution is in his hands. He has a counter offer: their lives for the treasure. Suppose they found it, he argues. What could they possibly do with it? How would they move it? How could they dispose of it without exciting the cupidity of those with whom they dealt or corrupt officials?

Gold is very heavy, and people are curious. Decebilus offers here some comments on treasure-finding that are rarely considered. Most people at one time or another have thought of finding a treasure, yet few of them have gone beyond that to decide what they would do if they found it.

The government of most countries would take half; some countries would confiscate it all. They would have to transfer a large amount of gold and gems into Istanbul, and like any large city, it is filled with thieves. What then?

On the other hand, Decebilus explains, he is equipped to cope with the problem. He has underworld means of disposing of the loot; he has the force necessary to guard and protect it; he can use methods they as reasonably legitimate people dare not use. He has a ship and a crew prepared to handle it. He has a truck nearby to take it to the loading dock in a fishing village, and he has means of persuading the curious to be less so.

Ballantyne, realizing that Villette is in worse danger than he himself, tells them where to dig. They dig, uncover a stone slab, remove it, enter an underground chamber.

It is an ancient temple, prepared for worship. A Phoenician god faces them from a dais. In niches in the wall are four slightly smaller replicas. In the center of the room there are twelve large amphorae lying piled in a bunch.

Mustafa Bem calls to Decebilus.

They go to the opening and look. It is not yet dark, although the sun is down. Standing on the slope are forty or fifty people. They are the villagers, the friends of Rashid, and they stand very silently, watching.

Decebilus is furious. He demands of Ballantyne who they are, and Ballantyne can only guess. “They are my friends,” he said, “and they want no trouble, but they are prepared for it.”

It is a Mexican standoff, and Decebilus knows it. If he starts shooting he will kill some of them, but he will also raise such a turmoil that troops will be rushing down from Istanbul, his ship stopped, the treasure confiscated.

He bargains. Ballantyne will let him take half. They argue. Finally to save the villagers from a fight that is not their own, he agrees to let Decebilus go with eight of the amphorae, if he goes at once.

Decebilus departs and Rashid comes.

Villette comments that they have some of it, anyway, but Ballantyne replies that they actually have it all!

THE TREASURE:

After his defeat by the Romans, while they sought him everywhere, Hannibal escaped to the island of Crete. He brought with him some large jars that were heavy and were kept sealed and guarded. These were believed to contain his treasure.

When the Romans discovered his hiding place he slipped away from Crete to the Gulf of Nicomedia, where he lived in a fishing village. Discovered again by the Romans in 183 B.C., he killed himself rather than face capture, and his treasure was never found.

For our story purposes, the treasure could have always been kept inside some hollow Phoenician idols (also the gods of Hannibal’s Carthage) outside his door.

A weaver of rugs, following a legend handed down in his family for generations, found the treasure room at Eski Hissar, but took only a few pieces away with him.

Arrested in trying to sell a gem, he was imprisoned and after a while, because he was a weaver, was put to work. He refused to tell the whole story, claiming he had found only a few things buried in a ruin miles from Istanbul. After a while, he was believed, but he was kept busy weaving rugs for the Ottoman Turks. Into one of the rugs he wove the secret of the treasure, and into four other rugs he wove a key that only his own family would understand.

He died without knowing his son had died before him, and his daughter had been sold into slavery in India. A beautiful girl, she was taken into the harem of one of the Maharajah’s family. With her she took the secret of the rug and a bracelet that had once belonged to Hannibal.

The Maharajah of Kasur’s great-grandfather had finally found what the rug was, but not until Jay had they found anyone who could read the secret, and he read it too late.

COMMENTS: I believe that, had Louis continued on with this novel, he would have improved it considerably. The treatment you have just read seems to have been a fairly “quick and dirty” attempt to make a sale to a movie studio. If Dad had pressed on with this project, there would have been more development of the backstory between Decebilus and Ballantyne, and certainly some sort of mano a mano final fight between them. The arrival of the villagers at the finale feels like a cop-out intended to wrap up the treatment so he could get on to the next project. It is not the sort of thing that Louis ultimately would have gone on to actually write in a book.

Given that Decebilus discusses the difficulty of unloading a treasure, I suspect that Louis would have realized that Jay, being a fairly wise man, had worked out how to transport and dispose of whatever he finally discovered. Perhaps Jay had even been intending to use Decebilus in this capacity but Decebilus double-crossed him by planting the bomb in his plane once he decided (erroneously!) all he had to do was grab the rug from Villette. It is also clear that, unless Louis was planning to rewrite the beginning yet again, Villette knows more than she is letting on. The story starts with her spending part of several days at Eski Hissar. That indicates she already has a general sense of where the treasure is buried.

Louis left behind notes that suggest part of the secret is how the ruins look as the light changes toward the end of the day. It’s not just that the pattern of walls is woven into the rug; the shadows they cast are also a part of the weaving. He also included a good deal of information on rug-weavers’ knots, so much that I began to think that the ultimate trick in a story like this would be to have a certain thread that could be picked out of the rug and then pulled. This would unravel the section around the rug’s archway lamp, leaving behind a different design…the one that showed the location of the treasure. I became so enamored with this idea that I added the line where the weaver mentions his family’s secret knot. I may not be done with this story. We’ll have to see.

At another point in his notes, Louis seemed to consider the idea that two different groups might be searching for the treasure, one a bunch of crooks, the other with political motives….I believe this idea came before he conceived of the Decebilus character. The “political” group might have created a way of using the treasure for a higher purpose, as well as a method of unloading all that precious metal in a world that was still on the gold-exchange standard.

As was his way, Louis included a pep talk for himself in his notes:

Make this a suspense story in line of The Maltese Falcon, but make it deeper, better, a fine love story, a story of background and suspense, a sexy story.

Make the love affair gay, lighthearted, two people at an outpost of the world, both skating on thin ice.

Make this a definitely superlative book, something completely out of the ordinary. Discuss books, politics, painting, jewels, beliefs, folklore, magic, etc.

Make this something really fine. With a great suspense yarn and a beautiful love story. Make the writing something very special.

A final comment on the one thing about this story that I have never been able to figure out. It is this piece of the opening line:

He lay on his face in the wet sand, a tall old man in shabby clothes, and looking down at the body, Ballantyne knew that it had begun again but this time he did not know why.

“…knew that it had begun again…” It’s a great opening and Louis definitely had something particular in mind. Initially, I thought “again” referred to the bombing of Jay’s plane—chronologically, that is the first death related to the plot—but now I’m not so sure. At a guess, taking other drafts and notes into consideration, “again” may imply Ballantyne suspects that those who got too close to the treasure were being bumped off by someone guarding it…maybe an individual, maybe a secret group, who didn’t even really know what they were guarding. Perhaps Dad realized later on that having the hero know too much in the beginning of the story wasn’t going to work all that well and started to pull back from that concept, or at least from Ballantyne’s knowledge of an ongoing plot or series of murders.

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