Forgive me. I got carried away, but it’s passed off now. I went for a walk, or at any rate I stood up from the table and stamped up and down the length of this caravan for a bit. I might have gone further, I suppose, if I had dared to go outside, but I lacked the courage. I am too afraid to open my door in case the bombs get me, so I stay here, inside my caravan, where I am safe from bombs. It’s nonsense. It’s madness. It’s as stupid as blaming those good people in that church all those years ago for the bombs that are falling on me now. I went to make a cup of tea but I forgot I haven’t any tea. Forgive me. I have come to mistrust crowds, that’s all. It’s all right now. As I recall, I was telling you how the priests dragged me round the church in my tent of a shawl.
Round the church we went, everybody turning in their places as we passed, the way that daisies turn to the sun, only I was the daisy and a thousand tiny candle-suns were turning toward me.
The priests led me back to my throne and began a new bout of chanting. To tell the truth, it was boring. I had no idea what to do or even what I was supposed to be thinking while all this singing was going on. I tried to think high-minded thoughts. I strove to prepare the inner man for the awesome duty I was about to undertake. More than anything else, I struggled to keep a straight face. My eyes found Sarah standing near the front of the crowd, her weight on one foot, the other leg a little to one side so she stood like a capital R with that curve sweeping down to her heel. Do you remember what we used to say about “a prettily turned ankle”? In the old days that was just about all there was to see and, although I’d seen all the rest, seeing that gorgeous, swan-neck curve was as good as seeing her naked again. And there was Tifty, standing near her, glowing in that daring dress. Mrs. MacLeod, I knew, would be close by, too short to spot in the crush, but I could see Max, looking solemn, and Arbuthnot looking the same as he always did. He never changed, that man.
I turned my kingly gaze on each of them in turn, as if my private thoughts could reach them, but my eyes lingered on Sarah and stayed there. That dress. That hat. Those eyes. The candlelight falling on her face. The tiny, locked world of the railway-carriage sleeping car. The taste of her. The smell of her. The warmth of her. I was so deep in love with that girl and I wanted it to show in my face. I wanted her to look in my eyes and see herself reflected there and know that I loved her. She did. I hope that she did. I know she did because I saw it in her eyes when she looked back at me and, more than that, I saw it in Tifty’s eyes, saying, “Goodbye.”
The priest-song halted for a moment.
“Say, ‘Une nuk,’” said Kemali.
So I did, and in exchange the priests gave me a scepter to hold and then we had another procession all the way round the church and back to the throne for some more singing.
“Say, ‘Une nuk,’” said Kemali, when they reached another break in proceedings, and then they gave me a golden orb to hold. Off we went round the church again, only this time we stopped in front of the great wall of icons, pictures of Christ and his mother, pictures of this saint and that saint, endless rows of them, with their long beards and their sheep’s eyes. Each of them had to be asked for a special blessing. Each of them had to be saluted by name.
“Bow when they bow,” said Kemali, so I stood there in my little tent shawl, with my orb and my scepter and, when the priests bowed, I bowed and we all got on very well. There was another age of bowing and picture kissing before we went back to the throne for another sing, but this time when they all fell silent and Kemali said, “Say …” I beat him to it and said, “Une nuk.” I never had any problems with learning my cues.
The priests surrounding me let go of my little shawl, took a few steps back and returned with an enormous red cape that any self-respecting cardinal would have dismissed as a bit ostentatious. There was so much gold embroidery stitched into it that I reckon the damned thing could probably have stood up by itself. It was absolutely rigid, like a suit of armor. God knows how many poor little nuns must have bled their fingers white in stitching it, and when they put it round my shoulder and buckled it up across my throat it felt like somebody had emptied a sack of coal into my pockets.
Luckily I still had my pageboy priests with me and they gathered round and helped me bear the load as we set off for another tour of the church, but this time, thank God, when we got back to the throne, they let me sit down.
The singing stopped. I was sitting bolt upright in my seat with my orb in one hand, secretly resting on my knee, and my scepter crossed over my chest and sort of leaning, just a little bit, on my shoulder, because the damned thing was starting to get heavy, and the whole place was absolutely dead silent. The whole place was holding its breath. There was a window open. I remember the cry of a blackbird that sounded out like a fire alarm and I remember the sweat, a tiny trickle of sweat, running down between my shoulder blades and the heat and the weight of that cape and I realized that it was my turn to say something and I took a big breath, ready to shout, “Une nuk,” in my kingliest voice, but Kemali held a finger up to his lips, so I sat there, very still instead, saying nothing at all.
Silence. Absolute silence. Then four priests came in a squadron, each one carrying a pole and, stretched between the poles, corner to corner, a sheet of cloth, like a portable roof with a tasseled fringe. They stood around me so the sheet was above my head, and then Archbishop Big Beard reached into his sleeve and produced a cut-crystal perfume bottle. He stood close to me. The priests lowered their poles. They came closer to the throne. They let the cloth sag. It fell in folds around us, hiding us in a tiny private world, a big top where we were the only performers. But that’s not right. It’s not respectful enough. It wasn’t a big top, it was a little sanctuary, a holy place in the middle of that holy place, where holy things were done, things so holy that they could not be looked on—not by anyone.
That fat old man, with his bristling beard, was standing so close to me I could smell his breakfast and, when he pulled the stopper off his perfume bottle, I swear to you it rattled in his trembling fingers as if he was handling nitroglycerine. He tipped a tiny flood of oil into his hand and dabbed it on my head with many murmurings. I felt it, cool and wet, in my hair, running down on to my scalp, trickling over my head, and I knew enough to know what it meant. It was more than a crown. It was the blessing and authority of God.
The priest wiped his hands across my ears and over my eyes and, last of all, with more garlic-sausage whispered prayers, he touched my mouth and then the moment was over. He straightened himself under our private little tent, and the pole carriers took that as their sign to lift the canopy high again.
I wonder if the anointing left me changed. I wonder if I was different to look at. Certainly I felt different and they looked at me differently—even Sarah, who put her ankle away and stood up straight and looked at me solemnly and then turned her face away and looked at the floor. Fool that I was, I liked that. The singing started again.
The canopy was back in place over my head. The priest handed his bottle to an acolyte, backed away from the throne and vanished through a door in the middle of the wall of icons. I couldn’t see where he had gone, but I knew why he had gone and, when he came back carrying the crown, the music burst like a thundercloud.
Don’t forget, those hundreds of people inside that church had never seen the crown before. Kemali and Zogolli had seen it. They imagined it, or rebuilt it or something, and I’d tried the damn thing on for God’s sake, but the people had been waiting for it to arrive the way that children wait for Christmas and far, far more than they had been waiting for me. When I arrived in the church they were all suitably respectful and properly excited, but nobody gasped, nobody stood there with their hands clamped over their mouths the way they did when they saw the crown. Nobody burst into tears for me.
The priests sang. The people sang back. The priests sang. The people sang back and slowly, slowly, the priest with the big beard drew closer to the throne, bearing the crown before him, carrying it with his hands folded inside his sleeves like a thing red-hot from a furnace.
He reached out to me. The priests holding the canopy stretched out their free hands toward him until, when he stood over me, all four of them were touching him, as if to say that they were crowning me too. The crown was close. Closer. Closer. The crown was poised over my head. I could feel the electric crackle of it. I wanted to sit staring to the front, dignified and imperious, and I tried, but I’m only flesh and blood and I know that my eyes flickered upward once or twice, just to see what was going on, and then there was nothing at all to see. My vision was filled by a theater curtain of golden robes and then the priest stepped away and I knew it had happened and I could feel the crown on my head and I knew that I was the king and all the other priests stepped away and the people could see me—me and the crown together—and they went crazy with their God Save the Kinging.
Well, we had to have another parade after that, all the way round the church again and back to the throne so I could sit to receive the homage of my people, one after another, kneeling to kiss my hand, and when that was done at last, Kemali said, “Now, Majesty, we must leave. It is time for the people to see their crowned king.”
“A moment, Kemali, I have business to conduct.”
“Another of your little surprises, Majesty?”
“I promise this is the last. I need you to translate.”
I stood up on the steps of the throne, but I had to put down the orb and scepter and that damned cloak was so bloody heavy, so I shucked that off and laid the whole lot on the seat, and then, when I looked a bit more ordinary, except for my fancy new sword belt and my fancy new hat, I beckoned the boy with the saddlebags toward me.
I said, “Citizens of the free and independent kingdom of Albania,” and Kemali translated.
“As your king, We pledge to you in full and equal measure the love and loyalty you have pledged to Us this day.” I might easily have said “today,” but “this day” sounded much, much grander and it produced the applause I had hoped for.
“First, We are happy to announce that the vile and craven Serbs have crumbled before the mere threat of war. Earlier this morning they informed our government that they have capitulated and will accede to all reasonable demands. Such is the terrifying might of the free and independent kingdom of Albania. Your strong sons will not be required of you. The national honor is restored. There will be no war.”
God knows they were happy enough when I told them we were going to crack heads together but, when I told them we’d already won and there would be no fighting after all, well, they just went crazy with delight. Kemali merely raised an eyebrow.
“Secondly, from this day, We make a solemn and binding covenant with you, Our people. We promise that your tongue, the language of the Albanian people, shall be Our language and the language of Our court and government.”
Wild applause.
“And, as a sign of Our especial favor, we wish to make certain gifts and grants. Whereas the heads of some of the nation’s most ancient and noble families have done Us the great honor of presenting their daughters to Us, these ladies are to be assured of the lasting love and regard of the Crown, honored henceforth as Sisters of the King and sent home …” the Royal Fathers-in-Law scowled and reached for where their pistols should have been, had they not been removed at the door, “sent home heavy with Our favor and each endowed with twenty thousand leks from Our private Treasury that they may secure good marriages.”
The fathers-in-law put down their imaginary pistols, grinned their broken-toothed grins and clapped like crazy.
When the applause had died down again I went on: “No king can rule without the good counsel of trusted friends. Therefore, We have chosen this day to found and institute a new order of knighthood open to the closest advisers to the throne, to those who stand as close as brothers to the king and only a little below him in honor, to those who are sworn to serve Us personally and with loyalty.
“The members of this new Order of Skanderbeg—” by God they loved that and clapped until their hands were bruised—“will be charged with the sacred duty of speaking the truth to the king; they will be assured of access to Our Person at all times and granted the right to dine at Our table.” No more sitting alone in a swanky dining room for me.
The applause went on and on until I had to hold my hands up for a bit of quiet. When I said, “The first Knight of Skanderbeg,” those Albanoks had no idea what I was taking about, but they understood me well enough when I called the name of “Ismail Kemali.”
The grand old man, God bless him, was slow to answer my beckoning, but the cheers and the shouting went on and at last Zogolli and the fattest father-in-law dragged him forward.
I reached into my saddlebag and brought out a scarlet curtain tie. “Will you swear your loyalty to me, as King of Albania, while you live? Do you promise to give true counsel when most needed, upon your honor as a Knight of Skanderbeg?”
Good Kemali said, “I do.”
“Say ‘Une nuk,’” I said.
“Une nuk.”
I laid the curtain tie across his shoulder, only now of course it wasn’t a curtain tie, it was the insignia of the Order of Skanderbeg, and every man in that huge crowd wanted a curtain tie across his shoulder as Kemali had one across his.
Sadly I had only twelve curtain ties in my saddlebag: one for Kemali, five for the jilted fathers-in-law, one for Zogolli, who wept hot salt tears and repeated every word of his oath before giving me his “une nuk.” His eyes filled with tears and his big carrot nose filled with snot while he sniveled his loyalty as if I had done something for him, as if I had paid him some special service when, if only he had noticed, Kemali had loved him like a father for years. But Kemali was not God’s anointed. Kemali had no crown, and it’s the crown that makes the difference.
Eventually, in spite of his lovesick slobbering, I managed to shake him from my hands and the boy stepped forward, holding up his bag so I could choose another curtain tie. Only twelve curtain ties, and seven of them gone already.
I called out “Sir Max Schlepsig, Knight of Skanderbeg,” and my mate Max came forward, looking like an embarrassed bear.
“Me, Otto? A knight? You sure?”
“Can’t think of anybody better. You might not be a nobleman, Max, but you’ve always been a noble man.”
“That’s kind of you to say, but I’m more used to swallowing swords than carrying one round on my hip.”
I leaned in close and whispered, “Shut up, Max. The world’s on its head. If I can be king, then you can damned sure be a knight. Now, do you promise to be loyal and always to tell me the truth?”
“Always have,” he said, which was true. Asking Max to be loyal and true was like asking the ocean to be wet and salty.
I threw the cloth across his shoulders. “You’re in,” I said. Then I called for “The Captain of the Royal Guard,” and Arbuthnot, looking as delighted as a man like Arbuthnot could ever look, fell to his knees and kissed my fingertips.
“What a hoot,” he said. “I wonder what they’ll make of this back home. I’d rather have this than the Garter.” I remember that’s exactly what he said, although to this very day and hour I have no idea what he meant by it.
Next I called for “The Countess Tifty Gourdas, Dame of the Order of Skanderbeg,” which sent a ripple round the church. I don’t know if the Albanoks were prepared for the idea of ladies close to the throne, but when they saw her walk to the steps they probably changed their minds, and when they saw her curtsy they were utterly convinced, because by God that woman could curtsy, and if I let my hand linger just a little longer than needful when I laid the sash of the order across that magnificent bosom, it was only by way of a fond farewell, that was all.
And then Sarah. My Sarah. It had to be Sarah. The tenth curtain tie was hers. I announced, “The Most Serene Lady, Sarah von Mesmer, Dame of the Order of Skanderbeg,” and, I swear to God, that whole church sighed when they saw her mount the steps of the throne. Remember that crowd? Remember them all pressed in together, with Sarah at the front? She came up out from them, like Venus coming up out of the waves, and they sighed like the waves as she passed.
All except one. All except her father.
While everybody was watching Sarah, I was watching him hold on to her as she tried to come to me, clinging to her until she was too far to touch, clawing at the empty air where her scent hung, even as she turned and promised him, “I’ll be back, Daddy,” pounding his cane into the pavement in fury, glaring at me with his black, dead eyes.
There she was, standing in front of me, so small and perfect, like a flower that suddenly appears where nobody ever planted flowers before.
“Hello, Otto,” she said.
“Hello, Sarah. You look nice.”
“So do you.”
“Would you like to be a Lady of Skanderbeg?”
“I think that sounds lovely, Otto. Thank you very much.”
“And do you promise to love me?”
“Always and forever.”
“And do you promise to roll about in that big bed with me for hours at a time and always on a Saturday morning?”
“Do all the Knights of Skanderbeg have to promise that, Otto?”
“Only me?”
“Always only you.”
“In that case, I promise.”
“And do you promise to tell me the truth?”
“Most of the time.”
“Fair enough. You’re in.”
Thank God that Kemali had stopped translating long before it was time to lay the sash across her shoulder, but when the boy held up his bag and I reached in to take one out, I saw at once that there was just one left. It was another of those dreadful “forgotten-to-do-your-homework” moments and the urge to scrabble about in the bottom of the bag was almost overpowering. Kemali, Zogolli, Max, Arbuthnot, Tifty and the five fathers-in-law. Sarah was not the tenth knight, she was the eleventh and I had only one curtain tie left, and there was Mrs. MacLeod, with that gorgeous frozen aviary on her head, smoothing her dress down, smiling her wicked smile, sinuous as a vine, fluid as flame, ready to step forward to receive the honors that were her due.
“The last place in the Order of Skanderbeg …”
The pretty little toe of Mrs. MacLeod’s pretty little shoe peeped out from behind the hem of her dress.
“… will be filled by my most worthy vizier.”
The smile on Mrs. MacLeod’s face folded its wings and died, like a pheasant in flight. Her little toe disappeared again and she turned to Professor Alberto, urging him forward with chilly whispers.
He would not budge. She pushed, angrily, at his elbow. He did not move.
Sarah went down to him and took his hand, but he said something to her and she let him walk alone, with a few shallow sweeps of the cane, to the foot of the steps.
The place was hushed—as quiet as it had been at the moment of my crowning—and somehow the people seemed to realize that this new Knight of Skanderbeg was a little more important than the others.
“Do you promise to be loyal?”
He turned those terrible, shining spectacles on me again, those black sheets of glass, like the opposite of searchlights. “I solemnly promise and swear my loyalty to you, my king.”
“And do you promise to tell the truth and always to offer sound counsel to your sovereign?”
“I do.”
I laid a curtain tie across his shoulder. “Hail, Knight of Skanderbeg.”
That was when the explosions started.