The food and wine worked their age-old magic, and gradually both Roupen and Yordanus began to grow more amiable. As the meal went on, the surly young lord became quite pleasant, and the sour old man grew sweet-tempered and convivial.
'Fill the cups!' he cried at one point, thrusting his beaker into the air. 'I want to drink the health of my new friends.' Happy to oblige, I took up the jar and poured the good red wine. Yordanus then raised his cup high and said, 'I drink to friendship, health, and peace – God's blessing on all his children.' We acclaimed this sentiment with cheers, whereupon our host said, 'May the Lord of the Feast eternally bless us with good food, good wine, and dear friends around the board -for ever and always! Amen!'
Roupen affirmed the benediction, but could not let the comment pass. 'Lord of the Feast?' he said when everyone had drunk. 'That is a title which belongs to Christ, I should have thought.'
Yordanus turned his head and regarded the young man quizzically. 'Yes?'
'Strange words from the mouth of a Copt,' Roupen observed with wine-induced carelessness.
The old man stiffened; the smile hardened on his face and his eyes narrowed.
Roupen, seeing he had offended his host, looked to me for help. But I remained silent and left him to face the consequence of his intolerance. 'I meant nothing more than that,' he offered weakly. 'Why does everyone look at me so?'
'You think Copts unworthy of salvation?' asked Yordanus, quietly bristling.
Roupen red-faced now, raised a hand in defence of his blunder. 'I meant no disresp -'
'You think because I am a Copt, I am less a Christian than you?' Yordanus challenged, growing rigid with indignation.
I made to intercede for the young man, but Padraig prevented me. 'Let him squirm,' the priest whispered. 'It will teach him a lesson.'
Yordanus stared with dull anger at the impudent young lord. 'Once,' he said, his voice growing cold, 'I would not have suffered an insult beneath the roof of my own house. But,' he lifted his bony shoulders in a shrug of heavy resignation, 'I am not the man I used to be.' He extended a long finger towards Roupen. 'It is lucky for you that I am not.'
'Father, please -' said Sydoni, reaching across to tug his sleeve.
The old man raised his hands. 'That is all I will say.' Rising to his feet, he threw down his empty cup. 'You must excuse me. I am tired. I am going to bed.'
Roupen, stricken and guilty, stammered, 'Please, sir, I am the one who should leave. And I will do so.' He jumped up from his place. 'Before I go, I will beg your pardon and ask your forgiveness for the offence I have caused. Please accept my deepest apologies.'
He spoke with such contrition that Yordanus, urged by the silent entreaty of his daughter, grudgingly relented. 'Oh, very well,' the old man said. 'Sit down, young man. Sit down. There is no harm done.' He sighed, and forced a sad smile. Flapping a hand at the young lord, he said, 'Come, sit down. We will put this unfortunate misunderstanding behind us.'
Reluctantly, Roupen lowered himself to his place once more. Yordanus gazed at him for a moment. 'For more than thirty generations,' the old man said, thrusting his finger skyward, 'the House of Hippolytus has been a Christian house-before Byzantium, before Rome, before the Gospel of Christ was proclaimed in the streets of Athens, we were Christians.'
'An ancestry to glory in,' Padraig remarked. 'If every family could claim such long obedience, this world would not labour under so great a weight of faithlessness and falsehood.'
'Indeed, sir,' said Yordanus proudly. 'When the followers of The Way were thrown out of the High Temple at Jerusalem where they were meeting in those days, my ancestors were there. On the day that the Blessed Stephen was put to death, my ancestors carried his poor, battered corpse to the tomb. When the persecution began, the infant church scattered-north, south, east, west-wherever they hoped to escape the terrible oppression of the mob, and the tyranny of the temple leaders.'
Yordanus raised his cup, and Sydoni emptied the last of the jar into it. He drained the cup and said, 'But all that was a very long time ago. No one wants to hear it now.'
Roupen, duly chastised and anxious to make whatever amends he might, quickly said, 'If you please, sir, I would hear it.'
Certainly, that was the right thing to say, for the old man's eyes rekindled with a spark of his former gladness.
'Well, perhaps I will just say this one thing more-so to improve your understanding,' Yordanus conceded, swiftly overcoming his reluctance. Taking up a small bronze bell from the table, he rang it vigorously several times, and then said, 'Jerusalem became too dangerous, so my people fled south. Since the time of the great patriarch, Abraham, whenever trouble threatened in Palestine, the Jews took refuge in Egypt. This my people did, and in Egypt they stayed. In time, we became Egyptians, and those of us who remained staunch in the faith became known as Copts. My ancestors prospered greatly; they became traders-some with fleets, and some with camels, some with important stalls in the principle markets of the great cities.
'This is the life that was handed down to me. I became a trader, after my own fashion, and my son likewise.' At these words, a shadow passed over the old man's face; his voice faltered. 'My son…' he paused, cleared his throat, and finished, saying, 'Once the extent of my interests stretched from the banks of the Nile to the tops of the Tarsus mountains. Now all that is gone… gone and finished and dead – like my son. The last hope of my illustrious line.'
Yordanus raised his eyes and smiled sadly. 'I am sorry,' he said, sinking once more into himself, 'my grief is a burden I did not intend forcing upon you. Forgive an old man.'
He paused, during which time the fat man who had met us at the door appeared. 'Gregior,' Yordanus ordered, 'bring us more wine.' The sullen servant turned without a word and lumbered off. 'And try not to drink it all before it reaches the table,' his master called after him.
'I do not believe in keeping slaves,' explained Yordanus. 'But I make an exception for Gregior and Omer. They are hopeless, you must agree. If I turned them out they would soon starve, and I cannot, in good Christian conscience, allow that to happen. So, I keep them for their own good, as no one else would have them.' He smiled weakly and spread his hands. 'I apologize for your sorry reception. Mind you, it would have been no different for anyone else. Be you caliph or king, beggar, leper, or thief, Omer would treat you exactly the same.'
'What language does he speak?' asked Padraig. 'I could not make out a word of it.'
'So far as I know, it is no language at all,' answered our host, chuckling to himself. 'Omer imagines he is speaking Latin, but so long as I have known him, I have never had so much as a single intelligible word out of him in any tongue whatsoever.' He shook his head wearily. 'Hopeless.'
The wine arrived in a great silver jar, and Sydoni poured it into the cups which Yordanus offered to us once more, saying, 'I drink to my friends, old and new! May the High Holy One keep you all in the hollow of his hand. Amen!'
We drank and our host, placing his cup firmly on the table, said, 'Now then, to business. Tell me, why did our Templar friend de Bracineaux send you to old Yordanus?'
TWENTY-FOUR
Yordanus listened with half-closed eyes while I made a brief account of the events which had led us to his door. He nodded and glanced at Padraig as I described how the priest and I had come to be on pilgrimage, and how we had met the Templars and young Lord Roupen in Rouen, and all that had flowed from that meeting-all, that is, save for Bohemond's plan to reclaim the Armenian stronghold at Anazarbus. I thought it best to keep that to myself.