Omar Khayyam - a life (9 page)

"My soul!" quoth Tutush the next morning, "you look like a hermit returned from the animal kingdom. How we searched for you! How will you cover the fire of Nizam's anger with the water of explanation? No matter—it is all one now that you are here."

"While I was gone," Omar asked, "did Yasmi send a message, a token?"

"Ah, that girl." The master of the spies blinked amiably. "Why, I think not—nay, I heard of nothing."

"But your men have tidings?"

Tutush pursed his lips and shook his head regretfully. His agents, he said, had watched like hawks; they had seen nothing. "After all," he observed brightly, "there are other girls in the market—little Persian bulbuls—Chinese slaves from Samarkand-way, very well trained, oh, most skillful. But Nizam is angry. We must have work to show him—some plan to lay before him."

Omar was silent. He had not the ghost of a plan in his head.

"Think, O youthful khwaja. Think of the plan you brought from the House of Wisdom. What was then in thy mind to accomplish, for a patron."

"A new calendar."

"What?"

"A new measure of time that will be accurate, instead of losing hours."

Tutush glanced at Omar apprehensively. The servants had said that the new master behaved strangely. "Now," he suggested, smiling, "lay the hand of pity on the ache of my ignorance. We have the moon, created by Allah to tell us by its first light when a new month begins. Surely no mortal can fashion an instrument to do better what the moon does. Eh—eh?"

"The Egyptians have done it; the Christians have done it." Omar frowned impatiently. "But that small wooden gnomon you have planted here is fit for children to play with. Come, and see."

With Khwaja Mai'mun bringing up the rear they went out to the slender wooden staff. Tutush had taken great pains in superintending its erection by carpenters from the Castle. He thought it cast a beautiful shadow on the carefully smoothed clay. But Omar uprooted it with one heave of his shoulders and cast it down the slope. A deep anger seemed to be burning in this man from the desert roads.

"That thing would bend in the wind and warp in the sun," he cried. "Are we children playing makebelieve? We need what the infidels had, a marble column five times the height of a man, true to a fingernail upon all sides and at the point. Then a base of mortar, and marble slabs to make a triangle for its shadow. The slabs must be ground, polished, bound together with copper and laid with a water level. Oh—send me artisans, and I will tell them what is needed."

"First," muttered Tutush, "I must have the consent of Nizam al Mulk. This thing hath the sound of an infidel monument to me——"

"It is the only way to measure a hair's breadth change in the shadow each day."

"A hair's breadth!" Tutush seized his turban and drew the attentive Khwaja Mai'mun aside, to ask in a whisper if the mathematician did not believe Omar befuddled.

"Fuddled he may be," the old man announced. "As to that I know not. But this I know——" his beard twitched in a faint semblance of a smile—"he is not foolish in making calculations. Such a gnomon as he describes would be accurate. I will even admit that if truly placed it would be as accurate as the great globe of Avicenna yonder."

Tutush carried his perplexity to Nizam who listened coldly enough to his tale—Omar's disappearance had interfered with his own plans—until he admitted that Khwaja Mai'mun approved of the scheme to measure time.

"A calendar," the minister of the Court mused. "It would go against tradition—ay, the Ulema would oppose it. The Christians have one calendar from the days of Rome, the Cathayans have their cycles, and we Persians had the Yazdigird era before the Moslem conquest. I think—I think it would be dangerous."

Closing his eyes, Tutush sighed. "First Omar tells me Time is only one, and now the Arranger of the World doth declare that there are four different Times. Alas, for my understanding."

"Four calendars," corrected Nizam. "And, Malikshah still asks for Omar."

"And now Omar asks for a water clock to measure a single minute in a whole day. What would he do with such a contrivance—watch it every livelong moment of waking and sleeping?"

"With it he could select the day in spring and autumn when day and night are equal to the minute. With the great gnomon he could determine the instant when the sun's shadow at noon is longest in the winter and shortest in the summer. And with his observation of the star movements he could revise both calculations. Yes, I understand what he would do."

"Inshallah,"
murmured Tutush. "God willing."

"If God wills. We could present Malikshah with a new calendar for his reign."

Nizam suddenly felt that this would be an excellent plan. It would please the Sultan to have a new calendar devised for him alone; being doubly pleased with Omar, he might name the Tentmaker—as Nizam had anticipated from the first—astronomer to the King.

"I will see that he has his new water clock," he decided. "But what made him wander in that fashion?"

Tutush blinked and smiled. "Only God knows—thy servant is ignorant."

"Make it thy task to see that he wanders not again. For I have need of him."

When he had left Nizam's presence Tutush hastened to his own quarters. At times he retired from sight to a certain nook in an old warehouse overlooking the bazaar and the mosque courtyard, where he kept such belongings as he did not wish to be known to any one else. His hiding hole was guarded by a dumb Egyptian who posed as the owner of the rooms. And here, rooting into a chest with triple locks, Tutush drew out a slender armlet of silver set with turquoises the color of the clear sky.

It had been brought to the tower by a hunchback who had been the favorite jester of the late Sultan. This hunchback had said it was a token from a woman named Yasmi who had said that her heart was sickening and she was being carried far along the western roads to Aleppo.

"Only in this one respect is Omar stubborn," Tutush reflected. "And by my soul I will not have him starting off into the western world, to Aleppo. Not with Nizam's anger hanging over my head."

He decided that he would rid himself of this silver token. Thrusting it into his girdle, he closed the chest and descended to the alleys. When he came to a bevy of half-grown girls playing around a fountain, he took out the silver armlet and dropped it. Nor did he turn his head at the click of the metal against pebbles. There was silence behind him, and then soft exclamations followed by a swift pattering of bare feet. Tutush glanced back.

The fountain was deserted, and the silver armlet had vanished.

"Hide a stone among stones," he quoted, smiling, "and a grain of sand in the desert."

Nizam al Mulk was pleased with events at the observatory. Before the end of the hot season the water clock stood in the workroom. It had a small wheel that revolved sixty times in the hour, and a large wheel that turned once in the hour. A silver point like a spear point moved along a graduated scale bar exactly once between noon and noon, and then started on its return journey during the next day. At least Tutush thought it to be marvelously exact, but Khwaja Mai'mun informed him that after a year or so they would be able to determine its variation from true time. Tutush rejoined that it lacked a miniature horseman, to mark the days with his spear like the one in the Castle. And Mai'mun merely glanced at him, pityingly. Mathematicians, it seemed, did not need any tell-tale to remind them of the days.

At last all the instruments were in place, and four more observers selected. The new marble gnomon reared skyward, and even Mai'mun admitted that they were ready to begin their great task of measuring time anew. Mai'mun believed it would take seven years, while Omar thought it could be done in four or five.

"My soul!" cried Tutush. "We could build a palace in four or five weeks."

"Yes," said Omar, his dark eyes kindling, "and when your palace is broken dust with lizards dwelling there, our calendar will be unchanged."

"If I had a palace," laughed the plump master of the spies, "I would not care a whit what came to pass after I was laid among the lizards."

But he reported to Nizam that the six astronomers were ready, with their loins girded up and their wits whetted down to a sword's edge. Nizam thereupon arranged a little drama for the benefit of his lord the Sultan, the week before the autumn equinox—when Omar had told him they planned to begin observations.

That day Malikshah the Sultan was persuaded to visit the tower after his return from a gazelle hunt. By mid-afternoon the observatory looked like a pleasure pavilion, with carpets spread throughout the new garden and trays of sweetmeats and sherbet set out beneath the trees.

Thither came a deputation of professors from the academy, with Master Ali the Algebraist—all in court robes—and a group of silent mullahs from the mosque who kept apart from the others. Nizam welcomed these mullahs with all ceremony—and seated them nearest the silk-covered dais reserved for Malikshah, because they were members of the all-powerful religious Council and they brought with them no sympathy for scientific innovations. He whispered to Omar to be careful to stand behind them, and not to speak before them.

Omar had no desire to say anything. He felt like a spectator at another's party, and he was glad when the salutations ceased and all eyes turned toward a cavalcade of horsemen coming up the slope from the river.

Malikshah handed his hunting spear to a slave and dismounted at the gate before the anxious servants could spread a carpet for him. He was dusty and in high good humor after his long ride, but Omar thought that the young Sultan felt no real pleasure in meeting Nizam and the oldest of the mullahs. Malikshah's pale face was poised upon a corded neck; he moved with an animal's grace. He did not lift his hands or raise his voice when he spoke.

When Nizam led Omar forward to kneel before him, he looked intently at the young astronomer. "That is the man," he said in his low voice.

"The servant," Omar murmured the expected phrase, "of the Lord of the World."

"At a serai on the Khorasan road thou didst come to me, prophesying what was to be—although those about me had filled my ears with lying words. I have not forgotten. I will not forget. What wilt thou have, now, from my hand?"

For a moment the two contemplated each other—the warrior still isolated in his thoughts from the crowded world of Islam, still the child of the remote Kha Khan who had ruled an empire of cattle and men up there beyond the Roof of the World—and the scholar who still lived in his imagination. Malikshah was twenty years of age, Omar twenty-two.

"I ask to be taken into the service of the King."

"It is done." Malikshah smiled. "Now show me what thou hast made, here."

He was pleased with the lofty gnomon, and he studied the other instruments curiously. When the aged Mai'mun, rendered awkward by the throng and the presence of his king, tried to explain the great celestial globe, Malikshah turned to Omar and bade him explain. He liked the clear words of the young astronomer.

The chief of the mullahs, exasperated by the attention shown to the scientific instruments, came forward to assert his dignity.

"Give heed!" he cried. "It is written,
'Bend not in adoration to the sun or the moon, but bend in adoration before God who created them both, if ye would serve Him!'"

A murmur of assent from the mullahs greeted the words of the Koran.

"Also," said Omar at once, "it is written,
'Among his signs are the night and the day, and the sun and the moon. Unless the signs be made clear, how shall we receive them?'
"

Malikshah said nothing. His grandsires, pagan Turks and barbaric, had been converted to Islam, and Malikshah was as devout as the fanatical Nizam. He took farewell ceremoniously of the oldest mullah, but he summoned Omar to his stirrup when he had mounted his horse.

"The Minister hath besought me," he remarked, "to grant thee the post of astronomer to the King. It is done. At the Council tomorrow a robe of honor shall be given thee." He leaned down impulsively, "Come and sit beside me often. By my head, I have need many times of a true sign."

And with a twist of the rein, a thudding of flashing hoofs, he was off down the slope with a long queue of officers and huntsmen strung out in his dust.

"It was ill done," remarked Nizam when next they were alone, "to match words with the mullahs of the Ulema. Now, it may be, they will put obstacles in thy path."

"But why, O Father? I have naught to do with the Ulema."

"Then see to it, Omar, that thou keepest thy foot from the skirt of their garments. Now, give heed, for there are things to be learned that thou knowest not as yet. First, thine appointment is recorded in the Council, and a yearly sum of twelve hundred
miskals
shall be paid thee without deduction of any tax.

Omar uttered an exclamation of astonishment. He had never thought of such a sum as this.

"And it may be," Nizam resumed unconcernedly, "that Malikshah will make other gifts to thee. I think thou art firm in his favor, but forget not that he is harsh as edged steel to one whom he distrusts; his spies are like bees in the honeycomb of the palace. His favor is the very pole of thy tent—without it, thy house would fall."

It seemed strange to Omar that even while he was buried in his work he must contend for the favor of the young monarch whom he liked heartily. Nizam guessed his thought.

"Thou hast my support," he added calmly, "and at present, God willing, no one dares oppose me openly. Yet I also have my labor "

Deftly he revealed to Omar how he was weaving together the fabric of a new empire.

Until the coming of the Seljuk Turks three generations before, the lands of Islam had been divided, in war, following different princes. The Kalif himself, at Baghdad, enjoyed only a shadow of the authority once held by the great Haroun ar Raschid—until the Seljuk Turks with their victorious clans had been enlisted to aid him. Alp Arslan, that Valiant Lion, had swept like a storm wind from east to west, clearing Khorasan of its enemies and entering Baghdad in triumph, as the Sultan acknowledged by the Kalif.

Then Aleppo had been conquered and the holy cities of Mecca and Medinah taken into the new kingdom. The Christian Byzantines had been first harassed and then overwhelmed at Malasgird—which Omar had seen with his own eyes. Now the growing empire extended from Samarkand to within sight of the walls of Constantinople, and the last descendants of the Romans paid tribute to Malikshah. In time Nizam planned to marry a daughter of Malikshah to the present Kalif—Malikshah had already taken to wife a daughter of the Byzantine Emperor of Constantinople. So, the young king would be united by blood to the lawful head of Islam, and to the Roman Caesars.

"This winter," Nizam added thoughtfully, "the Sultan will march with his army to Aleppo, on the way to take Jerusalem, the third of the holy cities, from the Egyptian kalif—an upstart and a troublemaker."

It appeared miraculous to Omar that any man could plan out with certainty that this city was to be taken, and that river-land added to the empire. Nizam summoned him daily to long talks—explaining the details of law enforcing and tax gathering, the mobilization of an army, and the network of spies— the eyes and ears of the Sultan throughout the region. He explained carefully Malikshah's whims—a passion for hunting, a disposition to treat women as unthinking slaves, a superstitious reliance on omens.

"Remember always," Nizam concluded, "that his grandfather was a barbarian. If—if Malikshah had beside him an astrologer in the pay of his enemies, he could be ruined by this very superstition."

Omar nodded. He could very well understand how a charlatan could ruin any man.

"So is thy task a weighty one," Nizam said slowly. "I think thou hast little belief in horoscopes or omens. As for me, I know only that the regular courses of the stars reveal the power of God. When Malikshah consults thee as to a fortunate hour for an undertaking, or a sign as to whether success or failure shall follow it, make thy calculations truly, by his horoscope. See that no other influences him—and remember that many will be watching every act of thine with jealous eyes."

Omar assented readily. He had learned what it was to have his movements watched by spies. And if Malikshah asked him to calculate the meaning of celestial signs, it would be simple enough to do just that, by the rules of astrology as ancient as the towers of the Chaldeans. What if such signs had no meaning? If Malikshah asked, they should be rendered him without adding or taking away.

"At times," Nizam went on carelessly, "he may beseech thee for a portent as to matters of state such as I have in my hands. Then thou wilt send a message to me, to learn what is best to answer. For such matters must be planned, and I alone can arrange them."

Omar glanced up curiously.

"Two hands," Nizam smiled—his mind apparently far off— "rule the empire, under God's will. One the hand of the king who wears a crown, and the other the hand of the minister who wears a turban. From the hand of the king come war and conquest, punishment and reward; from the hand of the minister—order and taxation and the policy to be followed toward other peoples. I serve Malikshah truly, yet in the end my task is to build the foundation of a new state.... So I ask only that thou wilt consult me as to matters of policy. That is understood?"

"Verily," Omar assented. He felt that he had been taken into the confidence of this austere man who was wiser than Malikshah, or himself, or the dogmatic Ulema. Nizam's integrity was as firm as the marble pillar of the new gnomon.

"I have thy promise," Nizam responded quietly.

He gave no sign of the exultation he felt. Ever since the sudden death of Alp Arslan two years before, he had planned to find Omar, to attach the young scientist to himself and to have Omar appointed astrologer to Malikshah.

"Now," he confided in Tutush, "we can use his influence to sway Malikshah."

But Nizam's satisfaction vanished at Omar's first request. For a year, the new King's astronomer explained, the day-to-day observations at the tower would be routine work which Mai'mun and the others could manage without him. Meanwhile he wished to journey with Malikshah into the west—in fact, the Sultan had requested him to come.

Omar did not explain to Nizam that he had put the idea into the Sultan's head. Or that he would search the roads of the west for Yasmi. Now he had wealth, authority, servants, and the favor of a mighty monarch, and he intended to find the girl he sought.

Tutush smiled when he heard the tidings. "Nizam old boy," he said to himself, "once you damned me because this same Tentmaker slipped away from me like a vagabond; but in the very first moon of your guidance he goes off to the road again with the Sultan for a cup companion."

Aloud, he only said piously, "It was written."