The Vintage: A Romance of the Greek War of Independence

CHAPTER II

TWO SILVER CANDLESTICKS

For two days longer the army remained at Kalamata in an ecstasy of success. Petrobey posted several companies of men on the lower hills of Taygetus and at the top of the plain, from which a pass led into Arcadia, in ambush for any relieving force from Tripoli, should such be sent. Flushed with victory as they were, nothing seemed impossible, and the spirit of the men was to march straight on that stronghold of the Turkish power. But Petrobey was wiser; he knew that this affair at Kalamata had been no real test of the army's capacity; they had stood with folded arms, and the prey had dropped at their feet. To attack a strongly fortified place, competently held, was to adventure far more seriously. At present he had neither men nor arms enough, and the only sane course was to wait, embarking, it might be, on enterprises of the smaller sort, till with the news of their exploit the rising became more general. In the mean time he remained at Kalamata in order to get tidings from the north of the Morea as to the sequel of the beacon there, and, if expedient, to unite his troops with the contingent from Patras and Megaspelaion. As commander-in-chief of the first army in the field, he issued a proclamation, declaring that the Greeks were determined to throw off the yoke of the Turk, and asking for the aid of Christians in giving liberty to those who were enslaved to the worshippers of an alien god.

The primates and principal clergy of the Morea, it will be remembered, had been summoned to Tripoli for the meeting at the end of March, and the scheme that the wisdom of Mitsos had hatched, to give them an excuse for their disobedience, had met with entire success. Germanos, who both spoke and wrote Turkish, forged a letter, purporting to come from a friendly Mussulman at Tripoli, warning him to beware, for Mehemet Salik, thinking that a rising of the Greeks was imminent, had determined to put one or two of the principal men to death in order to terrorize the people, and with the same stone to deprive them of their leaders. With this in his pocket, he set out and travelled quietly to Kalavryta, where he found other of the principal clergy assembled at the house of Zaimes, the primate of the place. Germanos arrived there in the evening, and before going to bed gave the forged letter to Lambros, his servant, telling him to start early next morning, ride in the direction of Tripoli, then turn back and meet the party at their mid-day halt. He was then to give the letter to his master, saying that he had received it from a Turk on the road, who hearing that he was Germanos's servant, told him, as he valued his life and the life of his master, not to spare spur till he had given it him, and on no account to hint a word of the matter to any one.

Lambros, who had the southern palate for anything smacking of drama and mystery, obeyed in letter and spirit, and at mid-day, while the primates were halting, he spurred a jaded, foam-streaked horse up the road, flung himself quickly off, and gave the forged communication to his master. Germanos glanced through it with well-feigned dismay and exclamations of astonished horror, and at once read it aloud to the assembled primates, who were struck with consternation. Some suggested one thing and some another, but every one looked to Germanos for an authoritative word.

"This will we do, my brothers," he said, "if it seems good to you: I will send this letter to my admirable friend—or so I still think—Mehemet Salik, and ask for a promise of safety, a matter of form merely. Yet we may not disregard what my other admirable friend has said, for if, as God forbid, it is true, where would our flock be without their shepherds? But if it is false, Mehemet will at once send us a promise of safety. Meantime, we must act as if the truth of this letter were possible, and I suggest that we all disperse, and for our greater safety each surround himself with some small guard. And before the answer comes back, it may be"—he looked round and saw only the faces of patriots—"it may be that there will be other business on hand"—and his face was a beacon.

It is probable that more than one of the primates guessed that the letter was a forgery, but they were only too glad to be supplied with a specious excuse for delaying their journey, and followed Germanos's advice.

Then followed those ten days of feverish inaction, while on Taygetus Petrobey collected the forces which were to be the doom of Kalamata. Evening by evening patient men climbed to the hills where the beacon fuel was stacked, questioning the horizon for the signal, and morning by morning returned to the expectant band of patriots in their villages, saying "Not yet, not yet," until one night the signs of fire shouted from south to north of the land, telling them that the Vintage was ripe for harvest. At Kalavryta, where the first blow in the north was struck, they found the Turks even less ready than at Kalamata, and little expecting the soldiers of God in their companies from the monastery; and on the 3d of April the town surrendered on receiving, as at Kalamata, a promise that there should be no massacre. The place was one of little importance among the Turkish towns, but of the first importance to the revolutionists, lying as it did in the centre of the richest valley in Greece, and in close proximity to Megaspelaion, and it became the centre of operations in the north. Also, it was valuable inasmuch as several very wealthy Turks lived there, and the money that thus fell into the hands of the Greeks was food for the sinews of war.

As soon as this reached Kalamata, Petrobey determined to move. The wholesale success of the patriots in the north showed that they were in no need of immediate help, and to have two different armies in the field, one driving the Turks southward, the other northward into Tripoli, the central fortress of Ottoman supremacy, was ideal to his wishes. But more than ever now soberness and strength were needed; the men hearing of the taking of Kalavryta were wild to unite with the northern army and march straight on Tripoli. But Petrobey, backed by Nicholas, was as firm as Taygetus; such a course could only end in disaster, for they were yet as ignorant as children of the elements of war, and it would be an inconceivable rashness now to venture on that which would be final disaster or the freedom of the Morea. They must learn the alphabet of their new trade; what better school could there be than their camp on the slopes of Taygetus, the lower hill-sides of which were covered with Turkish villages, and where they would not, from the nature of the ground, be exposed to the attacks of cavalry? So, after making great breaches in the walls of the citadel of Kalamata, and filling up the well, so that never again could it be used as a stronghold, they marched back across the blossomed plain and up to the hill camp below the beacon with the glory of success upon them.

Three nights later Yanni and Mitsos were sitting after supper in the open air by a camp-fire. Yanni, still rather soft from his month's fattening at Tripoli—"And, oh, Yanni," said Mitsos, "but it is a stinging affair to have fattened a little pig like you, and never have the eating of it"—was suffering from a blister on his heel, and Mitsos prescribed spirits on the raw or pure indifference.

"If you had been cooped and fattened as I, little Mitsos," said Yanni, in an infernally superior manner, "how much running do you think you could lay leg to? As it is, if you continue to eat as you eat, what a belly-man will Mitsos be at thirty!"

Mitsos pinched Yanni over the ribs.

"Poor Mehemet!" he said, "all that for nothing. I have a fine cousin who is only just twenty, and if you said he was fat, man, you wouldn't give a person any proper notion of him."

"My blister is worse than it was yesterday," said Yanni, pulling off his shoe.

"There was a show at Nauplia last year," continued Mitsos, lying lengthily back and looking at the stars, "and a fat woman in it. When she walked she wobbled like a jelly-fish. Just about as fat as a cousin of mine."

"Oh!"

"She wasn't married, the man said, and was to be had for the asking. I hate fat women almost as much as I hate fat men."

Nicholas had strolled out of his hut, and was standing behind the boys as they talked.

"Now look at Uncle Nicholas, Yanni," said Mitsos, still unconscious of his presence, "he will be some twelve good inches taller than you, and forty years older; but I doubt if you could tie his trousers-strings."

Nicholas laughed.

"I can do it myself, little Mitsos," he said. "Come in, you two; there is work forward."

Yanni sprang up and stepped into his shoe, forgetting the blister.

"A journey," he said, "for Mitsos and me? Oh, Mitsos, it is good."

"Yanni cannot walk," said Mitsos; "he has a blister, and must needs be carried like a scented woman."

"A blister?" asked Nicholas. "Don't think about it."

"So said I," answered Mitsos, "but he has no thought for aught else in God's world."

"Well, come in," answered Nicholas, "and hear what you will hear."

The business was soon explained. The ship which had been seen at Kalamata had gone back to Nauplia, so it was reported, and was to transport thence to Athens several wealthy Turkish families who were fearful for their safety. From Athens it would come back, bringing arms and ammunition, to Nauplia. The time for the fire-ship had come.

"And Nicholas says, little Mitsos," continued Petrobey, "that you know the bay of Nauplia like your own hand, and can take your boat about it as a man carries food to his mouth."

Mitsos flushed with pleasure.

"And in truth I am no stranger to it," he said. "When do I start?"

"To-morrow morning. The ship arrived there three days ago, but will wait another five days. The business is to be done when she is well out to sea, so that there is no time for her to get back. You will want some one with you. Whom would you like?"

Mitsos looked at Yanni.

"Whom but the fat little cousin?" he said.

"The little cousin doesn't mind," said Yanni, with his eyes dancing, and gave Mitsos a great poke in the ribs.

"Ugh, Turkish pig," quoth Mitsos, "we will settle that account together."

"Be quiet, lads," said Petrobey, "and listen to me"; and he gave them the details of their mission.

"Big butchers we shall be," said the blood-thirsty Mitsos when Petrobey had finished. "Eh, but the fishes will give thanks for us."

Yanni and he tumbled out of the hut again, sparring at each other for sheer delight at a new adventure, and sat talking over the fire, smoking the best tobacco from Turkish shops at Kalamata, till Nicholas, coming out late to go the round of the sentries, packed them off to bed.

All the apparatus they would require, and also the caique to serve as the fire-ship, were at Nauplia; and they started off next morning unencumbered with baggage, with only one horse, which the "scented woman" was to ride if his blister should tease him. A detachment of the clan who were not on duty, as well as Nicholas and Mitsos' father, saw them to the top of the pass, which they were to follow till they got onto the main road at Sparta, and then go across country, giving Tripoli a very wide berth, and taking a boat across the bay of Nauplia so as to avoid Argos. At Nauplia they were to put up at Mitsos' house, but keep very quiet, and remain there as little time as might be. The caique would be lying at anchor opposite; Lelas, the café-keeper, had charge of it.

The journey was made without alarm or danger. On the evening of the first day they found themselves at the bottom of the Langarda pass, with the great fertile plain of Sparta spread out before them, now green, now gray, as the wind ruffled the groves of olive-trees. A mile beyond the bottom of the pass their way lay close under the walls of the little Turkish town of Mistra, and this they passed by quickly, in case the news of the taking of Kalamata had come and the soldiers were on the lookout for wandering Greeks. But as they skirted along a foot-path below the town Yanni looked back.

"It's very odd," he said, "but we have passed nobody going home; and look, there are no lights in any of the houses."

"That is queer," said Mitsos; "no, there is not a single light. We'll wait a bit, Yanni."

They sat down off the path in the growing dusk, but not a sign came from the town; no lights appeared in the windows, it seemed perfectly deserted, and by degrees their curiosity made a convert of their caution.

"We will go very quietly and have a look at the gate," said Yanni. "It will be pleasanter sleeping in a house than in the fields, for it will be cold before morning up here."

"That comes of living in a fine house in Tripoli," remarked Mitsos. "Come on, then."

The two went very cautiously back to the road which led up to the gate and found it standing wide open.

"That ought to be shut at dark," says Mitsos; "we will go a little farther."

Still there was no living thing to be seen, no glimmer shone from any house, and soon Mitsos stopped.

"Oh, Yanni, I see," he said. "They must have had news of the Kalamata thing, and all have fled. There's not a soul left in the place. Come on, we'll just go to the top of the street."

They left the horse for the time in the outer court of a mosque which stood near the gate, and advanced cautiously up the steep, cobbled road. Everywhere the same silence and signs of panic-stricken flight prevailed. Here a silk-covered sofa blocked the doorway of a house; farther on they came upon a couple of embroidered Turkish dresses; a big illuminated Koran lay with leaves flapping in the evening wind on a door-step, and outside the old Byzantine church at the top of the street, which had been turned into a mosque by the Turks, stood two immense silver candlesticks, four feet high, and each holding some twenty tapers. Yanni looked thoughtfully at these for a minute.

"It is in my mind," he said, "that I will eat my dinner by the light of fine silver candlesticks. Pick up the other, cousin; I can't carry both. Holy Virgin, how heavy they are!"

"Where are we to take them?" asked Mitsos.

"To a nice house, where we will have supper," says Yanni. "I saw such a one as I came up. There was a barrel of wine outside it, and my stomach cries for plenty of good wine. Oh, here's a woman's dress. Eh, what a smart woman this must have been!"

The house which Yanni had noticed was a two-storied café, standing a little back from the street. The upper rooms were reached by an outside staircase from the garden, and as they went up to it a cat, the only live thing they had seen, looked at them a moment with mournful eyes, and then, deciding that they were to be trusted, put up an arched, confiding back against Mitsos' leg, and made a poker of her tail. Below, the house was of three rooms, the outer of which, looking over the plain, was full of the signs of flight. A long Turkish narghilé, with an amber mouth-piece, was overturned on the floor, and on one of the little coffee tables stood another pipe half filled with unsmoked tobacco, while the silk pouch from which it was supplied lay unrolled beside it, and on a shelf were four or five long-stemmed chibouks. A long divan, smothered in cushions, ran round three sides of the room, and the cat, in the belief that her friends were coming back, jumped lightly into her accustomed place and looked at the boys, blinking and purring contentedly. The second room was full of cans of coffee and tobacco, and on a table in the centre stood a dish with two chickens, one wholly plucked, the other but half denuded, and by it an earthenware bowl of water, in which were cool, green lettuces. The third room was a stable for horses; a manger full of fresh hay ran down one side, and in the opposite corner were an oven and a heap of charcoal. The fire had gone out and was only a heap of white, feathery ash, while on the extinguished embers still stood two little brass coffee jugs, their contents half boiled away. Yanni smiled serenely when they had finished their examination.

"You will sup with me to-night, cousin?" he asked, pompously. "Oh, Mitsos, but this is a soft thing we have hit upon."

Mitsos walked back into the outer room, where he closed the wooden shutters and lit all the candles.

"Nice little candlesticks," he said, approvingly. "How I wish the owner of the house could see us. Wouldn't he howl!"

Up-stairs there were two rooms—one with two beds in it, the other with one. The beds were still unmade, just as they had been slept in, and Mitsos pulled off the sheets disdainfully, for he would not lie where a Turk had been. Then, while Yanni kindled the fire to boil the chickens, he rummaged in the store-room.

"A pot of little anchovies, Yanni," he remarked; "they will come first to give us an appetite. Thus I shall have two appetites, for I have one already. By the Virgin! there is tobacco too, all ready in the pipes. We shall pass a very pleasant evening, I hope. Oh, there's the horse still waiting at the gate. I will go and fetch him; and be quick with the supper, pig."

Yanni laughed.

"Really the Turk is a very convenient man," he said. "I like wars. We can take provisions from here which will last to Nauplia. There will be no skulking about villages after dark to buy bread and wine without being noticed."

Yanni put the chicken to boil, and while Mitsos fetched the horse, having nothing more to do, he amused himself by trying on the dress of the Turkish woman which they had found in the street. The big black bernous concealed the deficiencies of the skirt, which only came to his knees, and he had finished adjusting the veil, and had sat down chastely on a corner of the settee, when he heard Mitsos come up the street and call to him from the stable. So he got up and went on tiptoe out of the house and round to the other door, and Mitsos looking up saw a Turkish woman peeping in, who screamed in shrill falsetto when she saw him. For one moment he thought that somehow or other this was Suleima, but the next moment he had rushed after Yanni and hauled him in.

"Is not my supper ready, woman?" he cried, "and why do you not attend to your master?"

They ate their dinner in the best of spirits, for that the hated and despised Turk, whose destruction was their mission, should board and lodge them so handsomely seemed one of the best jokes. Mitsos every now and then broke into a huge grin as he made fearful inroads upon the food and wine, and Yanni kept ejaculating: "Very good chicken of the Turk. The best wine of the Turk; give me some lettuce of the Turk. I wish we could take the candlesticks, Mitsos; but perhaps two peasant boys with heavy silver sticks four feet high slung on their mules might attract attention."

The moon had risen soon after sunset, and after dinner they sat smoking in the garden, which was planted with pomegranates and peach-trees, and fringed by a row of cypresses, which looked black in the moonlight. All was perfectly still but for the sleepy prattle of the stream below. Now and then a nightingale gave out a throatful of song, or some spray of asphodel, ripe to the core, cracked and scattered its seed round it. The cat prowled about the garden, now creeping through the shadow of the trees, or flattening herself out on the ground, and now making springs at some imaginary prey in the moonlight, and when they went up-stairs she preceded them, and, jumping onto Mitsos' bed, lay purring like a tea-kettle.

CHAPTER III

THE ADVENTURE OF THE FIRE-SHIP

They started again early the next morning, having loaded the pony with provisions, for Yanni preferred to suffer from his blister than from hunger, and struck in a southeasterly direction across the plain, leaving Sparta with its red roofs and olive-groves on the left, over low hills of red earth, covered in this spring-time with cistus in full flower, tall white heather, and myrtle in the freshness of its fragrant leaf. About two hours' going brought them to the Eurotas, flowing clear and bright over its shining pebble-bed, on which the sunlight drew a diaper of light and shade, sliding on from pool to shallow, and shallow to rapid, and ford to ford. Here Mitsos, who in his inland life pined for the amphibious existence of Nauplia, came upon a deep pool, and in a moment was stripped and swimming. From there another two hours led them across the plain to the foot of the hills, where they halted and ate their midday meal, looking across the green plain to where Taygetus, rising in gray shoulder over shoulder, met the sky in a spear-head of snow.

So for two more days they went on, sleeping sometimes during the middle of the day under the shade of aromatic pines, or behind some bluff of earth in a dry torrent-bed, and as they got nearer to Tripoli and Argos, marching through the cool, still night over shoulders and outstretched limbs of mountain range, or down through silent valleys all aflush with spring, and spending the daylight hours in some sheltered nook or cave, each keeping alternate watches while the other slept. Thus came they down to Myloi, where they were to get the boat which should take them across the bay, early one morning while it was still dark. So once again in the sweetness of sunrise Mitsos saw the blue mirror of the bay spread out smooth and clear at his feet, and the first rays of morning sparkling on the town at the other side, turning the damp roofs to sheets of gold, and on a white house at the head of the bay, where his heart was.

They were home by nine o'clock, and from there they could see plainly the great Turkish ship, as large as a church, lying close to the quay, showing that they were in time. The attack, as Petrobey had told Mitsos, must, of course, be at night, and through the café-keeper Lelas they learned that she would sail the same evening at midnight, or thereabouts. This was quite to their convenience, for had she sailed during the day they would have had to follow her till the fall of night gave cover to their approach, thus, perhaps, attracting suspicion, and certainly finding themselves many miles from home out at sea when their work was done. Lelas, the café-keeper, to whom they were referred, showed them the caique which Nicholas had told him to keep for Mitsos, and the boy, saying that he would go out a little way at once to see how it sailed, got into it, leaving Yanni on the shore. The latter winked at Mitsos as he got in, and remarking "I am sorry I cannot go with you," for he knew precisely where Mitsos was going, though his chance of seeing Suleima by day was absolutely nil, went back to Constantine's house and waited patiently for his return.

Lelas, who was an arrant gossip-monger, had the news of the town: the Turks were flying in all directions, some to Tripoli, some to Constantinople, some to Athens, such was their consternation at the taking of Kalamata. Many of those about Nauplia were going on board the war-ship, which was bound for the Piræus, and to return with arms. "And tell me," he said, "what is Mitsos going to do with the caique? I am sure it is some plot against the Turk."

But Yanni, seeing Nicholas had not thought fit to tell him, denied any knowledge of the purpose of the boat.

Meantime Mitsos had put out, and was sailing straight to the white wall. The wind was blowing lightly from the east, and he ran straight before it. The boat, slimly built and carrying more sail than his, was certainly a faster goer than his own before the wind, and he suspected would sail closer to it. Certainly it took the air like a bird, and, though the breeze was but light, was a very sea-gull for moving. That, no doubt, was why Nicholas, whose knowledge of boats was as of one who had never set foot on dry land, had chosen it, and Mitsos glanced towards the big ship moored off the quay at Nauplia, and mentally gave it fifteen minutes' start in an hour's run. "And, oh, I love a blaze!" thought he.

Twenty minutes' scudding brought him nearly up to the wall; there he took in the sail and drifted. There was no one on the terrace; that was unusual on a fine morning, when there were often two or three of the servants about, or a woman from the harem. How quiet it looked! Yet, though he did not see Suleima, it was something to know she was near, sitting, it might be, at the back of the garden, or in-doors; perhaps Zuleika had the toothache and she was unapproachable; perhaps the two were talking together; perhaps they were talking of him, wondering when he would come again....

In the farther of the two walls running back from the sea was a small door, and Mitsos' boat had drifted till this appeared in view, and looking up from his revery he saw that it was open. This was even more unusual; never had he seen it open before, and he sat for a moment or two frowning, wondering at it. Then suddenly the smile was struck dead on his face; a possibility too horrible for thought, suggested by those open doors at Mistra, had dawned on him, and regardless of imprudence he took up an oar, put the boat to land, and tying it up went straight to the open door. The garden was empty, the house-door was open, and, more convincing than all, a hare ran across the path and hid itself in the tangle of a flower-bed.

Then with a flash the horrible possibility became a certainty to his mind. The house was empty and deserted; Abdul and the household had fled; a ship was now at Nauplia to carry away the fugitives; that ship he was going to destroy, consigning all on it to a death among flames from which there was no escape. Abdul was surely there, and with Abdul and his household....

Mitsos stood there a long minute with wide, unseeing eyes; for a moment the horror of his position drowned his consciousness as a blow stuns the brain. Then as his reason came back to him he realized that he could not, that he was physically unable, to carry out his orders. The fire-ship should not start—no, it must start, for there was Yanni with him, who knew about it, and he cursed himself for having taken Yanni. But so be it; it should start, but something should go wrong—he would forget to take kindling for it, or, setting light to it, it should only drift by the other and not harm her. For it was no question of choice; he could not do this thing.

Thus thought poor Mitsos as he sailed home again. It seemed to him that nothing in the world mattered except Suleima, and by the bitter irony of fate the man in the world whom he most loved and respected had told him to destroy with all on board the ship in which Suleima was. On the one hand stood Nicholas, his father, Petrobey, Yanni, and the whole clan of those dear, warm-hearted cousins who had treated him as a brother, yet half divine; on the other, Suleima, and Suleima was more to him than them all; Suleima was part of himself, dearer than his hand or his eye, and besides—besides....

Yanni was having dinner when he entered the house, but there was that in Mitsos' face which made him spring up.

"Mitsos," he said, "little Mitsos, what is the matter?"

Mitsos looked at him a moment in silence, but that craving of the human spirit for sympathy in trouble, whether the sympathy is given by man or beast, overpowered him. Though in his own mind he had settled that he could not destroy this ship, the trouble of his struggle was sore upon him.

"Yanni," he whispered, "there will be no fire-ship. Abdul has gone, has fled with all the household, with Suleima among them. Where has he fled but onto the ship we are to destroy? I cannot do it."

Yanni sank down again in his chair.

"Oh, Mitsos," he said, "poor Mitsos! God forgive us all."

Mitsos glanced at him, frowning.

"'Poor Mitsos!'" he cried; "why do you say 'poor Mitsos'? Do you think I am going to do this?"

"You are not going to do it?"

"No!" shouted Mitsos. "It is not I who choose. There is no choice. I cannot!"

"But the clan, the oath to obey—"

"There are bigger things than clans or oaths. To hell with my oath, to hell with the clan," cried Mitsos.

Yanni sat silent, and Mitsos suddenly flared up again.

"How dare you sit there," he cried, "and let your silence blame me? You, whom I rescued from the house of Mehemet; who but for me would have been rotting in the ground, or worse than that; you, whom I saved when a cross-legged Turk had you down on the ground—"

"Mitsos!" said Yanni, looking at him without fear or anger, but stung intolerably.

For a moment or two Mitsos sat still, but then the blessed relief of tears came.

"What have I said to you, Yanni?" he sobbed. "O God, forgive me, for I know not what I said; yet—yet how can I do this? Oh, of course you are right, and I—I—Yanni, is it not hard? What was it I said to you? Something devilish, I know. Don't give me up, Yanni; there is none—there will soon be none who loves me as you do."

Yanni's great black eyes grew soft with tears, and he put his arm round Mitsos' neck as his head lay on the table.

"Oh, Mitsos! poor little Mitsos!" he said again. "What is to be done? If only Nicholas or my father knew; and yet you could not and cannot tell them. Perhaps she is not on the ship, you know."

"Perhaps, perhaps—oh, perhaps she is!" cried Mitsos.

The two sat there in silence for a time, stricken almost out of consciousness by this appalling thing. At last Mitsos raised his head.

"There is nothing more to be said," he muttered. "I have no idea what I shall do. Either to do the thing or not to do it is impossible, and yet by to-morrow it will be done or left undone. But, Yanni, just tell me you forgive me for what I said just now and make indulgence, for this is a hard, weary day for me."

Yanni smiled.

"Forgiveness is no word from me to you, dear Mitsos," he said. "There is nothing you could do or say to me for which you need ask that."

Mitsos looked up at him with dumb, dry eyes and a quivering mouth.

"Forget it, too, Yanni, and tell me it will make no change between us, for, in truth, I do not know what I said."

"There, there," said Yanni, soothingly. "The thing is not, it never has been."

The hours went on slowly and silently. Mitsos said nothing, but lay in the veranda like some suffering animal that has crept away to die alone of a mortal wound, and Yanni was wise enough to leave him quite to himself, for his struggle was one that had to be wrestled out alone without help or sympathy from others. But gradually and very slowly the mist of irresolution passed away from Mitsos' brain, and he felt that he would decide one way or the other. Meantime the sun had sunk to its setting, and Yanni prepared food and took some with wine out to Mitsos.

"Eat, drink," he said. "You have not eaten since morning."

"I am not hungry," said Mitsos, listlessly.

For answer Yanni took up the glass of wine and held it to him.

"Drink it quickly, Mitsos; you are faint for something," he said, "and then I will take it and fill it again."

Mitsos obeyed like a sick child, and Yanni took the glass and brought it back full. This time he waited a moment, and then said:

"You must make up your mind, Mitsos. If you settle to do nothing, tell me, and I must think for myself."

Mitsos nodded.

"I will come in in half an hour and tell you," he said. "That will be time enough. Please leave me alone again, Yanni; it is better so."

Yanni went back into the house. His warm-hearted nature, and his intense love for Mitsos, made him suffer to the complement of his capacity of suffering. He would willingly have changed places with Mitsos had it been possible, for he felt he could not suffer more, but so the other would suffer less. Oh, poor Mitsos, whose strength and habit of laughter availed him nothing!

It was less than half an hour later when Mitsos came in. His face was drawn and white, and he felt deadly tired. He did not look at Yanni, but merely stood in the doorway, his eyes cast down.

"Come, Yanni," he said, "it is time we should start. Where are the cans of turpentine and the wood?"

"In the boat; I put them there."

Mitsos looked up at him sharply.

"So you meant to do it yourself if I did not?"

"I meant to try."

Men walk firmly to the scaffold when they are to die for a good cause, and martyrs have seen their wives and children tortured or burned before their eyes and wavered not, and it was this courage of absolute conviction which nerved the poor lad now. With his whole heart he believed in the right of this exterminating war against the Turk; he had put himself unreservedly at the service of its leaders, and there was an order laid on him. He had made of himself a part of a machine, and should a jarring axle speak to the driver and say it would go no farther, or bid him stop the whole gear? Thus it was that, with a firm step and with no tenderness, but only despair and conviction clutching at a cold heart, he walked down with Yanni to the beach, and, having looked over all the apparatus and seen that nothing was wanting, pushed off, and, helping him to set the sail, took his place at the helm.

The enterprise they were embarked upon was dangerous. The caique in which they sat was piled with inflammable materials and a cargo of brushwood, and carried four large cans of turpentine, with which they would presently soak the sails. They were to run up to the Turkish ship, tie their boat up to it, or entangle it in the rigging, set fire to it, and jump into the small boat they towed behind them and row off. The flames would spread like lightning over the boat, giving them hardly a second to escape, and they might easily be seen and shot at while they were lighting her before they could row off; and this element of danger, perhaps, was a help to poor Mitsos.

The night at least was favorable to their adventure, being thickly clouded and with a fine fresh breeze, thus enabling them to come up quickly, and also under cover of darkness. Otherwise the moon, which was nearly full, would have doubled their peril. The wind was from the east of north, so that the ship would probably run straight before it for a mile or so before turning south out of the gulf, and the time to attack her would be just when she turned, for she would then be far enough from the shore to render her destruction inevitable, and the moment of slack speed as she put about would enable them to run into her the more easily. At present they would approach within about a quarter of a mile, and lie there waiting for her to put out.

There was still plenty of time, and when Mitsos let the boat run before the wind instead of going straight to Nauplia, Yanni had no need to ask him why, for he knew where he was going, and kept his eyes away, for he could not bear to see Mitsos' agony. For a little while the hardness and conviction had left him, and the hour of his agony was on him again. And as they neared the white wall, which glimmered faintly under the cloudy night, he thought his heart would break within him. They passed it quickly under the ever-freshening breeze, and Mitsos looked at it as a man looks on the dead form of his dearest, the house which she had inhabited in life. To him Suleima was dead, a memory only insufferably sweet, ineffably bitter, and when the wall faded again into the blackness he felt as if he had buried her whom he had loved and murdered. Then putting about, they ran past the island and saw the lights of Nauplia grow nearer and larger.

In the foreground was the tall, black hull of the Turkish ship outlined with lights. The deck was brilliantly lit, and they could hear sounds of talking and laughing coming from it. The sailors were evidently preparing to put to sea, for now and then little figures of men like small insects would move up the lines of rigging, adjusting rope or block with busy antennæ, and loud voices seemed to be shouting orders. Then a bell rang on board, and a rope-end splashed into the water and was pulled on deck.

They had drifted a little out to sea, and Mitsos tacked back again to within three hundred yards of the ship, and finding shallow water, cast anchor. Two long hours went by, but neither spoke; only the freshening wind whistled in the rigging, the clouds promised a stormy night, and on board the Turkish ship they made ready to go to sea. A row of open port-holes showed a necklace of light, each light waking a column of reflection from the waters of the bay. Then a lantern was hoisted up onto the foremast, and another run out in the bows. Presently after came the grating sound of the anchor being pulled home, and a small sail was set, sufficient in this wind to take her slowly out of the harbor. Now a light in the town was hidden behind her bows, and another sprang up from behind the stern; she moved along the quay stately and slow, and, clear of the buoy at the end, she put up another sail.

Mitsos watched her intently, and then, without a word, he pulled up the anchor and ran up the sail, and silently they went in pursuit. But their light boat went too fast with its sail full spread, and when they had approached again to within two or three hundred yards he took in a couple of reefs, which equalized their speed, or, if anything, allowed the other to gain on them a little. And so they followed in the wake of the great condemned ship out past the harbor lights, round the end of the peninsula beyond the town, and into the black, foam-flecked gulf outside. The lights grew small and far away, the land faded to a dark shadow, which brooded on the horizon, and the two crafts, one with its immense cargo of human creatures, the other with a couple of beardless Greek lads—but with how strange a burden of anguish and destruction!—were shut off from all sound and sight except the threats of rising waves.

Then Mitsos rose, and pointing to the cans of turpentine:

"Empty one on the brushwood in the bows," he said to Yanni, "and give me another."

He climbed up the mast, and, resting the tin on the yard, took out the cork and let the contents dribble down over the sail. When the can was empty he came quickly down again and flushed the whole deck with another tinful, while Yanni poured the fourth onto the remainder of the fuel.

Then, in a hard, dry voice:

"Let out the sail," he said, "and climb into the boat behind, but give me the lantern first."

Yanni handed him the dark lantern first, which they had lit before starting, and, pulling the boat in under the stern of the caique, jumped on board. Under the full-spread sail they drew rapidly near the doomed ship, and when they were within a hundred yards they heard its rudder splash and stir like some great fish under water, and the speed slackened as she turned south. Mitsos, who had never felt cooler or more collected in his life, went straight on, so as to strike her sideways below the huge, overhanging stern. He calculated to perfection the speed they were going and the distance, and just as Yanni became aware of a great black thing with a panel of light in it overhead, he heard a crash, and broken glass fell over him. The mast of the caique had gone right through one of the windows in the stern. Their boat gave a great lurch, and Mitsos sprang off into the small boat astern, still with the lantern in his hand.

"Quick, quick!" he said, "that I cannot do."

Yanni jumped up, and, crouching beneath the stern of the caique, thrust the lantern open into a heap of brushwood impregnated with turpentine. It caught and flared up in a moment, and while from the Turkish ship came sudden confused sounds and runnings to and fro, the flame leaped along the caique from stern to bow, ran like a flash of lightning up the sail, and was driven by the wind with a roar right into the broken panel. Next moment Mitsos, having cast loose their smaller boat, pushed off backward into the darkness, and both the boys, seizing their oars, rowed for life. But the blaze between them and the ship had made it impossible for those on board to see them, and after five minutes or so Yanni, blown and streaming with perspiration, saw Mitsos drop his oar and sink down to the bottom of the boat and lie there as if dead.

CHAPTER IV

THE TRAINING OF THE TROOPS

Into the Greek camp on Taygetus there came flocking day by day fresh bands of recruits from all the country-side, and in the mouths of all were fresh tales of the rise of the Greeks. The taking of Kalamata had been spark to tinder, and in a hundred villages the patriots had risen, attacking and slaughtering those of the hated race who lived among them, burning their dwellings, and capturing women and children. In other cases, though rarely, the Turks had been prepared, and the tale was of slaughter and pillage among the Greeks; but for the most part the oppressors had slumbered on in their soft, indolent life till the red hand of vengeance had gripped them. Inglorious though these deeds were, they were inevitable, for slaves who break their bonds are not apt to deal judicially, and vengeance—that rough justice—was in this case very just. Then when the slaughter was done the bands would march to join one of the two centres at Kalavryta or on Taygetus; but for the most part the latter, for Petrobey was still commander-in-chief, and to his army belonged the prestige of the siege and capture of Kalamata.

But soon the numbers became unmanageable, and he and Nicholas at length resolved to strike a second blow. Messenia, in which the only stronghold of the Sultan had been Kalamata, no longer gave opportunity for anything but guerilla warfare, but in Arcadia there were several fortified places which would have to be reduced, or at any rate rendered powerless to send help to Tripoli before the latter place was attacked. Chief among these was Karitaena, standing on a precipitous hill above the gorge of the Alpheus, a fortified town, almost exclusively Turkish, and it was against this place that Petrobey suggested the second attack should be made. It was, indeed, high time that the unorganized rabble who were pouring in should have something to do and also learn the elements of war. So his proposal to Nicholas was that he should organize some kind of regiment out of these, taking with him as leaven some of the better-drilled men who had been at Kalamata, besiege and take the place, if possible, and if not, give the men a notion of what a forced march meant, and some idea of military discipline. Meantime Petrobey would move his quarters into the hills between the upper Arcadian plain and Tripoli, so that in case of disaster Nicholas could get quickly back into connection with the rest of the army, and, at the same time, from there the southern troops could watch that fortress. He would, however, quarter a small body of men in the pass between Arcadia and Messenia, and have another depot in the present camp, so that if the Turks attempted to land troops at Kalamata they would find the passes from Messenia both blocked.

Nicholas fell in with the scheme, and two days afterwards set out with perhaps the least efficient army that has ever taken the field. But he had deliberately chosen his troops from the most ill-prepared and untrimmed of the recruits, for somehow or other all this raw material had to be put into shape before it was possible that it should render a creditable or useful account of itself in any serious operations. But they were all hardy, out-of-door folk, accustomed to sleep on the hills and eat the roughest food with health and cheerfulness, and it was just these who would most speedily prove a drag and a demoralization if left idle in camp.

So on the third morning they set out, at an open and scattered double, where the mountain-side was steep, among the budding bushes and tilted rocks, taking the short-cut down to the plain, where it might be possible to give them some semblance of formation. The baggage and commissariat mules had preceded them by a few hours, and were to wait for them when they got down to marching ground.

Two days' march, or rather tramp, brought them to Megalopolis, a sparkle in the centre of the green Arcadian plain. They found the town in the hands of the insurgent Greeks, a body of whom, consisting of about two hundred men, enrolled themselves under Nicholas. Here, too, they heard the same tale of slaughter and pillage of the Turk; but already the selfish evil which was to do such harm to the Greek cause generally—namely, the personal greed for plunder—had crept in, and the insurgents were wrangling over the distribution of the booty. But Nicholas, with a fine indignation which shamed them into obedience, though amid murmurs of suppressed grumbling, was hot with reproach. Was it for a few piastres, he said, that they were up in arms? Was the liberty of the nation to be weighed against a cask of wine or a Turkish slave? And taking the whole matter into his own hands, he reserved half the booty captured for the expenses of the war, and half he divided as fairly as might be among the claimants.

From Megalopolis Karitaena was only a four hours' march, and he was anxious to force the pace so as to reach it early next morning, before rumor of their approach should have gone abroad. The Megalopolis men were as untrained as his own, but they knew the country better, and he organized out of them a corps of skirmishers, who should go in advance and intercept any fugitives who might carry the news of the march into Karitaena. The only chance of taking it was if he could find it unprepared, like Kalamata, creep up to it at night, and either make a night assault or draw beleaguering lines round it before he could be attacked.

Like Kalamata, the town was pregnable only from one side, but on this the road ran steeply up to the gate parallel with the citadel wall, thus exposing the attacking party to a broadside fire if the besieged were prepared. They were, in fact, more than prepared; they were wishfully expectant, and Nicholas fell into a very neatly baited trap.

The skirmishing party had started a little before sunset, while the others were to set out soon after, so as to reach the town by midnight or before, if possible make a night attack, or if not, take up their places, so that when morning dawned the citadel might find itself beleaguered. But the skirmishers, exceeding Nicholas's instructions, had gone too far and were seen from Karitaena, and all that night the Turks made preparations for a long-headed manoeuvre on the morrow. However, Nicholas arrived about midnight, and finding everything quiet, and hearing nothing from the skirmishing party which could lead him to think that Karitaena was prepared, reconnoitred the ground, and decided not to attack it by night, for the gate was strong and well fortified, and without artillery of some kind would not quickly be forced; and he returned to the men and gave orders for the disposition of the troops. Those who were most trustworthy, consisting of the greater part of the Argive corps, were posted along the road and to guard the bridge over the Alpheus, which led to Megalopolis and Tripoli; the less trained soldiers he posted on the north and south, where there was little likelihood of attack. He himself remained with the rawer troops, where his presence was more likely to be needed than with the Argives, on whom he thought he could rely.

Morning came chilly and clear, and Nicholas, on foot, early went forward a little to see if there was yet any sign of movement in the citadel, and, advancing to where he could see the gate, he observed that it was open and that a couple of Turks driving mules were coming leisurely down the path. This was an unexpected opportunity; surely they could storm the place out of hand and have done with it; and going back to the men, he ordered an immediate advance. The Argive troops were to form the vanguard, then the skirmishers from Megalopolis, and in the rear the mixed and untried men, which he led himself; in a quarter of an hour all was ready, and, the Argive corps leading the way, they advanced at a double up the steep path.

Then, when they were streaming up under the walls, the Turks showed that they, too, had a word to say to these summary arrangements. A storm of musketry fire opened on the besiegers from the length of the wall, and, like troops unaccustomed to fire, they did the very worst thing possible, and stopped to return it, instead of advancing. This was hopeless, for their assailants were completely sheltered behind the fortifications and the Greek fire did no more than innocuously chip off pieces of mortar and stone from the walls; and, after losing several minutes and many lives, they pressed on again gallantly enough towards the gate, which still stood open. This brought the second part of the army with Nicholas under fire, but they were now moving rapidly forward, and he still hoped that they would be able to get in. But the fire had a demoralizing effect on these raw recruits, who had seen nothing of warfare but the pillaging of defenceless farm-houses, and as they were shot down one after another they, too, wavered. Once the first three ranks stopped and would have turned to run, but Nicholas, with a voice of cheerful encouragement—"This way, boys, this way!" he shouted. "We shall soon be past this little shower, and then comes our turn."

His voice, the sight of him running on as a man runs to a wine-shop under a pelting of rain, and the words which in the Greek contained a somewhat coarse but popular joke, had the right effect, and they doubled on again to close up the gap between them and the vanguard. Those few minutes had been deadly expensive, yet it was a marvel to see how these men, untried and raw as they were, but fed with hate, faced all the horror of a well-directed fire, the grunt and gasp of death, the involuntary cry of overwhelming physical pain, the writhing body under foot, or, hardly less horrible, the sudden and complete striking out of life; and Nicholas, looking back on the thinned ranks, the terror-struck faces, but the determined advance, thought gleefully, "These are brave men—and this is what they need."

By this time the Argives had very nearly reached the gate, but then the defenders played their second card. Quite suddenly from inside dashed out a band of cavalry, some five hundred in number, who rode full speed down on them. The Argives stopped, and, attempting to make the best of a hopeless job, the front ranks opened fire and a few Turks fell. But the charge came on, the two met with a crash, and the inevitable happened. The ranks of foot broke, and the men poured down off the road onto the steep slope below like water spilled. Resistance was not possible, and the cavalry came on hewing their way through the congested mass of men, and in the mean time the firing from the walls went on steadily. Nicholas seeing what had happened knew that to face this spelled annihilation, and with a fine wisdom, though the words were bitter in his mouth, did the best he could.

"Save yourselves," he cried; "run."

And they turned and fled down the road again, the Turkish cavalry in their rear, hewing, hacking, and discharging their pistols. The rout was complete, each man ran as fast as he could go, while the cavalry, like a swarm of stinging wasps, flew hither and thither, opening out as they reached the plain, and chasing the men as they fled single or in batches of five or six.

Luckily for them wooded hills came down close to the plain here, and they struck for them desperately across the narrow strip of level land, for there the cavalry could not easily follow them, or only man to man. Nicholas, running down the slope from the road, tripped in a bush—as it turned out luckily for him, for a sabre at that moment swung over the place where his head should have been; and the Turk, not waiting to attack him singly when there were many little knots of men among whom he could pick and choose, rode on leaving him; and Nicholas, who had sprained his ankle slightly as he fell, plunged into the brushwood where it was thickest, to find refuge and concealment. His rifle he had thrown away, for it impeded his flight, and he found himself some distance behind the others, who were going in the right direction towards Valtetzi, where Petrobey had told them the camp would be. But though the rout had been complete and utter, and Nicholas was far from disguising the fact from himself, his heart was filled with a secret exultation at the way the troops had behaved for those two or three moments which try the courage of any man when he is being fired at and cannot return the fire. To be shot at when a man may shoot in return, and aim is matched with aim, is known to be strangely exhilarating, but to be shot at and not to shoot is cold stuff for the courage. They had been through the baptism of fire under the most trying circumstances, and with the exception of that one moment of wavering had stood their ground till they were told to stand no longer.

He crept painfully up the hill-side all alone, but the pursuit had passed, and the cavalry, he could see, were returning across the plain to the town, knowing it was useless to follow farther. That fatal road up to the gate was strewn with corpses, almost all Greek, with only a handful of Turks and horses. Other horses, however, were careering riderless about the plain; and Nicholas, limping from his sprain, thought how much more convenient it would be to go riding to Valtetzi than to drag along his swollen foot. A quarter of a mile away he could see two or three of the men trying to capture one of these, but they only succeeded in frightening it, and it bolted up towards the hill where Nicholas was, and a couple of minutes later he saw it burst through the first belt of trees and halt on a piece of open ground below him. There it stopped, and in a minute or so began cropping at the short-growing grass. Its bridle, he could see, was over its head, trailing on the ground.

Now Nicholas was an Odysseus of resource, and having lived in the open air all his days not witlessly, he knew the manners of many beasts, and could imitate certain of their calls to each other so that even they were deceived; and, furthermore, his foot was one burning ache; and, not wishing to walk more than he could help, he preferred that this horse should come to him rather than that he should go to the horse. It was about a hundred yards from him, but a long way below, and it was grazing quietly. So Nicholas, to make it a little alert, and also to assist in bringing it nearer him, took up a pebble, and with extreme precision lobbed it over the horse, so that it fell on the far side of him. The animal, startled by the noise, stopped grazing, and started off at a trot in the direction away from where the pebble had seemed to come and directly towards Nicholas. After a few yards, however, it stopped again, and Nicholas whinnied gently. At that it looked up again and sniffed the air, but before it had continued its grazing he whinnied once more, and then lay flat down on his back. In a moment the horse answered and Nicholas called to it a third time, and heard from below that it had left the open and was pushing towards him through the trees. Once again he called, and the answer came nearer, and in a few moments the horse appeared ambling quickly up the steep incline. For a moment it did not see Nicholas, for he lay flat on the ground, half covered by the bush; but when it did, seeing he lay quite still, it came close up to him and sniffed round him. Then quietly reaching out a hand, he caught the bridle as it trailed on the ground.

This was satisfactory, for, besides getting a mount, he had acquired a pistol which was stuck into its case on the holster, and getting up, he pushed the horse forward through the trees. Half an hour's ride brought him into a bridle-path, running loftily along the mountain-side, and he halted here to take his bearings. Straight in front of him, and not an hour's ride distant, stood the huddled roofs of a village, which he took to be Serrica, but at present he could only see a few of the outlying houses. But at the thought that this was Serrica his heart thrilled within him, for it was the village from which his wife had come. A wonderful return was this for him; already the work of avenging her death had begun, and soon, please God! should a Turk be slain for every hair of her head. Ah, the cursed race who had brought dishonor to her, and to him a wound that could never be healed! Helen, too—little Helen—who ran towards him, crying "Father, father!" Yes, by God, her father heard her voice still, and her cry should not be lifted up in vain!

In half an hour more he stopped to reconnoitre, turning off the path among the heather. His heart pulled him thither, yet for that very reason he would be cautious, and not risk the ultimate completeness of his vengeance. From the slope above he watched for ten minutes more, and, seeing no movement or sign of life in the village, concluded that here, too, the Greeks had risen, and, after driving out the Turks, had gone either to Petrobey or to Kalavryta. And as he looked he saw that a dozen houses at one spot were roofless, showing by their charred beams pointing up to the sky that they had been burned. At the end stood the church dedicated to the Mother of God; and, oh, the bitterness of that! It was there he had been married; from that door he had walked away with the dearest and fairest of women, the happiest man in Greece.

Nicholas hesitated no longer; it was still an hour before noon, and he did not care to travel during the day. He would go down once more to the place, he would see it all again, and let its memories scourge him into an even keener anguish, a keener lust for vengeance, and, putting his horse to an amble down the crumbling hill-side, in ten minutes more he stood in the straggling village street. There was the house—her house—just in front of him, and he went there first. The door was standing open, and inside he found, as Mitsos had found at Mistra, the signs of a sudden departure. His brother-in-law then, to whom the house belonged, must have gone to Petrobey, or Kalavryta, probably the latter, and the thought was wine to him. Husband and brother, a double vengeance, and his should be the work of three men!

He had not eaten that day, but he soon found bread, meat, and wine, and, after stabling his horse and eating, he went out again to the church. Every step seemed a tearing open of the wound, yet with every step his heart was fed with fierce joy. Ah, no, Helen should not call in vain!

The church door was open and he entered. It had not altered at all in those twenty years since he had seen it last. Over the altar hung a rude early painting, showing the Mother of God, and nestling in her arms the wondrous Child. In front the remote kings did obeisance, behind stood the ox and the ass in the stall. And casting himself down there, in an agony bitter sweet, he prayed with fervor and faith to the Mother of the Divine Child. All the hopes and the desires of years were concentrated into that moment, and he offered them up humbly, yet at his best, to the Lord and the Handmaid of the Lord. Then, in the excitement of his ecstasy, as he gazed on that rude picture with streaming eyes, it seemed to him that a sign of acceptance, visible and immediate, was given him. A light as steadfast, but milder than the sun, grew and glowed round the two figures, the rough craft of the artist was glorified, and on the face, so human yet divine, there came the soft and sudden graciousness of life; it was touched with a pitiful sympathy for him, and the eyes smiled acceptance of his offering. Bowed down by so wonderful a pity, he hid his face in his hands, faith struck fear from his heart, and in that moment he felt that he had not prayed alone, that his wife had knelt by him, and that it was her prayers mingled with his that had brought for him that signal favor of the Thrice Holy Maid on his work.

That night, as soon as the sun went down and the ways grew dark, he went on his journey with a soul refreshed and strengthened; he felt that the vow he had made over the dead body of his wife had been attested and approved by Christ and the Mother of Christ, and from that hour to the end of his life never for a day did that gracious vision, like bread from heaven, fail to sustain and strengthen him. And all through the clear spring night the hosts of heaven that rose and wheeled above him were ministering spirits, and the wind that passed cool and bracing over the hill-sides the incense which carried his prayer upward. He, to whom vengeance belonged, had chosen him as His humble but willing agent. His sword was the sword of the Lord.

He crossed the first range of hills by midnight, and then struck the road which led by the khan where Mitsos and Yanni had stopped on their way from Tripoli. It was now within two hours of daybreak, but seeing a light in the windows, he drew rein to inquire whether Anastasis had seen aught of the other fugitives. Looking in cautiously through the windows, he saw that the floor was covered with Greeks, who lay sleeping, while Anastasis, good fellow, was serving others with hot coffee and bread.