A puff of hot air wandered by the boat, the sails shivered for a moment and were still again. A veiled flash of lightning gleamed through the clouds over the Tripoli hills and was reflected sombrely across the sky, and a peal of thunder droned a tardy answer. A faint rim of light, like the raising of tired eyelids, opened over the sea, and he saw the ropes of his boat stand out sharp against it. Then, suddenly, there came from the hills a sound he knew, and knew to be dangerous—the shrill scream of a mountain squall from the highlands to the west of the gulf. He sprang to the ropes and had the sail down just before it struck him, but in less than a minute the bows were driven round, and the white tops of little waves began to fleck the bay. He felt the salt spray on his face and hands, and laughed exultantly. This was what he wanted.

With a joy in the danger of the thing he hoisted the sail, struggling and pulling to be free, and in a moment he was tearing back straight to the head of the gulf, with the rudder pushed hard a-port.

At the pace he was going the boat was quite steady, cutting through the waves instead of rising to them, and now and then one was flung over the bows like a white rag. The wind screamed, the white snakes of foam flew by, and, bareheaded, Mitsos clung with both hands to his rudder, controlling the course of the boat like the rider of a restive horse, laughing to himself for some secret glee, and every now and then shouting out a verse of the vine-diggers' song. Before long the wall appeared again, and he took in his sail; the water was already rough, and was dashing up against it; but he let the boat drift on till he was within thirty yards of it. The rim of light over the sea had widened, and he could see the edge of the top of the wall quite distinctly, and, behind, the tall sombre cypresses in rows. But there was no one there.

Just then the rain began hissing into the sea like shot, and for a few minutes turning the whole surface milky white. Mitsos, frowning and peering awhile into the darkness, put up his collar, and with some difficulty proceeded to put about. The wind was blowing hard ashore, and he had to take down the sail altogether and row. Even then he seemed hardly to be making way against the maddened air, and it was a quarter of an hour's hard work to get far enough from the shore to sail again. Then he fetched a long tack towards Nauplia, and from there managed to handle the boat back opposite the shore where his house stood. The surf was breaking nastily on the rock-ridden beach, and he had to get through a narrow channel, both sides of which were shoal water, not sufficiently deep to allow the boat to pass. But he had the light from his own house and that from the café opposite to steer by, and he knew that he could run in when they were in a line. As he neared the shore he could see it was impossible to bring the boat round sharply enough, and while there was yet time he beat out again for a quarter of a mile and approached it more directly. This time he was successful, and the boat skimmed past the tumbled water on each side—and as he passed he saw sharp-toothed rocks foaming and gnashing at him—safe into the smoother water of his anchorage. Constantine was waiting up for him, and when his tall figure appeared in the doorway, he looked up with relief.

"Mitsos, you shouldn't sail on nights like these," he said; "the best seamen in the world might not be able to handle a boat in such a squall. How did you get in?"

"It's easy enough when you get the lights from the house and the café in a line," said Mitsos; "besides, I was six miles out in the bay when the squall came down."

"Six miles out? You have not been long getting back," said his father, marvelling at the lad's knowledge.

Mitsos walked to the door to close it, turning his back on Constantine.

"No, there was a fine wind to sail on," he said, and whistled the vine-diggers' song beneath his breath.

Constantine did not ask any more questions, and Mitsos went to make himself some hot coffee and get out of his wet clothes, for he was drenched from head to foot.

Two days after this the ordinary wine had cleared completely, and it was racked into fresh casks, for if it stood too long on the lees in contact with the skins and stalks it would become bitter. The crust itself Constantine removed from all the barrels and put into the still for the making of spirits. This only required one man to look after, and on the day Mitsos went to Epidaurus to get the resin he employed himself with it.

The apparatus was of the simplest. He placed all the crusts from the barrels in a big iron pot, under which he lit a slow charcoal fire; into a hole in the lid of this, which screwed on to the body, he inserted a bent iron pipe, on to which he screwed another pipe made in spirals. A big wooden tub filled with water, through the bottom of which passed a third pipe fitting at one end into the spirals which lay in the water, and communicating at the other with the glazed jar into which the spirit was to be stored, completed the apparatus. The fire drove off the alcohol from the fermented crust in a vapor, which distilled itself into spirit as it passed through the tube that lay in the cold water, and dripped out at the farther end into the jar.

He finished the day's work by soon after five, and, having business in Nauplia, set off there at once; so that Mitsos, returning a little later from Epidaurus with the resin, found him out, and, without waiting to get any food, he set off again at once down to the bay.

It was drawing near that moment when all the beauty of the day in sea, land, and sky is gathered into the ten minutes of sunset. The sun, declining to its setting, was dropping slowly above a low pass in the hills, shining with an exceeding clearness, and it was still half an hour above the horizon when Mitsos got into the boat. The land-breeze was blowing temperate and firm, and his boat dipped to it gently, and glided steadily on the outward tack. Between him and the Argive hills hung a palpable haze of thinnest blue; but the whole plain slept in a garment of gold, woven by the level rays. The surface of the water, unruffled under the shadow of the land, was green and burnished like a plate of patinated bronze, and the ripple from the bows broke creamily and flowed out behind the boat in long, feather-like lines. As the sun neared its setting, the golden mist grew more intense in color, and the higher slopes of the mountains turned pink behind their veil of blue. The sky was cloudless from rim to rim, except where, low in the west, there floated a few thin skeins of vapor, visible against the incredible blue only because they were touched with red. Just as Mitsos neared the wall on his second tack the sun's edge was cut by the ragged outline of the mountain, and in ten minutes more it would have set.

She, the nameless, ineffable she—and Mitsos never questioned that this was the sweet singer—was leaning on the edge of the wall looking seawards. She saw Mitsos sitting in the stern of his boat, and guessed at once—for few boats passed so close—that it was he who had sung the second verse of the vineyard song two nights ago, and that it was his boat which passed close under the wall last night, when the other women of the harem were there with her. She had not known till she saw him that she wished to see the owner of that half-formed boyish voice, which had come so pleasantly out of the darkness; and now, when she did see him, she looked long. He, too, was looking, and her eyes made a bridge over the golden air that lay between them and brought them close together.

The boat drew nearer, and she dropped her eyes and began playing with a spray of roses that trailed along the top of the wall. She picked a couple of buds, smelled them, and then very softly she began the first verse of the vine-diggers' song.

CHAPTER VII

THE PORT DUES OF CORINTH

Nicholas got safely across to Corinth early in the morning after he had parted from Mitsos, but was obliged to wait there two days for a caique to take him to Patras. The revolution for which the leading Greeks throughout the Peloponnese were preparing was there in the hands of the Archbishop Germanos. Like Nicholas, he too had felt the cruel appetites of the Turk, and, like Nicholas, he was willing to leave revenge unplucked until the whole scheme was ripe to the core. An agent of his had met the latter at Corinth, bidding him come, if he had a few days to spare, at once; if not, as soon as he could. But as Nicholas had left Nauplia with the idea of proceeding to Patras at once, he sent the messenger back, saying he was on his way, but that for greater security he would come by sea. That he was suspected of being concerned in intrigue against the Turk he knew, and as his plans were now already beginning to be thoroughly organized, and the club had made him their principal agent in the Morea, he wished to avoid any needless risk in passing through the garrisoned towns on the gulf.

On the second day, however, a Greek caique laden with figs was starting from Corinth, and Nicholas went on board soon after dark, and about midnight they started.

For a few hours an easterly breeze drew up from the narrow end of the gulf, but it slackened and dropped between three and four in the morning, and daylight found them becalmed, with slack sails, some eight miles out to sea, and nearly opposite Itea. To the north the top of Parnassus wore morning on its face, and stood high above them rose-flushed with dawn, while they still lay on a dark, polished plain of water as smooth as glass. On the opposite side of the gulf, but farther ahead, Cyllene and Helmos, on the north side of which last winter's snow still lay heraldically in bars and bezants, had also caught the light, which, as the sun rose higher, flowed like some luminous liquid down their slopes, wooded below with great pine forests.

Nicholas had pillowed himself on the deck, and woke when the sun had risen high enough to touch the caique. The captain and owner of the boat, who had been all night in the little close cabin below, came up as he roused himself and sat down near him.

"The wind has dropped altogether," he said; "we may be here for hours. Are you in a hurry to get on?"

Nicholas filled his pipe very carefully.

"I am never in a hurry," he said, "if I am going as quick as I can. I would make a wind if I could, but I cannot, and so I am content to wait. If swearing would do any good I would even swear, but I find it has no effect on the elements. You have a good heavy cargo."

"A good, heavy cargo?" said the man. "Yes, and we should have a dipping gunwale if those devils had not seized six crates of figs at Corinth."

"The Turks?" asked Nicholas.

"Who else? Port dues, they call them. Much of a port is Corinth—a heap of stones tumbled into the water, and five rickety steps."

"Harbor dues! They are a new institution, are they not?"

"A month old only," said the man; "but if I hear right they will not be very much older when they are taken off again."

"Taken off? How is that?" asked Nicholas, blandly.

"They say there will soon be a great cutting of the swines' throats. I spend my life on the sea, and for the most part my ears are empty of news; but surely you know what was being said at Corinth?—that before a year is out we Greeks shall not have these masters any longer."

One of the crew was standing near, and the captain motioned him to go farther off.

"I do not like to say this before my own men," he said; "but why should I not tell you? you will be landed at Patras, and you will go your way and I mine. Besides, for all your Turkish clothes you are no Turk, for they are a short-legged folk. I heard it at the café last night. Four Turks were talking about the arms which they say the peasants are collecting. They spoke of one Nicholas Vidalis as a leader—they expected to take him, for word had come to them that he was travelling to Corinth."

"Thus there are disappointed men," thought Nicholas. Then aloud, "Who is this Nicholas?"

"Nay, I know him not," said the man. "I am from the islands. I thought it might be you could tell me of him."

"From which island?" asked Nicholas.

"From Psara."

Nicholas lit his pipe with a lump of charcoal and inhaled a couple of long breaths, silent, but with a matter in balance.

Then, looking straight at the man, he said:

"I am Nicholas Vidalis, the man whom the Turks would dearly like to catch. But at present they catch me not, for I am a clean and God-fearing man, and I hate the Turk even as I hate the devil, for the two are one. And now there are two ways open to you—one is to give me up at Patras, the other to try to help me and others in what we are doing. For this will be no time for saying 'I have nothing to do with this; let those who will fight it out.' You will have to take one side, and you had better begin at once. See, I have trusted you with my secret, because you may be of use to me. You come from Psara, and you probably know the coast of Greece as a man knows the shape of his boots and gaiters. We have got plenty of men to fight on land, and plenty to pay them with; what we want are little ships, which, in case of need, will hang about the Turks if they try to escape from their destruction, and sting them as the mosquito stings the slow cattle in the evening."

Nicholas paused for a moment, and his face lit up with a blaze of hatred.

"For it is already evening with them," he cried, "and when the day dawns night shall have swallowed them, and they will awake no more. Do you know what is the strongest feeling that ever grips a man's heart? No, not love, nor yet fear, but revenge. And if you had suffered as I have suffered you would know what it is to be filled with one thought only—to see blood in the sunrise and blood in the setting of the sun; to feel that you have ceased to be a man and have become a sword. That is what I am, and the hand that holds me is the right hand of God. And by me He will smite and spare not. And when there are no more to smite, perhaps I shall become a man again, and live to see peace and plenty bless a free people. But of that I know nothing, and I do not greatly care. Come, now, what answer do you give me?"

Nicholas rose to his feet; the other had risen too, and they faced each other. There was something in the earnestness and intensity of this man with one idea which could not but be felt, for enthusiasm is the one fact that cannot be gainsaid, a noble disease in which contagion ever makes infection. And his companion felt it.

"Tell me more," he said, eagerly; "but wait a moment—here is the wind."

He hurried aft to give orders to the men. Far away on the polished surface of the water behind them, smooth and shining as a sealskin, a line had appeared as if the fur had been stroked the wrong way. In a couple of minutes the men were busy with the ropes, and two stood ready to slacken the sheets of the heavy square sail if the squall was violent, and one stood at the tiller, for some cross-current had turned the boat round, and it would be necessary to put about. Meantime the rough line had crept nearer, and behind it they could see the tops of little waves cut off by the wind and blown about in spray. A couple of men had put out the long sweep-oars, and were tugging hurriedly at them to get the head of the boat straight before the wind before it struck them. But they were not in time; the wind came down with a scream, the boat heeled over till the leeward gunwale touched the water, and the mast bent; then, and with a perfect precision, the sheets were slackened for a moment to let her right herself; and, braced again, she began to make way, and in a few seconds they were scudding straight down the gulf almost directly before the wind, till, with their increasing speed, it seemed to die down again. The water all round them was broken up into an infinite number of little green foam-embroidered wave troughs, through which, at the pace they were going, they moved as quietly as a skater over smooth ice.

Nicholas had a careful eye to the handling of the boat during these operations, and he saw that the little crew of six men knew their work perfectly, and that they were quick and prompt at the moment when a mishap might easily have occurred. He never let slip the smallest opportunity which might some day prove to be useful, and he knew that for anything like united action it would be necessary for the Greeks to have, if not command of their sea-coast, at any rate the power to communicate with each other. The outbreak, as he would have it, would take place first in the Peloponnesus, but, not to fail of its completeness, it would have to spread over the north. Patras and Missolonghi were within a few miles of each other by sea, but unless there was free communication by the waterway they would be powerless for mutual support. To some extent both his fear and his hope were realized.

Half an hour later he and Kanaris, the captain of the boat, were breakfasting together, and Nicholas was explaining to him exactly what the weakness of the movement was, and the necessity for conjunction between the sea and land forces. He wished him, he said, to continue to exercise his trade for the sake of appearances, but always to be ready at a moment's notice. When the outbreak took place it was quite certain that many of the Turks, especially those on the sea-coast, would try to escape by sea. That must not be; it was no polite or diplomatic war on which they were to embark; their aim from the first must be the annihilation of the Turks. He told him in detail how this means of escape was to be cut off, as will appear later, and as he unfolded his bloody plan Kanaris's heart burned within him, and he promised, in the name of God, to help him gather that red vintage.

About mid-day the wind went down, and they lay becalmed again; but Nicholas, who, as he had said, was never in a hurry when he was going as quick as he could, felt that his time could hardly have been better employed. Kanaris, it appeared, was of a large Psarian clan; for generations he and his had been seafaring folk, men of the wind and wave, whose help Nicholas knew to be so essential. He promised, if possible, to come to Psara himself before the year was out; but he said that his hands were very full, and he could pledge no certainty.

For three hours or so they lay on a tossing water, for the wind of the morning had roughened the narrow sea, which so quickly gets up under a squall from the mountains, and great green billows came chasing each other down from the east beneath the brilliant noonday sun, which turned them into a jubilant company of living things. The boat, lying low in the water with its heavy cargo, reeled and rolled with a jovial boisterousness, alternately lifting up sides all ashine with the sea over the crest of a wave, and burying itself again with a choking hiccough in its trough. The sun drew out from the crates of figs their odor of mellow luxuriance, which hung heavy round the boat, dispersed every now and then by a puff of wind which blew in the salt freshness of the sea.

By four o'clock, however, the wind, still favorable, sprang up again, and on they went into the sunset, the black nose of the boat pushing and burrowing through the waves, and throwing off from its sides sheets of spent foam. As the hours passed Kanaris felt ever more keenly the fascination and strength of this strange man, and after supper they sat together in the stern watching the heavens reel and roll above them, and the top of the mast striking wildly right and left across a hundred stars. Nicholas, perched on the taffrail, balancing himself with an exquisite precision to every movement of the boat, talked in his deep low voice of a thousand schemes, all blood-stirring, with the Turk for target. For no one knew better than himself the value of personal power, and the success of his proselytizing had been to a large extent, even as in the case of Mitsos, the outcome of his own individuality, which could so stir the minds of men, and fan to a flame the smouldering hatred against the Turks, and cause it to leap up in fire.

Germanos, the Metropolitan Bishop of Patras, had only just risen next morning when his messenger came back, having travelled through the night to announce Nicholas's coming, and also report the same talk in the cafés which Kanaris had heard. The bishop smiled to himself at the idea of any untoward fate laying hands on Nicholas, and told his servant to let it be widely known that Nicholas had been taken and killed.

"For," as he said, "the Turks will be delighted to believe that (and men always succeed in believing what they wish), and all Greeks to whom Nicholas is more than a name will know that this is one of those things which do not occur. I am ready for breakfast, and let a room for my poor dead friend be got ready, and also a bath in which the body may be washed."

Germanos was a splendid specimen of a Greek of unmixed blood, now nearly or quite extinct. His family came from the island Delos, still unviolated by the unspeakable race, and from generation to generation they had only married with islanders. He was rather above the middle height, and his long black cassock made him appear taller. In accordance with Greek rite, neither his hair nor beard had ever been cut, and the former flowed black and thick onto his shoulders, and his beard fell in full rippling lines down as far as his waist. Though for three or four years his life had been one long effort of organizing his countrymen against the Turks, the latter had never suspected his complicity, and he intended to take the fullest advantage of their misplaced confidence in him. Though Germanos had not trodden the world so widely as Nicholas had done, he was nevertheless a man of culture—shrewd, witty, and educated. And Nicholas too, though for the sake of the great cause he would have condemned himself cheerfully never to speak to a man of his own rank and breeding again, found it a pleasant change, after his incessant wanderings among peasants, to mix with his own kind again. His few days with Constantine at Nauplia, it is true, he had much enjoyed, for it was impossible not to be happy when that apostle of happiness, the little Mitsos, was by; and Constantine, too, was of the salt of the earth. He only arrived in the evening, just before dinner, and they sat down together as soon as he had washed.

"There is a good man to hand, I think, to-day—the captain of the boat I came by," said he. "I suggested he should come and talk with us to-morrow. I would have brought him with me, but he was busy with his fig cargo."

"My dear Nicholas, you are indefatigable. I do not believe there is a man in the world but you who would wake at dawn on the gulf and instantly set about making a proselyte. You should have been a priest. What made you see a patriot in him?"

"It was a long shot," said Nicholas. "He spoke without sympathy of the new Turkish harbor dues at Corinth, and told me my capture was imminent. I risked it on that."

The archbishop frowned.

"New harbor dues? It is time to think of harbor dues when there is a harbor."

"So he said," answered Nicholas. "Their methods have simplicity. They seized six crates of his figs."

"We are commanded," remarked Germanos, "to love all men. I hope I love the Turk, but I am certain that I do not like him. And I desire that it will please God to remove as many as possible of his kind to the kingdom of the blest or elsewhere without delay. I say so in my prayers."

Nicholas smiled.

"That gives a double sound," said he; "you pray not for their destruction, but for their speedy salvation. Is that it?"

"To love all men is a hard saying; for, indeed, I love my nation, and I am sure that the removal of the Turks will be for their permanent good. What does the psalmist say, though he was not acquainted with the Turk, 'I will wash my footsteps in the blood of the ungodly'?"

"As far as I can learn the ungodly were expecting to wash their footsteps in my blood at Corinth," said Nicholas; "but they behaved as it is only granted to Turks to behave. They expected me twenty-four hours after I had gone away."

"How did things go at Nauplia?"

"Better than I could possibly have expected. I found the very man, or rather the boy, I wanted in my young nephew."

"The little Mitsos? How old is he?"

"Eighteen, but six feet high, and with the foot of a roe-deer on the mountains. Moreover, I can trust him to the death."

"Eighteen is too young, surely," said Germanos. "Again, you can trust many people to just short of that point, and they are the most dangerous of all to work with. I could sooner work with a man I could not trust as far as a toothache!"

In answer Nicholas told him of that midnight test, and Germanos listened with interest and horror.

"You are probably right then, and I am wrong," he said; "and a boy can move about the country without suspicion where a man could not go. But how could you do so cruel a thing? Are you flesh and blood—and a young boy like that?"

"Yes, it was horrible!" said Nicholas; "but I want none but those who are made of steel. I knew by it that he was one in a thousand. He clinched his teeth, and never a word."

"What do you propose to do with him now?"

"That is what I came to talk to you about. It is time to set to work in earnest. The Club, as you know, have given me a free hand and an open purse. Mitsos must go from village to village, especially round Sparta, and tell them to begin what I told them and to be ready. The Turks are, I am afraid, on the lookout for me, and I cannot travel, as you say, in the way he can without suspicion."

"What did you tell them to begin?" asked Germanos.

"Can you ask? Surely to grind black corn for the Turk. It must be done very quickly and quietly, and chiefly up in the villages there in Maina. You say you are collecting arms here?"

"Not here, at the monastery at Megaspelaion. Many of them have been bought from the Turks themselves. There lies a sting. The monks carry them in among the maize and reed stalks. Father Priketes was met the other day by a couple of their little Turkish soldiers, who asked why they were carrying so many reeds, and he said it was to mend the roof. Reeds make a capital roof."

"Yes, the monastery roof will want many mules' loads of mending," said Nicholas. "Do you suppose they suspect anything?"

"Certainly, but they have nothing to act on; besides, I would be willing to let them search the monastery from top to bottom. Do you remember the chapel there, and the great altar?"

"Surely."

"The flag-stone under the altar has been taken up and a hole made into the crypt. The door into the crypt, which opens from the passage in the floor below, has been boarded over and whitewashed, so that it looks exactly like the rest of the passage wall. It is impossible to detect it. Mehemet Salik, the new governor in Tripoli, appointed only this month from Nauplia, was there last week and examined the whole place. He is a young man, though suspicious for his age."

"That is good," said Nicholas. "Your doing, I suppose. How many guns have you?"

"About a thousand, and twice as many swords. In another month we shall be ready. Megaspelaion makes a far better centre than Patras would, as it is so much nearer Tripoli. That is where the struggle will begin."

"Who knows?" said Nicholas. "When we are ready we will begin just where it suits us. Personally, I should prefer—" He stopped.

"Well?"

"It is this," said Nicholas. "It is no gallant and polite war we want; we do not want to make terms, or treaties, or threats. We want to strike and have done with it; to exterminate. I should prefer, if possible, striking the first blow either at Kalamata or Nauplia. Then the dogs from all round would run yelping into Tripoli, as it is their strongest place, and so at the end there would be none left."

"Exterminate is no Christian word, Nicholas. The women and the children—"

"The women and children," said Nicholas, rising and pacing up and down the room; "what are they to me? Once when I was an outlaw I spared them—yes, and spared the men, too, only sending them riding back face to the horse's tail. But did they spare my wife and my child? If there is a God in heaven I will show them the mercy they showed me!"

Germanos was silent a few moments, and waited till Nicholas had sat down again.

"Will you drink more wine?" he asked; "if not, we will sit on the balcony; it is hot to-night. I think you are right about striking the first blow somewhere in the south, so that they shall go to Tripoli. I had thought before that it would be better to strike at the centre. But your plan seems to me the wiser. Come outside, Nicholas."

Germanos's house stood just out of the town, high up on the hill, which was crowned by the castle, and from his balcony they could see the twinkling lights in the fort below like holes bored in the dark, and beyond the stretch of starlit water, and dimly on the other side of the gulf the hill above Missolonghi shouldering itself up in the faint black distance. Before long the moon rose above the castle behind them, and turned the whole world to silver and ebony. Cicalas chirped in the bushes, and the fragrance of the southern night came drowsily along the wind. Every now and then a noise would rise up for a moment in the town, shrill to its highest, and die away again.

A boy brought them out coffee, made thick and sweet in the Turkish manner, and two narghilés with amber mouth-pieces, and brazen bowls for holding the coarse-cut tobacco. On each he placed a glowing charcoal ember, and handed the mouth-pieces to the two men. For a long while they sat in silence, and then Nicholas spoke:

"It will be no time for mercy—I shall go where my vow leads me, and I have vowed to spare neither man, woman, nor child. I will show them the mercy they showed me, and no other."

"God make you merciful on that day, as you hope for mercy," said Germanos. "For me, I shall not be a party to any butchering of the defenceless. There will be plenty of butchers without me. Blood must be shed; it cannot be otherwise. Fight and spare not, but when the fighting is over let the rest go out of the country, for we will not have them here. But for massacre, I will not make myself no better than a Turk!"

The two narghilés bubbled in silence again for a few minutes, and at last Germanos broke in with a laugh:

"The Turks all think you are dead," he said. "I told the boy to let it be widely known that you had been killed at Corinth. It is just as well they should believe it. Mehemet Achmet, the sleepiest man God made, was here this afternoon, and he regretted it with deep-seated enjoyment. They seemed to know all about you here!"

"But none in Patras know me by sight," said Nicholas, "and as I am dead they never will. It is possible that it may prove useful to me. What are your plans for to-morrow?"

"We will do what you like. It might be well for you to see Megaspelaion. We could get there in a day if the wind held to Vostitza. They have, as I said, a curious little crypt there, which is worth a visit."

Nicholas smiled.

"It is impossible for a man to see too much," he said, "just as it is impossible for a man to pretend to know too little. I would give a fortune, if I had one, for a face like my brother-in-law Constantine's, for it is as a mask in carnival time, behind which who knows what may be? Yet there is force in him, and Mitsos obeys him as—as he obeys me! And yet he is too large a lad to take commands easily."

"Perhaps no other influence has come in yet. To fall in love, for instance, sometimes makes a good lad less obedient than an orphan to his parents."

"The little one in love would be fine," said Nicholas. "He would send the whole world to the devil. Why, shooting is the strongest passion he has known yet, and he shoots as if all the saints were watching him."

"I hope some of them are," remarked Germanos, "and that they will especially watch him when he is inclined to send the whole world to the devil. I hope Mitsos will not think of including me."

"I will warn him when I see him next. I shall go on there, I think, in November. I must get back to Maina first and see my cousin, Petros Mavromichales, who is the head of the clan, and find out if the clan are prepared to rise in a body. That man Kanaris was handy enough with his boat, but I would back Mitsos to sail against him in any weather."

"Ah! that fire-ship is a horrible idea of yours, Nicholas."

"Horrible, but necessary. We must not have supplies of arms and gunpowder coming to the Turks by sea, and there must be no escape out of the death-trap which we will snap down on them. And now let me tell you all that is in my mind, for it may be we shall not meet again till the great Vintage is ripe for the gathering."

For an hour or so Nicholas talked eagerly, unfolding his schemes, Germanos listening always attentively, sometimes dissenting, but in the main approving. He spoke of the Club of Patriots in north Greece, who had given him leave to act in their name until the time came for them to send a delegate who would act openly; for at present if it became known that the leading men of Greece, many of whom were in official positions under the Turks, were concerned in schemes of revolution, the whole project would be a pricked bubble. He sketched the rising of the peasants, in whom the strength of the war would lie; the flame that should run through the land, as through summer-dry stubble, from north to south and east to west; and it seemed in after years to Germanos that a spirit of prophecy had been on the man.

And as Nicholas went on another vision rose before the bishop's eyes: the vision of his church, the mother of their hearts, throned not only there, but in the glory of an earthly magnificence, in visible splendor the bride of her Lord. Therein to him was food for hope and aspiration, and his thoughts drifted away from war and bloodshed to that.

And when Nicholas had finished he met an eye that kindled as his own, but with thoughts that were not spoken, but partook of their sweet and secret food in silence and self-communing.

CHAPTER VIII

THE MENDING OF THE MONASTERY ROOF

Kanaris had finished his unlading the same evening, and he was ready at daybreak to take Nicholas and Germanos as far as Vostitza, a fishing village lying some four miles from the mouth of the gorge, at the top of which stands Megaspelaion. Here the archbishop and Nicholas would get mules and reach the monastery the same evening. Vostitza, with their fair wind, was not more than four hours from Patras, and on arriving there the archbishop went straight to the house of the Turkish governor, from whom he procured mules, and to whom he introduced Nicholas as his cousin; and the three talked together a while over a cup of coffee, discussed the idle rumors that were abroad concerning a movement against the Turks among the Greeks, and found cause for comfort as lovers of peace in the undoubted fact that Nicholas had been killed two days before at Corinth. He was a turbulent, hot-headed man, said the archbishop, and did not value the blessings of tranquillity. His cousin also had met him, a quarrelsome, wine-bibbing fellow, quoth Nicholas; he could have had no more appropriate end than a brawl in a wine-shop.

Thus they chatted very pleasantly and harmoniously while their mules were being made ready, and Said Aga, who was no man of the sword, being rotund and indolent in habit, was much relieved to find that Germanos scoffingly dismissed the idea of any hostile movement being on foot among the Greeks. True, there had been disturbances lately; a Turkish tax-collector had been killed at Diakopton, three miles from Vostitza. Had they not heard? The news had come yesterday!

"Alas! for this unruly people," said Germanos. "What was the manner of it?"

"I hardly know," said Said Aga. "It was the usual story, I believe. He had taken to himself a Greek woman, and the husband killed him. The man has fled, but they will catch him, and he will suffer, and then die. For me, I shrug my shoulders at these things. We Turks have certain customs, and the Prophet himself had four wives, and when we are the lords of a country we must be obeyed."

"True," said Nicholas, "quite true, and we must submit. It is not the will of God that all men should be equal."

He caught Germanos's eye for a moment.

"I am glad that you think there is nothing in these rumors," went on Said Aga. "Your countrymen would hardly be so foolish as to attempt anything of the sort. But the rumors are somewhat persistent. It was even said that the monks at Megaspelaion were collecting arms, and my colleague Mehemet Salik, a very energetic young man who was lately put in charge at Tripoli, thought best to make an inspection there. But he was quite satisfied there was no truth in it."

Germanos laughed heartily.

"That is a little too much," he said. "You may at least rest assured that we priests of God are men of peace. Our mules, they tell me, are ready. A thousand thanks, Excellency, for your kindness."

They mounted and rode up the straying village street, paved with big, uneven stones. The villagers were all out in the fields for the fruit harvest, and the rough, shaggy-haired dogs, keeping watch in the deserted house-yards, came rushing out barking and snarling with bared teeth at the sound of their mules with their tinkling bells and iron-shod feet grating over the cobbles. The mule-boys paid little attention to their noisy menaces, though now and then some dog more savage or less wisely valorous than his fellows would come within stick distance, only to be sent back with better cause for crying than before.

But in ten minutes or so they got clear of the village, and taking one of the field roads struck across the plain towards the mouth of the gorge, about four miles distant. The grapes were not yet so far advanced as at Nauplia and still hung hard, and tinged with color only on the sunward side; but the fruit harvest was going on, and under the fig-trees were spread coarse strips of matting on which the fragrant piles were laid to dry. A few late pomegranate-trees were still covered with their red wax-like blossoms, but on most the petals had fallen, and the fruit, like little green-glazed pitchers, was beginning to swell and darken towards maturity. The men were at work in the vineyards cutting channels for the water, and through the green of the fig-trees you could catch sight every now and then of the brightly-colored petticoat of some woman picking the fruit, or else her presence was only indicated, where the leaves were thicker, by the dumping of the ripe figs onto the canvas strips below. The sun was right overhead before they struck the mouth of the gorge, and the heat intense—a still, fruit-ripening heat in the heavy air of the plains. But as they approached the hills a cooler draught slid down from between the enormous crags, bearing on it the voice of the brawling torrent, which is fed by the snow of Cyllene and Helmos, and knows not drought.

Here the country was given up to olives and wheat, and occasional clumps of maize near the bed of the stream. The oleanders were still in flower, and their great clusters of pink blossom marked the course of the river. Another mile took them to the ford, on the far side of which the path began to climb through the ever-narrowing gorge. Further up they found it impossible to keep to the course of the stream, for the road had been washed away in places and not repaired, and leaving it on their right, they turned up over a steep grassy stretch of moor, sprinkled here and there with pines. Looking back they could see below them the hot luxuriant plain they had left, trembling sleepily under the blue haze of heat, and further off the shimmering waters of the gulf. As they ascended the vegetation changed: pines entirely took the place of the olives, and the grass, all brown and dead below from the summer's heat, began to be flushed with lively green, and studded with wild campanulas and little blue gentians, throbbing hotly with color. Then descending again they passed along the upper slope of the cliffs above the gorge and saw before them the deep, sheltered valley stretching up to Kalavryta, a land of streams and a garden of the Lord.

The sun was already near its setting when they joined the main road leading up to the monastery from the valley, and they struck into a train of some half-dozen mules covered and enveloped in loads of reeds, the tops of which brushed rustling along the ground behind like some court lady's dress. Two of the monks from the monastery were in charge of these, and when they saw who it was with Nicholas they stopped and kissed the archbishop's hands. As they moved forward again he said:

"I see you are carrying reeds, my sons. From where did they come, and for what purpose?"

"From Kalavryta, father," said one. "We have six mules laden with them. The monastery roof needs mending."

"That is good. Observe, Nicholas, how fine these reeds are. They seem to be a heavy load. The monastery roof, they say, wants mending."

The younger of the two monks smiled.

"A great many things want mending, father!" he said. "We are making preparations for mending them."

Nicholas, who was in front, checked his mule.

"And have you black corn," he said, "good black corn for the Turk?"

The monk shook his head.

"I do not understand," he said.

Germanos smiled back at Nicholas.

"A roof for the monastery first, Nicholas," he said; "there will be time for the good black corn when the roof is mended. And now, my son, I will ask you to go forward quickly and tell Father Priketes, with my salutations, that my cousin and I will arrive very soon. We shall stop with him for a day, or it may be two, for we wish to superintend this mending of the monastery roof, and see that it is well done for the glory of God."

Another half-hour through the gathering dusk brought them in sight of the monastery, which from the distance was indistinguishable from the face of the cliff, against which it was built. Chains of light shone from the narrow windows, row above row, some from the height of all its twelve stories, twinkling a hundred feet above them, as if from cottages perched high on the cliff, others larger and nearer from the windows of the sacristy and library. To the right stood the great gateway, about which several moving lanterns seemed to show that the news of their coming had anticipated them, and that due preparations were being made to receive the archbishop. As they got close they could see that the monks were pouring out of the arch, and taking their places in rows on each side of the terrace leading up to the gate. In front of them stood the novices, some mere boys of fourteen and fifteen, but all dressed alike, and all with long hair, that had never known the scissors, flowing onto their shoulders. In the centre of the gateway—a tall, white-bearded figure—stood Father Priketes, who helped the archbishop to dismount, and then knelt to receive his blessing. Germanos paused a moment as he entered, and said in a loud, clear voice to them all:

"The peace of God be upon this holy house and all within it, and His blessing be upon the work"—and his voice dwelt on the word—"upon the work you are doing."

Nicholas was already known to Father Priketes, but the latter looked as if he had seen a ghost when he caught sight of him.

"We heard you were dead," he said.

Nicholas smiled.

"I am delighted to know it, father," he said. "Do not destroy the idea, if you please."

They passed on to Father Priketes's rooms, where they were alone.

"I see your repairs are going on steadily," said Germanos. "We passed some laden mules on the way. Nicholas wished much to see what you were doing. He is—how shall I say it?—our overseer; we are the workmen. He will tell us when the work must be finished. Let us go at once to the chapel, my brother, and thank St. Luke, your founder, and the Blessed Virgin, that they have brought us here safe. That is the first duty of the soldiers of God."

Father Priketes led the way to the chapel, and pushed open the great brazen door for Germanos to enter. He knelt in turn before the great altar, the altar to the Beloved Physician, and before the black relief of the Virgin, made, as tradition says, by the hands of St. Luke himself, and said for himself and Nicholas a thanksgiving for the aid of the Saints which had brought them safely to the end of their journey. They then supped with Father Priketes, and went back to the chapel.

The place was but dimly lighted with oil lamps, and after locking the door behind them—for at present only a few of the monks had been trusted with the secret of the crypt—the father lighted a lantern and led the way up to the east end. Then after crossing himself he drew from underneath the altar a small crowbar, and creeping under with the lantern, he prized away a square paving-stone, which covered a hole large enough for a single man to creep through. Rough wooden steps had been erected from the floor of the crypt up to the level of this, and one by one they descended. The crypt was some forty feet long by twenty broad, and the light of the lantern struck from all the walls a reflection of steel. Since Germanos's last visit, they had largely added to the number of arms, and on a hasty glance Nicholas reckoned that there could not be less than fifteen hundred guns.

His eyes glistened as he moved the lantern round the walls, and he turned to Father Priketes.

"This will make a hole in the Turks bigger than the hole in your roof," he said. "You have enough, I think. They will be hungry, these reeds; grind their food for them, and do not let them feel stint of that."

"Already?" asked Father Priketes.

"Already! It is August now, and when our vineyards are green with the fresh leaves in the spring, the juice of the greater vintage shall be spilled. And there will be a mighty gathering; the wine-press will be running red, and fuller than the vats of Solomon. Where can you stow the food for all these hungry throats?"

"There is room here, is there not?"

"Surely, room and to spare; but it would not be well to keep it here. Whoever enters here must carry a light; a chance spark, and he may cry to the Virgin in vain."

Father Priketes paused a moment.

"You shall take a walk with me to-morrow and we will see. You are satisfied at present?"

"I shall never be satisfied," said Nicholas. "I should not be satisfied if I saw all the armaments of angels in array against the Turk. But it is time to think of other things. Could you raise men at once?"

"Five hundred in one minute from within these walls," said Father Priketes, "and two thousand more in the time it would take an eager man to climb up here from Kalavryta."

Nicholas looked round again, smiling as a man smiles to look on one he loves.

"This feeds my soul," he said. "And swords too, little sickles for the gathering! Look you, perhaps we shall not meet again till after our vintage has begun; but remember this: After four months from now, we cannot tell when the day of the beginning of the gathering will come, and so be ready. Whatever the archbishop orders, do it, for he and I work together. And, O Father, let no man take thought for himself on that day. What matters it to whom the honor and the glory go, if once Greece is free? If you desire such things, I give to you now by bequest all the honor and riches that may come to me. Forgive me for saying this, but that is the only loophole where failure may creep into our camp, and that I fear more than ten Sultans and their armies. I say the same thing to all, and I remind myself of it daily. I have been chosen to conduct this matter, for the present, in the Morea, and I will give my life and all I possess to it; and in company with others, of whom the archbishop is one, and Petros Mavromichales, of Maina, another, I will do my best, so help me God, honestly and without a selfish mind. The moment a single dissentient voice is raised, not in the matter of councils or plan of actions, on which we will listen to all that is to be said, but of command and obedience, I only ask leave to serve in the ranks. Let us deliberate together by all means till the time comes to act, but when that time comes, and a word of command goes through the country, let there be no delay. For all will depend, so I take it, on the speed with which we act when we come to action. This is the beginning and the end of success, and all that lies between."

"But how is the word of command to come," said Father Priketes, who had secretly hoped for a little independent campaign, "if you are not with us? Must I not act on my own judgment?"

"No, a thousand times no," said Nicholas. "What I have seen here shows me that you in Megaspelaion and Patras will be no small portion of our first success. How the war will spread afterwards, God knows; but when the first grapes are cut it will be you, so I think, to garner them. This is why you must obey absolutely. Nothing will be left to your judgment. A message will come, and you will obey."

"How am I to tell who your messenger is?"

Nicholas smiled.

"Some afternoon, when you are sitting in the spring sunshine, or perhaps some night in this next winter, when you are sleeping, a monk will come to you and say, 'There is a man here, or a boy it may be, or a girl even, who wishes to see you, and we cannot understand what he means.' Then you will delay not, but go and see what it is. You will say, 'I am Father Priketes; you have a message for me?' And the message will be in this form: 'I am bidden to ask you if there is corn to be given to those who need it?' And you will say, 'Is it black corn they need, and are the needy hungry, or are they Turks?' And the messenger will say, 'Send black corn for the Turks to Kalamata or Kalavryta, or wherever it is, and let two hundred or five hundred or a thousand men carry it.' Other instructions may come as well, but always in that form. And as you obey, so may the Lord give you a place among His saints in heaven."

Father Priketes was silent for a moment.

"You are right, Nicholas," he said; "and I swear by the picture of the mother of God that I will obey in all things. Come, shall we go up again?"

They climbed up into the chapel, and went out down the vaulted stone passage to the story below, where another passage, whitewashed and boarded on both sides, led to the monks' library and Father Priketes's own rooms. Nicholas, who carried in his hand an olive-wood stick, tapped the panelling carelessly as he went along, and once stopped a moment and smiled at Germanos.

"The wall seems to be a little less thick here than at other places," he said. "Mehemet Salik, however, was too cunning to attend to such simple things."

"The Lord be praised for making so many clever men," said Germanos, piously. "To have a fool for an enemy has been the undoing of more good people than Satan himself."

They went on to Father Priketes's room where they had supped before, and Nicholas lit himself a pipe.

"That is quite true," he said. "A fool is always blundering into the weak place by accident—there is nothing so disconcerting; whereas a clever man is on the lookout for less patent weaknesses, and passes over the patent ones on purpose. And the Turk is both clever and indolent—a very happy combination."

"For us," said Priketes, who had, as Nicholas once said, a wonderful faculty for seeing that which was obvious.

"As you say, for us," said Nicholas; "and we intend to profit by it. And now, father, with your leave I will go to bed. I have seen all I came to see, and think I had better push on to-morrow. You will find, no doubt, a prudent place for your granary. It is impossible to be too prudent now, just as it will be more than possible to be too wary hereafter. When once we get into the open we keep there until all is finished."

"Where do you go now?" asked Germanos.

"Southwards," said Nicholas. "I must travel as widely as I can in Messenia, and also see my cousin Petrobey. The Maina district will be raised by him. If once the war begins, as I would have it to begin, I shall be at ease about the rest. Only the beginning must be as sudden as the thunderbolt. Ah, but there is fever in my blood for that!"

Nicholas, as his custom was, rose early next morning and went from the dark-panelled room, where he had slept, down towards the chapel. The great green bronze bell hanging in the wooden balcony outside had just begun to ring for matins, and the sound, grave and sonorous, floated out over the valley like a dream. He waited there awhile looking at the blackened Byzantine paintings which covered the roof, till the monks began trooping up the cobbled passage, and with the first of them he went inside the chapel. From the centre of the roof hung a great gilt candelabrum in the form of a crown, and from side to side of the building ran a row of silver lamps—some thirty in number—which had been burning all night, but looked red and dim in the fresh morning light. Set in the gilt altar-screen were the paintings of the Panagia and of Christ, and at the south end—more precious to the faithful than all—the wax relief of the Virgin and Child. The silver panel, behind which it is placed, had been opened, and Nicholas, with the others, made his obeisance before it. The head of the Virgin and the head of the Child are all that can be seen, and these are black with age; the rest is one mass of chased gold. The crown which the Child wears is studded with rubies and emeralds grown dim; His mother's crown is less magnificent; and on the silver rail in front of it hang the offerings of those to whom, in the days of faith, its contemplation had brought healing of many diseases. Over the gate to the altar hung two stoles of red velvet, in which the priest who said the mass would robe himself. A border of gold holly leaves ran down them on each side, and down the middle they were embroidered with floreated and cusped ornaments in red and gold, in the centre of each of which was worked the figure of Christ. On the north wall, by the easternmost of the monks' stalls, hung the picture of the daughter of the Emperor Palæologus. She is dressed in a red cloak with golden eagles embroidered over it; her hair is golden auburn, and she raises a face charmingly childlike and naïve, and holds up hands of prayer to the gracious figure of the Virgin who stands beside her.

Priketes and Germanos were the last to enter, and when the short prayers were said, Nicholas went out with them, and they walked up and down the terrace awhile talking. Some of the elder monks, with their purple cassocks trimmed with fur wrapped closely round them, sat outside the iron-sheeted gate, under the fresco of Adam and Eve being driven out from Paradise, which fills the triangular space above it, watching them with eager attention, for it had become known who Nicholas was and what his errand. On their right rose the enormous mass of the monastery, crowned by an overhanging cliff of gray rock, which the smoke from the chimney had stained in places to a rich vandyke-brown, in the hollow of which, as in the hollow of a sheltering hand, the great pile of buildings stood, seeming rather to have been the core round which the rock rose than to have been built into it. In front the ground fell rapidly away into the valley, but was terraced up into little gardens, full of cypresses and poplars or figs and plane trees; under these stood many little wooden arbors, trellised over with vines, where the brethren spent their tranquil days; and a hundred riotous streams—some conducted down wooden shoots, some straying over the paths—rattled headlong to join the river below. Further down, the hill-side was covered with low-growing scrub, and on the opposite side of the valley, the village of Zachlórou hung on by teeth and nails to the climbing moor. A company of swallows cut curves and circles in the thin morning air, their black backs showing metallic, like oxidized steel in the sunlight, and a great flight of white pigeons clattered out of the rock above and settled in a cloud by the fountain. In one of these little arbors Germanos and Nicholas drank their coffee and smoked a pipe of the monastery tobacco until the latter's horse was brought round. Then, rising,

"We shall meet again," he said, "when the vintage is ripe, or, if we meet not, we shall both be laborers in the treading; you here, I perhaps in the south. So now, father, give me your blessing, for I must go on my way."

CHAPTER IX

THE SINGER FROM THE DARKNESS

November went out with a fortnight of cold showers and biting winds, and the woodcock came down in hundreds to the plain of Nauplia. Often when the curtain of cloud which veiled Mount Elias day by day was rent raggedly in two by some blast in the upper air, the higher slope of the mountain, it could be seen, was sprinkled with snow. Then the peak would again wrap itself in folds of tattered vapors as a beggar throws his torn cloak over his shoulder, and perhaps would not peer through the mists again for a couple of days. Down in the plain scudding showers swept across from north to south and east to west, and the earth, still thirsty from the long drought of the summer, drank them in feverishly as a sick man drains the glass by his bedside and turns to sleep again.

Mitsos had many round oaths for this horrible weather, but like a wise lad cursed and had done with it. The bay and the sweet possibilities of the bay were only in the range of thought, but the woodcock were more accessible, and with something of the air of a martyr he would pass a long day on the uplands towards Epidaurus, and come back, after the fall of dark, with a leash of woodcock, and an appetite which bordered on the grotesque, singing and contented. But later in the evening he would be twitched by an eager restlessness, and make many journeys to the door to see if the weather had cleared, or showed signs of clearing, only to be met by a buffeting clap of windy rain in the face, which made him close it again quickly, for where was the use, he argued, of lying rolling and rocking off the white wall if he was to be alone there? Once or twice during this fortnight he had sailed by it, but his wages were only a wetting. Constantine was somewhat puzzled and perplexed at Mitsos' behavior about this time, but he took it all with his habitual serenity of tolerance, and likened him in his own mind to a colt who is just beginning to find out that he is a horse, and, knowing his own strength and learning his needs, whinnies and kicks up his heels. He knew that it would be useless to try to extract unvolunteered information out of Mitsos, and he guessed more nearly to the truth than he knew, that Mitsos' somewhat spasmodic moods were merely the natural results of his budding manhood, and were as inexplicable to him as they were to his father. Meantime, though they had neither heard nor seen anything more of Nicholas, Constantine felt that Mitsos was growing in the way he would have him grow, and was increasing in self-reliance and surefootedness of mind just as he was increasing in bodily strength and stature.

But Mitsos was exercising more self-control than his father gave him credit for. That acquaintance with Suleima, the Greek girl in the harem of the Turk, begun so strangely, had ripened no less strangely. He had sat below the wall night after night and talked to her from his boat, rocking gently in the swell, or standing still and steady in the calm water, till with a sign she motioned him away, seeing some other woman of the harem or one of the servants come out into the garden.

Then Suleima had made a confidante of one of the elder women, who, seeing Mitsos' handsome, laughing face, had given her sympathy, and, what was better, a practical exhibition of it, and had promised to watch in the garden so that they might talk without fear of interruption; stipulating, however, through Suleima as interpreter, half laughing, yet half in earnest, that Mitsos should give her a kiss for every time she watched for them. Suleima had felt herself flushing as she interpreted this into Greek, but Mitsos' tone reassured her as he answered,

"She might as well do it for nothing. Oh, don't translate that, but say we are very much obliged. Pay-day is long in the house of a Turk."

Then there came an evening, only just before the weather had broken, when Mitsos took down to the boat a little rope ladder. Suleima had told him that he was to come there late, not before midnight, and she would have gone to her room early, saying she was not well. Then, if possible, she would come out to him, and they would go for a sail together.

It was an evening to be remembered—to be lived over again in memory. Her reluctance and eagerness to come; the terrorizing risk of discovery, which none the less was a whetstone to her enjoyment; her delight at getting out, though only for an hour or two; her half-frightened, childish exclamations of dismay as Mitsos put about, when the water began to curl back from the forefoot of the boat as they went hissing out to sea before the wind; her face looking as if it was made of ebony and ivory beneath the moonlight, with its thin, black eyebrows, and long, black eyelashes; her sense of innocent wickedness, as in response to Mitsos' entreaties she unveiled it altogether; her curious, fantastic story of how she was carried off years ago by a Turk, and had forgotten all about her home, except that her father was a tall man with a long, black dress; her pretty, hesitating pronunciation of Greek; her bewildering treatment of himself as if he was a boy, as he was, and she a person of mature experience, as she was not, being a year younger than he; the view which she took of this moonlight sail as just a childish freak, heavily paid for if discovered, and to be repeated if not, while to him it was the opening of heaven. Then, as he still remained serious, looking at her with wide eyes of shy adoration, she too became just a little serious as they turned homewards, and said that she liked him very much, and that old Abdul Achmet was a fat pig. Then in answer to him—Oh, no, she was quite content where she was, except when Abdul was in a bad temper or the eunuch beat her. There was plenty to eat, nothing to do, and they were all much less strictly looked after than in other harems, for Abdul was old and only cared for one of them. For herself she was a favorite servant of his chief wife, and not really in the harem. It was not very exciting, but if Mitsos would come again now and then and take her for sails she would be quite happy. Finally, it was useless for him to come except when it was fine, for the harem was always locked up in wet weather, and she would not be able to get into the garden. Also, she hated rain like a cat.

Then intervened the fortnight when the climate of Nauplia, which for the most part is that of the valley of Avilion, gave way to the angry moods of a child—to screaming, sobbing, and steady weeping. The surface of the bay was churned up by the rain and streaked with foam by the wind, and the big poplar-tree, under which Maria had slept, shook itself free of its summer foliage and stood forth in naked, gnarled appeal to the elements. For a fortnight the deluge continued, but on the night of the 1st of December, Mitsos, waking at that strange moment when the earth turns in her sleep, and cattle and horses stand up and graze for a moment before lying down again, saw with half an eye the shadow of the bar of his window cast sharply onto the floor of his bedroom by the slip of the crescent moon, which rode high in a starry sky, and when he woke again it was to see a heaven of unsullied blue washed clean by the rain.

Half the day he spent dreaming and dozing in the veranda, for he meant to be out on the bay that night, and after his mid-day dinner he went down to overhaul the boat, taking with him his fishing-net and a bag of resin. He had wrapped up in the centre of the net the pillow from his bed, for Suleima had said that the net on which she sat before smelled fishy. But after supper that night he found himself beset by a strange perplexity, the like of which he had never felt. His fustanella was old and darned; it was hardly suitable. It did very well before, but somehow now—and the moon would be larger to-night. The perplexity gained on him, and eventually he took out and put on his new clothes, only worn on festa days, which were thoroughly unsuitable for rough fishing by night. He brushed his hair with extreme care, and wished it was sleek and smooth like Yanko's, instead of growing in crisp, strong curls, put his red cap rakishly on the side of his head, and laced up his brown cloth leggings to the very top. All this was done with the greatest precision and seriousness, and he went down-stairs on tiptoe for fear of wakening his father, who was already abed, and had left injunctions with him to lock the door and take the key with him if he was likely to be late.

It was about half-past ten when he set off, and the moon had risen. It took him an hour or more to reach the dim, white wall, for the breeze was yet but light and variable. As he neared it he began to feel his heart pulsing in his throat, as it had done one night before when he passed the scene of the hanging by the wayside, but somehow differently, and he peered out anxiously into the darkness to see if there was any one there. Something white glimmered on the wall, down went his sail, and a few minutes later the nose of his boat grated against the stone-work.

She gave a little chuckling laugh.

"I thought you would come," she said, "on the first night of stars. They are all in bed. I listened at Mohammed's door; he was Mohammed no more—only a grunt and a snore."

Mitsos said nothing, but threw the ladder and rope on the wall and sprang up himself.

"Yes, I have come," he said. "Ah, how I have been cursing this rain—may the saints forgive me!—but I cared not, and cursed."

Suleima looked at him a moment.

"Why, how smart you are!" she said. "Is it the Greek use that a man goes fishing in his best clothes? Oh, my clean fustanella!" she cried, looking sideways on him.

Mitsos smiled. The best clothes had been a good thought, in spite of a momentary confusion.

"Hush!" he whispered, "we will talk in the boat. I will hold the ladder. There, it is quite steady."

The girl stepped lightly down the rungs, and Mitsos, directing her to sit still, threw the ladder and rope back and let himself down onto the side of the boat.

"Where shall we go to-night?" he asked.

The girl laughed gently—the echo, as it were, of a laugh.

"Oh, out, out to sea," she said; "right away from this horrible place. Where shall I sit?"

Mitsos took the pillow out of the net and put it for her at the stern of the boat.

"See," he said. "I remembered that you said the net smelled fishy, and I have brought you my pillow to sit on. There—is there a more comfortable seat in all Greece?"