The Pasha sat down on the divan and lighted a cigarette. Almost
immediately the nightingale stopped singing. For a few moments
Zümbül Agha's steps could be heard outside. Then it became very
still. The Pasha did not like it. Look which way he would he could
not help seeing the chest--or listening. He got up and went into the
big room, where he turned on the water of the fountain. The falling
drops made company for him, and kept him from looking for lost
reflections. But they presently made him think of what Hélène had
said about them. He went out to the porch and sat down on the steps.
In front of him the pines lifted their great dark canopies against
the stars. Other stars twinkled between the trunks, far below, where
the shore lights of the Bosphorus were. It was so still that water
sounds came faintly up to him, and every now and then he could even
hear nightingales on the European side. Another nightingale began
singing in his own woods--the nightingale that had told him what to
do, he said to himself. What other things the nightingales had sung
to him, years ago! And how long the pines had listened there, still
strong and green and rugged and alive, while he, and how many before
him, sat under them for a little while and then went away!
Presently he heard steps on the drive and Shaban came, carrying
something dark in his hand.
"What is that?" asked the Pasha, as Shaban held it out.
"A pistol, my Pasha. Zümbül Agha told me you wanted it."
The Pasha laughed curtly.
"Zümbül made a mistake. What I want is a shovel, or a couple of
them. Can you find such a thing without asking anyone?"
"Yes, my Pasha," replied the Albanian promptly, laying the revolver
on the steps and disappearing again. And it was not long before he
was back with the desired implements.
"We must dig a hole, somewhere, Shaban," said his master in a low
voice. "It must be in a place where people are not likely to go, but
not too far from the kiosque."
Shaban immediately started toward the trees at the back of the house.
The Pasha followed him silently into a path that wound through the
wood. A nightingale began to sing again, very near them--the
nightingale, thought the Pasha.
"He is telling us where to go," he said.
Shaban permitted himself a low laugh.
"I think he is telling his mistress where to go. However, we will go
too." And they did, bearing away to one side of the path till they
came to the foot of a tall cypress.
"This will do," said the Pasha, "if the roots are not in the way."
Without a word Shaban began to dig. The Pasha took the other spade.
To the simple Albanian it was nothing out of the ordinary. What was
extraordinary was that his master was able to keep it up, soft as the
loam was under the trees. The most difficult thing about it was that
they could not see what they were doing, except by the light of an
occasional match. But at last the Pasha judged the ragged excavation
of sufficient depth. Then he led the way back to the kiosque.
They found Zümbül Agha in the little room, sitting on the sofa with a
pistol in either hand.
"I thought I told you not to come back!" exclaimed the Pasha sternly.
"Yes," faltered the old eunuch, "but I was afraid something might
happen to you. So I waited below the pines. And when you went away
into the woods with Shaban, I came here to watch." He lifted a
revolver significantly. "I found the other one on the steps."
"Very well," said the Pasha at length, more kindly. He even found it
in him at that moment to be amused at the picture the black man made,
in his sedate frock coat, with his two weapons. And Zümbül Agha
found no less to look at in the appearance of his master's clothes.
"But now there is no need for you to watch any longer," added the
latter. "If you want to watch, do it at the bottom of the hill.
Don't let any one come up here."
"On my head," said the eunuch. He saw that Shaban, as usual, was
trusted more than he. But it was not for him to protest against the
ingratitude of masters. He salaamed and backed out of the room.
When he was gone the Pasha turned to Shaban:
"This box, Shaban--you see this box? It has become a trouble to us,
and I am going to take it out there."
The Albanian nodded gravely. He took hold of one of the handles, to
judge the weight of the chest. He lifted his eyebrows.
"Can you help me put it on my back?" he asked.
"Don't try to do that, Shaban. We will carry it together." The
Pasha took hold of the other handle. When they got as far as the
outer door he let down his end. It was not light. "Wait a minute,
Shaban. Let us shut up the kiosque, so that no one will notice
anything." He went back to blow out the candles. Then he thought of
the fountain. He caught a play of broken images in the pool as he
turned off the water. When he had put out the lights and had groped
his way to the door he found that Shaban was already gone with the
chest. A last drop of water made a strange echo behind him in the
dark kiosque. He locked the door and hurried after Shaban, who had
succeeded in getting the chest on his back. Nor would Shaban let the
Pasha help him till they came to the edge of the wood. There,
carrying the chest between them, they stumbled through the trees to
the place that was ready.
"Now we must be careful," said the Pasha. "It might slip or get
stuck."
"But are you going to bury the box too?" demanded Shaban, for the
first time showing surprise.
"Yes," answered the Pasha. And he added: "It is the box I want to
get rid of."
"It is a pity," remarked Shaban regretfully. "It is a very good box.
However, you know. Now then!"
There was a scraping and a muffled thud, followed by a fall of earth
and small stones on wood. The Pasha wondered if he would hear
anything else. But first one and then another nightingale began to
fill the night air with their April madness.
"Ah, there are two of them," remarked Shaban. "She will take the one
that says the sweetest things to her."
The Pasha's reply was to throw a spadeful of earth on the chest.
Shaban joined him with such vigour that the hole was very soon full.
"We are old, my Pasha, but we are good for something yet," said
Shaban. "I will hide the shovels here in the bushes," he added, "and
early in the morning I will come again, before any of those lazy
gardeners are up, and fix it so that no one will ever know."
There at least was a person of whom one could be sure! The Pasha
realised that gratefully, as they walked back through the park. He
did not feel like talking, but at least he felt the satisfaction of
having done what he had decided to do. He remembered Zümbül Agha as
they neared the bottom of the hill. The eunuch had not taken his
commission more seriously than it had been given, however, or he
preferred not to be seen. Perhaps he wanted to reconnoitre again on
top of the hill.
"I don't think I will go in just yet," said the Pasha, as they
crossed the bridge into the lower garden. "I am rather dirty. And I
would like to rest a little under the chestnut trees. Would you get
me an overcoat please, Shaban, and a brush of some kind? And you
might bring me a coffee, too."
How tired he was! And what a short time it was, yet what an
eternity, since he last dropped into one of those wicker chairs! He
felt for his cigarettes. As he did so he discovered something else
in his pocket, something small and hard that at first he did not
recognise. Then he remembered the key--the key.... He suddenly
tossed it into the pool beside him. It made a sharp little splash,
which was reëchoed by the dripping basins. He got up and felt in the
ivy for the handle that shut off the water. At the end of the garden
the Bosphorus lapped softly in the dark. Far away, up in the wood,
the nightingales were singing.