AT CONSTANTINOPLE
Upon the following morning horses were brought round and they were
ordered to mount. An officer with twelve Turkish troopers took charge
of them. The pasha came out from his tent.
“I am sending a letter to the Porte saying what I know of the doings
of your ship, and of the service you rendered by saving our countrymen
at Athens. I have also given directions that the vessel conveying you
shall touch at Tenedos, and have written to the governor there asking
him also to send on a letter in your favour.”
After an hour’s riding they reached the town of Larissa, and then
followed the river on which it stands down to the sea.
“What a lovely country!” Horace exclaimed as he looked at the
mountains to the right and left.
“We are travelling on classical ground,” the doctor replied. “This is
the vale of Tempe, that hill to the right is Mount Ossa, that to the
left is Mount Olympus.”
“They are grand,” Horace said, “though I should certainly enjoy them
more under other circumstances. Fancy that being the hill that Jove
used to sit on. It would be a grand place to climb, wouldn’t it?”
“I should be quite content to look at it comfortably from the deck of
the schooner, Horace, and should have no desire whatever to scale it.”
“Where is the schooner now, do you think, doctor?”
“Where we left her. They would wait at the village where they expected
us to be handed over to them till late in the afternoon, and then most
likely march back to the shore. This morning they will be trying to
get news of us. It is possible that one of the Greeks has taken down
the news of our capture by the Turks, in hopes of getting a reward. He
would not know whether we were killed or captured--they bolted too
fast for that; but if a fellow does take news of the fight he will
probably offer to show the spot. Martyn will take out a strong party,
and when he finds the bodies of the two Greeks and no signs of us, he
will arrive at the conclusion that we have been carried off. The
Greeks probably recognized the men who attacked them as being a band
of Albanians. The white petticoats alone would tell them that; and as
the Christian Albanians would certainly not be likely to be plundering
on this side at the present time, they will be sure they are
Mohammedans either raiding on their own account or acting with the
Turkish forces in Thessaly.
“No doubt they will offer a reward for news of us, and will probably
learn from some peasant or other that a party of Albanians crossed the
range into Thessaly about mid-day. Then when they hear that the
pasha’s force was lying in the plain, not far from the foot of the
hills, they will arrive at the truth that we were taken there. What
their next step will be I cannot say, but I should fancy they will
sail round the promontory and try and open communication with some
small village, and get someone to visit the camp and try and pick up
news of what has become of us. It must be days before they can do all
this, and by the time they find we have been put on board ship we
shall be at Constantinople.
“At any rate, Horace, I regard the idea of there being a chance of
their rescuing us as out of the question. What they will do is, of
course, beyond guessing. It is vexing to think that if they did but
know at the present moment we were being put on board ship, they might
cut us off at the mouth of the Dardanelles. It is little farther from
the Gulf of Zeitouni than it is from the mouth of this river, and the
schooner would probably sail twice as fast as any craft we are likely
to be put on board. It is annoying, but it is of no use being annoyed.
They don’t know we are going to be embarked, and they can’t learn it
for four or five days at the very earliest, so don’t let us worry
about that. We have reasonable cause for worry in knowing that we are
going to be taken to Constantinople, for not improbably we will be
executed when we get there.”
“You think that it is probable, doctor?”
“I do, indeed. The Sultan is not the man to stand on niceties. He has
decided not to give quarter to foreigners who fight against him, and
as a matter of policy he is perfectly right. We knew all along what
our fate would be if we fell into the hands of the Turks. We have done
them an immense amount of mischief: we have destroyed a frigate and
beaten off their boats; we have taken a lot of prizes, and delivered
some two or three thousand valuable slaves from their hands. The only
set-off to this is that we assisted to save some three hundred Turkish
women and children, as to whose fate the Sultan was probably perfectly
indifferent. The balance is very heavy against us.”
Horace could not but admit that this was so, but in this beautiful
valley, and with Constantinople still in the distance, the idea that
ere long a violent death might befall him there was not sufficiently
vivid to depress his spirits greatly.
After four hours’ riding they came down upon the little port at the
mouth of the river. Two or three craft were lying there under the guns
of the battery.
“That is our vessel, you will see, Horace. It is a man-of-war brig. I
expect she is placed here on purpose to enable the pasha to
communicate direct with Constantinople, instead of having to send up
through the passes to Salonika.”
Leaving the prisoners under charge of the guard, the officer took a
boat and rowed off to the brig. In a few minutes a large boat lying
beside her was manned by a dozen sailors and rowed ashore. The officer
was on board of her. Two of the men who had brought their valises
strapped behind their saddles had already removed them, and stepped
into the boat forward, while their comrades took charge of their
horses. The officer then signed to Horace and the doctor to step on
board, and they were rowed out to the brig. Half an hour later the
anchor was got up, the sail set, and the vessel left the port.
There was no attempt at restraint of the prisoners. A young lieutenant
who spoke Greek informed them, in the name of the captain, that the
orders of the pasha were that they were to be treated as ordinary
passengers, and he requested them to take their meals with him in the
cabin. They would be entirely at liberty, except that they would not
be allowed to land at Tenedos, or at any other port at which the
vessel might touch.
The brig proved a fairly fast sailer; the wind was favourable, and
late on the afternoon of the day after they had sailed they dropped
anchor off Tenedos, and the officer in charge of the captives at once
went ashore with the pasha’s letter to the governor. He returned late
at night, after the prisoners had turned in in one of the officers’
cabins that had been vacated for their use. There was not a breath of
wind in the morning, and the captain accordingly did not attempt to
weigh anchor.
“It would be a fine thing if this calm would last for a fortnight,”
the doctor said as they came on deck in the morning.
“Yes, but there is no chance of that, doctor. We have never had a dead
calm for more than three days since we came out.”
“Well, we might do equally well with a light breeze from the north.
That would help the schooner across the gulf, and at the same time
would not enable the brig to work up the Dardanelles; there is a
strongish current there. Still, I am not at all saying it is likely;
I only say that I wish it could be so.”
When the officer came on deck he informed them, through the
lieutenant, that the governor had given him a strong letter to the
Porte speaking in the highest terms of the humanity they had shown
towards the Turks they had rescued from Athens. An hour later two or
three boats came off. Among those on board them were several women.
When these saw the doctor and Horace leaning over the bulwark, they
broke into loud cries of greeting.
“I expect they are some of those poor creatures we brought over,”
Horace said. “I don’t remember their faces, we have had too many on
board for that, and I don’t understand what they are saying, but it is
evidently that.”
Some of the boatmen understood both Greek and Turkish, and these
translated the expressions of the women’s gratitude, and their regret
at seeing him a prisoner. They were not allowed to set foot on the
brig, but they handed up baskets of fruit and sweetmeats. One of the
women stood up in the boat and in Greek said in low tones to Horace,
as he leant over the rail:
“There are but few of us here, and we are poor. Our hearts melted this
morning when the news spread that you were prisoners on board a ship
on her way to Constantinople. We can do nothing but pray to Allah for
your safety. My husband was one of the soldiers you brought over, the
one who had lost his arm, and who was tended by the _hakim_. As he was
of no more use they have discharged him, and he has remained here, as
I am a native of the island and have many friends. He will start in an
hour with some fishermen, relations of mine. They will land him above
Gallipoli, and he will walk to Constantinople. Then he will see the
bimbashi and his former comrades, and find out Osman and Fazli Beys,
who were with us, and tell them of your being prisoners, so that they
may use their influence at the Porte, and tell how you risked your
lives for them, and all--May Allah protect you both, _effendis_!”
Her story terminated abruptly, for the captain at this moment came up
and ordered the boat away from the side.
“What is all that about, Horace?” Macfarlane asked as Horace returned
the woman’s last salutation with two or three words of earnest thanks.
“Why, what is the matter, lad? there are tears in your eyes.”
“I am touched at that poor woman’s gratitude, doctor. As you can see
by her dress she is poor. She is the wife of a discharged soldier,
that man who lost his arm. You dressed the stump, you may remember. I
know you said that it had been horribly neglected, and remarked what a
splendid constitution the Turk had; you thought that had he been an
Englishman the wound would probably have mortified long before.”
“Of course I remember, Horace. And has he got over it?”
“He has.” And Horace then told him what the woman had said.
“It does one good to hear that,” Macfarlane said when he had finished.
“Human nature is much the same whether it is in the wife of a Turkish
soldier or of a Scottish fisherman. The poor creature and her husband
are doing all they can. The bimbashi and the beys were great men in
their eyes, and they doubtless think that they are quite important
persons at Constantinople. Still, it is pleasant to think that the
poor fellow, whose arm must still be very far from healed, is
undertaking this journey to do what he can for us. It minds me of that
grand story of Effie Deans tramping all the way from Scotland to
London to ask for her sister’s pardon.
“I don’t say that anything is like to come of it, but there is no
saying. If these Turks are as grateful as this soldier and his wife
they might possibly do something for us, if it were not that the
Sultan himself will settle the matter. An ordinary Turkish official
will do almost anything for money or favour, but the Sultan is not to
be got round; and they say he is a strong man, and goes his own way
without asking the advice of anyone. Still it is, as I said, pleasant
to know that there are people who have an interest in us, and who are
doing all in their power to help us.”
An hour later a small boat was seen to put out from the port and to
row away in the direction of the mainland.
For three days the brig lay at her anchorage. Then a gentle breeze
sprang up from the south. Making all sail, the brig was headed to the
entrance of the Dardanelles.
“Unless there is more wind than this,” Horace said, “I should hardly
think she will be able to make her way up, doctor. She is not going
through the water more than two knots an hour.”
“No, she will have to anchor again as soon as she is inside the
straits unless the wind freshens, and I don’t think it is likely to do
that. To my mind it looks as if it would die out again at sunset.”
This proved to be the case, and before it became dark the brig was
anchored in a bay on the Asiatic side a short distance from the
entrance.
The next morning the breeze again blew, and somewhat fresher than
before. All day the captain strove to pass up the straits. Sometimes
by keeping over out of the force of the current he made two or three
miles, then when they came to some projecting point the current would
catch the vessel and drift her rapidly down, so that when the breeze
again sank at sunset they had gained only some four miles. Next day
they were more fortunate and passed the castle of Abydos, and the
third evening came to anchor off Gallipoli. On the following morning
the wind blew briskly from the east, and in the afternoon they dropped
anchor off Constantinople.
“Eh, man, but it is a wonderful sight!” Macfarlane said, as they
looked at the city with the crenellated wall running along by the
water’s edge, the dark groves of trees rising behind it, and the
mosques with their graceful minarets on the sky-line. Ahead of them
was Pera with its houses clustering thickly one above the other, and
the background of tall cypress. Across the water lay Scutari, with its
great barracks, its mosques, and the kiosks scattered along the
shore. Caiques were passing backwards and forwards across the water;
heavy boats with sailors or troops rowing between the ships of war and
the shore; native craft with broad sails coming up astern from Broussa
and other places on the Sea of Marmora; pleasure boats, with parties
of veiled women rowing idly here and there; and occasionally a long
caique, impelled by six sturdy rowers, would flash past with some
official of rank.
“I have seen many places,” the doctor went on, “but none like this.
Nature has done more for Rio, and as much perhaps for Bombay, but man
has done little for either. We may boast of our western civilization,
and no doubt we can rear stately buildings; but in point of beauty the
orientals are as far ahead of us as we are ahead of the South Sea
Islanders. Who would think that the Turks, with their sober ways,
could ever have even dreamed of designing a thing so beautiful as that
mosque with its graceful outlines. See how well those dark cypresses
grow with it; it would lose half its beauty were it to rise from the
round heads of an English wood.
“Just compare the boats of light-coloured wood all carved and
ornamented with their graceful lines, and the boatmen in their
snow-white shirts, with their loose sleeves and bare arms, and their
scarlet sashes and fezzes with the black tub of an English or Scottish
river. Look at the dresses of the peasants in that heavy boat there,
and compare them with those of our own people. Why, man, we may be a
great nation, intelligent, and civilized, and all that; but when it
comes to an appreciation of the beautiful we are poor bodies, indeed,
by the side of the Turk, whom we in our mightiness are accustomed to
consider a barbarian. I know what you are going to say,” he went on,
as Horace was going to speak. “There is tyranny and oppression, and
evil rule, and corruption, and other bad things in that beautiful
city. I grant you all that, but that has nothing to do with my
argument. He may be a heathen, he may be ignorant, he may be what we
call uncivilized; but the Turk has a grand soul or he never would have
imagined a dream of beauty like this.”
As the sun set half an hour after the anchor was dropped the officer
sent with them by the pasha did not think it necessary to land until
the following morning, as the offices would all be shut. At eight
o’clock he was rowed ashore and did not return until late in the
evening. Business was not conducted at a rapid rate in the offices of
the Porte. The lieutenant interpreted to the prisoners that the letter
of the governor of Tenedos had been laid before the grand vizier, who
would deliver it with that of the pasha to the Sultan at his audience
in the evening.
“Did he see the grand vizier himself?” Horace asked.
The answer was in the affirmative.
“Did he gather from him whether it was likely that the Sultan would
regard the matter favourably?”
The two Turks spoke together for some time. “I am sorry to say,” the
lieutenant replied when they had done, “that the vizier was of opinion
that the Sultan would be immovable. He has sworn to spare none of
those who have stirred up his subjects to rebellion, and who, without
having any concern in the matter, have aided them against him. He
regards them as pirates, and has resolved by severity to deter others
from following their example. The vizier said that he would do his
best, but that when the Sultan’s mind was once made up nothing could
move him; and that having himself received the reports of the
destruction of one of his war-ships, and the very heavy loss inflicted
on the boats of the fleet at Chios, and having, moreover, received
memorials from the merchants at Smyrna as to the damage inflicted on
their commerce by what was called the white schooner, he felt that he
would be deaf to any appeal for mercy to two of her officers.”
At eight o’clock next morning a boat with twelve soldiers and an
officer came off to the brig. The officer, mounting on the deck,
handed to the captain an order for the delivery to him of the two
prisoners sent from Thessaly.
“Things look bad, I am afraid,” Horace said as they stepped into the
boat. “I saw the officer exchange a word or two with the cavalry man
who brought us here and the captain, and I am sure, by the expression
of their faces, that the news was bad. I am sure, too, from the way
they shook hands with us at parting.”
“Some of these men’s faces seem familiar to me,” the doctor said as
they were being rowed towards a landing to the east of the palace
gardens. “I can’t say that they were among the men we brought from
Athens, but I have a strong idea that two or three of them were. Do
you recognize them?”
“I can’t say that I do. You see they were only on board one day, and I
thought more of the women and children than of the soldiers and
sailors.”
“I am almost sure of them, Horace; yet it is curious, that if they are
the men we saved they did not make some sign of recognition when we
came down the ladder. Turkish discipline is not very strict. They did
not seem to look up much. They were all sitting forward of the six
oarsmen, and I noticed, that till we pushed off they seemed to be
talking about something together, and were so intent on it that they
did not look up until after we had pushed off. I did notice that the
oarsmen looked a little surprised when the officer, as we pushed off,
gave an order to the man steering, and they saw which way the boat’s
head was turned.
“I don’t suppose they knew that we were prisoners, Horace, and were
expecting to go back to the place they came from. I suppose the
landing they are taking us to is the nearest one to the prison.”
There were no boats lying at the broad steps alongside which the boat
drew up. Six of the soldiers took their places in front of them, the
officer marched between them, and the other six soldiers followed
behind. The road, which was a narrow one, ran between two very high
walls, and rose steeply upward.
“Evidently this landing-place is not much used,” the doctor said. “I
suppose it leads to some quiet quarter.”
A hundred yards from the landing-place the officer gave the word to
halt, and then another order, upon which one of the men, who carried a
bag, began to open it.
“Quick, gentlemen!” the officer said in Greek; “you must change here.
Quick! there is not a moment to lose.”
Astonished at the order, the doctor and Horace obeyed it.
“I suppose,” the former muttered, “they don’t want it known they have
got two European prisoners. I don’t see what else they can be up to.”
The change was quickly made. Two long baggy Turkish trousers were
pulled over their own, their jackets were thrown into the bag, and
they were enveloped in Turkish robes. Their caps were thrown beside
their jackets, and turbans placed on their heads, while their shoes
were pulled off and their feet thrust into Turkish slippers. The
officer and two of the soldiers aided in the work, and in a couple of
minutes the metamorphosis was complete.
“Allah be praised!” the officer exclaimed fervently; and the words
were echoed by the soldiers. These for a moment, regardless of
discipline, gathered round the prisoners. One after another seized
their hands, and bending over them pressed them to their forehead;
then the officer gave an order, and one or two at a time--the soldiers
carried only their side-arms--left the group and hurried on ahead,
until the officer remained alone with the astonished Englishmen.
“What does this all mean?” Horace asked the officer in Greek.
“It means that you are free, my friends,” he said, shaking each of
them cordially by the hand; “at least, so far free. Now let us follow
the others.”
Still, almost thinking they were dreaming, the doctor and Horace
accompanied their companion up the narrow lane, and emerged into a
quiet street behind a great mosque; skirting the wall of this, they
entered a wider street.
“Be careful,” the officer said in Greek; “walk along carelessly, and
seem to be conversing with me.”
Horace translated the remark to the doctor.
There were not a great many people about, but as they went along the
number increased. They crossed a busy street, turned down a lane on
the other side, and then walked for upwards of half an hour, turning
frequently, and as far as Horace could guess, making a wide detour,
and again approaching the busy part of the town. Presently the officer
stopped near the corner of a lane in a quiet street, and began to talk
in an animated tone about the size of the town and other matters,
until he saw that the street was for a moment empty; then he turned
sharply down the lane, which ran between the backs of two sets of
houses, went for a hundred yards, and then stopped at a door in the
wall; opened it with the key, hurried them in, and locked the door
behind him.
“Allah be praised!” he again said; “you are safe thus far. Now come
in, they are anxiously expecting us.”
He entered the house, which stood in a small inclosure, and led the
way into a room. They were received at the door by a Turk, whom both
recognized at once as Osman Bey, one of the principal Turks they had
carried from Athens. He repeated the officer’s pious exclamation:
“Allah be praised for his mercies!” and then in Greek he said, “Truly
I am rejoiced, my friends, that Allah has granted me an opportunity of
showing that I am not ungrateful, and that as you saved me and mine
from death, so have I been able to save you; and I am doubly glad in
seeing, what I knew not before, that one of you is the son of the
Englishman to whom principally we owed our escape.”
“We are grateful, indeed,” Horace said; “but at present we understand
nothing. This officer has told us nothing whatever.”
“This officer is my son, and is only an officer for the occasion,”
Osman Bey said. “But come into the next room; my wife and daughters
are eagerly expecting you.”
Three ladies rose from a divan on which they were sitting when the bey
entered the room. They were lightly veiled, but the bey said:
“Lay aside your veils. These are as my sons, and you can unveil as if
they were members of the family.”
The ladies unveiled. Horace had not seen their faces before on board
ship, for the women of the upper class had remained closely veiled.
The mother was a stout, elderly woman, with a kindly face. Her
daughters were girls of fourteen or fifteen, with dark hair, somewhat
colourless faces, and lovely eyes. The bey’s wife expressed her
pleasure at the arrival of the Englishmen. The girls shrank rather
timidly behind her, embarrassed at being thus unveiled before
strangers.
“Now sit down,” the bey said. “Zuleika, do you bring in coffee and
sweetmeats yourself. I do not wish your attendant to enter while these
gentlemen are here.”
“I have sent her down the town on a message,” the bey’s wife said,
while the younger girl rose and left the room. “She is faithful, but
girls will chatter. Mourad, we know, we can trust.”
The girl soon returned with a tray with coffee, cakes, and sweetmeats.
Then the bey said:
“Now I will tell you all about this. Ahmed, the sooner you get rid of
that uniform the better. Give it to Mourad at once, and let him take
it back to its owner, he may want it.”
The young man left the room.
“Now this is how it happened,” the bey began. “Three days ago came the
messenger from Tenedos. Did you know of his being sent hither?”
“Yes; his wife told us he was leaving--a soldier who had lost his
arm.”
“That was the man. He went to Hassan Bimbashi, who brought him first
to Fazli Bey, and then to me. We had a consultation. It was clear to
us all that it would be intolerable that men who had behaved with such
humanity to us should be put to death, if we could possibly save them.
It took us a long time to arrange the matter, and we three sat in the
next room there debating the matter all night. We took Ahmed into our
council at once, for he was, of course, as anxious to aid the men who
had saved his parents and sisters from massacre as we were. Naturally,
we at first thought of getting you out of prison by bribing the
guards; but though this would have been comparatively easy, it was
doubtful whether there would be time to carry it out. There are
several prisons here, and there was no saying which you might be sent
to, or who would be the men in charge of you; therefore, time would be
needed after you arrived here, and we saw that it was probable that no
time would be given us. The Sultan might, of course, view your case
favourably; but, on the other hand, if he ordered you to execution,
there would be no delay.
“When a thing has to be done, especially when foreigners are in the
case, it is better to do it at once; otherwise, the Porte would be
pestered by the foreign representatives. It was agreed, therefore,
that if you were to be rescued, it must be done between the time of
your arrival and your being put in prison. We divided the work into
four parts. Fazli, who has most interest at the Porte, was to try all
in his power to influence the ministers, and to get the grand vizier
to represent the matter favourably to the Sultan. He was to give us
the earliest news of whatever decision might be arrived at, and above
all, he was to get some minor official there to follow the officer to
whom the order for bringing you ashore should be given.
“The soldier who had brought the message from Tenedos was to find out
a dozen of those who had been rescued with us, and to enlist them in
the business. The bimbashi undertook the work of seizing the officer
bearing the order. He could not very well take the command of the
soldiers. Their faces would not be noticed by the sailors in the
dockyard boat, nor by those on board the ship; but Hassan’s would be
fully seen by both. My son, therefore, volunteered to undertake this
part of the affair, dressed in Hassan’s uniform. He was to meet the
twelve men at some spot agreed upon, near the dockyard gate; to march
in with them, produce the order, and go out in one of the dockyard
boats to the vessel; bring you ashore, and lead you here. My part of
the business was to conceal you as long as necessary, and to arrange
for your escape from Constantinople. Thus, you see, the risk was
slight in each case. Fazli would be suspected, because he had urged
your case at the Porte; but nothing could be proved against him. His
servants might be examined, and his house searched. He would be able
to prove that he spent the evening with several of his friends, to
whom he gave an entertainment; and this morning, at the time the boat
came for you, he was to be at the ministry again, trying what could be
done on your behalf.
“None of the soldiers would know that the bimbashi was mixed up in the
affair at all. Their one-armed comrade was to be furnished with money
in case their gratitude required stimulating. My son ran no risk,
because it is among the officers of the garrison that the search will
be made for the man who commanded the party. As for myself, there is
nothing to connect me in any way with it. Ahmed will take you off this
evening to a small kiosk of mine ten miles away on the coast. The
bimbashi’s share was the most dangerous. He was to take three men of
his regiment on whom he could thoroughly rely. They would be three of
those he had commanded at Athens and who had wives and children who
had been rescued by you. He was much loved by his soldiers, for he
lived and starved as they did, and did all in his power for their
comfort.
“It is always dangerous to trust anyone, but in this case there was
the men’s loyalty to him and their gratitude to you to bind them. He
would learn from Fazli the hour when the Sultan’s decision would be
given, and he and the three soldiers were to be upon the spot and to
watch for the coming out of an officer followed by the man Fazli was
to appoint. The officer was sure to go to one or other of the barracks
for some soldiers to accompany him to the vessel. It would depend
upon the hour and the orders he received whether to go direct on board
or to do it in the morning. It was certain the hour would be late, for
the conferences with the Sultan are invariably in the evening. Whether
he went to one of the barracks or to his own lodging, he was to be
followed until he got to some quiet spot, then seized, bound, and
gagged, put into a large basket two of the soldiers were to carry, and
taken to some quiet spot outside the walls. To-night, after it is
dark, Hassan will go up and loose his bonds sufficiently to enable him
to work himself free after a time.
“That was the arrangement at which we arrived after talking it over
for hours. It was the work of the bimbashi and Ahmed. I am sure that
Fazli and I would never have thought of it at all by ourselves. Ever
since then we have kept a sharp look-out for the vessel. Everything
had been got ready. The one-armed soldier had got the twelve men ready
to go off. Hassan said he had made his arrangements, and had found a
ruined hut half a mile out of the town beyond the walls, where there
was little chance of anyone looking in in the course of the day, and,
indeed, if anyone did so after eight o’clock, it would make little
matter, as you would be ashore by that hour. After the brig arrived I
had messages from Fazli every hour. He told us of the strong letters
that had been sent by Ali Pasha and the governor of Tenedos, and he
brought all his influence to bear to aid the representations made by
them and by the officer who brought you down.
“The ministers and the grand vizier were all agreed that the kindness
shown by those on board the English ship should suffice to save your
lives, but the Sultan decides for himself, and he was known to be so
enraged at foreigners joining the Greeks in their rebellion against
him that they feared nothing would move him. Everything, therefore,
was prepared for the attempt. The twelve soldiers were directed to be
at a spot near the dockyard at seven in the morning; and the bimbashi,
with his three men, took up his post near the entrance to the
ministry. I had nothing to do. At twelve o’clock last night Hassan
came here, bringing the official letter and a suit of his uniform.
Everything had gone well. The messenger had been seized in a lonely
street leading to one of the barracks, and was overpowered and
silenced before he had time to utter a sound. Hassan accompanied the
men carrying the basket in case by any accident they should be
questioned, and saw the officer placed, securely bound, in the hut. As
he had been blindfolded the instant he had been seized he could not
have seen that his assailants were soldiers. Ahmed can tell you the
rest.”
“There is nothing to tell,” the young man said. “I found the soldiers
waiting at the spot agreed upon, and gave them the arranged sign. We
went into the dockyard. I showed the order, and demanded a large boat,
which was at once given me. Then I went off to the vessel, where our
friends were handed over to me without a question; rowed to the wharf;
the clothes were changed in the lane; and here we are.”
“I cannot thank you sufficiently for your kindness, Osman Bey, on
behalf of myself and my friend here, and express our gratitude also to
your son, to Hassan Bimbashi, and to Fazli Bey. You have indeed nobly
repaid the service that my father and all of us were glad to have been
able to render you.”
“Do not talk about gratitude,” the bey said. “You saved not only us,
but our wives and families, and that at the risk of your lives, for I
expected that the Greeks would fall upon you for interfering in their
butchery. What you did for us was done for strangers against whom you
were in arms. What we have done for you has been done for our
benefactors. Therefore let no more be said. My wife and daughters
would have despised me had I not done all in my power to rescue their
preservers. Now let us return to the next room, where we will have a
meal. I think it would be as well, Ahmed, to send Mourad at once down
to the bridge to hire a caique there, and tell him to take it to the
next landing to that at which you disembarked, and there wait for you.
What do you say?”
“I think, father, it would be better to go boldly down to the bridge
and take the boat there. I am sure to see some of the men we generally
employ, and it will seem natural to them that I should be going with
two friends up to our kiosk; whereas the other way would be unusual,
and when inquiries are made, as there are sure to be, they might speak
of it. But I agree with you that it will be as well not to wait until
the evening. Directly the officer gets free there is sure to be a
great stir, and there may be janissaries placed at the various
landings, as it might be supposed the escaped prisoners would try to
get on board a neutral ship.”
“Perhaps that would be better, Ahmed. I think they might boldly go
through the crowd with a little more attention to their dress.”