"That's a long story. Tell us first why you're here, and why you're
a prisoner."
"I was going to the mission at Marash--to stay a year there and help,
before returning to the States. They warned me in Tarsus that the
trip might be dangerous, but I know how short-handed they are at
Marash, and I wouldn't listen. Besides, they picked the best men
they could find to bring me on the way, and I started. I had a Turkish
permit to travel--a teskere they call it--see, I have it here. It
was perfectly ridiculous to think of my not going."
"Perfectly!" Fred agreed. "Any young woman in your place would have
come away!"
She laughed, and colored a trifle. "Women and men are equals in
the States, Mr. Oakes."
"And the Turk ought to know that! I get you, Miss Vanderman! I
see the point exactly!"
"At any rate, I started. And we slept at night in the houses of
Armenians whom my guides knew, so that the journey wasn't bad at
all. Everything was going splendidly until we reached a sort of
crossroads--if you can call those goat-tracks roads without stretching
truth too far--and there three men came galloping toward us on blown
horses from the direction of Marash. We could hardly get them to
stop and tell us what the trouble was, they were in such a hurry,
but I set my horse across the path and we held them up."
"As any young lady would have done!" Fred murmured.
"Never mind. I did it! They told us, when they could get their breath
and quit looking behind them like men afraid of ghosts, that the
Turks in Marash--which by all accounts is a very fanatical place--had
started to murder Armenians. They yelled at me to turn and run.
"'Run where?' I asked them. 'The Turks won't murder me!'
"That seemed to make them think, and they and my six men all talked
together in Armenian much too fast for me to understand a word of
it. Then they pointed to some smoke on the sky-line that they said
was from burning Armenian homes in Marash.
"s'Why didn't you take refuge in the mission?' I asked them. And
they answered that it was because the mission grounds were already
full of refugees.
"Well, if that were true--and mind you, I didn't believe it--it was
a good reason why I should hurry there and help. If the mission
staff was overworked before that they would be simply overwhelmed
now. So I told them to turn round and come to Marash with me and
my six men."
"And what did they say?" we demanded together.
"They laughed. They said nothing at all to me. Perhaps they thought
I was mad. They talked together for five minutes, and then without
consulting me they seized my bridle and galloped up a goat-path that
led after a most interminable ride to this place."
"Where they hold you to ransom?"
"Not at all. They've been very kind to me. I think that at the
bottom of their thoughts there may be some idea of exchanging me
for some of their own women whom the Turks have made away with.
But a stronger motive than that is the determination to keep me safe
and be able to produce me afterward in proof of their bona fides.
They've got me here as witness, for another thing. And then, I've
started a sort of hospital in this old keep. There are literally
hundreds of men and women hiding in these hills, and the women are
beginning to come to me for advice, and to talk with me. I'm pretty
nearly as useful here as I would be at Marash."
"And you're--let's see--nineteen-twenty--one--two--not more than
twenty-two," suggested Fred.
"Is intelligence governed by age and sex in England." she retorted,
and Fred smiled in confession of a hit.
"Go on," said Will. "Tell us."
"There's nothing more to tell. When I started to run toward
the--ah--music, the women tried to prevent me. They knew Americans
had come, and they feared you might take me away."
"They were guessing good!" grinned Will.
She shook her head, and the loosened coils of hair fell lower. One
could hardly have blamed a man who had desired her in that lawless
land and sought to carry her off. The Armenian men must have been
temptation proof, or else there had been safety in numbers.
"I shall stay here. How could I leave them? The women need me.
There are babies--daily--almost hourly--here in these lean hills,
and no organized help of any kind until I came."
"How long have you been here?" I asked.
"Nearly two days. Wait till I've been here a week and you'll see."
"We can't wait to see!" Will answered. "We've a friend of our own
in a tight place. The best we can do is to rescue you--"
"I don't need to be rescued!"
"--to rescue you--take you back to Tarsus, where you'll be safe until
the trouble's over--and then hurry to the help of our own man."
"Who is your own man? Tell me about him."
"He's a prince."
"Really?"
"No, really an earl--Earl of Montdidier. White. White all through
to the wish-bone. Whitest man I ever camped with. He's the goods."
"If you'd said less I'd have skinned you for an ingrate!" Fred
announced. "Monty is a man men love."