"You can have no idea," said the flat and unemotional voice by Mr.
Spokesly's shoulder, "simply no idea how miraculous the whole business
seems to us. Astonished? No word for it. We were flabbergasted. For you
saved the situation. You arrived in the nick, positively the nick, of
time. I don't go beyond the facts when I say things were looking
decidedly, well blue, for us. Oh, don't misunderstand me. No
ill-treatment. Just the reverse, in fact. But you can understand we
weren't bothering much about politeness when we couldn't get anything to
eat. And that's what it amounts to."
"Yes, I suppose so," said Mr. Spokesly. "I must say, finding so many of
you here, has surprised me."
"We had to stay. Couldn't get out," replied the other man, shooting a
frayed cuff and flicking the ash delicately from his cigarette.
They were seated, as it were, at the centre of that vast crescent which
the city forms upon the flanks of Mount Pagos. On either hand the great
curves of the water-front sprang outward and melted into the confused
colours of the distant shore. From their vantage point on the roof of
the Sports Club, they could see in some detail the beauty of the
buildings, the marble entrances, the cedar-wood balconies and the green
jalousies of the waterside houses. They could see the boats sailing
rapidly across the harbour from Cordelio in the afternoon breeze, and
beyond, bathing the whole panorama in a strong blaze of colour, the sun,
soon to set in the purple distances beyond the blue domes of the
islands. To the right the shore curved in a semi-circular sweep to form
the head of the great Gulf, while on their left the green waters,
ruffled by the breeze and given a magical lustre by the rays of the
setting sun, stretched away into the distance.
And it was into this distance that Mr. Spokesly, his elbow on the stone
balustrade of the roof of the Sports Club, was thoughtfully directing
his gaze. Even with his physical eyes he could make out a faint dot,
which he knew was the _Kalkis_. And while he listened to the remarks of
his companion, his thoughts went back to the final catastrophe of the
voyage. He had been leaning over watching the boat come alongside, his
hand on the telegraph to put her astern, when the whole ship shook
violently, there was a grinding of metal on metal and a sound as of a
load of loose stones pouring harshly upon hollow iron floors. He stared
round him even as he pulled the handle back to full astern, searching
for some hint of the cause. And he realized he had been searching for
something else, too. He had been voicelessly calling for Plouff and for
the captain. As he sat calmly looking out across the water at the
wreck--for he did not disguise from himself the fact that the _Kalkis_
was a total loss--he was thinking of that moment when he had to decide
what to do and had turned his head to call for help. And he knew now
that if he had called, if he had run down and hammered on that man's
door to come up and take charge, to resume the authority he had
abdicated so short a time before, there would have been no answer.
That was the point around which his memories clustered now, although
nobody save himself was aware of it. Indeed, there had been a distinctly
admiring note in this gentleman's voice, flat and unemotional as it was
by habit, when he had climbed up the ladder and set foot on the deck of
the _Kalkis_. "You were very cool," he had said. He had not been cool.
There had been a moment, just after he had pulled that telegraph-handle,
and the ship, instead of slowly gaining sternway and moving off into the
turbulence of her wake, had given another inexplicable shudder, and the
bows sank into a sudden deathlike solidity when he rang "stop," as
though that noise and that shudder and that almost imperceptible
subsidence had been her death-throe, the last struggle of her
complicated and tatterdemalion career. That moment had settled the
_Kalkis_ and it had nearly settled him, too. He had turned right round
and seen the man at the wheel methodically passing the spokes through
his hands, his eye on the ship's head, his ear alert for the word of
command. Mr. Spokesly had seen this, and for an instant he had had a
shocking impulse to run to the far side of the bridge and go over, into
the water. A moment of invisible yet fathomless panic. Looking back at
it, he had a vague impression of a glimpse into eternity--as though for
that instant he had really died, slipping into an unsuspected crevice
between the past and the future.... The man at the wheel was looking at
him. He heard a voice, the voice of the helmsman, saying, "She don't
steer," and the moment was past. He walked firmly to the side and looked
down at the boat, and heard someone calling, "Where is your ladder?"
And the next thing he remembered was the remark of this gentleman when
he arrived on deck: "You were very cool." He had said in reply: "There
is something I wish to tell you. I have sent for the captain and he has
not come up. I must go and fetch him." He remembered also the dry
comment, "Oh, so you are not the captain?" and the start for the cabin
as Evanthia came out, buttoning her gloves, dressed for walking. He
remembered that. The gentleman who had told him he was very cool, and
who sat beside him now on the roof of the Sports Club, had been
explaining that he came as an interpreter and was English himself, when
the door opened and Evanthia appeared. He had stopped short and let his
jaw drop, and his hand slowly reached up to remove his old straw hat.
The others, who were in white uniforms with red fezzes on their heads,
stepped back involuntarily in stupefaction at such an unexpected vision.
And he, dazed by his recent experience, stood staring at her as though
he were as astonished as the rest. For she came up to him in that long
stride of hers that always made him feel it would be hopeless to explain
to her what was meant by fear, and slipped her hand through his arm. "My
husband," she said, smiling at the men in fezzes, and she added, in
their own tongue. "My father was Solari Bey, who had the House of the
Cedars near the cemetery in Pera."
It was she who had been "very cool." She was wearing her black dress and
the toque with the high feather. Her eyes glowed mysteriously, and she
stood beside him dominating them all. He heard the astonished
interpreter mumbling: "Oh--ah! Really! Dear me! Most unexpected
pleasure! Plucky of you, permit me to say. Oh--ah!..." and the men in
fezzes making respectful noises in their throats as the conversation
suddenly became unintelligible. He had stood silent, watching her while
she spoke that bewildering jargon, the words rushing from her exquisite
lips and catching fire from the flash of her eyes. There was a potent
vitality in the tones of her voice that seemed to him must be
irresistible to all men. She spoke and they listened with rapt attentive
gaze. She commanded and they obeyed. They laughed, and bent their tall
heads to listen afresh. She might have been some supernatural being,
some marine goddess, come suddenly into her old dominions, and they her
devout worshippers.
He heard the word "captain" and opened his mouth to speak to the
interpreter.
"Is he English?" asked that gentleman. "She says he is a--well, I hardly
know how to explain just what she means.... You had better tell this
officer here. He speaks some English. Colonel Krapin? Ah, quite so. The
colonel wishes me to say, he must see the captain. Perhaps, if you will
allow us, we can sit down in the cabin, he says."
And when they had entered the cabin, and were seated about the table,
the young Jew, who had been cowering in the pantry, was brought forth
and ordered in crisp tones to descend and inform the captain.
"I knocked at the door," Evanthia told them quickly. "I said, a boat is
coming. I heard him move. I heard him come to the door and then, he
strike the door with all his force while I have my hand on it. The door
shake, _boom_! The fool is afraid for anybody to go in. Ask the boy, the
young Jew. He will tell you."
The colonel studied his sword, which he had laid on the table before
him, and made a remark in a low tone. He had been somewhat embarrassed
by the absence of the captain. Without a captain and without the papers
which would apprise them all of the exact nature of the cargo, he was at
a loss.
And the young Jew had come stumbling up the stairs, his hands outspread,
and in quavering tones said something which had brought the officer to
his feet and grasping his sword. He had remembered that moment.
"You know," said his companion with a slight smile, "really you know,
when he came up and told us the captain was leaning against the door and
wouldn't let him open it--said he could see the captain's shoulder, just
for a moment I thought you had been let in. Poor old Krapin was in a
funk. He was sure he was in a trap. You remember he wouldn't go down.
Made _me_ go."
"Yes," said Mr. Spokesly steadily, "I remember. I couldn't explain
because I didn't know myself. He thought I was in the plot, I suppose."
"And now he thinks you ..." he paused and flicked his cigarette again.
"H--m! Down there in that dark passage, I was ready to think all sorts
of funny things myself. I saw his shoulder. Extraordinary sensation
running up and down my spine. I said, 'Captain, you are wanted.' No
answer, of course. What is one to say in a situation of that kind? I ask
you. For a moment I stood with my foot in the door and him leaning
against it. It reminded me of my boyhood days in London when all sorts
of people used to come round to sell things and try to keep you from
shutting the door. For a moment I wondered if he thought I had come off
in a boat to sell him something."
He gave a short laugh and looked down with reflective eyes upon the
people walking in the street between the houses and the sea. His straw
hat and linen suit were very old and frayed and his shoes were of canvas
with rope soles. Yet he gave the impression of being very smartly
attired. A gentleman. His bow tie burst forth from a frayed but spotless
soft collar. A cotton handkerchief with a spotted blue border hung
fashionably from his pocket. And his features had the fine tint and
texture of a manila envelope.
"Absurd, of course. Yet in a case like that one doesn't know how to
avoid the absurd. And finally, when I gave a smart shove, I said:
'Excuse me, Captain, I really must ...' the shoulder disappeared and
there was a most awful clatter and a thud. And then a silence. Frankly I
was unable to open the door for a second, I was so upset. I half
expected the thing to fly open and a crowd of people to rush out on me.
That was the sensation I got from that rumpus. Imagine it!"
"Yes," said Mr. Spokesly, "I can believe you felt strange. But how was
anybody to know?"
"And you still think it was an accident?" said his companion curiously.
"Yes, it was an accident," replied Mr. Spokesly steadily.
"H--m! Well, you knew him."
"I don't believe he had the pluck to do such a thing," went on Mr.
Spokesly. "He hadn't the pluck of a louse, as we say. And you must
remember he was all dressed for going ashore. He had all his money on
him, all his papers. He very likely had his hat on. But for some reason
or other, before he could do anything and speak to anybody, he had to
take some sort of pill. Small, square white tablets. I've known him keep
out of the way, go over the other side of the bridge and turn his back
before speaking to me. I could see his hand go to his mouth as he came
along the deck. I don't know for sure. Nobody will know for sure. But I
know what I think myself."
"Yes? Some private trouble? That's the usual reason, isn't it?"
"He had a grudge against everybody. Thought everybody was against him.
They were, but that was because he hadn't the sense to get on with
them."
"Perhaps it was a woman," suggested his companion hopefully.
"Him! A woman? Do you think a woman would have anything to do with him?"
Mr. Spokesly's tone as he put this question was warm. It was a true
reflection of his present state of mind. "My husband," Evanthia had
said, and it was as her husband he had stepped ashore. And he was
conscious of a glow of pride whenever he compared other men with
himself. She was his. As for the captain, the very idea was grotesque.
He stirred in his chair, moved his arm on the balustrade. He did not
want to talk about the captain. The words, "Perhaps it was a woman," did
not, he felt, apply exactly to any one save himself. He heard his
companion reply doubtfully, as though there could be any doubt:
"Oh--well, you know, one has heard of such cases. Still, as you say, the
circumstantial evidence is strong. Those tablets of his were all over
the place, I remember."
"He had the medicine-chest in his room," said Mr. Spokesly.
"Yes. The Doctor showed me where he'd been mixing the stuff in a cup.
And there was a mould for making them. So you think he had no intention
of...."
"No intention of taking anything fatal himself," was the reply.
"Ah! Indeed! That opens up a very interesting departure," said the
other.
"Not now," said Mr. Spokesly. "Not now."
"You'll excuse my own curiosity," said his friend, "but when I found
him, you know, eh?"
"If he had found you," Mr. Spokesly remarked, looking towards the
mountains to the eastward, "he would never have taken the trouble to
mention it to a soul except officially. I didn't know him very well, but
I should say he is better off where he is. I shall have to be getting
along."
They rose and descended the broad staircases to the terrace facing the
sea, a terrace filled with tables and chairs. Across the Gulf the lights
of Cordelio began to sparkle against the intense dark blue of the land
below the red blaze of the sunset. It was the hour when the Europeans of
the city come out to enjoy the breeze from the Gulf, making their
appearance through the great archway of the Passage Kraemer and sitting
at little tables to drink coffee and lemonade tinctured with syrup. They
were coming out now, parties of Austrians and Germans, with fattish
spectacled husbands in uniforms with fezzes atop, and tall blonde women
in toilettes that favoured bold colour schemes or sharp contrasts of
black and white, with small sun-shades on long handles. There were
Greeks and Roumanians and here and there a quiet couple of English would
sink unobtrusively into chairs in a corner. And a band was tuning up
somewhere out of sight.
Mr. Spokesly plunged straight down the steps of the terrace, past a
group of Austrian girls who were taking their seats at a table, and who
eyed him with lively curiosity, and started towards the custom house,
his companion, whose name was Marsh, hurrying after him.
"By the way," said he. "I would like, some time, to introduce you to
some of the crowd. They are really very decent. They have made things
much easier for us than you might imagine. Of course, for the sake of my
family and myself I have kept well in with them; but quite apart from
the expediency of it, it has been a pleasure. You have been here nearly
a week now," he went on, smiling a little, "and we have seen nothing of
you."
Mr. Spokesly muttered something about being busy all day on the ship,
getting the cargo out of her.
"Yes, but why not come round now? It is only just through the Passage,
near Costi's. I can assure you they are a very interesting lot."
"Well, it's like this, Mr. Marsh. I'm under orders, you see. And I've
got this launch now and I'm not so sure of the engine that I want to get
stuck with it after dark. I'll tell you what. I'll come to-morrow, eh?"
And to this Mr. Marsh was obliged to agree. Mr. Spokesly dived into the
custom house and made for the waterside, where a number of gasolene
launches were tied up. It was one of these which, on account of the
gasolene in the cargo of the _Kalkis_, he had been able to get for his
own use. He had had long struggles with the engine, towing it out with
him to the ship and working on it while the men loaded the barges. Now
it was in pretty good shape; he understood it well enough to anticipate
most of the troubles. He got down into it now and took off his coat to
start the engine.
It was not that he did not appreciate the offer of his friend. The crowd
alluded to were well enough no doubt--clerks and subordinate officials
who had gradually formed a sort of international coterie who met in a
wing of one of the consulates. Indeed, one of them lived in a house not
far from himself on the hillside at Bairakli. But he was in a mood just
now which made him reluctant to mix with those highly sophisticated
beings. He wanted to go home. As he steered his launch through the
entrance of the tiny harbour and made straight across the Gulf towards
the eastern end, he was thinking that for the first time in his life he
had a home. And she had done it! With a cool indomitable will she had
set about it. He knew he could never have achieved this felicity by
himself. She had held out her hand for money and he had handed it over
to her. If she had not watched he would not have had nearly so much, she
told him, and he believed her. That was the key to his mood. He crouched
in the stern of his boat and kept his eyes upon the house, a white spot
against the steep brown slope of the mountain. That house, rented from a
poverty-stricken Greek who had left most of the furniture, and an old
woman, who had lived all her life in the village, as servant,
represented for Mr. Spokesly his entire visible and comprehensible
future. This was another key to his mood. It was as though he had
suddenly cashed in on all his available resources of happiness,
hypothecating them for the immediate and attainable yet romantic
present. By some fluke of fortune he could see that he actually held
within his grasp all that men toil and struggle for in this world, all
that they desire in youth, all that they remember in age. But he had no
certainty of the permanence of all this, and he lived in a kind of
anxious ecstasy, watching Evanthia each day with eager hungry eyes,
waiting with a sort of incredulous astonishment for the first shadow to
cross the dark mirror of their lives.
As it must, he told himself. This could not last for ever. And sometimes
he found himself trying to imagine how it would end. To-night he was
preoccupied with the discovery that each day, as the end approached, he
was dreading it more and more. He had tried to explain this to her as
they walked in the garden under the cypresses and looked across the dark
waters of the Gulf, and she had smiled and said: "Ah, yes!" She was
still a mystery to him, and that was another grief, since he did not yet
suspect that the mystery of a woman is simply a screen with nothing
behind it. She smiled in her alluring inscrutable way and he held her
desperately to him, wondering in what form the fate of their separation
would appear.
And when he saw that she had not come down to the jetty to meet him, as
she had done on previous nights, he instantly accepted her absence as a
signal of change. Yet at the back of his mind there burned a thin bright
flame of intelligence that told him the truth. Evanthia had that supreme
virtue of the courageous--her dissimulation was neither clumsy nor
cruel. It was as much a part of her as was her skin, her hair, her amber
eyes. He knew in his heart this was so and made of it a rack on which he
tortured himself with thoughts of her fidelity. Each day the difference
between this experience and the shallow clap-trap intrigues he had known
became more marked to him. The thought of her out there, hidden away
from other men, with her delicious graces of body and lucidity of mind,
for him alone, was almost too poignant for him. As he came alongside the
little staging, and made fast, he returned again to the foreboding
thought of the day. There would come an end. And beyond the end of this
he could see nothing but darkness, nothing save an aching void.
Nevertheless, as he came up from the jetty and stood for a moment in the
road which followed the curve of the shore, and listened to the sounds
of the village that nestled in the valley like a few grains of light in
a great bowl of darkness, he was conscious of something which he could
not successfully analyze or separate from his tumultuous emotions. He
put it to himself, crudely enough, when he muttered: "I shall have to
take a hand." He was discovering himself in the act of submitting once
more to outside authority. Looking back over his life, he saw that as
his hitherto invincible habit of mind. He saw himself turning round to
call the captain. And now he was the captain. And Evanthia's enigmatic
gaze was perhaps the expression of her curiosity. She was above all
things in the world, stimulating. He found himself invigorated to an
extraordinary degree by his intimacy with that resourceful, courageous,
and lovable being, who would never speak of the future, waving it away
with a flick of her adorable hand and looking at him for an instant with
an intent, unfathomable stare. And as he started to climb the hillside,
setting the loose stones rolling in the gullies and rousing a dog to
give forth a series of deep ringing notes like a distant gong, he saw
that the initiative rested with himself. He would have to take a hand.
It would not do for him to imagine they could remain like this in almost
idyllic felicity. The ship would be unloaded in a week or so and nothing
would remain but to let the water into her after-hold and sink her,
according to the commandant's orders, in the fair way. But he could not
let himself sink back into a slothful obscurity. He had no interior
resources beyond his almost desperate passion for this girl who seemed
to accept him as an inevitable yet transient factor in her destiny, a
girl who conveyed to him in subtle nuances a chaotic impression of
sturdy fidelity and bizarre adventurousness. That was one of the secrets
of her personality--the maintenance of their relations upon a plane
above the filth and languor of the flesh, yet unsupported by the
conventional props of tradition and honour. For she had so just a
knowledge of the functions and possibilities of love in human life that
he could never presume upon the absence of those props. It amazed him
beyond his available powers of expression, that in giving him herself
she gave more than he had ever imagined. She had given him an enormously
expanded comprehension of character, an insight into the secrets of his
own heart. And it was, perhaps, this new knowledge of what he himself
might do, that was impelling him to "take a hand." When he reached the
gate set in the wall of the garden, he had decided to take a hand at
once. He had a plan.
And it would have been a valuable experience for him, advancing him some
distance in spiritual development, had he been able to see clearly and
understandingly into her alert and shrewdly logical mind when he told
her his plan. For she saw through it in a flash. It was romantic, it was
risky, it was for himself. It might easily be for her ultimate good, yet
she saw he was not thinking of that at all. And because he was romantic,
because he visualized their departure as a flight into a fresh paradise,
they two alone, she turned to him with one of her ineffably gracious
gestures and loved him perhaps more sincerely than ever before. It was
this romantic streak in the dull fabric of his personality which had
attracted her, even if she had not perceived the emotional repose that
same dullness afforded her. It was like being in a calm harbour at
anchor compared with that other adventure, which had been a voyage
through storms and whirlpools, a voyage that would inevitably end in
shipwreck and stranding for her anyhow.
"I could do it," he was saying. "They don't know about it, but that boat
is the fastest they've got in the harbour and, with luck, it would be
easy to get away."
"To where?" she whispered, looking out into the fragrant gloom of the
high-walled garden below them.
"Anywhere," he exclaimed. "Once outside, we'd be picked up. Or we could
go to Phyros, and get home from there."
"Home?"
"Yes, home. England. I want you to come with me, stay with me, for good.
I can't--I can't do without you. I've been thinking every day, every
night. There's nobody else now."
She shot a glance at him. He was leaning forward in his chair, his eyes
fixed on the floor thinking, in a warm tumult of desire, of the
adventure. He saw the boat bounding through the fresh green wave-tops
into the deeper blue of the Ægean, he steering, with his arm around her
form which would be enfolded in that same big coat, making a dash for
freedom.
And as she patted his arm gently, she knew he was not thinking of her
save as a protagonist in a romantic episode. For to ask her to go to
England was, from her point of view, the reverse of a dash for freedom.
In her clear, cold, limited mentality, equipped only with casual and
fragmentary tales told by the ignorant or the prejudiced products of
mid-European culture, England was the home of debased ideals and gloomy
prisons, of iron-hard creeds and a grasping cunning avarice. Her
mercenaries were devoted to the conquest and destruction of all that
made life beautiful and gay. Out of her cold wet fogs her legions came
to despoil the fair places of the earth. And his fidelity, his avowed
abandonment of the sentiments of the past, inspired her more with wonder
and delight than a reciprocal passion. For she was under no illusions as
to her own destiny. She, too, knew this would not last for ever. Her
quick mind took in all the fantastic possibilities of his plan, and she
perceived immediately the necessity of giving her consent. He must be
kept in this mood of exalted happiness. Intuitively she knew that she
herself fed on that mood, in which he rose superior to the normal level
of his days. And in spite of her dismay at the mere thought of going out
again upon the sea, leaving everything she understood and loved, leaving
a land of whose spirit and atmosphere she was a part, she asked him when
he wanted to go.
"Not yet," he replied, still gazing at the ground, and she looked at him
with amazement. She could hardly repress an exclamation at his
credulity. He actually believed she would go.
"And we will take all our money?" she suggested.
"Yes, of course," he agreed absently. It was part of his happiness to
put everything in her hands. There was for him a supremely sensuous
delight in the words, "It is all for you. Take it. Without you, it is of
no use to me." He was unable to imagine a more complete surrender, nor
could he believe that a woman would accept it save at the price of
integrity. Evanthia was like that. Money was never her preoccupation,
but she never forgot it. She had none of the futilities of
book-education filling her mind like dusty and useless furniture, so
that her consciousness of money was as clear and sharp as her
consciousness of food or pain. And a sudden perception of his faith in
her, his profound absorption in his own romantic illusions, struck her
to a puzzled silence, which he took for assent and sympathy. She looked
away from him and out across the sea. It was too easy.
"Evanthia," he whispered, and she turned her full, direct untroubled
gaze upon him with a swift and characteristic movement of the chin.
"I love you," he muttered and touched her arm with his lips in a gesture
of adoration. She looked at him with glowing amber eyes. Sometimes he
almost terrified her with the violence of his passionate abnegation. She
had never seen anything like it before. He became gloomy with love, she
noted; and her quick wit transfused the thought into a presentiment. She
would break the spell of his infatuation with a quick movement and lure
him back to earth with a smile. She laughed now as he touched her.
"Tell me," he said, "you wish to come to England with me?"
"Ah, yes!" she sighed sweetly, nestling against him. "You an' me, in
England."
"Some time next week I'll be ready," he said. "You must get plenty of
food for the boat. And the money. Bring that."
She sat leaning against him, his arms about her, but at these words she
stared past him into the darkness of the room thinking quickly. Next
week!
"I am getting the engineer to make me a silencer, the boat makes so much
noise," he explained.
"I understand," she murmured absently, slipping out of his arms. She
must send into the town, she thought. Amos must go.
"To-morrow," he went on, "I go to the Club in the Austrian Consulate.
Mr. Marsh asked me to go. I may be a little late. You won't mind?"
She turned upon him in the darkness where she was feeling for the lamp,
and gave him a blank stare. He never saw it; and if he had he would
never have been able to understand that at that moment she could have
killed him for his stupidity. He sat in silence wondering a little, and
then the emotion had passed and she gave her delicious throaty chuckle.
"Ah, no, _mein Lieber_. I do not mind."
"Why do you sometimes call me your _Lieber_?" he asked playfully. "Is it
a pet name?"
The lamp was alight and he saw her eyes smouldering as she raised them
from the flame she was adjusting.
"Yes, _Lieber_ means love," she said gravely.
"You are not sorry we did not go to Athens?" he asked, smiling.
"To Athens ..." her face for a moment was blank, so completely had she
forgotten the ruse she had employed in Saloniki. "... ah, I understand.
Athens? No!" She turned the lamp up and began to set the table for
supper.
This was the hour that appealed to him more than anything in their life.
To see her moving about in a loose cotton frock, her bare feet thrust
into Turkish slippers, to follow the line of her vigorous supple body
beneath the thin material, and the expert rapidity of her hands as she
prepared the simple meal of stew and young figs in syrup, red wine and
coffee with candied dates, was sheer ecstasy for him. He would sit in
the dusk of the window, sprawling in his chair, his head sunk on his
breast, breathing heavily as he devoured every motion with his eyes. It
never occurred to him to wonder what she was thinking about as she
worked with her eyes cast down towards the white table or turning
towards the door to call in musical plangent accents to the old woman in
the kitchen below. She was an object of love and for him had no
existence outside of his emotional necessities. He asked in lazy
contentment if she regretted Athens. Her eyes, declined upon the table,
were inscrutable as she reflected that the young Jew was even then in
the city finding out for her whether any officers had arrived from
Aidin. "We'll have a house like this, in England," he remarked, smiling.
"And you will forget all about Saloniki, eh?"
He would expect this, of course, she thought. It was the duty of a woman
selected by a romantic to forget everything in the world except himself.
She was thinking of Saloniki even as she smiled into his eyes and
nodded. And Saloniki was thinking of her. It was at this hour that Mrs.
Dainopoulos said to her husband:
"You are sure they reached port safe?"
Mr. Dainopoulos, who had heard, by his own intricate and clandestine
methods, of the unconventional arrival of his ship in Giaour Ismir, and
who was not bothering himself very much about either Evanthia or Mr.
Spokesly since both had served his turn, remarked:
"Yes, all safe."
"You know, Boris, I should never forgive myself if anything happened to
her. If he did not marry her as soon as they got on shore. I did it for
the best. Encouraged it, I mean. I do believe he was trustworthy."
"Don't you worry, Alice," he said gruffly. "You'll see that girl again.
What you like I get you? I done a beeg business to-day."
"What was that? How much?" she asked with assumed interest. She did not
want to know, but she knew he liked her to ask.
"Oh, the British give me the paper for a big cargo I got for 'em. You
count this, now: _Thirty--five--thousand--pound_. Eh? Ha--ha!" He leaned
forward and covered her hands with kisses murmuring: "My little wife! My
little wife! What shall I buy my little English wife, eh?"
And when Mr. Spokesly asked Evanthia if she would forget it all when she
got to England she stood by the table, stricken to a sudden and
mysterious immobility and regarded him with wide amber-coloured eyes.
Then she lifted a finger to her lips.
There was a noise below. The iron gate banged. Evanthia, her finger to
her lips, her eyes shining like stars, came to the window and leaned
over. "Art thou come back?" she called in Greek. And the voice of the
young Jew replied:
"Here I am, Madama. I am returned from the city."
"Any news of the Franks at Aidin?" she asked, smiling at Mr. Spokesly
where he sat in silent admiration.
"They are here, Madama. Three, one of them the man you described to me,
young and full of laughter."
"_Aiee!_ A good servant thou art. I will keep thee always." She turned
to her lover.
"Ah, yes!" she sighed. "A house like this in England. And I have forgot
Saloniki now. Supper is ready, _mein Lieber_."