"Thank Heaven! the plan did not fail," said the chief officer, riding
by the side of the fugitive general.
"In no particular has it failed, Colonel," replied Scanderbeg. "And
for this every praise is due your wise precautions. I have never known
better work of brain or nerve. With such grand soldiers as you and
your men, I fear nothing for Albania. But your name, Colonel?"
"Moses Goleme," replied the officer courteously.
Scanderbeg reined his horse, and gave him his hand heartily. "A man as
grand as he is brave! And do I really look into the face of him whom I
was to have sought out in Dibria, that I might tell him his words had
been to me like a voice from heaven? Heaven reward you, good Moses!
But you must vow to stand by me yet as patiently as you have done
hitherto--during my apostasy. I shall need your charity still; for I
am but a returning prodigal; a half-Christian; a man of strange ways;
of a temper which I understand not myself, and which will disappoint
you. Pledge me that you will be my good angel. Counsel me frankly,
fearlessly, as a man should always counsel a man. Rebuke me freely:
but bear with me in your heart, as you would with a child."
"I may not advise the most capable general in the world," replied
Moses Goleme. "I vow to obey. Let that be my part. As I have already
imperilled my estates by open opposition to the Turkish rule, and
given my life to the liberty of my country, so I offer all to thee,
Sire, the sovereign of my heart, until you shall be acknowledged the
sovereign of Albania, and a new empire be founded on the east of the
Adriatic which shall take the place of the decaying powers of Italy on
the west."
"The task your patriotism proposes is vast," replied Scanderbeg; "too
vast for one man and one lifetime."
"Too great for any but the great Castriot!" was the answer, evidently
as honest as it was reverent. "But you do me too much honor, General,
in praising my plan of meeting you. I was ably seconded by my men, and
especially by two of them. One of them was wounded."
"I trust you speak not of a brave fellow who brought me the time and
place of the rendezvous: for I never saw such strength and daring in
my life."
"The same, I fear," said Moses. "A Servian, whom I had not known
before yesterday. But he was boiling over with rage for the slaughter
of his family, and commended to me by our most trusted scout."
"Did he tell you how he found me out, and communicated your plan to
me?"
"No, for he was too severely hurt to speak much."
"I will tell that part for him, then," said Scanderbeg. "It was in the
hottest of the fight. My own body-guard was thrown into confusion. A
fellow, clad like one of my own staff, crowded close to my side. His
horse actually rested against my own, and I would have severed his
head from his shoulders for his impudent valor, had not his oath at
his beast been 'by the beard of Moses!' Seeing that I observed it he
grunted, 'At the brook to the north!' as he dodged the circles of the
cimeters; and 'Near the Roman road!' he hissed as he pared the cap
from a Christian's head with his sword; and 'At the ninth hour
to-night!' he shouted as he parried a thrust. Before I had breathing
space--for I was closely beset at the time--he had gone; borne back by
a Spahi,[20] who envied him his place and emulated his valor. But he
was not skilful in using his weapon or managing his horse. I am
grieved, but not surprised, at his receiving hurt. I thought he must
have fallen. But who was the other?"
"Yonder old fellow with a huge green turban on the saddle before him.
If his brain were as big as his head-piece, he could not have planned
better. He has dwelt about here lately."
"I must thank him in person," said Scanderbeg, riding back toward him.
"What!" he exclaimed as the full daylight fell upon the man's
features, "Kabilovitsch?"
The old man diverted Scanderbeg's compliments by an expression of
solicitude for Milosch, whom he had permitted to undertake the
desperate venture already narrated, although until a few days before
he, being a Servian, had no knowledge of the project of the Albanians.
"We must haste, Sire," said Moses. "It is advised that you cross to
the north of the pass in the Balkans, and take thence the valley way
between Caratova and the Egrisu. A message from General Hunyades
informs me that relays can be provided along the road, and that every
facility shall be given us."
"Kabilovitsch will accompany us?" asked Scanderbeg.
"On one condition, Sire," replied the old man. "My little daughter
must go with me: a lass of ten spring tides--"
"Impossible! for our ride must be night and day."
"Then I may follow, but cannot accompany you," said Kabilovitsch.
"I need such men as you with me. No true Albanian will delay for a
child. Country must be child and mother to us all," said the general.
The cheeks of Kabilovitsch whitened; his eyes flashed. Looking
Scanderbeg squarely in the face, he said quietly, but putting
intention into every word,
"George Castriot may lead, but may not rebuke the patriots who have
watched for Albania with sacrifices he knows not of, while he has been
among our country's enemies. An old man, thy father's friend before
thou wast born, may say that, Sire."
Scanderbeg grew pale in turn. He had been unaccustomed to brook
insubordination, however righteous. Who had dared to question him? Who
to fling the taunt into his face? The hot words were upon his lips.
But he paused, at first from the mere habit of self-restraint. Then,
because he was a wise man, and realized that he was no longer the
tyrant, with power of life and death over his soldiers--men who had
been hired, stolen, impressed into the service, and transformed into
mere machinery of flesh and blood--but was to be the public liberator
of a people every man of whom was already as free as he. Then, he had
become a just man. Strange and sanguinary as had been the events
accompanying his desertion of the Turks, he had taken this step only
after a deep moral struggle. He had revolted from his own past life;
and felt an inward disgrace for what had been his outward glory--the
service of the Moslem; he despised himself more than any other person
could. It was this sense of the justice of Kabilovitsch's rebuke that
checked the rage which had blanched his face, and sent the flush to
his temples, as he slowly, replied, "I bow to the merited chastisement
of your words. Your years and your better life give you license to
utter them. My future shall atone for the past. But cannot your child
be left safely where she is?"
"She is safe where she is; but I may not leave her without providing
for her future. Milosch is lying in a cottage but a little before us.
If his wounds are not fatal--as I believe they are not, though the
leech thought otherwise--I may bring the girl to him, and still
overtake you before you come in sight of the Black Mountains. I can
cross this country by paths through which I could not direct you.
During many years, for justice's sake and our country's, I have
wandered over these mountains where only the eagle's shadow has
fallen."
"I will stop with you at the cottage," said Scanderbeg, "for, though
the moments are precious, I would bless the brave fellow for his work
yesterday."
There were several wounded Christian soldiers at the little hovel. A
Greek monk was administering both spiritual and physical comfort; for
Rilo Monastir had sent its inmates along the track of the Christian
army in spite of the insults of the Latin soldiers, who, though in
sight of the common enemy of their faith, could not repress the
meanness of their sectarian jealousy and hatred. Milosch was doing
well. His wounds were, one in the fleshy part of the shoulder, the
other a contusion on the head, from a blow which had stunned him. A
few weeks would put him again upon his feet, though perhaps his
fighting days were over; for the flesh wound lay across an important
muscle, and would permanently destroy the strength of the right arm.
Milosch fell in with the proposition of Kabilovitsch regarding
Morsinia. Though a Servian, he had lost interest in his own country
because of the vacillating course of the Despot, George Brankovitch,
who was half Christian and half Moslem, according to the policy of the
moment. Milosch would identify himself with the cause of Albania, for
which he had already done and suffered so much.
The two men entered into what is known among the Servians and
Albanians as "Brotherhood in God," covenanting in the name of God and
St. John to devote their lives, each to the other, and both to their
common cause. The compact was sealed by each putting the left hand
upon the other's heart, and holding up the right hand in invocation of
the Divine witness. Kabilovitsch said:
"My brother, I commit to thy keeping our daughter, Morsinia, thine and
mine, from henceforth. She is all I have but life to share with thee,
which also I freely give."
To this Milosch replied:
"My brother, I commit to thy keeping our boy, Constantine, thine and
mine from henceforth. He is all I have that I wot of to share with
thee, but my life which--God spare it--I freely give."
"Bismallah!"[21] said Scanderbeg. "And if the girl and the boy were
the ones I saw asleep in each other's arms by the fire the other
night, the compact is good for two generations at least."
It was agreed that, upon his sufficient recovery, Milosch should bring
the children from the camp of Hunyades to Albania.
The ride by the Vitosh and Rilo Mountains where the mighty ranges of
the Balkans, the Upper Moesian, and the Rhodope are thrown close
together, was sufficiently grand to engross the eye and mind of the
dashing riders. Thus most of the day was passed in silence, broken
only by the clatter of the horses' hoofs against the rocks; the roar
of cascades making their awful plunge hundreds of feet from the
precipices; the complaint of rivers far down at the bottom of ravines,
fretting beneath the prison roof of ice and snow; and glorious pines,
pluming the brow of crag and ledge, through which the everlasting
winds breathed the dirge over fallen empires of men.
As they forced their way up a long and tedious ascent, Scanderbeg
joined Kabilovitsch and said:
"To relieve the tedium of this slow part of the journey you must tell
me about that lass you would not leave for the love of Albania. A
sweet face as I saw it. I could have run off with it myself, had I not
other business on hand. And I can pardon a father's heart for
clinging very closely to such a child. You will forget my rude speech
a while ago. I played with a little lass like that when I was a boy.
The face of your child, that night I watched for you, carried me back
to those happy days. I could see my little sweet-heart in her; though
thirty years have thrown their shadows of dark events across my
memory."
Kabilovitsch turned familiarly to Scanderbeg with the query,
"May I read your thoughts, Sire?"
"Yes, he is welcome to do so who can find my soul beneath this
battered face."
"That child was the fair Mara, the daughter of the noble George
Cernoviche, whose castle ruins lie now by the shore of Ochrida. Am I
not right?"
"Right! but I knew not of the fall of her father's house. Can you tell
me aught of the history of my little maiden. If she lives, she must be
a goodly matron now."
"Yes, I can tell her story and more. She married the noble Musache de
Streeses, whose castle once stood near the Skadar."[22]
"Ah! I have heard of his sad fate," replied the general. "Oh, for
vengeance on these villains who have despoiled the land! Musache de
Streeses was the richest of all the land-owners on the coast of Adria,
the soul of honor, a genuine patriot, with whom my father held
confidential intercourse. His purse and sword were freely offered for
service against the Turk. It was a favorite scheme of my father to
some day unite our families. I hear that my nephew, Amesa, has become
possessed of those estates, being also nephew to De Streeses, who was
slain by the Turks. But my fairy, Mara, you said was married to De
Streeses. It was she, then, who, with her infant child, was killed by
the Turks during the raid?"
"Noble Castriot! De Streeses and the Lady Mara were murdered, foully,
treacherously," said the old man, reining his horse, and speaking with
terrible passion.
"Oh, to take vengeance!" exclaimed Scanderbeg. "By the fair face of
Mara! this, with the thousand other murders of these years, shall be
washed out, if my sword drains a myriad veins of Turkish blood to make
sure of his who struck so brutal a blow!"
"Your sword need not search so wide as that," said Kabilovitsch. "The
family of De Streeses were murdered by hands we both know but too
well."
"How know you, Kabilovitsch?"
The man removed his cap as if inviting the inspection of his face,
and, lowering his voice, replied,
"I am not Kabilovitsch, I am Arnaud."
"Arnaud, the forester of De Streeses? Arnaud, whose shoulders I
bestrode before I ever mounted a steed?" exclaimed Scanderbeg, turning
his horse and stopping, but at his companion's motion indicating
caution, lowering his tone, and moving close beside him.
"The same, Sire. And the Turks who murdered the nobleman and his
beautiful wife were not such Turks as you have been accustomed to
command. Too white of skin and too black of heart were they. I would
not say this, but that I give you also my reasons for so grave an
accusation. Turks in raiding do not discriminate in their
depredations; but these harmed not a leaf beyond the castle of De
Streeses. Nor do Turks swear by St. John, as I heard one of them do as
he cursed a fellow villain for some slip in the plan. Nor again would
Turks, seeking only for plunder, have shown as much eagerness to kill
the little babe as they did to slay its father; and this they did,
searching even among the ashes for evidence that the tiny bones had
been sufficiently charred to prevent their recognition. But the child
was not in the castle at the time. My good wife was suckling it--the
Lady Mara being of delicate condition--and that night the babe was at
the lodge. As soon as the commotion was heard at the castle the child
was hidden in the copse."
"But where is this child now?" asked Scanderbeg eagerly.
"You have gazed upon her by my camp-fire, sire; and your soul saw in
her face that of the sainted Mara, though your eyes detected her not."
"And you know the perpetrator of this damnable deed?" asked
Scanderbeg.
"I may not say I know, since your noble father refused to believe that
any other than Turkish hands did it. But he who possesses the estate
now knows too much of this affair to thank God in his prayers for his
inheritance. I saved the child; yet Lord Amesa has sworn that once a
Turk who fell beneath his sword in a private brawl confessed to him
that his hands had strangled the infant on the night of the raid. Some
one interested had suspicion of where the truth lay, for my own cot
was raided, and my wife slain one night during my absence. But the
child was safe elsewhere. Since then, knowing that her life was secure
only through her being secreted, I have been a wanderer. A price was
secretly set upon my head by Amesa. In the mountains of Macedonia, in
the pass of the Balkans, have I kept watch over my sacred charge. I
want not to see Albania, but as I can see justice done in Albania.
Therefore I said I would go only if the lass might go with me, and
under the strong protection of a Castriot who knows the truth, whose
very soul recognized the child of Mara."
"The child's life shall be as sacred to me as if Mara had become my
wife as she vowed in her play, and the child were my own," said
Scanderbeg. "But this perplexes our cause. Amesa is one of our
bravest, wiliest voivodes. To antagonize him with this old charge
would imperil my reception with the people and the liberty of our
land. But I pledge you, my good Arnaud, that though vengeance waits,
it shall not sleep. In the time when it shall be most severe upon the
offender, and most honorable to the name of Albanian justice, the bolt
shall fall."
It was readily foreseen by both that only at the peril of her life
could Morsinia be allowed to accompany her foster father, Arnaud or
Kabilovitsch, to the camp of Castriot. The former forester would be
recognized and suspicion at once excited as to the person of his ward.
It was, therefore, determined that she should be domiciled safely in a
little hamlet on the borders of Albania, where her history was
unknown; and that, to elude suspicion, Milosch and the boy,
Constantine, should accompany her, as her father and brother, neither
of whom knew her true history. The "Brotherhood in God" between
Kabilovitsch and his old neighbor gave sufficient warrant for
Milosch's claim to paternity.
FOOTNOTES:
[20] Spahi: master of cavalry.
[21] Bismallah; "Please God," a Turkish common exclamation.
[22] Lake Scutari.