ARTS OF PEACE.
The expedition had reached port, but this was all that could be
said. The quiet fore-court of the monastery was filled with kicking
mules, vociferating drivers, and curious sailors, while two or three
agitated monks bewailed the invasion with uplifted hands. The
strangers had brought women within the sacred gates, and were further
polluting the precincts with the presence of schismatics and of
weapons of war. The glory of Hagiamavra had departed, for the stain
could never be removed. Leaving Wylie to arrange measures of defence,
Maurice set himself to soothe the feelings of the distracted hosts. A
little diplomacy induced them to confess that the monastery had on one
former occasion in its history given shelter to the abhorred sex, in
the shape of a number of women and children from Skandalo seeking
refuge on account of the visit of a Roumi fleet, but then these
suppliants had asked no more than to crouch on the bare stones of the
courtyard. However, in answer to a tactful question or two, the
Hegoumenos, or Abbot, owned that the number of monks was now so much
reduced as to occupy only the innermost cells, those which clustered
round the church, in the narrowest part of the rift, thus leaving the
buildings near the gateway free for the accommodation of the visitors.
A promise from Maurice that the ladies would make no attempt to
penetrate farther than the fore-court contributed still more to smooth
matters, and the Hegoumenos volunteered to send a couple of lay
brethren to sweep out the rooms and to provide firewood.
Returning to the rest, Maurice found that Wylie had got one of the
guns unpacked and set up to protect the entrance, but was in doubt
whether to carry out the rest of his plan and mount the other upon the
gateway itself. The idea was opposed vehemently by Dr Terminoff, who
urged that since the monastery had so fortunately been reached without
the shedding of a drop of blood, there was every hope of coming to a
happy understanding with the insurgents, but that this would be
grievously imperilled by any show of distrust. At his earnest request
Maurice allowed the insurgent leader to go up to the gateway and
address the crowd outside, which he did with much effect. A marked and
somewhat awestruck silence succeeded the din which had hitherto
prevailed, and the various chiefs who were present requested Dr
Terminoff to convey their assurances of friendship to the English
visitors. As he descended from the gateway, the English visitors
seized upon him.
“What was that you told them about Roumi troops being on their way
here?” demanded Maurice.
“It is quite true. Five battalions are already embarked, we
understand, and others are on the point of departure.”
“But how have you heard it up here?” cried Wylie.
“Oh, I heard it at Skandalo. A messenger from Therma--one of the men
who work for Professor Panagiotis--came in this morning.”
“And why in the world didn’t you tell us at once?”
“Because I thought you would go away in your ship without landing if
I did,” was the ingenuous reply.
“Oh, look here!” cried Armitage indignantly, “this is a little too
much! We must get the ladies back to the yacht as soon as
possible--to-night, if they are not too tired.”
“Why?” asked Maurice. “You surely didn’t think the Roumis would not
send troops? We have known all along that we should probably have to
face them. You can do much more good by bringing up supplies,
Armitage, as we arranged.”
“But I can’t take my men away, and leave you and the ladies at the
mercy of these fellows outside. The Roumis couldn’t be worse.”
“These men are Christians--patriots,” said Dr Terminoff with
indignation. “In their holy war they welcome the aid of Prince
Theophanis and his friends. To-morrow, in full assembly, the
conditions of alliance will be settled, and the defence of the
peninsula will be entrusted to the illustrious Colonel Wylie. Our
patriots are brave as lions, but they know little of discipline, and
just now there was no time to enter into explanations. But having
heard the truth, they will freely allow the passage of the Milordo and
his men.”
“I’m not afraid of that!” cried Armitage, flushing angrily. “It is
that I don’t think the Prince and his family are safe.”
“Sir, you throw doubts on the patriots of Emathia?” Dr Terminoff was
bristling with rage, but Wylie interposed.
“He doesn’t know them as we do, and their behaviour this afternoon has
been calculated to prejudice a stranger rather unfavourably. Leave the
ladies to us, Armitage, and ransack the Mediterranean for supplies and
ammunition. Not rifles,--we have enough for the men who have
none,--but cartridges to fit our Mausers, in packages small enough to
be carried by one man. With anything like an adequate supply, we might
hold that country we passed through to-day for months. You had better
arrange for a further consignment to be sent out from England to meet
you at some safe place, but just now you must pick up what you can
get, and hurry back before the Roumis appear.”
“But they may be here to-morrow!” cried Armitage.
“Not they. Roumi troops are not kept ready for service at a moment’s
notice, and transports are not to be had for nothing. The five
battalions are probably in the first agonies of mobilising at this
moment, and the Jews of Czarigrad are chartering all the condemned
tramps they can hear of to carry them, so you will just have time to
make a foraging trip and get back. And by the bye, if the Princess
will let you make use of her letters of credit, bring us a good supply
of small change,--any currency will do. We don’t want to have to add a
mint to the other activities before us, and our New Model army will
require to be paid.”
Taken aback, alike by the nature of Wylie’s calculations and their
ultra-practical character, Armitage allowed himself to be dismissed
with his sailors after a hasty meal. They were mounted on the Skandalo
mules, and escorted in triumphal procession by the repentant
insurgents outside, who were now only anxious to embrace the men for
whose blood they had previously been thirsting. A code of signals had
been arranged, by means of which Armitage, on sighting a precipitous
headland not far from Skandalo, might know whether it was safe for the
yacht to approach the land, and where she was to disembark her stores.
The accommodation provided by the monastery was not luxurious, though
the steward of the yacht had done what he could to make the bare
cells, hollowed out in the rock and opening in front into wooden
galleries, habitable. He had been left at Hagiamavra to act as cook,
since the Greek retainer of Prince Romanos, who would not make himself
useful for any one but his master, was the only servant with the
party. Dr Terminoff chose out six members of his band, guaranteed to
be trustworthy, to serve as guards, and they camped round a fire in
the fore-court. At the head of the shallow steps leading to the lowest
gallery, from which all the others were approached, Wylie had built up
the cases of arms into a breastwork, on which he mounted the
machine-gun he had unpacked, not caring to leave it exposed to the
active curiosity of the guards in the court. Thus the position was as
safe as it was possible to make it, and the adventurers talked and
laughed round the inadequate brazier provided for their comfort, with
a determination not to let things flag which suggested inevitably a
certain amount of effort. Their reception at Hagiamavra had not been
quite what they expected, but they were resolved to make the best of
things.
With the morning came the necessity of meeting the insurgent chiefs in
full assembly, as Dr Terminoff had promised, and it was an assembly
that lasted for three days. Wylie excused himself after the first
morning, for the assembly appeared to be possessed of unlimited powers
of talk, and to be determined to exercise them. It seemed to be the
custom that every man should have the opportunity of addressing his
fellows if he desired it, and there were few sufficiently merciful or
retiring to waive the privilege. Hour after hour Maurice and Prince
Romanos sat side by side listening to the flow of like sentiments
delivered in different dialects and with varying gestures by the
highlanders from the mainland, the cosmopolitan refugees from Therma,
and the Greek fishermen and artisans from the coast districts. The
speeches all began in the same way, with a declaration of the
speaker’s theoretical preference for a republic on the American--Wylie
unkindly suggested the South American--model, but nearly all of them
came to the lame conclusion that in view of the dislike felt by some
of the Powers for republican institutions, and the benefits certain to
be conferred upon the cause by the adhesion to it of the Theophanis
family, it would be well to recognise their pretensions. The returning
delegates from Bashi Konak had now had time to make their influence
felt, and the imminent peril of a Roumi invasion in force inclined
Greek and Slav for once to lay aside their differences and agree to
postpone the actual choice of a Prince until the danger was over. In
the presence of the assembly, Maurice swore on the head of his little
son, and Prince Romanos on the sacred relics, brought with great pomp
and precaution from the monastery, to fight side by side as
brothers-in-arms, and submit their respective claims to the judgment
of the Emathian people when success should have brought peace. Upon
this the gathering resolved, only a few austere republicans
dissenting, to change its name from the Revolutionary to the
Constitutional Assembly, and an intimation of the fact, together with
the information that Emathia had determined to choose a ruler from
among the descendants of the Theophanis Emperors, was sent to
Professor Panagiotis for dissemination by the usual channels.
While Maurice was thus establishing his position by patient endurance
of dilatory declamation, Wylie was hard at work. At his request Dr
Terminoff picked out for him each day twenty men from among the most
intelligent and adaptable of the insurgents, and they accompanied him
in a survey of the coasts of the peninsula. They found that their new
leader (Glaukos, or Glafko, was the name they gave him among
themselves) had an eye for country as good as their own, and a
conception of military tactics which went far beyond their crude idea
of firing from ambush until their retreat was seriously threatened,
and then retiring with all speed to take up a new position to the
rear. The few precarious landing-places which broke the line of the
precipitous cliffs were noted, and the fishermen living near them
enrolled as scouts, while a ledge of rock here, and a sheltered hollow
there, were marked as the site of rough fortifications from which the
port might be defended. There was much interest as to Wylie’s plans
for defending the narrow isthmus which united the peninsula with the
mainland, and considerable disappointment, and even murmurs of
treachery, when he refused to requisition the services of the
inhabitants _en masse_ for the purpose of digging a ditch and erecting
a rampart across it. He took no notice of the grumbling, but when,
after much consultation among themselves, a deputation of his
followers inquired the reason for his inaction, he pointed out to them
that nothing better could be desired than that the Roumis should
attack Hagiamavra by land. The broken ground of the interior continued
as far as the isthmus, which was not traversed by any road, and an
army making its way painfully into the hills would be subject to
perpetual attacks from an active enemy well posted and knowing the
country. Since the insurgents were so much in love with digging, he
promised them plenty of it in making shelter-trenches, but if they
wanted to help in something really large and important, he could only
advise them to offer their services in making the strong earthwork
above Skandalo, which had been undertaken by Dr Terminoff partly in
response to the demands of the inhabitants, and partly to provide
relief employment for the refugees. In the face of ships’ guns it
would be untenable, and only draw destruction upon the place, but the
townspeople were loud in demanding protection, and a landing in boats
might be prevented by rifle-fire from its shelter.
While Wylie was regaining his own health in the hard open-air life,
and attaching to himself the men whom he destined as the nucleus of a
disciplined force, Zoe and Eirene had found work of their own. Time
threatened at first to hang heavy on their hands, for they were
forbidden to move about inside the monastery, or to go outside it
without an escort, which every one was too busy to supply. But on the
second morning, to Zoe’s astonishment, Eirene broke in upon her in her
impulsive way.
“Zoe, I want to do something for those poor wretched women--the people
from Therma. Maurice has arranged that those who can work shall be
fed, but some of them were ill, and there are the babies. I can’t bear
to think of them with no proper shelter.”
Zoe had been assuring herself that if she proposed doing anything for
the refugees, Eirene would throw cold water on the suggestion, and she
assented with surprise and some remorse. The guards, who were
grumbling at their enforced detention in the courtyard, remote alike
from the deliberations of the Assembly and from Wylie’s explorations,
were despatched to find mules, and welcomed the break in the monotony
of their lot. The reception at the refugee camp, after the toilsome
journey necessary to reach it, was not equally encouraging. The women
seemed to have only one idea of bettering their condition, and that
was by begging, and the most strenuous efforts, enforced by personal
example, were needed to induce them to set to work. Zoe, longing in
vain for her invaluable maid, Linton of the strong arm and caustic
tongue, felt herself shamed by Eirene, who seemed to find no work too
hard, no task too degrading. Only Eirene herself knew that she was
undertaking the care of these people as in some sort an expiation.
Their present plight was largely due to her; what if the punishment
should fall on the dearly loved boy for whose future she planned and
plotted night and day? If any humiliation or exertion of hers could
turn away the danger from him, it should not be wanting. Thus she and
Zoe toiled to induce the women to improve their temporary habitations,
and make at least an effort to keep them clean, and to separate the
fever-stricken from the rest, gathering them into a makeshift
hospital. Some people might think, said Zoe, after various trying
experiences with some of the more active elderly women who had been
chosen as nurses, that philanthropic work among Emathian refugees was
romantic; whereas workhouse nursing at home was instinct with romance
in comparison. The medical officer would naturally have been Dr
Terminoff, but he was already fully occupied with his duties as a
leader of revolt. However, since his liege ladies gave him no peace,
and he was anxious to impress upon his followers the necessity of
deference to Maurice and his family, he unearthed two medical students
who had run away from their studies at Bellaviste to join one of the
bands, and appointed them to hospital posts. Their consent was not
asked, and they proved, unfortunately, to be the only two men in the
peninsula who positively yearned for drill, so that they were
invariably missing whenever Wylie was working at the raw material of
his army.
Notwithstanding all the drawbacks, Armitage found a distinct
improvement in the condition of the insurgent forces when he returned
at the end of a fortnight. By dint of a lavish expenditure of money,
he had got together a good cargo of provisions, but no efforts seemed
effectual in securing satisfactory ammunition. At one port, where he
thought he had the promise of a large quantity of cartridges, it
proved necessary to get the cases on board in tremendous haste owing
to the suspicions of the harbour authorities and an alarm as to the
arrival of a British warship, and on being opened they turned out to
be largely filled with scrap-metal, while such cartridges as they did
contain were of all sorts and kinds. He brought good news, however, in
the positive assurance that, owing to the representations of the
Powers at Czarigrad, the projected despatch of Roumi troops had been
abandoned. The massacres at Therma had touched the conscience of
Europe--or perhaps, as Wylie said, the devastation of so important a
commercial centre had touched its pocket; in any case, the Roumis were
not to have a free hand in Hagiamavra. Such troops as Jalal-ud-din
Pasha already possessed in and around Therma he might employ against
the insurgents, but they were not to be swept out of existence by
overwhelming force.
The news produced a profound impression upon the insurgents, who came
by bands solemnly to congratulate Maurice, and thank him for his
efforts in their cause. Not until an indiscreet remark of Dr Terminoff
let the cat out of the bag did he and Armitage understand why he was
supposed to be responsible for the action of the Powers.
“You know, and I know,” said the Emathian, “that you had nothing to do
with the Czarigrad negotiations, since the Powers are not even aware
of your presence here, so well has Professor Panagiotis manipulated
the press. But it is very well for the people to believe that this
success is due to you.”
“I don’t want them to believe anything that isn’t true,” said Maurice.
“What are you hinting at?”
“The Professor has only allowed it to become known that the Assembly
has addressed a hearty request to any prince of the house of
Theophanis to place himself at their head, and achieve the deliverance
of Emathia,” was the reply. “This the reactionary Powers fear above
all things, and therefore they will not allow Roum to attempt to crush
the Emathians, lest Western sympathy should be roused and autonomy
demanded for them. The Powers will act in concert, wasting time and
effecting nothing, but prolonging the present state of affairs until
Scythia and Pannonia are ready for action. Then the wretched
troublesome country will be gladly handed over to them.”
“You mean that though the Roumis are forbidden to crush us, the Powers
will do it for them?” said Armitage.
Dr Terminoff nodded. “Yes, and that is why it is well for the Prince
that the people should believe the Powers are acting in his support.
Nilischeff and the anti-dynastic party are hiding their heads at
present, but if they knew that the Prince would be disowned by the
country of his birth, they would urge that his presence here was
merely a danger to the cause, and he ought to be given up.”
“Cheerful prospect for the immediate future!” said Maurice. “Wylie
would hardly let those fellows of his make the row they are doing if
he knew how mistaken their rejoicing was.”
With dramatic propriety Wylie appeared at the moment from the
direction of the extemporised drill-ground.
“More news!” he said. “One of my fishermen scouts brought it, and
thought fit to announce it to the whole army as well as to me. Last
night he spoke a Therma boat which told him that several
ironclads were leaving this morning for these waters, and by the
description it must be a division of the British Mediterranean Fleet.
My beauties down there are mad with joy, anticipating a triumphal
procession to Therma, and Jalal-ud-din’s head on a charger.”
“We must make them understand that the fleet is much more likely to
act against us than with us,” said Maurice.
“You cannot, sir,” said Dr Terminoff. “They would only ascribe your
denials to diplomacy. Many years of disappointment have not been able
to destroy their confidence in the goodwill of England, and they
believe that she has just given a superlative proof of it at
Czarigrad. Only the personal assurance of the British Admiral will
convince them.”
“Backed by a shell or two, I suppose?” said Maurice. “Well, Armitage,
it’s very clear that you must be off at once. It isn’t only that you
mustn’t be caught at Skandalo, but we don’t want to give them a chance
to recognise the yacht if they meet her again.”
“The ironclads will have to lie about a mile out,” said Armitage
reflectively. “We must hug the shore to the southward and slip round
them. There will just be time.”
“And when you come back,” said Maurice, “bring provisions, whatever
you have to leave behind. We find that the Skandalo people have been
turning an honest penny by shipping all their spare supplies to
Therma, where prices are enormous, of course, while we have been at
our wits’ end to feed our refugees. We shall have to establish an
embargo if it goes on, for it’s almost certain that news leaks out as
well; but it would be horribly difficult to enforce, and make a
fearful amount of ill-feeling.”
“Our recruits are not a success as police,” explained Wylie, as they
returned to the monastery. “They are most zealous in hunting
evil-doers, but then I have to hunt the police. Just wait till I get
my Sikhs, though!”
“I say, you know,” said Armitage, “you fellows have really done a lot
in this short time. You’ve got the beginnings of an army, and public
works, and a judicial system, and you’re contemplating tariff reform!”
“Until the British fleet comes and blows the peninsula out of the
water,” said Maurice. “Well, I never expected to fight against the
Union Jack, nor did you, Wylie, I’m sure,--but we mean to stick to
this job unless we’re turned out. To have got Greeks and Slavs to
drill shoulder to shoulder is a bigger thing than it looks.”