Greeks, fully a hundred strong, came up. They were evidently in an ill
temper, and replied sulkily to the questions of the guard of the
prisoners. Horace gathered from their answers that they had fired a
volley upon the boats as they approached; then, seeing they came on
without a pause, had at once run from the village and scattered,
reuniting some miles on.

“We lost everything we had taken,” one of the men said. “We had it all
packed and ready to carry away, when those confounded sailors came.
Some of us did start with our bundles, but they came so fast up to us
that we had to throw everything away, and even then we had a lot of
difficulty in keeping away from them. I expect they caught some. It
was lucky we started off when we did; if we had waited till they
landed very few would have got away.”

“Didn’t they shoot?” one of the guards asked.

“No, they never fired a shot. I don’t know whether they came ashore
without powder, but from first to last they never fired.”

“They knew we had these two in our hands,” the guards said, “and they
were afraid if they killed any of us we should take it out of our
prisoners, and I think they were about right. Ah! here comes Rhangos.
He had to take to a farmhouse before he had gone half a mile, and I
suppose if any of them looked in they would have seen him feeding pigs
or something of that sort, with his finery and arms hidden away.”

The klepht had now come up to the fire. He was a spare man, some fifty
years old, with a keen hungry face.

“Are all here?” he asked briefly.

“We are six short of our number,” a man, who by his dress had
evidently the rank of an officer among them, replied.

“Killed?”

“No, there was no firing; I expect those sailors ran them down.”

“Then we must march in half-an-hour, they will make them lead them
here. Now, then, who are you?” he asked the doctor as the elder of the
prisoners.

“My friend does not speak Greek,” Horace replied. “As you must be well
aware we are officers of that schooner that was lying off the village.
This is the doctor, I am third lieutenant. We are friends of Greece,
we have been in action against the Turkish ships of war, we have saved
great numbers of Greek fugitives from the Turks, now this is the
treatment that we receive at the hands of the Greeks.”

Horace’s reticence as to the fact that he was the son of the owner of
the schooner was the result of a conversation with the doctor.

“These scoundrels have no doubt carried us off either for the purpose
of getting a ransom for us or of handing us over to the Turks as an
acceptable present. I expect the idea of ransom is at the bottom of
it. We have heard of this fellow Rhangos before. He is a noted klepht,
and more Albanian than Greek. Whatever you do, Horace, don’t you let
out you are the owner’s son. If you do there is no saying how much
ransom they might ask for you. They think that an Englishman who fits
out a ship at his own expense to come out here must be rolling in
money. As long as they think that they have only got hold of a doctor
and a third lieutenant they cannot ask a high price for them, but for
an owner’s son there is no saying what figure they might put him at.
Have you got a second name?”

“Yes, I am Horace Hendon Beveridge. Hendon was my mother’s name.”

“That is lucky; you can give them Horace Hendon. It is likely they may
know your father’s name, for the _Misericordia_ and her doings have
been a good deal talked about. I am not in favour of anyone telling a
lie, Horace, but as it is no lie to give your two first names without
giving your third, I cannot see that there is harm in it.”

“The ship belongs to the Lord Beveridge?” Rhangos asked next.

“Yes, that is his name,” Horace replied.

“What is your name and that of your companion?”

Horace gave his two Christian names and the name of his companion.

“Have you paper?” the klepht said.

“I have a note-book in my pocket.”

“That will do. Now write in Greek: My Lord Beveridge, This is to give
you notice that--now write the two names--‘Donald Macfarlane and
Horace Hendon,’” Horace repeated as he wrote them, “surgeon and third
lieutenant of your ship, are captives in my hands, and that unless
three hundred pounds in gold are paid to me as ransom for them they
will be put to death. If there is any attempt to rescue the prisoners
they will at once be shot. The messenger will arrange with you how and
where the ransom is to be paid.”

The klepht added his own name in scrawling characters at the bottom of
the note, then called one of the men and gave him instructions as to
where and how the ransom was to be paid, and then sent him off. As
soon as the band had satisfied their hunger the march among the
mountains was continued for another two hours. Then they threw
themselves down by the side of a stream in a valley surrounded on all
sides with craggy hills, and two men with muskets were placed as
sentries over the prisoners.

“Well, this is not so bad,” Horace said. “It is certainly very lucky
you gave me that hint about my name. Three hundred is not very much to
pay to get out of such a scrape as this. I suppose there is no fear
about their giving us up when they get the money.”

“I think not,” the doctor replied. “They would never get ransoms if
they did not keep their word. I only hope that no one may let out
before the messenger who you are. If they do, there will be a very
serious rise in prices.”

“Fortunately none of them speak Greek but my father, and probably he
would read the note before he would ask any questions.”

“Maybe yes, and maybe no,” the doctor said. “He is as like as not to
say when he sees a messenger, ’Is my son alive and well?’ and then the
cat would be out of the bag. Still, your father is a prudent man, and
may keep a still tongue in his head, especially when he sees that the
note is in your own handwriting. However, we will hope for the best.”

Morning had dawned some time before there was any movement among the
band. Then their fires were lighted and breakfast cooked.

“Will the English lord pay the ransom for you, do you think?” Rhangos
asked, sauntering up to Horace.

Horace shrugged his shoulders.

“It is a large sum to pay for two officers,” he said.

“He is rich, it is nothing to him.”

“He is well off, no doubt,” Horace said; “but it is not everyone who
is well off who is disposed to part with money for other people.”

“Well, it will be bad for you if he doesn’t pay,” the klepht said
significantly.

Three hours later the messenger was seen coming up the valley. Horace
looked at him anxiously as he approached, and was pleased to see that,
as he spoke to Rhangos, there was no expression of surprise or
exultation in the latter’s face. He nodded when the other had
finished, and then went to the fire where two or three of his
lieutenants were sitting, saying briefly to Horace as he passed him,
“He will pay.” Horace could hear what he said to the others.

“Demetri says the Englishman did not like paying the money. There was
a good deal of talk between him and his officers before he came back
to him and said, that though the demand was extortionate he would pay
it. He said he should complain to the central government, and should
expect them to refund it and settle with you.” There was a general
laugh among his hearers.

“I ought to have asked more,” the klepht went on; “but I don’t know
these English. Of course if any of you were taken, my dear friends, I
would give all I have to ransom you.” The assertion was received with
mocking laughter, as he went on calmly: “But you see other people are
not animated by the same generous feeling as we Greeks, and I don’t
suppose this milord sets any particular value on the lad, or on that
long-shanked doctor. He can hire more of them, and I expect he only
agreed to pay the money because his other officers insisted on it.
They are rolling in wealth these English, but they are mean; if not,
how is it that our pockets are not filled with English gold when we
are fighting for a sacred cause?”

His hearers were highly tickled by this sentiment.

“When are they to be delivered up, Rhangos?”

“At mid-day to-morrow at Pales, the village halfway between the foot
of the hills and the sea. Four men are to take them down to within a
quarter of a mile of the village; then Demetri will go in and get the
gold; then when he returns with it to the others the prisoners will be
freed.”

“I should have thought the matter might have been arranged to-day,”
one of the men said.

“So it might have been,” the klepht replied; “but I could not tell
that. I thought that Demetri would not be able to go off to the ship
this morning. He had six hours’ walking, and would not be there until
two hours past midnight; then he would have to rest for an hour or two
after he had seen them, and then six hours to walk back. It would have
been too late to deliver them up before dark, and I should never think
of sending them in the dark--their guards might fall into an ambush.
As it was, Demetri found them in the village. They had not returned,
as I thought they would do, on board their ship. He walked in,
thinking the place was empty, when two of those sailors jumped out on
him with cutlasses. Thinking that they were going to cut his throat he
showed them the letter. They led him to the principal house in the
village, and one went in while another held him fast outside. He heard
a great talking and excitement in the house, and presently he was
taken in. Then, as I told you, there was a great talk, and at last
they agreed to pay the ransom. As soon as he got his answer he started
on his way back, lay down for an hour or two in an empty cottage, and
then came on here. We will stay where we are until to-morrow morning;
then, Kornalis, you shall start with four men, and Demetri and the
captives, and we will go on our way. We will deal another blow to
Vriones, and then we will be off. We will fix on some place where you
can join us after you have got the ransom.”

“It could not have happened better for us,” Horace said to his
companion after he had translated the klepht’s story. “As it turned
out, you see, my father got the note before he could say a word to the
messenger. That was a capital move their pretending to hesitate about
paying the ransom. If they had jumped at it this scoundrel is
perfectly capable of raising his terms. As it is, he thinks he was
clever enough to hit upon just the maximum sum that could be got for
us. Well, it is all right now.”

“It will be all right when we are among the others, Horace; there is
never any saying what may happen in this country. Some of the peasants
these fellows have been robbing may fall on us, seeing we are but a
small party. This Vriones with his bandits, who I daresay are just as
bad as these fellows, may happen to meet us. No, we won’t calculate
too confidently. Things have gone on very well so far. We will just
hope they will go on to the end.”

Now that the affair was considered to be settled, but little attention
was paid to the prisoners. Their cords were taken off, and they were
permitted to move about, two men keeping an eye upon them, but not
following them closely. They congratulated themselves that the sailors
had withheld their fire, for undoubtedly their position would have
been very different had some of the brigands been killed. So far from
bearing any animosity now, the men chatted with them in a friendly
manner, asked questions about their ship, and their encounters with
the Turks.

“We would rather fight for the Greeks than the Turks,” one said: “but
we follow our captains. There is neither pay nor plunder to be
obtained with the Greeks; and as Odysseus and all the other chiefs
play their own game, and think only of making money, why should poor
devils like us be particular? All Albanian tribes have had their wars
against each other as long as we or our fathers can remember. We know
nothing about the Greece that they talk so much of now. There were the
Morea and other provinces, and so there have always been so far as we
know, and it is nothing to us whether they are ruled by Turks or by
their own captains. As to religion, many of our tribes are Mussulmans,
many are Christians. We do not see that it makes any difference.

“Everyone plunders when he gets a chance. Why should I want to cut a
man’s throat because he is a Mussulman? His father was a Christian
before him; my son may be a Mussulman after me. What does it matter?
Since the fight at Petta many chiefs have gone over to the Turks, and
if the Greeks win a battle most of them will go back again. The affair
is nothing to us. On the mountains we hunt where we are most likely to
get game. You like to hunt for amusement, and so you have come out
here on a matter which does not at all concern you. We hunt to live,
and don’t much care whether we take a sheep out of one flock or
another.”

Horace smiled at the man’s avowal of the want of any principle
whatever.

“I was a schoolmaster,” one of the lieutenants of the band, who was
stretched at full length smoking and listening to the conversation,
remarked. “I know about the old time, but I don’t know anything of
this Greece you speak of. Where was it? What did it do? It was just
then as it is now. There were a number of little tribes under their
own captains. Athens, and Corinth, and Sparta, and Argos, and Thebes,
and the rest of them always fighting against each other just as our
Albanian clans do; not even ready to put aside their own quarrels to
fight against an invader. Pooh! There never was a Greece, and I
neither know nor care whether there ever will be. Why should we throw
away our lives for a dream?”

“Yes; but at any rate the Greeks have a common language, which shows
they are one people.”

“Families fall out more than strangers,” the man replied with a laugh.
“You English and the Americans have a common language, and yet you
have been fighting against each other, and they refuse to remain one
nation with you. These things signify no more than the smoke of my
pipe. A Christian’s money, and a Christian’s goods and cattle, are
worth just as much to me as a Turk’s; and my captain, who pays me, is
more to me than either Mavrocordatos or the Sultan. I daresay that
English milord is a worthy man, though he must be a fool, and yet the
wine I shall buy out of my share of his money will be just as good as
if it had grown in my father’s vineyard.”

Horace laughed. He was not skilled in argument, even had he any
inclination to indulge in it at the present time; and he sauntered off
and sat down by the doctor, who, not being able to talk with the
Greeks, found the time hang heavy on hand. Horace repeated to him his
conversation with the two brigands.

“I own I did not know how to answer the last fellow, doctor.”

“There is no answer to be made, Horace. To argue, men must have a
common ground to start from. There is no common ground between you and
him. His argument is the argument of the materialist everywhere,
whether he is Briton, Frenchman, or Greek. To a man who has neither
religion nor principles there remains only self-interest, and from
that point of view there is no gainsaying the arguments of that
Albanian scamp any more than it would have been of use for a lowland
merchant carried off by Highland caterans to urge upon them that their
conduct was contrary to the laws both of morality and political
economy. They would have said that they knew nothing about either, and
cared less, and that unless his goodwife or fellow citizens put their
hands in their pockets and sent the ransom they demanded, his head
would be despatched to them in a hamper with small delay. He certainly
had you on the hip with what he said about ancient Greece, for a more
quarrelsome, cantankerous, waspish set of little communities the world
never saw, unless it were the cities of Italy in the middle ages,
which at any rate were of a respectable size, which was, by the way,
the only respectable thing about them. Religion and principle and
patriotism are the three things that keep men and nations straight,
and neither the Greek nor Italian communities had the least glimmering
of an idea of either of them, except a love for their own petty states
may be called patriotism.”

“A good deal like your Highland clansmen, I should say, doctor,”
Horace laughed. “The head of the clan was a much greater man in the
eyes of his followers than the King of Scotland.”

“That is so, Horace; and the consequence was, that while there was
peace and order and prosperity in the lowlands, the Highlands scarcely
made a step forward until the clans were pretty well broken up after
Culloden. It was a sore business at the time, but no one can doubt
that it did good in the long run. And now, lad, I think that I will
just take a sleep. It was not many hours we got of it last night, and
you see most of these fellows have set us an example.”

The next morning they started at daybreak. The main body of the band
had moved off hours before, leaving the Lieutenant Kornalis, Demetri,
and four of the men. Three hours’ walking took them out of the
mountains. There was little talking. The Greeks would have preferred
going with their leader to plunder another village, for although the
booty taken was supposed to be all handed over to the chief for fair
distribution, there were few who did not conceal some trinket or money
as their own special share of the plunder. They were but a mile or
two beyond the hills, when, from a wood skirting the road, four or
five shots rang out.

Two of the Greeks fell; the rest, throwing away their guns, fled at
the top of their speed. Before the prisoners had time to recover from
their surprise a number of men rushed out, and with the butts of their
muskets and pistols struck them to the ground. When they recovered
their senses a group of men were standing round them, while at some
little distance they could hear the sound of firing, showing that the
pursuit of their late captors was being closely maintained. By this
time they had become sufficiently accustomed to the various costumes
to know that they had now fallen into the hands of men of one of the
Albanian tribes, probably Mussulmans acting as irregulars with the
Turkish army, engaged upon a raiding expedition. One of them asked
Horace a question, but the dialect was so different to that of the
Greeks of Athens and the Morea that he was unable to understand it.
Presently the men who had gone in pursuit returned, and the whole
party set off to the north, placing their prisoners in their midst,
and warning them by pointing significantly to their knives and pistols
that they had better keep up with them.

“Eh! man,” the doctor said; “but it is dreadful. Just as we thought
that everything was settled, and that in another couple of hours we
should be with our own people, here we are in the hands of a pack of
villains even worse than the others.”

“You said that we should not shout until we were out of the wood,
doctor, and you have turned out a true prophet; but at present I am
thinking more of my head than of anything else, I am sure I have got a
couple of lumps on it as big as eggs.”

“It shows the folly of man,” the doctor said philosophically. “What
good could they expect to get from knocking us down? We were neither
fighting nor running away. We had not our wits about us, lad, or we
should have just taken to our heels.”

“I expect they would have caught us if we had. We have neither of us
had much walking lately, and those fellows are always climbing among
their mountains. Do you think it is of any use trying to make them
understand that if they will take us a few miles farther they will
find three hundred pounds waiting for them?”

“You might try, Horace; but I don’t think that it will be of any use.
I expect they are just skirting along at the foot of the hills to see
what they can pick up. There are not above thirty of them, and they
would not like to go far out upon the plains; besides, I don’t know
that it would turn out well. If they were to go on in a body, Martyn
would as likely as not fire at them, and then they would think that we
had led them into an ambush, and shoot us without waiting to ask any
question. Still, you can try if you like; we might be sorry afterwards
if we didn’t.”

But when Horace tried to speak to the men he was threatened roughly,
and he lapsed into silence. For three hours they ascended a great
range of hills running east and west. When they gained the crest they
could see stretched away far in front of them a flat and fertile
country.

“The plains of Thessaly,” the doctor said; “the fairest and richest
portion of the Greece of old. There is little chance of its forming
part of the Greece of the future, at least not until a complete
overthrow of the Turkish Empire. If Greece attains her independence
the frontier line will be somewhere along the crest of these hills,
for Thessaly, although there was some slight trouble there at first,
has not joined the movement. There are no mountains and fortresses
where they can take refuge, and a troop of Turkish cavalry could scour
the whole country. There is where we are bound for, I expect;” and he
pointed to a large clump of white tents far out on the plain. “I
expect that is the camp of the Pasha of the province. I suppose he is
going to operate on this side when the main force advances to the
west.”

It took them another four hours’ walking before they approached the
camp. When within a short distance of it their captors turned off and
entered a village where numbers of their countrymen were sitting in
the shade smoking or dozing. The band went on until they reached the
principal house in the village, and four of them entering took their
prisoners into a room where a tall old chief was sitting on a divan.
They talked for some minutes, evidently explaining the circumstances
of their capture. When they had done, the chief asked the prisoners in
Greek who they were.

“We are Englishmen,” Horace replied; “we belong to a ship lying off a
village whose name I don’t know. We had landed to buy fruit and
vegetables, and then we were suddenly seized and carried away to the
mountains by some Greek brigands led by a fellow named Rhangos. We had
arranged for a ransom and were on our way under a guard to the village
where the money was to be paid when your band put the Greeks to flight
and made us prisoners.”

“How much ransom was to be paid?” the Albanian asked.

“Three hundred pounds, and if you will send us there now our friends
will be glad to pay it to your people. I tried to explain that to them
on the way, but they would not listen to me.”

“They are fools,” the chief said decidedly; “and besides, they don’t
speak Greek. It is too late now. I must take you to the Pasha, who
will deal with you as he chooses.” Then rising, and followed by a
group of his officers and the prisoners in charge of four men, he
walked across to the Turkish camp.

“They are a picturesque-looking set of cut-throats,” Macfarlane said.

“That they are. People at home would stare to see them with their
white kilted petticoats and gaudy sashes, with their pistols inlaid
with silver, and their embroidered jackets and white shirt sleeves.
Well, what are we to say if we are asked about the ship?”

“We must tell the truth, lad; I doubt not they have had news before
now that the schooner is cruising about on the coast; and even if we
were disposed to tell a lie, which we are not, they would guess where
we had come from. No English merchantman would be likely to be
anchored off the coast here to buy vegetables; and, indeed, there are
very few British vessels of any sort in these waters now. You need not
just tell them that the schooner is the craft that has been playing
the mischief over on the other coast and robbed them of their Chiot
slaves; nor is it precisely necessary to enter into that affair near
Cyprus. We need simply say, if we are asked, that we are Englishmen in
the naval service of Greece; I don’t expect they will ask many
questions after that, or that we shall have any occasion to do much
more talking.”

“You think they will hang us, doctor.”

“It may be hanging, Horace, or it may be shooting, and for my part I
am not very particular which it is. Shooting is the quickest, but then
hanging is more what I may call my family way of dying. I should say
that as many as a score of my ancestors were one way or another strung
up by the Stuarts on one miserable pretence or other, such as
cattle-lifting, settling a grudge without bothering the law-courts,
and trifles of that sort.”

Horace burst into a fit of laughter, which caused the Albanian chief
to look round sharply and inquiringly.

“It is all right, old chap,” Macfarlane muttered in English; “we are
just laughing while we can, and there is no contempt of court
intended.”

The Pasha was in a tent considerably larger than those that surrounded
it. The Albanian went in, leaving the prisoners in charge of their
guard. In five minutes he came out and signed to them to follow him
in. The Pasha was an elderly man with a snow-white beard. He looked at
the prisoners with some interest.

“I hear that you are Englishmen,” he said in Greek.

“That is so, sir.”

“And that you are in the Greek service.”

“We were in the Greek service, but after being carried off by Greek
brigands I do not know that we shall have any inclination to remain in
it.”

“If you had been taken fighting against us I should have ordered you
to be shot,” the Pasha said; “but as it is I do not know. Do you
belong to that schooner with white sails that has been cruising off
the coast some days?”

“We do,” Horace admitted.

“I am told,” the Pasha went on, “that she is the ship that did us much
harm at Chios.”

“We were attacked, and we beat off the boats,” Horace said. “That is
fair warfare. Our principal object has been to rescue people in danger
or distress, whether Christian or Turk. We rescued numbers of Chiot
slaves. And on the other hand we saved numbers of Turks at the
surrender of the Acropolis at Athens, and conveyed them safely to
Tenedos, where we landed them; and the governor there recognized our
service to his countrymen, and came off to the ship and invited us on
shore to dine with him.”

“Yes, I have heard about that,” the Pasha said. “We have all heard of
the white schooner. She has been a dangerous enemy to us, and has done
us more harm than the whole of the Greeks together; but after your
humanity at Athens I cannot feel animosity against you. It was a noble
deed and worthy of brave men. Thus it is that nations should fight,
but the Greeks began by massacre, and have been false to the oaths
they swore twenty times. How can you fight for men who have neither
courage nor faith, and who are as cruel as they are cowardly?”

“There have been cruelties on both sides,” Horace said, “though I own
that the Greeks began it; but in England we love freedom, and it is
not long since we drove the French out of Egypt and preserved it for
you. Our sympathies are with the Greeks, because they were oppressed.
We have never killed a Turk save in fair fight, and the crews of every
ship we have taken we have permitted to return to shore in their boats
without injuring one of them.”

“This also I have heard,” the Pasha said, “and therefore I will do you
no harm. I will send you to Constantinople, where the Sultan will
decide upon your fate. He has given orders that all foreigners taken
in arms against us shall at once be put to death for interfering in a
matter in which they have no concern; but as you were not taken in
arms I do not feel that the order applies to you, and will therefore
take upon myself to send you to him.”

“I thank you, sir,” Horace said, “though I fear it will only be a
reprieve.”

“I cannot say,” the pasha replied gravely. “The Sultan strikes hard
when he wishes to give a lesson. You see, his people were massacred
wholesale by the Greeks, and at Chios he taught them that he could
retaliate; but he is not cruel by choice. He is unswerving when his
mind is made up. Whether he will make an exception in your case or not
is more than I can say. I can only send you to him, and hope that he
will be as merciful in your case as I would be had I the power.”

Then he ordered one of his officers to take charge of the prisoners,
to see that they had a comfortable tent and were well cared for, and
that none molested them. Four soldiers were to be always on guard at
the tent, and to answer for the safety of the prisoners with their
lives. In a short time they were placed in a tent among those allotted
to the officers, and four sentries were placed round it. After sunset
two soldiers brought large trays with meat, vegetables, and sweets
from the pasha’s own table, and also a bottle of raki.

“The Turk is a gentleman, Horace,” the doctor said as, after having
finished dinner, he mixed himself some spirits and water. “I am not
saying, mind you, that I would not have mightily preferred a bottle of
good whisky; but I am bound to say that when one has once got
accustomed to it, raki has its virtues. It is an insinuating spirit,
cool and mild to the taste, and dangerous to one who is not accustomed
to it. What do you think of it, Horace?”

“I don’t care for it, but then I don’t care for any spirits,” Horace
said; “but I thoroughly agree with you that the pasha is a good
fellow, only I wish he could have seen his way to have let us go. The
Sultan is a terrible personage, and the way he has hung up hostages at
Constantinople has been awful. If he has made up his mind that he will
deter foreigners from entering the Greek service by showing no mercy
to those who fall into his hands, I have no very great hope that he
will make any exception in our case.”

CHAPTER XX

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.”

CHAPTER XXI

THE “MISERICORDIA” AGAIN

Before starting, the disguises of Horace and the doctor were
perfected. They were so bronzed by the sun and air that their skin was
no fairer than that of many Turks of the better class; but it was
thought as well to apply a slight tinge of dye to them, and to darken
the doctor’s eyelashes and eyebrows with henna. The hair was cut
closely off the nape of the neck, below the line to which the turban,
properly adjusted, came down, and the skin was stained to match that
of their faces. The garments they wore formed part of Ahmed’s
wardrobe, and only needed somewhat more careful adjustment than they
had at first received. The ladies came up to bid them farewell; but,
as it had been arranged that in the course of a few days, when inquiry
should have ceased, the bey, with his wife and daughters, should also
proceed to their country residence, they would meet again ere long.
Mourad was to accompany them, and putting a large box on his
shoulders, filled with changes of clothes and other necessaries, he
followed them down the street.

In a short time they were in a busy thoroughfare, the number of people
becoming larger and larger as they went down towards the water.
Janissaries in their showy uniform swaggered along, soldiers of the
line, merchants, and peasants, while _hamals_ staggering along under
enormous burdens swung from bamboo poles, made their way, keeping up a
constant shout to the crowd to clear the road. State functionaries
moved gravely along on their way to the offices of the Porte. Veiled
women, with children in their arms or clinging to them, stopped to
talk to each other in the streets or bargained with the traders at the
little shops. Military officers and Turks of the upper class rode
along on showy horses, prancing and curvetting and scattering the foot
passengers right and left.

Ahmed and his companions kept straight on, paying apparently no
attention to what was going on around them, Ahmed occasionally making
a remark in Turkish, the others keeping silent.

When they reached the water-side a number of boatmen surrounded Ahmed,
who soon found two men whom he had frequently employed. The caique was
brought alongside. Ahmed had already told Horace to step in without
hesitation with his companion, and to take their seats at the bottom
of the boat in the stern, while he and Mourad would sit between them
and the boatmen. The latter took their places, and each seized a pair
of the sculls. These, which were much lighter than the sculls of an
English boat, were round with a long broad blade. They were not in
rollocks, but in a strap of leather fastened to a single thole-pin;
inside this they thickened to a bulk of three or four inches in
diameter, narrowing at the extremity for the grip of the hand. This
thick bulge gave an excellent balance to the sculls, and was rendered
necessary by the fact that the boats were high out of water, and the
length of the sculls outboard disproportionately large to that
inboard.

A few vigorous strokes by the rowers sent the boat out into the open
water. Then the forward oarsman let his sculls hang by their thongs
alongside, took out four long pipes from the bottom of the caique,
filled and lighted them, and passed them aft to the passengers, and
then again betook himself to his sculls. Bearing gradually across they
reached the other side below Scutari, and then kept along the shore at
a distance of a hundred yards from the land. Ahmed chatted to the
oarsman next to him, and to Mourad, occasionally making some remark to
the others in Turkish in reference to the pretty kiosks that fringed
the shore; enforcing what he said by pointing to the objects of which
he was speaking. They assumed an appearance of interest at what he was
saying, and occasionally Horace, who was next to him, talked to him in
low tones in Greek, so that the boatman should not catch the words,
Ahmed each time replying in Turkish in louder tones.

No class of boatmen in the world row with the vigour and strength with
which those of the Bosphorus--who are for the most part Albanians--ply
their sculls, and both Horace and the doctor were struck with surprise
and admiration at the steady and unflagging way in which the men
rowed, their breath seeming to come no quicker, though the
perspiration stood in beads on their brown faces and muscular arms,
and streamed down their swarthy chests, which were left bare by the
open shirts of almost filmy material of snowy whiteness. Once only in
the two hours’ journey did they cease rowing and indulge for five
minutes in a smoke; after which they renewed their labours with as
much vigour as when they first started.

“That is the kiosk,” Ahmed said at last, pointing to one standing by
itself near the water’s edge on a projecting point of land, and in a
few minutes the caique swept in to the stairs. Ahmed had quietly
passed a few small silver coins into Horace’s hand, whispering in
Greek:

“Give them these as you land; an extra tip is always welcome.”

Then he paid the men as he got out, saying to them:

“I expect the ladies in a few days. You had better go up each morning
to the house, and then you can secure the job.”

Horace dropped the coins into the boatman’s hand, with a nod, as he
stepped out, and then they walked up to the house. The boatmen again
lighted their pipes for a smoke before starting back on their long
row. The kiosk was shut up. Mourad opened the door with a key, and
threw the shutters open.

“I wonder you leave the place entirely shut up,” Horace said.

“There is nothing to steal,” Ahmed laughed. “A few mats for the floors
and cushions for the divans. The cooking pots and crockery are locked
up in a big chest; there is little else. There are a few vases for
flowers and other ornaments stowed away in a cupboard somewhere, but
altogether there is little to tempt robbers; and, indeed, there are
very few of them about. The houses are always left so, and it is an
almost unknown thing for them to be disturbed. You see everything is
left clean and dusted, so the place is always ready when we like to
run down for a day or two. The house has not been used much lately,
for my parents and sisters have been two years at Athens, and I have
been frequently away at our estates, which lie some fifteen miles west
of Constantinople. Now we will take a turn round, while Mourad is
getting dinner ready.”

The latter had brought with him, in addition to the box, a large
basket containing charcoal, provisions, and several black bottles.

“There is a village half a mile farther along the shore, where he will
do his marketing to-morrow,” Ahmed had explained as he pointed to the
basket.

The garden was a rough triangle, two sides being washed by the water,
while a high wall running across the little promontory formed the
third side. It was some sixty or seventy yards each way; the house
stood nearly in the middle; the ground sloped down on either side of
it to the water, and was here clear of shrubs, which covered the rest
of the garden, interspersed with a few shady trees. There were seats
placed under these, and a small summer-house, surrounded on three
sides by high shrubs but open to the water, stood at the end of the
point.

“It is a little bit of a place, as you see,” Ahmed said; “but my
mother and the girls are very fond of it, and generally stay here
during the hot season. It is quite secluded, and at the same time they
have a good view of everything going up and down the Sea of Marmora;
and if there is any breeze at all, it sweeps right through the house.”

“It is charming,” Horace said. “With a boat here, one could not want
anything better.”

“We always have a boat, with two men, while we are here,” Ahmed said.
“The two men who rowed us have been with us two or three seasons. My
father often wants to go into Constantinople, and I generally go when
he does. We usually sleep at our house there, and come back the next
evening. If the ladies want to go out while we are away, they can get
a caique at the village.”

After they had taken a turn round the garden they went into the house
again. The principal room on the ground-floor was at the end of the
house, and occupied its full width. The windows extended entirely
round three sides of it, a divan, four feet wide, running below them.

“You see, on a hot day,” Ahmed said, “and with all these windows open,
it is almost like being in the open air; and whichever way the wind
is, we can open or close those on one side, according to its
strength.”

The ceiling and the wall on the fourth side of the room were coloured
pink, with arabesques in white. The windows extended from the level of
the divan up to the ceiling, and were of unpainted wood varnished, as
was the wood-work of the divan. The floor was very carefully and
evenly laid, and the planks planed and varnished. Beyond two or three
little tables of green-painted wood, there was no furniture whatever
in the room. Outside the windows were jalousies or perforated
shutters, which could be closed during the heat of the day to keep the
room dark and cool.

Mourad had already got out the cushions and pillows and spread them on
the divan; had placed a small iron bowl full of lighted charcoal in a
low box full of sand in the centre of the room, and a brass casket
full of tobacco on one of the tables. Half a dozen chibouks, with
amber mouthpieces and cherry or jasmine-wood stems, leant in a corner.

Three of the pipes were soon filled, and a piece of glowing charcoal,
taken from the fire with a pair of small tongs lying beside it, was
placed on each bowl. A few puffs were taken to get the tobacco alight,
then the pieces of charcoal were dropped into the fire again, and
shaking off their slippers they took their seats on the cushions of
the divan.

“It is very unfortunate that your friend does not speak Greek,” Ahmed
began.

“Yes, it is unfortunate for him,” Horace said as he translated the
remark to Macfarlane.

“If I had known that my lot was going to be cast out here,” the doctor
said, “I would have insisted on learning modern Greek instead of
ancient at school--that is, if I could have got a dominie who could
have taught me. It is a very serious drawback, especially when you
know that people are talking of things that may or may not mean that
you are going to get your throat cut in an hour or so. For the last
two days I seem to have been just drifting in the dark.”

“But I always translate to you as much as I can, doctor.”

“You do all that, Horace, and I will say this that you do your best;
but it is unsatisfactory getting things at second hand. One likes to
know precisely how things are said. However, as matters have gone
there is nothing to grumble at, though where one’s life is concerned
it is a natural weakness that one should like to have some sort of
say in the matter, instead of feeling that one is the helpless sport
of fate.”

Horace laughed, and Ahmed smiled gravely, when he translated the
doctor’s complaint.

“It comes all the harder to me,” the doctor went on, “because I have
always liked to know the why and the wherefore of a matter before I
did it. I must confess that since I have been in the navy that wish
has been very seldom gratified. Captains are not in the habit of
giving their reasons to their surgeons, overlooking the fact
altogether that these are scientific men, and that their opinion on
most subjects is valuable. They have too much of the spirit of the
centurion of old. They say ‘Do this,’ and it has to be done, ‘You will
accompany the boats, Dr. Macfarlane,’ or ‘You will not accompany the
boats.’ I wonder sometimes that, after an action, they don’t come down
into the cockpit and say, ‘You will cut off this leg,’ or ‘This arm is
not to be amputated.’ The highness-and-mightiness of a captain in His
Majesty’s navy is something that borders on the omnipotent. There is a
maxim that the king can do no wrong; but a king is a poor fallible
body in comparison with a captain.”

“Well, I don’t think you have anything to complain of with Martyn,”
Horace laughed.

“Martyn is only an acting-captain, Horace, and it is not till they get
the two swabs on their shoulders that the dignity of their position
makes itself felt. A first lieutenant begins, as a rule, to take the
disease badly, but it is not till he gets his step that it takes
entire possession of him. I have even known a first lieutenant listen
to argument. It’s rare, lad, very rare, but I have known such a thing;
as for a captain, argument is as bad as downright open mutiny. Well,
this is a comfortable place that we have got into, at least in hot
weather, but I should say that an ice-house would be preferable in
winter. These windows don’t fit anyhow, and there would be a draft
through them that would be calculated to establish acute rheumatism
in the system in the course of half an hour.”

“The house is not used at all in winter,” Ahmed said, when he
understood the nature of the doctor’s criticisms. “Almost all the
kiosks along here belong to people in the town, and are closed
entirely for four months of the year. We are fond of warmth, and when
the snow is on the ground, and there is a cold wind blowing, there
would be no living here in any comfort.”

Six days passed. Ahmed went once to Constantinople to learn what was
going on. He brought back news that the escape of the two English
prisoners had caused a great sensation at the Porte, that all the
officers in the regiments there had been paraded in order that the
boatmen and the officers of the brig might pick out the one who had
brought off the order, but that naturally no one had been identified.
The soldiers had also been inspected, but as none of these had been
particularly noticed by the boatmen, the search for those engaged had
been equally unsuccessful. Fazli Bey had been severely interrogated,
his servants questioned, and his house searched, but nothing had been
found to connect him in any way with the escape. A vigilant watch had
been set upon every European ship in port, and directions had been
sent that every vessel passing down the straits was to bring-to off
the castles, and to undergo a strict search.

Ahmed said that his father had heard from Fazli Bey that while the
Sultan was furious at the manner in which the prisoners had been
released, it was against those who had taken part in it that his anger
was principally directed, and that it was thought he was at heart not
altogether sorry that the two men who had befriended the Turks at
Athens had got off, although he would not have wavered in his own
expressed determination to put to death without exception all
foreigners who had aided the Greeks. “My father has not at present
thought of any plan for getting you away,” Ahmed said. “The search is
too rigorous, and no master of a vessel would dare to carry you off;
but in a short time the matter will be forgotten, and the search in
the port and in the Dardanelles will be slackened. It causes a great
deal of trouble and inconvenience, and the officials will soon begin
to relax their efforts. It is one of our national characteristics, you
know, to hate trouble. My father will be here with the others in a
couple of days, and then we will hold a council over it.”

The next day a boat arrived with carpets and hangings for the rooms
upstairs, which were entirely devoted to the females of the household;
and on the following evening Osman Bey, with his wife and daughters,
arrived in the same caique that Ahmed had come in, two female servants
with a quantity of luggage coming in another boat. The next few days
passed very pleasantly. The ladies took their meals apart upstairs,
but at other times sat in the room below, treating Horace and the
doctor as if they were members of the family. There were many
discussions as to the best method of effecting their escape, and Ahmed
went twice to Constantinople to ascertain whether the search for them
was being relaxed.

At last he and his father agreed that it would be the best plan for
them to go to Izmid, and to take a passage from there if some small
craft could be found sailing for Chios, or one of the southern ports
or islands. Ahmed was to accompany them, and was first to go to Izmid
to make the necessary arrangements. He knew many merchants in the
port, and as some of these were intimate friends they would probably
be disposed to assist those who had rendered so great a service to
Osman Bey and his family, but at the same time Ahmed said: “You must
not be impatient. The news of your being carried off by sham soldiers,
as they say, after their having assaulted and robbed the officer who
was bearer of the order for your delivery, has made a great talk, and
I shall have to be very careful as to how I open the subject.”

“Pray run no risks,” Horace said. “You have all done so already, and
we should be unhappy, indeed, were any ill-fortune to befall you or
your family for what you have done for us. We are very comfortable
here. I would much rather wait for some really favourable opportunity
than hazard your safety, to say nothing of our own, by impatience. It
is but a fortnight since we made our escape.”

“I am going up the Bosphorus to-morrow,” Ahmed said. “I have to see
a bey whose property adjoins ours, and who has a kiosk some distance
above Scutari. It is only a question of business, and I shall not be
many minutes. I shall be glad if you will go with me; you can remain
in the boat. The rowers are so accustomed to see you that they can
have no curiosity about you; besides, now that they are regularly in
our service, and sleep and live here, there is no one for them to
gossip with, and, indeed, as we are good patrons of theirs I do not
think they would say anything about you, whatever they might suspect.”

“I suppose you can take us both, Ahmed?”

“Certainly I meant that, of course. Your friend would find it dull
indeed alone here.”

Accordingly the next morning they started. When they neared Scutari
they saw on the other side of the water a brig making her way in from
the Dardanelles.

“That is a slovenly-looking craft, doctor, with those dirty
ill-fitting sails; rather a contrast that to our schooner. I wonder
where she is and what she is doing. That brig is about her size too,
and the hull is not unlike hers, looking at it from here.”

The doctor gazed at the craft intently. “Eh, man,” he said in low
tones, grasping his companion’s arm tightly, “I believe that it is our
craft, Horace.”

“What, that dirty looking brig, doctor, with her sides looking as
rusty as if she had not had a coat of paint for the last year!”

“It’s the schooner disguised. It is easy enough, lad, to alter the
rig, and to get hold of dirty sails and to dirty the paint, but you
can’t alter the shape. No Greek, or Turk either, ever turned out the
hull of that brig.”

“It is marvellously like the schooner,” Horace said. “I should almost
have sworn that it was her.”

“It is the schooner, lad. How she got there, and what she is doing, I
don’t know, but it is her.”

“What is it?” Ahmed asked. “What is there curious in that brig that
you are so interested in her?”

“We both think it is our schooner, Ahmed; the one in which we took
your father and mother from Athens in.”

“That!” Ahmed exclaimed incredulously; “why, my sisters were always
saying what a beautiful vessel it was, with snow-white sails.”

“So she had, Ahmed; but if it is the schooner she is disguised
altogether. They have taken down her top-masts and put those stumpy
spars in instead; they have put up yards and turned her into a brig;
they have got sails from somewhere and slackened all her ropes, and
made her look dirty and untidy; still we both think that it is her.
Please tell the boatmen to cross to the vessel and row alongside.”

Ahmed gave the order, and as the caique shot away from the shore said:
“But how could it be your ship? Do you think that she has been
captured? If not, she could not have ventured up here.”

“She has not been captured,” Horace said confidently, “and if she had
been her captors would not have taken the trouble to spoil her
appearance. If that is the schooner they have come up to make
inquiries about us, and to try to rescue us if possible.”

It was fully two miles across, and as they approached the brig the
doctor and Horace became more and more convinced that they were not
mistaken.

“Please tell the men to pull in behind her,” Horace said, “so that we
can see her better. There can be no mistake about her if we can catch
a sight of her fore and aft.”

When they fell into the brig’s wake they were some three hundred yards
astern of her, and the last vestige of doubt disappeared as they saw
her great breadth and fine run.

“That is my father’s craft, Ahmed, I could swear to her now. Will you
tell the men to row up alongside.”

There were only four or five men visible on deck in the ordinary dress
of Turkish sailors. As the caique came alongside a man put his head
over the rail and asked in Turkish “what they wanted?”

“We want to come on board,” Ahmed said; “we have business with the
captain.”

“I am the captain,” the man said; “are you one of the port officers?”

“Drop astern to the chains,” Ahmed said to the boatmen, who were
hanging on by a boat-hook. They let the caique fall aft her own
length, and then, seizing the shrouds, the doctor and Horace sprang up
on to the chains and then leapt on board, Ahmed following them more
slowly. There was no doubt that it was the schooner, though her decks
were covered with dirt and litter, and the paint of her bulwarks
discoloured as if they had been daubed with mud which had been allowed
to dry. The sailors looked up as if in surprise at the sudden
appearance of the strangers on their deck. Horace glanced at them. He
knew none of their faces.

“Well, sir,” the captain said, coming up, “may I again ask what you
want with us?”

“You talk to him, Ahmed,” Horace said in Greek. “We will run below;”
and at a bound he was at the top of the companion and sprang down into
the cabin. “Father,” he shouted, “are you here?”

The door of the main cabin opened, and a Turk with a flowing white
beard made his appearance.

“My dear father, is it you?”

“Why, Horace, Horace, my dear boy, where do you come from, what
miracle is this?” And in a moment they were clasped in each other’s
arms. A moment later a tall Nubian rushed out and seized Horace’s
hand.

“Why, Martyn, you don’t mean to say it is you in this disguise?”

“It is indeed, Horace. I am delighted to see you, lad; and you too,
doctor. I had never thought to clap eyes on you again;” and he shook
hands heartily with Macfarlane, as also did Mr. Beveridge.

“I seem to be in a dream,” the latter said; “how do you come here,
what has happened?”

“I may say the same, father; but first, where are Miller, Tarleton,
and the crew?”

“They are all down in the hold,” Martyn said; “they are all in
hiding.”

“I have a friend on deck, father; he is the son of one of the Turks we
saved at Athens. He and his friends saved our lives, and have been
concealing us since they got us away. I expect he is having some
difficulty with the man who calls himself captain.”

“Come up with me then, Horace, and we will fetch him down; and I will
tell Iskos that it is all right.”

As soon as they reached the deck Mr. Beveridge explained to the
supposed captain that these were the friends he had come to find, and
that all was well.

Martyn had also come up. “What had we better do now, Martyn?”

Martyn looked up at the sails, and at the water, “Fortunately the wind
is dying out fast,” he said. “I don’t think we are making way against
the current now, and we shall certainly not do so long. Hold on a few
minutes longer, Iskos, and then anchor. It will seem as if we could
not get up against the stream to the other shipping. If you see a boat
coming off, let us know. They will probably be sending off to look at
our papers; but perhaps they may not trouble about it till we get up
to the regular anchorage. Now, Mr. Beveridge, we will go down below
and gladden their hearts there.”

The main-deck was filled with casks, bales, and merchandise of all
sorts, and the hatchways of the hold covered with sacks of flour.
Macfarlane joined them, and aided Martyn and Horace in removing the
sacks. Horace saw as he did so that what appeared a solid pile was
really hollow, and that the hatchway was only partially closed so as
to allow a certain amount of air to pass down below. The bags were but
partly removed when there was a rush from below, Miller and Tarleton
with their cutlasses in hand, followed by the sailors with
boarding-pikes dashed through the opening. They paused in astonishment
upon seeing only Martyn, Mr. Beveridge, and three Turkish gentlemen,
but as they recognized Horace and the doctor, the officers threw down
their swords and with a shout of joy seized them by the hand. The
sailors close behind them broke into a cheer which swelled into a roar
as the men below gathered the news that their two officers had
returned.

“The men can come up between decks, Miller,” Martyn said. “Let them
have a stiff ration of grog all round. Boatswain, see that the sacks
are piled again as before, leaving two or three out of their place to
allow the men to go down again if necessary. If the word is passed
that a boat is coming off, let them hurry back again and replace the
sacks carefully after them as they go down.”

The sailors continued pouring up through the hatchway, and behind them
came the two Greeks, whose joy at seeing Horace was excessive.

“Now,” Mr. Beveridge said, “let us adjourn to the cabin and hear all
about this wonderful story.”

On entering the main cabin Horace found that its appearance, like that
of the rest of the ship, had been completely altered, all the handsome
fittings had been removed, and the whole of the woodwork painted with
what he thought must have been a mixture of white paint and mud, so
dirty and dingy did it appear.

“Now, father, in the first place I must properly introduce my friend
Ahmed to you all. He is the son of Osman Bey, who was one of the
principal Turks of the party we took to Tenedos, as no doubt you
remember; it is to him and his father, aided by Fazli Bey, and the
bimbashi who was in command of the troops, and some of the
soldiers, that we owe our lives.”

[Illustration: THE DOCTOR TELLS THE STORY]

This was said in Greek, and while Mr. Beveridge was expressing his
gratitude to Ahmed, Horace repeated the same in English to the three
officers, who warmly shook hands with the young Turk. Marco and his
brother placed refreshments of all kinds on the table.

Ahmed partook of them sparingly, and then said to Horace: “Of course
you will not be returning with me now. I think I had better be going
on, it will be dark before I have done my business and get back again;
and besides, the boatmen will be wondering at my long stay here.”

“I am afraid your father will think us horribly ungrateful if we go
off without thanking him and your mother for all their kindness to
us,” Horace said; “but of course we must be getting out of this as
soon as we can.”

“My father and mother will be delighted to hear that you have so
suddenly and unexpectedly got out of your difficulties,” Ahmed said,
“and that in a manner from which no suspicion can possibly arise to
us. What we have done has been but a small return for the service you
rendered us.”

Mr. Beveridge added his warmest thanks to those of Horace, and Ahmed
then went up with the others on to the deck and took his place in the
caique; Horace making a present of a small gold piece to each of the
boatmen. Ahmed said good-bye to him and the doctor in Turkish,
expressing the hope that when they got back to Cyprus they would write
to him, a message that Iskos afterwards translated to Horace. As soon
as he had rowed away the rest of them returned to the cabin.

“And now for the story,” Mr. Beveridge said as they took their places
round the table.

“The doctor shall tell it,” Horace said. “He has had no chance of
talking for the last fortnight, and it is only fair he should have his
turn now.”

The doctor accordingly, in his slow and deliberate way, related the
whole story of their adventures from the time they landed from the
schooner until their return on board, a narration which lasted nearly
two hours.

Then Martyn related what had happened on board since. “You know,” he
said, “that directly we heard the firing on shore and saw the boat
rowing off we began to get ready to send a strong party off. You can
imagine how horrified we were when, on the boat coming alongside, we
found you were both missing. The beggars fired away at us as we rowed
ashore, but they bolted before we reached it, and when we made a rush
into the village, it was empty. We could find no one to ask questions
of, for, as we found afterwards, they had all made off while the
brigands were firing at us. However, as there were no signs of you it
was evident the only thing to do was to follow the ruffians, and off
we set. We chased them four miles, but they scattered directly they
left the village and we only came up with two of them. Unfortunately
they showed fight, and the sailors cut them down before we could come
up.

“After searching about for some time we thought the best plan was to
go back to the village. There we quartered ourselves among the houses,
and, as you have been telling us, the man came with a letter. We
noticed how you had worded it and had underscored the names, and we
saw the fellows did not know that you were the son of the owner, so
your father pretended to hang back for a bit. As soon as the man had
gone off with the message we thought that it was all right, and
everyone was in the highest spirits. Of course there was nothing to do
next day, but the following morning Mr. Beveridge and Miller went off
with thirty men, as the time named for giving you up was one o’clock.

“We began to expect them back at four, and as the hours went on I was
in a regular stew. I did not like to land, and as I had only twenty
men I was afraid of weakening her further, as we should have been in
an awkward fix if a Turkish man-of-war had come along; however, at
nine o’clock I sent Tarleton ashore with five men to see if he could
gather some news from the villagers, who had all come back again soon
after the brigands had left. It was not till after eleven o’clock that
he came off, with the news that the party had returned and had heard
nothing of you.

“Next morning one of the boats came off with Mr. Beveridge. Half an
hour before a Greek had come in and stated that he was one of the
party bringing you down to the place agreed upon when they were
suddenly fired upon from a wood. Two of the party fell dead and the
rest ran and were hotly pursued for some distance. He was unable to
say what had become of you, nor did he know who the men were who had
attacked them, except that they were certainly Albanians. We held a
council, and then I started off with Tarleton and ten men and Marco.
Mr. Beveridge wanted to go, but I persuaded him not to, for it was
morally certain that we should not find you, and all we could hope for
was to get some sort of clue, and if the Albanians were still in the
neighbourhood Marco would have opened negotiations with them for a
ransom. The man who had brought the news acted as guide. We found the
bodies of his comrades who had been killed, but no signs of you, which
was a comfort in one way. It was pretty evident that you had both been
carried off.

“We had taken with us a dozen men from the village to which you were
to have been sent, and we offered what to them must have been a big
reward for news as to these Albanians. So after finding the bodies we
sent them off in different directions, and went back to their village.
Late in the evening they straggled in. They had done their work well,
spreading all over the country and getting hold of shepherds and
charcoal-burners and wood-cutters; and they were able to tell us for
certain that the Albanians had come over the range of hills between us
and Thessaly. They had been doing a good deal of plundering and some
murdering, had destroyed two small villages at the foot of the
mountains, and had been seen soon after the hour at which you must
have been captured making their way back. They assured us that the
troops of Ali Pasha lay in the plain beyond the hills, and that,
doubtless, the Albanians had taken you to him. We had a good long rest
in the afternoon, and as I knew what a state of anxiety your father
was in we started at once and got on board at four o’clock in the
morning. We had a long talk over what was the best thing to be done,
and resolved at any rate to sail out of the bay and round the Cape,
and then keep along the coast until we were off Thessaly.

“As soon as it was daylight we weighed anchor. The wind was so light
that it took us two days to get there, and half that time at least, I
should say, the men were in the boats towing. Marco had volunteered to
land and make his way to the Turkish camp to try to find out what had
become of you. We landed him at night; he bought from some of the
villagers a suit of their clothes, and in twenty-four hours came down
again to the boat we had sent ashore for him with the news that you
had been sent to Constantinople; that you had been taken by an escort
of cavalry down to the little port at the mouth of the river that
flows in between Ossa and Olympus; that he had seen some of the
soldiers who formed your escort, who told him that they had seen you
go on board a Turkish brig-of-war with their officer and two of their
comrades who had accompanied you.

“This was horrible news, and as the brig had got four days’ start
there was little chance of our catching her. For another three days we
were almost becalmed. We had every stitch of canvas set and yet most
of the time we had not even steerage-way. The men behaved splendidly,
and all the time, day and night, we had two boats out ahead towing;
and on the fourth day we arrived off Tenedos. Then we got a breeze
again, and soon afterwards picked up a fishing-boat. From them we
learned that the brig had lain becalmed two days off the town, that
some of the people that we brought from Athens had gone out with
little presents of fruit to you and had seen you.

“We anchored that night a short distance from the town, for there
were no Turkish ships of war there. At night a boat came off with a
woman whom we had brought from Athens, and she told us that her
husband, a discharged soldier, had gone to Constantinople to tell some
of the people whom we brought from Athens that two of our officers had
been captured, and to ask them to do what they could to save your
lives. We did not think anything of it, though of course it was
pleasant to see that some of the people were grateful, and Mr.
Beveridge made her a handsome present, which I will do her the justice
to say she refused until he almost had to force it upon her. Knowing
how bitter the Sultan is against foreigners in the Greek service, and
that after the harm we had done he was not likely to be specially well
disposed towards us, the thing seemed almost hopeless. The two Greeks
volunteered if we would put them ashore to the west of the straits to
make their way to Constantinople, but as it did not seem to us that
they could do any good that idea was given up.

“At last Tarleton proposed that we should disguise the schooner and go
up ourselves. He admitted that the betting was a hundred to one
against our being able to help you in any way, especially as it was
almost certain you would have been hung a few hours after you got
there. Still, if that had been put off, and you should be in a prison,
there was just the possibility we might land at night, make our way to
the prison, blow in the gate, get you out, and make our way across the
country to some place where the boats would be waiting for us, and be
on board before daylight. It was certainly a desperate undertaking,
but as none of us could think of any other plan, we agreed it would be
well to try it, so we sailed at once to Athens.

“We had a great debate whether it would not be better to buy some
Turkish brig that had been brought in as a prize; but we finally
agreed to stick to the schooner, for if we were discovered on the way,
or if we did get you on board, we should have to sail, and we knew
that nothing the Turks have got could outsail the schooner. We worked
hard at Athens. We sent down the tall spars, got those clumsy poles
up in their place, got up yards, and turned her into a brig. Then we
bought a lot of old sails, and, as you see, turned her into as
lubberly-looking a craft as you will meet even in these seas. Then we
filled her up between decks with goods we bought out of some prizes
brought in by the Hydriots, dirtied her decks, threw acid down her
sides to take off the paint, took down the cabin fittings, as you see,
and daubed over the woodwork with dirty paint. It was enough to make
one cry to see the _Misericordia_ spoilt. It was like disguising a
girl of fashion as a dirty gipsy.

“While we had been at this work the two Greeks had been on shore, and
had gathered up eight men who spoke Turkish as well as Greek. The most
intelligent we made captain, with two officers under him. We got the
papers from a Turkish prize, a brig about the same size which had been
captured by the Hydriots on her way from Rhodes to Constantinople.
Then it was agreed that your father should disguise himself as a Turk,
a respectable land-owner of Rhodes, going as a passenger to
Constantinople, with myself as his Nubian servant. That way we could
stay on deck. When all was ready we started. The crew kept on deck
till we got near the Dardanelles, and then stowed themselves away in
the hold as you saw. We were stopped at the castle, but as the papers
were all right there was no suspicion excited, and nothing happened
till Iskos came down and told us a caique was coming alongside, and
then a minute or two later we heard your voice.”

CHAPTER XXII

ALL ENDS WELL

The hours passed on. It was still a dead calm, and, as Martyn had
thought likely, no visit was paid by the Turkish port officials, as
the brig was lying a good mile below the usual anchorage, and would no
doubt move up to the wharves as soon as she got the wind. Horace went
to the main deck and gave a sketch of his adventures to Tom Burdett,
who he knew would retail them to the crew.

“Well, Mr. Horace,” the boatswain said, “you are certainly a good one
at getting out of scrapes.”

“I had nothing to do with getting out of it, Tom; it was all done
without any effort on my part.”

“It was mighty well done, sir, and I would not have given them Turks
credit for putting such a plan together. I always liked the chaps
myself when I served with them as a young fellow in that Egyptian
business under Abercrombie. Good-natured sort of coves they was, and
wonderful good-tempered considering what shocking bad grub they had;
but I never looked upon them as sharp. Still, there you are; you see,
one never knows what a chap can do till he is pushed. Well, there is
one thing, Mr. Horace, I don’t care how many Turkish fugitives we may
take on board this ship in future, they will be heartily welcome by
every man Jack on board for the sake of what these fellows did for
you. I wish I had known it when you first came on board. I should have
liked to have given that young Turk a hearty shake of the hand, and
the men would have given him as good a cheer as ever you heard come
from fifty British sailors.”

“It is just as well you didn’t know, Tom, for if they had given a
cheer together on deck it would have been heard from shore to shore,
and everyone who heard it would have known that it never came from
Turkish throats.”

As soon as it was dark the anchor was weighed, and the vessel drifted
down with the current, a boat towing ahead so as to give her
steerage-way, while the rest of the crew set to work to unbend her
sails.

“You are not going to put up her own sails, are you, Captain Martyn?”
Horace asked, for as soon as it got dusk Martyn had removed the stain
from his skin, and exchanged the Nubian attire for his uniform.

“No, Horace, the white sails would tell their tale at once. We got two
suits at Athens, one that miserable lot you saw on us to-day, the
other we had cut up to fit us as we are sparred now. They are not very
clean, but that won’t affect her sailing, and though I don’t mean to
say she will walk along as she would under her proper canvas, I fancy
she is likely to sail as fast as anything we shall meet. I shall only
get her foresail, a jib, and that square top-sail on her, as we want
to go along as slowly as possible. I want to manage to anchor below
Gallipoli after sunset; or if I can’t manage that I shall anchor a
mile or two this side of the town, so as not to be visited by any of
the port officers. Then when it gets quite dark we will get up all
sail and run down the straits. It is against the rules to pass through
at night, and if the forts catch sight of us no doubt they will send a
few shots after us, but we must risk that. It is not easy to hit a
moving mark when it is so dark that you can scarcely see her outline.
There are half a dozen of their ships-of-war lying abreast of the
forts. We must keep as far as we dare over on the other shore. I am
not afraid of the ships. We shall be a mile away before the crews wake
up and load, but I expect they keep a pretty sharp look-out in the
forts, though most likely their attention is chiefly directed below
them.”

It took a couple of hours’ work to unbend all the sails and bend on
fresh ones. Horace spent the evening in the cabin chatting with his
father, and when the others came down at ten o’clock for a glass of
grog he heard that the boat had been run up and housed, and that the
brig was now under easy sail.

“There is very little wind,” Martyn said, “but there is enough to give
steerage-way. I shall not count you in for duty until to-morrow.”

“Oh, I am ready to take my watch as usual. I have been living a very
lazy life for the last three weeks, and shall be very glad to be on
duty again.”

“I shall get the guns up the first thing in the morning, Miller. We
will throw a tarpaulin over them when we get into the narrow part of
the straits.”

“Will you have the pivot-gun up too?”

“Yes, I think so; if we have to fight, we may as well fight as hard as
we can. When we get it mounted we can put a few barrels along each
side of it, cover the whole over with a sailcloth, and stow one of the
gigs at the top of all. No one would have a suspicion that there was a
gun there then, and if we wanted to use it we could clear it in a
minute.”

“The Turkish custom-house officers will stare in the morning when they
see the brig gone,” Miller said, “and will wonder what has become of
her.”

“If they think of her at all, Miller, they will think she has got up
sail at daylight and gone up the Bosphorus on her way to Varna or one
of the Black Sea ports.”

“It would require a good deal more breeze than there is now.”

“Yes, I did not think of that. Well, then, perhaps they will suppose
that we made a try to go up to the anchorage as soon as the day began
to break, but simply drifted back. You see another half a mile astern
would take us round that point there and out of sight of them.
However, we don’t care much what they think. They are not likely to be
interested enough in the matter to bother themselves about it one way
or the other, and certainly not likely to do the only thing that would
be of any consequence to us, I mean send down a messenger to Gallipoli
telling them to overhaul us if we came down the straits. Now, then,
the watch on deck; the others turn in. I am sure, Mr. Beveridge, you
will be all the better for a quiet night’s rest. You have certainly
not slept much for the last month, and you have been getting thinner
and thinner daily, while you have also long arrears in the way of food
to make up. It has been quite pitiful to see the faces of the Greeks
as you sent away plate after plate untouched.”

“I shall soon be myself again, Martyn, and even one good night’s rest
will, I am sure, do wonders for me.”

“We have been getting quite uneasy about your father,” Miller said as
he and Horace went up on deck for the middle watch.

“Yes, he looks sadly broken down, Miller. Directly he had taken off
that beard I was quite shocked; he looks years older.”

“We have been really anxious about him. He would turn up three or four
times during the night watches and walk the deck for an hour or two
talking to one or other of us as if he could not stop alone in his
cabin. Neither Martyn nor I ever had the slightest idea of finding you
were alive when we got here, and still less of getting you out. But
when Tarleton proposed disguising the schooner and coming up, he
caught at the idea so eagerly that we fell in with it at once. It
seemed to us both rather a mad sort of business, but we should not
have cared what it was so that it would but rouse him up; for from the
time when we first got word that you had been taken to the Turks, till
Tarleton made that proposal at Tenedos, he had scarcely spoken a word.
He cheered up for an hour or two when Marco brought news that at any
rate you had not been killed at Ali Pasha’s camp, but had been sent on
to Constantinople; but that lasted for a very short time, for he soon
saw that so far from improving your chances, it had lessened them. Ali
might have taken a handsome sum for your ransom, or your guards might
have been bribed; anyhow, there would have been a much better chance
of getting you away from his camp than from a prison in
Constantinople.

“Of course we did all we could to cheer him, and, I am afraid, told
some awful crammers as to the easy job it would be to get you out.
Still, the plan did do him good. It gave him something to think about,
as at Athens we were constantly thinking of something or other that he
could go ashore and see about. Since we sailed from there he has been
in a sort of fever, walking restlessly about the deck, going down to
the cabin and coming up again twenty times every hour, worrying about
the wind, and complaining at the boat’s loss of speed. He took to
Tarleton most, because he was nearest your age, I think. He talked to
him several times about you as a child, and seemed specially unhappy
because he had seen so little of you up to the time when he bought you
that first craft you had. The two Greeks were terribly concerned about
him. They are two fine fellows those. They were as gentle as women.
Well, it has been an anxious time for us all. Even the men have felt
for him, and it was quite curious to see how silent the ship became
when he was on deck. They seemed to speak almost in whispers, and I
have not heard a laugh forward from the hour that you and the doctor
were missed. I was glad he was taken with you, for he is a good
fellow, and it was a comfort to know that you were together.”

“It was a great pull,” Horace agreed. “He was just the same all the
time as he is on board, quiet and slow in his talk, but with an
occasional gleam of humour. It has been rather hard on him, too,
because, from the day we first landed, there has always been someone
with us who could speak Greek, and it is very slow for a man sitting
listening to talk that he can’t understand, waiting for bits to be
translated to him. Still, he never showed that he minded.”

“Yes, that must have been very annoying,” Miller agreed, “especially
when the talk was about matters that concerned his life. It makes you
feel so helpless and baby-like to have everything managed for you and
to be able to do nothing yourself. I don’t think he took kindly to
that Turkish dress. He slipped away and changed it before he had been
on board five minutes, while you kept yours on till you turned in for
a nap two hours ago.”

“I was comfortable enough, and never gave the clothes a thought after
I had worn them an hour or two,” Horace laughed. “Of course one felt
very baggy about the legs, and I certainly should not like to go aloft
in the things. No wonder the Turks are such clumsy sailors with their
legs in bags like that; but I did notice that the doctor never seemed
to move about naturally. I expect if he could have talked away as I
did he would not have thought of them so much. The wind is heading us
a bit.”

“Yes, it is;” and Miller gave the orders for the sheets and braces to
be hauled aft.

“I should not be surprised if it is in the south by morning.”

“That would be all the better, for then we could choose our own time
for getting off Gallipoli. We must get up all our sail when it is
daylight and make a show of doing our best; but when one is tacking
backwards and forwards one can always manage either to keep a little
off the wind or so close into it as pretty well to deaden one’s way
through the water.”

Horace turned in at four o’clock, and an hour and a half later heard a
trampling of feet on deck, and knew that the watch was making sail.
When he went up at eight o’clock the wind was blowing briskly from the
south-east, and the schooner was making a long leg out from the land.
He was now able to see the set of the sails that had been bent on the
evening before. The lower sails were of the same size as the
schooner’s original suit, and fitted her well. The upper sails
contained less than half the canvas of her old ones, but her spread
was sufficient to lay her over well and to send her through the water
at an encouraging rate of speed.

“She is not going along so badly, is she, Horace?” Martyn asked.

“No, indeed. Of course in a light wind the loss of all that upper
canvas will tell, but at present she is doing well enough for
anything, quite well enough for anything we are likely to meet.”

“We have been holding our own for the last two hours with that
felucca on the other tack, and we have been purposely sailing her a
good bit off the wind. We could overhaul her soon enough if we liked,
and most of those boats are fast; but we don’t want to get along too
quickly. If the wind freshens any more I shall tow a sail alongside to
deaden her way a bit. I want to arrive off Gallipoli about half an
hour after sunset.”

Two of the broadside guns had just been brought up and put in
position, and by midday the other six and the pivot-gun were in place,
and the latter hidden by a screen of barrels and one of the gigs,
bottom upwards, laid over it. The decks had been scrubbed, but, as
Martyn said mournfully, it would take weeks to get them back to their
former colour. The ropes still hung slackly, and although the schooner
looked a good deal more ship-shape than when Horace had first seen her
on the previous day, she was still as untidy as the average of vessels
in Eastern waters. Her course was timed well, and the sun had already
sunk some time, when she dropped anchor a short distance outside the
craft lying off Gallipoli.

“I see some of their ships of war have come up from below since we
passed three days ago. However, there is no fear of their sending a
boat off to-night,” Martyn said as they gathered in the cabin for
dinner, “and they will naturally suppose that we anchored so far out
because we were going on down the straits the first thing in the
morning.”

Mr. Beveridge had remained in his berth all day. The reaction after
the long excitement and anxiety told severely upon him. Although he
had got up the first thing, he had been obliged to lie down again,
being too weak to stand. The doctor, however, told Horace that this
was only to be expected.

“He will want a week’s quiet and plenty of nourishment to set him on
his legs again. He has been fairly worn out. But there is no fever
about him, and we can trust the Greeks to feed him up. It is just as
well that he should keep perfectly quiet to-day and sleep as much as
he can. To-morrow I hope I shall be able to get him up on deck. Then
chatting with you and taking an interest in things will rouse him.”

At nine o’clock sail was again made and the anchor weighed. The wind
had gone down very much, and had veered round to the south, which
enabled them to lay their course through the greater part of the
straits. Two men were placed in the chains with lead-lines. The lights
were all extinguished, with the exception of the binnacle. The
tarpaulins were removed from the guns and the barrels and gig from
around the pivot-gun. The watch off duty was sent below, and two of
the keenest-eyed men on board placed as look-outs at the bow. The
European shore, which was comparatively high, could be made out as a
dark bank, but the Asiatic shore, which was low, could scarcely be
seen. The chart was laid on the cabin table, the port-holes having all
been carefully covered with curtains, and a tarpaulin laid over the
skylight.

The men in the chains kept on taking soundings, Horace going backwards
and forwards between them and the quarterdeck with the news as to the
depth of water. Miller was in charge of the deck, while Martyn paid
frequent visits to the cabin to determine their position on the chart
according to the depth of the soundings. There was no fear of their
meeting with any craft until they approached the forts; but in the
darkness it was necessary to be very careful, as the water was shallow
on the eastern side, and were they to run on to a shoal, going as they
were with the force of the current, there would be little chance of
getting off again, unless by lightening the ship. There was just wind
enough to give her steerage-way. Men were stationed in readiness to
let go the anchor instantly, should it be necessary; while ten men, in
the longboat, paddled gently ahead of her, just keeping a tow-rope
taut in readiness to tow her instantly in any direction that might be
required. None of them were acquainted with the set of the current,
and Martyn had only the depth of water and the dim outline of the
banks to direct his course by. Several times, when the water shoaled,
the crew of the boat were directed to row vigorously in the direction
of the right bank; and once or twice there were but a few feet under
the keel, and a keen feeling of anxiety was experienced on board
until the leads-man announced that the water was deepening. At last,
according to Martyn’s calculations they could not be far away from the
formidable forts.

The boat was directed to fall astern and hang on to the rope, in
readiness either to come on board or to carry out any orders that
might be given. The crew on deck were told to take axes and
capstan-bars, so that should they drive down against one of the
Turkish ships they could fend the schooner off as much as possible, or
cut away any rope that might catch. They were directed to stand
perfectly still, and not a word was to be spoken whatever happened.
The greatest danger lay in the fact that most of the ships of war were
lying above the forts, and that, consequently, should an alarm be
given by them, the gunners at the batteries would be in readiness to
pour in their fire upon her as she passed.

“The ground to our right looks much higher than it did, Miller. I
think we must have been drifting a good deal over towards that side.”

“I think so too,” Miller agreed. “I have been fancying that we were
getting over that way ever since we stopped sounding.”

“At any rate we must take our chance,” Martyn said. “I daren’t sound
again; the splash would attract attention half a mile away on a quiet
night like this. Besides, we could not tow her the other way now; we
must take our chance. It is not likely they are keeping much of a
look-out on board. We might pass within twenty yards of a vessel
without being noticed on such a night as this. I will stay at the
helm, Miller. Her sails are still full, and we have got steerage-way.
Do you go up into the bow. Let two of the men take their boots off,
and if they make out anything ahead, let one of them run to me like
lightning with orders whether to port or starboard the helm.”

The conversation was carried on in the lowest tone. Miller stole
lightly forward; Tarleton and Horace were already there, one on each
bow, straining their eyes into the darkness.

“We are a long way over on this side, Miller, I don’t believe that
high ground over there is more than two or three hundred yards away.”

“That is just what I have been saying, Tarleton. The current must have
set us across tremendously. Martyn is at the helm, and you see we are
heading off that shore, but I don’t think we are going more than a
couple of knots through the water.”

In five minutes Tarleton whispered:

“I think there is something dark just over the cathead.”

At the same moment Horace stepped from the other side.

“There is a ship a short way ahead, Miller, unless I am mistaken.”

“By Jove, so there is!” Miller said, looking out. “We shall never be
able to clear her with the current taking us down.”

He had kicked off his own shoes when he reached the bow, thinking it
better himself to carry any message.

“Port your helm, Martyn,” he said as he ran up. “There are two craft
ahead, and we can never clear the outside one in this current. Our
only chance is to run between them.”

Martyn had jammed the helm down as Miller spoke.

“Keep it there,” Martyn said to the helmsman, and sprang to the
bulwark to look out himself. “That is enough,” he said; “straighten
her now, just as she is. You con her from the other side, Miller.”

All on board saw the two vessels now. By their height and bulk they
were evidently large frigates or men-of-war. They were not fifty yards
away, and were about the same distance apart. Martyn pulled off his
jacket and threw it over the binnacle, as its light would have been at
once noticed by anyone looking down from the lofty hulls. Noiselessly
the schooner passed into the gap between the ships; not the slightest
sound was heard from her decks. The two officers looked anxiously up
at the sails, for had one of these flapped, or a block rattled, the
sleepiest look-out must have noticed it. The silence on the decks of
the Turkish ships was as profound as that on the schooner. Rapidly
the latter slid between them, the current taking her along faster than
the wind. A minute more and she was beyond them; still no hail was
heard. Another minute and they loomed dark and indistinct behind her.

“Thank God for that!” Miller said in a whisper as he crossed the deck
to Martyn.

“Yes, indeed; it was touch and go. I expect they have only an anchor
watch. Most likely they are asleep; they would know that nothing could
come up the straits with this light breeze. I think, Miller, those are
the two eighty-gun ships we noticed as we came up. They were moored a
good bit outside the others; in which case we have a clear course
before us.”

“Yes; I have no doubt those are the two,” Miller agreed.

“Now we have only the forts; they are about a quarter of a mile
further down. Go forward, please, and tell the men not to move till
they get orders.”

Another quarter of an hour passed, and Martyn felt sure that they were
now well beyond the forts. For a few minutes longer he held on, and
then passed the word along the deck that the danger was over. Now that
they knew their exact position there was no longer any occasion for
sounding. The men in the boat were called up, and the watch off duty
ordered below, and when morning broke the land was far behind them. A
brisk wind had sprung up from the south-east, and the vessel was just
able to lay her course for Athens.

The doctor had remained below during their passage through the
straits.

“I should only have been in the way if I had been on deck,” he said
when Horace chaffed him for taking matters so easily. “When a man can
do no good, it is always better for him to get out of the way; and
after all there is no great pleasure in standing for hours afraid to
move, and without any duty to perform; so I just chatted for a bit
with your father, and directly I saw the sleeping draught I had given
him was beginning to take effect I turned in myself, and had as
comfortable a sleep as ever I had in my life. After sleeping on sofas
for three weeks, in that heathen sort of way, it was a comfort to get
between sheets again.”

“Well, but you went to bed the night before, doctor?”

“That was so,” the doctor agreed. “But a good thing is just as good
the second time as it is the first--better, perhaps. The first time
the novelty of a thing prevents you altogether enjoying it. I knew
very well that if we ran into any of the Turkish ships, or the forts
opened fire at us, I was like to hear it plainly enough.”

“And would you have lain there then, doctor?”

“No, lad. I would have had my duties to perform; and I would have
dressed and gone into the main deck at once, with my instruments ready
to do anything I could for those that required it.”

“Have you seen my father this morning, doctor?”

“Yes; and I am glad to say that he is all the better for his two
nights’ sleep. His pulse is stronger, and I shall get him up here
after breakfast. The news that we were fairly out to sea, and that all
danger was over, was better for him than any medicine. Well, lad, we
did not think eight-and-forty hours ago that we would be racing down
the Ægean again, on board the _Misericordia_, by this time. We have
had a wonderful escape of it altogether, and I would not like to go
through it again for enough money to set me up for life in Scotland.
When we were on board that Turkish brig, on our way to Constantinople,
I would not have given a bawbee for our chances.”

When they arrived at Athens the Greek sailors who had personated Turks
were landed. Mr. Beveridge was unequal to the exertion of going
ashore; but day after day he was visited by politicians, military
leaders, and others. After a fortnight spent there, Dr. Macfarlane
said to him:

“It is no use, sir, my giving you medicines and trying to build you
up, if you are going on as you are now doing. You are losing
strength, man, instead of gaining it. Each morning you seem a little
better; each evening you are fagged and worn out by these importunate
beggars. I can see that it worries and dispirits you. It is all very
good to wish well to Greece, Mr. Beveridge; but unless you have a
desire to be buried in Greek soil, the sooner you are out of this the
better. It is not so much change of air as change of thought that you
require. Go anywhere, so that it is to some place where you will never
hear the name of Greece.”

“I think you are right, doctor. The worry and disappointment has, I
know, been telling on me for months. Yes, I will definitely decide to
go away, at any rate for a time. Will you ask Captain Martyn to come
down?”

“Captain Martyn,” he went on when the latter entered the cabin, “the
doctor tells me I must absolutely get away from here.”

“I am quite sure that he is right, sir. You have been gradually
wearing yourself out ever since you came here.”

“I think we will go back to England in the first place, Martyn. I have
no doubt more bracing air will do me good. Then we can see how events
go on here.”

“Very well, sir. I think we shall be all heartily glad to be on our
way back.”

“You had better go ashore at once, Martyn. Take Horace with you, and
go to my agents. You know they have always kept the papers in
readiness for a re-sale of the vessel back to me. Go with them to the
consulate and have the sale formally registered. I will write a note
for you to take to my agent.”

Ten minutes later the gig took Martyn and Horace ashore. They returned
four hours later. There was a little move of excitement among the crew
as they stepped on deck again, for through the Greeks, who had heard
the news from Mr. Beveridge, it had spread forward. On reaching the
deck Martyn went to the signal locker. “Now, Miller,” he said, “down
with that flag.”