In Greek Waters: A Story of the Grecian War of Independence

“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.