"What's the matter?" demanded Plouff, astonished.
Mr. Spokesly regarded him with considerable impatience.
"How can I stop here?" he inquired. "You ought to have more sense," and he walked away towards the garden.
Plouff looked round at his circle of listeners, as though calling them to witness the strenuous nature of service with the English, and followed. He found Mr. Spokesly pausing irresolutely by the foot of the stairs, confronting a large woman with strongly marked brows and a severe expression who was descending the stairs with the air of a proprietress.
"Ah, Madame Antigone," said Plouff in hurried French. "This gentleman is the lieutenant of my ship. He has an assignation with a young lady who lives in a house near by."
The woman regarded Plouff steadily and shook her head. She was turning away as though she took no interest whatever in the matter.
"This is not a house of assignation," she said gravely, merely recording a casual fact.
"Oh, most surely not!" ejaculated the eloquent Plouff. "Madame totally misunderstands the situation. All that was suggested was that possibly Madame would permit the young lady to enter the garden. We have a boat, and here am I to row. Madame, to-morrow we sail; it is the last night for us. You can understand, Madame?"
Whether Madame understood or not was locked in her own broad, handsome bosom. She advanced as though Joseph Plouff and Mr. Spokesly had no corporeal existence, shaking her head and muttering softly that it was impossible. For a second the defeated bosun stood looking after her. Impossible? The massive form of Madame Antigone swam forward into the café and passed out of view. So it was impossible. Plouff became aware of his chief officer's expression.
"What are we going to do now?" said Mr. Spokesly irritably, going towards the garden. "Lot of use you are with your Frenchy friends. Let's get out of this."
"How could I help it?" demanded Plouff, breaking into a trot to keep up with Mr. Spokesly's anxious stride. "What's the matter, anyway? You don't understand, Mister. This way, round here. This is the path. Look out, you might hit your head—very low here under the trees. No, not yet. Here's the—that's it. Where are you goin' now? To the house?" Plouff whispered, a little out of breath, for Mr. Spokesly had been striding along oblivious to everything. What was the matter with the man? What was it to him if the girl did miss her passage? Ah!—--Plouff, as they came out upon a soft-earth cart-track that led away into the darkness, had a sort of spasm in his brain. Of course! This was anenlèvement. Ha! What a wooden-headed booby he had been to miss an obvious thing like that. Ho-ho! Plouff had a wife somewhere in the world, and as he never under any circumstances remembered to send her any support, he was romantic in his ideas concerningenlèvements. And mysteriously enough, Plouff became instantaneously more devoted to the task in hand, in spite of Mr. Spokesly's disgust. That officer realized he was pressing ahead without any clear notion of his future actions.
"I wonder what Dainopoulos 'ud think if he saw me hanging round," he mused. "Nobody on the ship, too! Well, here goes." And he whispered to the attentive Plouff.
"Do you know where the cars are, Bos'?"
"Of course I do. What do you take me for?"
"Go on, then, go on. I'll know the house if I see it."
Plouff was getting excited.
"And she come down with you?" he demanded.
"I don't know yet, man. Wait."
And suddenly they emerged upon the street.
Mr. Spokesly paused in the shadow of the wall enclosing the house they had left. On either hand extended an obscure and empty street. From that retired vantage the suburbs of Saloniki were wrapped in a peace as complete as that of the harbour. A faint hum, as of a distant trolley-car, came along the wires overhead. Mr. Spokesly reflected quietly, noting the landmarks, getting his bearings. The Dainopoulos house was a little farther on, he guessed. As he took a step forward, a door banged some distance off, and a dog gave a few ringing howls.
"Is it far?" asked Plouff in a tense whisper. Mr. Spokesly looked at him. He was very much excited, and looked foolish, with his round eyes and extraordinarily pretentious moustache.
"No, I don't think it is," said Mr. Spokesly. "I got an idea it's just along on the other side." And then, as they moved up the road and the view changed somewhat, opening out on a familiar clump of trees, he added, "Yes, it's just along here," and mended his pace.
And he advanced upon the place where he believed Evanthia to be waiting for him, in a mood of mingled fear and pleasure. Perhaps there was shame in it, too, for he almost felt himself blush when he thought of himself sitting there on theKalkiswaiting. And but for an accident—Plouff was the accident—he might have been waiting there still. He grew hot. He saw that his long habitude of regarding women as purchasable adjuncts to a secular convenience had corrupted his perception of character. Why had he not seen immediately that she would expect him to carry out the whole enterprise? Where had his wits been, when the amber eyes smouldered and broke into a lambent flame that seemed to play all round his heart? That was her way. She never supplicated, evoking a benign pity for her pathetic and regretted womanhood. Nor did she storm and rail, getting what she desired as the price of repose. She simply accepted the responsibility with a flickering revelation of her soul in one glance from those amber eyes. And left him to divine the purpose in her heart. He thought of all this in the few moments as he moved up to the house with the active and enthusiastic Plouff at his heels like a shadow. And he wondered if she would keep him waiting. That, at any rate, was not one of her faults.
There was no light in the front of the house. That was not promising. He crossed over and took an oblique view of the windows behind the trees of the garden. And she was there. He saw a shadow on the ceiling, a shadow that moved and halted, with leisurely deliberation. He walked to the gate and tried it. It was shut.
"Listen Bos'," he said, holding that person's shoulder in a firm grip. "You've got to give me a leg over. Then—listen now—go back and get the boat out, and lay off the end of the garden. Savvy?"
"Yes. Now, up you go," said Plouff. "What do you want to hold me like that for? Over?"
There was no need for the question or for a reply. Mr. Spokesly, assisted by an energetic heave from Plouff, flew over the gate and came down easily on the flags below. He heard Plouff depart hastily, and went round into the garden to discover what he might have to do. It was easy to push along the path and look up at the lighted window. She was there. He could see her arms above her head busy with her hair. While he stood there she took a large hat from her head and presently replaced it by a black toque with a single darting cock's feather athwart it. Once he saw her face, stern and rigid with anxiety over the choice of a hat. And he saw, when he flung a small piece of earth gently against the window, the arms stop dead in their movements and remain there while she listened. Again he flung a piece of earth, a soft fragment that burst silently as it struck the glass, and the light went out.
Mr. Spokesly bethought him of the gate over which he had come and he made his way back to see if it could be opened from within. It could, and he opened it. And then, just as he was preparing for a secret and stealthy departure, bracing his spirit for the adventure of anenlèvement, the door behind him opened and shut with some noise, and Evanthia Solaris, buttoning a glove, stood before him, a slender black phantom in the darkness.
He was dumfounded for a moment, until the full significance of her action was borne in upon him. She had surrendered her destiny to his hands after all. It was with him that she was willing to venture forth into unknown perils. What a girl! He experienced an accession of spiritual energy as he advanced hurriedly in the transparent obscurity of the garden. She did not move as he touched her save to continue buttoning a glove.
"Ready?" he whispered.
She gave him an enigmatic glance from behind the veil she was wearing and thrust her body slightly against his with a gesture at once delicate and eloquent of a subtle mood. She was aware that this man, come up out of the sea like some fabled monster of old, to do her bidding, was the victim of her extraordinary personality; yet she never forgot that his admiration, his love, his devotion, his skill, and his endurance were no more than her rightful claim. Incomparably equipped for a war with fate, she regarded men always as the legionaries of her enemy. And that gesture of hers, which thrilled him as a signal of surrender, was a token of her indomitable confidence and pride.
"For anything," she said, smiling behind her veil. "What have you done?"
"I've got a boat," he whispered. "It's all ready. Where are they?" He pointed to the house.
"Asleep," she said, pulling the gate open.
"Don't make so much noise," he begged. She stopped and turned on him.
"I can go out if I like," she said calmly. "You think I am a slave here?"
"Oh, no, no. You don't understand...." he began.
"I understand you think I am afraid of these people. Phtt! Where is the carriage?"
"It's only a little way. You can't get boats down at the landings. Just a little way."
"All right." She pulled the gate to and the latch clicked. And then she put her gloved hand lightly on his arm, trusting her fate to him, and they walked down the road in the darkness.
"Have you got everything?" he asked timidly.
She did not reply at once. She was looking steadily ahead, thinking in a rapt way of the future, which was full of immense possibilities, and which she was prepared to meet with a dynamic courage peculiarly her own. And at that moment, though her hand lay on the arm of this man who was to take her away, she was like a woman walking alone in the midst of perils and enemies, towards a shining destiny, her delicate body sheathed in the supple and impenetrable armour of an inherited fortitude. She smiled.
"Everything," she murmured in French. "Have I not thee?" And she added, so that his face cleared of doubt and he, too, smiled proudly: "Ah, yes. What do we need, if we have each other?" He strained her suddenly to him and she stood there looking up at him with her bright, fearless, amber eyes smiling. She said:
"The boat?"
They reached the corner and for an instant the dark unfamiliarity of the lane daunted her.
"Down here, dear," he said, holding her close. "I have a man I can trust in the boat. He's waiting."
They advanced silently, turning the corners of the lane and stooping beneath the boughs of the sycamores. Her faint adumbration of doubt inspired in him an emotion of fiery protectiveness. For a moment, while they were among the trees in the garden, they halted and stood close together. The door swung open, letting out a long shaft of yellow light for an instant, showing up in sharp silhouette a chair, a table, some garbage, and a startled cat. And closed again with a bang and a rattle that mingled with the steps of someone going off up the lane.
"What is this place?" she whispered, looking up into the sky for the outline of the roof. "Ah, yes!" she said, noting the bulging cupola on the tower. "I see."
"You know about this place?" he asked as they reached the low parapet at the bottom of the garden. She pressed his arm in assent. She did. Women always know those facts of local history. Evanthia recalled, looking out over the obscure and shadowy waters of the Gulf, the tale of that old votary of pleasure. Men were like that. Behind her infatuation for the gay young person supposed to be in Athens, she cherished a profound animosity towards men. She stood there, a man's arm flung tensely about her, another man cautiously working the boat in beneath where she stood, the blood and tissues of her body nourished by the exertions of other men, meditating intently upon the swinish proclivities of men. She even trembled slightly at the thought of those proclivities, and the man beside her held her more closely and soothed her with a gentle caress because he imagined she was the victim of a woman's timidity.
"It's all right, dear," he murmured. "Now I'll get down." He stooped and cautiously lowered himself into the boat, which rose and fell in a gentle rhythm against the sea-wall. And for a moment Evanthia had a slight vertigo of terror. She found herself suddenly alone. That arm—it had sustained her. She looked down and descried Mr. Spokesly standing with his arms extended towards her.
"Quick, dear! Now!" His face showed a white plaque in the darkness; face and hands as though floating up and down below her disembodied, and the faint tense whisper coming up mysteriously. She felt the rough coping with her fingers and leaned over towards the face.
"Hold me!" she breathed, and swung herself over. She felt his hands grip firmly and closing her eyes, she leaned backward into the void, and let go.
"Now push off, Bos'," said Mr. Spokesly, holding her in his arms. "We're away." He set her down and took the tiller. "Easy now, Bos'," he added, breathing hard.
Plouff, his eyes protruding with decorous curiosity, pulled out and began to row cautiously into the darkness. It was done. She sat on a thwart, her gloved hands folded in her lap, demure, collected, intoxicating. It was done.
"All right now?" he whispered exultingly. She looked at him, an enigmatic smile on her veiled face, and touched his knee. His tone was triumphant. He imagined he was doing all this, and she continued to smile.
"Ah, yes!" she breathed. "Always all right, with you."
He pressed her hand to his lips. She let him do this.
"The ship?" she said gently.
"Soon," he said. "We must be careful. Tired?"
"A little. Where is the ship?"
"That is her light. We go this way—keep out of sight."
"How long?"
"Soon, soon."
She became trustful as they turned and made for the ship. Plouff, stifling his desire to proclaim his incomparable efficiency, brought up imperceptibly against the grating and, stepping out, crept intelligently up the ladder to make sure of the watchman. That person was, as Plouff expected, drowsing comfortably over the galley fire. He tiptoed to the bulwarks and whispered:
"Come up. All clear!"
Mr. Spokesly drew Evanthia upon the gangway and guided her steps upward. Plouff stood at the top, his head thrust forward and his hand gripping the bulwark as though about to fling himself upon them. His globular eyes and glossy curling moustache made him look like some furtive and predatory animal. He slipped down the gangway, got into the boat, and pushed off. Plouff was off to have a night free from responsibility. His chief officer was on board.Sacré!His chief officer hadjoli goût. And he, Plouff, had his eyes about him. And his wits. There was something behind this. So, not a word!
And the two passengers, whom he had transported so neatly and without arousing either the watchman or the suspicious picket-boats, went into the cabin and, after closing the door, Mr. Spokesly lit the swinging lamp. Evanthia looked about her.
"A ship," she said absently, revolving the novel idea in her mind.
"You must go to bed," said he gravely. "And you must stay down in there until I tell you it is all clear. Do you understand?"
"Yes, I understand."
"I'll show you," he said, and he carefully piloted her down the companion. She leaned forward daintily to peer as he lit her lamp.
"It's the best I could do," he whispered.
"Beautiful. Tck!" she saw her clothes in the drawer he opened and patted his arm. She regarded him curiously, as though seeing him in a fresh light. "You are very good to me."
"Easy to be that," he muttered, holding her and breathing heavily. "Good-night!"
He closed the door and strode away to the companion, and he was about to mount when a thought struck him. She must keep her door locked, in case somebody came down. He walked back.
And as he put out his hand to open the door again to tell her this, he heard the key grind in the lock.
He paused, and then went away up, and very thoughtful, turned in.
From his conspicuous post on the forecastle Mr. Spokesly watched the elderly lieutenant—his old friend whom he had met at Floka's—descend the ladder into his launch. The ship was already moving, the anchor was awash, and the elderly lieutenant wavered somewhat as he put out his hands to grasp the rail running along the cabin of his launch. It was evening, and he was, Mr. Spokesly could see, adequately full. Indeed, he had been reinforced by more than one whiskey and soda before he had arrived with the captain's sailing orders. And Captain Rannie, who was watching him as though hoping he might by some fortunate turn of fate slip into the water and vanish for ever, had placed a bottle of whiskey and a syphon at his elbow in the cabin and permitted him to help himself. The old fellow had been very full of a triumph he had achieved over the authorities. He had been transferred to the Transport Office, where it was evident they needed an experienced ship's officer to keep a general eye upon things. All very well, these naval people, in their way—here he filled his glass again—but what did they know aboutourwork? Nothing! The soda shot into the glass, cascading all over the table. He drank. Incredible, absolutely incredible what queer things these people thought up. Told him to run round and round the White Tower for the duration of the war! Him! An experienced officer! Nice thing that, now! He drank again and refilled his glass. But he had been transferred....
Captain Rannie sat out this sort of thing for over half an hour and then went up on the bridge and pulled the whistle lanyard. TheKalkisuttered a yelp, followed by a gargling cry ending in a portentous hiccough. Mr. Spokesly remarked:
"They are signalling to heave up, sir."
"Then heave up," Captain Rannie had snapped, and had run down again. He found the elderly lieutenant smiling and refilling his glass. He did not see the expression of impatience on the captain's features as he entered.
"Anchor's coming up," the captain said in a distinct tone. "Steward, take the glasses." He gathered up the papers, muttering, and went down to his room. This sudden cessation of hospitality penetrated the old lieutenant's consciousness. He rose up and went out to the gangway, and it was there Mr. Spokesly saw him. It could not have been better, the chief officer remarked to himself. The old souse had turned up most providentially. The long-nosed quarrelsome creature who usually came out to the transports, and who always found out everything that was going on, was sick in the hospital out on the Monastir Road. The vessel gathered speed. They were away.
And Captain Rannie, who now appeared on the little bridge in company with a yellow-haired man at the wheel, was in a mood in which a much larger bridge would have been a comfort to him. The binnacle interrupted his headlong march from side to side, his head down, his hands in his trouser pockets. He would swing round suddenly and plunge across as though he had a broad thoroughfare ahead of him. At the binnacle he had to turn a little and edge past it before he could take three more strides and bring up against the end. Mr. Spokesly, who was finishing up on the forecastle, noted his Commander's movements and asked himself the cause of the agitation.
For Captain Rannie was agitated beyond his customary disapproval of mankind. He had had a long conference with his employer that morning before coming on board. They might not see each other again for some time, it was understood. The interview had taken place in the little office in the Rue Voulgaróktono, off the Place de la Liberté, and the usual crowds had thronged the street while they talked. Mr. Dainopoulos had gone on with his business, rising continually to change money, and once he went away for half an hour to look at some rugs. Captain Rannie had remained coiled up on his chair, smoking cigarette after cigarette, listening to his owner's remarks, his eyes wandering as though in search of some clue.
"You understand," Mr. Dainopoulos had said in the course of this conversation, "I'm doing this for my wife. My wife likes this young lady very much. Another thing, the young lady's mother, she's married again. Man with plenty of money. I do his business for him here."
Captain Rannie looked hard at a crack in the linoleum near his foot.
"I'm sure it doesn't make the slightest difference to me. I know nothing about it, nothing at all. My chief officer was going to say something to me this morning and I shut him up at once. I knew perfectly well from the very first there was something like this in the wind and I made up my mind to have nothing at all to do with it. As master of the vessel it's impossible ... you can quite understand ... eh?"
"That's all right," replied Mr. Dainopoulos, looking at his open palm. "No passport. Once you get outside, no matter. The young lady, she give me a paper. She loves my wife. She gives everything she may have to my wife."
"Which isn't much, according to what you told me before. You grumbled to me, and said in so many words she cost you a lot of money to keep for a companion to your wife."
Mr. Dainopoulos stared hard at his captain's sneering face.
"That was before her mother got married again. Miss Solaris, she tell me her mother want somebody to look after the farms, by and by."
"I don't want to hear anything about it," burst out Captain Rannie, turning round in his chair so that he could hear better.
"And she say, she say," went on Mr. Dainopoulos steadily, "her mother perhaps, you understand, some women have one, two, three, four husband, you see? Well, her mother want a good man of business. So Miss Solaris she sign a paper for me. She give everything to my wife."
"Everything! Which is nothing, I've no doubt."
"Ah-h! Not nothing. I sell his tobacco now, and it's not nothing, I can tell you. No! By and by, Miss Solaris, now her mother marry again, will be rich. But she's crazy about that feller I told you she had here."
"I don't remember anything about it. I make it a rule to have nothing to do with passengers. I expect no less," announced Captain Rannie, alert to hear every word.
"Well, if a woman wants a man, she gets him," observed Mr. Dainopoulos gravely.
"That's true, I admit," was the unexpected reply.
"And you know well enough she'll find young Lietherthal easy if she wants him. Me, I think she'll stay round withhim." And Mr. Dainopoulos jerked his finger in the direction of theKalkis.
Captain Rannie suddenly reversed himself on his chair and changed legs, uttering a sound like a snort.
"Yes," said Mr. Dainopoulos. "My wife she thinks maybe he marry her."
Captain Rannie moved his foot up and down and smiled unpleasantly.
"No hope of that," he muttered.
"Yes!" repeated Mr. Dainopoulos, jumping up to change a five-pound note into excellent Greek drachmas. "Yes! If she wants him to do it, it will be easy enough. You don't know her."
Captain Rannie was heard to say in a low, hurried tone that he didn't want to.
Mr. Dainopoulos grinned, which did not improve his appearance. He waved his fingers at his captain with a gesture indicating his jocular conviction that he did not believe it.
"If I was single ..." he began, and ended with a loud "H—m!" and smiled again.
Captain Rannie flushed dark red with annoyance. It was one of the scourges of his existence that he had to let men imagine he was a terrible fellow with women.He!And he loathed them. He would strangle every one of them if he had the power. Blood-sucking harpies! As he walked the bridge now, keeping a sharp eye upon the buoys of the nets which were coming into view, he recalled the shameful way his generosity had been played upon by those women of his own family. Daughters leagued with mother and aunt against him! But he had paid them out, hadn't he? Ha-ha! He savoured again, but with a faint flavour of decay, that often-imagined scene when they realized at last that he was gone and gone for good. That was the way to treat them. No nonsense. As for this passenger in the chief officer's cabin, he hadn't seen her, and he hoped she'd fall overboard in the night, and a good riddance. Good heavens! Hadn't the master of a ship enough responsibility on a trip like this without loading him down with a creature like that? In any case, she must remain in her cabin. Under no circumstances could he permit her on deck. To be meeting her on the stairs or promenading—the very thought made him feel faint.
Another thing Mr. Dainopoulos had said:
"A very good thing for him, too. He would make a lot of money—here." Captain Rannie didn't believe it. He had arrived at a complete and horrifying conviction that Europe was collapsing of its own weight, that the only hope for anybody was to do as he himself was doing—sending all his money to the Anglo Celestial Bank in Hong-Kong to be exchanged for silver dollars. That was the place—China. Down the far reaches of memory he saw the great River, smooth and shining, stretching away from the long quays of the port. No storms, no pitching or rolling, no rocks, no finding of one's position. And when he stepped ashore in spotless yellow pongee silk suit and great sun-helmet, he was somebody. Here, in Europe, he was nobody. Out there once more, with plenty of hashish, he could face the future.
He had said:
"She must land on arrival."
"You tell her," said Mr. Dainopoulos, "when you arrive. Put her ashore. He'll take her. You will find plenty of friends, on arrival."
Captain Rannie received this information without ecstasy. He did not go sailing about the world in search of friends. He was very worried. Mr. Dainopoulos favoured him with another grin.
"Why not take her ashore yourself?"
Captain Rannie shrank as if from a blow.
"You're the captain," added Mr. Dainopoulos.
Captain Rannie turned on his chair, his shoulder hunched, as though to ward off an impending calamity.
"Why, I thought you liked a little fun," said Mr. Dainopoulos, surprised.
"Don't speak of it," said Captain Rannie in a stifled voice. "I make a point of never interfering. Never allude.... Purely personal...."
"Well," said his owner, in some perplexity, "please yourself. I daresay you understand what I mean. You'll have a good bit of time, you know, on arrival. You won't have coal, you know, to go very far...."
He had made no reply to this, remaining hunched up on his chair, staring fixedly at the floor. Mr. Dainopoulos had stood up, looking at him for a while.
"You can do it?" he had asked softly. "Remember, the papers you carry will mean big money if you get through."
Still no answer.
"It is easy," went on Mr. Dainopoulos. "You do not change your course, that is all. Keep on. East-southeast."
Captain Rannie was perfectly well aware of all this, but he lacked the superficial fortitude to discuss it. He kept his head averted while his employer was speaking, his long wrist with the slave-bangle hanging over his knee. Change his course! That phrase had two meanings, by Jove! And his course was east to China, as soon as he could collect. He could do it. Talking about it to a man who was making fifty times, a hundred times, more than himself, was horrible to him.
He had got up suddenly and put on his hat, harassed lest this sort of thing should bring bad luck, for he was superstitious. At the back of his mind lay an uneasy fear lest that girl business should spoil everything. Who could foresee the dangers of having a woman on the ship? His ship! He, who could not bear to go near them at all, who treated even elderly creatures with brusque discourtesy! It would bring bad luck.
And now at last he was slipping through the nets, bound out upon a voyage of almost dismaying possibilities. It was a voyage of no more than thirty-six hours. Captain Rannie shivered and stood suddenly stock still by the binnacle as he thought of what was to transpire in those thirty-six hours. Could he do it? He was beginning to doubt if he could. He said to the helmsman:
"Keep her south and three points east," and went into the little chart room.
The Ægean Sea is a sea only in name. It could be more accurately described as a land-locked archipelago. Emerging from any of the gulfs of the mainland, gulfs which are nearly always narrow and reëntrant angles with walls of barren and desolate promontories, one can proceed no more than a few hours' steaming on any course without raising yet more promontories and the hulls of innumerable islands. Closed to the southward by the long bulk of Crete lying squarely east and west like a breakwater, it presents its own individual problems to the navigator, the politician, and the naval commander. The last named, indeed, was finding it anything but a joke. The very configuration of the coastline, which rendered a sally from the Dardanelles a feat of extraordinary folly and temerity, made it a unique hiding place for the small craft who slipped out of Volo and emerged from the Trikari Channel after dark. Submarines, coming round from Pola, could run into rocky inlets in the evening and would find immense stocks of oil, in cans, cached under savage rocks up the ravines of almost uninhabited islets of ravishing beauty. Gentlemen in Athens, in a hurry to reach Constantinople, took aëroplanes; but there was another way, across the Ægean Sea, in small sailing ships which were frequently blown out of their course at night and would take refuge in Kaloni, whence it was easy to reach the mainland of Asia Minor. And this business—for it was a business—was so profitable, and the ships of war so few in proportion to the area, that it went on gaily enough "under our noses" as one person said in disgust. Not quite that; but the problem did not grow any simpler when there was yet another neutral government—with ships—at Saloniki, a government that might be almost hysterically sympathetic to the cause of freedom and justice but which might also be imposed upon by conscienceless and unscrupulous merchants already in collusion with other unscrupulous people in Constantinople. This was the situation when theKalkisturned the great headland of Karaburun and headed south-southeast on the journey from which she never returned. Captain Rannie, staring at the chart on which he had pencilled the greater part of her course, southeast from Cape Kassandra, bearing away from the great three-pronged extremity of the Chalcidice peninsula, was aware that she would not return, but he found himself flinching from the inevitable moment, drawing nearer and nearer when he must face success or failure. When he asked himself, echoing Mr. Dainopoulos, could he do it? He was not sure that he could.
From this reverie he was roused by Mr. Spokesly appearing on the bridge. For a moment he was almost betrayed into a feeling of relief at the approach of a companion. He opened his mouth to speak and Mr. Spokesly, standing by the door, stopped to listen. But nothing came. Captain Rannie knew the secret power of always letting the other man do the talking on a ship. He said nothing. He crushed down the sudden craving to confide in Mr. Spokesly. He wanted—just for a moment—to call him in, shut the door, and whisper, with his hand on Mr. Spokesly's shoulder, "My boy, we are not going to Phyros at all. We are going to...."
No, he stopped in time. Why, he might stop the engines, blow the whistle, run the ship ashore! He stepped out beside Mr. Spokesly who was looking down at the compass, and wrote some figures on the slate that hung in view of the helmsman.
"That's the course."
"All right, sir."
"Call me at midnight if necessary. I'll relieve you at two o'clock. Time enough to change the course then."
"All right, sir."
Captain Rannie gave a rapid glance round at the diverging shores as they opened out into the Gulf, and turned away abruptly. Mr. Spokesly heard him descending, heard him unlock his door with a series of complicated clicks and rattles, heard him slam and relock it, and finally the vigorous jingle of curtain rings as he drew the curtain across.
Mr. Spokesly struck a match and lit the binnacle lamp, a tiny affair which shone inward upon the vibrating surface of the card. He did not attempt to walk up and down. His moods never demanded that of him. Perhaps it would be better to say his nature did not demand it. He was feeling much better than he had been all day. He had been nervous about Evanthia's safety in that room. Had had to make some bullying remarks to the steward about trying to get in where he had no business. To the puzzled creature's stammering explanations he had replied with more bullying: "Keep out. Don't come down here at all until I say you can." The steward had come to the conclusion that in addition to a crazy skipper whose room smelt of hashish and florida water, they now had a crazy mate who had something in his room he was ashamed of.
And yet Mr. Spokesly need have had no fear. Evanthia lay in her bunk all day. She knew perfectly well that she must remain within that room as one dead until the ship got outside. So she lay there, her eyes half closed, listening to the sounds of men and machinery, the sunlight screened by the yellow curtain tacked over the little round window, hour after hour all day, with a stoicism that had in it something oriental. It was about an hour past noon when there had come a smart thump on the door. She had got out and listened and the sharp whisper outside had reassured her. And when she had slipped the bolt and opened the door a few inches, Mr. Spokesly had thrust a glass of wine and a tin box of biscuits upon the wash-stand and pulled the door shut. And she had got back into the bunk and lay munching, and smiling, and sometimes kissing the emerald ring on her finger, the ring which was sailing out once more into the darkness. And as the day wore on, she peeped out and saw the tug go away with its empty lighter, heard the ominous thutter and thump of a gasolene launch under her, and heard the arrival of strangers who entered the cabin overhead. And then the clink of a glass.
Her reflections, as she lay in that bunk, her eyes half closed, were of that primitive yet sagacious order which it seems impossible to transfer to any authentic record. Her contact with reality was so immediate and instinctive that to a modern and sophisticated masculine intellect like Mr. Spokesly, or Mr. Dainopoulos even, she appeared crafty and deep. As when she locked the door. She had not imagined Mr. Spokesly returning. The whole complex network of emotions which he had predicated in her, modesty, fear, panic, and coquetry, had not even entered her head. She had formidable weapons, and behind these she remained busy with her own affairs. So, too, when she had given everything she might possibly inherit to her benefactress, she saw instantly the immediate and future advantages of such a course. She could always come back, when the detestable French had gone away home, and live with her friend again. She knew that old Boris better than he knew himself. She knew that he would do anything for his wife. Also she knew him for one of those men who stood highest in her own esteem—men who made money. For men who did not make money, who were preoccupied mainly with women, or books, or even politics, she had no use. She did not like Mr. Dainopoulos personally because he saw through her chief weakness, which was a species of theatricality. She had a trick of imagining herself one of the heroines of the cinemas she had seen; and this, since she could not read and was unable to correct her sharp visual impressions by the great traditions of art, appeared to be no more than a feminine whim. It was more than that. It was herself she was expressing at these moments of mummery. She had those emotions which are most easily depicted by grandiose gestures and sudden animal movements. It was her language, the language in which she could think with ease and celerity, compared with which the coördinated sounds which were called words were no more to her than the metal tokens called money. So there was nothing extraordinary in her quick grasp of the situation which demanded a mouse-like seclusion for a while. She lay still, even when footsteps clattering down the ladder were obliterated by the spluttering whoop of the whistle. And then came a novel and all-embracing sense of change, a mysterious and minute vibration which becomes apparent to a person situated well forward in a vessel beginning to move under her own power. Ah! themachine à vapeur, thevapore, the fire, the agitation behind. For perhaps a single second her quick flame-like mind played about the incomprehensible enigmas of mechanism. She, for whom unknown men in distant countries were to scheme and toil, that they might send her yachts and automobiles, music-machines and costly fabrics, jewels and intricate contrivances for her comfort and pleasure, had the conceptions of a domestic animal concerning the origins of their virtues. For her the effortless flight of a high-powered car ascending a mountain road was as natural and spontaneous as the vulture hanging motionless above her or the leaf flying before her in an autumn wind. Her gracile mentality made no distinction in these things, and the problems of cost never tarnished the shining mirror of her content. Upon her had never intruded those mean and unlovely preoccupations which distract the victim of western civilization from the elementary joys and sorrows. She had always been fed and cared for and she had no shadow of doubt upon her mind that nourishment and care would ever cease. Her notion of evil was clear and sharp. It implied, not vague economic forces, but individual personalities whom she called enemies. Any one announcing himself as an enemy would be met in a primitive way. She would back into a corner, spitting and biting. If she had a weapon, and she always had, she would use it with cool precision. She lay in her bunk now without a care in the world because she possessed the power of animating men to bear those cares for her. She could inspire passion and she could evoke admiration and remorse.
She saw the sun going down, saw him disappear as into a glowing brazier among the mountains, and the coming of darkness. Evanthia hated darkness. One of the whims she indulged in later days was the craving for a shadowless blaze of light. She moved in her bed place and turning on her elbow stared at the door, listening. Someone came down the stairs. A door was unlocked, slammed, and locked again. She became rigid. Her eyes glowed. Who was that? She got up and sought for matches to light the lamp. But she had left it burning the night before and the oil was exhausted. And her watch had stopped. She put on her black dress and did her hair as well as she could before the dark reflection in the mirror. She had very little of that self-consciousness which reveals itself in a fanatical absorption in minute attentions to one's appearance. She was, so to speak, always cleared for action, for love or war. She twisted her dark tresses in a knot, thrust a great tortoise-shell comb into them, unlocked the door and went out.
It was thus she came up the stairs into the lighted saloon and encountered the steward, who was laying the table for supper. He was leaning over the table setting out knives and forks. He looked over his shoulder and saw a face of extraordinary loveliness and pallor, with dark purple rings under the amber eyes, coming up out of the gloom of the stairway. He dropped the things in his hands with a clatter and whirled round upon her, his jaw hanging, his hands clutching the table.
"Sh-h!" she said, coming up into the room and advancing upon him with her finger to her lips. "Who are you?" she added in Greek.
He was about to answer that he was the steward, in spite of the obvious injustice of such a query, when the outer door leading to the deck was opened and the young man named Amos appeared with a tray of dishes. He stepped into the little pantry to set down his burden and then made a profound obeisance.
"Tch!" said the lady, "Who is this?"
"The pantryman, Madama."
"Tell him to fill my lamp with oil."
"Your lamp, Madama?" quavered the steward. "Is Madama in the Captain's room? I have not been told."
Evanthia beckoned Amos and pointed down the stairs. "The room on the right," she said. "Fill the lamp with oil and light it. Make the bed. Go!"
She watched him descend.
"Now," she said to the steward, "is this the way you attend to passengers? Bring me some meat. I am starving."
"Yes, yes! In a moment, Madama." He hurried to and fro, twisting the end seat for her to take it, dashing into his pantry and bringing out dishes, a cruet, a napkin. Evanthia seated herself and began to devour a piece of bread. She watched the steward as he moved to and fro.
"Where is the captain?" she asked.
"In his room, Madama. He has eaten and now he sleeps till midnight."
"And the officer?"
"He is on the bridge, Madama."
"Who eats here?"
"The officer and the engineer."
"Is the Engineer English?"
"Maltese, Madama."
The man spoke in low, respectful tones, his eyes flickering up and down as he sought to scan her features. This was most marvellous, he was thinking. The new chief officer brings a woman, a ravishing creature, on board in secret. This explains the abuse of the morning. What would the captain say? He must tell Plouff. He had mentioned to Plouff the singular behaviour of the chief officer when he, the steward, had attempted to enter that gentleman's cabin. Plouff had laughed and pushed him out of the road. It was time to call Plouff to relieve the chief officer. He hurried to the galley to fetch the stew. He lifted the canvas flap which screened the lights from a seaward view and found Plouff seated in a corner talking to the cook.
"Hi, Jo," he whispered, "Madama on sheep! Madama on sheep! Yes."
"What's the matter with you?" demanded Plouff disdainfully. "What are you makin' that funny face for?"
"She come oop," went on the steward with much dramatic illustration. "I look, see Madama. You savvy? Very nice. Very beautiful."
"Has she come out?" asked Plouff with interest.
"Yaas. She come oop."
"I'll go up and tell the mate," said Plouff. "You savvy, Nicholas, plenty mon' if you look after her. Fix her up. The mate, you savvy?" and Mr. Plouff rubbed the sides of his two forefingers together, to indicate the tender relations existing between Mr. Spokesly and the lady.
"Oh, yaas, I savvy all right, Jo." The steward writhed in his impotence to express the completeness of his comprehension, and hurried away.
Mr. Spokesly listened in silence to the news.
"I'll go down," he said. "If you see a light of any sort, stamp on the deck."
"Well, I should think so. I ain't likely to stand on my head, am I?" said Plouff, peeping at the compass.
Mr. Spokesly went down without replying to this brilliant sally. He stood for a moment looking over the rail at the sullen end of the sunset, a smudge of dusky orange smeared with bands of black and bronze, and wondered what the night would bring for them all. The little ship was moving slowly through a calm sea that shone like polished black marble in the sombre light from the west. Ahead, the sky and sea merged indistinguishably in the darkness. No light showed on the ship. She moved, a shadow among shadows, with no more than a faint hissing rumble from her engines. Mr. Spokesly moved aft, inspired by a wish to see for himself if all the scuttles were screened. He found the engineer smoking near the engine hatch.
"All dark?" he said, pausing.
"Everything's all right here, Mister Mate," said the man, a quiet creature with an unexpected desire to give every satisfaction. Mr. Spokesly was puzzled to account for the captain's dislike of Mr. Cassar.
"Why don't you go and eat?" asked Mr. Spokesly.
"The steward, he tell me there's a lady in the cabin, Mister Mate, so I t'ink I'll wait till she feenish."
"You don't need to," was the steady answer.
"Yes, I wait till she feenish, all the same."
"Very well. Mind they keep the canvas over the hatch. It shows a long way across a smooth sea, you know."
"I watch 'em, Mister Mate."
And Mr. Spokesly went forward again. In spite of the gravity of their position, without guns or escort, he felt satisfied with himself. He passed once more by the rail before going in. In his present mood, he was mildly concerned that Evanthia should have found it necessary to "turn the key in his face." He didn't intend to do things that way. It would be pretty cheap taking an advantage like that. Was it likely he would run all this risk for her, if that was all he thought of her? He was painfully correct and logical in his thoughts. Well, she would learn he was not like that. He would treat her decently, and when they reached Piræus, he would carry out her wishes to the letter. He could not help worrying about the day or two they would remain in Phyros. She would have to keep out of sight.... He opened the cabin door and went in. He had a strange sensation of walking into some place and giving himself up, only to find that he had forgotten what he had done. A strange notion!
She looked up and regarded him with critical approval. She had finished eating and sat with her chin in her hands. The swinging lamp shed a flood of mellow light upon her, and her arms, bare to the elbow, gleamed like new ivory below the shadowy pallor of her face. And as he sat down at the other end of the table, facing her, he had another strange notion, or rather a fresh unfolding of the same, that at last they met on equal ground, face to face, measured in a mysterious and mystical antagonism. She lifted her chin, a movement of symbolical significance, and met his gaze with wide-open challenging amber eyes.
And when he went up on the bridge half an hour later, she expressed a charming and sudden desire to see the things he did there, and the mystery of the night.
"You'll be cold," he muttered, thinking of the night air. He led her carefully up the little ladder, and she shivered.
"Bos'," said Mr. Spokesly in a low tone. "Have you got an overcoat?"
"Of course I have. What do you think I am?" demanded the rather tired Plouff.
"You wouldn't if you had had to jump into the water as I did," said Mr. Spokesly patiently. "I want you to bring it up here for this lady."
"Of course I will. Why didn't you say so?"
"You can sit here," said the chief officer. There was a seat at each end of the bridge screened by a small teak house with glass windows, and he pushed Evanthia gently into the starboard one. "And now put this on," he added when Plouff appeared holding out an enormous mass of heavy blue cloth.
And into that dark corner she vanished, so obliterated by the coat that only by leaning close to her could Mr. Spokesly discern the gleam of her forehead and eyes. But when he had seen that she was comfortable, he took himself to the centre of the bridge and stood there looking out over the dodger and thinking of the question she had put to him in the cabin. By and by, she had retorted upon his avowal of independence, he would go back to his sweetheart, his fiancée, in England, and what would Evanthia do then? That was the question. He stared into the darkness and sought some kind of an answer to it. It cut to the very quick of his emotion for her—that extraordinary sentiment which can exist in a man's heart without impairing in any way his authentic fidelities. He wanted to make her see this, and he could not find words adequate to express the subtle perversity of the thought. He had a sudden fancy she was laughing at him and his clumsy attempts to justify his devotion. He turned and walked over to her and bent down. He could see the bright eyes over the immense collar of the coat.
"England is a long way away," he whispered. "I mean, very distant. Perhaps I shall never get back. And nobody writes to me. No letters. So, while I am here, you understand?"
He remained bent over her, his head lost in the darkness of the little recess, waiting for a reply which did not come. And he thought, going away to the binnacle again:
"She is right. Nobody can excuse themselves in a case like this. The only way is to say nothing at all."
He did not go near her for a long while. Then an idea came to him, so simple he wondered he had not thought of it before. He was not making the most of the situation. He glanced back at the helmsman. He was far back, behind the steering wheel, and the faint glow of the binnacle lamp was screened by a canvas hood. Mr. Spokesly bent over the girl again.
"You do not believe me?" he muttered. "You think I am not sincere? You think I would leave you?"
He leaned closer, watching her bright deriding eyes, and she nodded.
"Ah yes," she sighed. "By and by you would go."
"You think because other men do that ... you think...?"
She nodded emphatically.
"... all men alike?" he finished lamely.
"They are!" she said quickly and laid her head against his shoulder for a moment with a faint chuckle of laughter.
"All right," he whispered gravely, "they are, as you say. But when we get ashore in Athens, we will get married. Now then...."
His tone was low but triumphant. She could have no reply to that. It swept away all doubts in his own mind: and he thought her mind was like his own, a lumber room of old-fashioned, very dusty conventions and ideals. If he married her she must be convinced of his sincerity. It did not occur to him that women are not interested very much in the sincerity of a man, that he can be as unfaithful as he likes if he fulfills her conception of beauty and power and genius, that a woman like Evanthia might have a different notion of marriage from his own.
And she did not reply. He moved away from her, up-lifted by the mood of the moment. There could be no reply to that save surrender, he thought proudly.
And Evanthia was astonished. She sat there in the darkness, bound upon a journey which would bring her, she believed, to the amiable and faithless creature who had touched her imagination and who embodied for her all the gaiety and elegance of Europe. And this other man, a man of a distant, truculent, and predatory race, a race engaged in the destruction of European civilization as a sacrifice to their own little tribal god (which was the way Lietherthal had explained it to her) was proposing to marry her. It bereft her of speech because she was busy coördinating in her swift, shrewd mind all the advantages of such a scheme. There was an allurement in it, too. Her imagination was caught by the sudden vision of herself as the chatelaine of a villa. Yes! Her eyes sparkled as she figured it. He came towards her again and, leaning over, buried his face in the clean fresh fragrance of her hair. She remembered that magical moment by the White Tower when he had transcended his destiny and muttered hoarsely that he would go to hell for her. She put the question to herself with terrible directness—could she hold him? Could she exercise the mysterious power of her sex upon him as upon men of her own race? She closed her eyes and sought blindly for an accession of strength in this crisis of her life. She put her arms up and felt his hand on her face. And then, giving way to an obscure and primitive impulse, she buried her teeth in his wrist. And for a long while they remained there, two undisciplined hearts, voyaging through a perilous darkness together.
Mr. Spokesly, looking down from the bridge at the up-turned and uncompromising face of Joseph Plouff, frowned.
"What does he say?" he repeated uneasily.
"He says keep the course."
"You gave him the note?"
"No, he didn't open the door. He just said, to keep the course. I said 'You mean, don't alter it, Captinne?' and he said, 'No.'"
Plouff handed up the note Mr. Spokesly had given him, and the puzzled chief officer took it and opened it, as though he had forgotten or was uncertain of its contents. But before he read it afresh, he took a look round. This told him nothing for he was entirely lost in a white fog that rolled and swirled in slow undulating billows athwart the ship's bows. For four hours he had been going through this and the captain had not made his appearance on the bridge. Each time had come up the same message, to keep the course. And at last Mr. Spokesly had written a little note. He had torn a page out of the scrap-log and written these words:
To Captain RannieSir,We have run our distance over this course. Please give bearer your orders. Weather very thick.R. Spokesly.Mate.
To Captain Rannie
Sir,
We have run our distance over this course. Please give bearer your orders. Weather very thick.
R. Spokesly.Mate.
And he hadn't even opened the door. It was this singular seclusion which caused Mr. Spokesly so much anxiety. Fog, and the captain not on deck! Plouff, whose presence was an undeniable comfort for some reason or other, pulled himself up the steep little ladder and stood staring lugubriously into the fog.
"Funny sort of old man, this," muttered the mate.
"He's always the same at sea," said Plouff, still staring.
"What? Leaves it to the mate?"
"Yes. Always."
"But...." Mr. Spokesly looked at the fog, at Plouff, at the binnacle, and then hastily fitted himself into the little wheel-house. He bent over the chart with a ruler and pair of dividers, spacing first a pencilled line drawn from Cape Kassandra to a point a few miles south of Cape Fripeti on the Island of Boze Baba, and then along the scale at the edge of the chart.
"See what's on the log, Bos', will you?" he called.
This was serious. Within a few minutes the course ought to be altered to due south. The usual four knots of theKalkishad been exceeded owing to the smoothness of the sea, which accounted for their arrival at this position before six o'clock, when the captain would once more take charge. Another thing was that from now on they would be on the course of warships passing south from the great base at Mudros, the land-locked harbour of Lemnos. The bosun came up again and reported thirty miles from noon. Well, the log was about ten per cent. fast, so a note said in the night order book. It was five-thirty now, which gave them twenty-seven miles from noon or nearly five knots. That brought them due south of Fripeti.
Mr. Spokesly looked at Plouff, who was looking at the fog with an expression of extreme disillusion on his round face. And again at the chart. There was nothing more to be extracted from either Plouff or the chart. The pencilled line which indicated their course ended abruptly. Where, then, were they bound? Keep on the course, the captain said. Mr. Spokesly laid the parallel ruler against the line and produced it clear across the chart. He stood up with a sharp intake of breath and regarded the impassive Plouff, who looked down at the chart with respectful curiosity.
"Say, Bos'," he began. "This is a funny business."
"What's a funny business?" demanded Plouff, looking round, as though expecting to see something of an extremely comical nature being performed. The pause gave Mr. Spokesly time to reflect. He cleared his throat.
"The Old Man staying down there. He ought to ... but then he says keep...."
"'Hold her on the course,' were his words," said Plouff obstinately, adding, "Hasn't she got a clear road?"
"Yes ..." muttered the mate jerkily, "road's clear ... humph!" he stared at the chart. "Oh, well! By George, I wish this damn fog would clear away."
"What's the matter with the fog?" said Plouff. "We're safe in the fog, ain't we? You can bet themunterseeboats'll keep in under the islands this weather. Too much chance o' gettin' stove in," he added sympathetically. The mate did not reply for a moment. He was very uneasy. He studied the chart. Indeed, he could not get away from that pencilled line running right into the Gulf of Smyrna. And Phyros was south of Khios. He was tired and sleepy. Eight hours was a long while to stay on the bridge. He would be glad when they got in.Got in where?He stared again at the chart. And the Old Man locked in his room. Always did that, eh?
"Go away, Bos'," he said, suddenly. "You got to be about to-night, you know. We'll be anchoring...."
He forgot what he was saying, staring hard at the chart. Plouff slipped down into the fog and clattered away forward.
But Mr. Spokesly was not unhappy. There was an unfamiliar yet desirable quality about this life. The sharp flavour of it made one forget both the ethical and economic aspects of one's existence. At the back of his mind was a boyish desire to show that girl what he was made of. And when they got to Athens he would——Athens! The word sent him back to the chart. Keep on the course. He was sailing across a wide ocean and the old familiar landmarks were hull down behind the fog. There was something symbolic in that fog. It was as though he had indeed left the world of his youth behind, the world of warm English hearts, of cantankerous affections and dislikes, of fine consciences and delicate social distinctions, and was passing through a confusing and impalpable region of vaporous uncertainty to an unknown country. He was not unhappy. The future might be anything, from silken dalliance behind green jalousies in some oriental villa with a fountain making soft music, which is the food of love, to a sudden detonation, red spurts of savage flame, and a grave in a cold sea. He went out and looked at the compass. And at the fog. Now that Plouff was gone down he felt lonely. He stamped on the deck to call the steward. The captain would have to be called. If he did not come, he, the mate, would go down and inform him that the course would be changed without him. That would be the only way. He had never had a commander like this, nor a voyage like this, for that matter. He paused suddenly in his thoughts and looked down, pinching his lower lip between finger and thumb. He had an idea. To achieve anything, one had to be eternally prepared for just such unexpected predicaments. Here he was, with an invisible commander and an invisible horizon. And down in a cabin below him was Evanthia Solaris, a distinct and formidable problem. He was going to marry her. He saw his destiny, almost for the first time in his life, as a ball which he could take in his hand and throw. And the direction and distance depended entirely upon his own strength, his own skill, his own fortitude. He was going to marry her. And he saw another thing for the first time—that marriage was of no significance in itself for a man. What he is, brain and sinew, character and desire, is all that counts. He saw this because he had left the old life behind beyond the fog. Back there, marriage was a contrivance for the hamstringing and debasing of men, a mere device for the legal comfort and security of women who were too lazy or incompetent or too undesirable to secure it for themselves. Ahead he had a strange premonition that he was going to have a novel experience.
He was.
He was aroused by the helmsman reaching out and striking four soft blows on the little bronze bell hanging by the awning-spar over the binnacle. Six o'clock. And the young Jew, in a huge apron and a high astrakhan cap he had picked up somewhere, came slowly up the bridge ladder.
"Captain," said Mr. Spokesly, making a number of motions to signify knocking at a door and calling somebody out. "Savvy?"
The frightened creature, who was quite unable to comprehend the extraordinary phenomenon of the fog on the sea, and who regarded Mr. Spokesly, moreover, as a species of demi-god, raised his remarkable face as though in supplication, and backed down again. It was evident to him that his employer had consigned him to some distant place of torment from which he could never return. Yet even in his timid heart there was hope. Already he had given his allegiance to that beautiful and haughty creature whose cabin it was his trembling joy and pride to put in order. His ears were alert at all times to catch the sharp clapping sound of her hands when she needed him, and then he flew below. She would speak to him in his native tongue, which was Spanish, and ravish his soul with words he could understand, instead of the terrifying gutturals of those powerful Franks who walked to and fro on the top of the tower above them and gave incomprehensible commands.
"Fear not," she assured him. "When the ship reaches the port, thou shalt go with me as my servant. The lieutenant shall give thee money as wages when he is my husband."
"Merciful Madama, what port? Whither do we go? Is it beyond the clouds?"
"Ah," she retorted, leaning back on the cushions of the settee, and blowing cigarette-smoke from her beautiful lips. "I would like to know that myself. Beyond the clouds? You mean this fog. Yes, far beyond the clouds. Did you not hear anything at all in the Rue Voulgaróktono?"
"Nothing, Madama, except that once I heard Señor Dainopoulos tell Señor Malleotis that they, someone, had reached Aidin."
"Aiee?" ejaculated Evanthia, sitting up and fixing her burning amber eyes on the frightened and hypnotized creature. "And didst thou hear nothing else? Aidin! Tchk!"
"I do not know, Madama," he quavered. "Unless there is a port called Bairakli."
Evanthia showed her teeth in a brilliant smile and patted the youth's arm.
"My servant you shall be," she chuckled. "No, there is no port called Bairakli, but it is near to a city you and I will find good. Shalt live at Bairakli, Amos! Tck—tck! What a fool I was. Oh! Caro!Oh mein lieber Mann!" And she sang sweetly a few notes of a song.
The young man stared at her in stupefaction.
"Go," she said, pushing him with a characteristic gesture, at once brusque and charming. "You need have no fear. Your fortune is made."
A few minutes past six Captain Rannie climbed the bridge ladder and examined the compass without addressing his chief officer, bending over it with an exaggerated solicitude. Apparently satisfied, he went into the chart room and immediately pushed the ruler from its significant position, pointing into the interior of Asia Minor. There was an indefinable nervous bounce about him which indicated a highly exalted state of mind. He seemed, Mr. Spokesly imagined, to be assuming truculence to cover timidity. He probably knew that his insistence on keeping the course had aroused conjecture, and the ruler, lying as it did on the chart, confirmed the idea. Yet he did not speak. Funking, Mr. Spokesly decided, obstinately remaining close to the dodger and staring straight ahead—towards Asia Minor. If the Old Man thought he was going to get away with it ... he cleared his throat and remarked:
"About time to change the course for Phyros, sir?"
And to his surprise Mr. Spokesly, in the midst of his highly complex cogitations, found himself listening to a jaunty and characteristic monologue which touched upon—among other things—the one rule which Captain Rannie insisted was thesine qua nonof a good officer, that he should accept the commander's orders without comments. Otherwise, how could discipline be maintained? As to the course, he, Captain Rannie, would attend to that immediately. And while he appreciated it, of course, there was no real need for Mr. Spokesly to remain on the bridge after he had been relieved.
Mr. Spokesly, still looking ahead, wanted to say sarcastically, "Is that so?" but he was tongue-tied, dumfounded. Here was a man, apparently of straw, who was jauntily inviting him to clear out and mind his own business. He pulled himself together.
"Unless we pick up a Mudros escort somewhere round here," he muttered, turning away.
Captain Rannie came out of the chart room from which his lean and cadaverous head had been projecting to deliver his homily on obeying orders, and looked all round at the white walls of fog. It was as though he were contemplating some novel but highly convenient dispensation of Providence which he was prepared to accept as one of the minor hardships of life. All consciousness of Mr. Spokesly's presence seemed to have vanished from his mind. He spoke to the helmsman, walked to port and looked down at the water, looked aft and aloft, and resumed his stroll.
And Mr. Spokesly, craftily placed at a disadvantage, turned suddenly and clattered down the ladder.
"Well," he thought to himself, pausing on the deck below and still holding to the hand-rail, "he can't keep it up for ever. And I can't do anything in this fog. He's going to pile her up."
But as he went into the saloon he could not help asking himself, "What for?" What gain had Captain Rannie or Mr. Dainopoulos in view when they ran a valuable cargo on the rocky shores of Lesbos or Anatolia? The word "ran" stuck in his mind. "Running a cargo" in war-time, eh? One didn't run cargoes on the rocks, in war-time. He stared so fixedly at Amos, who was laying the table, that in spite of Evanthia's assurance of future good fortune, the poor creature trembled and grew pale. Mr. Spokesly understood neither Greek nor Spanish, or he might have derived some enlightenment from a conversation with the young Jew. He frowned and went on down to his cabin. He wanted sympathy in his anxiety. And it was part of his Victorian and obsolete mental equipment to expect sympathy from a woman.
She was standing before the little mirror, setting the immense tortoise-shell comb into her hair at the desired angle, and she gave herself a final searching scrutiny, as she turned away, before flashing a dazzling smile at him.
"What is the matter?" she asked in her precise English, seeing the worried expression on his face. He sat down on the settee, and she seated herself close beside him, smiling with such ravishing abandon that he forgot the reason for his concern.
"If I can only get you ashore," he muttered, holding her to him and kissing her hair.
"Where?" she whispered, watching him with her bright amber eyes.
"That's just it," he said. "I don't know where."
She put her finger to her lips.
"I know," she said.
He put his hands on her shoulders and held her away a little, staring at her.
"You!" he breathed incredulously. "You?"
She nodded, her eyes kindling.
"Here," he said hoarsely. "You must be straight with me, dear. Tell me what you know. The captain, he's very funny to-day."
"Ismir!" she called into his ear in a ringing tone. "Beautiful, beautiful Ismir!"
"What's that you're talking about?" he demanded doubtfully. "I don't understand."
"No? Soon you will understand, when we reach Ismir."
"I've never heard of it," he declared. "But I can tell you, if the Old Man don't alter the course, we're going straight into Smyrna."
"Ah, yes," she sighed. "I remember now. You call it that. We call it Ismir, Turkish place. When I was little, little girl, we arrive there, my fazzer and my muzzer. Oh, beautiful! The grand hotels, thebains, theplage, thequais, the mountains, thecafés-chantant.Aiee!And Bairakli! I will show you. I was little, thirteen years old." She laughed, a soft throaty chuckle, on his shoulder, at some reminiscence. "Ismir!Oh mein lieber Mann!"
She intoxicated him with her bewildering moods, with her trick of recalling to his memory his early dreams of beautiful women, those bright shadows of unseen enchantresses which had tortured and stimulated his boyish thoughts. But he could not refrain from returning to the serious problem of how she knew so accurately the intentions of his commander.
"The captain tell you?" he asked expectantly. Her brow grew dark and a blankness like a film came over her eyes.
"I do not like yourcapitaine," she muttered. "He is like an old woman. Look at his face. And the silver ring on his wrist. Like an old vulture, his head between his shoulders. Look at him. He never lifts his eyes. Do not speak of him. But hear me now. When we reach Ismir, we will have a house, you and me, eh?"
He stared at her, entranced, yet preoccupied with the overwhelming difficulties of his situation.
"Oh,mon cher, you do not know how beautiful it is. The most beautiful city in the world."
"But how did you know? Why didn't you tell me? Did Mrs. Dainopoulos tell you?"
"Ssh! Madame Dainopoulos is an angel. She like you an' me very much. But Monsieur Dainopoulos, he say to me, if I want to see my friends in Pera, by and by there is a ship. You understand? An' then, here on the ship, I hear somesing. Oh, tell me,mon cher, what time we arrive at Ismir?"
He was hardly listening to her, so busy were his thoughts with the vista opening out before him. He was vaguely conscious that he was passing through a crisis, that Fate had suddenly laid all her cards on the table and was watching him, with bright amber eyes, waiting for him to make out what those cards portended. Here, she seemed to say, is everything you have ever dreamed of, adventure, romance, and the long-imagined pleasures of love.