Cheerlessthough the underground prison might be, it offered a respite from further journeying, and for the moment the captives could think of nothing else. Exhausted by the long night spent in tramping through the rain, the girls asked only for rest, and a sack of corn for pillow, with a rug for coverlet, furnished as luxurious a couch as they could need. They were asleep in a moment, and Maurice envied them. He had chosen his own sleeping-place close to the door, but he could not rest until he had built up the boxes and sacks into a barricade which might shelter the girls from prying eyes. It seemed to him that the noise he made would wake anybody, but Zoe and Eirene never stirred, and he erected a very fair partition, and retired thankfully to his own sack and rug on the threshold. He was not allowed to sleep, however, for a beam of light appeared at the other end of the cellar, and a voice called him. Rising with much reluctance, he found that a board of the crazy flooring above had been lifted, and a basket containing writing materials was being lowered down, while Milosch instructed him through the hole as to the terms of the letter he was to write to Wylie. The circumstances might excuse a certain acerbity in the wording, and Maurice was conscious of a savage satisfaction as he added his postscript, scarcely able to see, so drowsy was he. Even when he had finished his letter, it was sent down to him again that the girls might add their signatures, and he was obliged to wake them in turn, and actually guide their hands over the paper. Then at last he was left in peace, and lay down and slept for eight hours without waking. It was the girls’ voices that roused him at last. He could hear them talking.
“Do you think they mean to starve us?” murmured Eirene.
“I don’t know. I’mfrightfullyhungry,” returned Zoe.
The suggestion reminded Maurice that he was very conscious of the pangs of hunger himself, but it was difficult to see how the fact was to be brought home to the brigands. On testing the door by repeated knocks, he found that it was still blocked up on the outside, and he had nothing with which to reach the ceiling, and so disturb the floor of the room above. In these circumstances, the bright idea seized him of rolling about some of the empty jars, which made a most satisfactory noise, and presently the board was lifted again, and Milosch ordered the prisoners angrily to be quiet. When the state of things was explained, he deigned to parley, assuring them that it only wanted half an hour to sunset, and that as soon as it was twilight they should be released and bountifully fed, but that for the present they must keep absolute silence, if they valued their lives. The reason for this became apparent in the course of one of the longest half-hours they had ever spent, when the boards above rattled with the not very distant sound of regular tramping.
“That’s Wylie and his army going home,” said Maurice. “Fancy their being so close to us! I suppose we must have come back quite near the village we passed through last night. If the old chap only knew!”
The sound of the tramping died away, the dim religious light which filtered through the chinks between the boards vanished altogether, and they waited in darkness until there was a welcome noise at the door. The fodder which had concealed it was being flung away, and they were ordered to come out. Passing from the noisome stable, they were hurried through the yard into the house, and while room was made for Maurice in the jovial circle of brigands who occupied the stone divans in a large ground-floor room, deeply interested in the extensive cooking operations going on over and before an enormous fireplace, the girls were taken up into the tower they had already visited, and handed over to the women of the family. The grandmother and two or three elderly dependants were doing the cooking downstairs, where also were the men of the house, acting as more or less willing hosts to the brigands, but there were matrons and girls and children enough to make the household a puzzle in relationships. The women were shy at first, but when they saw by the rays of their primitive lamp the plight of their guests they forgot their timidity. They bathed and bound up their wounded feet, pressed upon them clean head-handkerchiefs and the loose embroidered shirts they themselves wore on feast-days, and brought them a plentiful supply of food. After the meal they made them comfortable with loose sheepskins upon the divans, and sat upon the floor to make conversation. The girls had picked up something of the language by this time—Eirene helping herself out with Scythian words—and an abundant use of gesture helped towards mutual comprehension. The prisoners were able to indicate the names of their respective countries, the manner of their capture, and their wanderings since that event, while the women expressed their pity and sympathy, together with their unbiassed opinion of the brigands.
That was the first of five nights passed in the tower, the days being spent underground, and the curious relations of the brigands with the rural population became manifest. The peasant-farmer had the privilege of providing the brigand with food, clothes, shelter if he demanded it, and intelligence of the doings of the authorities, in return for which he received protection against rival bands, and was secured against wilful damage to his property, while the brigands winked at the prompt disappearance of every article of value from the house and from the dress of the women when a visit from them was expected. There was no love lost between protectors and protected, guests and hosts, for the women had much to say of the ruthless demands of the brigands for food and clothing when the family had barely enough for themselves, and laughed at their boast of plundering only the rich. Money they took from the rich alone, certainly, but if the poor man, who had no money, tried to hide his last sheep to save it from their clutches, he might be thankful if he escaped with his life. With all this, the family were discussing—with as little constraint as if the priesthood had been the career in question—whether the eldest son of one of its numerous branches should become a brigand instead of submitting to the vicissitudes of rural life. Brigandage was the best profession for an active young man, it was generally agreed, and it was both a protection and a distinction to have a relation in a well-known band, but it gave the authorities a pretext for additional exactions, and if the long course of serving two masters should happen to end unfortunately, it was not desirable for the chief to have at hand a hostage for the conduct of the family. Not that the authorities could do much harm to a band like Stoyan’s, declared the grandmother, who was the chief advocate of brigandage as a career, for Stoyan had his own agent, receiving a regular salary, among the underlings of the Vali himself, who sent him early news of any offensive action that might be contemplated. It was only when troublesome foreigners rushed things, as Wylie had done, that the arrangement broke down.
All these things Zoe stored up in her mind for Maurice’s benefit, against the time when he should appear as the Michael who was to deliver Emathia from oppression on the one side and lawlessness on the other. It struck her as almost overpoweringly pathetic that when the women learned that her father and mother were both dead, they should ask, scarcely waiting for a reply, “The Roumis killed them, of course?” but the effect was spoilt when she discovered that they regarded the inhabitants of a Greek-speaking village near them with a hatred as rancorous as that which they cherished towards the Moslems whose name they never mentioned without a curse. It was the irony of fate that the last representatives of Greek ascendency should be dependent on these fanatical Slavs for the commonest offices of kindness, but what hope was there of reconciling the divergent elements? “If one could spend a lifetime travelling about the country, and getting to know the people personally, there might be some chance,” thought Zoe; “but even if there was the time to spare, the jealousy of the Powers would prevent it.” She was sitting on the divan, wearing the best clothes of one of the women, who was adding a border of brown homespun to the much-patched grey skirt, and the woman looked up and smiled at her. Eirene, who had refused any help rather abruptly, was sitting close to the lamp, mending her own skirt, having left Zoe to explain, with much futile gesticulation, that her sister was very independent, and would insist on doing everything for herself. “I wonder what would happen if I could make them understand who we are?” thought Zoe, but she did not try it.
The days in the underground dungeon were long and trying, for the absence of light prevented the girls from having recourse even to needlework, and much as they needed rest, they could not sleep all day as well as all night. On the second day they organised a mutual entertainment society, or rather Zoe did her part without being asked, and worried the others into doing theirs. She led off, and also filled up gaps, with a serial story of such length and complexity that there seemed no reason for it ever to come to an end, of which Maurice remarked ungratefully that he knew now why no publishers would have anything to do with her novels; they feared for their reason if they were once drawn into examining them. Eirene told Scythian folk-tales, gathered from her nurses in the very early years before she was afflicted with English, French, and German governesses simultaneously, and Maurice drew on his store of Cambridge stories, which was running very low before the imprisonment ended.
It was not until the sixth day after their night of wandering that they left the farm, and though the Roumi troops had presumably quitted the district, they were conducted away with as much precaution as had been observed in reaching it. Zoe suggested that the brigands feared their eyes might suffer from the daylight after such a long deprivation of it, and that this was the reason for blindfolding them afresh, for they actually quitted the place without having seen it, or the faces of the inhabitants, by any but artificial light. The women expressed their condolence and pity loudly, and would have loaded them with more gifts of food and clothes than they could well carry, but the brigand chief interfered. They had a long march before them, he said, and no one was going to carry the prisoners’ parcels for them. The gifts were therefore reduced to their smallest dimensions, and the start was made, each of the helpless captives walking between two of the brigands. To their relief, the track was neither so steep nor so rough as the one they had followed in reaching the farm, and after two hours’ walking, their guards removed the handkerchiefs from their eyes. To their weakened sight, all appeared dark even then, and it was only by degrees they distinguished that they were in a thick forest, the trees arching over the narrow path on which they stood. They were allowed little time to accustom themselves to the half-light, for the march was continued at once, the trend of the path being uniformly upward, but the ascent fairly gradual. A brief rest at midday was welcomed by the girls, who were already flagging, much to the annoyance of the brigands, and a hasty consultation took place between Stoyan and his lieutenants. As a result, it was evidently decided not to attempt to push on as far as had been intended, for the pace was less severe when they started again, and the halt for the night was called in a small clearing as early as four o’clock in the afternoon.
Adversity had done wonders in teaching the girls to bear their part in a backwoods life, and Maurice was no longer left to construct the usual hut by himself. He cut the poles and fixed them in the ground, but Zoe and Eirene twisted in and out the smaller branches which formed both roof and sides, and collected leaves and twigs for beds. Eirene was openly proud of her handiwork, but for Zoe it was associated with a regretful thought of Wylie. “What a lot of trouble we used to give him at first!” she mused; “and we never offered to do anything for ourselves. He must have thought us disgustingly helpless.” The recollection that if Wylie had thought so, he had, at any rate, put a good face on the matter, afforded some comfort, and by a peculiar process of thought she derived consolation also from the reflection that on the whole it was better he should think so.
There were no kabobs to cook to-night, for the food brought from the farm supplied a plentiful supper, but the brigands lighted a fire for the sake of keeping off wild beasts and evil spirits, and sat round it in great contentment. The prisoners declined the offer of a fire of their own, and sat on the ground at the upper part of the clearing, luxuriously propped against tree trunks, to watch the sunset glow which pierced the black canopy of leaves and branches overhead. To Eirene it suggested similar sunsets seen through boughs of pine or birch on the great plains of Scythia, and as though the magic of the hour had unloosed her tongue, she began to talk of the long summer evenings, when there was scarcely any actual night, and she had donned peasant costume, and attended by the governess who happened to be in favour at the moment, joined in the games and dances of the peasant girls on her father’s estate. Maurice listened, fascinated, half by the suggestion of a new side to Eirene’s character, half by the conviction that in any disguise she would still infallibly be a queen among subjects. If the subjects were recalcitrant, so much the worse for them. He drew her on by questions, laughed at her answers, and owned that he wished he had been there to take part in the revels—a suggestion which served to jar upon Zoe, who had been sitting silent.
“I do wish,” she said, opening her eyes wearily, “you wouldn’t disturb my meditations in this frivolous way. You forget the literary exigencies of the moment.”
“What are they?” asked Maurice. “Is it particularly literary to go to sleep leaning against a tree?”
“I said I was meditating,” was the severe answer. “You seem to forget that as all my note-books have been heartlessly reft from me, I have to store up all our experiences in my head.”
“Ready for the book? Is it to be a plain tale—or a decorated one—or a novel?”
“Both,” said Zoe decisively. “I find it would be a waste of good material to lavish it all on one. The plain tale of our adventures and sufferings will sell like wildfire, and pay for the novel, which will be all local colour. I shall keep all the choice bits of folklore and that sort of thing for it.”
“I know you said once that people always skipped the local colour in reading a book,” objected Eirene.
“How can they, if it’s all local colour?”
“They needn’t read the book,” said Maurice.
“That’s why I shall need the success of the plain tale to pay for it,” returned Zoe calmly. “I shall have asuccès d’estimewith the novel. And after that, I shall never have to trouble about local colour again all my life.”
“I really believe,” came in accents of considerable irritation from Eirene, “that you enjoy being imprisoned in underground dungeons, and climbing up and down these atrocious hills with your skirts in ribbons, and wearing horrid moccasins because you have no shoes, and being cursed and threatened if you stop to rest for a moment, just because you mean to put it into your books.”
“No, I can’t say that I enjoy it, certainly—but I can’t help knowing how well it will look in the book.”
“You are mad upon your books!” said Eirene tartly. “If it was painting, or music, or anything of that kind, I could understand it, but mere novel-writing!”
“Of course you can’t understand it yet. Only wait until you have an object in life, and then you will.”
“How can you say I have not an object in life? Am I not suffering for it at this very moment?”
“You might have the politeness to say that the suffering isn’t so bad because we are here,” suggested Zoe.
“Oh, I am not skilful in putting things politely. I am not literary!” with deep contempt.
“And don’t you wish you were?” asked Maurice lazily.
“No, I am not like Zoe. She says that when she marries, the man must have fallen in love with her through reading her books.”
“And none of them are written yet? Well, my future brother-in-law has plenty of time to spare,” chuckled Maurice.
“Eirene, you are the very meanest——” began Zoe.
“Look here,” said Maurice hastily, “you’re both tired out, aren’t you? I was sure the march was too much for you. Let us all meditate if you think it’ll be restful. Or what do you think of turning in at once?”
“No,” said Eirene, “it is not that we are tired, it is that we are both cross. I was cross because Zoe always seems to think that if she has described a thing in suitable language it is all right—and besides, she said I had no object in life. Why were you cross, Zoe?”
“I don’t know—and,” added Zoe with emphasis, “I never knew that telling people they were cross made them less so.”
“But it’s part of Eirene’s system,” said Maurice. “Don’t you remember how we discussed it with Wylie quite a long time ago—her view that you ought never to mask disagreeable facts for the sake of other people’s feelings?”
“And you were all against me!” sighed Eirene. Later on, when she and Zoe had rolled themselves up in their rugs for the night, she recurred to the question.
“Zoe, why were you so angry? You could hardly speak. Did I say anything very dreadful?”
Zoe turned upon her with flashing eyes. “A girl who will tell a man what another girl said to her in private isn’t worthy the name of girl,” she said tersely.
“But Maurice! I never thought——”
“Maurice is a man, and men don’t understand. You seem to have had something left out of your composition, Eirene. You ought to know that sort of thing without thinking.”
“I suppose it is because I had no brothers and sisters and no friends of my own rank,” said Eirene, in a choking voice. “I think I would make almost any sacrifice for you and Maurice, and yet I do these dreadful things without even knowing they are dreadful.”
“Oh, don’t cry!” entreated Zoe anxiously. “I suppose it isn’t your fault, as you say. Lots of people would have an arm cut off for their relations, though they can’t manage not to say nasty things to them.”
“I would give up everything for you and Maurice—except my object in life,” repeated Eirene.
“How funny it would be if you found yourself called upon to give up just that!” mused Zoe aloud, and then realised with a shock that she was approaching dangerous ground.
“What do you mean?” asked Eirene quickly. “How could I be obliged to give that up for you?” and Zoe embarked hastily upon a lame and rambling explanation.
“Why, you see, it struck me suddenly that some one might make you choose between giving up—your object, and having us killed. The sort of thing that happens in a book, don’t you know? I don’t know what made me think of it; I suppose it was my literary mind, which you dislike so much. I can’t help it, I’m always like that. Whatever happens—or even little everyday things which are not happenings at all, simply chances for things to happen—my mind always jumps forward to the end, and I think of all sorts of developments, and they work themselves out on their own lines. You see, this situation is so full of possibilities——”
“But why that one? Why do you think of such fearful things?” moaned Eirene. Zoe, who hoped she had guided the conversation into the safe paths of literary disquisition, was obliged to begin again.
“Oh, it was only nonsense. How could such a thing happen? Whatever your object may be——”
“You shall judge,” said Eirene. “I will tell it you.”
“Oh, no!” cried Zoe, who was by no means anxious to find herself officially burdened with the secret she had discovered unaided. “Why, if there was no other reason, don’t you see that it might be safer for Maurice and me to know nothing if we were questioned? I mean—you don’t tell me what there is to be afraid of, but you seem to think there’s something. Surely, as you have kept your mouth shut so long, you had better do it still?”
“I suppose so,” agreed Eirene, with considerable hesitation. “But you understand—you know—that whatever happens, Maurice and you are my dear brother and sister, and nothing is to come between us?”
“If anything does, it won’t be on our side,” said Zoe heartily, and immediately wondered whether this was likely to be strictly true.
“It’sa church!” said Eirene, in tones of horror.
“Well, I suppose it was a church once, but it’s only a ruin now,” said Zoe. Another day of climbing had brought them out of the forest, and up to an isolated building standing on the saddle between two mountain-peaks, which they were informed was to be their dwelling for the present.
“But to live in it—it is sacrilege! And they say that we are to sleep behind theikonostasis!”
“Well, I think it’s rather nice of them. It has a roof, at any rate, and the rest of the church hasn’t much.”
“But it is the sanctuary, where no woman may even set foot! Let us tell them we refuse to enter.”
“And sleep out in the open, I suppose? No, thank you. Why, Eirene, the brigands wouldn’t do anything that they thought would make the saints angry, and they belong to the Greek Church just as much as you do.”
“They? They are miserable schismatics—followers of the upstart heretical church of Thracia, outcasts from Orthodoxy!” cried Eirene.
“Oh, do be quiet!” cried Zoe anxiously. “That new man whom Milosch brought with him to-day may understand English. I saw him staring hard at you when you were kissing all those old worn-out saints on the screen.”
“But what harm could it do if he did? These men know that they are schismatics.”
“Yes, but it isn’t natural that a Scythian girl should think them so. How will you account for your Greek sympathies?” A pause of horror, as Zoe realised what she had said, then she rallied her forces. “You know, the time for the ransom is getting so near now that I am feeling horribly nervous. How dreadful it would be if any of us did anything that made the brigands suspicious, so that they refused to let us go! Do be sensible, and let us be thankful we have this nice little place to ourselves.”
“Well, I shall sit outside as long as I can,” said Eirene obstinately. “I suppose I must come in when it gets dark, but I feel we shall deserve whatever may happen to us after this.”
Undisturbed by these religious, or superstitious, fears, Zoe went on with the work of preparing the room, on the threshold of which Eirene had been standing, declining to enter. It was the chancel, or apse, of the ruined church, and the half-dome which formed its roof was still in place, together with theikonostasis, or wooden screen painted with figures of saints, which separated it from the body of the building, though the plates of metal which had formerly represented haloes and details of clothing had been wrenched away. Beneath the steps which led up to the sanctuary from the church was an underground chamber, approached by a door and staircase on one side, and this was the only place where a fire could be made, lest the light or smoke should betray that the building was inhabited. The brigands were already lighting the fire, and the smoke dispersed itself by way of the staircase into the church, and penetrated through the cracks of the screen into the sanctuary. It seemed curious that the wild bands which made the place one of their haunts had not torn down the screen for firewood, but apparently their sacrilegious impulses had stopped short after depriving the saints of their haloes. Zoe went to work methodically, spreading on the stone floor for beds the pine-branches Maurice had cut, and unrolling the rugs. Maurice would sleep on the threshold, on the broad topmost step, and Zoe felt an unusual sense of comfort and security in the fact that this bare little room was to be their own for some days. The end of the captivity was in sight—for she entertained not the smallest doubt of the success of Wylie’s efforts—and from the ruined church they might hope to make their last journey as prisoners, to the spot where the ransom was to be paid.
“Well, I shall sit outside as long as I can,”said Eirene obstinately.
“Well, I shall sit outside as long as I can,”said Eirene obstinately.
Her work done, Zoe sat down to rest, too tired even to pass down the ruined nave and seek Eirene outside. Maurice was helping some of the brigands to cut firewood in the forest, Zeko and another man were in charge of the underground kitchen, and the rest were mending their moccasins or lounging idly in the church. It was not dark yet, and Zoe had accepted Eirene’s decision as unshakable, so that it was with surprise she saw her coming up the steps, and entering the sanctuary without protest or hesitation. Her face was aglow with hope, and she threw herself down on the rug beside Zoe.
“Zoe,” she whispered eagerly, “we have a friend. It is Vlasto, the man who came to-day with Milosch.”
“But have you been talking to him all this time? Oh, Eirene, suppose he is a spy!”
“No, listen. I was sitting outside, when he came up the hill with a bundle of wood. He stumbled and nearly fell, and called out in Scythian—not in the mixed language the others speak. Then he recollected himself, and looked round to see whether any one had heard. I thought it was curious, and spoke to him in Scythian, and he told me Professor Panagiotis had sent him.”
“The Professor? To Maurice?”
“No, to me. He guessed which I was when he saw me venerate theikons, and the stumble and the exclamation in Scythian were meant to draw my attention.”
“But how did the Professor know you were here?”
“I asked him that, but he did not seem to know—seemed to think that Professor Panagiotis had been expecting me as he had you, but I told him no. Then he said the Professor must have put two and two together when he heard I had disappeared, but he had not told him about it.”
“I hope it’s all right,” murmured Zoe doubtfully.
“What could there be wrong about it? He said that he was to warn me of a plan the Professor hoped to carry out—and that I should not go down to Therma with you when we are released, lest I should be recognised by some one belonging to the Scythian colony. But I refused to contemplate such a thing. I said I would not be separated from my faithful friends until we were all in safety.”
“Eirene, I don’t believe the man came from Professor Panagiotis at all!” cried Zoe. “I can’t imagine the Professor would choose a messenger who talked Scythian, and why should he send him to you instead of to us?”
The question in her mind was, naturally, whether the Professor could have changed his mind and be playing Maurice false, but to Eirene her doubt seemed the outcome of self-esteem wounded by an apparent slight.
“I must really explain things to you, Zoe,” she said, with a gentleness which she did not intend to be patronising. “I am Eirene Nicolaievna Féofan, and the Professor is intrusted with the honourable task of restoring to me the throne of my imperial ancestors.”
“Oh dear, yes, I know that,” said Zoe impatiently; “but why should he do such a foolish thing as to send messages about it to you now?”
“You knew?” gasped Eirene. “How?”
“Oh, the Professor had told us about you, and it came to me suddenly. You see, you fitted in with all that I knew of Eirene Féofan, and of nobody else.”
“Does Maurice know?”
“No, I’m sure he doesn’t, and there’s no reason why he should. Let us keep it to ourselves.”
“I particularly wish Maurice to be told,” said Eirene decisively. “If you won’t do it, I must.”
“Oh, I will,” cried Zoe quickly.
“Very well, then; as soon as possible, please. I am glad to put things on a right footing at last. If I had known and trusted you as I do now when we first met, I should have told you then, as I ought.”
“Good gracious, Eirene, don’t talk as if you were suddenly removed miles above us! We are ourselves, and you are yourself, just as before. I can promise you that your wonderful news won’t make any difference to us, and I have respect enough for your character to trust that it won’t to you.”
Eirene smiled in a puzzled way. “Perhaps you would have preferred me to follow the Professor’s advice, and say nothing to you?” she said.
“Did he tell you to say nothing to us?”
“That was his message by Vlasto, that I was not to reveal this scheme of his to you.”
“And you go and do it at once?”
“Professor Panagiotis has no control over my actions,” said Eirene, with dignity. “He may tender his advice, but it is for me to accept or reject it as I think well.”
“What could have been his reason?” mused Zoe.
“He also asked whether I had told you who I was, and entreated me to keep the secret if I had not. It made me feel that I was not treating you fairly—that a peasant should know what my trusted companions had not been told.”
“Did he cross-question you any more?” asked Zoe, too anxious to care much about Eirene’s mental perplexities.
“He was very eager to know whether all the family jewels I took with me when I escaped were hopelessly lost. It seems that the rubyplaque de corsagewas exposed for sale in Therma, and has since been destroyed—the one with the wings, you know. That made me very sad for a moment, but I was able to assure him that I had saved the most important of all.”
It was dark now, but she took Zoe’s hand and guided it over her skirt. “The girdle of the Empress Isidora,” she said, as Zoe’s fingers came in contact with something round and hard, once, again, some dozen times in all.
“Eirene, the weights you put in your skirt! you have had them there all this time? That was the reason you would never let any one touch it!” cried Zoe.
“Yes, I sewed them in that day when I made you go out for a walk at Przlepka. Doesn’t it seem a long time ago? I dared not hide them in my pockets. The girdle is the most precious thing in the world. It has been handed down in secret in my father’s family since the fall of Czarigrad.”
“But, Eirene, you had it—on you—when you told the brigands you had given up everything, and you let Captain Wylie swear that you had? He believed what you said.”
Eirene’s face showed perplexity. “Yes,” she said, “I know. Sometimes I have wished that I had not done it, when I saw how you and Maurice thought of such things. But then I remembered that I could not possibly have let it go, so I felt that there was nothing else to be done.”
“You are not really sorry,” said Zoe with severity. “If you were, I suppose you would give it up to the brigands now.”
“That is quite impossible,” said Eirene calmly.
“Well, you must have a funny sort of conscience. You are afraid something will happen to you because you have to sleep in a church, and yet you tell a deliberate lie without a qualm.”
“We need not have slept in the church. The other could not be avoided,” said Eirene.
“Well, I expect the something has happened already, through your talking to Vlasto. I feel more and more certain he is a spy, and no doubt he will manage to get the girdle from you somehow. Milosch is quite capable of having told him what to say.”
“But how should Milosch know who I am?”
“By putting two and two together, I suppose, like the Professor. Oh, Eirene, if you have kept us from being set free next week, I shall never—— Well, do you think that we could ever forgive you?”
“But it would be as bad for me.”
“I don’t know—perhaps not.” Eirene looked at her in wonder. “At any rate, you would have only yourself to blame.”
“Here is Maurice,” said Eirene. “Now remember.”
Very unwillingly Zoe obeyed her instructions, and succeeded in catching Maurice by himself the next morning.
“Eirene is particularly anxious that I should tell you something,” she said. “She is Eirene Féofan, the girl the Professor told us about, our very distant cousin, and the next heir after you and me.”
Maurice sat in stupefied silence for a moment. “Did you ever?” he remarked slowly at last. “To think that we have had her with us all this time without finding it out!”
“I found it out long ago,” said Zoe calmly.
“No, really? How?”
“Why, of course, I had been trying to place her ever since we first met. It was clear she came from Scythia, but I didn’t think she could belong to the Imperial family, for how could she have got away, and why should she be wandering about on a solitary mission? Then, one evening, in the cave, we were talking, do you remember? and it came out that she knew the Professor, and that she sympathised with the Greeks against the Slavs, and that she was expecting a kingdom in her own right. She simply couldn’t be any one but Eirene Féofan.”
“But I heard it all, and never twigged.”
“Oh, you were thinking of other things—of Eirene herself, and of ameliorating the lot of the brigands. I nearly exploded when she accused us of trying to find out who she was, and you declared so indignantly that we were doing nothing of the kind. It was after I had asked her a leading question.”
Maurice frowned. “Well, I suppose you have told her who we are?” he said.
“Certainly not, and I am not going to.”
“Then I shall.”
“No, you won’t. It wouldn’t be safe. You know what Eirene is—or, rather, you can’t tell what she will do. Only yesterday afternoon she made a confidant of that new brigand, Vlasto, and told him everything she could tell, just because he said he had been sent to her by Professor Panagiotis.”
“That’s just it. If she knew about us, she would realise that the Professor wouldn’t send to her. It isn’t fair, Zoe. It’s placing her under a disadvantage for us to know her secret while she doesn’t know ours.”
“Why, what difference would it make if she did?”
Maurice appeared to find a difficulty in answering. “Well, I should think she’d be rather pleased,” he said, after some hesitation, “to find that we were her equals and relations and that sort of thing, don’t you know?”
“My dear boy!” with superb scorn. “Do you know Eirene as little as that after all this time? Do you really think she would welcome us as relations and equals? You seem to forget that we stand for the ruin of all her schemes. She is simply not wanted if you are recognised as the heir.”
“Oh, I say, but this is vile!” cried Maurice. “To go and rob a poor girl of what she has always looked forward to as her own——! Look here, Zoe, let’s chuck it.”
“You forget the Professor,” said Zoe.
“Oh, blow the Professor! What did he mean by mixing things up in this way? Why couldn’t he have left Eirene alone, instead of feeding her up with the thought that she was the heir, and then bringing her here only to disappoint her? You don’t seem to see what a low business it is, or how much worse it makes it that we have got to know her and find out what it means to her.”
“I can quite see why the Professor might have brought her into contact with us, but unfortunately he didn’t. As far as I can make out, he dropped her father finally because he would do nothing but shilly-shally instead of taking action, but the father was indiscreet enough to let Eirene know about the offers that had been made him. She takes action on her own account, in a way which would have been most embarrassing for the poor Professor but for the railway accident. In the meantime he has found you, and thinks no more about Eirene. But if the train had reached Therma all right, we should probably have separated at the station only to meet upon the Professor’s doorstep, and he would have had to decide point-blank between his rival candidates.”
“You seem to be enjoying the whole thing,” said Maurice indignantly. “It doesn’t occur to you how much more it is to Eirene than to us. We have only to go home again if the thing doesn’t come off, but it’s everything to her. She has cut herself off entirely from her friends and everybody in Scythia, and she has no money, and even her jewellery is gone. What is she to do?”
“It all depends on whether you care more for Eirene’s feelings or for what you felt to be your duty when we started,” said Zoe. “You have heard her talk; you can imagine what sort of ruler she would make if any possible concurrence of disasters drove the Powers in desperation to revive the Empire for her. You know, too, the lines on which you would work if the task fell to you. Besides, it’s not a question of feeling, but of right.”
“I always heard that women were hard on women, but I didn’t think you were like that.”
Zoe restrained her anger with an effort. “My dear Maurice,” she said impatiently, “you compel me to remind you that there is one very simple and obvious way of reconciling your rights and Eirene’s. It is still open to you.”
“What are you suggesting?” demanded Maurice.
“I suggest nothing,” Zoe replied, with a wooden face.
“You are suggesting that I should be a cad.”
“Then I will add the further suggestion that you should not be an idiot,” said Zoe, thoroughly roused. “I merely want you to leave things as they are until we get to Therma. Then you can do as you like, and I fail to see where the caddishness comes in. But if we tell Eirene who we are now, she will simply regard us as impostors, and she will be utterly unmanageable. I have a stake in the matter as well as you, and I absolutely refuse to allow you to tell her. I own I do put a little value on my life.”
“I beg your pardon. I thought you meant that I was to try and make sure of her now, when she has no one else to turn to, and can’t get away from us.”
“Why will men always read detestable meanings into the simplest advice?” cried Zoe, still angry; then, softening, “Dear boy, do be sensible. What chance do you think you would have with Eirene as things are? Wait until she knows the truth, and can realise that it is not quite a case of Queen Cophetua and a beggar-man. But don’t risk all our lives, just when we are within a week of safety, by giving her the idea that you are either an impostor or a dangerous rival. I don’t suppose for a moment that she would mean to harm you, but she acts on impulse, and that makes her do all sorts of things. Why—I didn’t mean to tell you, because it seems to reflect on her—but she actually told this man Vlasto that she has carried about with her a priceless Byzantine girdle all this time, sewn up in pieces in her skirt.”
“But I thought she gave up everything when we were captured?” said Maurice.
“She said she did,” said Zoe reluctantly. “We were discussing whether she ought not to give it up to the brigands now. What do you think?”
“Oh, nonsense! It isn’t as if it belonged to the brigands,” said Maurice contemptuously. “But,” he changed the subject with an effort, “what about this man Vlasto? Why should he address himself to her?”
“That’s exactly what makes me think he doesn’t come from the Professor at all,” cried Zoe. “He evidently thought the Professor knew she was coming to Therma, and brought her a message based on that, but the Professor had no idea of her journey, or that she was with us.”
“Did she tell you what the message was?”
“It was to try to get her to separate from us when we are ransomed—on the plea that she might be recognised in Therma. Happily, she refused, but—— Maurice, you know it was Milosch who brought this man here. We thought, when we saw he was not with the band the day before yesterday, that he had gone to meet some members of his Committee, and get fresh orders. Suppose it was a Scythian agent he went to meet, and that Scythia had got the idea that Eirene might be here with us, and sent Vlasto to make sure? She has given everything away.”
“We mustn’t be seeing Scythians in every bush,” said Maurice gloomily, “but it looks bad. What can they want to get her away from us for? It can’t mean any good to her. Zoe, will you do your level best to keep her firm in sticking to us? You see, she is practically an outlaw, having cut herself off from Scythian protection, but if anything happened to you or me the matter would be looked into.”
“I will. And you won’t make any attempt to tell her who we are?”
“No. I see that it’s better not to disturb her mind.”
“It’sa dog’s life!” said Zeko, leaning against one of the columns of the deserted church, and rolling a cigarette.
“I should have thought you had rather a good time, on the whole,” said Maurice, who was sitting on the steps below theikonostasis. The girls sat on the top step behind him, looking out through the ruined west doorway, the lower part of which was blocked by the remains of the narthex. Rain was falling heavily, and they could not go out, but between the battered columns they could see the wild mountain landscape like a picture in a frame. Most of the brigands were luxuriating in the warmth of the underground kitchen, but the chief, with Milosch and Vlasto, had gone out into the rain some time before, and Zeko and one other were keeping an eye upon the prisoners.
“A good time!” repeated Zeko scornfully. “It’s hard work, and constant danger, and no comfort, and what does it lead to? Sometimes we pull off a good thing, as when we got hold of you, but what good will it do us? The Committee will take nearly all the money; it isn’t as if we could retire and settle down upon what we do get. It’s all very well to swagger through a village with your belt full of weapons, with all the girls pointing at you, and whispering, ‘There goes the valiant Zeko of Stoyan’s band,’ and all the lads wanting to join you, but it’s different when you come to the village, frozen and starving, on a winter’s night, and want food and shelter. The people dare not refuse you, but you can see their black looks, and you know they are cursing you under their breath. We say we don’t rob the poor, but they know, and we know, that our bags must be filled with bread, though the children go hungry, and we must have greatcoats, if we take them from the old grandfathers. Then if the Vali gets to know of our being in the neighbourhood, and wishes to get a good name for activity with the foreign consuls, he doesn’t go after us, but down he comes on the poor souls who have fed us, and robs them of what we have left them. And they don’t venture to denounce, much less betray us, for they are more afraid of us than him.”
“But if you are so sorry for the people, why expose them to all this?” asked Maurice.
Zeko shrugged his shoulders. “We must live,” he said. “And our own relations are supporting other bands in our own villages in the same way. We don’t remain in our own neighbourhood, for it would make it too easy for the Vali. He could destroy our village if he wanted to be revenged on us. But since we all come from different villages, and work at long distances from our homes, he knows it would do no good to destroy any particular village. Of course, it means that we can only visit our own people by stealth, and with great precautions, perhaps at intervals of many months.”
“But if the life is so hard, why go on with it?” persisted Maurice.
“What else is there to do? There are the taxes, and the troubles with the police, and the blood-feuds—all the different reasons that made us take to the hills; how can we go back to them? All you rich people who grind the faces of the poor shriek loud enough when we make you taste a little of what our life is, but you drive us to it. Perhaps you will pity us a little now that you have tried what hunger and cold and hardship really are.”
“I pitied you long before I came to Emathia,” said Maurice, “but I pity you less now. Your misfortunes are so much your own fault. United, you Emathian Christians might have wrung concessions, even self-government, from Roum, and extorted the respect of Europe, but you have made yourselves a byword by your dissensions. Village fights village, and one side of a street the other side. When you should be all banded together against the Roumis, you Illyrians and Thracians and Dardanians are murdering Greeks, and the Greeks are preparing for revenge. Christian hates Christian worse than Roumi.”
“Of course,” said Zeko, with entire acquiescence. “Are not the Patriarchists—curse them to the lowest depths of hell!”—he spat on the ground—“worse than the Roumis? If we could get rid of them we should have no more trouble.”
“And so you waste and weaken your strength in fighting one another!” said Maurice. “I tell you, if I were your leader, I would not trouble about the Roumis, but I would put down with an iron hand these feuds among Christians.”
He had spoken with more earnestness than he realised, and the brigands laughed, while Zoe thought of the youthful Pompey in the pirate stronghold, and Eirene frowned, not approving of this imaginary encroachment upon her rights. Before any one had taken the trouble to controvert Maurice’s absurd theories, the talk was interrupted. The chief and Milosch came up the church, and Stoyan, with a lowering brow, gripped Eirene by the shoulder.
“Is it true that you still have jewels concealed about you, though you declared you had given up everything?” he demanded.
Eirene had turned pale, but she answered boldly, “Yes.”
“And you were aware of this?” asked the chief of Maurice.
“I did not know——” began Maurice. Then he changed the form of his sentence. “Yes, I know.”
“Don’t hold me,” said Eirene. “I will give it up.”
“No, you are welcome to it. I hear it brings ill-luck. It has done so already to you. Keep it, and its ill-luck with it.”
Zeko and his companion, who had begun to murmur, were appeased on hearing this, and withdrew to discuss the matter with their comrades, while the chief and Milosch strode out again. Zoe grasped Maurice’s arm and drew him aside.
“Why didn’t you say you had no idea of it?” she asked indignantly.
“How could I give her away? It sounds so insane of her to have tried to deceive even us.”
“You think only of her. Don’t you see they believe that Captain Wylie knew, and deliberately took a false oath?”
“Oh, nonsense! how could they? But I don’t quite see what I could do now, anyhow. They wouldn’t believe me if I explained.”
“No, you have done the mischief—you and Eirene between you,” said Zoe bitterly. “I suppose you will both be convinced now that Vlasto was a spy?”
No further reference was made to the matter, for Eirene, realising what she had done, shrank painfully from any approach to it, but the prisoners found themselves regarded with deep suspicion. They were not allowed to move outside the church unescorted, or to enter the forest at all, and two additional sentries, with rifles which they loaded ostentatiously, kept guard on the sanctuary steps at night, one on each side of Maurice. Zeko and one or two others, who had shown some approach to friendliness, now scowled whenever their eyes fell on the captives, and most ominous of all, Milosch went about bubbling over with malicious and irrepressible glee. Thus a week went by, until it was the day before that appointed for the ransom and the release. Once more the prisoners were ordered to collect their belongings for a march, and they obeyed with fast-beating hearts. Was freedom before them at last?
Leaving the ruined church, they spent the morning on the rugged tracks to which they were now becoming accustomed, climbing up and down and winding round mountain-shoulders in a seemingly purposeless way. At noon they sheltered in a cave, while two of the brigands went on, apparently to spy out the land. About an hour later these men returned, in a state of great excitement, and much talking and discussion ensued. Finally Stoyan vouchsafed to tell the prisoners that they would not march again until dark, and this for a sufficiently disquieting reason. By the road they had been taking it was necessary to pass through the district terrorised by a rival chief, of the name of Kayo, and his band, and it had only been chosen because it was the nearest way, and because Kayo was believed to be busy besieging a recalcitrant Greek notable at the farther end of his territory. But it appeared that he had become aware of the fact that the ransom was about to be paid, and he was on the watch for Stoyan and his band, intending either to capture the prisoners from him, and secure the money for himself, or at least to enforce a division of the spoil. It was necessary, therefore, to turn back and take a more roundabout way, which would occupy at least two days more than the other. In spite of his bitter disappointment, Maurice could not but realise the reasonableness of Stoyan’s contention that if there was a fight between the two bands, the girls were very likely to come off badly, while they would not suffer from the extra journey, since he had succeeded in procuring horses for them. Maurice suggested that Wylie would be made very anxious by the non-appearance of his friends, but received the assurance that a message would be despatched to him through the country people, and that he need not pay over the ransom until he was satisfied. The girls resigned themselves to the inevitable, when Maurice brought them the news, with as good grace as they could, and rested during the afternoon in preparation for the night journey, having learnt, among other things, to utilise every opportunity for repose that offered itself while on the march.
At dusk the two men stole out again and brought back the horses, or rather ponies, and as soon as the girls were mounted the party set out, proceeding at first very slowly, and with intense caution. By the time the moon rose they were far enough from Kayo’s boundaries to be able to move on at a good pace, though the track was so narrow, and the precipices so steep, that the girls found it more comfortable to shut their eyes, and leave the guidance of their steeds to the brigands who led them. They were tired and thoroughly chilled when the moonlight began to fail them, and welcomed the decision of Stoyan that he could not find the way in this unfamiliar region in the dark. A halt was called on a shelf of rock—a mere widening of the track—and the girls lay down on their rugs on the inner side, sheltered by the horses from the biting wind, and Maurice and the brigands on the track itself. Hard rock and sharp stones vied with the cold in making their resting-place uncomfortable, but they succeeded in getting a little sleep, and were ready to go on in the morning. It was now necessary, they were told, for them to be blindfolded again, as they were about to pass through a passage in the mountains which the brigands were all pledged not to show to any eyes but their own, and to this they submitted. But when Milosch produced a cake of beeswax from his bag, and ordered them to stop their ears as well, they rebelled.
“We spare you fright,” he asserted. “Zere is Roumi garrison in front. If you hear ze drum, you scream, and zat betray us all. Wiz ears obstructed, you hear nossing.”
“We shan’t scream,” declared Zoe indignantly. “We won’t make a sound, whatever we hear.”
Milosch appealed to the chief, who pondered the matter gloomily.
“We owe you no consideration,” he grumbled. “For a whole month we have clothed and fed you, and provided you with shelter while we lay in the cold, and you have been deceiving us the whole time. For your sakes we have been hunted from our usual haunts, have made forced marches, and wandered about whole nights. You have no gratitude. If you see a chance of betraying us to the Roumis, you will do it.”
“We are not such fools,” said Maurice. “If it came to a fight we should be the first to suffer, as you said yesterday. We have promised not to try to escape, and we don’t mean to.”
“What are your promises worth?” sneered Stoyan; but nothing more was said about the wax, and the girls rode on in darkness, Maurice being led between them. They had been marching about two hours when a sudden tension made itself felt among the brigands. Rifles were cocked, and there were excited whispers. The horses were turned and made to stand across the road, with their tails to the rock, and Maurice was placed between them and ordered to hold the bridles of both, while all the brigands apparently went forward to reconnoitre. It was some time before the soft pad of moccasined feet announced their return. Milosch’s voice said, in a strident whisper, “Utter not one single word, or ze price is death.” The bridles were taken from Maurice’s hands, he felt a man on each side of him as before, and the march was resumed. It was continued, still in absolute silence, for hours, until the girls were nearly dropping from their horses with fatigue; but at last those in front stopped, and the handkerchief was removed from Maurice’s eyes. He stared about him in astonishment. They had halted in a stony valley, with towering peaks all round it, and the sun was nearing its setting. A number of men were standing round, leaning on their rifles, but they wore rough brown clothes instead of the dirty kilts and long leggings of Stoyan and his band. There was not a familiar face to be seen. As if by magic, an entirely new set of brigands had taken the place of the old.
“Do help us down, Maurice,” said Zoe, rather impatiently. “I am too stiff to move,” and he complied mechanically. But while he fumbled with the knot of the handkerchief which covered her eyes, he tried to prepare her.
“Zoe—Eirene—there’s something wrong. None of our brigands are here. These are all strangers.”
“Our brigands? How funny to call them that!” said Eirene, twisting off the handkerchief for herself. “Oh!” and she and Zoe stared blankly at their new companions.
“Ask them what it means, Maurice,” said Zoe, in a rather shaky voice, and Maurice obeyed. But the strangers proved, or pretended, to be ignorant of all the languages which their prisoners could muster among them, though they talked to one another in an unknown tongue which Eirene thought must be Mœsian. They declined also to understand, or at any rate to answer, questions asked by means of signs, though when Maurice pointed the way they had come, and signified that he and the girls wished to go back, they quickly barred his progress, patting their rifles meaningly. Baffled and worn out, the prisoners sat down, whereupon the chief of the new brigands smiled upon them approvingly, and pointed to the preparations which were being made for the night. A pole was thrust into a crevice of the rock, and a long piece of rough canvas hung over it and pegged down at each side to form a tent, a second piece, fastened to the projecting end of the pole, serving as a curtain. Maurice advised the girls to take possession, and the chief beamed approval. A fire had been kindled, and food of some kind was cooking in a large pot, watched eagerly by the brigands. There was the usual deficiency of plates, but the captives were accommodated with their share in the lid, while their guards ate out of the pot, and as, like them, they now each possessed a wooden spoon, given them by the women at the farm, they found no difficulty in making a meal. The fare was a kind of hasty-pudding, made of flour boiled with grape-treacle, very sweet and sticky, and eminently satisfying. The girls had soon had enough, and then came the moment Maurice had been dreading. He advised them to go to bed as soon as they had finished, but neither of them stirred.
“Maurice, what does it mean? We must know,” said Zoe. “Has Kayo’s band got hold of us after all?”
“How could they, without a fight? One can’t believe that Stoyan and all his men were wiped out without a shot or a cry. No, I’m afraid it is that Stoyan has handed us over to some other band.”
“And where are they taking us?” asked Eirene harshly.
Maurice hesitated, then decided that it was no use to attempt concealment. “As far as I can tell, we ought to have gone south-east to get to Therma,” he said, “but we seemed to be going south-west, in the direction of the Morean frontier.”
“And no one will know! Perhaps we shall never be rescued,” said Zoe, with quivering lips.
“And it is all my fault!” cried Eirene. “I have brought you into this trouble, and I can do nothing.”
“Oh, don’t!” said Zoe hastily, forcing back her own tears when she saw Eirene’s. “We have been in worse troubles than this, and have got through. It’s—it’s just that everything seemed to be all right, and now we have to begin it all over again. And we’re tired, too. We shall look at these things more cheerfully in the morning.”
If the girls cried themselves to sleep that night, Maurice was not to know it, and in the morning they were almost ostentatiously cheerful, though the line of march still led away from Therma and towards the unknown. The character of the mountains was changing. The familiar sloping hillsides and tapering peaks were giving place to perpendicular or even overhanging cliffs, and stupendous pillars of rock towering in isolated masses.
“It’s like being at the bottom of a cañon,” said Zoe, late in the afternoon, looking up at the walls of rock. “How curiously it widens in front, Maurice! And there is another of those rock columns. Why, there is a little house at the very top! How do they get up? No, it is a big one—a castle.”
“It must be a rock monastery,” said Maurice, “though I didn’t know there were any in Emathia.”
They gazed up into the sky, where the monastery of Hadgi-Antoniou stood on its pillar like a bud at the end of a long stalk.