* * * * *I was brought to my senses by the simple process of a Cossack dropping his lance into the fleshy part of my arm--no pleasant restorative, but in my case a most effectual one. The first sight that greeted my eyes was his little horse's girths and belly, and his own rough, savage countenance, looking grimly down upon me as he raised his arm to repeat the thrust. I muttered the few words of Russian I knew, to beg for mercy, and he looked at his comrades, as though to consult them on the propriety of acceding to so unheard-of a request as that of a wounded man for his life. A few paces off I saw the Beloochee, evidently taken prisoner, disarmed, and his head running with blood, but his whole bearing as dignified and unmoved as usual.In this awkward predicament I happily bethought me of the Russian prisoner's epistle."Quarter, comrade! quarter!" I shouted as loudly as my failing voice would suffer me. "I have a letter from your officer. Here it is.""Osmanli?" inquired the Cossack, once more raising his arm to strike. I shuddered to think how quickly that steel lance-head might be buried in my body."No, Inglis!" I replied, and the man lowered his weapon once more and assisted me to rise.Fortunately at this juncture an officer rode up, and to him I appealed for mercy and proper treatment as a prisoner of war. I misdoubted considerably the humanity of my first acquaintance, whose eyes I could see wandering over my person, as though he were selecting such accoutrements and articles of clothing as he thought would suit his own taste. The officer, who seemed of high rank, and was accompanied by an escort, fortunately spoke German, and I appealed eloquently to him in that language. He started at the superscription of the deserter's letter, and demanded of me sternly how I obtained it. In a few words I told him the history of the unfortunate spy, and he passed his gloved hand over his face as though to conceal his emotion."You are English?" he observed rapidly, and looking uneasily over his shoulder at the same time. "We do not kill our English prisoners, barbarians as you choose to think us; but to the Turk we give no quarter. Put him on a horse," he added, to my original captor, who kept unpleasantly near: "do not ill-treat him, but bring him safely along with you. If he tries to escape, blow his brains out. As for that rascal," pointing to the Beloochee, "put a lance through him forthwith."A happy thought struck me. I determined to make an effort for Ali. "Excellence," I pleaded, "spare him, he is my servant."The Russian officer paused. "Is he not a Turk?" he asked, sternly."No, I swear he is not," I replied. "He is my servant, and an Englishman."If ever a lie was justifiable, it was on the present occasion: I trust thiswhiteone may not be laid to my charge."Bring them both on," said the Russian, still glancing anxiously to his rear. "Lieutenant Dolwitz, look to the party. Keep your men together, and move rapidly. This is the devil's own business, and our people are in full retreat." All this, though spoken in Russian, I was able to understand; nor did the hurried manner in which the great man galloped off shake my impression that he still dreaded a vision of Iskender Bey and his band of heroes thundering on his track.I was placed on a little active Cossack pony. The Beloochee's wrist was tied to mine, and he was forced to walk or rather run by my side; whenever he flagged a poke from the butt-end of a lance admonished him to mend his pace, and a Russian curse fell harmlessly on his ear. Still he preserved his dignity through it all; and so we journeyed onwards into Wallachia, and meditated on the chances of war and the changes that a day may bring forth.CHAPTER XXTHE BELOOCHEEThe pursuit was fast and furious. After crossing such a river as the Danube, in the teeth of a far superior force and under a heavy fire--after carrying the Russian redoubts with the bayonet, and driving their main body back upon its reserve, the Turkish troops, flushed and wild with victory, were not to be stopped by any soldiers on earth.Iskender's charge had completely scattered the devoted body that had so gallantly interposed to cover the retreat of their comrades, and a total rout of the Russian forces was the result. The plains of Wallachia were literally strewed with dismounted guns, broken ambulance wagons, tumbrils, ammunition carts, dead and dying, whilst still the fierce Moslem urged his hot pursuit. Straggler after straggler, reeking with haste and all agape with fear, reached the astonished town of Bucharest, and the reports in that pleasure-seeking capital were, as may well be imagined, of the most bewildering and contradictory description.Many a frightful scene was witnessed by the terrified Wallachian peasant, as fugitive after fugitive was overtaken, struck down and butchered by the dread pursuers. Nay, women and children were not spared in the general slaughter; and the hideous practice of refusing "quarter," which has so long existed between the Turkish and Russian armies, now bore ghastly fruit.A horse falls exhausted in a cart which contains some Russian wounded, and a woman belonging to their regiment. Its comrade vainly struggles to draw them through the slough in which they are fast. Half-a-dozen Turkish troopers are on their track, urging those game little horses to their speed, and escape is hopeless.Helpless and mutilated, the poor fellows abandon themselves to their fate. The Turks ride in and make short work of them, the Muscov dying with a stolid grim apathy peculiar to himself and his natural foe. The woman alone shows energy and quickness in her efforts to preserve her child. She covers the baby over with the straw at the bottom of the cart; wounded as she is in the confusion, and with an arm broken, she seeks to divert the attention of her ruthless captors. Satisfied with their butchery, they are about to ride on in search of fresh victims, and the mother's heart leaps to think that she has saved her darling. But the baby cries in its comfortless nest; quick as thought, a Turkish trooper buries his lance amongst the straw, and withdraws the steel head and gaudy pennon, reeking with innocent blood. The mother's shriek flies straight to Heaven. Shall the curse she invokes on that ruthless brute fall back unheard? Ride on, man of blood--ride on, to burn and ravage and slay; and when the charge hath swept over thee, and the field is lost, and thou art gasping out thy life-blood on the plain, think of that murdered child, and die like a dog in thy despair!By a route nearly parallel with the line of flight, but wandering through an unfrequented district with which the Cossacks seem well acquainted, the Beloochee and myself proceed towards our captivity. We have ample leisure to examine our guards, these far-famed Cossacks of whom warriors hear so much and see so little--the best scouts and foragers known, hardy, rapid, and enduring, the very eyes and ears of an army, and for every purpose except fighting unrivalled by any light cavalry in the world. My original captor, who still clings to me with a most unwelcome fondness, is no bad specimen of his class. He is mounted on a shaggy pony, that at first sight seems completely buried even under the middle-sized man it carries, but with a lean, good head, and wiry limbs that denote speed and endurance, when put to the test. In a snaffle bridle, and with its head up, the little animal goes with a jerking, springing motion, not the least impaired by its day's work, and the fact that it has now been without food for nearly twenty-four hours. Its master, the same who keeps his small bright eye so constantly fastened upon his prisoners, is a man of middle height, spare, strong, and sinewy, with a bushy red beard and huge moustache. His dress consists of enormously loose trousers, a tight-fitting jacket, and high leathern shako; and he sits with his knees up to his chin. His arms are a short sabre, very blunt, and useless, and a long lance, with which he delights to do effective service against a fallen foe. He has placed the Beloochee between himself and me; it seems that he somewhat mistrusts my companion, but considers myself, a wounded man on one of their own horses, safe from any attempt at escape. The Beloochee, notwithstanding that every word calls down a thwack upon his pate (wounded as it is by the sabre-cut which stunned him) from the shaft of a lance, hazards an observation, every now and then, in Turkish. It is satisfactory to find that our guardians are totally ignorant of that language. I remark, too, that Ali listens anxiously at every halt, and apparently satisfied with what he hears, though I for my own part can discern nothing, walks on in a cheerful frame of mind, which I attribute entirely to the Moslem stoicism. His conversation towards dusk consists entirely of curses upon his captors; and these worthies, judging of its tenor by the sound, and sympathising doubtless with the relief thus afforded, cease to belabour him for his remarks.At nightfall the rain came on again as in the morning; and at length it grew pitch dark, just as we entered a defile, on one side of which was a steep bank covered with short brushwood, and on the other a wood of young oaks nearly impenetrable.I felt the Beloochee's wrist press mine with an energy that must mean something."Are you in pain?" he whispered in Turkish, adding a loud and voluble curse upon the Giaour, much out of unison with his British character, but which was doubtless mistaken for a round English oath."Not much," I replied in the same language; "but sick and faint at times.""Can you roll off your horse, and down the bank on your left?" he added, hurriedly. "If you can, I can save you.""Save yourself," I replied; "how can I move a step with a ball in my ankle-bone?""Silence!" interposed the Cossack, with a bang over the Beloochee's shoulders."Both or none," whispered the latter after a few seconds' interval, "do exactly as I tell you.""Agreed," I replied, and waited anxiously for the result.Our Cossack was getting wet through. To his hardy frame such a soaking could scarcely be called an inconvenience; nevertheless, it created a longing for a pipe, and the tobacco-bag he had taken from Ali was fortunately not half emptied. As he stopped to fill and light his short silver-mounted meerschaum, the spoil of some fallen foe, the troopers in our rear passed on. We were left some ten paces behind the rest, and the night was as dark as pitch.Ali handed me a small knife: he had concealed that and one other tiny weapon in the folds of his sash when they searched him on the field of battle. I knew what he meant, and cut the cord that bound our wrists together; his other hand, meanwhile, to lull suspicion, caressed the Cossack's horse. That incautious individual blew upon his match, which refused to strike a good light.In a twinkling Ali's shawl was unwound from his body and thrown apparently over the Cossack's saddle-bow. The smothered report of a pocket-pistol smote on my ear, but the sound could not penetrate through those close Cashmere folds to the party in front, and they rode unconsciously forward. The Beloochee's hand, too, was on his adversary's throat; and one or two gasps, as they rolled together to the ground, made me doubt whether he had been slain by the ball from that little though effective weapon, or choked in the nervous gripe of the Asiatic.I had fortunately presence of mind to restrain my own horse, and catch the Cossack's by the bridle; the party in front still rode on.Ali rose from the ground. "The knife," he whispered hoarsely, "the knife!"Once, twice, he passed it through that prostrate body. "Throw yourself off," he exclaimed; "let the horses go. Roll down that bank, and we are saved!"I obeyed him with the energy of a man who knows he has butonechance. I scarcely felt the pain as I rolled down amongst the brushwood. I landed in a water-course full of pebbles, but the underwood had served to break my fall; and though sorely bruised and with a broken ankle, I was still alive. The Beloochee, agile as a cat, was by my side."Listen," said he; "they are riding back to look for us. No horse on earth butonecan creep down that precipice; lie still. If the moon does not come out, we are saved."Moments of dreadful suspense followed. We could hear the Cossacks shouting to each other above, and their savage yell when they discovered their slain comrade smote wildly on our ears. Again I urged the Beloochee to fly--why should he wait to die with me? I could scarcely scrawl, and a cold sickness came on at intervals that unnerved me totally.To all my entreaties he made but one reply, "Bakaloum" (We shall see), "it is our destiny. There is but one Allah!"The Cossacks' shouts became fainter and fainter. They seemed to have divided in search of their late prey. The moon, too, struggled out fitfully. It was a wild scene.The Beloochee whistled--a low, peculiar whistle, like the cry of a night-hawk. He listened attentively; again he repeated that prolonged, wailing note. A faint neigh answered it from the darkness, and we heard the tread of a horse's hoofs approaching at a trot."It is Zuleika," he observed, quietly; "there is but one Allah!"A loose horse, with saddle and bridle, trotted up to my companion, and laid its head against his bosom. Stern as he was, he caressed it as a mother fondles a child. It was his famous bay mare, "the treasure of his heart," "the corner of his liver,"--for by such endearing epithets he addressed her,--and now he felt indeed that he was saved."Mount," he said, "in the name of the Prophet. I know exactly where we are. Zuleika has the wings of the wind; she laughs to scorn the heavy steeds of the Giaour; they swallow the dust thrown up by her hoofs, and Zuleika bounds from them like the gazelle. Oh,jhanum!--oh, my soul!" Once more he caressed her, and the mare seemed well worthy of his affection; she returned it by rubbing her head against him with a low neigh.I was soon in the saddle, with the Beloochee walking by my side. His iron frame seemed to acknowledge no fatigue. Once I suggested that the mare should carry double, and hazarded an opinion that by reducing the pace we might fairly increase the burden. The remark well-nigh cost me the loss of my preserver's friendship."Zuleika," he exclaimed, with cold dignity, "Zuleika requires no such consideration. She is not like the gross horse of the Frank, who sinks and snorts, and struggles and fails, under his heavy burden. She would step lightly as a deer under three such men as we are. No, light of my eyes," he added, smoothing down the thin silky mane of his favourite, "I will walk by thee and caress thee, and feast my eyes on thy star-like beauty. Should the Giaour be on our track, I will mount thee with the Tergyman, and we will show him the mettle of a real daughter of the desert--my rose, my precious one!"She was, indeed, a high-bred-looking animal, although from her great strength in small compass she appeared less speedy than she really was. Her colour was a rich dark bay, without a single white hair. Her crest was high and firm as that of a horse; and her lean, long head and expressive countenance showed the ancestry by which her doting master set such store. Though the skin that covered those iron muscles so loosely was soft and supple as satin, she carried no flesh, and her deep ribs might almost be counted by the eye. Long in her quarters, with legs of iron and immense power in her back and loins, she walked with an elastic, springy gait, such as even my own Injour could not have emulated. She was of the highest breed in the desert, and as superior to other horses as the deer is to the donkey. I wondered how my friend had obtained possession of her; and as we plodded on, the Beloochee, who had recovered his good-humour, walking by my side, condescended to inform me of the process by which the invaluable Zuleika had become his own."Tergyman!" said he, "I have journeyed through many lands, and with the exception of your country--the island of storms and snows--I have seen the whole world.[#] In my own land the mountains are high and rugged, the winters cold and boisterous; it rearsmenbrave and powerful asRustam, but we must look elsewhere forhorses. Zuleika, you perceive, is from the desert: 'The nearer the sun, the nobler the steed.' She was bred in the tent of a scheik, and as a foal she carried on her back only such children as had a chief's blood in their veins."[#] This is a common idea amongst Orientals when they have done Mecca and seen a greater part of Asia Minor."From my youth up I have been a man of war, Effendi, and the word of command has been more familiar to my lips than the blessed maxims of the Prophet; but the time will come when I too shall be obliged to cross the narrow bridge that spans the abyss of hell. And if my naked feet have no better protection from its red-hot surface than deeds of arms and blood-stained victories, woe to me for ever! I shall assuredly fall headlong into the depths of fire."Therefore I bethought me of a pilgrimage to Mecca, for he is indeed a true believer who has seen with his own eyes the shrine of the Blessed Prophet. Many and long were the days I passed under the burning sun of the desert; wearisome and slow was the march of the caravan. My jaded camel was without water. I said in my soul, 'It is my destiny to die.' Far behind the long array, almost out of hearing of their bells, my beast dragged his weary steps. I quitted his back and led him till he fell. No sooner was he down than the vultures gathered screaming around him, though not a speck had I seen for hours in the burning sky. Then I beheld a small cloud far off on the horizon; it was but of the size of one of these herdsmen's cottages, but black as the raven, and it advanced more rapidly than a body of horsemen. Ere I looked again it seemed to reach the heavens, the skies became dark as night, columns of sand whirled around me, and I knew the simoom was upon us and it was time to die."How long I lay there I know not. When I recovered my consciousness, the caravan had disappeared, my camel was already stripped to the bones by the birds of prey, my mouth and nostrils were full of sand. Nearly suffocated, faint and helpless, it was some time ere I was aware of an Arab horseman standing over me, and looking on my pitiable condition with an air of kindness and protection."'My brother,' he said, 'Allah has delivered thee into my hand. Mount, and go with me.'"He gave me water from a skin, he put me on his own horse till we were joined by his tribe; I went with him to his tents, and I became to him as a brother, for he had saved me at my need."He was a scheik of the wild Bedouins: a better warrior never drew a sword. Rich was he too, and powerful; but of all his wives and children, camels, horses, and riches, he had two treasures that he valued higher than the pearl of Solomon--his bay mare and his daughter Zuleika."The Beloochee's voice trembled, and he paused. For a few seconds he listened as if to satisfy himself that the enemy were not on our track, and then nerving himself like a man about to suffer pain, and looking far into the darkness, he proceeded--"I saw her day after day in her father's tent. Soon I longed for her light step and gentle voice as we long for the evening breeze after the glare and heat of the day. At last I watched her dark eyes as we watch the guiding star by night in the desert. To the scheik I was as a brother. I was free to come and go in his tent, and all his goods were mine. Effendi! I am but a man, and I loved the girl. In less than a year I had become a warrior of their tribe; many a foray had I ridden with them, and many a herd of camels and drove of horses had I helped them to obtain. Once I saved the scheik's life with the very sword I lost to-day. Could they not have given me the girl? Oh! it was bitter to see her every hour, and to know she was promised to another!"A few days more and she was to be espoused to Achmet. He was the scheik's kinsman, and she had been betrothed to him from a child. I could bear it no longer. The maiden looked at me with her dark eyes full of tears. I had eaten the scheik's salt--he had saved me from a lingering death--he was my host, my friend, my benefactor, and I robbed him of his daughter. We fled in the night. I owned a horse that could outstrip every steed in the tribe save one. I took a leathern skin of water, a few handfuls of barley, and my arms. I placed Zuleika on the saddle in front of me, and at daybreak we were alone in the desert, she and I, and we were happy. When the sun had been up an hour, there was a speck in the horizon behind us. I told Zuleika we were pursued; but she bid me take courage, for my steed was the best in the tribe, said she, except her father's bay mare, and he suffered no one to mount that treasure but himself. She had loosed the bay mare the night before from her picket-ropes; it would be morning before they could find her, and there was nothing to fear. I took comfort, and pressed my bride to my heart."In the desert, Effendi, it is not as with us. The Arab's life depends upon his horse, and he proves him as you would prove a blade. At two years old he rides him till his back bends,[#] and he never forgets the merits of the colt. Each horse's speed is as well known in the tribe as is each officer's rank in the army of the Padisha. Nothing could overtake my charger save the scheik's bay mare; and, thanks to Zuleika, the bay mare must be hours behind us."[#] An Arab maxim, from which they are studious not to depart; their idea being that a horse's worst year is from three to four; during which period they let him run perfectly idle, but feeding him at the same time as if in full work: for, say they, "a horse's goodness goes in at his mouth." At five he is considered mature."We galloped steadily on, and once more I looked over my shoulder. The speck had become larger and darker now, and I caught the gleam of a lance in the morning sun. Our pursuer must be nearing us; my horse too began to flag, for I had ridden fiercely, and he carried myself and my bride. Nevertheless, we galloped steadily on."Once more I looked back. The object was distinct enough now; it was a horseman going at speed. Allah be praised! there was but one. Zuleika turned pale and trembled--my lily seemed to fade on my bosom. Effendi, I had resolved what to do."CHAPTER XXIZULEIKA"Man to man, and in the desert, I had but little to fear, yet when I saw Achmet's face, my heart turned to water within me. He was a brave warrior. I had ridden by his side many a time in deadly strife; but I had never seen him look like this before. When I turned to confront him, my horse was jaded and worn out--I felt that my life was in the hand of mine enemy."'Achmet,' I said, 'let me go in peace; the maiden has made her choice--she is mine.'"His only answer was a lance-thrust that passed between Zuleika's body and my own. The girl clung fainting to my bosom, and encumbered my sword-arm. My horse could not withstand the shock of Achmet's charge, and rolled over me on the sand. In endeavouring to preserve Zuleika from injury, my yataghan dropped out of its sheath; my lance was already broken in the fall, and I was undermost, with the gripe of my adversary on my throat. Twice I shook myself free from his hold: and twice I was again overmastered by my rival. His eyes were like living coals, and the foam flew from his white lips. He was mad, and Allah gave him strength. The third time his grasp brought the blood from my mouth and nostrils. I was powerless in his hold. His right arm was raised to strike; I saw the blade quivering dark against the burning sky. I turned my eyes towards Zuleika; for even then I thought ofher. The girl was a true Arab, faithful to the last. Once, twice, she raised her arm quick and deadly as the lightning. She had seized my yataghan when it dropped from its sheath, and she buried it in Achmet's body. I rose from the ground a living man, and I was saved by her."Effendi, we took the bay mare, and left my jaded horse with the dead man. For days we journeyed on, and looked not back, nor thought of the past, for we were all in all to each other; and whilst our barley lasted and we could find water we knew that we were safe: so we reached Cairo, and trusted in Allah for the future. I had a sword, a lovely wife, and the best mare in the world; but I was a soldier, and I could not gain my bread by trade. I loathed the counters and the bazaar, and longed once more to see the horsemen marshalled in the field. So I fed and dressed the bay mare, and cleaned my arms, and leaving Zuleika in the bazaars, placed myself at the gate of the Pasha, and waited for an audience."He received me kindly, and treated me as a guest of consideration; but he had a cunning twinkle in his eye that I liked not; and although I knew him to be as brave as a lion, I suspected he was as treacherous as the fox; nevertheless, 'the hungry man knows not dates from bread,' and I accepted service under him willingly, and went forth from his presence well pleased with my fate. 'Zuleika,' I thought, 'will rejoice to hear that I have employment, and I shall find here in Cairo a sweet little garden where I will plant and tend my rose.'"I thought to rejoin my love where I had left her, in the bazaar; but she was gone. I waited hours for her return; she came not, and the blood thickened round my heart. I made inquiries of the porters and water-carriers, and all the passers-by that I could find: none had seen her. One old woman alone thought she had seen a girl answering my description in conversation with a black, wearing the uniform of the Pasha; but she was convinced the girl had a fawn-coloured robe, or it might have been lilac, or perhaps orange, but it certainly was not green: this could not then be Zuleika, for she wore the colour of the Prophet. She was lost to me--she for whom I had striven and toiled so much; my heart sank within me; but I could not leave the place, and for months I remained at Cairo, and became a Yuz-Bashi in the Guards of the Pasha. But from that time to this I have had no tidings of Zuleika--my Zuleika."The Beloochee's face was deadly pale, and his features worked with strong emotion: it was evident that this fierce warrior--man of blood though he had been from his youth upward--had been tamed by the Arab girl. She was the one thing on earth he loved, and the love of such wild hearts is fearful in intensity. After a pause, during which he seemed to smother feelings he could not command, he proceeded in a hoarse, broken voice with his tale."The days have never been so bright since I lost her, Effendi; but what would you? it was my kismet, and I submitted; as we must all submit when it is fruitless to struggle. Day by day I did my duty, and increased in the good opinion of the Pasha; but I cared for nothing now save only the bay mare, and I gave her the name of one whom I should never see again."The Pasha was a haughty old warrior, lavish in his expenses, magnificent in his apparel, and above all, proud of his horses. Some of the swiftest and noblest steeds of the desert had found their way into his stables; and there were three things in the world which it was well known he would not refuse in the shape of a bribe, these were gold, beauty, and horse-flesh. Ere long he cast a wistful look on my bay mare Zuleika."It is well known, Effendi, that an Arab mare of pure race is not to be procured. The sons of the desert are true to their principles, and although gold will buy their best horses, they are careful not to part with their mares for any consideration in the world. For long the Pasha would not believe that Zuleika was a daughter of that wonderful line which was blessed so many hundred years ago by the Prophet, nor was I anxious that he should learn her value, for I knew him to be a man who took no denial to his will. But when he saw her outstripping all competitors at the jereed; when he saw her day after day, at work or at rest, in hardship or in plenty, always smooth and sleek and mettlesome as you see her now, he began to covet so good an animal, and with the Pasha to covet was in one way or another to possess."Many a hint was given me that I ought to offer him my bay mare as a present, and that I might then ask what I would; but to all these I turned a deaf ear; now thatshewas gone, what had I in the world but Zuleika? and I swore in my soul that death alone should part us. At length the Pasha offered me openly whatever sum I chose to name as the price of my mare, and suggested at the same time that if I continued obdurate, it might be possible that he should obtain the animal for nothing, and that I should never have occasion to get on horseback again. My life was in danger as well as my favourite. I determined, if it were possible, to save both."I went to the Pasha's gate and demanded an audience, presenting at the same time a basket of fruit for his acceptance. He received me graciously, and ordered pipes and coffee, bidding me seat myself on the divan by his side."'Ali,' said he, after a few unmeaning compliments, 'Ali, there are a hundred steeds in my stable. Take your choice of them and exchange with me your bay mare, three for one.""'Pasha!' I replied, 'my bay mare is yours and all that I have, but I am under an oath, that never in my life am I togiveorsellher to any one.'"The Pasha smiled, and the twinkle in his eye betokened mischief. 'It is said,' he answered, 'an oath is an oath. There is but one Allah!'"'Nevertheless, Highness,' I remarked, 'I am at liberty to LOSE her. She may yet darken the door of your stable if you will match your best horse against her, the winner to have both. But you shall give me a liberal sum to run the race.'"The Pasha listened eagerly to my proposal. He evidently considered the race was in his own hands, and I was myself somewhat surprised at the readiness with which he agreed to an arrangement which he must have foreseen would end in the discomfiture and loss of his own steed without the gain of mine. I did not know yet the man with whom I had to deal."'To-morrow, at sunrise,' said the Pasha, 'I am willing to start my horse for the race; and, moreover, to show my favour and liberality, I am willing to give a thousand piasters for every ten yards' start you may choose to take. If my horse outstrips your mare you return me the money, if you win you take and keep all.'"I closed with the proposal, and all night long I lay awake, thinking how I should preserve Zuleika in my own possession. That I should win I had no doubt, but this would only expose me to fresh persecutions, and eventually I should lose my life and my mare too. Towards sunrise a thought struck me, and I resolved to act upon it."I would hold the Pasha to his word; I would claim a start of fifty yards, and a present of five thousand piasters. I would take the money immediately, and girth my mare for the struggle. With fifty yards of advantage, where was the horse in the world that could come up with Zuleika? I would fly with her once more into the desert, and take my chance. Better death with her, than life and liberty deprived of my treasure. I rose, prayed, went to the bath, and then fed and saddled my favourite, placing a handful of dates and a small bag of barley behind the saddle."All Cairo turned out to see the struggle. The Pasha's troops were under arms, and a strong party of his own guards, the very regiment to which I belonged, was marshalled to keep the ground. We were to run a distance of two hours[#] along the sand. Lances pointed out our course, and we were to return and finish in front of a tent pitched for the Pasha himself. His ladies were present, too, in their gildedarabas, surrounded by a negro guard. As I led my mare up they waved their handkerchiefs, and one in particular seemed restless and uneasy. I imagined I heard a faint scream from the interior of heraraba; but the guard closed round it, and ere I had looked a second time it had been driven from the ground. Just then the Pasha summoned myself and my competitor to his tent. I cast my eye over my antagonist. He was considerably lighter than I was, and led a magnificent chestnut stallion, the best in the Pasha's stables; but when I looked at its strong but short form, and thought of Zuleika's elastic gait and lengthy stride, I had no fears for the result."[#] About seven miles. The Asiatic always counts space by time, and an hour is equivalent to something over a league."I saluted the Pasha, and made my request. 'Highness,' I said, 'I claim a start of fifty yards and five thousand piasters. Let the money be paid, that I may take it with me and begin.'"'It is well,' replied the Pasha; 'Kiātib,' he added, to his secretary, 'have you prepared the "backshish" for Ali Mesrour? Bestow it on him with a blessing, that he may mount and away,' and again the cruel eye twinkled with its fierce grim humour. Effendi, my heart sank within me when I saw two sturdy slaves bring out a sack, evidently of great weight, and proceed to lay the burden on my pawing mare. 'What is this?' I exclaimed, aghast; 'Highness, this is treachery! I am not to carry all that weight!'"'Five thousand piasters, oh my soul!' replied the Pasha, with his most ferocious grin; 'and all of itin copper, too. Mount, in the name of the Prophet, and away!'"My adversary was already in his saddle; the sack was fastened in front of mine. I saw that if I made the slightest demur, it would be considered a sufficient excuse to deprive me of my mare, perhaps of my life. With a prayer to Allah, I got into my saddle. Zuleika stepped proudly on, as though she made but little of the weight; and I took my fifty yards of start, and as much more as I could get. The signal-shot was fired, and we were off. Zuleika sniffed the air of the desert, and snorted in her joy. Despite of the piasters, she galloped on. Effendi, from that day to this I have seen neither my antagonist in the race, nor the negro guard, nor the gildedarabas, nor the Pasha's angry smile. I won my mare, I won my life and freedom; also I carried off five thousand piasters of the Pasha's money, and doubtless four times a day he curses me in his prayers, but yonder is the dawn, and here is the Danube. Sick and faint you must be, Tergyman! Yet in two hours more we shall reach Omar Pasha's tent, for I myself placed a picket of our soldiers on either bank at yonder spot, and they have a boat; so take courage for a little time longer, and confess that the breath of the morning here is sweeter than the air of a Russian prison. Who can foretell his destiny? There is but one Allah!"I had not the tough frame of my Beloochee friend; before we reached the waterside I had fainted dead away. I remembered no more till I awoke from my fever in an hospital tent at head-quarters. On that weary time of prostration and suffering it is needless for me to dwell. Ere I could sit upright in bed the winter had commenced, the season for field operations was over, and the army established in cantonments. There was a lull, too, before the storm. The Allies had not yet put forth their strength, and it was far from improbable that the war might even then be near its conclusion.Victor had determined to return to Hungary, and insisted on my accompanying him. Weak, maimed, and emaciated, I could be of no service to my chief, or to the great General who had so kindly recognised me. I had nothing to keep me in Turkey; I had nothing to take me to England. No, no, anywhere but there. Had I but won a name, I should have rejoiced to return into Somersetshire, to see Constance once again--to repay her coldness with scorn--perhaps to pass her without speaking--or, bitterer still, to greet her with the frankness and ease of a mere acquaintance. But what was I, to dream thus? A mere adventurer, at best a poor soldier of fortune, whose destiny, sooner or later, would be but to fatten a battle-field or encumber a trench, and have his name misspelt in aGazette. No, no, anywhere but England, and why not Hungary? Victor's arguments were unanswerable; and once more--but oh! how changed from the quiet, thoughtful child--I was again at Edeldorf.CHAPTER XXIIVALÈRIE"I tell you I saw them led out under my very windows to be shot. Two and two they marched, with their heads erect, and their gait as haughty as if they were leading the assault. Thirteen of them in all, and the oldest not five-and-forty. Oh! woe to the Fatherland!--the best blood in Hungary was shed on that fearful day,--the gallant, the true-hearted, who had risen at the first call, and had been the last to fail. Taken with arms in their hands, forsooth! What should be in a gentleman's hands but arms at such a time? Oh, that I had but been a man!" The girl's dark eyes flashed, and her beautiful chiselled nostril dilated as she threw her head back, and stamped her little foot on the floor. None of your soft-eyed beauties was Valèrie de Rohan, but one who sparkled and blazed, and took your admiration fairly by storm. Those who are experienced in such matters affirm that these are the least dangerous of our natural enemies, and that your regular heart-breaker is the gentle, smiling, womanly woman, who wins her way into the citadel step by step, till she pervades it all, and if she leaves it, leaves desolation and ruin behind her. But of this I am incapable of giving an opinion; all I know is, Valèrie grew soft enough as she went on."I knew every man of them intimately; not one but had been my father's guest--my poor father, even then fined and imprisoned in Comorn for the manly part he had played. Not one of them but had been at our 'receptions' in the very room from the windows of which I now saw them marching forth to die; and not one but as he passed me lifted his unfettered hand to his head, and saluted me with a courtly smile. Last of all came Adolphe Zersky, my own second cousin, and the poor boy was but nineteen. I bore it all till I saw him; but when he passed under my very eyes, and smiled his usual light-hearted smile, and waved his handkerchief to me, and pressed it to his lips--a handkerchief I had embroidered for him with my own hands--and called out blithesomely, as though he were going to a wedding, 'Good-morning, Comtesse Valèrie; I meant to have called to-day, but have got a previous engagement,' I thought my heart would break. He looked prouder than any of them; I hardly think he would have been set free if he could. He was a true Hungarian. God bless him!--I heard the shots that struck them down. I often dream I hear them now. They massacred poor Adolphe last of all--he retained hissang-froidto the end. The Austrian officer on guard was an old schoolfellow, and Adolphe remarked to im with a laugh, just before they led him out, 'I say, Fritz, if they mean to keep us here much longer, they really ought to give us some breakfast!'"Oh, Mr. Egerton, it was a cruel time. I had borne the bombardment well enough. I had seen our beautiful town reduced to ruins; and I never winced, for I am the daughter of a Hungarian; but I gave way when they butchered my friends, and wept--oh, how I wept! What else could I do? We poor weak women have but our tears to give. Had Ibutbeen born a man!"Once more Valèrie's eye flashed, and the proud, wild look gleamed over her features; while a vague idea that for same days had pervaded my brain began to assume a certain form, to the effect that Valèrie de Rohan was a very beautiful woman, and that it was by no means disagreeable to have such a nurse when one was wounded in body, or such a friend when one was sick at heart. And she treated me as arealfriend: she reposed perfect confidence in me; she told me of all her plans and pursuits, her romantic ideas, and visionary schemes for the regeneration of her country, for she was a true patriot; lastly, she confessed to a keen admiration for my profession as a soldier, and a tender pity for my wounds. Who would not have such a friend? Who would not follow with his eyes such a nurse as she glided about his couch?It is useless to attempt the description of a woman. To say that Valèrie had dark, swimming eyes, and jet-black hair, twisted into a massive crown on her superb head, and round arms and white hands sparkling with jewels, and a graceful floating figure, shaped like a statue, and dressed a little too coquettishly, is merely to say that she was a commonplace handsome person, but conveys no idea of that subtle essence of beauty--that nameless charm which casts its spell equally over the wisest as the weakest, and which can no more be expressed by words than it can be accounted for by reason. Yet Valèrie was a woman who would have found her way straight to the hearts of most men. It seems like a dream to look back to one of those happy days of contented convalescence and languid repose. Every man who has suffered keenly in life must have felt that there is in the human organisation an instinctive reaction and resistance against sorrow, a natural tendency to take advantage of any lull in the storm, and a disposition to deceive ourselves into the belief that we are forgetting for the time that which the very effort proves we too bitterly remember. But even this artificial repose has a good effect. It gives us strength to bear future trials, and affords us also time for reflections which, in the excitement of grief, are powerless to arrest us for a moment.So I lay on the sofa in the drawing-room at Edeldorf, and rested my wounded leg, and shut my eyes to the future, and drew a curtain (alas, what a transparent one it was!) over the past. There was everything to soothe and charm an invalid. The beautiful room, with its panelled walls and polished floor, inlaid like the costliest marquetry, a perfect mosaic of the forest; the light cane chairs and brocaded ottomans scattered over its surface; the gorgeous cabinets of ebony and gold that filled the spaces between the windows, reflected in long mirrors that ran from floor to ceiling; the gems of Landseer, reproduced by the engraver, sparkling on the walls--for the Hungarian is very English in his tastes, and loves to gaze through the mist at the antlered stag whom Sir Edwin has captured in the corrie, and reproduced in a thousand halls; or to rest with the tired pony and the boy insabotsat the halting-place; or to exchange humorous glances with the blacksmith who is shoeing that wondrously-drawn bay horse, foreshortened into nature, till one longs to pat him;--all this created a beautiful interior, andfromall this I could let my eyes wander away, through the half-opened window at the end, over the undulating park, with its picturesque acacias, far, far athwart the rich Hungarian plain, till it crossed the dim line of trees marking the distant Danube, and reached the bold outline of hills beyond the river, melting into the dun vapours of an afternoon sky.And there was but one object to intercept the view. In the window sat Comtesse Valèrie, her graceful head bent over her work, her pretty hands flitting to and fro, so white against the coloured embroidery, and her soft glance ever and anon stealing to my couch, while she asked, with a foreigner'sempressement, which was very gratifying, though it might mean nothing, whether I had all I wanted, and if my leg pained me, and if I was not wearying for Victor's return from thechasse?"And you were here years ago, when I was almost a baby, and I was away on a visit to my aunt at Pesth. Do you know, I always felt as if we were old friends, even the first day you arrived with Victor, and were lifted out of the carriage, so pale, so suffering! Oh, how I pitied you! but you are much better now.""How can I be otherwise," was my unavoidable reply, "with so kind a nurse and such good friends as I find here?""And am Ireallyuseful to you? and do you think that my carereallymakes you better? Oh! you cannot think how glad I am to know this. I cannot be a soldier myself, and bear arms for my beloved country; but I can be useful to those who have done so, and it makes me so proud and so happy!"The girl's colour rose, and her eyes sparkled and moistened at once."But I have not fought for Hungary," I interposed, rather bluntly. "I have no claim on your sympathies--scarcely on your pity.""Do not say so," she exclaimed, warmly. "Setting apart our regard for you as my brother's friend, it is our enemy with whom you have been fighting--our oppressor who has laid you now on a wounded couch, far from your own country and your friends. Do you think I can tolerate a Russian? he is but one degree better than an Austrian! And I canhate--I tell you I can hate to some purpose!"She looked as if she could. What a strange girl she was!--now so soft and tender, like a gentle ring-dove; anon flashing out into these gleams of fierceness like a tigress. I was beginning to be a little afraid of her. She seemed to divine my thoughts, for she laughed merrily, and resumed, in her usual pleasant voice--"You do not yet know me, Mr. Egerton. I am a true De Rohan, and we are as strong in our loves as in our hatreds. Beware of either! I warn you," she added archly, "we are a dangerous race to friend or foe."Was this coquetry, or the mere playful exuberance of a girl's spirits? I began to feel a curious sensation that I had thought I should never feel again--I am not sure that it was altogether unpleasant.Valèrie looked at me for a moment, as if she expected me to say something; then bent her head resolutely down to her frame, and went on in a low, rapid voice--"We are a strange family, Mr. Egerton, we 'De Rohans'; and are a true type of the country to which we belong. We are proud to be thought real Hungarians--warm-hearted, excitable, impatient, but, above all, earnest and sincere. We are strong for good and for evil. Our tyrants may break our hearts, but they cannot subdue our spirit. We look forward to the time whichmustcome at last. 'Hope on, hope ever!' is our motto: a good principle, Mr. Egerton, is it not?"As I glanced at her excited face and graceful figure, I could not help thinking that there must be many an aspiring Hungarian who would love well to hear such a sentiment of encouragement from such lips, and who would be ready and willing to hope on, though the ever would be a long word for one of those ardent, impulsive natures. She worked on in silence for a few minutes, and resumed."You will help us, you English, we all feel convinced. Are you not the champions of liberty all over the world? And you are so like ourselves in your manners and thoughts and principles. Tell me, Mr. Egerton, and do not be afraid to trust me,is it not true?""Is notwhattrue?" I asked, from the sofa where I lay, apathetic and dejected, a strange contrast to my beautiful companion.She went to the door, listened, and closed it carefully, then looked out at the open window, and having satisfied herself there was not a soul within ear-shot, she came back close to my couch, and whispered, "An English prince on the throne of Hungary, our constitution and our parliaments once more, and, above all, deliverance from the iron yoke of Austria, which is crushing us down to the very earth!""I have never heard of it," said I, with difficulty suppressing a smile at the visionary scheme, which must have had its origin in some brain heated and enthusiastic as that of my beautiful companion; "nor do I think, if that is all you have to look to, that there is much hope for Hungary."She frowned angrily."Oh!" she answered, "you are cautious, Mr. Egerton: you will not trust me, I can see--but you might do so with safety. We are all 'right-thinkers' here. Though they swarm throughout the land, I do not believe a Government spy has ever yet set foot within the walls of Edeldorf; but I tell you, ifyouwill not help us, we are lost. You laugh to see a girl like me interest herself so warmly about politics, but with us it is a question of life and death. Women, as well as men, have all to gain or all to lose. I repeat, if you do not help us we have nothing left to hope for. Russia will take our part, and we shall fall open-eyed into the trap. Why, even as enemies, they succeeded in ingratiating themselves with the inhabitants of a conquered country. Yes, Hungary was aconquered country, and the soldiers of the Czar were our masters. They respected our feelings, they spared our property, they treated us with courtesy and consideration, and they lavished gold with both hands, which was supplied to them by their own Government for the purpose. It is easy to foresee the result. The next Russian army that crosses the frontier will march in as deliverers, and Austriamustgive way. They are generous in promises, and unequalled in diplomacy. They will flatter our nobles and give us back our constitution; nay, for a time we shall enjoy more of the outward symbols of freedom than have ever yet fallen to our lot. Andmerelyas a compliment,merelyas a matter of form, a Russian Grand-Duke will occupy the palace at Pesth, and assume the crown of St. Stephen simply as the guardian of our liberties and our rights. Then will be told once more the well-known tale of Russian intrigue and Russian pertinacity. A pretence of fusion and a system of favouritism will gradually sap our nationality and destroy our patriotism, and in two generations it will be Poland over again. Well, even that would be better than what we have to endure now.""Do you mean to say," I asked, somewhat astonished to find my companion so inveterate ahater, notwithstanding that she had warned me of this amiable eccentricity in her character,--"do you mean to say that, with all your German habits and prejudices, nay, with German as your very mother tongue, you would prefer the yoke of the Czar to that of the Kaiser?"She drew herself up, and her voice quite trembled with anger as she replied--"The Russians do not beat women. Listen, Mr. Egerton, and then wonder if you can at my bitter hatred of the Austrian yoke. She was my own aunt, my dear mother's only sister. I was sitting with her when she was arrested. We were at supper with a small party of relations and friends. For the moment we had forgotten our danger and our sorrows and the troubles of our unhappy country. She had been singing, and was actually seated at the pianoforte when an Austrian Major of Dragoons was announced. I will do him the justice to say that he was a gentleman, and performed his odious mission kindly and courteously enough. At first she thought there was some bad news of her husband, and she turned deadly pale; but when the officer stammered out that his business was withher, and that it was his duty to arrest her upon a charge of treason, the colour came back to her cheek, and she never looked more stately than when she placed her hand in his, with a graceful bow, and told him, as he led her away, that 'she was proud to be thought worthy of suffering for her country.' They took her off to prison that night; and it was not without much difficulty and no little bribery that we were permitted to furnish her with a few of those luxuries that to a lady are almost the necessaries of life. We little knew what was coming. Oh! Mr. Egerton, it makes my blood boil to think of it. Again, I say, were I only aman!"Valèrie covered her face with her hands for a few seconds ere she resumed her tale, speaking in the cold, measured tones of one who forces the tongue to utter calmly and distinctly that which is maddening and tearing at the heart."We punish our soldiers by making them run the gauntlet between their comrades, Mr. Egerton, and the process is sufficiently brutal to be a favourite mode of enforcing discipline in the Austrian army. Two hundred troopers form a double line, at arm's-length distance apart, and each man is supplied with a stout cudgel, which he is ordered to wield without mercy. The victim walks slowly down between the lines, stripped to the waist, and at the pace of an ordinary march. I need hardly say that ere the unfortunate reaches the most distant files he is indeed a ghastly object. I tell you, this high-born lady, one of the proudest women in Hungary, was brought out to suffer that degrading punishment--to be beaten like a hound. They had the grace to leave her a shawl to cover her shoulders; and with her head erect and her arms folded on her bosom, she stepped nobly down the tyrant's ranks. The first two men refused to strike; they were men, Mr. Egerton, and they preferred certain punishment to the participation in such an act. They were made examples of forthwith. The other troopers obeyed their orders, and she reached the goal bleeding, bruised, and mangled--she, that beautiful woman, a wife and a mother. Ah! you may grind your teeth, my friend, and your dog there under the sofa may growl, but it is true, I tell you,true, I saw her myself when she returned to prison, and she still walked,sonobly,soproudly, like a Hungarian, even then. Think of our feelings and of those of her own children; think of her husband's. Mr. Egerton, what would you have done had you been that woman's husband?""Done!" I exclaimed furiously, for my blood boiled at the bare recital of such brutality, "I would have shot the Marshal through the heart, wheresoever I met him, were it at the very altar of a church."Valèrie's pale face gleamed with delight at my violence."You say well," she exclaimed, clasping her hands together convulsively; "you say well. Woman as I am, I would have dipped my hands in his blood. But no, no, revenge is not for slaves like us; we must suffer and be still. Hopeless of redress, and unable to survive such dishonour, her husband blew his brains out. What would you have? it was but a victim the more. But it is not forgotten--no, it is not forgotten, and the Marshal lives in the hearts of our Hungarian soldiers, the object of an undying, unrelenting hatred. I will tell you an instance that occurred but the other day. Two Hungarian riflemen, scarcely more than boys, on furlough from the army of Italy, were passing through the town where he resides. Weary, footsore, and hungry, they had not wherewithal to purchase a morsel of food. The Kaiser does not overpay his army, and allows his uniform to cover the man who begs his bread along the road. An old officer with long moustaches saw these two lads eyeing wistfully the hot joints steaming in the windows of acafé."'My lads,' he said, 'you are tired and hungry, why do you not go in and dine?'"'Excellency,' they replied, 'we come from the army of Italy; we have marched all the way on foot, we have spent our pittance, and we are starving.'"He gave them a few florins and bade them make merry; he could not see a soldier want, he said, for he was a soldier too. The young men stepped joyfully into thecafê, and summoned the waiter forthwith."'Do you know,' said he, 'to whom you have just had the honour of speaking? that venerable old man is Marshal Haynau.'"The two soldiers rushed from the room; ere the Marshal had reached the end of the street they had overtaken him; they cast his money at his feet, and departed from him with a curse that may have been heard in Heaven, but was happily inaudible at the nearest barrack. So is it with us all; those two soldiers had but heard of his cruelty, whilst I, I had stood by and seen her wounds dressed after her punishment. Judge if I do notlovehim! But, alas! I am but a woman, a poor weak woman; what can I do?"As she spoke, we heard Victor's step approaching across the lawn, and Valèrie was once more the graceful, high-born lady, with her assured carriage and careless smile. As she took up her embroidery and greeted her brother playfully, with an air from the last new opera, hummed in the richest, sweetest voice, who would have guessed at the volcano of passions concealed beneath that calm and almost frivolous exterior. Are women possessed of a double existence, that they can thus change on the instant from a betrayal of the deepest feelings to a display of apparently utter heartlessness? or are they only accomplished hypocrites, gifted with norealcharacter at all, and putting on joy or sorrow, smiles or tears, just as they change their dresses or alter the trimmings of their bonnets, merely for effect? I was beginning to study them now in the person of Valèrie, and to draw comparisons between that lady and my own ideal. It is a dangerous occupation, particularly for a wounded man; and one better indeed for all of us, in sickness or in health, let alone.
* * * * *
I was brought to my senses by the simple process of a Cossack dropping his lance into the fleshy part of my arm--no pleasant restorative, but in my case a most effectual one. The first sight that greeted my eyes was his little horse's girths and belly, and his own rough, savage countenance, looking grimly down upon me as he raised his arm to repeat the thrust. I muttered the few words of Russian I knew, to beg for mercy, and he looked at his comrades, as though to consult them on the propriety of acceding to so unheard-of a request as that of a wounded man for his life. A few paces off I saw the Beloochee, evidently taken prisoner, disarmed, and his head running with blood, but his whole bearing as dignified and unmoved as usual.
In this awkward predicament I happily bethought me of the Russian prisoner's epistle.
"Quarter, comrade! quarter!" I shouted as loudly as my failing voice would suffer me. "I have a letter from your officer. Here it is."
"Osmanli?" inquired the Cossack, once more raising his arm to strike. I shuddered to think how quickly that steel lance-head might be buried in my body.
"No, Inglis!" I replied, and the man lowered his weapon once more and assisted me to rise.
Fortunately at this juncture an officer rode up, and to him I appealed for mercy and proper treatment as a prisoner of war. I misdoubted considerably the humanity of my first acquaintance, whose eyes I could see wandering over my person, as though he were selecting such accoutrements and articles of clothing as he thought would suit his own taste. The officer, who seemed of high rank, and was accompanied by an escort, fortunately spoke German, and I appealed eloquently to him in that language. He started at the superscription of the deserter's letter, and demanded of me sternly how I obtained it. In a few words I told him the history of the unfortunate spy, and he passed his gloved hand over his face as though to conceal his emotion.
"You are English?" he observed rapidly, and looking uneasily over his shoulder at the same time. "We do not kill our English prisoners, barbarians as you choose to think us; but to the Turk we give no quarter. Put him on a horse," he added, to my original captor, who kept unpleasantly near: "do not ill-treat him, but bring him safely along with you. If he tries to escape, blow his brains out. As for that rascal," pointing to the Beloochee, "put a lance through him forthwith."
A happy thought struck me. I determined to make an effort for Ali. "Excellence," I pleaded, "spare him, he is my servant."
The Russian officer paused. "Is he not a Turk?" he asked, sternly.
"No, I swear he is not," I replied. "He is my servant, and an Englishman."
If ever a lie was justifiable, it was on the present occasion: I trust thiswhiteone may not be laid to my charge.
"Bring them both on," said the Russian, still glancing anxiously to his rear. "Lieutenant Dolwitz, look to the party. Keep your men together, and move rapidly. This is the devil's own business, and our people are in full retreat." All this, though spoken in Russian, I was able to understand; nor did the hurried manner in which the great man galloped off shake my impression that he still dreaded a vision of Iskender Bey and his band of heroes thundering on his track.
I was placed on a little active Cossack pony. The Beloochee's wrist was tied to mine, and he was forced to walk or rather run by my side; whenever he flagged a poke from the butt-end of a lance admonished him to mend his pace, and a Russian curse fell harmlessly on his ear. Still he preserved his dignity through it all; and so we journeyed onwards into Wallachia, and meditated on the chances of war and the changes that a day may bring forth.
CHAPTER XX
THE BELOOCHEE
The pursuit was fast and furious. After crossing such a river as the Danube, in the teeth of a far superior force and under a heavy fire--after carrying the Russian redoubts with the bayonet, and driving their main body back upon its reserve, the Turkish troops, flushed and wild with victory, were not to be stopped by any soldiers on earth.
Iskender's charge had completely scattered the devoted body that had so gallantly interposed to cover the retreat of their comrades, and a total rout of the Russian forces was the result. The plains of Wallachia were literally strewed with dismounted guns, broken ambulance wagons, tumbrils, ammunition carts, dead and dying, whilst still the fierce Moslem urged his hot pursuit. Straggler after straggler, reeking with haste and all agape with fear, reached the astonished town of Bucharest, and the reports in that pleasure-seeking capital were, as may well be imagined, of the most bewildering and contradictory description.
Many a frightful scene was witnessed by the terrified Wallachian peasant, as fugitive after fugitive was overtaken, struck down and butchered by the dread pursuers. Nay, women and children were not spared in the general slaughter; and the hideous practice of refusing "quarter," which has so long existed between the Turkish and Russian armies, now bore ghastly fruit.
A horse falls exhausted in a cart which contains some Russian wounded, and a woman belonging to their regiment. Its comrade vainly struggles to draw them through the slough in which they are fast. Half-a-dozen Turkish troopers are on their track, urging those game little horses to their speed, and escape is hopeless.
Helpless and mutilated, the poor fellows abandon themselves to their fate. The Turks ride in and make short work of them, the Muscov dying with a stolid grim apathy peculiar to himself and his natural foe. The woman alone shows energy and quickness in her efforts to preserve her child. She covers the baby over with the straw at the bottom of the cart; wounded as she is in the confusion, and with an arm broken, she seeks to divert the attention of her ruthless captors. Satisfied with their butchery, they are about to ride on in search of fresh victims, and the mother's heart leaps to think that she has saved her darling. But the baby cries in its comfortless nest; quick as thought, a Turkish trooper buries his lance amongst the straw, and withdraws the steel head and gaudy pennon, reeking with innocent blood. The mother's shriek flies straight to Heaven. Shall the curse she invokes on that ruthless brute fall back unheard? Ride on, man of blood--ride on, to burn and ravage and slay; and when the charge hath swept over thee, and the field is lost, and thou art gasping out thy life-blood on the plain, think of that murdered child, and die like a dog in thy despair!
By a route nearly parallel with the line of flight, but wandering through an unfrequented district with which the Cossacks seem well acquainted, the Beloochee and myself proceed towards our captivity. We have ample leisure to examine our guards, these far-famed Cossacks of whom warriors hear so much and see so little--the best scouts and foragers known, hardy, rapid, and enduring, the very eyes and ears of an army, and for every purpose except fighting unrivalled by any light cavalry in the world. My original captor, who still clings to me with a most unwelcome fondness, is no bad specimen of his class. He is mounted on a shaggy pony, that at first sight seems completely buried even under the middle-sized man it carries, but with a lean, good head, and wiry limbs that denote speed and endurance, when put to the test. In a snaffle bridle, and with its head up, the little animal goes with a jerking, springing motion, not the least impaired by its day's work, and the fact that it has now been without food for nearly twenty-four hours. Its master, the same who keeps his small bright eye so constantly fastened upon his prisoners, is a man of middle height, spare, strong, and sinewy, with a bushy red beard and huge moustache. His dress consists of enormously loose trousers, a tight-fitting jacket, and high leathern shako; and he sits with his knees up to his chin. His arms are a short sabre, very blunt, and useless, and a long lance, with which he delights to do effective service against a fallen foe. He has placed the Beloochee between himself and me; it seems that he somewhat mistrusts my companion, but considers myself, a wounded man on one of their own horses, safe from any attempt at escape. The Beloochee, notwithstanding that every word calls down a thwack upon his pate (wounded as it is by the sabre-cut which stunned him) from the shaft of a lance, hazards an observation, every now and then, in Turkish. It is satisfactory to find that our guardians are totally ignorant of that language. I remark, too, that Ali listens anxiously at every halt, and apparently satisfied with what he hears, though I for my own part can discern nothing, walks on in a cheerful frame of mind, which I attribute entirely to the Moslem stoicism. His conversation towards dusk consists entirely of curses upon his captors; and these worthies, judging of its tenor by the sound, and sympathising doubtless with the relief thus afforded, cease to belabour him for his remarks.
At nightfall the rain came on again as in the morning; and at length it grew pitch dark, just as we entered a defile, on one side of which was a steep bank covered with short brushwood, and on the other a wood of young oaks nearly impenetrable.
I felt the Beloochee's wrist press mine with an energy that must mean something.
"Are you in pain?" he whispered in Turkish, adding a loud and voluble curse upon the Giaour, much out of unison with his British character, but which was doubtless mistaken for a round English oath.
"Not much," I replied in the same language; "but sick and faint at times."
"Can you roll off your horse, and down the bank on your left?" he added, hurriedly. "If you can, I can save you."
"Save yourself," I replied; "how can I move a step with a ball in my ankle-bone?"
"Silence!" interposed the Cossack, with a bang over the Beloochee's shoulders.
"Both or none," whispered the latter after a few seconds' interval, "do exactly as I tell you."
"Agreed," I replied, and waited anxiously for the result.
Our Cossack was getting wet through. To his hardy frame such a soaking could scarcely be called an inconvenience; nevertheless, it created a longing for a pipe, and the tobacco-bag he had taken from Ali was fortunately not half emptied. As he stopped to fill and light his short silver-mounted meerschaum, the spoil of some fallen foe, the troopers in our rear passed on. We were left some ten paces behind the rest, and the night was as dark as pitch.
Ali handed me a small knife: he had concealed that and one other tiny weapon in the folds of his sash when they searched him on the field of battle. I knew what he meant, and cut the cord that bound our wrists together; his other hand, meanwhile, to lull suspicion, caressed the Cossack's horse. That incautious individual blew upon his match, which refused to strike a good light.
In a twinkling Ali's shawl was unwound from his body and thrown apparently over the Cossack's saddle-bow. The smothered report of a pocket-pistol smote on my ear, but the sound could not penetrate through those close Cashmere folds to the party in front, and they rode unconsciously forward. The Beloochee's hand, too, was on his adversary's throat; and one or two gasps, as they rolled together to the ground, made me doubt whether he had been slain by the ball from that little though effective weapon, or choked in the nervous gripe of the Asiatic.
I had fortunately presence of mind to restrain my own horse, and catch the Cossack's by the bridle; the party in front still rode on.
Ali rose from the ground. "The knife," he whispered hoarsely, "the knife!"
Once, twice, he passed it through that prostrate body. "Throw yourself off," he exclaimed; "let the horses go. Roll down that bank, and we are saved!"
I obeyed him with the energy of a man who knows he has butonechance. I scarcely felt the pain as I rolled down amongst the brushwood. I landed in a water-course full of pebbles, but the underwood had served to break my fall; and though sorely bruised and with a broken ankle, I was still alive. The Beloochee, agile as a cat, was by my side.
"Listen," said he; "they are riding back to look for us. No horse on earth butonecan creep down that precipice; lie still. If the moon does not come out, we are saved."
Moments of dreadful suspense followed. We could hear the Cossacks shouting to each other above, and their savage yell when they discovered their slain comrade smote wildly on our ears. Again I urged the Beloochee to fly--why should he wait to die with me? I could scarcely scrawl, and a cold sickness came on at intervals that unnerved me totally.
To all my entreaties he made but one reply, "Bakaloum" (We shall see), "it is our destiny. There is but one Allah!"
The Cossacks' shouts became fainter and fainter. They seemed to have divided in search of their late prey. The moon, too, struggled out fitfully. It was a wild scene.
The Beloochee whistled--a low, peculiar whistle, like the cry of a night-hawk. He listened attentively; again he repeated that prolonged, wailing note. A faint neigh answered it from the darkness, and we heard the tread of a horse's hoofs approaching at a trot.
"It is Zuleika," he observed, quietly; "there is but one Allah!"
A loose horse, with saddle and bridle, trotted up to my companion, and laid its head against his bosom. Stern as he was, he caressed it as a mother fondles a child. It was his famous bay mare, "the treasure of his heart," "the corner of his liver,"--for by such endearing epithets he addressed her,--and now he felt indeed that he was saved.
"Mount," he said, "in the name of the Prophet. I know exactly where we are. Zuleika has the wings of the wind; she laughs to scorn the heavy steeds of the Giaour; they swallow the dust thrown up by her hoofs, and Zuleika bounds from them like the gazelle. Oh,jhanum!--oh, my soul!" Once more he caressed her, and the mare seemed well worthy of his affection; she returned it by rubbing her head against him with a low neigh.
I was soon in the saddle, with the Beloochee walking by my side. His iron frame seemed to acknowledge no fatigue. Once I suggested that the mare should carry double, and hazarded an opinion that by reducing the pace we might fairly increase the burden. The remark well-nigh cost me the loss of my preserver's friendship.
"Zuleika," he exclaimed, with cold dignity, "Zuleika requires no such consideration. She is not like the gross horse of the Frank, who sinks and snorts, and struggles and fails, under his heavy burden. She would step lightly as a deer under three such men as we are. No, light of my eyes," he added, smoothing down the thin silky mane of his favourite, "I will walk by thee and caress thee, and feast my eyes on thy star-like beauty. Should the Giaour be on our track, I will mount thee with the Tergyman, and we will show him the mettle of a real daughter of the desert--my rose, my precious one!"
She was, indeed, a high-bred-looking animal, although from her great strength in small compass she appeared less speedy than she really was. Her colour was a rich dark bay, without a single white hair. Her crest was high and firm as that of a horse; and her lean, long head and expressive countenance showed the ancestry by which her doting master set such store. Though the skin that covered those iron muscles so loosely was soft and supple as satin, she carried no flesh, and her deep ribs might almost be counted by the eye. Long in her quarters, with legs of iron and immense power in her back and loins, she walked with an elastic, springy gait, such as even my own Injour could not have emulated. She was of the highest breed in the desert, and as superior to other horses as the deer is to the donkey. I wondered how my friend had obtained possession of her; and as we plodded on, the Beloochee, who had recovered his good-humour, walking by my side, condescended to inform me of the process by which the invaluable Zuleika had become his own.
"Tergyman!" said he, "I have journeyed through many lands, and with the exception of your country--the island of storms and snows--I have seen the whole world.[#] In my own land the mountains are high and rugged, the winters cold and boisterous; it rearsmenbrave and powerful asRustam, but we must look elsewhere forhorses. Zuleika, you perceive, is from the desert: 'The nearer the sun, the nobler the steed.' She was bred in the tent of a scheik, and as a foal she carried on her back only such children as had a chief's blood in their veins."
[#] This is a common idea amongst Orientals when they have done Mecca and seen a greater part of Asia Minor.
"From my youth up I have been a man of war, Effendi, and the word of command has been more familiar to my lips than the blessed maxims of the Prophet; but the time will come when I too shall be obliged to cross the narrow bridge that spans the abyss of hell. And if my naked feet have no better protection from its red-hot surface than deeds of arms and blood-stained victories, woe to me for ever! I shall assuredly fall headlong into the depths of fire.
"Therefore I bethought me of a pilgrimage to Mecca, for he is indeed a true believer who has seen with his own eyes the shrine of the Blessed Prophet. Many and long were the days I passed under the burning sun of the desert; wearisome and slow was the march of the caravan. My jaded camel was without water. I said in my soul, 'It is my destiny to die.' Far behind the long array, almost out of hearing of their bells, my beast dragged his weary steps. I quitted his back and led him till he fell. No sooner was he down than the vultures gathered screaming around him, though not a speck had I seen for hours in the burning sky. Then I beheld a small cloud far off on the horizon; it was but of the size of one of these herdsmen's cottages, but black as the raven, and it advanced more rapidly than a body of horsemen. Ere I looked again it seemed to reach the heavens, the skies became dark as night, columns of sand whirled around me, and I knew the simoom was upon us and it was time to die.
"How long I lay there I know not. When I recovered my consciousness, the caravan had disappeared, my camel was already stripped to the bones by the birds of prey, my mouth and nostrils were full of sand. Nearly suffocated, faint and helpless, it was some time ere I was aware of an Arab horseman standing over me, and looking on my pitiable condition with an air of kindness and protection.
"'My brother,' he said, 'Allah has delivered thee into my hand. Mount, and go with me.'
"He gave me water from a skin, he put me on his own horse till we were joined by his tribe; I went with him to his tents, and I became to him as a brother, for he had saved me at my need.
"He was a scheik of the wild Bedouins: a better warrior never drew a sword. Rich was he too, and powerful; but of all his wives and children, camels, horses, and riches, he had two treasures that he valued higher than the pearl of Solomon--his bay mare and his daughter Zuleika."
The Beloochee's voice trembled, and he paused. For a few seconds he listened as if to satisfy himself that the enemy were not on our track, and then nerving himself like a man about to suffer pain, and looking far into the darkness, he proceeded--
"I saw her day after day in her father's tent. Soon I longed for her light step and gentle voice as we long for the evening breeze after the glare and heat of the day. At last I watched her dark eyes as we watch the guiding star by night in the desert. To the scheik I was as a brother. I was free to come and go in his tent, and all his goods were mine. Effendi! I am but a man, and I loved the girl. In less than a year I had become a warrior of their tribe; many a foray had I ridden with them, and many a herd of camels and drove of horses had I helped them to obtain. Once I saved the scheik's life with the very sword I lost to-day. Could they not have given me the girl? Oh! it was bitter to see her every hour, and to know she was promised to another!
"A few days more and she was to be espoused to Achmet. He was the scheik's kinsman, and she had been betrothed to him from a child. I could bear it no longer. The maiden looked at me with her dark eyes full of tears. I had eaten the scheik's salt--he had saved me from a lingering death--he was my host, my friend, my benefactor, and I robbed him of his daughter. We fled in the night. I owned a horse that could outstrip every steed in the tribe save one. I took a leathern skin of water, a few handfuls of barley, and my arms. I placed Zuleika on the saddle in front of me, and at daybreak we were alone in the desert, she and I, and we were happy. When the sun had been up an hour, there was a speck in the horizon behind us. I told Zuleika we were pursued; but she bid me take courage, for my steed was the best in the tribe, said she, except her father's bay mare, and he suffered no one to mount that treasure but himself. She had loosed the bay mare the night before from her picket-ropes; it would be morning before they could find her, and there was nothing to fear. I took comfort, and pressed my bride to my heart.
"In the desert, Effendi, it is not as with us. The Arab's life depends upon his horse, and he proves him as you would prove a blade. At two years old he rides him till his back bends,[#] and he never forgets the merits of the colt. Each horse's speed is as well known in the tribe as is each officer's rank in the army of the Padisha. Nothing could overtake my charger save the scheik's bay mare; and, thanks to Zuleika, the bay mare must be hours behind us."
[#] An Arab maxim, from which they are studious not to depart; their idea being that a horse's worst year is from three to four; during which period they let him run perfectly idle, but feeding him at the same time as if in full work: for, say they, "a horse's goodness goes in at his mouth." At five he is considered mature.
"We galloped steadily on, and once more I looked over my shoulder. The speck had become larger and darker now, and I caught the gleam of a lance in the morning sun. Our pursuer must be nearing us; my horse too began to flag, for I had ridden fiercely, and he carried myself and my bride. Nevertheless, we galloped steadily on.
"Once more I looked back. The object was distinct enough now; it was a horseman going at speed. Allah be praised! there was but one. Zuleika turned pale and trembled--my lily seemed to fade on my bosom. Effendi, I had resolved what to do."
CHAPTER XXI
ZULEIKA
"Man to man, and in the desert, I had but little to fear, yet when I saw Achmet's face, my heart turned to water within me. He was a brave warrior. I had ridden by his side many a time in deadly strife; but I had never seen him look like this before. When I turned to confront him, my horse was jaded and worn out--I felt that my life was in the hand of mine enemy.
"'Achmet,' I said, 'let me go in peace; the maiden has made her choice--she is mine.'
"His only answer was a lance-thrust that passed between Zuleika's body and my own. The girl clung fainting to my bosom, and encumbered my sword-arm. My horse could not withstand the shock of Achmet's charge, and rolled over me on the sand. In endeavouring to preserve Zuleika from injury, my yataghan dropped out of its sheath; my lance was already broken in the fall, and I was undermost, with the gripe of my adversary on my throat. Twice I shook myself free from his hold: and twice I was again overmastered by my rival. His eyes were like living coals, and the foam flew from his white lips. He was mad, and Allah gave him strength. The third time his grasp brought the blood from my mouth and nostrils. I was powerless in his hold. His right arm was raised to strike; I saw the blade quivering dark against the burning sky. I turned my eyes towards Zuleika; for even then I thought ofher. The girl was a true Arab, faithful to the last. Once, twice, she raised her arm quick and deadly as the lightning. She had seized my yataghan when it dropped from its sheath, and she buried it in Achmet's body. I rose from the ground a living man, and I was saved by her.
"Effendi, we took the bay mare, and left my jaded horse with the dead man. For days we journeyed on, and looked not back, nor thought of the past, for we were all in all to each other; and whilst our barley lasted and we could find water we knew that we were safe: so we reached Cairo, and trusted in Allah for the future. I had a sword, a lovely wife, and the best mare in the world; but I was a soldier, and I could not gain my bread by trade. I loathed the counters and the bazaar, and longed once more to see the horsemen marshalled in the field. So I fed and dressed the bay mare, and cleaned my arms, and leaving Zuleika in the bazaars, placed myself at the gate of the Pasha, and waited for an audience.
"He received me kindly, and treated me as a guest of consideration; but he had a cunning twinkle in his eye that I liked not; and although I knew him to be as brave as a lion, I suspected he was as treacherous as the fox; nevertheless, 'the hungry man knows not dates from bread,' and I accepted service under him willingly, and went forth from his presence well pleased with my fate. 'Zuleika,' I thought, 'will rejoice to hear that I have employment, and I shall find here in Cairo a sweet little garden where I will plant and tend my rose.'
"I thought to rejoin my love where I had left her, in the bazaar; but she was gone. I waited hours for her return; she came not, and the blood thickened round my heart. I made inquiries of the porters and water-carriers, and all the passers-by that I could find: none had seen her. One old woman alone thought she had seen a girl answering my description in conversation with a black, wearing the uniform of the Pasha; but she was convinced the girl had a fawn-coloured robe, or it might have been lilac, or perhaps orange, but it certainly was not green: this could not then be Zuleika, for she wore the colour of the Prophet. She was lost to me--she for whom I had striven and toiled so much; my heart sank within me; but I could not leave the place, and for months I remained at Cairo, and became a Yuz-Bashi in the Guards of the Pasha. But from that time to this I have had no tidings of Zuleika--my Zuleika."
The Beloochee's face was deadly pale, and his features worked with strong emotion: it was evident that this fierce warrior--man of blood though he had been from his youth upward--had been tamed by the Arab girl. She was the one thing on earth he loved, and the love of such wild hearts is fearful in intensity. After a pause, during which he seemed to smother feelings he could not command, he proceeded in a hoarse, broken voice with his tale.
"The days have never been so bright since I lost her, Effendi; but what would you? it was my kismet, and I submitted; as we must all submit when it is fruitless to struggle. Day by day I did my duty, and increased in the good opinion of the Pasha; but I cared for nothing now save only the bay mare, and I gave her the name of one whom I should never see again.
"The Pasha was a haughty old warrior, lavish in his expenses, magnificent in his apparel, and above all, proud of his horses. Some of the swiftest and noblest steeds of the desert had found their way into his stables; and there were three things in the world which it was well known he would not refuse in the shape of a bribe, these were gold, beauty, and horse-flesh. Ere long he cast a wistful look on my bay mare Zuleika.
"It is well known, Effendi, that an Arab mare of pure race is not to be procured. The sons of the desert are true to their principles, and although gold will buy their best horses, they are careful not to part with their mares for any consideration in the world. For long the Pasha would not believe that Zuleika was a daughter of that wonderful line which was blessed so many hundred years ago by the Prophet, nor was I anxious that he should learn her value, for I knew him to be a man who took no denial to his will. But when he saw her outstripping all competitors at the jereed; when he saw her day after day, at work or at rest, in hardship or in plenty, always smooth and sleek and mettlesome as you see her now, he began to covet so good an animal, and with the Pasha to covet was in one way or another to possess.
"Many a hint was given me that I ought to offer him my bay mare as a present, and that I might then ask what I would; but to all these I turned a deaf ear; now thatshewas gone, what had I in the world but Zuleika? and I swore in my soul that death alone should part us. At length the Pasha offered me openly whatever sum I chose to name as the price of my mare, and suggested at the same time that if I continued obdurate, it might be possible that he should obtain the animal for nothing, and that I should never have occasion to get on horseback again. My life was in danger as well as my favourite. I determined, if it were possible, to save both.
"I went to the Pasha's gate and demanded an audience, presenting at the same time a basket of fruit for his acceptance. He received me graciously, and ordered pipes and coffee, bidding me seat myself on the divan by his side.
"'Ali,' said he, after a few unmeaning compliments, 'Ali, there are a hundred steeds in my stable. Take your choice of them and exchange with me your bay mare, three for one."
"'Pasha!' I replied, 'my bay mare is yours and all that I have, but I am under an oath, that never in my life am I togiveorsellher to any one.'
"The Pasha smiled, and the twinkle in his eye betokened mischief. 'It is said,' he answered, 'an oath is an oath. There is but one Allah!'
"'Nevertheless, Highness,' I remarked, 'I am at liberty to LOSE her. She may yet darken the door of your stable if you will match your best horse against her, the winner to have both. But you shall give me a liberal sum to run the race.'
"The Pasha listened eagerly to my proposal. He evidently considered the race was in his own hands, and I was myself somewhat surprised at the readiness with which he agreed to an arrangement which he must have foreseen would end in the discomfiture and loss of his own steed without the gain of mine. I did not know yet the man with whom I had to deal.
"'To-morrow, at sunrise,' said the Pasha, 'I am willing to start my horse for the race; and, moreover, to show my favour and liberality, I am willing to give a thousand piasters for every ten yards' start you may choose to take. If my horse outstrips your mare you return me the money, if you win you take and keep all.'
"I closed with the proposal, and all night long I lay awake, thinking how I should preserve Zuleika in my own possession. That I should win I had no doubt, but this would only expose me to fresh persecutions, and eventually I should lose my life and my mare too. Towards sunrise a thought struck me, and I resolved to act upon it.
"I would hold the Pasha to his word; I would claim a start of fifty yards, and a present of five thousand piasters. I would take the money immediately, and girth my mare for the struggle. With fifty yards of advantage, where was the horse in the world that could come up with Zuleika? I would fly with her once more into the desert, and take my chance. Better death with her, than life and liberty deprived of my treasure. I rose, prayed, went to the bath, and then fed and saddled my favourite, placing a handful of dates and a small bag of barley behind the saddle.
"All Cairo turned out to see the struggle. The Pasha's troops were under arms, and a strong party of his own guards, the very regiment to which I belonged, was marshalled to keep the ground. We were to run a distance of two hours[#] along the sand. Lances pointed out our course, and we were to return and finish in front of a tent pitched for the Pasha himself. His ladies were present, too, in their gildedarabas, surrounded by a negro guard. As I led my mare up they waved their handkerchiefs, and one in particular seemed restless and uneasy. I imagined I heard a faint scream from the interior of heraraba; but the guard closed round it, and ere I had looked a second time it had been driven from the ground. Just then the Pasha summoned myself and my competitor to his tent. I cast my eye over my antagonist. He was considerably lighter than I was, and led a magnificent chestnut stallion, the best in the Pasha's stables; but when I looked at its strong but short form, and thought of Zuleika's elastic gait and lengthy stride, I had no fears for the result."
[#] About seven miles. The Asiatic always counts space by time, and an hour is equivalent to something over a league.
"I saluted the Pasha, and made my request. 'Highness,' I said, 'I claim a start of fifty yards and five thousand piasters. Let the money be paid, that I may take it with me and begin.'
"'It is well,' replied the Pasha; 'Kiātib,' he added, to his secretary, 'have you prepared the "backshish" for Ali Mesrour? Bestow it on him with a blessing, that he may mount and away,' and again the cruel eye twinkled with its fierce grim humour. Effendi, my heart sank within me when I saw two sturdy slaves bring out a sack, evidently of great weight, and proceed to lay the burden on my pawing mare. 'What is this?' I exclaimed, aghast; 'Highness, this is treachery! I am not to carry all that weight!'
"'Five thousand piasters, oh my soul!' replied the Pasha, with his most ferocious grin; 'and all of itin copper, too. Mount, in the name of the Prophet, and away!'
"My adversary was already in his saddle; the sack was fastened in front of mine. I saw that if I made the slightest demur, it would be considered a sufficient excuse to deprive me of my mare, perhaps of my life. With a prayer to Allah, I got into my saddle. Zuleika stepped proudly on, as though she made but little of the weight; and I took my fifty yards of start, and as much more as I could get. The signal-shot was fired, and we were off. Zuleika sniffed the air of the desert, and snorted in her joy. Despite of the piasters, she galloped on. Effendi, from that day to this I have seen neither my antagonist in the race, nor the negro guard, nor the gildedarabas, nor the Pasha's angry smile. I won my mare, I won my life and freedom; also I carried off five thousand piasters of the Pasha's money, and doubtless four times a day he curses me in his prayers, but yonder is the dawn, and here is the Danube. Sick and faint you must be, Tergyman! Yet in two hours more we shall reach Omar Pasha's tent, for I myself placed a picket of our soldiers on either bank at yonder spot, and they have a boat; so take courage for a little time longer, and confess that the breath of the morning here is sweeter than the air of a Russian prison. Who can foretell his destiny? There is but one Allah!"
I had not the tough frame of my Beloochee friend; before we reached the waterside I had fainted dead away. I remembered no more till I awoke from my fever in an hospital tent at head-quarters. On that weary time of prostration and suffering it is needless for me to dwell. Ere I could sit upright in bed the winter had commenced, the season for field operations was over, and the army established in cantonments. There was a lull, too, before the storm. The Allies had not yet put forth their strength, and it was far from improbable that the war might even then be near its conclusion.
Victor had determined to return to Hungary, and insisted on my accompanying him. Weak, maimed, and emaciated, I could be of no service to my chief, or to the great General who had so kindly recognised me. I had nothing to keep me in Turkey; I had nothing to take me to England. No, no, anywhere but there. Had I but won a name, I should have rejoiced to return into Somersetshire, to see Constance once again--to repay her coldness with scorn--perhaps to pass her without speaking--or, bitterer still, to greet her with the frankness and ease of a mere acquaintance. But what was I, to dream thus? A mere adventurer, at best a poor soldier of fortune, whose destiny, sooner or later, would be but to fatten a battle-field or encumber a trench, and have his name misspelt in aGazette. No, no, anywhere but England, and why not Hungary? Victor's arguments were unanswerable; and once more--but oh! how changed from the quiet, thoughtful child--I was again at Edeldorf.
CHAPTER XXII
VALÈRIE
"I tell you I saw them led out under my very windows to be shot. Two and two they marched, with their heads erect, and their gait as haughty as if they were leading the assault. Thirteen of them in all, and the oldest not five-and-forty. Oh! woe to the Fatherland!--the best blood in Hungary was shed on that fearful day,--the gallant, the true-hearted, who had risen at the first call, and had been the last to fail. Taken with arms in their hands, forsooth! What should be in a gentleman's hands but arms at such a time? Oh, that I had but been a man!" The girl's dark eyes flashed, and her beautiful chiselled nostril dilated as she threw her head back, and stamped her little foot on the floor. None of your soft-eyed beauties was Valèrie de Rohan, but one who sparkled and blazed, and took your admiration fairly by storm. Those who are experienced in such matters affirm that these are the least dangerous of our natural enemies, and that your regular heart-breaker is the gentle, smiling, womanly woman, who wins her way into the citadel step by step, till she pervades it all, and if she leaves it, leaves desolation and ruin behind her. But of this I am incapable of giving an opinion; all I know is, Valèrie grew soft enough as she went on.
"I knew every man of them intimately; not one but had been my father's guest--my poor father, even then fined and imprisoned in Comorn for the manly part he had played. Not one of them but had been at our 'receptions' in the very room from the windows of which I now saw them marching forth to die; and not one but as he passed me lifted his unfettered hand to his head, and saluted me with a courtly smile. Last of all came Adolphe Zersky, my own second cousin, and the poor boy was but nineteen. I bore it all till I saw him; but when he passed under my very eyes, and smiled his usual light-hearted smile, and waved his handkerchief to me, and pressed it to his lips--a handkerchief I had embroidered for him with my own hands--and called out blithesomely, as though he were going to a wedding, 'Good-morning, Comtesse Valèrie; I meant to have called to-day, but have got a previous engagement,' I thought my heart would break. He looked prouder than any of them; I hardly think he would have been set free if he could. He was a true Hungarian. God bless him!--I heard the shots that struck them down. I often dream I hear them now. They massacred poor Adolphe last of all--he retained hissang-froidto the end. The Austrian officer on guard was an old schoolfellow, and Adolphe remarked to im with a laugh, just before they led him out, 'I say, Fritz, if they mean to keep us here much longer, they really ought to give us some breakfast!'
"Oh, Mr. Egerton, it was a cruel time. I had borne the bombardment well enough. I had seen our beautiful town reduced to ruins; and I never winced, for I am the daughter of a Hungarian; but I gave way when they butchered my friends, and wept--oh, how I wept! What else could I do? We poor weak women have but our tears to give. Had Ibutbeen born a man!"
Once more Valèrie's eye flashed, and the proud, wild look gleamed over her features; while a vague idea that for same days had pervaded my brain began to assume a certain form, to the effect that Valèrie de Rohan was a very beautiful woman, and that it was by no means disagreeable to have such a nurse when one was wounded in body, or such a friend when one was sick at heart. And she treated me as arealfriend: she reposed perfect confidence in me; she told me of all her plans and pursuits, her romantic ideas, and visionary schemes for the regeneration of her country, for she was a true patriot; lastly, she confessed to a keen admiration for my profession as a soldier, and a tender pity for my wounds. Who would not have such a friend? Who would not follow with his eyes such a nurse as she glided about his couch?
It is useless to attempt the description of a woman. To say that Valèrie had dark, swimming eyes, and jet-black hair, twisted into a massive crown on her superb head, and round arms and white hands sparkling with jewels, and a graceful floating figure, shaped like a statue, and dressed a little too coquettishly, is merely to say that she was a commonplace handsome person, but conveys no idea of that subtle essence of beauty--that nameless charm which casts its spell equally over the wisest as the weakest, and which can no more be expressed by words than it can be accounted for by reason. Yet Valèrie was a woman who would have found her way straight to the hearts of most men. It seems like a dream to look back to one of those happy days of contented convalescence and languid repose. Every man who has suffered keenly in life must have felt that there is in the human organisation an instinctive reaction and resistance against sorrow, a natural tendency to take advantage of any lull in the storm, and a disposition to deceive ourselves into the belief that we are forgetting for the time that which the very effort proves we too bitterly remember. But even this artificial repose has a good effect. It gives us strength to bear future trials, and affords us also time for reflections which, in the excitement of grief, are powerless to arrest us for a moment.
So I lay on the sofa in the drawing-room at Edeldorf, and rested my wounded leg, and shut my eyes to the future, and drew a curtain (alas, what a transparent one it was!) over the past. There was everything to soothe and charm an invalid. The beautiful room, with its panelled walls and polished floor, inlaid like the costliest marquetry, a perfect mosaic of the forest; the light cane chairs and brocaded ottomans scattered over its surface; the gorgeous cabinets of ebony and gold that filled the spaces between the windows, reflected in long mirrors that ran from floor to ceiling; the gems of Landseer, reproduced by the engraver, sparkling on the walls--for the Hungarian is very English in his tastes, and loves to gaze through the mist at the antlered stag whom Sir Edwin has captured in the corrie, and reproduced in a thousand halls; or to rest with the tired pony and the boy insabotsat the halting-place; or to exchange humorous glances with the blacksmith who is shoeing that wondrously-drawn bay horse, foreshortened into nature, till one longs to pat him;--all this created a beautiful interior, andfromall this I could let my eyes wander away, through the half-opened window at the end, over the undulating park, with its picturesque acacias, far, far athwart the rich Hungarian plain, till it crossed the dim line of trees marking the distant Danube, and reached the bold outline of hills beyond the river, melting into the dun vapours of an afternoon sky.
And there was but one object to intercept the view. In the window sat Comtesse Valèrie, her graceful head bent over her work, her pretty hands flitting to and fro, so white against the coloured embroidery, and her soft glance ever and anon stealing to my couch, while she asked, with a foreigner'sempressement, which was very gratifying, though it might mean nothing, whether I had all I wanted, and if my leg pained me, and if I was not wearying for Victor's return from thechasse?
"And you were here years ago, when I was almost a baby, and I was away on a visit to my aunt at Pesth. Do you know, I always felt as if we were old friends, even the first day you arrived with Victor, and were lifted out of the carriage, so pale, so suffering! Oh, how I pitied you! but you are much better now."
"How can I be otherwise," was my unavoidable reply, "with so kind a nurse and such good friends as I find here?"
"And am Ireallyuseful to you? and do you think that my carereallymakes you better? Oh! you cannot think how glad I am to know this. I cannot be a soldier myself, and bear arms for my beloved country; but I can be useful to those who have done so, and it makes me so proud and so happy!"
The girl's colour rose, and her eyes sparkled and moistened at once.
"But I have not fought for Hungary," I interposed, rather bluntly. "I have no claim on your sympathies--scarcely on your pity."
"Do not say so," she exclaimed, warmly. "Setting apart our regard for you as my brother's friend, it is our enemy with whom you have been fighting--our oppressor who has laid you now on a wounded couch, far from your own country and your friends. Do you think I can tolerate a Russian? he is but one degree better than an Austrian! And I canhate--I tell you I can hate to some purpose!"
She looked as if she could. What a strange girl she was!--now so soft and tender, like a gentle ring-dove; anon flashing out into these gleams of fierceness like a tigress. I was beginning to be a little afraid of her. She seemed to divine my thoughts, for she laughed merrily, and resumed, in her usual pleasant voice--
"You do not yet know me, Mr. Egerton. I am a true De Rohan, and we are as strong in our loves as in our hatreds. Beware of either! I warn you," she added archly, "we are a dangerous race to friend or foe."
Was this coquetry, or the mere playful exuberance of a girl's spirits? I began to feel a curious sensation that I had thought I should never feel again--I am not sure that it was altogether unpleasant.
Valèrie looked at me for a moment, as if she expected me to say something; then bent her head resolutely down to her frame, and went on in a low, rapid voice--
"We are a strange family, Mr. Egerton, we 'De Rohans'; and are a true type of the country to which we belong. We are proud to be thought real Hungarians--warm-hearted, excitable, impatient, but, above all, earnest and sincere. We are strong for good and for evil. Our tyrants may break our hearts, but they cannot subdue our spirit. We look forward to the time whichmustcome at last. 'Hope on, hope ever!' is our motto: a good principle, Mr. Egerton, is it not?"
As I glanced at her excited face and graceful figure, I could not help thinking that there must be many an aspiring Hungarian who would love well to hear such a sentiment of encouragement from such lips, and who would be ready and willing to hope on, though the ever would be a long word for one of those ardent, impulsive natures. She worked on in silence for a few minutes, and resumed.
"You will help us, you English, we all feel convinced. Are you not the champions of liberty all over the world? And you are so like ourselves in your manners and thoughts and principles. Tell me, Mr. Egerton, and do not be afraid to trust me,is it not true?"
"Is notwhattrue?" I asked, from the sofa where I lay, apathetic and dejected, a strange contrast to my beautiful companion.
She went to the door, listened, and closed it carefully, then looked out at the open window, and having satisfied herself there was not a soul within ear-shot, she came back close to my couch, and whispered, "An English prince on the throne of Hungary, our constitution and our parliaments once more, and, above all, deliverance from the iron yoke of Austria, which is crushing us down to the very earth!"
"I have never heard of it," said I, with difficulty suppressing a smile at the visionary scheme, which must have had its origin in some brain heated and enthusiastic as that of my beautiful companion; "nor do I think, if that is all you have to look to, that there is much hope for Hungary."
She frowned angrily.
"Oh!" she answered, "you are cautious, Mr. Egerton: you will not trust me, I can see--but you might do so with safety. We are all 'right-thinkers' here. Though they swarm throughout the land, I do not believe a Government spy has ever yet set foot within the walls of Edeldorf; but I tell you, ifyouwill not help us, we are lost. You laugh to see a girl like me interest herself so warmly about politics, but with us it is a question of life and death. Women, as well as men, have all to gain or all to lose. I repeat, if you do not help us we have nothing left to hope for. Russia will take our part, and we shall fall open-eyed into the trap. Why, even as enemies, they succeeded in ingratiating themselves with the inhabitants of a conquered country. Yes, Hungary was aconquered country, and the soldiers of the Czar were our masters. They respected our feelings, they spared our property, they treated us with courtesy and consideration, and they lavished gold with both hands, which was supplied to them by their own Government for the purpose. It is easy to foresee the result. The next Russian army that crosses the frontier will march in as deliverers, and Austriamustgive way. They are generous in promises, and unequalled in diplomacy. They will flatter our nobles and give us back our constitution; nay, for a time we shall enjoy more of the outward symbols of freedom than have ever yet fallen to our lot. Andmerelyas a compliment,merelyas a matter of form, a Russian Grand-Duke will occupy the palace at Pesth, and assume the crown of St. Stephen simply as the guardian of our liberties and our rights. Then will be told once more the well-known tale of Russian intrigue and Russian pertinacity. A pretence of fusion and a system of favouritism will gradually sap our nationality and destroy our patriotism, and in two generations it will be Poland over again. Well, even that would be better than what we have to endure now."
"Do you mean to say," I asked, somewhat astonished to find my companion so inveterate ahater, notwithstanding that she had warned me of this amiable eccentricity in her character,--"do you mean to say that, with all your German habits and prejudices, nay, with German as your very mother tongue, you would prefer the yoke of the Czar to that of the Kaiser?"
She drew herself up, and her voice quite trembled with anger as she replied--
"The Russians do not beat women. Listen, Mr. Egerton, and then wonder if you can at my bitter hatred of the Austrian yoke. She was my own aunt, my dear mother's only sister. I was sitting with her when she was arrested. We were at supper with a small party of relations and friends. For the moment we had forgotten our danger and our sorrows and the troubles of our unhappy country. She had been singing, and was actually seated at the pianoforte when an Austrian Major of Dragoons was announced. I will do him the justice to say that he was a gentleman, and performed his odious mission kindly and courteously enough. At first she thought there was some bad news of her husband, and she turned deadly pale; but when the officer stammered out that his business was withher, and that it was his duty to arrest her upon a charge of treason, the colour came back to her cheek, and she never looked more stately than when she placed her hand in his, with a graceful bow, and told him, as he led her away, that 'she was proud to be thought worthy of suffering for her country.' They took her off to prison that night; and it was not without much difficulty and no little bribery that we were permitted to furnish her with a few of those luxuries that to a lady are almost the necessaries of life. We little knew what was coming. Oh! Mr. Egerton, it makes my blood boil to think of it. Again, I say, were I only aman!"
Valèrie covered her face with her hands for a few seconds ere she resumed her tale, speaking in the cold, measured tones of one who forces the tongue to utter calmly and distinctly that which is maddening and tearing at the heart.
"We punish our soldiers by making them run the gauntlet between their comrades, Mr. Egerton, and the process is sufficiently brutal to be a favourite mode of enforcing discipline in the Austrian army. Two hundred troopers form a double line, at arm's-length distance apart, and each man is supplied with a stout cudgel, which he is ordered to wield without mercy. The victim walks slowly down between the lines, stripped to the waist, and at the pace of an ordinary march. I need hardly say that ere the unfortunate reaches the most distant files he is indeed a ghastly object. I tell you, this high-born lady, one of the proudest women in Hungary, was brought out to suffer that degrading punishment--to be beaten like a hound. They had the grace to leave her a shawl to cover her shoulders; and with her head erect and her arms folded on her bosom, she stepped nobly down the tyrant's ranks. The first two men refused to strike; they were men, Mr. Egerton, and they preferred certain punishment to the participation in such an act. They were made examples of forthwith. The other troopers obeyed their orders, and she reached the goal bleeding, bruised, and mangled--she, that beautiful woman, a wife and a mother. Ah! you may grind your teeth, my friend, and your dog there under the sofa may growl, but it is true, I tell you,true, I saw her myself when she returned to prison, and she still walked,sonobly,soproudly, like a Hungarian, even then. Think of our feelings and of those of her own children; think of her husband's. Mr. Egerton, what would you have done had you been that woman's husband?"
"Done!" I exclaimed furiously, for my blood boiled at the bare recital of such brutality, "I would have shot the Marshal through the heart, wheresoever I met him, were it at the very altar of a church."
Valèrie's pale face gleamed with delight at my violence.
"You say well," she exclaimed, clasping her hands together convulsively; "you say well. Woman as I am, I would have dipped my hands in his blood. But no, no, revenge is not for slaves like us; we must suffer and be still. Hopeless of redress, and unable to survive such dishonour, her husband blew his brains out. What would you have? it was but a victim the more. But it is not forgotten--no, it is not forgotten, and the Marshal lives in the hearts of our Hungarian soldiers, the object of an undying, unrelenting hatred. I will tell you an instance that occurred but the other day. Two Hungarian riflemen, scarcely more than boys, on furlough from the army of Italy, were passing through the town where he resides. Weary, footsore, and hungry, they had not wherewithal to purchase a morsel of food. The Kaiser does not overpay his army, and allows his uniform to cover the man who begs his bread along the road. An old officer with long moustaches saw these two lads eyeing wistfully the hot joints steaming in the windows of acafé.
"'My lads,' he said, 'you are tired and hungry, why do you not go in and dine?'
"'Excellency,' they replied, 'we come from the army of Italy; we have marched all the way on foot, we have spent our pittance, and we are starving.'
"He gave them a few florins and bade them make merry; he could not see a soldier want, he said, for he was a soldier too. The young men stepped joyfully into thecafê, and summoned the waiter forthwith.
"'Do you know,' said he, 'to whom you have just had the honour of speaking? that venerable old man is Marshal Haynau.'
"The two soldiers rushed from the room; ere the Marshal had reached the end of the street they had overtaken him; they cast his money at his feet, and departed from him with a curse that may have been heard in Heaven, but was happily inaudible at the nearest barrack. So is it with us all; those two soldiers had but heard of his cruelty, whilst I, I had stood by and seen her wounds dressed after her punishment. Judge if I do notlovehim! But, alas! I am but a woman, a poor weak woman; what can I do?"
As she spoke, we heard Victor's step approaching across the lawn, and Valèrie was once more the graceful, high-born lady, with her assured carriage and careless smile. As she took up her embroidery and greeted her brother playfully, with an air from the last new opera, hummed in the richest, sweetest voice, who would have guessed at the volcano of passions concealed beneath that calm and almost frivolous exterior. Are women possessed of a double existence, that they can thus change on the instant from a betrayal of the deepest feelings to a display of apparently utter heartlessness? or are they only accomplished hypocrites, gifted with norealcharacter at all, and putting on joy or sorrow, smiles or tears, just as they change their dresses or alter the trimmings of their bonnets, merely for effect? I was beginning to study them now in the person of Valèrie, and to draw comparisons between that lady and my own ideal. It is a dangerous occupation, particularly for a wounded man; and one better indeed for all of us, in sickness or in health, let alone.