A morning or two after this, there was no small consternation existing among the soldiers of my little band at Rodosdchig, when Dugald Mac Ildhui, my sergeant, paraded them as usual, and neither Callum Dhu nor his master were forthcoming. Corporal Donald Roy was despatched to make inquiries, but returned to the parade with tidings that he had knocked repeatedly at Mr. Mac Innon's door without receiving any answer; and as it was open, he had ventured to peep in, and saw but too plainly that his camp-bed had not been slept in over-night; that the last fragment of an unextinguished candle was still burning, but streaming and guttering on the table; that his sword and belt and some of his uniform lay strewed about; but that neither he nor Callum Dhu had been seen since last night, when the Turkish sentinel at the barrier-gate thought he perceived them both pass hurriedly out, and take the path which led towards the sea.
The faithful sergeant and his corporal spent that day, all the next, and all the succeeding in vain surmises and in futile inquiries; no trace of their officer and missing comrade was to be found; and as the story of Hussein's rage and imprecations against me, for causes unknown, had by some means—perhaps through the chaoush or onbashi of the Bombardiers—reached the little band of Celts, they began to look darkly and inquiringly in each other's faces, while vague whispers of assassination gained strength and corroboration among them. The sergeant and his corporal had been among the wandering Highland dancers who went to Paris in 1848, and were so near being shot by the Republican troops for appearing kilted and plaided, with dirk and claymore, in the Place de Carrousel; and having imbibed thereafter a great doubt of, and detestation for, all foreigners whatsoever, they came to the conclusion that we had met with an untimely end.
The circumstance of a boat being found by a Galiondgi adrift near the castle, containing an officer's regimental sash, spotted with blood, and a Highland private's Glengarry bonnet, increased this terrible mystery, and led the soldiers to believe that, beyond a doubt, the unfortunate Ensign Mac Innon and his fidus Achates had become food for the fishes of the Propontis, and the whole beach around the bay was searched in vain for their bodies.
The sergeant—a sober, steady, and brave soldier, one of the many who were daily forced from their homes into our ranks, for he was an evicted Sutherland Highlander (evicted because he was unable to pay the marriage-tax of forty shillings now daily and illegally exacted by the grasping factors of the north and west Highlands from the people, to keep the number of the population down)—procured a thin yellow sheet of Turkish paper, and after holding a solemn council of war, in which a vote of vengeance was unanimously passed on the Yuze Bashi, who was still under the Jewish Hakim and the signs of the Zodiac, he squared his elbows, made a broad margin, carefully nibbed his pen, and proceeded to prepare an official report to Major Catanagh, recounting the strange disappearance of the officer commanding the detachment; and this report caused no small excitement at the mess-table when it reached Heraclea.
Some weeks elapsed before this mystery was cleared up; and the origin of it all was as follows:—
One evening, after the arrival of the Moolah Moustapha, of whose presence at the fortress I had an intuitive dread, an unusual bustle, and then a dead silence were remarked in the apartments of the Yuze Bashi; and in half an hour after sunset, Callum Dhu, with his dark face flushed and excited, came in haste to inform me, that a boat—one of those straight prowed and heavily-built craft, called by the Turks a kochamba—with several men in it, had come from the harbour round the promontory of the castle, and was now close to the sea staircase, a flight of steps hewn in the rocks near the lower gun-battery. He added more startling intelligence.
A loud whistle, as a signal, had been given by someone in this boat, and thereafter two men, one of whom he suspected to be the Moolah Moustapha, had left the postern gate, half leading and half dragging a veiled woman, 'who sobbed heavily,' concluded. Callum, 'but who made not the least resistance, as if all hope in her heart was dead, poor thing!'
I cannot express the horror with which I heard this information. Innumerable stories of Turkish cruelty, of the burial of living women, sacked and drowned in the Bosphorus; of the gashed and mangled bodies of others that have been found across the cables of our own ships, or were raked up by them, as they swung at their anchors by the Golden Horn; of bodies stranded and torn by jackals on the shore at Pera, with a thousand real and imaginary instances of the terrible result of oriental jealousy and domestic cruelty, flashed upon my memory, and I determined to save Iola from the dreadful fate impending over her, or to die in the attempt.
In the beginning of Islamism—women who were supposed to have broken their vows were stoned to death, or immured in a stone wall; for the fourth chapter of the Koran commands that they shall be "imprisoned in separate apartments until death release them."
'You are my foster brother, and will stand by me, Callum?' said I, grasping his hand.
'To the death will I stand by you; but on what errand go you now?'
'To save this woman.'
'The wife of the Yuze Bashi.'
'Yes—the Greek girl, Iola.'
'From what?'
'Death!'
'Death?'
'Yes—yes! hand me my dirk and the shot-belt for the revolver; get your bayonet. The Yuze Bashi means to drown his wife in a sack—'
'Dhia! it is horrible!—like a puppy-dog.'
'Or, it may be, to behead her by a slash of a yataghan. If either takes place, her blood will be on our heads, Callum—on mine, at least.'
'I don't understand all this; but, dioul! I will follow YOU anywhere, Mac Innon—so lead on.'
I slung my dirk and revolver-pistol to my belt; Callum buckled on his bayonet; we hurried from the castle, and soon reached the landing-place, where a few boats were usually moored.
The night was dark and cloudy; no moon was visible, and the sea of Marmora lay between its headlands like an ocean of ink; yet, by stooping low, I could perceive between me and the white streak that lingered at the horizon a large boat, containing several dark figures, being pulled like a great funeral barge, silently and rapidly to seaward.
''Tis those we are in search of,' said Callum, as we leaped on board of a little Greek caique, slashed through the painter, shipped the oars, and pulled sturdily and breathlessly after them.
In such a land as Turkey, where, in 1808, the Sultan Mahmoud II. could quietly, and quite as a matter of course, or as a piece of state policy, strangle his deposed brother Mustapha IV., together with his infant son; and also command four of his female slaves to be sacked and drowned, because they were likely to increase the royal family by presenting him with four little Harem-zadehs; where even his son, the present Sultan Abdul Medjid, with all his vaunted civilization, has committed more than one act of domestic barbarity, more especially the assassination of the two little princes, his nephews; and where too many of the atrocities recorded by travellers in all ages are still perpetrated, I knew all that hung over the doomed wife of Hussein; all I had to repent of, and all I had to fear!
Ill-fated Iola!
While all the rest of the world has been pushing on the rapid march of progression, Turkey like Spain, has stood still. The Turkish woman, says the Baron de Tott, when inspired by an irresistible love and desire of freedom, overcomes every obstacle, and at times escapes from the harem, her domestic prison. 'These unfortunate creatures,' he continues, always carry off their jewels with them, and consider nothing too good for their lover. Blinded by their unhappy passion, they do not perceive that this wealth often becomes the cause of their destruction. The villains to whom they fly never fail at the end of a few days to punish their temerity, and ensure the possession of their effects by a crime which, however monstrous, the government is least in haste to punish. The bodies of these miserable women, stripped and mangled, are frequently seen floating in the Port (of Constantinople) under the very windows of their murderers; and these dreadful examples, so likely to intimidate the rest, and prevent such madness, neither terrify nor amend.'
But to resume: surely, steadily, and lustily, with all our strength, Callum and I shot the light caique after the great dark barge of these voyagers in the dusk, at every stroke causing her to fly through the seething water as with each effort of the bending oars we almost lifted her into the air, and made the black waves boil in her white wake astern. The clatter and straining of our oars between the tholing pins, and the noise made by the caique as it surged through the water, soon gained the attention of the rowers in the large boat, which was now about half a mile from the shore, and they paused for a minute to observe us. Then one black figure stood erect, and peered into the gloom of the darkened sea.
He was the Moolah Moustapha.
The voice of one in authority now warned us to keep off, for the large boat contained two topchis, of Hussein's company, and four armed policemen of the Bostandgi Bashi, with one or two galiondgis.
'Dioul!' exclaimed Callum; 'what is he saying?'
'That they will fire, if we do not keep off.'
'How many of them are there?'
'One—two—six—seven, if not more.'
'Including the Moolah?'
'Who is almost nobody.'
'Two to six, at least,' pondered Callum.
'But I have six shots in my revolver.'
'If I had only my old rifle here,' sighed Callum, 'I could pick them all off like black-cocks!'
Two pistols flashed from the kochamba, and threw a sudden gleam across the water; but their bullets whistled harmlessly over us. Exasperated by this, my foster-brother cried,
'Kill every mother's son of them, Mac Innon—quick—before they reload again!'
But I dared not fire, lest one of those dark figures should be Iola.
'Pull hard,' said I; 'we are not twenty yards apart now; board and attack them with your bayonet—I'll make good use of my dirk, believe me!'
'Fire—fire! are they not three to one?'
'One Highlandman is equal to three Turks any day.'
'True, Mac Innon,' exclaimed Callum, entering at once into the spirit of the attack; 'hoigh—hurrah!'
But never was assault more fatally devised, or more signally unsuccessful.
In a moment the prow of the caique came with a frightful crash against the quarter of the lumbering kochamba; the shock threw me forward upon the thwarts, by one of which I was severely cut and bruised about the face, while I narrowly escaped three pistol shots, one of which grazed and slightly wounded Callum's left hand; but our misfortunes were only beginning; for in the concussion I lost my revolver-pistol. On relinquishing the oar, and springing up, I instinctively grasped for it at my waist-belt—but alas! the pistol was gone. For a moment I groped wildly and fruitlessly about the bottom of the caique, without finding it; and then, as no time could be lost, with my naked dirk, I sprang madly on board the kochamba, followed by Callum, who made free use of his bayonet, and now a deadly struggle took place; the Turks assailing us with batons, drawn sabres, and the brass knobs of their long-barrelled pistols, amid a storm of yells and barbarous maledictions.
Grasping one powerful galiondgi by the waist, Callum flung him fairly overboard, tossing him into the air like an India-rubber ball; and he was left by his fatalist friends to sputter and sink, or scramble on board as best he could.
The huge boat swayed from side to side, plashing and surging heavily, while we fought and grappled like wild animals; but though individually more than a match for any of the Osmanlies present, Callum and I were overborne by their number, and must inevitably have been shot, stabbed and tossed overboard, but for the exertions and authority of the Moolah Moustapha, who would not allow them to slay us; but under pain of his everlasting curse and displeasure, commanded them to spare our lives, "as he had eaten bread and salt with us." Though four of the fellows whom we encountered, and with whom we had exchanged several buffets, blows, and stabs in the dark, belonged to the unscrupulous force of the Bostandgi Bashi, or Police Inspector on the banks of the Bosphorus and its adjacent villages, the voice of the Moolah, who ordered us to be taken alive, proved all powerful. We were soon beaten down, and severely, roughly, even brutally, tied like sheep with a wet rope which lay steeping in the bilge at the bottom of the boat; and while we were lying helplessly there, the revengeful Osmanlies trampled and spat upon us, reviling us at the same time with such epithets as can only come from a vituperative Turkish tongue.
'Allah burn you, you dog's sons—you imps of Shaitaun!' said one whom they frequently named Zahroun, and who seemed to be half Bostandgi and half seaman.
'The drunken Inglees—whose dogs are they?' asked another, mockingly.
'They worship the devil, like the wild Yezidies of Iraun—the children of hell, and are false as the falsest Yahoudi. Dirt be upon their beards!' said the ferocious Zahroun.
'Son of Shaitaun,' said another, kicking me so severely that I thought my right arm was broken, 'it is your khismet (destiny) to die here, and I know not why the simple Moolah spares you.'
'Infidel that you are,' said a fourth, 'your khismet is written on your forehead by the finger of the prophet—and it is a skinful of the cold Bosphorus.'
To all this, the others added coarse and vulgar ribaldry, such as one might expect from the boatmen and Bostandgi of the Bosphorus, a depraved and murderous class at all times; and my heart swelled with honest rage when I thought of the futile war we had waged for those insensate Turks, whose name had not been heard in battle since our army landed in the Crimea, and who, with all their boasted valour, had fled at Balaclava, and left a single Highland regiment—"the thin red streak" of Sir Colin Campbell—to receive in line the charge of all the Russian cavalry!
But now the Moolah raised his voice.
'Bismillah—peace, I command you, peace! Allah permits them yet to live, and dare such as ye to repine? We come not here to brawl or to revile, but to fulfil the decrees of Allah as spoken by his prophet, upon whose memory, name, and grave be all the blessings of the faithful. The home of a true Believer—the anderun of a true Mussulman—one fearing God, obeying his Koran, and walking in the shadow of the prophet, has been violated, and the Koran and the law say, that a terrible punishment must follow!'
'Amaun! amaun!' muttered Zahroun and all the others present, while a moan from the stern of the boat drew my eyes towards Iola.
* * * * *
Would that I could blot from my memory the dreadful scene that followed!
Worn by nights and days of weeping—exhausted by unavailing prayers for pity, and paralyzed by terror, there seemed to be no life left in her slender and delicate form, save what a short, quick, and heavy sob indicated, as her small and tremulous hands were tied by a cord behind her back; and, calm and pale as death itself, she submitted to her fate without a murmur.
'Moustapha—insensate Moolah!' I exclaimed, in an agony of mind, 'hear me—hear me! Have you no pity?—no mercy?—no compassion for those who have been cruelly tempted?'
'Peace, accursed,' replied the Moolah, in a stern whisper, 'we tempt ourselves.'
As a degradation, the executioners had torn away the yashmack of muslin from her face, and its pale beauty and divine resignation were sad, sublime, and maddening to me; but a large, coarse sack was hastily drawn over her by Zahroim, who seemed an adept in the work; he tied it securely to her slender ankles, and saw her form no more.
A cry escaped me, and a half-suppressed groan from Callum Dhu, as these inhuman wretches launched her headlong into the deep.
She sunk like a stone! * * * * * *
On the black waves of that midnight sea there rose a few bubbles, and a ripple or two, that widened round us, and then all was over! A voice broke the stillness; it was that of the Moolah praying. He was repeating the first chapter of the Koran; a short chapter held in great veneration by the Mohammedans, who use it us a prayer, and deem it the quintessence of the whole writings of the Prophet.
'Allah latif magid!' (Allah is gracious!) he exclaimed, with a loud voice: 'the Lord of all creatures—the most merciful the King of the day of judgment! Thee do we worship, and of Thee do we beg assistance. Direct us in the right way—in the way of those to whom Thou hast been gracious—not of those against whom Thou art incensed and who go astray.'
'Amaun! amaun!' muttered all the ruffians, bowing their heads, as they shipped their oars again, and now the huge and lumbering koehamba was slowly pulled away from the place; from that hideous grave—the inky wafers that had swallowed up Iola Vidimo.
In the morning I was beloved by a beautiful woman—at night by an immortal but scarcely purer spirit; and with eyes full of tears for her who had passed away, I gazed upward on the starlit sky of Greece.
The passages of that night seemed all a hideous and incredible dream.
Iola was the most artless of all earthly beings, for in many things she was a mere child, and can aught be nearer angels, or more akin to heaven, than a child? But so perished this unhappy one; so pure, so unstained and beautiful—the victim of a pitiless destiny!