The Vintage/Part 3/Chapter 2
CHAPTER II
TWO SILVER CANDLESTICKS
For two days longer the army remained at Kalamata in an ecstasy of success. Petrobey posted several companies of men on the lower hills of Taygetus and at the top of the plain, from which a pass led into Arcadia, in ambush for any relieving force from Tripoli, should such be sent. Flushed with victory as they were, nothing seemed impossible, and the spirit of the men was to march straight on that stronghold of the Turkish power. But Petrobey was wiser; he knew that this affair at Kalamata had been no real test of the army's capacity; they had stood with folded arms, and the prey had dropped at their feet. To attack a strongly fortified place, competently held, was to adventure far more seriously. At present he had neither men nor arms enough, and the only sane course was to wait, embarking, it might be, on enterprises of the smaller sort, till with the news of their exploit the rising became more general. In the mean time he remained at Kalamata in order to get tidings from the north of the Morea as to the sequel of the beacon there, and, if expedient, to unite his troops with the contingent from Patras and Megaspelaion. As commander-in-chief of the first army in the field, he issued a proclamation, declaring that the Greeks were determined to throw off the yoke of the Turk, and asking for the aid of Christians in giving liberty to those who were enslaved to the worshippers of an alien god.
The primates and principal clergy of the Morea, it will be remembered, had been summoned to Tripoli for the meeting at the end of March, and the scheme that the wisdom of Mitsos had hatched, to give them an excuse for their disobedience, had met with entire suecass. Germanos, who both spoke and wrote Turkish, forged a letter, purporting to come from a friendly Mussulman at Tripoli, warning him to beware, for Mehemet Salik, thinking that a rising of the Greeks was imminent, had determined to put one or two of the principal men to death in order to terrorize the people, and with the same stone to deprive them of their leaders. With this in his pocket, he set out and travelled quietly to Kalavryta, where he found other of the principal clergy assembled at the house of Zaimes, the primate of the place. Germanos arrived there in the evening, and before going to bed gave the forged letter to Lambros, his servant, telling him to start early next morning, ride in the direction of Tripoli, then turn back and meet the party at their mid-day halt. He was then to give the letter to his master, saying that he had received it from a Turk on the road, who hearing that he was Germanos's servant, told him, as he valued his life and the life of his master, not to spare spur till he had given it him, and on no account to hint a word of the matter to any one.
Lambros, who had the southern palate for anything smacking of drama and mystery, obeyed in letter and spirit, and at mid-day, while the primates were halting, he spurred a jaded, foam-streaked horse up the road, flung himself quickly off, and gave the forged communication to his master. Germanos glanced through it with well-feigned dismay and exclamations of astonished horror, and at once read it aloud to the assembled primates, who were struck with consternation. Some suggested one thing and some another, but every one looked to Germanos for an authoritative word.
"This will we do, my brothers," he said, "if it seems good to you: I will send this letter to my admirable friend—or so I still think—Mehemet Salik, and ask for a promise of safety, a matter of form merely. Yet we may not disregard what my other admirable friend has said, for if, as God forbid, it is true, where would our flock be without their shepherds? But if it is false, Mehemet will at once send us a promise of safety. Meantime, we must act as if the truth of this letter were possible, and I suggest that we all disperse, and for our greater safety each surround himself with some small guard. And before the answer comes back, it may be"—he looked round and saw only the faces of patriots—"it may be that there will be other business on hand"—and his face was a beacon.
It is probable that more than one of the primates guessed that the letter was a forgery, but they were anly too glad to be supplied with a specious excuse for delaying their journey, and followed Germanos's advice.
Then followed those ten days of feverish inaction, while on Taygetus Petrobey collected the forces which were to be the doom of Kalamata. Evening by evening patient men climbed to the hills where the beacon fuel was stacked, questioning the horizon for the signal, and morning by morning returned to the expectant band of patriots in their villages, saying "Not yet, not yet," until one night the signs of fire shouted from south to north of the land, telling them that the Vintage was ripe for harvest. At Kalavryta, where the first blow in the north was struck, they found the Turks even less ready than at Kalamata, and little expecting the soldiers of God in their companies from the monastery; and on the 3d of April the town surrendered on receiving, as at Kalamata, a promise that there should be no massacre. The place was one of little importance among the Turkish towns, but of the first importance to the revolutionists, lying as it did in the centre of the richest valley in Greece, and in close proximity to Megaspelaion, and it became the centre of operations im the north. Also, it was valuable inasmuch as several very wealthy Turks lived there, and the money that thus fell into the hands of the Greeks was food for the sinews of war.
As soon as this reached Kalamata, Petrobey determined to move. The wholesale success of the patriots in the north showed that they were in no need of immediate help, and to have two different armies in the field, one driving the Turks southward, the other northward into Tripoli, the central fortress of Ottoman supremacy, was ideal to his wishes. But more than ever now soberness and strength were needed; the men hearing of the taking of Kalavryta were wild to unite with the northern army and march straight on Tripoli. But Petrobey, backed by Nicholas, was as firm as Taygetus; such a course could only end in disaster, for they were yet as ignorant as children of the elements of war, and it would be an inconceivable rashness now to venture on that which would be final disaster or the freedom of the Morea. They must learn the alphabet of their new trade; what better school could there be than their camp on the slopes of Taygetus, the lower hill-sides of which were covered with Turkish villages, and where they would not, from the nature of the ground, be exposed to the attacks of cavalry? So, after making great breaches in the walls of the citadel of Kalamata, and filling up the well, so that never again could it be used as a stronghold, they marched back across the blossomed plain and up to the hill camp below the beacon with the glory of success upon them.
Three nights later Yanni and Mitsos were sitting after supper in the open air by a camp-fire. Yanni, still rather soft from his month's fattening at Tripoli—"And, oh, Yanni," said Mitsos, "but it is a stinging affair to have fattened a little pig like you, and never have the eating of it"—was suffering from a blister on his heel, and Mitsos prescribed spirits on the raw or pure indifference.
"If you had been cooped and fattened as I, little Mitsos," said Yanni, in an infernally superior manner, "how much running do you think you could lay leg to? As it is, if you continue to eat as you eat, what a belly-man will Mitsos be at thirty!"
Mitsos pinched Yanni over the ribs.
"Poor Mehemet!" he said, "all that for nothing, I have a fine cousin who is only just twenty, and if you said he was fat, man, you wouldn't give a person any proper notion of him."
"My blister is worse than it was yesterday," said Yanni, pulling off his shoe.
"There was a show at Nauplia last year," continued Mitsos, lying lengthily back and looking at the stars, "and a fat woman in it. When she walked she wobbled like a jelly-fish. Just about as fat as a cousin of mine."
"Oh!"
"She wasn't married, the man said, and was to be had for the asking. I hate fat women almost as much as I hate fat men."
Nicholas had strolled out of his hut, and was standing behind the boys as they talked.
"Now look at Uncle Nicholas, Yanni," said Mitsos, still unconscious of his presence, "he will be some twelve good inches taller than you, and forty years older; but I doubt if you could tie his trousers-strings."
Nicholas langhed.
"I can do it myself, little Mitsos," he said. "Come in, you two; there is work forward."
Yanni sprang up and stepped into his shoe, forgetting the blister.
"A journey," he said, "for Mitsos and me? Oh, Mitsos, it is good."
"Yanni cannot walk," said Mitsos; "he has a blister, and must needs be carried like a scented woman."
"A blister?" asked Nicholas."Don't think about it."
"So said I," answered Mitsos, "but he has no thought for aught else in God's world."
"Well, come in," answered Nicholas, "and hear what you will hear."
The business was soon explained. The ship which had been seen at Kalamata had gone back to Nauplia, so it was reported, and was to transport thence to Athens several wealthy Turkish families who were fearful for their safety. From Athens it would come back, bringing arms and ammunition, to Nauplia. The time for the fire-ship had come.
"And Nicholas says, little Mitsos," continued Petrobey, "that you know the bay of Nauplia like your own hand, and can take your boat about it as a man carries food to his mouth."
Mitsos flushed with pleasure.
"And in truth I am no stranger to it," he said. "When do I start?"
"To-morrow morming. The ship arrived there three days ago, but will wait another five days. The business is to be done when she is well out to sea, so that there is no time for her to get back. You will want some one with you. Whom would you like?"
Mitsos looked at Yanni.
"Whom but the fat little cousin?" he said.
"The little cousin doesn't mind," said Yanni, with his eyes dancing, and gave Mitsos a great poke in the ribs.
"Ugh, Turkish pig," quoth Mitsos, "we will settle that acconnt together."
"Be quiet, lads," said Petrobey, "and listen to me"; and he gave them the details of their mission.
"Big butchers we shall be," said the blood-thirsty Mitsos when Petrobey had finished. "Eh, but the fishes will give thanks for us."
Yanni and he tumbled out of the hut again, sparring at each other for sheer delight at a new adventure, and sat talking over the fire, smoking the best tobacco from Turkish shops at Kalamata, till Nicholas, coming out late to go the round of the sentries, packed them off to bed.
All the apparatus they would require, and also the caique to serve as the fire-ship, were at Nauplia; and they started off next morning unencumbered with baggage, with only one horse, which the "scented woman" was to ride if his blister should tease him. A detachment of the clan who were not on duty, as well as Nicholas and Mitsos' father, saw them to the top of the pass, which they were to follow till they got onto the main road at Sparta, and then go across country, giving Tripoli a very wide berth, and taking a boat across the bay of Nauplia so as to avoid Argos. At Nauplia they were to put up at Mitsos' house, but keep very quiet, and remain there as little time as might be. The caique would be lying at anchor opposite; Lelas, the café-keeper, had charge of it.
The journey was made withont alarm er danger. On the evening of the first day they found themselves at the bottom of the Langarda pass, with the great fertile plain of Sparta spread out before them, now green, now gray, as the wind ruffled the groves of olive-trees. A mile beyond the bottom of the pass their way lay close under the walls of the little Turkish town of Mistra, and this they passed by quickly, in case the news of the taking of Kalamata had come and the soldiers were on the lookout for wandering Greeks. But as they skirted along a foot-path below the town Yanni looked back.
"It's very odd," he said, "but we have passed nobody going home; and look, there are no lights in any of the houses."
"That is queer," said Mitsos; "no, there is not a single light. We'll wait a bit, Yanni."
They sat down off the path in the growing dusk, but not a sign came from the town; no lights appeared in the windows, it seemed perfectly deserted, and by degrees their curiosity made a convert of their caution.
"We will go very quiatly and have a look at the gate," said Yanni. "It will be pleasanter sleeping in a house than in the fields, for it will be cold before morning up here."
"That comes of living in a fine house in Tripoli," remarked Mitsos. "Come on, then."
The two went very cautiously back to the road which led up to the gate and found it standing wide open.
"That ought to be shut at dark," says Mitsos; "we will go a little farther."
Still there was no living thing to be seen, no glimmer shone from any house, and soon Mitsos stopped.
"Oh, Yanni, I see," he said. "They must have had news of the Kalamata thing, and all have fled. There's not a soul left in the place. Come on, we'll just go to the top of the street."
They left the horse for the time im the outer court of a mosque which stood near the gate, and advanced cautiously up the steep, cobbled road. Everywhere the same silence and signs of panic-stricken flight prevailed. Here a silk-covered sofa blocked the doorway of a house; farther on they came upon a couple of embroidered Turkish dresses; a big illuminated Koran lay with leaves flapping in the evening wind on a door-step, and outside the old Byzantine church at the top of the street, which had been turned into a mosque by the Turks, stood two immense silver candlesticks, four feet high, and each holding some, twenty tapers. Yanni looked thoughtfully at these for a minute.
"It is in my mind," he said, "that I will eat my dinner by the light of fine silver candlesticks. Pick up the other, cousin; I can't carry both. Holy Virgin, how heavy they are!"
"Where are we to take them?" asked Mitsos.
"To a nice house, where we will have supper," says Yanni. "I saw such a one as I came up. There was a barrel of wine outside it, and my stomach cries for plenty of good wine. Oh, here's a woman's dress. Eh, what a smart woman this must have been!"
The house which Yanni had noticed was a two-storied café, standing a little back from the street. The upper rooms were reached by an outside staircase from the garden, and as they went up to it a cat, the only live thing they had seen, looked at them a moment with mournful eyes, and then, deciding that they were to be trusted, put up an arched, confiding back against Mitsos' leg, and made a poker of her tail. Below, the house was of three rooms, the outer of which, looking over the plain, was full of the signs of flight. A long Turkish narghilé, with an amber mouth-piece, was overturned on the floor, and on one of the little coffee tables stood another pipe half filled with unsmoked tobaceo, while the silk pouch from which it was supplied lay unrolled beside it, and on a shelf were four or five long-stemmed chibouks. A long divan, smothered in cushions, ran round three sides of the room, and the cat, in the belief that her friends were coming back, jumped lightly into her accustomed place and looked at the boys, blinking and purring contentedly. The second room was full of cans of coffee and tobacco, and on a table in the centre stood a dish with two chickens, one wholly plucked, the other but half denuded, and by it an earthenware bowl of water, in which were cool, green lettuces. The third room was a stable for horses; a manger full of fresh hay ran down one side, and in the opposite corner were an oven and a heap of charcoal. The fire had gone out and was only a heap of white, feathery ash, while on the extinguished embers still stood two little brass coffee jugs, their contents half boiled away. Yanni smiled serenely when they had finished their examination.
"You will sup with me to-night, cousin?" he asked, pompously. "Oh, Mitsos, but this is a soft thimg we have hit upon."
Mitsos walked back into the outer room, where he closed the wooden shutters and lit all the candles.
"Nice little candlesticks," he said, approvingly. "How I wish the owner of the house could see us. Wouldn't he howl!"
Up-stairs there were two rooms—one with two beds in it, the other with one. The beds were still unmade, just as they had been slept in, and Mitsos pulled off the sheets disdainfully, for he would not lie where a Turk had been. Then, while Yanni kindled the fire to boil the chickens, he rummaged in the store-room.
"A pot of little anchovies, Yanni," he remarked; "they will come first to give us an appetite. Thus I shall have two appetites, for I have one already. By the Virgin! there is tobacco too, all ready in the pipes. We shall pass a very pleasant evening, I hope. Oh, there's the horse still waiting at the gate. I will go and fetch him; and be quick with the supper, pig."
Yanni langhed.
"Really the Turk is a very convenient man," he said. "I like wars. We can take provisions from here which will last to Nauplia. There will be no skulking about villages after dark to buy bread and wine without being noticed."
Yanni put the chicken to boil, and while Mitsos fetched the horse, having nothing more to do, he amused himself by trying on the dress of the Turkish woman which they had found in the street. The big black bernous concealed the deficiencies of the skirt, which only came to his knees, and he had finished adjusting the veil, and had sat down chastely on a corner of the settee, when he heard Mitsos come up the street and call to him from the stable. So he got up and went on tiptoe out of the house and round to the other door, and Mitsos looking up saw a Turkish woman peeping in, who screamed in shrill falsetto when she saw him. For one moment he thought that somehow or other this was Suleima, but the next moment he had rushed after Yanni and hauled him in.
"Is not my supper ready, woman?" he cried, "and why do you not attend to your master?"
They ate their dinner in the best of spirits, for that the hated and despised Turk, whose destruction was their mission, should board and lodge them so handsomely seemed one of the best jokes. Mitsos every now and then broke into a huge grin as he made fearful inroads upon the food and wine, and Yanni kept ejaculating: "Very good chicken of the Turk. The best wine of the Turk; give me some lettuce of the Turk. I wish we could take the candlesticks, Mitsos; but perhaps two peasant boys with heavy silver sticks four feet high slung on their mules might attract attention."
The moon had risen soon after sunset, and after dinner they sat smoking in the garden, which was planted with pomegranates and peach-trees, and fringed by a row of cypresses, which looked black in the moonlight. All was perfectly still but for the sleepy prattle of the stream below. Now and then a nightingale gave out a throatful of song, or some spray of asphodel, ripe to the core, cracked and scattered its seed round it. The cat prowled about the garden, now creeping through the shadow of the trees, or flattening herself out on the ground, and now making springs at some imaginary prey in the moonlight, and when they went up-stairs she preceded them, and, jumping onto Mitsos' bed, lay purring like a tea-kettle.