Singing Waters

by Ann Bridge

  “Well, what became of it? If they had such a great kingdom, why did it fade out?”

  “Oh, other nations came up—history’s just one long see-saw! First the Greeks, then the Romans. Rome was a terrible leveller,” said Warren. “It took a couple of centuries but Rome finally annexed Illyria, and what’s more, she annexed it for just the same reasons that Italy wants to annex Albania today—because for security purposes she wanted the ports of Valona and Durazzo—Durazzo was called Dyrrhachium then.”

  Gloire was shocked.

  “How absolutely bloody—I mean, to think of this annexation business going on and on for two thousand years.”

  “Well, that’s the way it was. The King then was called Gentius—he was taken to Rome. He invented gentians; anyway they were called after him. If you know what a gentian is, beside the liqueur,” said Warren, looking quizzically at her.

  “Don’t be an owl, Warren—I know the liqueur and the flowers,” said Gloire without heat. “The liqueur’s lousy,” she added.

  “You’re right! It was under the Romans this place got Christianised,” Warren went on. “St. Paul came and preached at Durazzo, and all round about.”

  “Did he really?” Gloire asked, but without much enthusiasm; she was more interested in Gentius than in St. Paul. She and Tony had picked gentians together, oh moraines and high pastures.

  “Sure. He says himself—‘Round about into Illyricum, I have fully preached the Gospel of Christ’. He’s one of the favourite local saints.”

  Gloire was rather impressed by this. It was queer to think that St. Paul, a person in the Bible, whom one knew about, had travelled and preached, perhaps, in this very place where she now was.

  “I wonder if he spoke Illyrian,” she speculated.

  “Thraco-Illyrian,” Warren corrected her. “No, I guess St. Paul used an interpreter,” he pursued.

  “I should think that would be terribly damping, when you were preaching away like mad, to have to wait while somebody else translated, and not know if he was getting it right,” said Gloire, pushing the floor with her sandalled toe, and setting the swing seat in motion. “Get me another drink, Warren dear—there’s a lamb.”

  Warren hoisted his great length up out of the chair, mixed her a drink, and brought it to her.

  “Thanks,” Gloire said. “Well, go on,” she said, after taking a sip. “What happened after the Romans?”

  “Oh, one damned thing—or damned nation—after another. When the Empire broke up, all these infernal races came pouring in. The Celts were the first, I guess. They didn’t amount to much; they pushed right on, North-West, to populate Gaul and Britain and Ireland—leaving their kilts behind them!” said Warren, a smile deepening the lines on his face. “Then it was Goths, Huns, Avars, Serbs, Croats, and what-have-you—a whole procession, none of them very permanent, either. But about the seventh century the Bulgars appeared, and I be damned if the Normans didn’t come here too!”

  “The Normans? What on earth did they come for?” Gloire enquired, drinking and swinging. The Normans were a relief— vaguely, she knew about the Normans.

  “On a Crusade. Robert Guiscard took Durazzo fifteen years after the Norman Conquest. It was the Normans,” Warren pursued reflectively, “who invented the name Albania, but I haven’t an idea why.

  “And here’s a funny thing,” he went on—“you were asking in the car the other day why some of the Albanians were Orthodox, not Roman Catholics. Well, history knows all the answers! When another lot of Crusaders attacked Constantinople in 1204, and took it, the damned Venetians took a hand, and helped—”

  “Why the damned Venetians? surely it was O.K. for them to fight the Turks?” Gloire put in.

  “The Turks weren’t in Constantinople in 1204, my poor benighted child,” drawled Warren, “it was still the old Byzantine Empire. The Turks only took Constant in 1453.”

  “Oh, sorry—my error. Go on,” said Gloire, quite unabashed.

  “Well, the Venetians helped, as I say, so they were given all this coast as a nice little pourboire” said Warren sourly. “ ‘Reward your friends’ was going strong, even then. But a guy called Michael Comnenus gathered the folks together, the Albanian Minute-Men, threw the Wops out, and set up a state in Southern Albania. It was around then that the South Albanians turned Orthodox—Comnenus was Orthodox himself. And I daresay by that time the Albanians were beginning to think that Roman Catholicism wasn’t so hot, since the Crusaders and the Venetians were both Romans.”

  Gloire laughed. She was rather amused to see how familiar Warren was with all this, so that he talked about it as matter-of-factly as if it had all happened last week.

  “Go on,” she said briefly.

  “Oh well, there you are—Bulgars, Serbs; Venetians, Serbs; Bulgars again, right down the centuries. It’s an endless story, and wretchedly the same right along. But the point is,” said Warren, putting down his glass and turning round to stare at her with great intensity from under his grizzled eyebrows, “that these Albanians went right on fighting and resisting the whole enduring time, never giving in, never being absorbed. That’s why I say they’re so individual. A tough people!” said Warren, and took a long pull at his drink.

  Gloire was struck by his enthusiasm. Warren’s enthusiasms were rather rare; he was too diffident and too disillusioned to kindle easily.

  “They sound pretty tough, I must say,” she said. “It’s funny they’ve never got anywhere, except way back in prehistoric times, under the White Star Line!”

  “It isn’t really funny,” Warren retorted. “And if all that, what I’ve been telling you, wasn’t enough, the God-damned Turks had to come and just sit on the country for four hundred years, like they did in the rest of the Balkans. Stagnation, that was; no education, no improvements; just barracks and taxation. The Turks quite plainly froze the Balkans for four centuries—that’s why the whole Balkan outfit is so mediaeval today. And remember they were only cleared out of here in 1912.”

  “As late as that? I didn’t realise,” said Gloire. “But I thought the Turks were frightfully go-ahead now.”

  “So they are. But that’s only since Atatürk—he was smart enough to see that if they were to get anywhere in the modern world, they had to go all modern.”

  “Was Atatürk an Albanian? Someone once told me so,” Gloire asked idly.

  “No. But most of the best men in the Young Turk outfit, before Atatürk, were. Enver Bey, Talaat Bey, Djavid Bey—all Albanians.”

  “You’re pretty partisan, aren’t you?” said Gloire coolly.

  “A bit, maybe I am. Not altogether. Everyone who knows these people feels the same. Why, even Anne likes them now,” Warren said.

  Gloire laughed. If Miss Anne had stamped Albania with the mark of Beacon Street approval, there was nothing more to be said!

  She had been curious, from the moment she arrived in Tirana, to see whether she would meet Miss Glanfield again. But for some time there was no sign of her. However, the very next day, at lunch, Miss Anne said—

  “Warren, the Carruthers have asked us to luncheon on Saturday. I suppose we should go? It’s rather short notice.”

  “Yes, surely—we’re not engaged elsewhere, are we?”

  “No. They have a British writer staying with them,” Miss Anne pursued. Gloire pricked up her ears.

  “Who’s that?” Warren enquired, devouring his grilled Bari lobster.

  “Susan Glanfield.”

  “Oh—that lady! Yes, I’d certainly like to meet her,” said Warren. “She’s quite a writer. I shall be able to tell her where she gets off about the Yugos, too.”

  “Now Warren, I beg that you won’t be argumentative,” said Miss Anne repressively. “You know that Lady Carruthers would dislike that extremely.”

  “So she would!” replied Warren, with a glint at Gloire. “I’ll try to behave, Anne.”

  But Gloire had another idea in her head, which she was determined to put into execution as soon as possible. “Take
a look at Albania,” Larsen had said. Well, she had taken a look at the capital and its immediate environs, she had been for one of the two picnics, she was about to see Durazzo. But she wanted to get right out into the country and look at the people—to go to the place, whatever its name was—with the Abbot and the great church, of which Larsen had spoken. And as she and Warren sat in the garden room after lunch she electrified him by saying suddenly—

  “Warren, I want to go up-country. Will you fix it?”

  Warren was obviously horrified by this request.

  “Go up-country?” he echoed. “Why, my dear, you’d hate that! It’s practically impossible, anyway. There are no hotels, you know.”

  “I know there aren’t. But you can take a pony train, and tents and beds and things, can’t you? General Stanley must have everything. And I suppose he could fit one out with an interpreter and a guide, couldn’t he?”

  “Why,” said Warren doubtfully—“maybe he could. But it would be terribly rough and uncomfortable. It wouldn’t suit you at all. Whatever gave you that idea?”

  “I just want to go,” said Gloire stubbornly. “I want to see the country and the people. You can’t see them properly here.”

  “Well”—Warren was uncomfortably thinking, more or less aloud. “Yes, I suppose we could make a trip down to Valona—maybe we might go on to Butrinto and see the excavations. Though the mosquitoes down at Butrinto are just nobody’s business, Carruthers says. But we could take mosquito-bars, I guess.”

  “You don’t have to come,” said Gloire.

  “My dear, you can’t go alone.”

  “Oh Warren, don’t be so New England! Of course I can go alone. Anyway I don’t want to see excavations. I want to go right up-country.”

  “But there’s nothing to see up-country, as you call it—just mountains and wild, wild places,” Warren protested. “There’s no place to go.”

  “Yes there is. There’s that place with an Abbot, and a big church, and a kind of prince living somewhere close by, that one stays with,” said Gloire obstinately.

  Warren looked at her with an enquiring gaze. Who on earth had been putting that into her head?

  “Oh, you mean Torosh,” he said. “But that’s a hell of a trip! And just anyone can’t go and stay with Lek-Gionaj—you have to be invited.”

  “Well, people get invited, don’t they? Anyhow I don’t have to stay with him—I can camp,” said Gloire firmly. “But that’s where I’m going, Warren, and if you won’t fix it with General Stanley, I will.” Gloire had met the General and considered, not altogether mistakenly, that she had done rather well with him.

  Warren Langdon groaned practically aloud. He knew how remorseless and even unscrupulous Gloire could be in getting her own way about anything she happened to want. But it was not perfectly simple for him, as an American diplomat, to go to the British head of the Gendarmerie and ask quite a large favour of him for one of his, Langdon’s, guests. He knew, as Gloire did not, how much was involved. It was not merely a case of being lent beds and tents, as Gloire blithely assumed, and being “fixed up” with a guide and an interpreter—though even to procure these took some arranging, and it was not nothing to ask a man for the loan of his camp-bed! Warren knew that General Stanley would be reluctant to have a woman who was totally ignorant of the language, life, and customs of the place wandering about High Albania without sending one of his own officers to look after her; and that meant the question of chaperonage—especially in the case of someone who looked like Gloire!—and would also involve a gendarmerie escort every yard of the way, since for reasons of discipline as much as of security, gendarmerie officers never travelled without one. A lot of official time and man-power, and a certain amount of official money would have to be spent on Gloire’s whim—for he could not believe that it was more than one of her usual frivolous whims.

  However, he also knew from past experience that to oppose Gloire would only make her more obstinate, so he said pacifically—

  “No, don’t you worry. I’ll talk to the General about it. I daresay we can get it fixed up.”

  “Do, Warren. That will be angelic of you,” said Gloire cajolingly.

  “Who’s been telling you about Torosh, anyway?” Warren unwisely asked her.

  “Never you mind.” Gloire dropped the cajoling manner abruptly. “You get it fixed, Warren my angel—and do it quickly, won’t you? I want to be at Torosh by Whitsun,” said Gloire, lighting another cigarette. “But remember, if you don’t get going, I shall,” she added, and got up, and walked off to her room.

  Oh, damn the little girl! Warren thought. What an obstinate, selfish, tiresome little cuss she was—and always had been. If only that nice husband of hers hadn’t been killed, he might have beaten some sense into her; British husbands did, he understood. But that thought brought a sudden relief. Gloire was, after all, a British national with a British passport. That would make it a shade less embarrassing to bother the General on her account. Then a sudden suspicion flashed into Warren’s mind. Could there be some man in High Albania whom she wanted to see? No, that was impossible. There just wasn’t anyone; Gloire couldn’t know any Albanian men, and the only foreigner there this year was his mad compatriot, old Dr. Emmeline Crowninshield, who as usual was wandering around with her “health unit”—a pony team loaded up with medicines, and an Albanian servant who, so the story went, acted impartially as groom, anaesthetist, hospital orderly, and lady’s-maid. But if there wasn’t some man, why in tunket should Gloire want to go off camping in the wilds? Warren shook his handsome grey head—it was an insoluble puzzle.

  In spite of Gloire’s threat, Warren did not hurry himself over asking the General about her proposed trip—he decided to discuss it with Sir Arthur Carruthers when he saw him on Saturday; they were on excellent terms, and he could “sound out” the Englishman about General Stanley. He continued to wonder about Gloire. She wasn’t running true to form—all this visiting schools and hospitals was very unlike her, and she was quieter, somehow.

  The drive from Tirana to Durazzo used to take rather over an hour, though it is barely thirty miles; this was due to the extremely poor character of the road. If there were two cars making the trip, they had to travel at least three miles apart, to allow the clouds of white dust which rose from the untarmacked surface to blow out across the fields and settle on the roadside vegetation—it was considered rather bad form to pass another car on the Durazzo-Tirana road. Warren explained all this to Gloire as they drove out to the British Legation luncheon; Miss Anne opined that it was evidently to be a largish affair, for there were several other cars before and behind them. Warren cursed aloud as a large Isotta-Fraschini shot past, blotting out everything in a white cloud.

  “Warren! Who is that?” Miss Anne enquired indignantly.

  “My dear, you don’t have to ask! It’s the Italian, of course—the S.O.B.!” muttered Warren vindictively. When the dust had settled he pointed out to Gloire the airfield and buildings of the Ala Littoria, on the outskirts of the town; and beyond the level flat in which Tirana lies, perched on a spur of the hills, the rugged outline of Kruja, Scanderbeg’s mediaeval fortress. The road presently crossed a low stony ridge, before dropping again to a flat straight stretch, running between the sea on one side and a large sheet of water on the other, flanked by a heathy swamp—that was the lagoon, Warren said, turning round from the front seat to impart this information. “The road’s built on a causeway—at one time Durazzo was an island. That’s it—right ahead.” Gloire saw in the distance a long hump-backed hill standing out against the sea; at its foot lay a modern-looking town, and more ancient buildings were piled up on the slope, tier above tier of pinkish-brown tiled roofs, with the sharp minarets of a mosque dominating all, in the clear midday light. Close at hand the slopes of the ridge which they were crossing were planted with orchards of fruit-trees, well grown and carefully tended—Warren drew Miss Anne’s attention to them. “Looking pretty good, aren’t they?”

&nbs
p; “Do they grow much fruit here?” Gloire asked idly.

  “Not as much as they should. It’s a perfect climate for it—not for citrous stuff, of course, but apples and pears. Greece grows them intensively, and makes a packet out of it, and they could do just the same here.”

  “Why don’t they then?”

  “The usual reason—lack of capital, and of education. If I had twenty-five million dollars,” said Warren, “I would loan it to Albania at one per cent, on condition that it was used for fruit-growing, under expert supervision, and in ten years I would have this country one big garden, and humming like a hive.”

  As they drew level with the lagoon, Gloire’s attention was caught by a fleet of immense white birds, slowly moving up it before the wind—above them a cloud of sea-birds wheeled and cried.

  “Warren, what on earth are those birds? They’re too big to be swans,” she asked.

  “Pelicans,” responded her host promptly. “The lagoon’s full of them.”

  In Durazzo they drove for a few moments along broad streets between large white buildings, characterised by that modern featurelessness which, except in America, so seldom succeeds; Miss Anne commented on them. “They call it functional, but to me it’s just vacant,” she concluded. Then they turned right and crept through narrow streets where only one car could pass, between ancient untidy houses with shutters at the windows, or high walls from which creepers hung—after a pause, while the cars before them emptied, they turned into a lane as narrow as any, and drew up before a small door in a blank wall—a gaily-uniformed dragoman bowed and saluted as he opened the door of the car.

  “What an extraordinary place!” Gloire murmured.

  “It certainly is,” said Miss Anne. “How Lady Carruthers puts up with it I can’t think. Why, there’s barely plumbing! And all the rooms are so inconveniently placed. I should hate to live here.”