by V. A. Stuart
“You may rely on me, sir. I—”
Respecting his honesty, Phillip smiled at him. “I take it that the girl in question lives in Soukoum?”
Lieutenant Roberts inclined his head. “She does, sir, yes.”
“My orders are to call only at Ghelenjik,” Phillip pointed out. “Were you aware of that when you volunteered to join us?” Again the Marine officer nodded.
“Yes, I was.”
“Yet you still volunteered?”
“I thought I might be of some use to you, Commander Hazard and I . . . well, I hoped I might be able to send a message to Soukoum. Or even that an opportunity might arise for me to go there.”
“It’s unlikely that there will be time for you to go there and back, Mr Roberts. We have only ten days.” Roberts’s face fell and, suddenly remembering his own feelings for Mademoiselle Sophie—who, in Odessa, was as far away from him now as any woman could be—Phillip relented. “If in the strict course of duty,” he promised, “I require to send an officer down the coast to Soukoum or Redoute Kaleh, rest assured that you will be the officer I shall choose . . . provided that you can be spared, you understand.”
“I understand and I . . . thank you very much, sir.” Roberts rose, drawing himself to attention. “I’m very grateful. Forgive me for taking up so much of your time, sir.”
“It was usefully spent,” Phillip assured him. “I’ve learnt a great deal.” He took out his pocket watch. “I am dining in the gunroom today, so I shall see you there in an hour’s time, Mr Roberts.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” Roberts acknowledged cheerfully and took his leave.
Phillip had intended to occupy the next hour in a careful perusal of his orders and the report from Captain Jones of the Sampson, a copy of which had been provided for him but, try as he might, he could not concentrate on either for very long. His conversation with Lieutenant Roberts had stirred up old memories and he found his thoughts continually straying to Mademoiselle Sophie, as a vision of her small, sweet face—as he had seen it again in the Cathedral at Odessa—blotted out the closely written pages of Captain Jones’s excellent but somewhat wordy report. They had bidden farewell to each other in her carriage when she had driven him back from the Cathedral and their parting, he reminded himself sternly, had been final and irrevocable. Had he not returned the ring she had given him, with the double-headed Imperial eagle cut into its magnificent stone, so that it might become the property of her then unborn child? His mouth tightened as he let his thoughts drift back into the past and, in memory, he heard the church bells ring out the glad tidings that a son and heir had been born to the widow of Prince Andrei Narishkin . . . her son, Mademoiselle Sophie’s son, whom he had never seen and almost certainly never would see. And he would never see Mademoiselle Sophie again; he knew and accepted this now, without bitterness, and yet . . . Phillip shook his head dazedly, like a man roused suddenly from sleep. Why, he asked himself, in heaven’s name why did she still hold his heart? Why could he not consign the memory of her to that limbo from whence it could no longer torment him?
He would not forget her, of course; the heart, as she had once told him sadly, did not forget but . . . he thought fleetingly of Catriona Moray and realized that, although he owed her his life, her memory possessed no power to hold him and had not been hard to banish from his mind. Perhaps this was because Catriona had never been quite real to him—she had never existed for him, in her own right, as a woman. She had attracted him initially because of the slight resemblance she bore to Mademoiselle Sophie and now, on that account, he could not separate her image from Sophie’s, could not think of her as an individual. He sighed, the awareness of what might have been causing him a twinge of conscience. Where, he wondered, was Catriona Moray now? Had she returned to Scotland, to her grandfather’s house, and was she living the life of a country gentlewoman among her Highland kinsfolk . . . and she, too, perhaps, with memories that brought her pain and could never be erased?
Sitting there, with his new orders in front of him, Phillip remembered what Martin Fox had said to him on the subject of Catriona and again experienced a pang of conscience. “I should have liked to see her again . . . more especially since you told me that you had no serious intentions towards her yourself, Phillip” . . . they had been almost the last words his dying First Lieutenant had spoken, and he had ended regretfully, “Mine, I believe, might have been had she offered me any encouragement, for I held her in high esteem. Perhaps you will tell her so, if you write to her . . .”
He had promised he would and had, in fact, done so, some weeks after Fox’s passing, but his had been a brief, uninformative letter, telling her only the bare facts of the action at Eupatoria, in which Martin Fox had been fatally wounded. He had meant to write again, to pass on Martin’s message in greater detail but, for one reason and another, he had not done so. He had received no reply to his first letter, which he had addressed to her care of old Sir Alastair Moray, her grandfather, and, uncertain of where to send the second letter, had let the matter slide. Feeling oddly guilty, he took out his pocket watch—which had been a gift from Mademoiselle Sophie—and again consulted it. The gunroom took its midday meal at two-thirty at sea and it was not quite a quarter to two . . . time enough to write a letter, although when he would next have an opportunity to despatch mail he had no idea. When the Viper joined them, probably. But he owed it to Martin to write . . . no doubt Catriona’s grandfather would know where she was and would, in due course, forward his letter, if he again addressed it to Castle Guise.
Phillip reached for pen and ink and, having reached a decision, found that the words came easily and fluently, as he described the Cossack attack on Eupatoria and Martin Fox’s courageous sortie in defence of the magazine. When it came to describing his friend’s last hours, his pen moved more slowly and he was aware of a choking tightness in his throat, but he persisted and, when Higgins came to tell him that dinner was ready to be served, the letter was done, all three pages of it, the lines criss-crossing each other on the flimsy paper. He wrote the address, franked and sealed the envelope, and placed it in his letter-box, ready for despatch when next the opportunity should arise. His conscience somewhat relieved, he made his way aft to the gunroom to join his officers for the midday meal.
Ghelenjik was sighted during the latter half of the Middle Watch but Phillip decided to wait until daylight before entering the port. He was on deck at sunrise, to find himself looking out across the wide expanse of a beautiful bay, behind which rose a succession of mountain peaks, capped with perpetual snow. The lower slopes were thickly wooded, and precipitous cliffs guarded the eastern side of the bay, following its semicircular curve to where a small town nestled in a hollow, at the foot of what appeared to be a rocky gorge. The fort, a square block-house pierced for guns and with bastions at the angles, stood on the cliff top above the town, covering both the gorge and the seaward approaches.
There were a number of fishing boats lying at their moorings alongside a wooden quay, several of which hoisted tall lateen sails and came out to meet the Huntress as, after exchanging salutes with the fort, she stood-in to the bay. The anchorage at Ghelenjik had been surveyed by Captain Jones and aware, from his report, that it was one of the best on the whole of the Circassian coast, with a more than adequate depth of water, Phillip instructed Graham to bring-up within hailing distance of the quay.
The fishermen, having inspected the new arrival and recognized the ensign she was flying, swiftly put their boats about and preceded her like a flock of white-winged gulls, skimming this way and that on the smooth, green surface of the water, their crews waving excitedly. They bounded ashore as the Huntress dropped anchor, eager to spread the news of her coming throughout the town and evidently did their work well for, when Phillip put off in the quarter-boat accompanied by Lieutenant Roberts, the Turkish interpreter and an escort of Marines, a considerable crowd had gathered on the sturdily built wooden quay to receive them.
It was a colourful a
nd exclusively male crowd, the majority wearing sleeveless black jackets—fashioned from plaited goats’ hair, according to Roberts—over gaily hued cloth blouses, trimmed with braid or embroidery and reaching to the knees. Voluminous pantaloons, leather-thonged sandals or boots and high caps of sheep or goat-skin completed this picturesque attire, and all were armed. Some had curved scimitars at their sides, others an assortment of evil-looking daggers thrust carelessly into the silk sashes which girt their waists and every man carried a long flintlock rifle and leather ammunition pouch slung from his shoulder. As the Huntress’s boat drew nearer, a big, red-bearded man, dressed in what appeared to be Cossack costume, sprang to his feet and, standing a good head and shoulders above his companions, fired his rifle into the air. This was the signal for a fusilade of shots and Phillip, realizing that the shots were intended as a welcome, crisply ordered his boat’s crew to toss oars in salute, which was greeted by a roar of approval. When he stepped ashore, the red-bearded giant seized him in a bear-like hug, grinning widely.
“Ingealez?” he suggested. Phillip, still a trifle breathless from the huge fellow’s exuberant embrace, inclined his head in wordless assent. The man fingered the hilt of his naval sword, bushy red brows raised in question. “For . . . fight?” he demanded, in pantomime, adopting a duelling stance. “Fight Muscovs?”
“Yes,” Phillip assured him gravely, as his escort of Marines formed up at his back. “We have come to fight the Muscovs with you.”
“Good!” the bearded warrior beamed. “Good, good!” This, it seemed, was the sum total of his knowledge of English and the Turkish interpreter, officiously waving him to stand aside, said that he was a Kouban Cossack. “They are poor, ignorant fellows, Commander Hazard—do not waste your time with this one.” He spat his contempt. “There will be Turkish officers at the fort with whom we can speak.”
“No doubt there will, Mr Aslam,” Phillip returned coldly. “But I have been sent here to speak with Serfir Pasha, the Circassian chief, so perhaps you would be so good as to enquire where I may find him, if you do not wish me to waste time on underlings.” He looked about him, his own smile echoing those on the handsome, light-skinned faces of the motley crowd thronging the quay. The plump little interpreter eyed him sullenly and he made a mental note that it would be unwise to trust him on his own, lest he endanger their relations with the local people with his strutting arrogance.
“Someone’s coming from the fort now, sir,” Lieutenant Roberts warned. He pointed to the cliff-top and Phillip saw two men on horseback who, after a brief pause to take stock of his party, put their horses to a gallop and came thundering down the steep slope in the direction of the quay. Both were superb riders and he guessed, from the chagrined expression on the interpreter’s swarthy face, that they were not the Turkish officers he had expected but Circassians. Roberts confirmed his supposition as the two men drew rein and called out a greeting, before leaping lightly to the ground.
“They both look like Circassians, sir. I should imagine the elder of the two is in command of the fort.”
“Then let us go and meet them, Mr Roberts,” Phillip said. “Your men may stay where they are for the time being. Have them stand easy, though—this may take a little while. Mr Grey”—he turned to the young mate, who was in command of the boat—“carry on, if you please. Post a guard over the boat and those Minié rifles and let the rest of your crew ashore to stretch their legs.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” Grey acknowledged.
With Roberts at his side, Phillip went to meet the newcomers. Both, he saw, were as colourfully dressed as their compatriots on the quay and, apart from the fact that their cloaks and caps were of astrakan and less crudely fashioned than those of the townsfolk, only their authoritative bearing set them apart from the rest. One was in his late forties, the other a slim, athletic looking youth of perhaps twenty, with merry grey eyes and a very fair skin. Their close resemblance to one another suggested that they were father and son, the manner in which the crowd parted to permit them to pass that one or both held a position of some importance in the community.
“Mr Aslam . . .” the interpreter came reluctantly in response to Phillip’s call. “Introduce Mr Roberts and myself to these gentlemen, if you please, and ask whom we have the honour of addressing.”
Aslam did as he was told, but the tone of his voice was less than friendly. However, he received a courteous reply and, turning to Phillip, he announced that the fort commander was Najib Bey, and the youth his eldest son, Dafir.
“They are, it seems, in charge here,” the interpreter added. “The troops they command are of their own wild tribe, apart from a few gunners of the Turkish redif.”
Phillip saluted and then held out his hand to Najib Bey who, after a slight hesitation, wrung it with every appearance of pleasure. The youth smiled but held back, subjecting the two British officers and the corpulent Turkish interpreter to a wary scrutiny before voicing a string of questions. His father silenced him with a wave of the hand and interposed a question of his own.
“The young one asks if your ship has brought men and arms to assist their struggle to drive the Muscovs from this land,” Aslam translated. “And both wish to know if more English ships will come. Najib Bey further asks if your honour has news of Mustapha Pasha. He says that he had word that the Pasha would come some weeks ago.”
Phillip phrased an appropriate answer, which Aslam repeated in rapid Osmanli, and the eyes of both men lit up when they learned that a visit from the Turkish commander was imminent. “Now ask them, please, where I may expect to find the Circassian chief Serfir Pasha. Say that I have an important message from my Admiral which must reach His Excellency without delay.”
The Turk repeated what he had said and again Phillip noticed a gleam of pleasure in the eyes of both father and son. The boy whispered to his father, who at first shook his head and then, evidently relenting, spoke quietly and at some length to the interpreter.
“Well, Mr Aslam, what does he say?” Phillip prompted impatiently when Najib Bey lapsed into expectant silence. The swarthy little Turk looked frankly apprehensive but he recovered himself and responded unhappily, “Serfir Pasha is with his troops in the mountains, sir, and if your message from the English Admiral can brook no delay, then you will require to go to him. He is, it seems, waiting to set an ambush for a supply train which the enemy are sending overland to Soujak. In the opinion of Najib, only your honour’s personal intervention would bring His Excellency back to this place before he has achieved his objective, for he has planned the ambush for many weeks.”
“I see.” Phillip frowned. He hadn’t bargained for this but he understood and could sympathize with Serfir Pasha’s reluctance to abandon his carefully planned operation. By dint of question and answer, he elicited the information that the Pasha’s camp was a full day’s journey into the mountains, but that Najib would provide him with an escort of Circassian mountaineers led by his son and that, if he could be ready to leave within an hour, the greater part of the journey could be completed before dark, leaving only a short distance to travel the following morning.
“Your honour may take only two or at most three men with you,” Aslam translated. “More than this number would, the Bey says, be too great a responsibility for his men to assume, since yours are not mountain-men and therefore will require assistance. He asks that fit men may be selected . . .” beads of sweat had broken out on his pale face, Phillip observed, and it occasioned him little surprise when the Turk went on, his tone pleading, “Commander Hazard, I am not a fit man, nor am I accustomed to heights—I become sick. Could your honour not dispense with my services? I should, without doubt, delay you and—”
“I’d gladly dispense with your services, Aslam,” Phillip confessed. “But if I leave you behind, how can I communicate with Serfir Pasha?” The corpulent, unwilling little man would obviously delay him but it was essential that he should be able to convince the Circassian leader of the importance of the summons he broug
ht for a meeting of all the chiefs, prior to Mustapha Pasha’s arrival. He would be wasting his time if he made the long journey to the mountain camp and then failed— for lack of an interpreter—to persuade Serfir to return with him to Ghelenjik within the stipulated ten days. “There’s no help for it—I’m afraid you will have to come.”
Aslam, the perspiration now pouring down his cheeks, launched into an excited tirade in his own language, which the dignified Najib received with a polite smile. His answer, delivered with equal politeness, evidently offered a solution to his problem that pleased the Turk, for he turned back to Phillip with a relieved sigh. “Sir, there is a Polish officer, Kazim Bey, at the camp of the Pasha—he speaks French and, it is thought, English. There is with him his daughter, a young lady who has been educated in an Armenian convent school—she speaks French and Osmanli fluently and some English. In addition, Serfir Pasha also has a daughter with him, who has been educated in several languages. Who better to interpret your honour’s message to His Excellency? Whereas he might doubt my interpretation, he would not doubt that of his own flesh and blood. Besides, sir, if you leave me here, I can make myself useful in your honour’s service. I could go to other chiefs with His Excellency the English Admiral’s summons and—”
Phillip cut him short. He glanced enquiringly at Roberts and the Marine officer replied to his unvoiced query, “I suppose he could be useful here, sir, because there will be other chiefs to summon, will there not? As to those Najib Bey suggests as interpreters, he probably isn’t exaggerating . . . some of these girls are extremely well educated. The girl I told you about in Soukoum, sir, had also been brought up in a convent school and she spoke remarkably good French. The Polish officer is another possibility, of course, And if you do decide to leave Aslam here, it would enable you to take an extra man, who would pull his weight and be of more use to you in a tight corner than he would. It’s rough going in these mountains, but my Marines, sir, would volunteer, I know, and I’d be glad to, if you—”