Eastern Nights - and Flights Part 19

It was inevitable that in such a place my more or less smart Legation suit and my newly bought hat should attract attention. A policeman, of the "dog-collar" species, seemed particularly interested in them. I was leaving the bazaar by a narrow street that looked as if it might lead me to the subway station of Galata when he barred the way and said something in Turkish, while holding out his hand expectantly.

I failed to understand most of the words, but one of them--_vecika_--was enough. _Vecikas_ were the Turkish pa.s.sports with which every honest, or rich but dishonest, civilian had to provide himself if he wished to remain at liberty. They might be demanded at any time in any place by any gendarme.

Naturally I could produce no _vecika_. But I had the next best thing.

That same morning I had discussed with Vladimir Wilkowsky the possibility of being stopped in the street by a policeman. His advice was that if it happened I must claim to be a German officer. I remembered being photographed in civilian clothes when at Gumuch Souyou Hospital; and before leaving Psamatia I gave myself a useful ident.i.ty by signing one of the copies with a German name.

After searching an inside pocket, I now handed to the gendarme a photograph which went to prove that I was "_Fritz Richter, Oberleutnant in der Fliegertruppen_." Speaking [in fluent German, interspersed with a few words of broken Turkish], I protested violently that I was a German officer in mufti, and that he would get himself into trouble for having presumed to stop a German officer. And never was I more frightened than when uttering that bombast.

Half convinced and half browbeaten, the gendarme took the photograph, looked at it dubiously, and consulted a Greek from among the curious crowd that circled us. This man, it appeared, claimed to know German. I understood little of the conversation, but as far as I could gather the policeman asked if I really were a German officer; and the stallkeeper, reading the signature laboriously, informed him that it proclaimed me to be a Supreme Lieutenant of the Flying Soldiers.

"_Pek ee, effendi_," said the gendarme to me. He returned the photograph, salaamed, and apologized. He then went away. So did I.

I returned cautiously, through a combination of side streets, to the bridge-head, and I was much relieved to find that Mahmoud had disappeared. From the quay I chartered a rowing-boat, ordering the Turkish _kaiktche_ to row me up the Bosphorus.

"Are you Russian, _effendim_?" he asked.

"No, German," I replied, surlily. At that his conversational advances ended.

The train of thought started by the word Russian led me to decide that I had better spend the night aboard the Russian tramp steamer on which White and I were to travel as stowaways. Vladimir Wilkowsky, in fact, had told me to make for it if I failed to reach the hiding-place on sh.o.r.e, and to ask for M. t.i.toff, the chief engineer. Its name, I knew, was the _Batoum_, and most of its officers were in the conspiracy to help us, in return for substantial consideration. I knew that the ship was moored in the Bosphorus, but of its appearance or exact position I had been told nothing.

"_Russky dampfschiff Batoum_," I ordered the _kaiktche_, using the polyglot mixture which he was most likely to understand. But his voluble jabbering and his expressive shrug showed that he, also, was ignorant of where it lay.

"_Bosphor!_" I commanded, pointing higher up the Bosphorus and thinking that I would find the name _Batoum_ painted on one of the five or six ships that I could see in the distance, moored in midstream.

But having rowed some distance up the Bosphorus and already pa.s.sed Dolma Bagche Palace, I found no ship labelled _Batoum_. Most of the craft seemed to use only numbers as distinguishing marks. What was worse, most of them flew the German flag; although two of the masts sported a yellow-and-blue standard which I failed to recognize.

Certainly none flew the Russian eagle.

Our only chance of finding the _Batoum_ was to ask directions. We visited several lighters near the quay; but the _kaiktche's_ questions to Turks and Greeks were unproductive. As a last chance I told him to row close to a large steamer, on the deck of which I could see some German sailors.

"Please tell me where I can find the Russian boat _Batoum_," I shouted in German, standing up while the _kaiktche_ kept the little craft steady with his oars.

"Don't know the _Batoum_," said a sailor. "Here there are no Russian ships now. They've become German or Austrian."

"And those two over there?" I asked, pointing toward the vessels with the green-and-black ensign.

"Ukrainian."

"Thanks very much," I called as we sheered off. My mistake, I realized, had been in forgetting for the moment the existence of that newly-made-in-Germany republic the Ukraine. Any vessel from Odessa not flying the German or the Austrian flag would now be Ukrainian; and the yellow-and-blue standard must be that of the Ukrainian Republic. One of the pair flying this flag proclaimed itself to be the _Nikolaieff_. It followed that the other, which was marked only by a number, must be the _Batoum_.

Having made the _kaiktche_ take me to the bottom of its gangway, I climbed to the deck. At the top of the gangway was a tall man made noticeable by a bristling moustache and a well-pressed uniform of white drill. Obviously he was a ship's officer, and as such he must be one of the syndicate whom Captain White and I were bribing. If so, he would know of Wilkowsky.

"_Russky vapor Batoum?_" I asked in pidgin-Russian.

"_Da._"

"_Monsieur t.i.toff?_"--pointing at him by way of enquiry into his ident.i.ty.

"_Niet; Monsieur Belaef._"

"_Droug Vladimir Ivanovitch Wilkowsky?_"

He gave me a long look, smiled, and said under his breath: "Yes, meester."

These were the only English words known by Ivan Stepanovitch Belaef, first mate of the Ukrainian tramp steamer _Batoum_, from Odessa. And for the moment, at any rate, I was safe among friends.

At about armistice time I was hailed unexpectedly in Port Sad by C., one of the British officers whom I had left behind on the ferry stage of the Golden Horn. He himself had seen me leave the cafe, climb the steps leading to the bridge, and fade into the crowd.

A few moments after my disappearance, related C., the Turkish officer called the roll of the prisoners, before taking them to the ferryboat.

That roll-call almost led to the premature discovery of my escape; for when the Turk said "a-lan Thm-as Bott," _four_ people answered.

CHAPTER XII

THE FACE AT THE WINDOW

"Monsieur t.i.toff," announced the first mate, entering his cabin with a hunched-up figure of a man, whose most obvious characteristics were shifty eyes, very high cheekbones and a shrivelled, yellow skin.

M. t.i.toff and I inspected each other with care as I rose from the only chair and shook hands. He, I knew, was the guiding spirit in the syndicate of mates and engineers whom we were bribing.

He produced a book of English phrases, with their Russian equivalents.

Opening it at a prepared page he ran his finger down the list and said "Seegnal!"

"Signal?"

"Yess, ceegarette seegnal."

Remembering the arrangements for the beerhouse rendezvous, I placed a cigarette behind my left ear; whereat the chief engineer and the first mate smiled, and shook hands once again. Neither of them could speak any language but Russian, so that we talked with difficulty, exchanging half-understood patter from the phrase book.

After some strumming on the mandolin and balalaika by t.i.toff and Belaef, I slept on the first mate's couch, with my money tucked next to my skin.

Next morning I was introduced to the third mate, a stocky Lett who could speak German. Using him as interpreter t.i.toff explained his arrangements. I was to dress myself as a Russian sailor, leave the _Batoum_, and be led to the hiding-place in Pera. White and I were to remain there for a week, until the day before the ship sailed. We could then be concealed on board the _Batoum_ until she was safely out of the Bosphorus.

Wearing some old clothes belonging to Kulman, the third mate, but with their rank badges removed, I rowed ash.o.r.e. Kulman accompanied me, while t.i.toff, prominent in white drill, waited on the quay. Neither he nor the white-bearded old man to whom he was talking took the least notice of us, but turned and pa.s.sed toward the Rue de Galata. The third mate and I followed, without, however, showing apparent concern in their movements.

At the corner of a side street on the far side of the Rue de Galata t.i.toff parted from his companion. Kulman followed suit by leaving me, after giving low-voiced instructions that I must follow the old man.

The stranger led the way up the hill, toward Pera, while I kept behind him at a convenient distance, on the opposite side of the road. For a quarter of an hour he moved through a succession of uneven streets and cobbled alleys, so that I soon lost my bearings.

I was not conscious of danger, however. In the faded old uniform of a sailor, and with my civilian clothes wrapped in a newspaper, I attracted little attention. Occasionally I looked into shop windows to divert the suspicions of any who might otherwise have noticed that I was following the ancient.

Finally the guide halted among the wooden houses on the outskirts of Pera, produced an enormous key, and unlocked an iron door. I slackened my steps as he disappeared inside the door, but pa.s.sed through it a few seconds later.

Inside was half-darkness. Besides the old man I could see, dimly, an unkempt and unshaven figure, wearing an overcoat that was much too small for him. I looked at this apparition with puzzled doubt. Surely it could not be White, whom I had last seen running through the streets of Koum-kapou, in a perfectly respectable suit of Red Cross clothes?

Yes, it must be, for it came toward me with outstretched hand.