In the Track of the Troops Part 29

Lancey ran after him, but soon stopped. He might as well have chased a mountain hare. We both, however, followed the track he had pursued, and, catching our horses, pa.s.sed into the village.

"It's of no use to follow, sir," said Lancey, "we can't tell which way 'e's gone."

I felt that pursuit would indeed be useless, and pulled up with the intention of searching among the ruins of the village for some one who might have escaped the carnage, and could give me information.

The sights that met our eyes everywhere were indeed terrible. But I pa.s.s over the sickening details with the simple remark, that no ordinary imagination could conceive the deeds of torture and brutality of which these Turkish irregulars had been guilty. We searched carefully, but for a long time could find no one.

Cattle were straying ownerless about the place, while dogs and pigs were devouring the murdered inhabitants. Thinking it probable that some of the people might have taken refuge in the church, we went to it.

Pa.s.sing from the broad glare of day into the darkened porch, I stumbled over an object on the ground. It was the corpse of a young woman with the head nearly hacked off, the clothes torn, and the body half burnt.

But this was as nothing to the scene inside. About two hundred villagers--chiefly women, children, aged, and sick--had sought refuge there, and been slaughtered indiscriminately. We found the dead and dying piled together in suffocating heaps. Little children were crawling about looking for their mothers, wounded mothers were struggling to move the ghastly heaps to find their little ones. Many of these latter were scarce recognisable, owing to the fearful sword-cuts on their heads and faces. I observed in one corner an old man whose thin white hair was draggled with blood. He was struggling in the vain endeavour to release himself from a heap of dead bodies that had either fallen or been thrown upon him.

We hastened to his a.s.sistance. After freeing him, I gave him a little brandy from my flask. He seemed very grateful, and, on recovering a little, told us, with many a sigh and pause for breath, that the village had been sacked by Turkish irregular troops, Circa.s.sians, who, after carrying off a large number of young girls, returned to the village, and slaughtered all who had not already fled to the woods for refuge.

While the old man was telling the mournful tale I observed a little girl run out from behind a seat where she had probably been secreting herself, and gaze wildly at me. Blood-stained, dishevelled, haggard though she was, I instantly recognised the pretty little face.

"Ivanka!" I exclaimed, holding out my arms.

With a scream of delight she rushed forward and sprang into them. Oh how the dear child grasped me,--twined her thin little arms round me, and strained as if she would crush herself into my bosom, while she buried her face in my neck and gave way to restful moans accompanied by an occasional convulsive sob!

Well did I understand the feelings of her poor heart. For hours past she had been shocked by the incomprehensible deeds of blood and violence around her; had seen, as she afterwards told me, her brother murdered, and her mother chased into the woods and shot by a soldier; had sought refuge in the church with those who were too much taken up with their own terrible griefs to care for her, and, after hours of prolonged agony and terror, coupled with hunger and thirst, had at last found refuge in a kindly welcome embrace.

After a time I tried to disengage her arms, but found this to be impossible without a degree of violence which I could not exert.

Overcome by the strain, and probably by long want of rest, the poor child soon fell into a profound slumber.

While I meditated in some perplexity as to how I should act, my attention was aroused by the sudden entrance of a number of men. Their dress and badges at once told me that they formed a section of that n.o.ble band of men and women, who, following close on the heels of the "dogs of war," do all that is possible to alleviate the sufferings of hapless victims.--G.o.d's work going on side by side with that of the devil! In a few minutes surgeons were tenderly binding up wounds, and ambulance-men were bearing them out of the church from which the dead were also removed for burial.

"Come, Lancey," said I, "our services here are happily no longer required. Let us go."

"Where to, sir?" said Lancey.

"To the nearest spot," I replied after a moment's thought, "where I can lie down and sleep. I am dead beat, Lancey, for want of rest, and really feel unable for anything. If only I can s.n.a.t.c.h an hour or two, that will suffice. Meanwhile, you will go to the nearest station and find out if the railway has been destroyed."

We hurried out of the dreadful slaughter-house, Ivanka still sound asleep on my shoulder, and soon discovered an outhouse in which was a little straw. Rolling some of this into a bundle for a pillow, I lay down so as not to disturb the sleeping child. Another moment and I too was steeped in that profound slumber which results from thorough physical and mental exhaustion.

Lancey went out, shut the door, fastened it, and left us.

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

THE FALL OF PLEVNA.

The events which followed the ma.s.sacre in the Bulgarian village remain in my mind, and ever must remain as a confused dream, for I was smitten that night with a fever, during the course of which--part of it at least--I was either delirious or utterly prostrate.

And who can tell, save those who have pa.s.sed through a similar condition, the agonies which I endured, and the amazing fancies by which I was a.s.sailed at that time! Of course I knew not where I was, and I cared not. My unbridled fancy led me everywhere. Sometimes I was in a bed, sometimes on horseback; now in hospital attending wounded people, most of whom I noticed were women or little children; then on a battle-field, cheering the combatants with all my power, or joining them, but, when I chanced to join them, it was never for the purpose of taking, but of saving life. Often I was visited by good spirits, and also by bad. One of these latter, a little one, made a deep impression on me. His particular mission seemed to lie in his power to present before me, within a flaming frame, pictures of whatever I wished to behold. He was wonderfully tractable at first, and showed me whatever I asked for,--my mother, Bella, Nicholas, and many of my friends,--but by degrees he insisted on showing what I did not wish to see, and among these latter pictures were fearful ma.s.sacres, and scenes of torture and bloodshed. I have a faint recollection of being carried somewhere in a jolting wagon, of suffering from burning thirst which no one seemed to care to relieve, of frequent abrupt stoppages, while shouts, shrieks, and imprecations filled my ears; but whether these things were realities or fancies, or a mingling of both, I cannot tell, for a.s.suredly the bad spirit never once succeeded in showing me any picture half so terrible as those realities of war which I had already beheld.

One day I felt a peculiar sensation. It seemed to me that my intellectual faculties became more active, while those of my body appeared to sink.

"Come," said I to the demon who had wearied me so much; "come, you troublesome little devil, and show me my man Lancey. I can see better than usual; present him!"

Immediately Lancey stood by my side. He looked wonderfully real, and I noticed that the fiery frame was not round him as it used to be. A moment later, the pretty face of Ivanka also glided into the picture.

"Hallo!" I exclaimed, "I didn't ask you to send _her_ here. Why don't you wait for orders--eh?"

At this Lancey gently pushed Ivanka away.

"No, don't do that," I cried hastily; "I didn't mean that; order her back again--do you hear?"

Lancey appeared to beckon, and she returned. She was weeping quietly.

"Why do you weep, dear?" I asked in Russian.

"Oh! you have been _so_ ill," she replied, with an anxious look and a sob.

"So, then," I said, looking at Lancey in surprise, "you are not delusions!"

"No, sir, we ain't; but I sometimes fancy that everythink in life is delusions since we comed to this 'orrible land."

I looked hard at Ivanka and Lancey again for some moments, then at the bed on which I lay. Then a listless feeling came over me, and my eyes wandered lazily round the chamber, which was decidedly Eastern in its appearance. Through a window at the farther end I could see a garden.

The sun was shining brightly on autumnal foliage, amidst which a tall and singular-looking man walked slowly to and fro. He was clad in flowing robes, with a red fez on his head which was counterbalanced by a huge red beard.

"At all events _he_ must be a delusion," said I, pointing with a hitch of my nose to the man in question.

"No, sir, 'e ain't; wery much the rewerse.--But you mustn't speak, sir; the doctor said we was on no account to talk to you."

"But just tell me who he is," I pleaded earnestly; "I can't rest unless I know."

"Well, sir, I s'pose it won't do no 'arm to tell you that 'e's a Pasha-- Sanda Pasha by name--a hold and hintimate friend of mine,--the Scotch boy, you know, that I used to tell you about. We are livin' in one of 'is willas. 'E's in disgrace, is Sanda Pasha, just now, an' superseded.

The day you was took bad, sir, Russians came into the willage, an' w'en I come back I found 'em swarmin' in the 'ouses an' loop-'oling the walls for defence, but Sanda Pasha came down on 'em with a harmy of Turks an'

drove 'em out. 'E's bin a-lickin' of 'em all up an' down the country ever since, but the other Pashas they got jealous of 'im, specially since 'e's not a real Turk born, an' the first rewerse that come to 'im--as it will come to every one now an' again, sir--they left 'im in a fix instead of sending 'im reinforcements, so 'e was forced to retreat, an' the Sultan recalled 'im. It do seem to me that the Turkish Government don't know good men when they've got 'em; an', what's more, don't deserve to 'ave 'em. But long before these things 'appened, w'en 'e found that you was my master an' Ivanka our friend, 'e sent us to the rear with a strong guard, an' 'ere we are now in one of 'is willas, in what part o' the land is more than I can tell--near Gallipopolly, or somethink like that, I believe."

"So, then, we are prisoners?" said I.

"Well, I s'pose we are, sir, or somethink o' the sort, but, bless your 'art, sir, it's of no manner of consiquence. We are treated like princes and live like fighting-c.o.c.ks.--But you mustn't talk, sir, you mustn't indeed, for the doctor gave strict orders that we was to keep you quiet."

Lancey's communications were of so surprising a nature, so varied and so suggestive, that my mind was overwhelmed in the mere attempt to recall what he had said; in another moment I had forgotten all, and dropped into a deep, dreamless, refreshing slumber.

During the period that I was thus fighting, as it were, with death--in which fight, through G.o.d's blessing, I finally gained the victory--the fight between the Russians and the Turks had progressed apace; victory leaning now to the former, now to the latter. Many b.l.o.o.d.y engagements had taken place on the plains of Bulgaria and among the Balkan mountains, while Osman Pasha had carried on for some time that celebrated defence of Plevna which afterwards carried him to the front rank of the Turkish generals, and raised him, in the world's estimation, above them all. Everywhere breech-loading weapons, torpedoes, telegraphs, monster cannon, and novel appliances of modern warfare, had proved that where hundreds fell in the days of our fathers, thousands fall in our own--that the b.l.o.o.d.y game is immensely more expensive and deadly than it used to be, and that if war was folly before, it is sheer madness now.

The first great attack had been made on the redoubts in front of Plevna, and in a.s.saulting one of these poor Dobri Petroff distinguished himself so highly for desperate, reckless courage, that he drew the special attention of General Skobeleff, who sent for him, probably to offer him some appointment, but whatever it might be the scout declined promotion or reward. His object was to seek what he styled honourable death in the front of battle. Strange to say, he led a sort of charmed life, and the more he sought death the more it appeared to avoid him. Somewhat like Skobeleff himself, he stood unhurt, many a time, when b.a.l.l.s were whistling round him like hail, and comrades were mown down in ranks and heaps around him.

In all armies there are men who act with heroic valour and desperate daring. Some are urged thereto by calm contempt of danger, coupled with a strong sense of duty. It was something like this, probably, that induced Skobeleff to expose himself so recklessly on almost all occasions. It was simply despair, coupled with natural lion-like courage, that influenced the wretched scout.

Nicholas Naranovitsch had also acquired a name among his fellows for that grand sweeping fervour in attack which we are wont to a.s.sociate with the heroes and demiG.o.ds of ancient story. But Nicholas's motive was a compound of great physical strength, hot-blooded youth, and a burning desire to win distinction in the path of duty.

One consequence of the scout's return to headquarters was that he frequently met Nicholas, and felt an intense drawing towards him as being one who had shown him sympathy and kindness in that home which was now gone for ever. Deep was the feeling of pity which Nicholas felt when the scout told him, in a few sternly-uttered sentences, what had occurred at Venilik; and when Dobri expressed a desire to attach himself to Nicholas as his servant, the latter was only too glad to agree. Each knew the other well by report, and felt that the connection would be mutually agreeable.

At last one of the greatest events of the war approached. Plevna had been so closely hemmed in by Russian troops, and cut off from supplies, that the garrison was reduced to starvation. In this extremity, as is well known, Osman Pasha resolved on the desperate attempt to cut his way out of the beleaguered position.