The Luck of Thirteen Part 33

We met "Eyebrows" once more, just at the entrance to the village; but he was going on to Pod, so had finally got a day ahead of us. Found rooms in our old resting place.

The professor was threatening to accompany us to Italy--he was like the old man of the sea. We got a telegram from the English Minister, saying that he did not think we could ever get to Italy from Scutari. We preferred to trust to our luck which so far had been wonderful, especially in the matter of weather. In the evening the captain sent to say that twenty horses would await us the next day. A motor car would have been sent, he added, but almost all the bridges were washed away and they could get no nearer than Lieva Rieka.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER XXII

ANDRIEVITZA TO POD

A problem met us in the morning. Willett was quite ill and only fit for bed. But bed was impossible. We had just escaped from the sound of the guns, and did not know which way the Austrians were coming. To wait was too risky; others would certainly get seedy and sooner or later some one might get seriously ill. We felt we must push on to Podgoritza and be within hail of doctor and chemist. But Willett looked very wretched, lying flat and refusing breakfast.

We plied him with chlorodyne; but the chlorodyne did not like him and they parted company. We tried chlorodyne followed by brandy with better effect. Others also showed a distinct interest in the chlorodyne bottle.

We felt very anxious: milk was almost unprocurable, other comforts nil.

We finally decided that if he was going to have dysentery he had better have it decently and in order at Podgoritza, than stand the chance of being suddenly surprised by the Austrians and made to walk endless distances. So we heaved him on to a wooden pack, and the other chlorodyney figures of woe climbed on to the remaining queer-looking saddles.

Blease tried a horse which had a thoughtful eye. It kicked him on the knee, and trod on his toe, so he relinquished the joy of riding for the serener pleasure of walking. Jan clambered on to it, whereupon it stood on its forelegs, and as there were no stirrups and the saddle back hit him behind, he landed over its neck, remaining there propped up by a stick which was in his hand. After readjusting himself inside the two wooden peaks of the saddle, he testified his disapproval to the beast, and trotted away in style, leaving a row of grinning Montenegrins and boys behind with the exception of one who clung to reins and other bits of saddlery, imploring him to stop. It would seem as if pack ponies were never meant to trot, but at last he shook off the pony boy, pa.s.sed Miss Brindley (whose horse was looking at himself in a puddle with such deep and concentrated interest that he pulled her over his head and landed her in the middle of the water), and reached the vanguard of the party, who had deserted their horses for a lift on a lorry--Willett, sitting in front with the driver, was shrunk like a concertina inside his great coat.

The lorry dropped us just before the first broken bridge. Then we had to leave the road and face mud slush, climbing for hours. We had picked up various friends--a courtly old peasant who was very worried to hear that Kragujevatz had fallen, and feared for the invasion of Montenegro; two barefoot girls, who asked Jo all the usual questions, and an American-speaking Serbian man who had trudged from Ipek, the first refugee on that road from Serbia. He was very mysterious, and contrary to the usual custom, would not tell us about himself nor where he was going.

He was very anxious to stand us drinks, but curiously enough, every one refused. The professor had started before us, with a Greek priest. When we pa.s.sed him he lifted his hands deprecatingly, "Teshko."

Our hopes of arriving before dark were as usual crushed. The dusk found us still floundering in the mud on wayside paths. It began to pour. The hills above us became white--a straight line being drawn between snow and rain--and our guides wanted us to spend the night at an inn two hours before we reached Jabooka. But it looked very uninviting--we remembered the cheery hostess of Jabooka, the woman who came from "other parts," and knew a thing or two about cleanliness. Every one agreed to go on. Willett was rather better, so we forged ahead in the downpour and the dark, splashing through puddles and singing everything we knew.

Our Albanian guides chuckled and chanted their own nasal songs in a different key as an accompaniment.

Far away we saw a tiny light--Jabooka. We stretched our legs and hurried along, but alas! the inn room was full. There was the professor, his face shining from warmth and well-being, crowds of men in uniform, some fat travelling civilians: faces looked up from the floor, from the corners, faces were everywhere, wet boys were steaming in front of the fire, while the hostess and a girl were picking their way as best they could in the tobacco smoke with eggs and rakia.

Full; even the floor! and we were wet through. The professor had announced that we were staying at the dirty inn away back. Oh, the old villain!

He came forward, saying in an impressive voice that a major had taken the inn.

"Bother the major," said Jo. "Something must be done."

The professor smiled. "There _is_ another inn."

There was nothing for it. We had to go to the inn across the road, glad enough to have a roof at all. The rain was tearing down as if the heavens were filled with fire-engines.

But they didn't want us there. We beheld a dirty low-ceiled room filled with filthy people and a smell of wet unwashed clothes.

The owner and his wife received us roughly. "We have no room, we have nothing," they said.

We stood our ground. "We _must_ have a roof to-night."

Outside the road had become a river, our men were nearly dropping with fatigue.

"You can't come here," said the innkeeper, looking at us with great distrust.

The major, whom Jo had "bothered," came in. "You must take these people," he said, and asked various searching questions about the rooms.

Reluctantly the truth came out that if the whole family slept in one room there would be one for us. The major ordered them to do it. Jo wished she hadn't "bothered" him quite so gruffly.

The daughters stamped about, furiously pulling all the blankets off the two beds, while one of them stood in the doorway watching us to see that we did not secrete the greasy counterpanes. Several of the party sat, hair on end, with staring eyes, too tired to shut them.

"Food?"

"Nema Nishta," was the response.

"Can we boil water?"

"No."

"Where can we boil it?"

"Nowhere."

"But there is a fire in the kitchen," we said, pointing to a hooded fireplace where a few sticks were burning.

"Why shouldn't they boil water?" said a kindly looking man.

"Well, I suppose they can," said the old woman, who became almost pleasant over the kitchen fire--telling Jo she was sixty and only a stara Baba (old granny).

Miss Brindley made tea. We cheered as she brought it in. Tea, bully beef, and our last biscuits comprised our dinner, which we ate in big gulps, after which we sang "Three blind mice" as a digestive.

The half-open door was full of peering faces, so somewhat encouraged we gave them a selection of rounds.

We left next morning early in a heavy downpour, after being exorbitantly charged, glad to leave Jabooka for ever.

The professor was before us, an aged red Riding Hood, clad in his scarlet blanket. The day was long and uneventful. Trudge, trudge, splash, splash. The dividing line between snow and rain still was heavily marked, but it sleeted and our hands were quite numbed. We crossed an angry stream on a greasy pole and most of us splashed in.

Whatmough stood in the water, remarking, "I'm wet and I'll get no wetter," and helped people across. Again after dark we arrived at Lieva Rieka, to find our dirty old inn again; but it had a real iron stove which gave out a glorious heat, and we crowded around in the ill-lit room, clouds of steam arising from us. We tried to dry our stockings against the stove pipe, but the old mother did not approve. She was afraid of fire. When she ran out of the room, socks were pressed surrept.i.tiously against the pipe with a "sizz," and when she returned, innocent looking people were standing against the wall, no socks to be seen.

The eldest daughter settled down with her head in Jo's hip, having failed to get Miss Brindley alongside. She gazed longingly at Miss Brindley from Jo's lap, and asking for all the data possible as to her life.

"A devoika (girl), free, travelling from a country so far away that it would take three months in an oxcart to get there."

"Oh, how wonderful!"

They gave us a tiny room and two benches--much too small for the whole company; so some slept outside on the balcony.

The professor was in the adjoining inn, so we guessed it must be the best; but a young French sailor, from the wireless in Podgoritza, who came to gossip with us, said there was nothing to choose.

He was champing, as the Government were commandeering the wireless company's motor cars right and left using them to cart benzine; and now they were going to send a refugee Serb officer's family to Podgoritza in his motor, leaving him sitting.

We spent the next morning waiting for the motor, not knowing if it would arrive or no. The professor sailed away in the French one, being one up on us again. It still rained, so we sat contemplating the possibilities of lunch. No sooner was it on the boil than the biggest automobile in Montenegro, a covered lorry, turned up.