The Moonlit Way Part 1

The Moonlit Way.

by Robert W. Chambers.

PROLOGUE

CLAIRE-DE-LUNE

There was a big moon over the Bosphorus; the limpid waters off Seraglio Point glimmered; the Golden Horn was like a sheet of beaten silver inset with topaz and ruby where lanterns on rusting Turkish warships dyed the tarnished argent of the flood. Except for these, and the fixed lights on the foreign guard-ships and on a big American steam yacht, only a pale and nebulous sh.o.r.eward glow betrayed the monster city.

Over Pera the full moon's l.u.s.tre fell, silvering palace, villa, sea and coast; its rays glimmered on bridge and wharf, bastion, tower a.r.s.enal, and minarette, transforming those big, sprawling, ramshackle blotches of architecture called Constantinople into that shadowy, magnificent enchantment of the East, which all believe in, but which exists only in a poet's heart and mind.

Night veiled the squalour of Balat, and its filth, its meanness, its flimsy sham. Moonlight made of Galata a marvel, enn.o.bling every b.a.s.t.a.r.d dome, every starved facade, every unlovely and attenuated minarette, and invested with added charm each really lovely ruin, each tower, palace, mosque, garden wall and balcony, and every crenelated battlement, where the bronze bulk of ancient cannon slanted, outlined in silver under the Prophet's moon.

Tiny moving lights twinkled on the Galata Bridge; pale points of radiance dotted Scutari; but the group of amazing cities called Constantinople lay almost blotted out under the moon.

Darker at night than any capital in the world, its huge, solid and ancient shapes bulking gigantic in the night, its n.o.ble ruins cloaked, its cheap filth hidden, its flimsy Coney Island aspect transfigured and the stylographic-pen architecture of a hundred minarettes softened into slender elegance, Constantinople lay dreaming its immemorial dreams under the black shadow of the Prussian eagle.

The German Emba.s.sy was lighted up like a Pera cafe; the drawing-rooms crowded with a brilliant throng where sashes, orders, epaulettes and sabre-tache glittered, and jewels blazed and aigrettes waved under the crystal chandeliers, accenting and isolating sombre civilian evening dress, which seemed mournful, rusty, and out of the picture, even when plastered over with jewelled stars.

Few Turkish officials and officers were present, but the disquieting sight of German officers in Turkish uniforms was not uncommon. And the Count d'Eblis, Senator of France, noted this phenomenon with lively curiosity, and mentioned it to his companion, Ferez Bey.

Ferez Bey, lounging in a corner with Adolf Gerhardt, for whom he had procured an invitation, and flanked by the Count d'Eblis, likewise a guest aboard the rich German-American banker's yacht, was very much in his element as friend and mentor.

For Ferez Bey knew everybody in the Orient--knew when to cringe, when to be patronising, when to fawn, when to a.s.sert himself, when to be servile, when impudent.

He was as impudent to Adolf Gerhardt as he dared be, the banker not knowing the subtler shades and differences; he was on an equality with the French senator, Monsieur le Comte d'Eblis because he knew that d'Eblis dared not resent his familiarity.

Otherwise, in that brilliant company, Ferez Bey was a jackal--and he knew it perfectly--but a valuable jackal; and he also knew that.

So when the German Amba.s.sador spoke pleasantly to him, his att.i.tude was just sufficiently servile, but not overdone; and when Von-der-Hohe Pasha, in the uniform of a Turkish General of Division, graciously exchanged a polite word with him during a moment's easy gossip with the Count d'Eblis, Ferez Bey writhed moderately under the honour, but did not exactly squirm.

To Conrad von Heimholz he ventured to present his German-American patron, Adolf Gerhardt, and the thin young military attache condescended in his Prussian way to notice the introduction.

"Saw your yacht in the harbour," he admitted stiffly. "It is astonishing how you Americans permit no bounds to your somewhat noticeable magnificence."

"She's a good boat, the _Mirage_," rumbled Gerhardt, in his bushy red beard, "but there are plenty in America finer than mine."

"Not many, Adolf," insisted Ferez, in his flat, Eurasian voice--"not ver' many anyw'ere so fine like your _Mirage_."

"I saw none finer at Kiel," said the attache, staring at Gerhardt through his monocle, with the habitual insolence and disapproval of the Prussian junker. "To me it exhibits bad taste"--he turned to the Count d'Eblis--"particularly when the _Meteor_ is there."

"Where?" asked the Count.

"At Kiel. I speak of Kiel and the ostentation of certain foreign yacht owners at the recent regatta."

Gerhardt, redder than ever, was still German enough to swallow the meaningless insolence. He was not getting on very well at the Emba.s.sy of his fellow countrymen. Americans, properly presented, they endured without too open resentment; for German-Americans, even when millionaires, their contempt and bad manners were often undisguised.

"I'm going to get out of this," growled Gerhardt, who held a good position socially in New York and in the fashionable colony at Northbrook. "I've seen enough puffed up Germans and over-embroidered Turks to last me. Come on, d'Eblis----"

Ferez detained them both:

"Surely," he protested, "you would not miss Nihla!"

"Nihla?" repeated d'Eblis, who had pa.s.sed his arm through Gerhardt's.

"Is that the girl who set St. Petersburg by the ears?"

"Nihla Quellen," rumbled Gerhardt. "I've heard of her. She's a dancer, isn't she?"

Ferez, of course, knew all about her, and he drew the two men into the embrasure of a long window.

It was not happening just exactly as he and the German Amba.s.sador had planned it together; they had intended to let Nihla burst like a flaming jewel on the vision of d'Eblis and blind him then and there.

Perhaps, after all, it was better drama to prepare her entrance. And who but Ferez was qualified to prepare that entree, or to speak with authority concerning the history of this strange and beautiful young girl who had suddenly appeared like a burning star in the East, had pa.s.sed like a meteor through St. Petersburg, leaving several susceptible young men--notably the Grand Duke Cyril--mentally unhinged and hopelessly dissatisfied with fate.

"It is ver' fonny, d'Eblis--une histoire chic, vous savez! Figurez vous----"

"Talk English," growled Gerhardt, eyeing the serene progress of a pretty Highness, Austrian, of course, surrounded by gorgeous uniforms and empress.e.m.e.nt.

"Who's that?" he added.

Ferez turned; the gorgeous lady snubbed him, but bowed to d'Eblis.

"The Archd.u.c.h.ess Zilka," he said, not a whit abashed. "She is a ver'

great frien' of mine."

"Can't you present me?" enquired Gerhardt, restlessly; "--or you, d'Eblis--can't you ask permission?"

The Count d'Eblis nodded inattentively, then turned his heavy and rather vulgar face to Ferez, plainly interested in the "histoire" of the girl, Nihla.

"What were you going to say about that dancer?" he demanded.

Ferez pretended to forget, then, apparently recollecting:

"Ah! Apropos of Nihla? It is a ver' piquant storee--the storee of Nihla Quellen. Zat is not 'er name. No! Her name is Dunois--Thessalie Dunois."

"French," nodded d'Eblis.

"Alsatian," replied Ferez slyly. "Her fathaire was captain--Achille Dunois?--you know----?"

"What!" exclaimed d'Eblis. "Do you mean that notorious fellow, the Grand Duke Cyril's hunting cheetah?"

"The same, dear frien'. Dunois is dead--his bullet head was crack open, doubtless by som' ladee's angree husban'. There are a few thousan' roubles--not more--to stan' between some kind gentleman and the prettee Nihla. You see?" he added to Gerhardt, who was listening without interest, "--Dunois, if he was the Gran' Duke's cheetah, kept all such merry gentlemen from his charming daughtaire."

Gerhardt, whose aspirations lay higher, socially, than a dancing girl, merely grunted. But d'Eblis, whose aspirations were always below even his own level, listened with visibly increasing curiosity. And this was according to the programme of Ferez Bey and Excellenz. As the Hun has it, "according to plan."