The Prince of India; Or, Why Constantinople Fell Volume I Part 23

The answer duly delivered, the Emperor responded to the salaam with a bow and another message.

"His Imperial Majesty," the Acolyte said, "is pleased at meeting the Prince of India. He was not aware he had a guest of such distinction in his capital. He desires to know the place of residence of his n.o.ble friend, that he may communicate with him, and make amends for the hindrance which has overtaken him to-day."

The Prince gave his address, and the interview ended.

It is of course the reader's privilege to pa.s.s judgment upon the incidents of this rencounter; at least one of the parties to it was greatly pleased, for he knew the coveted invitation would speedily follow.

While the Emperor was borne past, Lael received his notice more especially than her guardian; when they were out of hearing, he called the Acolyte to his side.

"Didst thou observe the young person yonder?" he asked.

"The coronet she wears certifies the Prince of India to be vastly rich,"

the other answered.

"Yes, the Princes of India, if we may judge by common report, are all rich; wherefore I thought not of that, but rather of the beauty of his daughter. She reminded me of the Madonna on the Panagia in the transept of our church at Blacherne."

CHAPTER VIII

RACING WITH A STORM

One who has seen the boats in which fishermen now work the eddies and still waters of the Bosphorus will not require a description of the vessel the Prince and Lael stepped into when they arrived at the Grand Gate of Blacherne. He need only be told that instead of being pitch-black outside and in, it was white, except the gunwale which was freshly gilt. The untravelled reader, however, must imagine a long narrow craft, upturned at both ends, graceful in every line, and constructed for speed and beauty. Well aft there was a box without cover, luxuriously cushioned, lined with chocolate velvet, and wide enough to seat two persons comfortably; behind it, a decked s.p.a.ce for a servant, pilot or guard. This arrangement left all forward for the rowers, each handling two oars.

Ten rowers, trained, stout, and clad in white headkerchiefs, shirts and trousers of the same hue, and Greek jackets of brilliant scarlet, profusely figured over with yellow braid, sat stolidly, blades in hand and ready dipped, when the pa.s.sengers took their places, the Prince and Lael in the box, and Nilo behind them as guard. The vessel was too light to permit a ceremonious reception.

In front of the party, on the northern sh.o.r.e of the famous harbor, were the heights of Pera. The ravines and gra.s.s-green benches into which they were broken, with here and there a garden hut enclosed in a patch of filbert bushes--for Pera was not then the city it now is--were of no interest to the Prince; dropping his eyes to the water, they took in a medley of shipping, then involuntarily turned to the cold gray face of the wall he was leaving. And while seeing in vivid recollection the benignant countenance of Constantine bent upon him from the chair in the street, he thought of the horoscope he had spent the night in taking and the forenoon in calculating. With a darkened brow, he gave the word, and the boat was pushed off and presently seeking the broader channel of the Bosphorus.

The day was delightful. A breeze danced merrily over the surface of the water. Soft white summer clouds hung so sleepily in the southwest they scarce suggested motion. Seeing the color deepen in Lael's cheeks, and listening to her questions, he surrendered himself to the pleasures of the situation, not the least being the admiration she attracted.

By ships at anchor, and through lesser craft of every variety they sped, followed by exclamations frequently outspoken:

"Who is she? Who can she be?"

Thus pursued, they flew past the gate of St. Peter, turned the point of Galata, and left the Fish Market port behind; proceeding then in parallelism with the north sh.o.r.e, they glided under the great round tower so tall and up so far overhead it seemed a part of the sky. Off Tophane, they were in the Bosphorus, with Scutari at their right, and Point Serail at their backs.

Viewed from the harbor on the sea, the old historic Point leaves upon the well informed an impression that in a day long gone, yielding to a spasm of justice, Asia cast it off into the waves. Its beauty is Circean. Almost from the beginning it has been the chosen place in which men ran rounds gay and grave, virtuous and wanton, foolish and philosophic, brave and cowardly--where love, hate, jealousy, avarice, ambition and envy have delighted to burn their lights before Heaven--where, possibly with one exception, Providence has more frequently come nearer lifting its veil than in any other spot of earth.

Again and again, the Prince, loth to quit the view, turned and refilled his eyes with Sancta Sophia, of which, from his position, the wall at the water's edge, the lesser churches of the Virgin Hodegetria and St.

Irene, and the topmost sections far extending of the palaces of Bucoleon seemed but foundations. The edifice, as he saw it then, depended on itself for effect, the Turk having not yet, in sign of Mohammedan conversion, broken the line of its marvellous dome with minarets. At length he set about telling stories of the Point.

Off the site of the present palace of Dolma-Batchi he told of Euphrosyne, the daughter of the Empress Irene; and seeing how the sorrowful fortune of the beautiful child engaged Lael's sympathies, he became interested as a narrator, and failed to notice the unusual warmth tempering the air about Tchiragan. Neither did he observe that the northern sky, before so clear and blue, was whitening with haze.

To avoid the current running past Arnoot-Kouy, the rowers crossed to the Asiatic side under the promontory of Candilli.

Other boats thronged the charming expanse; but as most of them were of a humbler cla.s.s sporting one rower, the Prince's, with its liveried ten, was a surpa.s.sing attraction. Sometimes the strangers, to gratify their curiosity, drew quite near, but always without affronting him; knowing the homage was to Lael, he was happy when it was effusively rendered.

His progress was most satisfactory until he rounded Candilli. Then a flock of small boats came down upon him pell-mell, the rowers pulling their uttermost, the pa.s.sengers in panic.

The urgency impelling them was equally recognized by the ships and larger vessels out in the channel. Anchors were going down, sails furling, and oars drawing in. Above them, moreover, much beyond their usual levels of flight troops of gulls were circling on rapid wings screaming excitedly.

The Prince had reached the part of greatest interest in the story he was telling--how the cruel and remorseless Emperor Michel, determined to wed the innocent and helpless Euphrosyne, shamelessly cheated the Church and cajoled the Senate--when Nilo touched his shoulder, and awoke him to the situation. A glance over the water--another at the sky--and he comprehended danger of some kind was impending. At the same moment Lael commenced shivering and complaining of cold. The air had undergone a sudden change. Presently Nilo's red cloak was sheltering her.

The boat was in position to bring everything into view, and he spoke to the rowers:

"A storm is rising."

They ceased work, and looked over their shoulders, each for himself.

"A blow from the sea, and it comes fast. What we shall do is for my Lord to say," one of them returned.

The Prince grew anxious for Lael. What was done must be for her--he had no thought else.

A cloud was forming over the whole northeastern quarter of the sky, along the horizon black, overhead a vast gray wave, in its heart copper-hued, seething, interworking, now a distended sail, now a sail bursted; and the wind could he heard whipping the shreds into fleece, and whirling them a confusion of vaporous banners. Yet gla.s.sy, the water reflected the tint of the cloud. The hush holding it was like the drawn breath of a victim waiting the first turn of the torturous wheel.

The Asiatic sh.o.r.e offered the Prince a long stretch, and he persisted in coasting it until the donjon of the White Castle--that terror to Christians--arrested his eye. There were houses much nearer, some of them actually overhanging the water; but the donjon seemed specially inviting; at all events, he coolly reflected, if the Governor of the Castle denied him refuge, the little river near by known as the Sweet Waters of Asia would receive him, and getting under its bank, he might hope to escape the fury of the wind and waves. He shouted resolutely:

"To the White Castle! Make it before the wind strikes, my men, and I will double your hire."

"We may make it," the rower answered, somewhat sullenly, "but"--

"What?" asked the Prince.

"The devil has his lodgings there. Many men have gone into its accursed gates on errands of peace, and never been heard of again."

The Prince laughed.

"We lose time--forward! If there be a fiend in the Castle, I promise you he is not waiting for us."

The twenty oars fell as one, and the boat jumped like a steed under a stab of the spur.

Thus boldly the race with the storm was begun. The judgment of the challenger, a.s.suming the Prince to be such, may be questioned. The river was the goal.

Could he reach it before the wind descended in dangerous force?--That was the very point of contest.

The chances, it is to be remembered next, were not of a kind to admit weighing with any approach to certainty; it was difficult even to marshal them for consideration. The distance was somewhat less than three-quarters of a mile; on the other part, the competing cloud was wrestling with the mountain height of Alem Daghy, about four miles away.

The dead calm was an advantage; unfortunately it was more than offset by the velocity of the current which, though not so strong by the littoral of Candilli as under the opposite bluffs of Roumeli-Hissar, was still a serious opposing force. The boatmen were skilful, and could be relied upon to pull loyally; for, pa.s.sing the reward offered in the event of their winning, the dangers of failure were to them alike. Treating the contest as a race, with the storm and the boat as compet.i.tors, the Prince was not without chances of success.

But whatever the outcome of the venture, Lael would be put to discomfort.

His care of her was so habitually marked by tender solicitude one cannot avoid wondering at him now.

After all he may have judged the affair more closely than at first appears. The sides of the boat were low, but danger from that cause might be obviated by the skill of the rowers; and then Alem Daghy was not a trifling obstacle in the path of the gale. It might be trusted to hold the cloud awhile; after which a time would be required by the wind to travel the miles intervening.

Certainly it had been more prudent to make the sh.o.r.e, and seek refuge in one of the houses there. But the retort of the spirited Jew of that day, as in this, was a contemptuous refusal of a.s.sistance, and the degree to which this son of Israel was governed by the eternal resentment can be best appreciated by recalling the number of his days on earth.

At the first response to the vigorous pull of the oarsmen, Lael drew the red cloak over her face, and laid her head against the Prince. He put his arm around her, and seeing nothing and saying nothing, she trusted in him.