Freedom or Death

by Nikos Kazantzakis

  On the grandfather’s left lolled Captain Katsirmas the pirate. Tall and thin like a ship’s mast, clean-shaven, sunburned, squinting, he had neither the mighty, lordly style of the grandfather nor the heroic verve of Captain Mandakas. He was a difficult man to get on with and full of bitter accusations against God. He had always played a lone hand and relied only on himself. But his strength too was now gone.

  Of the other eleven captains, one was an abbot from the Monastery of Christ the Lord, with blue eyes and a flowing beard. Another was a schoolmaster from Embaro, a misshapen shriveled bit of a man whom nobody could set eyes on without asking: “What’s that rabbit doing in a gathering of beasts of prey?” But one had to see him in battle, when his spirit caught fire; or to accompany him to a drinking bout, where he played the lyre to set the stones a-dancing. And when people heard him speak, they felt like praying to God, “Give me ten ears, that I may hear it all.” Captain Polyxigis too had come, good-humored and self-contented, with his silver pistols and a silk scarf smelling of musk, a present from Emine’. He sat down next to Captain Michales. Their eyes met, but they did not speak to each other.

  Some thought that Tityros also ought to be invited, for he too had become wild and fierce. He had put away his books and now swept through the villages, to speak in the churches on Sundays and set men’s hearts on fire. But the grandfather had opposed this. “He’s never done a thing in Ms life but talk,” he had said. “Captain’s work is hard. Besidesand that settles ithe’s still too young.”

  All eyes were now turned upon the ancient. He rose, stretching out his bony arms in their white sleeves. His voice boomed darkly:

  “Welcome, captains, to my mountains. Otvly two tvŤvgs does a Cretan possess: God and his gun. In the name of

  God and our guns I open this meeting today. Once more we must speak about Crete. Let each man stand up and say freely what he thinks. But first, will the-holy abbot of Christ the Lord give the blessing?”

  The abbot had already donned his priestly stole. He went over to a boulder, in a hollow of which there was still some rain water. He bent down and plucked a sprig of thyme, with which he performed the sprinkling of the holy water. Then he began to say the prayers, while the captains rose to their feet and took off their fezzes and headbands. It did not matter that they did not precisely understand the words in church language: God, victory over the barbarians, justice, mercy. They had no need of such ideas, for in Captain Sefakas’ sheep pen they saw Crete in the flesh: a mother in mourning, barefoot, starving, bloodstained. They raised their hands to Heaven and prayed for their mother and her children.

  They crossed themselves and sat down again. For a while no one was able to speak. Their throats were swollen and speech bitterit would not come forth. Once more the grandfather was the first to speak. Turning to Captain Mandakas he said:

  “Captain Mandakas, as a child you tried powder out of your spoon. You have fought right through two genera-uons. Your spirit may have been a bit giddy at first, but with age it’s grown clear. Speak, then! Let’s know what you’ve got to say.”

  “The younger ones should speak,” he answered. The grandfather turned to Captain Katsirmas. “What have you got to say, Captain? You too have been fighting at sea for two generations. You’ve seen and suffered a great deal. Your opinion has weight. Speak.”

  “I have no word to say,” came the answer, sullenly. “When a man no longer has any strength, he no longer has anything to say. The young ones should speak,”

  “Very well, then, the young ones!” the grandfather exclaimed, folding his hands over his pistols and preparing to listen.

  The abbot of Christ the Lord stood up. He was short nd square. His cheeks, his forehead, his muscular arms and his throat had been scored with scimitar strokes and pierced by bullets. He directed his gaze at Captain Michales.

  “Captain Michales,” he said, “I think the first word is yours by right. You escaped from the massacre and you called us together. What, then, have you to say to us?”

  Captain Michales stood up. His blood was racing. He leaned on his gun.

  “Brothers, captains, you know very well I can’t spin speeches. So I’ll speak bluntly, drily and soberly; forgive me. Once again the noose is tightening around Crete. Soldiers and dervishes have come by ship; the Turks are slaughtering our brothers in Megalokastro. We are no lambs. The blood of the killed is crying out. Arise, captains! Freedom or death!”

  He sat down.

  The captains wagged their heads, and put them together by twos and threes. The aged Kambanaros, the first elder of the communes, rose. The murmuring died down. The speaker was well known for his clear reasoning. He was a man whose thoughts were measured. As soon as he stood up in an assembly to speak, the hotheads frowned in expectation of the cold water he would pour over them, while respectable folk breathed more easily.

  “Kill the king, but don’t threaten him!” he exclaimed, and threw a severe glance at Captain Michales. “When, in God’s name, shall we learn discretion? How often have we uttered threats, but never have we had the strength to carry them through and force the Sultan out of Crete! Curses on him! But it’s we who pay. Men and women and vineyards are destroyed each time the fire flares up in us. And we, the leaders, bear the responsibility for thousands of souls! And what are you aiming at this time, Captain Michales? Do we want to plunge Crete again into a bath of blood? You are a shrewd man. Tell us, then: how many shiploads of guns and ammunition and food and tents and horses have you already obtained? How any cannon to storm the fortress? Tell us, please, what understanding you have reached with Greece and with Moscow so that we may all fall upon the Sultan with one blow. Give us the facts! Reveal to us your secret, Captain Michales, that our hearts may rejoice!”

  All turned toward Captain Michales, who sat silently, chewing on his mustache. What sort of a secret was the old man driveling about? He had no secret. Neither the Muscovite nor the Greek had sent him as an envoy. He had come. He had come on his own decision, he was sent by Crete, crying and wailing within him.

  But at this point the short, pale, bent schoolmaster jumped up from the boulder on which he had been sitting, and the words rolled from his tongue like a wheel:

  “Old Kambanaros wants hard facts before moving: ships and provisions and weapons, and the Muscovites to send soldiers to get themselves bloody heads, and our poor mother Hellas to join in too with her three bits of regiments. But when have great deeds ever happened in the world with security, old Kambanaros? When has discretion inspired men to leave their houses and their property and take to the mountains in search of freedom? That is just the art of the palikar: to break out without security. The soul of a man, Captain Kambanaros, is not “a dealer but a fighter. Fighters are what we Cretans are, not shopkeepers. The heart of Crete is a warship, that lets fly at the Sultan’s fleet and blows it sky high. So forward in God’s name, I say with Captain Michales. To arms, brothers! This is what I have to say, you leaders, and he who has ears to hear, let him hear!”

  “My blessing on you, schoolmaster,” murmured the abbot, and raised his right hand in the teacher’s direction. He repeated aloud, so that all could hear: “My blessing on you. The soul of man carries no pair of scalesno, it carries a sword. You are right.”

  “Better an hour of life in freedom than forty years of slavery and prison,” Captain Trialonis of Jerapetra threw in.

  Old Kambanaros shook his discretion-filled head.

  The leaders had now risen to their feet, excited by the speeches and counter-speeches. They were chattering and arguing together in groups of two and three and five. The prudent were in the minority; the palikarsthose who would stake alloutweighed them. With angry, squinting eyes, Captain Katsirmas watched the band of captains foaming around him like the sea. Captain Mandakas sighed, remembering his youth. “Ah! these people here take pencil and paper and add up for and against. In our time we had one cry, Freedom or death!, and our brains reeled, and we charged the ramparts of Kastro to bre
ach them. Man is spoiled, he’s grown small, Captain Sefakas!”

  But the grandfather looked with warm sympathy at the younger men assembled around him, and he smiled. Everything’s in order, he thought, I have confidence. The old go under the earth and come again out of the earth. Made new. Crete is immortal.

  He stood up.“Hey, children,” he shouted, “this is an assembly of the elders, not a Jewish school. Sit down, and let’s reach a conclusion. Captain Kambanaros is on one side, the schoolmaster on the otherthere are two courses. We have met together in these mountains to decide. So choose!”

  Captain Polyxigis rose. He twirled his musk-scented mustache and bowed his greeting to the three old men. His shirt was open, and a red mark, made by EminŁ‘s teeth, was visible on his white throat. Coolly he looked the captains up and down, and paused for a second at the somber countenance of Captain Michales.

  “Brothers, captains,” he said, “leaders of eastern Crete! Whoever speaks in your presence is in duty bound to weigh his reasons. I have weighed mine. Leaders, listen to me. If we wait, Captain Kambanaros, for the shiploads you demand to be landed and for the Bear to set his bowlegs in motion and bring us help from the north, we shall never free ourselves. And we shan’t eitherGod forgive me!be worthy of freedom. To judge by my experience in the few years I’ve lived and worn my belt, reedom is not a cake that drops into one’s mouth and is there for the swallowing, but a citadel to be stormed with the saber. Whoever receives freedom from foreign hands remains a slave. So it’s fire to the villages, the ax to the trees, the tramp of men at war, streams of tears and blood! And even if we fall with our skulls split, fresh men will stand up in our place. Strife and mourning have far to go in Crete. A hundred, two hundred, three hundred yearsI don’t know. But one daythere’s no other way, don’t listen to people like Captain Kambanarosone day, yes, by the rbyal sun that circles over us, one day we shall see freedom!”

  Captain Polyxigis had taken off his fez, and his head steamed in the sun. The captains, exalted, leaped up and shouted, “Freedom or death!” Captain Michales went over to Polyxigis. With his heart bursting, he said, “A devil has got between us and is trying to separate us. But Crete is again at stake! Here’s my hand!”

  “Brother, Captain Michales,” the other answered. “Here’s mine too. And let the devil go to the devil.” He laughed. But Captain Michales was already sorry. He went back to his place, his countenance somber.

  The meeting lasted another hour. They arranged all the details of who were to meet, and where and how, in order to-occupy the crossroads, blockade the Turkish villages, gather the multitudes into the highlying monasteries.

  Wine was brought. They sprinkled it on the ground, taking oaths. The three eldest rose from their large bench. The sun was setting as the meeting came to an end.

  In God’s name! The leaders dispersed to their realms and gave orders to their companies. Young and old fetched their weapons from the lofts or dug them up out of the earth. Many of the guns were old muzzle-loaders from the 1821 period, which they now cleaned of rust and tied together with cord. The poorest shaped themselves clubs and made plans to fall upon the Turkish soldiers and seize their weapons.

  In the courtyards of the monasteries, girls and women tore up old manuscripts and folios and made cartridge cases of them. Skilled monks pounded ointments and balms for wounds in mortars. Roofs of churches were torn off, and their lead turned into bullets. Crete became a workshop of freedom, working day and night. The August moon shone, the cruel sun had already grown a little less harsh. Tenderly it stroked its beloved Crete, which had again given birth to wheat and barley, maize and grapes, and was now longing for the fresh rain. The first autumn clouds were already appearing in the sky, white and downy. A tiny, light breeze urged them along, till they had formed themselves anew and gently covered the face of Crete.

  The must was fermenting in the casks. But who will drink it? the Cretans asked themselves. Who will bake the bread from this year’s harvest? Who will live to celebrate Christmas? The mothers gazed at their hero sons, the wives at their husbands, the sisters at their brothers, and saw Charos staring over their shoulders. But they said nothing. They knew that they were Cretans, and had been born to die for Crete.

  Emine too had joined the Cretan ranks, and now, unveiled like the Christian women, helped to make cartridges in the churchyard in front of the church of Kasteli. She put together the cases, but her mind wandered. It was wholly unmoved by the fate of Crete, by Captain Polyxigis, and by Christ and all the saints. It kept flying into the mountains, to the wild man who hunted there. In a few weekson the fourteenth of September, Holy Cross Dayshe was to be baptized. Fat, heavily moving Chrysanthe stayed at home, in the konak of Ali Aga which the captain had taken over, and prepared the baked meats for the great day when the Moslem woman was to become a Christian.

  Seven captains, each with his train of palikars, were to come as godparents. Tityros would be asked to make an oration. The people of the neighboring villages also were expected in crowds, to witness with their own eyes the baptizing of Nuri’s wife. It seemed to them a good menthat Turkey would return to Greece. They took pride in pampering the beautiful new Christian woman. Emine accepted everything with a smile.

  On the evening of the assembly of elders, Emine’ was sitting at the window and waiting for the return of Polyxigis. She had washed and combed herself and dyed her heavy eyebrows. How she would have liked to go with him and to see those fourteen mighty captains like eagles on the cliffs! And then she would have met the wild, stiff-necked Captain Michales! At the thought her bosom rose passionately. Why, my God, did she think of him? what did she find in him? He was no man, but a wild beast, lone, uglyshe did not even like him! She had been right to choose the gentle, attentive sweetly speaking Captain Polxyigis. And yetif only she could, even for a moment, see Captain Michales up there on the mountains.

  She lifted her slanting eyes to the rosy peaks of Selena. Nuri Bey had completely vanished from her mind and body, as if he had never lived, as if he had not been as superb as a lion, as if he had never embraced her. Her flesh was like the sea. A ship would glide over it and scratch it for a moment. Then it would draw together again, untouched as a maiden. How should she still think of the cretinous pasha who had bought her from her „ father? That had been her father’s trade, by which he lived: he begot lovely daughters, fattened them well, displayed them and sold them … or should she remember the beardless palikar, the young Circassian, who one summer night had fallen upon her in a garden by the rivet bank and thrown her down among tall sunflowers? She had thought he wanted to murder her and had struggled against him, but he had not killed her. After the embrace he had become tame, had bent tenderly over her and smiled at her. “What’s your name?” he had asked, “mine is …” How should she remember his name? All those men and many others had glided over her and lost themselves in nothingness. Now it was the turn of Captain; Polyxigis. Now he was gliding over. But alas! She could feel that, on the day of their wedding, he would depart] rom her, and a three-masted pirate frigate with black sails would suddenly rise up from the bottom of the sea. While Emine, sighing, gazed out of the window, Captain Michales was riding, all alone, down to his father’s house. His heart was beating hard with anger and shame. You fool, you’re fighting for freedom and yet you’re still a slave, he cried within himself. Your lips say one thing, your hands another, and your heart means another! Why do you prattle, you hypocrite Captain Michales, and beat your breast because of Crete? Another demon has fixed its claws in you and is your master, you man without honor! And even if you fall in battle and if you storm Megalokastro and set Crete free, you’re still without honor. Your heart is after something else, your purpose dwells elsewhere!

  He had sent his best palikar, Thodores, ahead with the flag, and was wholly absorbed in argument with himself. He had seen Polyxigis again and on him had smelled that accursed Turkish musk. He had spied the red bite on his throat, and his blood had shuddered. “Curse
her,” he whispered, “curse the bitch! As long as she’s alive, I am dishonored.” He had the picture ceaselessly before his eyes of how the bridegroom had chosen his godparents from the assembly, how he had invited them to the crowning-day, how he had also approached Captain Michales and had started back before his glance.

  “I can’t stand it any more,” Captain Michales cried aloud, “this is no life. I must make an end of it.”

  Captain Polyxigis, Emine” and Chrysanthe were still at the table, eating their evening meal, when there was a knock at the door and in came Tityros. Captain Polyxigis was astonished. Since Diamandes and Vangelio had met so swift a death, he had not seen the schoolmaster again. At first he had been angry with him, because he suspected him of having poisoned Diamandes out of jealousy. But he had soon changed his mind. It was unthinkable that such a lamb of God could kill. And so he put the blame on destiny. It had been written … He no longer had nything against the schoolmaster. Now that he saw how the schoolmaster traveled through the villages arousing men’s hearts for the rebellion, he was willing to forget the whole business. He was delighted at seeing him so unexpectedly.

  “Welcome, schoolmaster,” he cried, and made room for him.

  The schoolmaster greeted him gaily and sat down, so that his face was lighted up by the lamp. Captain Polyxigis was startled by the change in his appearance. Was this Tityrosthat half-helping with glasses on a string, tight breeches and a crooked back? Beside him sat another man!