Athanasius, however, smiled encouragingly and took her hand to help her down the stairs.
'I don't like leaving like this,' Marianne objected. 'So furtively, like a thief! What will the Count say?'
The little servant's eyes met hers above the candle flame.
'Why, nothing. What can he say, other than "very good" or "an excellent notion", when I tell him your highness has gone to explore the island in the company of the Countess Fiorenza? It is as simple as that.'
Guided by Athanasius, who seemed to have cat's eyes, Marianne and Theodoros made their way down through the maze of narrow streets leading to the harbour. When they reached the waterfront, they went on, making for the side nearest the isle with the ruins of the little temple.
A big three-master with a tapering prow, like a swordfish, was at anchor off the spit of land. Her impressive rigging was an odd mixture of fore and aft and lateen sails. No light was showing on board and she looked like a ghost-ship floating on the calm waters of the harbour.
'The longboat is waiting just here, close by, in front of the chapel of the Knights of Rhodes,' whispered Athanasius.
The nearer they got to the vessel, the sulkier Theodoros seemed to become.
'That's not Miaulis's ship, or Tombazis',' he growled. 'It's not even a true polacca. Whose is this vessel?'
'It belongs to Tsamados,' Athanasius said, a trifle irritably. 'It is, in fact, a polacca-xebec, his latest prize and very fast, it seems. What difference does it make to you? It's the ship Hydra has sent. Of course, if you don't want to go aboard—'
The giant's big paw came down soothingly on the little steward's shoulder.
'You are right, friend, and I apologize. I'm more nervous than I've ever been.' He showed his teeth. That's what it is to travel with a woman.'
The ship's longboat was waiting by a short flight of stone steps. Two dark figures loomed up from it: the figures of the two seamen sent to ferry the passengers aboard.
In spite of herself, Marianne could not help tightening her grip on Athanasius' hand. She felt suddenly that all was not well, although she could not have said why. Perhaps it was the dark night and the unknown vessel but she felt that in saying good-bye to her guide she would be leaving her last remaining friend and plunging into a strange and menacing new world. The thought chilled her.
The steward must have sensed her alarm because he whispered to her:
'Do not be afraid, your highness. The men of Hydra are fine, brave fellows. You will have nothing to fear with them. All that remains for me to do is to thank you for visiting us and wish you a safe journey.'
Calmed by those few words, she answered:
'Thank you, Athanasius. Thank you for everything.'
The farewells were brief. With the help of one of the seamen, Marianne slithered and groped her way down the steep steps, expecting every moment to pitch head-first into the harbour. However, she arrived safely in the dipping wooden boat and Theodoros leaped in after her. Someone fended the boat off with a gaff and then they were away, with the oars, wielded by two pairs of powerful arms, dipping soundlessly into the dark water. On the quay, Athanasius' dumpling figure dwindled, and soon even the houses had receded.
Not a word was spoken on the way out to the ship. Theodoras stood in the bows, one foot on the gunwale, clearly burning with impatience to get aboard, and almost before they touched he had swung on to the companion ladder and, swarming up it with an agility almost incredible for one of his giant size, had vanished over the side.
Marianne followed more slowly, but with sufficient ease and agility to need no help from the seamen, and, when she reached the top, strong hands took hold of her to lift her on to the deck. Only then did it suddenly occur to her that something was dreadfully wrong.
Theodoros was there, standing facing a dark, silent knot of men who seemed to her menacing because of their very silence; they reminded her too much of the shadowy figures standing on the deck of the Sea Witch, watching without a word as she was lowered into the boat in which Leighton had doomed her to die.
Theodoros was speaking in the Romaic tongue she did not understand, but there was an odd break in his voice, which was that of a man accustomed to command, suggesting that there was fear somewhere, underlying his anger. He was the only person speaking and that in itself was alarming, for not a soul answered him.
The two sailors from the longboat had climbed up after her and Marianne could feel them close behind her, so close that she could hear them breathing.
Then, without warning, someone uncovered a dark lantern and held it by a face, so that it seemed to spring out of the darkness in the shadow of the mainmast. It was that of a sallow-skinned, strong-featured man, his nose jutting arrogantly above a bristling, horizontal moustache and his eyes hard under the high, deeply-lined forehead. But what was most terrible of all was that the face was laughing, laughing still in silence but with a cruelty that made Marianne shudder.
On Theodoros the apparition of this demonic head had acted like the vision of a gorgon. He uttered one cry of sheer fury and then turned to Marianne a chalk-like countenance on which, for the first time, she could read fear.
'We are betrayed!' he said. This ship belongs to the renegade Nicolaos Kouloughis!'
He had no time to say more before the silent crew of pirates seized them and thrust them down into the bowels of the ship.
The last thing Marianne saw, before she was swallowed up by the terrifying black hatchway, was a bright star shining, high up through the ratlines. Then a sail was hoisted suddenly, blotting it out, as a hand might cover a gigantic eye to hide its tears.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Between Scylla and Charybdis
Between decks it was dark and stiflingly hot, with a stench of filth and rancid oil.
From the bottom of the ladder, Marianne had been flung into a corner, without ceremony, while Theodoros was dragged away somewhere else. She had fallen on to something rough that might have been an old sack and had huddled there, not daring to move, half deafened by the row that was going on all round her.
The oppressive silence that had reigned earlier was shattered and, to judge by the din the pirates were making now, the amount of shouting and excited chatter drowning the furious bellowing of their prisoner, it seemed likely that the silence which had struck them on the deck was due in a large measure to sheer astonishment. It was rather as though they had not expected such a prize.
Certainly there was no mistaking one thing: for these men, Theodoros was what mattered and Marianne herself was of very minor interest. She had known as much from the casual way she had been thrown down, like a rather troublesome parcel, but one that might be worth picking up again later, to sell to the highest bidder in the market at Tunis, as Athanasius had warned her.
As she thought of Count Sommaripa's steward, the notion that he might have been responsible for the betrayal Theodoros had spoken of did not so much as cross her mind. Yet he had been the first to sight the polacca, and had been in touch with her crew. Hadn't he said that she belonged to a Captain Tsamados? He, again, had been the one to rouse the fugitives and urge them to leave at once, at the risk of his master's being obliged to face some awkward questions from the odabassy. Even so, Marianne simply could not believe in such turpitude on the part of a man who, still, after twenty years, could have tears in his eyes as he watched his master conversing with a ghost.
Possibly the people of Hydra were not as trustworthy as they were thought to be – or, perhaps, after all, it was all nothing but a tragic mistake.
Seeing the great ship come in, Athanasius might quite genuinely have thought her the one they were expecting. The Count himself had told Marianne that sea-going ships rarely put in at Naxos. He could have got in touch with the pirates without having the faintest idea who they were, while they, sensing a profit to be made, would have played their parts well and taken care not to undeceive him. But that was only one possibility among the many churning in the head of their
involuntary passenger, and she forced herself not to think of any of them. This was not the moment to ponder whys and wherefores. Now, faced with this new, terrible and wholly unexpected peril, Marianne made herself concentrate her whole mind on the one single idea of escape.
A ray of light fell across the deck and swung round to illuminate the foot of the ladder. The men were on their way back, having stowed their prisoner in a safe place. They were all talking at once, perhaps estimating the profit to be made from Theodoros who, Marianne was now beginning to realize, was a person of considerably more importance than she had imagined, although she did not even know his proper name.
In their midst, as the light from the lantern fell on him, she recognized their chief.
Deciding to strike the first blow, she got up and planted herself at the foot of the ladder, barring the way, and prayed inwardly that the difference of language would not prove an insurmountable obstacle.
It seemed to her that, whether or not it would do any good, this was the moment to make use of the French Emperor's name, which appeared to mean something in these barbarous latitudes. It might be only a slender chance, but it was worth trying. It was therefore in French that she addressed the renegade.
'Don't you think, monsieur, that you owe me some explanation?'
Her clear voice rang out like a clarion. The men fell silent at once, their eyes on the slim figure in the light-coloured dress who stood facing them with a pride that could not fail to strike them, even if they did not understand the meaning of what she said. As for Nicolaos Kouloughis himself, his eyes narrowed and he emitted a low whistle that might have been as much admiration as malevolence.
Then, to Marianne's surprise, he answered her, with a villainous accent, it was true, but nevertheless in the language of Voltaire.
'Ha! The French lady? I didn't believe it was true.'
'What was not true?'
'This business of a French lady. When we took the carrier pigeon, I thought it was a cover for something else, more interesting. Otherwise why go to so much trouble for a thing as trifling as a woman, even a French one? And we were right because we've caught the biggest rebel of them all, the one they never catch, the one the Grand Signior would give his treasure for – Theodoras Lagos himself! It's the best prize of my life. A king's ransom on his head!'
'I may be only a woman,' retorted Marianne, to whom the name meant nothing at all, 'but my head is not altogether worthless. I am the Princess Sant'Anna, a personal friend of the Emperor Napoleon, and his ambassadress to my cousin Nakshidil, Sultan Haseki of the Ottoman Empire.'
This broadside of impressive titles seemed to make some effect on the pirate, but only for a moment. Just as Marianne was beginning to think that her gamble had paid, he uttered a strident shout of laughter, which was instantly echoed in a sycophantic way by the men around him. The only result of this was to get them sent back to their work with a few sharp commands. When they were gone, Kouloughis laughed again.
'I was not aware that I had said anything funny,' Marianne said frostily. 'I do not imagine that the Emperor, my master, would appreciate your sense of humour. Nor am I accustomed to be laughed at.'
'Oh, but I'm not mocking, believe me. I admire you! You have a part to play and you're playing it to perfection. You almost took me in.'
'You mean that you do not believe I am who I say I am?'
'No, I don't! If you were an envoy of the great Napoleon, and a friend of his into the bargain, you'd not be roaming the seas dressed as a Greek woman, in the company of a notorious rebel and looking for a ship to carry you to Constantinople for your felonious purposes. You'd be on a fine frigate flying French colours and—'
'I was wrecked,' Marianne said indifferently. 'It happens not infrequently in these waters, as I understand.'
'It happens, as you say, frequently. Especially when the meltemi, our dangerous summer wind, blows, but either there are no survivors – or else rather more than two. Your story won't stand up.'
'Well, believe it or not, that's how it was.'
'I don't believe it.'
Without pausing for breath he went on to address her in Greek, a brief and violent speech of which she naturally understood not one word. She heard him out without a blink and even permitted herself the luxury of a contemptuous smile.
'You are wasting your breath,' she told him. 'I have no idea what you are saying.'
Silence. Nicolaos Kouloughis contemplated the woman before him with a scowl that brought his long nose and jutting chin dangerously close to one another. It was evident that she had disconcerted him. What woman could listen without flinching, even with a smile, to that stream of calculated insult, accompanied as it was by a detailed description of the subtle tortures in store for her to make her speak? It really did look as if this girl had not understood anything of what he had said. However, Kouloughis was not a man to hesitate for long, and he shrugged the doubt away, irritably, like a man getting rid of a tiresome burden.
'Well, you may be a foreigner, after all – that or you have a nerve of iron! Either way it makes no differences. Your friend Theodoros will be handed over to the pasha of Candia, who'll pay well for him. As for you, you look as though you'd be worth keeping until Tunis. The bey might prove generous if you take his fancy. Come, I'll take you where you'll be more comfortable. Damaged goods lose their value.'
He had grasped her by the arm and was dragging her towards the ladder, ignoring her resistance. Not even for the sake of an improvement in her own material surroundings, was she willing to be taken too far away from her companion who, she now found, had acquired a certain value in her eyes. Whatever else he might be, he was a brave man and the victim of the same involuntary betrayal on the part of the little winged messenger. She felt at one with him. But the renegade's sinewy fingers were clamped tightly round her slender arm, giving her as much pain as if they had been made of iron.
As she had feared, it was to the sterncastle that he was taking her. Guessing that he was making for his own quarters, she was preparing to put up an energetic fight, for who could tell whether the pirate would not decide to test his captive personally before putting her on the market? It must happen often enough.
The door he opened and closed carefully behind her was, in fact, that of his own cabin, but the cabin itself was the very opposite of what might have been expected of a Mediterranean pirate. Imagination might have predicted a combination of luxury and untidiness, mixed with a kind of oriental squalor.
In fact, with its dark mahogany and brass nautical instruments, the room had the brand of austere and sober elegance that would not have disgraced a British admiral. It was, furthermore, meticulously clean. It was not empty.
As Kouloughis thrust her inside, Marianne beheld a youth reclining on the bunk, amid the purple cushions which provided the single note of colour in the room. His appearance was sufficiently arresting to have attracted the most casual eye. In his way, he was undoubtedly a work of art, but of a somewhat perverse kind.
He was dressed, with calculation, in full trousers of pale blue silk with a kind of matching dolman decorated with immense silken frogs. Thick black curls flowed from under a cap with a long golden tassel, and he stared up languorously out of doe eyes rimmed with kohl and further enlarged by dashing pencil strokes. The rose-bud lips that pouted in a face of milky whiteness also quite clearly owed the better part of their bloom to diligent applications of rouge.
This androgynous creature, undeniably beautiful but with a beauty that was wholly feminine, was occupied in cleaning a statuette of a faun, his long, supple fingers polishing the thing, which was of a quite remarkable obscenity, as lovingly as a mother. Here, presumably, was the fastidious housewife responsible for this unexpectedly neat domain.
He showed no sign of being disturbed by Kouloughis' tumultuous entry with his captive, but merely raised his exquisitely plucked eyebrows and favoured the girl with a glance that was half-affronted, half made up of sheer distaste. No doubt he woul
d have looked much the same had Kouloughis suddenly thrown a bucketful of slops into his well-ordered world: a new and startling experience for one of the prettiest women in Europe.
The big cabin was well lighted by clusters of perfumed candles. Kouloughis dragged Marianne over to one of these and with a quick movement ripped off the embroidered shawl that covered her head and shaded her eyes. The light shone on the gleaming black mass of her plaited hair, and her green eyes sparkled angrily. She shrank back instinctively from the renegade's hand.
'How dare you! What are you doing!'
'Taking a good look at the goods I propose to sell, that's what I'm doing. There's no gainsaying you've a lovely face and your eyes are very fine – but it's hard to tell what may lie under the clothes worn by the women of my country. Open your mouth!'
'What—!'
'I said open your mouth. I want to see your teeth.'
Before Marianne could stop him, he had gripped her face between his hands and forced her jaws apart with a deftness born of long practice. Marianne might rage as she liked at finding herself treated precisely like a horse; she was compelled to endure the mortifying examination which, it seemed, was entirely to the satisfaction of the examiner. But when Kouloughis tried to undo her dress, she sprang away and fled for refuge behind the table in the centre of the cabin.
'Oh, no, you don't!'
The renegade looked vaguely surprised but he only gave a small shrug of annoyance and called:
'Stephanos!'
This was obviously the name of the dainty occupant of the bunk and, no less evidently, Kouloughis was summoning him to help.
Marianne and the Rebels Page 33
