Johannes was guarded by deaf mutes, and Zoë knew Constantinople and the ways of the palace well enough to understand that they were placed there to make an end of any one, man or woman, who should attempt to pass.
She tried signs, now. She took her basket from her head and set it down on the step between the sentinels, and crouched on her heels to uncover it and show the contents. The men saw and nodded, and then inclined their heads to one side in that peculiar way which means indifference all over the East. And indeed they did not care whether the basket held cheese or sweetmeats, and their faces grew stony again as they looked outwards, over her head.
She covered up her little basket disconsolately and rose to her feet. The glow was beginning to fade in the courtyard, and she felt her heart sink as the shadows deepened. It was absolutely necessary to the success of the dangerous enterprise on which she and Gorlias had embarked, that Johannes himself, or at least the captain’s wife should be warned of what was to take place in less than half an hour. If this could not be done, everything might go wrong at the last minute, their cleverly concerted trick would fail and be exposed, and she and Gorlias, and Zeno himself, would probably pay for their audacity with their lives.
The closed door between the sentinels was covered with iron and studded with big nails. It was perfectly clear that it must be opened from within, if at all, and that the men themselves would have to knock or make some other signal by sound in order to obtain entrance for any one who was really authorised to go in. It was also clear that if the men on the other side of the door were stone deaf like the two guards, they could not hear any such knocking, and no entrance would be possible at all except when those within opened for some reason of their own or at fixed hours. Again, thought Zoë, it followed that there was probably some one near who could hear sounds from without, and there was always a bare possibility, in such times, that this person might be a secret friend to the prisoner, though supposed to be one of his gaolers.
All these thoughts flashed across her mind in a few seconds, while she was covering her basket. She therefore took rather more time over this than was necessary, and as the mutes did not show signs of driving her away, she at once began to sing, quite sure that they could not hear her. It was a forlorn hope, indeed, but anything was worth trying. Her voice sounded loud and clear under the archway: —
Over the water to my love, for the hour is come!
The water, the blue water, the water salt and the water fresh!
Open, my very dear love, open thy door to me,
For I have come swiftly over the water ——
At this point, to Zoë’s inexpressible amazement and delight, the door really opened, and she almost choked for sheer joy.
The captain’s wife appeared in the dim evening light, standing well within, and Zoë recognised her at once from the description Gorlias had given of her. The sentinels, being perfectly deaf, did not at first know that the door had been opened, as they stood looking straight before them. The stout woman spoke in a low voice.
‘By four toes and by five toes,’ she said, by way of answer to the words Zoë had sung.
The girl lost no time, for there was none to lose, and though there was little light she saw that there were four or five more armed Ethiopians in the small chamber, so that it would be impossible to deliver her letter.
‘Tell him from Carlo Zeno to be ready at once,’ she said quickly, ‘and not to show surprise at anything that happens.’
The deaf mutes outside now perceived that she was speaking with some one, and that the entrance behind them was open. She had just handed her basket to the captain’s wife when the two turned together to see who had opened, but almost at the same instant the heavy iron door swung quickly on its hinges again and shut with a clang that echoed out to the courtyard. Zoë sprang back hastily lest the door itself should strike her as it closed, and the quick movement hurt her a little, for she made a false step on the foot with which she limped, turning it slightly as her weight came upon it.
That one step nearly cost her life, for though the sentinels were deaf and dumb they were not blind. She thought they were going to let her go away unhindered, and she was already almost out of the archway when she felt herself seized by the arms from behind.
When she had stumbled, her low shoe had turned a little, and the folded letter, now useless, had fallen out. As it was white, the guards had seen it instantly on the dark pavement, and one of them had picked it up while the other had caught her.
Zoë instinctively struggled with all her might for a few seconds, but the dumb man twisted one of her arms behind her till it was agony to move, and she was powerless. Her captor now handed her over to his companion, who had sheathed his scimitar and had placed the letter inside his steel cap. She could not look round, but she felt that the grip on her twisted wrist changed, and she was pushed out into the courtyard and made to walk in the direction of the palace. She could not help limping much more than before, and in the grasp of the big Ethiopian she felt what a small weak thing she would be in the tormentors’ hands if Gorlias did not come in time.
The purple light had almost faded below, and the grey dusk was creeping up out of the ground, though the high upper story of the marble palace was still bathed in the evening glow, and still a few swallows circled round the eaves. Zoë looked up to the vast cornices and at the fleecy pink clouds that floated in the sky, and as she was forced along, almost as fast as she could walk, she wondered whether she should ever again see the bright noonday sun. It would not take long to kill her if Gorlias did not come in time.
There were many men coming and going now, and there were guards in scarlet, drawn up at the entrance to the palace as if they were waiting. Some slaves, hastening away, paused a moment to watch Zoë go by, smooth-faced creatures who lived among the Emperor’s women.
‘There goes five hundred ducats’ worth!’ laughed one, in a voice like a girl’s.
‘What has she done?’ asked another, of the dumb Ethiopian.
The speaker was a newcomer in the palace, and the others jeered at him for not knowing that the man was one of the mutes.
And he pushed and dragged Zoë along without noticing them. She looked straight before her now, at the palace door, and as she went, she was in a kind of dream, and she wondered what the room to which she was being taken would be like, the place where she was presently to be tortured if Gorlias did not come in time; she wondered whether it would be light or dark, and what the colour of the walls would be.
The African hurt her very much as he forced her along, though she made no resistance; but she did not think of the pain she felt, nor of the pain she would surely be made to feel presently. It was as if she were detached from her own personality, and could speculate about what was going to happen to her, and about the men who would ask her questions, and about the queer-looking instruments of torture that would be brought, and even the colour of the executioner’s hair. She fancied him a red-haired man with ugly, yellow eyes and bad teeth that he showed. She did not know whether it were fear or courage that so took her out of herself.
But all the time she was listening for a distant sound that might come, or that might not; and her hearing grew so sharp that she could have heard it a mile away, and the distance between her and the palace door grew shorter very quickly, and the ruthless mute urged her along faster and faster, though she limped so badly.
Then her heart leapt and stood still a moment, and the Ethiopian’s grasp relaxed a little, and he slackened his pace. Not that he heard what she heard, for he was stone deaf; but the guards who stood about the door had begun to range themselves in even ranks on either side, and a tall officer made signs to the African to stand out of the way. The air rang with the music of distant silver trumpets, there was a subdued hum of many voices and the trampling of many horses’ hoofs on the hard earth outside the court.
‘The Emperor comes!’ cried the officer, again motioning the mute and his prisoner away.
The man understood well enough, and dragged her aside quickly and roughly out of the straight way, but not out of sight; and the sounds grew louder, and the trumpet-notes clearer, as the imperial cavalcade passed in under the great gate. First there rode a score of guards on their white horses; six running footmen came next, in short hose and red tunics that fitted close to their bodies and glared in the twilight; then two officers of the household on their chargers; and young Andronicus himself rode in on a bay Arab mare between two ministers of state, followed by many more guards who pressed close upon him to protect him from any treacherous attack. He was dressed all in cloth of gold, and his tall Greek cap was wrought with gold and jewels; but the day had gone down, and neither the metal nor the stones gave any light, while the scarlet uniforms of the guards and footmen surged about him like waves of blood in the gathering dusk.
The Ethiopian held Zoë pinioned by the arms and looked over her head as the Emperor came near. Andronicus had pale and suspicious eyes that searched every crowd for danger, and saw peril everywhere. He hung his head a little, his jaw was heavy, his lip was loose, and his uneasy glance wandered continually hither and thither. There was still plenty of light near the palace, and Zoë saw every little thing; and the cloth of gold he wore was lit up again by the reflexion from the marble walls.
He saw the girl, too, but though her hands were behind her, he did not see at once that the African held them, for she stood quite still and met his gaze. Then he perceived that the face was the most lovely he had ever seen, and he made a motion in the saddle that was like the rising of the snake when its prey is near, and his pale eyes gleamed, and his loose lower lip shook and moved against the upper one.
He drew rein and spoke in a low tone to the minister on his right, a Greek with a fawning face, who instantly made a sign to the girl to come nearer; and the Ethiopian mute saw the gesture, and pushed her forward with one hand, close to the Emperor’s stirrup, and with the other hand he took his steel cap very carefully from his head, drawing it down close to his head and over his ear so that the letter should not fall out; then, still grasping Zoë’s wrist, he held the helmet up like a cup, so that Andronicus might see what was in it.
The action needed no explaining, for the young usurper had himself ordered that his father should be guarded by the dumb Ethiopians after the alarm of the previous night. The Emperor looked down at the girl’s beautiful white face, but he took the letter from the soldier’s steel cap and spread it out, and read it quickly, and then passed it to the minister at his elbow, who read it too.
He looked at Zoë again, but in his eyes her beauty was all gone at once. She was one of those monsters that were always conspiring against him, against his throne and his life; she was one of those thousands whom he saw nightly in his dreams of fear, stealing upon him when he was alone and helpless, to blind him and kill him, and to bear his crowned father to the throne high on their shoulders. Zoë might have been as lovely as Aphrodite herself, just wafted from the foam of the sea by the breath of spring; to Andronicus she would have been but one of the countless evil beings who for ever plotted his destruction.
But this one was in his power. He sat on his horse and looked down at her, and his loose lips smiled; yet her face was still and proud, and in her poor blue cotton slave’s dress she faced him like a young goddess.
‘Who sent you with this?’ he asked in the deep silence, and every man there listened for her answer.
‘Since you have read it, you know,’ she answered, and there was no tremor in her voice.
‘Take care! Where is this Venetian, this Zeno?’
‘I do not know.’
‘Take care, again! I ask, where is he?’
Zoë was silent for a moment, and though she did not take her eyes from the young Emperor’s face she listened intently for a distant sound that did not come.
‘I do not know where he is,’ she said at last, ‘but I think you will see him before long, for he is coming here.’
‘Here?’ Andronicus was taken by surprise. ‘Here?’ he repeated in wonder.
‘Yes, here,’ Zoë answered, ‘and soon. He has business here to-night.’
‘The girl is mad,’ said the Emperor, looking towards the ministers.
‘Quite mad, your august Majesty,’ said one.
‘Evidently out of her mind, Sire,’ echoed the other. ‘It will be well to put out her eyes and let her go.’
The one who had spoken first, the fawning Greek, made a sign to an officer near him, and the latter gave an order to one of the running footmen who stood waiting. The latter instantly ran in through the great open doorway of the palace. Where Andronicus was, the torturer was never hard to find.
‘And pray,’ asked the Emperor, with an ugly smile, ‘what possible business can a Venetian merchant have here at this hour? Will you please to tell us?’
‘A business that will be soon despatched, if God will,’ answered Zoë.
She could not look away from the man who had murdered Michael Rhangabé, and though she knew what she was risking if she did not gain time, the longing for just vengeance was too strong for her, so that she could not control her speech, and in her clear young voice Andronicus heard an accent that struck terror to his heart.
‘She is not mad!’ he exclaimed in sudden anxiety. ‘She knows something! Make her speak!’
While the words were on his lips the running footman returned, and after him another man came quickly, carrying a worn leathern bag. He was very tall and thin, and he stooped, he had the face of a corpse and there was no light in his eyes. Zoë did not see him, but he came and stood behind her, close to the Ethiopian, and he fumbled in his bag; and all around the uniforms of the guard were as red as blood in the twilight.
‘I am not afraid to speak, since I am caught,’ Zoë said, answering the Emperor’s words, ‘and what I say is true. For what you owe me, you owe to many and many more, and the name of that debt is blood!’
‘She is raving!’ cried Andronicus in an unsteady voice.
‘No, I am not mad,’ Zoë answered, speaking loud and clear. ‘Your reckoning has been due these two years, and a man is coming within the hour to claim it, and you shall pay all, both to others and to me, whether you will or not!’
‘Who is this creature?’ asked the Emperor, but his cheeks were whiter now.
Not a sound broke the silence, and the man with the leathern bag crept a little nearer to the defenceless girl, and the Ethiopian’s grip tightened on her wrists. From somewhere beyond the walls of the courtyard the neighing of a horse broke the stillness.
‘Who is this girl that dares me within my own gates?’ Andronicus asked again, turning to his ministers and officers.
The Greek with the fawning face bent in his saddle towards the young Emperor as if he were prostrating himself, and he spoke in a very low voice.
‘Your Majesty would do well to have her tongue torn out before she says more.’
‘Who is she, I say?’ cried the sovereign, suddenly furious, as cowards can be.
No one spoke. The corpse-faced man crept nearer to Zoë, his dull eyes fixed on her features. Beyond the wall and far off the unseen horse neighed again. It was growing darker, but all around the scarlet tunics of the guards were as red as blood.
Then the answer came. The twisted lips of the tormentor moved slowly, and words came from them in a thin, harsh voice, like the creaking of the rack.
‘She is Michael Rhangabé’s daughter.’
‘The Protosparthos?’ The Emperor’s voice shook again.
The corpse-faced man nodded twice in assent, and his thin lips writhed hideously when Zoë’s eyes fell on him.
‘I saw her at the prison when I took him out to die,’ he said.
His bony hand, all knotty and stained from his horrid work, took the girl’s delicate chin, forcing her to turn her full face to him; and she quivered from head to foot at his touch. He knew well the convulsive shiver that ran through the victim he touched fo
r the first time; he could feel it in his fingers as the musician feels the strings; he was familiar with it, as the fisherman’s hand is with the tremor and tension of his rod when a fish strikes; and he smiled in a ghastly way.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘it is she.’ And he laughed.
He held her by the chin and wagged her beautiful head to right and left.
Since the Emperor had spoken no sound had been heard but the torturer’s discordant voice; but now the outraged girl’s shriek of fury split the air.
‘Wretch!’
Her small hands suddenly slipped through the Ethiopian’s capacious hold. Before he could catch her she had wrenched herself free from both men and had struck a furious blow full in the torturer’s livid face; and though she was but a slender girl her anger gave her a man’s strength, and her swiftness lent her a sudden advantage. The man reeled back three paces before he could steady himself again.
‘Hold her!’ cried Andronicus, for he feared she might have a knife hidden on her, and both her hands were free.
But only for that instant. Though the African was huge, he was quick, and he was behind her. Almost before the Emperor had called out, Zoë was a prisoner again, and the man she had struck was close to her with his battered leathern bag. He looked up to Andronicus for a command before he began his work.
‘Make her tell what she knows,’ the Emperor said, reassured since she was again fast in the African’s great hands.
He leaned forward a little, the better to hear the words which pain was to draw from Zoë’s lips, and the Greek minister settled himself comfortably in the saddle to enjoy the rare amusement of seeing a beautiful and noble girl deliberately tortured before half a hundred men. Some of the guards also pressed upon each other to see; but there were some among them who had served under Rhangabé, and these looked into one another’s faces and spoke words almost under their breath, that all together swelled to a low murmur, such as the tide makes on a still night, just when it turns back from the ebb.
Complete Works of F Marion Crawford Page 1186
