Phroso Part 33

'They mean no harm to you now.'

'Harm to any one?'

A pause followed before his gruff voice answered:

'Harm to n.o.body. What harm can be done when my gracious lord the Governor is on the island and watches over it?'

'True, Demetri. He has small mercy for wrongdoers and turbulent fellows such as some I know of.'

'I know him as well as you, my lord, and better,' said the fellow.

His voice was charged with a pa.s.sionate hate. 'Yes, there are many in Neopalia who know Mouraki.'

'So says Mouraki; and he says it as though it pleased him.'

'One day he shall have proof enough to satisfy him,' growled Demetri.

The savage rage of the fellow's tone had caught my attention, and I gazed intently into his face; not even the darkness quite hid the angry gleam of his deep-set eyes.

'Demetri, Demetri,' said I, 'aren't you on a dangerous path? I see a long knife in your belt there, and that gun--isn't it loaded? Come, go back to your home.'

He seemed influenced by my remonstrances, but he denied the suggestion I made.

'I don't seek his life,' he said sullenly. 'If we were strong enough to fight openly--well, I say nothing of that. He killed my brother, my lord.'

'I killed a brother of yours too, Demetri.'

'Yes, in honest fighting, when he sought to kill you. You didn't half kill him with the lash, before his mother's eyes, and finish the work with a rope.'

'Mouraki did?'

'Yes, my lord. But it is nothing, my lord. I mean no harm.'

'Look here, Demetri. I don't love Mouraki myself, and you did me a good turn a little while ago; but if I find you hanging about here again with your gun and your knife I'll tell Mouraki, as sure as I'm alive. Where I come from we don't a.s.sa.s.sinate. Do you see?'

'I hear, my lord. Indeed I had no such purpose.'

'You know your purpose best; and now you know what I shall do. Come, be off with you, and don't shew yourself here again.'

He cringed before me with renewed protestations; but his invention provided no excuse for his presence. He swore to me that I wronged him. I contented myself with ordering him off, and at last he went off, striking back towards the village. 'Upon my word,' said I, 'it's a nuisance to be honourably brought up.' For it would have been marvellously convenient to let Demetri have a shot at the Pasha with that gun of his, or a stab with the long knife he had fingered so affectionately.

This encounter had pa.s.sed the time of waiting, and now I strolled back to the house. It was hard on midnight. The light in Mouraki's window was extinguished. Two soldiers stood sentry by the closed door. They let me in and locked the door behind me. This watch was not kept on me; Mouraki knew very well that I had no desire to leave the island.

Phroso was the prisoner and the prize that the Pasha guarded; perhaps, also, he had an inkling that he was not popular in Neopalia, and that he would not be wise to trust to the loyalty of its inhabitants.

Soon I found myself in the compound at the back of the house. The ladder was placed ready; Kortes stood beside it. There seemed to be n.o.body else about. The rain still fell, and the wind had risen till it whistled wildly in the wood.

'She's waiting for you,' whispered Kortes. 'She knows and she will second the plan.'

'Where is she?'

'On the roof. She's wrapped in my cloak; she will take no hurt.'

'And Mouraki?'

'He's gone to bed. She was with him two hours.'

I mounted the ladder and found myself on the flat roof, where once Phroso had stood gazing up towards the cottage on the hill. We were fighting Constantine then; Mouraki was our foe now. Constantine lay a prisoner, harmless, as it seemed, and helpless. I prayed for a like good fortune in the new enterprise. An instant later I found Phroso's hand in mine. I carried it to my lips, as I murmured my greeting in a hushed voice. The first answer was a nervous sob, but Phroso followed it with a pleading apology.

'I'm so tired,' she said, 'so tired. I have fought him for two hours to-night. Forgive me. I will be brave, my lord.'

I had determined on a cold business-like manner. I went as straight to the point as a busy man in his city office.

'You know the plan? You consent to it?' I asked.

'Yes. I think I understand it. It is good of you, my lord. For you may run great danger through me.'

That was indeed true, and in more senses than one.

'I do for you what you did not hesitate to do for me,' said I.

'Yes,' said Phroso in a very low whisper.

'You pretended; well then, now I pretend.' My voice sounded not only cold, but bitter and unpleasant. 'I think it may succeed,' I continued. 'He won't dare to take any extreme steps against me. I don't see how he can prevent our going.'

'He will let us go, you think?'

'I don't know how he can refuse. And where will you go?'

'I have some friends at Athens, people who knew my father.'

'Good. I'll take you there and--' I paused. 'I'll--I'll take you there and--' Again I paused; I could not help it. 'And leave you there in safety,' I ended at last in a gruff harsh whisper.

'Yes, my lord. And then you will go home in safety?'

'Perhaps. That doesn't matter.'

'Yes, it does matter,' said she, softly. 'For I would not be in safety unless you were.'

'Ah, Phroso, don't do that,' I groaned inwardly.

'Yes, you will go back in safety, back to your own land, back to the lady--'

'Never mind--' I began.

'Back to the lady whom my lord loves,' whispered Phroso. 'Then you will forget this troublesome island and the troublesome--the troublesome people on it.'

Her face was no more than a foot from mine--pale, with sad eyes and a smile that quivered on trembling lips; the fairest face in the world that I had seen or believed any man to have seen; and her hand rested in mine. There may live men who would have looked over her head and not in those eyes--saints or dolts; I was neither; not I. I looked. I looked as though I should never look elsewhere again, nor cared to live if I could not look. But Phroso's hand was drawn from mine and her eyes fell. I had to end the silence.

'I shall go straight to Mouraki to-morrow morning,' said I, 'and tell him you have agreed to be my wife; that you will come with me under the care of Kortes and his sister, and that we shall be married on the first opportunity.'