Volume Ii Part 5 (1/2)

”Now, comrades, be governed by me; and besides the prize, if we win, you shall have my purse to divide amongst you man and man. Is it agreed?”

And they answered, foreman and all, yes. ”Very well,” he returned. ”Do you watch, and get the time and force from me. Now for the signal.”

The Princess sent the starting flag to the top of the pole, and the boats were off together. A great shout went up from the spectators--a shout of men mingled with the screams of women to whom a hurrah or cheer of any kind appears impossible.

To warm the blood, there is nothing after all like the plaudits of a mult.i.tude looking on and mightily concerned. This was now noticeable.

The eyes of all the rowers enlarged; their teeth set hard; the arteries of the neck swelled; and even in their tension the muscles of the arms quivered.

A much better arrangement would have been to allow the pa.s.sage of the racers broadside to the sh.o.r.e; for then the s.h.i.+ftings of position, and the strategies resorted to would have been plain to the beholders; as it was, each foreshortened vessel soon became to them a black body, with but a man and one pair of oars in motion; and sometimes provokingly indistinguishable, the banderoles blew backward squarely in a line with the direction of the movement. Then the friends on land gave over exercising their throats; finally drawn down to the water's edge, and pressing on each other, they steadied and welded into a ma.s.s, like a wall.

Once there was a general shout. Gradually the boats had lost the formation of the start, and falling in behind each other, a.s.sumed an order comparable to a string. While this change was going on, a breeze unusually strong blew from the south, bringing every flag into view at the same time: when it was perceived that the red was in the lead.

Forthwith the clansmen of Stenia united in a triumphant yell, followed immediately, however, by another yet louder. It was discovered, thanks to the same breeze, that the black banderole of the Gypsies was the last of the seven. Then even those who had been most impressed by the bravado of the hamari, surrendered themselves to laughter and sarcasm.

”See the infidels!” ”They had better be at home taking care of their kettles and goats!” ”Turn the seven twins into a cathedral, will they?

The devil will turn them into porpoises first!” ”Where is the hamari now--where? By St. Michael, the father of fishermen, he is finding what it is to have more noumiae than brains! Ha, ha, ha!”

Nevertheless the coolest of the thirty-five men then scudding the slippery waterway was the hamari--he had started the coolest--he was the coolest now.

For a half mile he allowed his crew to do their best, and with them he had done his best. The effort sufficed to carry them to the front, where he next satisfied himself they could stay, if they had the endurance. He called to them:

”Well done, comrades! The prize and the money are yours! But ease up a little. Let them pa.s.s. We will catch them again at the turn. Keep your eyes on me.”

Insensibly he lessened the dip and reach of his oars; at last, as the thousands on the Therapian sh.o.r.e would have had it, the Gypsy racer was the hinderling of the pack. Afterwards there were but trifling changes of position until the terminal galley was reached.

By a rule of the race, the contestants were required to turn the galley, keeping it on the right; and it was a great advantage to be a clear first there, since the fortunate party could then make the round unhindered and in the least s.p.a.ce. The struggle for the point began quite a quarter of a mile away. Each crew applied itself to quickening the speed--every oar dipped deeper, and swept a wider span;--on a little, and the keepers of the galley could hear the half groan, half grunt with which the coming toilers relieved the extra exertion now demanded of them;--yet later, they saw them spring to their feet, reach far back, and finish the long deep draw by falling, or rather toppling backward to their seats.

Only the hamari eschewed the resort for the present. He cast a look forward, and said quickly: ”Attend, comrades!” Thereupon he added weight to his left delivery, altering the course to an angle which, if pursued, must widen the circle around the galley instead of contracting it.

On nearing the goal the rush of the boats grew fiercer; each foreman, considering it honor lost, if not a fatal mischance, did he fail to be first at the turning-point, persisted in driving straight forward--a madness which the furious yelling of the people on the marker's deck intensified. This was exactly what the hamari had foreseen. When the turn began five of the opposing vessels ran into each other. The boil and splash of water, breaking of oars, splintering of boatsides; the infuriate cries, oaths, and blind striving of the rowers, some intent on getting through at all hazards, some turned combatants, striking or parrying with their heavy oaken blades; the sound of blows on breaking heads; plunges into the foaming brine; blood trickling down faces and necks, and reddening naked arms--such was the catastrophe seen in its details from the overhanging gunwale of the galley. And while it went on, the worse than confused ma.s.s drifted away from the s.h.i.+p's side, leaving a clear s.p.a.ce through which, with the first shout heard from him during the race, the hamari urged his crew, and rounded the goal.

On the far Therapian sh.o.r.e the mult.i.tude were silent. They could dimly see every incident at the turn--the collision, fighting, and manifold mishaps, and the confounding of the banderoles. Then the Stenia colors flashed round the galley, with the black behind it a close second.

”Is that the hamari's boat next the leader?”

Thus the Princess, and upon the answer, she added: ”It looks as if the Holy One might find servants among the irreclaimables in the valley.”

Had the Gypsies at last a partisan?

The two rivals were now clear of the galley. For a time there was but one cry heard--”Stenia! Stenia!” The five oarsmen of that charming town had been carefully selected; they were vigorous, skilful, and had a chief well-balanced in judgment. The race seemed theirs. Suddenly--it was when the homestretch was about half covered--the black flag rushed past them.

Then the life went out of the mult.i.tude. ”St. Peter is dead!” they cried--”St. Peter is dead! It is nothing to be a Greek now!” and they hung their heads, refusing to be comforted.

The Gypsies came in first; and amidst the profoundest silence, they dropped their oars with a triumphant crash on the marble revetment. The hamari wiped the sweat from his face, and put on his jacket and sandals; pausing then to toss his purse to the foreman, and say: ”Take it in welcome, my friends. I am content with my share of the victory,” he stepped ash.o.r.e. In front of the judge's stand, he knelt, and said: ”Should there be a dispute touching the prize, O Princess, be a witness unto thyself. Thine eyes have seen the going and the coming; and if the world belie thee not--sometimes it can be too friendly--thou art fair, just and fearless.”

On foot again, his courtierly manner vanished in a twinkling.

”Joqard, Joqard? Where are you?”