Part 12 (1/2)

”_Kronprinz_--_jabber jabber jabber_--_Sarajevo_-- _Jabber jabber jabber_--_automobil_-- _Jabber_--_Pouf! pouf! pouf! pouf! pouf!_-- _Kronprinz automobil halt boum!_-- _Jabber jabber jabber_--_Kronprinz aa-ee!_-- _Damen aa-ee! aa-ee!_--_jabber jabber_--_aa-ee!_-- _Jabber jabber jabber jabber jabber jabber._”

Lifting his arm as if aiming with a revolver.

We pa.s.sed a vote of thanks to Alfonso, together with a cigarette and a fig.

The departure from the mud village was as absurd as the rest of our experiences in it. On my ninth visit to him the commandant announced with pride that he had arranged for us to leave by the evening train, and that the station-master at Bosanti would leave an empty truck for us.

Twenty minutes before the train arrived we trudged through the rain to the station, carrying our parcels of disreputable kit. All three gates leading to the platform were guarded by sentries, who offered to bayonet any one who tried to pa.s.s without papers stamped by the local gendarmerie. To each sentry in turn Cuthbert explained frantically who we were and what the commandant had said, only to be met with an invariable ”_Ya.s.sak!_” and a fingering of the rifle.

The _bimbas.h.i.+_ himself was absent, and so was the Armenian interpreter--the only other person, apparently, who knew our orders.

Alfonso, despatched to the commandant's house, returned with the news that he could not be found. We stood in the rain puffing at damp cigarettes and cursing. H. returned to his old refrain, ”To h.e.l.l with the Turks!”, to the great wonder of the tatterdemalion men and boys gathered round us.

When the train steamed away from Alukeeshla, taking, no doubt, the empty truck reserved for us, we startled the guards and sentries with yells of uncontrollable laughter.

M. and I opened next morning's visit to the _bimbas.h.i.+_ with bitter protests, but had to end it in helpless acquiescence before his suave lies. He had given strict orders that the sentries were to let us pa.s.s, he pretended, and they would be punished severely for their failure to do so. Meanwhile, he was charmed that we were to accept the hospitality of the village for one day longer. He himself would be present to see us off by the next train that same evening.

For once the commandant kept his promise. He led us to the station himself. But this time no accommodation had been provided for us on the train. The trucks were full of Germans, the first- and second-cla.s.s carriages of Turkish officers, the third-cla.s.s carriages of Turkish soldiers. As it would be difficult to crowd the Turkish officers and impossible to dislodge any Germans, the only alternative was to clear out some of the Turkish privates.

The _bimbas.h.i.+_ selected a carriage, entered it, and ordered its occupants to descend to the platform. There were only nine of us, with the guards, while the soldiers numbered more than forty. Yet the _bimbas.h.i.+_ turned them all out. He hurled their packs through the open windows, and by candlelight drove them before him to the doorway. Some, who were reluctant to leave, he struck. It was astonis.h.i.+ng to see the little man smacking and kicking burly brutes twice his size; though he knew well that they would never dare to hit back.

When the carriage was quite empty he took us inside and placed us in a corner. The Turkish rabble, swearing and grumbling, returned with their packs and their rifles, and scowled at us as they packed themselves into the remaining seats. The whole matter could have been arranged, with a twentieth of the fuss, by merely moving nine Turks from one end of the carriage to the other.

”Good?” asked the commandant, proudly, after we were seated.

”Magnificent!” I replied, while we tried hard not to let our self-control be blown over by gusts of laughter.

”Then, au revoir, my friend.”

”Adieu, mister the commandant.”

He strutted down the platform; and we pa.s.sed from Alukeeshla to whatever weird experiences might be waiting for us elsewhere.

This chapter is but an amplification of an inscription signed by H. and myself before we left our mud home. When pa.s.sing toward Alukeeshla from the station, take the second turning to the right beyond the gendarmerie, then the first to the left, and enter the fifth house in a row of buildings that stare at you from the bottom of a blind alley.

Climb some rickety stairs to the back room on the first floor, and you may still find these words on one of the walls:

”In memory of some bad days and good yarns, spent and told in this dirty room of this verminous hut in this G.o.d-forsaken village. To h.e.l.l with the Turks!”

CHAPTER VII

IN THE SHADOW OF THE BLACK ROCK

Moored under a willow tree, we were clearing what was left of the cold chicken and salad from the middle of a punt. I filled the Chambertin bottle with water and dropped it overboard. It plashed and sank noiselessly to the bottom of the Thames. From the far side of our island came the metallic strains of a gramophone, made less blatant by the soft atmosphere of the river. A pa.s.sing punt-pole clacked, rose from the surface, stabbed the water and clacked again. Flies danced from the hot sunlight into the shade of the willow, and hovered over the remains of our lunch. I composed the cus.h.i.+ons and lay down, opposite Phyllis.

But the cus.h.i.+ons became harder and harder, and the breeze merged gradually into a stuffy, dark oppressiveness. I opened my eyes, and sat up. The head cus.h.i.+on, it appeared, was a sackful of kit, my white flannels were a uniform in creased and dirtied khaki, Phyllis was Alfonso the Turkish guard, and the Thames the military baths at Afion-kara-Hissar, in the centre of Anatolia.

Some ragged Turks arrived through the stone pa.s.sage that led to the hot room, and began undressing. Cuthbert was talking to the bath attendant, while Alfonso lay opposite me and snored. H. and W. also snored in dissonant notes. R. was sorting out his kit. The rest of the party still slumbered silently, stretched out in twisted att.i.tudes on the stone floor.