Eastern Nights - and Flights Part 24

Lloyd George as soon as he should reach Allied territory.

Next day the Ministry tried to send him out of Turkey by aeroplane, but failed because all aircraft was in the hands of the Germans. It was agreed that he should receive special pa.s.sports and proceed, via Smyrna, to either Chios or Mudros.

After the dinner party of the sixteenth events moved rapidly toward an armistice. The Vali of Smyrna caused a sensation two days later by stating openly, in the _Journal d'Orient_, that peace negotiations were in progress and that the Germans would have to go. Later in the day he again met Colonel Newcombe at the Tokatlian Hotel, and discussed the best means of approaching England for an armistice. By now the escaped colonel was going about Constantinople quite openly, although Yeats-Brown and Paul remained more or less in hiding.

Meanwhile, General Townshend, who was still a prisoner on Prinkipo Island, had also sent a memorandum to the Government. A Turkish armistice commission was formed, and he was asked by the Grand Vizier to accompany the delegates who were about to leave the country; which he did. It was arranged that Colonel Newcombe would follow in a few days' time.

On his last night in Constantinople Colonel Newcombe went by appointment to the terrace of the deserted British Emba.s.sy, and there met Captain Yeats-Brown, who had slipped past the police into the Emba.s.sy grounds. It was a meeting that neither of them will ever forget. Below was the Golden Horn, s.h.i.+mmering in the moonlight, and across its waters Stamboul showed up dimly, quiet and apparently asleep. But the watchers on the Emba.s.sy terrace knew that the city might stir from slumber at any moment; for the Phanar was bristling with machine guns, St. Sophia was an armed camp, and, more terrible than all, people were starving in the streets. The waning sickle moon that rode above Stamboul seemed the symbol of the Turks' waning dominion over Christian peoples. Very soon the Crescent would go down.

Very soon the Union Jack would float from the Emba.s.sy's barren flagstaff. Very soon Pera would be decked with banners, and an Allied fleet would proclaim an end to the nightmare of famine and oppression.

Next day Colonel Newcombe, who had been handed civilian pa.s.sports by the Minister of the Interior, travelled from Constantinople to Smyrna.

Finally he left Turkey, as a special adviser, in the company of Raouf Bey, the new Minister of Marine. The party put to sea in a trawler, and were picked up by H.M.S. _Liverpool_. They were taken to Mudros, where the British Admiral Commander-in-Chief and General Townshend were already negotiating with the Turkish delegates.

Up to the very end the Young Turk leaders hoped to hold the real, if not the ostensible, control in Constantinople. Captain Yeats-Brown was told by a politician that "n.o.body but Talaat could possibly manage Turkey," and that "the English, if they come, would be well advised to deal with the Committee of Union and Progress, as there is no other real party in the country. They not only have all the money, but all the brains and energy as well." Which last statement was nearly true.

But when it came to saying that Talaat was one of the dominant brains of the century, and comparable as a statesman only to Lloyd George, the disguised British officer could not help smiling and suggesting: "Surely Talaat is not indispensable? If he goes, another ex-telegraphist may arise, as good as he!"

This the members of the Committee of Union and Progress regarded as near-blasphemy; but the fact that all the Young Turk leaders were self-made men, with little knowledge of the science and history of modern government, was one of the causes why Von w.a.n.genheim, Von Bernstorff, and other emissaries of German Imperialism were able, for four years, to inspire a policy of Turkey for the Germans.

The sudden _volte face_ of the Turkish press, the announcement of the armistice terms, the flight of the three chief criminals (Talaat, Enver, and Djemal Pashas), and the downfall of the swaggering Germans brought great joy to the miserable populace of Constantinople. They vented their feelings in delirious enthusiasm over some released prisoners who visited Pera, wearing their carefully h.o.a.rded khaki uniforms.

The curtain was down, the sordid tragedy of oppression and corruption was over. The new era opened in the mist of a November morning, with the long, low lines of an Allied fleet steaming very slowly past the Iles des Princes toward the Bosphorus.

CHAPTER XV

STOWAWAYS, INC.

t.i.toff was head of a syndicate of s.h.i.+p's officers which might have named itself "Stowaways, Incorporated." He was the schemer-in-chief; and the others, while disliking him heartily, were content to rely on his superior cunning. Besides ourselves the syndicate undertook to carry across the Black Sea a Greek, a Jewess (both of them wanted by the Turkish police), and four pa.s.sportless prost.i.tutes; all of whom, to the extent of some hundred dollars apiece, wished to leave Constantinople for Odessa.

Most of the crew, also, were smuggling men, women, or material across the Black Sea. The crew itself included four Russian soldiers, who had escaped from prison camps in Turkey, and were pa.s.sing themselves off as seamen. The bo'sun's particular line of business was a woman thief who had with her a heavy purse and a trunk full of property, stolen from a merchant who had been her dear friend. Katrina, the kitchen girl who brought us our food, invested in a well-to-do Turkish deserter.

As for the non-human contraband, it was stowed in every corner of the vessel--cocaine, opium, raw leather, tobacco, cognac, and quinine.

Prices were extravagant enough in Constantinople, but in Russia they were colossal. The difference in the price of drugs, for example, often amounted to hundreds per cent. The demand for cocaine as contraband was so great during the week before we actually sailed that by the end of it the chemists of Pera and Galata would sell none under 500 dollars a kilo; but in Odessa, we heard, one might dispose of it without difficulty for a thousand dollars a kilo. Even White and I became infected by the contraband craze and, with Kulman as partner, gambled successfully on a consignment of leather and so covered most of our escape expenses.

At dusk, when we left the wireless cabin and paced the shadowed portion of the deck for exercise, we often saw a rowing boat creeping toward whichever side of the _Batoum_ happened not to face the sh.o.r.e. Somebody in it would exchange low whistlings with somebody on deck--the somebody often being t.i.toff. When the boat had been made fast to the bottom of the gangway, a figure, or two figures, would climb to the deck and disappear. Sometimes they brought and left a package; sometimes it was a visitor himself--or herself--who did not depart with the rowing boat.

Besides the mystery traffic from sh.o.r.e to s.h.i.+p there was also a certain amount from s.h.i.+p to sh.o.r.e. For this the steward--a Russian Jew--was responsible. A Turkish merchant had chartered the _Batoum_ for the coming voyage, and since our many delays in sailing were the result of his haggling with government officials over the amount of _baksheesh_ to be paid for permission to export, he undertook to feed the officers and crew for as long as they remained at Constantinople. Incidentally, he unknowingly fed White and myself, besides the other stowaways and the escaped Russian soldiers. The steward ordered more provisions than were needed; and a few hours after the delivery of each consignment a boatload would be sent back to the quay and carted to the bazaars.

t.i.toff, who organized the sale, shared the proceeds with the steward.

t.i.toff's methods of graft took him into many dubious by-paths, notably those around the offices of a Greek coal dealer. After preliminary plottings, with Viktor as interpreter, he ordered a hundred tons. The coal dealer delivered ninety, the bill for a hundred was presented to the Turkish merchant, and t.i.toff and the Greek split the value of the missing ten tons. It was easy enough for the chief engineer to make good the deficit by burning ten tons more on paper than in the furnaces.

With all this illicit traffic in men and goods there were some restless half hours during the last few days of our stay in the Bosphorus.

Trouble was caused by the bo'sun's woman-thief, whose presence among us the Pera police suspected. Five times they searched for her. The bo'sun detailed a man to watch the sh.o.r.e, and whenever a police launch appeared this look-out would blow a whistle. All the stowaways then scurried to their various hiding-places.

White and I, being the most dangerous cargo, were given the safest--and certainly the dirtiest--hiding-place of all. This was in the ballast-tanks, at the very bottom of the s.h.i.+p, underneath the propeller shaft. The entrance to them was through a narrow manhole, covered by a cast-iron lid, about twenty yards down a dark pa.s.sage leading from the engine-room to the propeller.

The alarm having been given, Feodor, the second engineer, would lead us along the pa.s.sage by the light of a taper, remove some boards, raise the lid, and help us to wriggle into the black cavity below. Our feet would be covered by six inches of bilge-water while we crouched down, so as to leave him room enough to replace the iron cover and re-lay the wooden boards that hid it. Then, one at a time and with our knees squelching in the water, we crawled from tank to tank.

Half-way along the line of tanks were two that contained small mattresses, which the second engineer had placed in position for us.

After the first day they were sodden with the bilge-water; but at any rate it was better to sit on them than in the water itself. The limited s.p.a.ce, however, made it impossible for us to be seated in any but a very cramped position, with hunched-up shoulders rubbing against the slime that coated the sides of each tank. Standing was impossible, and lying down meant leaning one's head on the wet mattress and soaking one's feet in the drain of bilge that swished backward and forward with every motion of the s.h.i.+p.

Complete blackness surrounded us. The air was dank and musty, so that matches sputtered only feebly when struck, and the light from a taper was hardly strong enough to chase the darkness from the half of each small tank.

When, after each search, the police returned to their launch we would hear the heavy boots of the second engineer tramping along the pa.s.sage overhead. As we listened to the nerve-edging noise that accompanied the removal of the boards and the iron lid we crouched into the best-hidden corners of our respective tanks, not knowing whether a friend or a policeman was at the entrance. We scarcely breathed until there came, booming and echoing through the hollow compartments, the word "_Signor!_"--the second engineer's pa.s.sword denoting that all was clear, and that we might return to the engine-room.

The twenty-second of August was the final date fixed for the departure.

By late afternoon of the twenty-first all the Turkish merchant's cargo, legitimate and otherwise, had been brought from the quay by lighters, and thence transferred by winches to the _Batoum's_ hatches. The export officials had been squared, the s.h.i.+p's papers were pa.s.sed and stamped, the bunkers were fully loaded with inferior coal. All on board, from the captain to the least-considered stowaway, were content, although nervous of what might happen during the next twenty-four hours.

At about five o'clock we received a welcome visit from Vladimir Wilkowsky, the Polish aviator who had acted as our intermediary from Psamatia. He bribed his guard to remain in Stamboul while he crossed the bridge to Galata, and hired the _kaik_ that brought him to the _Batoum_. He himself intended to follow us across the Black Sea by escaping on the next steamer to leave Constantinople for Odessa.

Meanwhile, we were especially glad to see him, for he brought from Mr.

S. the fifteen hundred dollars for which we had waited so anxiously. In return we sent improvised cheques written on strips of foolscap paper.

We now had enough money to pay t.i.toff's exorbitant fee, and still leave funds to live in Odessa for some weeks. Two German revolvers, bought for us in the bazaar by Kulman, added to the feeling of security.

Wilkowsky claimed to have sent on board the food and clothing which we left at Psamatia, and he was able to confirm our suspicions that t.i.toff must have stolen it. For the present, however, we refrained from tackling the chief engineer, wis.h.i.+ng to avoid a scandal before departure. We promised ourselves to deal with him adequately at Odessa.

That evening there were more than the usual number of mysterious visits from small boats. The full complement of stowaways was taken aboard, the last cases of contraband s.h.i.+pped. Until a late hour the engine-room resounded to the hammerings of Feodor and Josef, who were hiding a late consignment of cocaine. Our own investment in raw leather was in Kulman's cabin.

The firemen and greasers celebrated their farewell in the usual manner.

By nine o'clock several were roaring drunk. One of them--the Bolshevik who had told of the drowning of Baltic fleet officers--staggered across the aft deck with a drawn knife in his hand, shouting that he wanted to finish off the third engineer, who had insulted him. He found Josef in the engine-room, but was cowed and disarmed when the engineer threatened him with a revolver. He let himself be led away, while verbally murdering all officers in general and Josef in particular.

At 6.30 in the morning Josef, the third engineer, roused us from our sleep on the floor of his cabin and invited us to the ballast-tanks; for as the police and customs officers would be on board most of the time until we weighed anchor, we must remain hidden until the _Batoum_ left Turkish waters.

Since we expected to be hidden for about twelve hours, we took with us a loaf of bread, some dried sausage, and a bottle of water. After a last look, through the port-hole, at Seraglio Point and the domes of Stamboul, I pa.s.sed below, hoping and expecting that when I next looked to the open air we should be clear of Turkey.

For a long while nothing happened to take our thoughts from the cramped s.p.a.ce and the foul air of the tanks. We breakfasted sparingly, and allowed ourselves one cigarette apiece. More we dared not smoke, because of the effect on the oppressive atmosphere.

Then, at about ten o'clock, we heard from above a succession of three thuds, the signal to all stowaways in the region of the engine-room that the police were on board. We made ourselves as comfortable as possible, and took minute care to make no sound.

We waited in frantic impatience for the noises from the engine-room that would denote a getting-up of steam. At half-past eleven there began a continuous, rhythmic spurting, which we took to be the sound of the engines in action. Soon afterward a grinding and sc.r.a.ping from the deck convinced us that the anchor was being raised.

"Put it there, old man," said White, thrusting his hand through the hole that linked our respective tanks. "We're leaving Turkey at last!"

But not yet were we leaving Turkey. The noise from the engine-room was merely that of a pump preparing the pressure. After three-quarters of an hour it quieted as suddenly as it had begun, and we realized that the _Batoum_ was still moored in the Bosphorus, between Seraglio Point and the Sultan's palace of Dolma Bagtche.

And then, soon after noon, came the real music for which we had waited so anxiously. The telegraph from the bridge tinkled, a fuller and more throaty rhythm came from the engine-room, loud grinding and rattling from the deck testified that the anchor had parted company with the bottom of the Bosphorus. A few minutes later we felt the s.h.i.+p swinging round, and a swis.h.i.+ng and rus.h.i.+ng of water told us that this time we really were away. In silence we shook hands again.

For long hours we remained in the slimy tanks, crouched on the sodden mattresses. But it was no longer purgatory. The swish-swish of the screw chased away all sensation of discomfort, and there remained only the realization that we had left Constantinople and soon would have left Turkey. My old habit of subconsciously fitting metre and rhymes to mechanical rhythm, to which I had succ.u.mbed many times when seated behind aeroplane motors, began to a.s.sert itself as we sat in the darkness and listened to the penetrating throb-throb from the engine-room above us. Incongruously enough the unbidden lines that continued to pa.s.s maddeningly through my mind, in time with the steady rise and fall of the piston, were those of a G. K. Chesterton ballad:

If I had been a heathen I'd have kissed Naera's curls, And filled my life with love affairs, My house with dancing girls.

But Higgins is a heathen; And to meetings he is forced Where his aunts, who are not married, Demand to be divorced.

These words held sway for five hours of insistent, monotonous chugging.

They were succeeded by an extract from the Prodigal Son: