CHAPTER XI

THE BLACK HOLE OF CONSTANTINOPLE

Before leaving, we had protested strongly against the treatment of the women in the house.

"But they are Turkish subjects," said the detectives.

"Anyway, they are women," we protested.

But this had little effect. Theodore and his unfortunate family were marched off behind us to the Central Gaol. I think, however, that our protest was not quite in vain, for it gave the women courage. When I last saw them, before being taken to the Chief of Police, they had dried their tears. Eventually they were released, but not, alas! until they had endured much suffering.

The Chief of Police congratulated us on being safe once more in Turkish hands.

"Yes, we are comfortably back in prison," I said with a faint smile, "and therefore there is surely no harm in giving us back the personal trifles that the detectives took from us."

"I cannot give you your papers," he said. "There is a forged passport here, amongst other things."

"Very well, do as you like about that," I said, shrugging my shoulders, "but surely my empty pocket-book and my watch might be returned."

To this he agreed, whereupon he handed me--

(_a_) My pocket-book, containing five pounds hidden in the lining.

(_b_) My watch, and a compass, which he mistook for another timepiece.

(_c_) My false moustache, which had been captured on my person.

I was in an agony of anxiety about this moustache. Had the police inquired at the only two hairdressers' where such things were made, they would have found that Miss Whitaker had ordered it for me only ten days before. But now it was safely in my possession again. I had the only connecting link of evidence that might incriminate Miss Whitaker in my trouser pocket, and was tearing it to shreds as I talked to the Chief of Police.

The interview passed on a note of felicitation, until the very end. After praising the smart way his men had surrounded the house, and receiving his congratulations on our escapes, just as if the whole thing was a game, we said that there was one criticism we had to make on police methods, and that was their treatment of women.

"They are Turkish subjects," snapped the Chief of Police, suddenly showing his teeth.

"They are women," we retorted, "and they are innocent. If they are maltreated----"

"I know how to manage my affairs," he said with a gasp of annoyance.

"Certainly. But if they are maltreated you will be responsible after the war."

To this he made no reply.

We were removed without further ado, and after being photographed and measured in the most approved fashion for criminals, we were taken up long flights of stairs, and across a roof, to the quarters for prisoners awaiting trial. Here we were allotted separate cells, where we were to pass the next few days in strict isolation.

To my amazement (for I knew something of Turkish prisons from a previous experience, not here recorded) these cells were scrupulously clean. A bed, a table, and a chair were in each apartment, all very firm and foursquare, as if designed to withstand any access of fury or despair on the prisoner's part. There was electric light in the ceiling, covered with wire netting. Walls and woodwork were of a neutral colour. The windows, which were barred, had a convenient arrangement for regulating the ventilation. The heavy door, which admitted no sound, was provided with a sliding hatch, which could be opened by the warders at will for purposes of investigation. Everything was hideously efficient.

Turkey is a country of surprises, but I was not prepared for this. I would have preferred something more picturesque. One's mind, after the testing climax of recapture, craves for new doses of excitement.

The brain of a criminal, after he has been apprehended, must be a turmoil of thought. He curses his stupidity, or his luck, or his associates. He longs to explain and defend himself. Instead of this, he is left in silence in a drab room, with no company but his thoughts.

My own thoughts were most unpleasant. I had failed miserably and innocent people were suffering as the result.

After five weeks of effort I was farther than ever from escape. Worse than all, Miss Whitaker was in danger. Never again shall I pass such dismal hours. I see myself now, seated on that solid chair with head on arms, bent over that efficient table. A prisoner's heart must soon turn to stone.

But although our surroundings were inhuman, one of our gaolers had a generous heart. He opened the slot in my door merely to say he was sorry about it all, and that the women were all right. It is little actions such as these that so often light the darkest hours of life. The man was a European Turk.

It was urgently necessary to communicate with my fellow-prisoners, in order to arrange to tell the same story. My friend next door solved the problem by bawling up through his barred window at the top of his voice that he would leave a note for me in the wash-place.

"Right you are!" I howled in answer, and instantly the slot of my door opened, and I had to explain that I was singing.

Already, interest was beginning to creep back into one's life. I found the note in the wash-place, read it secretly, thought over my answer, and transcribed the message on to a cigarette paper. Having no writing material, I used the end of a match dipped into an ink prepared from tobacco juice and ash. By these simple means we established a regular means of communication and before forty-eight hours of our strict seclusion had elapsed we were all three in possession of a complete, circumstantial, and fictitious account of our adventures prior to capture.

When not engaged on reminiscences, I was generally pacing my cell, or trying to invent some new form of exercise to keep myself fit. But at times energy failed and one felt inclined to gnash one's teeth at the futility of it all.

One day, when I was feeling inclined to gnash my teeth, the slot in my door was furtively withdrawn, and, instead of a gaoler, a very comely vision appeared at the observation hatch. A pair of laughing black eyes were looking in on me. She wrinkled her nose, and laughed. I jumped up, thinking I was dreaming, and hoping that the dream would continue. At the same moment something dropped on to my floor. Then the trap door was softly shut to.

I found a tiny stump of lead pencil. That was proof of the reality of my vision.

Countless excuses to leave my cell, and voluminous correspondence with the pencil's aid eventually enabled me to find out that she was an Armenian girl, awaiting trial, who took a deep interest in us. At great risk to herself, she had provided the three of us with writing instruments. Except for a brief glimpse, and a mumbled word, I was never able to thank her, however, owing to circumstances beyond our control.

On the fourth day we were transferred to the Military Prison in the Square of the Seraskerat.

As usual in Turkey, our move was sudden and unexpected. That morning, on complaining at mid-day that I had as yet received no food, I was told that _inshallah_--if God pleased--it would arrive in due course.

Instead of a belated breakfast, however, a _posse_ of policemen arrived, and we started on our journeys again: my friends still in their shirt-sleeves and slippers, and myself still in my bowler hat, although I did not now wear it so rakishly.

But we were fairly cheery. We had learnt (no matter how) that the females of Theodore's family would soon be released, and that Theodore himself, although still in duress, would not suffer any extreme fate. Also, it was by now fairly obvious that Miss Whitaker would not be apprehended, as sufficient evidence was not obtainable against her. She had covered her tracks too well. All things considered, there was no cause for depression.

But waiting is hungry work. That afternoon still saw us, fretful and unfed, waiting outside the office of Djevad Bey, the Military Commandant of Constantinople.

At last I was taken into an ornate room, where I had my first talk with this redoubtable individual, who was popularly supposed to be the hangman of the Young Turks. Anyone less like an executioner I have never seen. He was plump, well-dressed, with humorous grey eyes. He wore long, rather well-fitting boots, and smoked his cigarettes from a long amber holder. He also had a long amber moustache, which was being trained Kaiser-wise.

I stood before him at attention.

"About this forged passport," he began--"do gentlemen in your country forge each other's signatures?"

"It is not usual," I admitted.

"Then you, as an English gentleman, surely did not counterfeit my writing?"

"Oh no! I wouldn't dream of doing such a thing."

"Then how do you account for this passport being in your possession?"

I remained silent.

"Who forged it?" he insisted.

"May I look?" said I. "Is that really your signature?"

"It is indeed. With it you could easily have got out of the country."

"What an idiot I was not to use it!" I said with quite unfeigned annoyance.

"You were!" he laughed--"they would have passed you straight through the Customs on seeing this."

I felt very faint at this moment, and staggered against the table. But I recovered after an instant. I quite forget his next few remarks, but I know that I committed myself to a story that I had bought the passport from a man in a restaurant whom I could not now recognise.

"But where have you been living all these weeks?" he asked.

"I was living in the ruins near the Fatih mosque," I said glibly--"and I used to lunch and dine at various cafés in the city, a different one every day. It was in one of these places that I bought the passport."

Djevad Bey considered this statement for a moment. There was a nasty look in his eye when he spoke again.

"I shall never rest until I know who it is who can forge my signature so well," he said--"and until I know, I am afraid you will be very uncomfortable, for by law you are in the position of a common malefactor."

"By law I am in the position of a prisoner of war," I answered--"and as such, I am liable to a fortnight's simple imprisonment, for attempting to escape. The Turkish Government signed this agreement only a few months ago with the British representatives at Berne."

"A man who forges another's name is not an officer, but a forger," he said meaningly.

"Say what you like, and do what you like," I answered--"I am in your power. But one thing I ask, and that is, that if you punish me, you should liberate the innocent Theodore and his family. True, we were found in their house, but----"

"I cannot believe what you say," said Djevad Bey thoughtfully.

There was a pause. Then:

"Come, as man to man, won't you tell me who forged that passport?"

"You have just called me a liar," said I. "That ends the matter."

And with an all-is-over-between-us air I left the room, feeling dizzy and uncomfortable.

It was then four o'clock in the afternoon, and I had not yet eaten. I did not feel at all amused at the prospect of the Military Prison.

I was taken downstairs into the darkness, on entering this inferno of the damned of Enver Pasha. There were cries and shouts down there, and men scrambling for food, and other men who looked like wild animals, behind bars. A swarthy custodian took my name, and I then proceeded, down a long corridor, until my escort reached an iron portal such as Dante imagined long ago.

_Lasciate ogni speranza voi ch'entrate. . . ._ The gates had clanged behind me, and I was in a long, low room below ground level, airless, ill-lit, filthy with tomato skins and bits of bread. Well-fed rats were scurrying amongst the garbage, and badly-fed prisoners were pacing the room forlornly, or twiddling their thumbs, or scratching themselves, or gnawing crusts of bread.

They gathered round me, clamouring for news and cigarettes. In less than no time they had picked my pockets. They had no more morals than monkeys. Poor devils! who could blame them, living as they did down there, where no rumours are heard of the outside world, except the cries of beaten men and the dull sound of wood on flesh?

"What are you in for?" they asked me.

"Forgery," said I, not to be outdone by any desperado present.

One man, however, confessed to murder, having cut a small boy's throat a few months before. With him I could not compete. But the most of us were fraudulent contractors, spies, petty swindlers and the like. Our morals, as I have said, were practically _nil_. Yet I noticed that a Jew lived quite apart, and was shunned by everybody. By trade he was a brigand, but this was no slur on his character as a criminal: the failing that had led to ostracism was that he pilfered the other prisoners' tomatoes. That was really beyond a joke. . . .

* * * * *

One of my newly found friends took me to a bed, consisting of two planks on an iron frame, which he said I could have for my very, very own. He also gave me a piece of bread and some water. On beginning to eat I at once realised how hungry I was, and inquired how I should obtain further nourishment.

"Luxuries are very difficult to obtain," he said; "how much money have you got?"

"Twenty-five piastres,[9]" I answered.

He pulled a long face.

"That won't go far. But every evening at eight a boy comes round with the scraps left over from the Officers' Restaurant. Otherwise you will live on bread and tomatoes."

"What about bedding?" I asked, to change the subject.

"Bedding!" he said, looking at me as if I was a perfect idiot. "Do you mean to say you have come here without any bedding?"

I admitted I had, but felt too exhausted to explain.

* * * * *

One was utterly lost in that dungeon. Even when the war ended, would one be found? I doubted it. Yet as I would naturally never reveal the forger's name, it seemed unlikely that I would get out. . . . Then I thought of my companions. I imagined them happily together, in some place where one could see the sky. . . . As for me, I might languish down here for ever. Obviously something should be done.

But what? I rose (rather hastily, for on looking between the planks of my bed, I noticed that the crack was entirely filled with battalions of board beasts in line, waiting for a night attack), and began to pace our narrow and nasty apartment. A group of prisoners were cooking some pitiful mess by the window. Four others played poker with a very greasy pack. One was twiddling his thumbs very fast, and I suddenly recollected that he had been twiddling his thumbs very fast half an hour ago, when I had first seen him. The lonely Jew was removing lice from the seams of his coat, and throwing his quarry airily about the room.

Then I noticed that besides ourselves, there were other prisoners even more unfortunate. There had been so much to see in my new surroundings that I had not noticed the people in chains. . . . One side of our room opened out on to some half-dozen cubicles, each of which contained a prisoner in chains. These cells had no light or ventilation. They measured six feet in length by four in breadth. In solitude and obscurity, fettered by wrist and ankle to shackles that weighed a hundredweight, human beings lived there--and are still living for aught I know--for months and even years, until death released them. These men were ravenous and verminous, but they had by no means lost their hope and faith. I shall never hear the hymn--

"Thy rule, O Christ, begin, Break with Thine iron rod The tyrannies of sin . . ."

without remembering that an Armenian lad said those words to me, lying in chains in one of these cells. With another prisoner, a Greek, who had endured eleven months of this torture, I also had some speech.

"Yes, the war will be over soon," he said. "My God, how good this cigarette of yours tastes! I haven't touched tobacco for a month. But be careful. The sentries must not see you speaking to me."

"Yes, the chains were bad at first," he continued when the sentry's back was turned, "but one gets used to anything in time. And I have had time enough. It takes a lot to kill a healthy man. Before I came in here I used to be strong and well. I used to ride two hours every day, on my own horses. Now my horses have gone to feed the Turkish Army and I can hardly drag my chains as far as the water-tap. But God is great. . . ."

God is great! _Allahu akbar!_

I determined to get away from that dungeon at all costs, if for no other reason than because I had to survive to write about it.

I went to the big gate, and tried to bluff the sentry to let me go to see the Commandant. But a clean face and a full stomach are practically necessary to a _débonnaire_ appearance. When one is scrubby and starved it is almost impossible to succeed in "wangling." I stared at the sentry through my eyeglass, and I offered him my twenty-five piastres as if I had plenty more _baksheesh_ to give to a good boy, but I utterly and dismally failed to impress him.

"_Yok, yok, yok_," he said, looking at me as one might look at an orang-outang that has

+-------------------------------+ | DO NOT IRRITATE THIS ANIMAL | +-------------------------------+

written over its cage.

I gibbered in impotent rage, and then went and put my head under a tap.

A little later, while I was drying my head with my handkerchief, I saw some barbers come to the big gate. They stood there, clapping and clacking their strops. Instantly, my fellow-prisoners rushed to the gate as if they had heard the beating of the wings of some angel of deliverance. This was apparently the occasion of their weekly shave, when egress to the corridor was permitted, the barbers naturally not wishing to go inside our loathsome room.

Taking this tide in the affairs of men at the flood, I found it led on to fortune. I was in the corridor with six other prisoners, and a barber confronted me with a razor in his hand. He whetted his steel expectantly, but I would have none of him, and seized a passing official by the arm.

He was a dog-collar gentleman.

A dog-collar gentleman, I must explain, is Authority Incarnate. On his swelling chest he wears a crescent tablet of brass, with the one word _Quanun_ inscribed thereon. _Quanun_ means "law," and the wearer of this badge is responsible for public decorum of every kind. If a Turkish officer be seen drinking alcohol in uniform, or playing cards, or flirting, or talking disrespectfully of the Germans, or indulging in any other prohibited amusement, he is instantly arrested by the dog-collar gentleman, and brought to prison. In his official capacity, the dog-collar gentleman is one of the most important personages in Turkey: policeman, pussfoot and prude in one.

"There is some mistake," I said excitedly. "I am a British officer, and have been put in a room with criminals."

"You a British officer?" said the dog-collar man incredulously.

"A captain of cavalry," said I, slipping him the twenty-five piastre note.

"_Pekke, Effendim_," he answered. "Very good, sir, I will see what can be done."

I had burnt my boats now.

About ten minutes later, just as I was flatly refusing to either be shaved or to return through the gate, a sergeant-major and a squad of soldiers arrived and bore me off to the Prison Commandant.

Here I caught sight of my two companions, and was able to fling them a few words through the "Yok, yok" of the sentries. They also had been separated, and put amongst criminals. Their lot had been no different to mine.

"A slight mistake has occurred," said the Prison Commandant to me, "but now you shall have one of the best rooms in the prison. Only I am afraid you will be alone there, until after your trial."

Of course I did not believe him, but I was glad that I was to be alone.

I was taken to a room on the upper floor, furnished with a bed and blanket, and with a window opening on to a corridor, where people were always passing. The Commandant had spoken the truth. It was quite a good room, as prison apartments go, and the traffic of the corridor amused me.

At nine o'clock that night I was able to get a dish of haricot beans, my first meal of the day.

Then I settled down to a month of solitary confinement.

I think I may claim to write of this torture, which exists not only in Turkey but through the prisons of the civilised world, with some expert knowledge. I use the word "torture" because it is nothing less. Solitary confinement is a punishment as barbarous and as senseless as the thumbscrew or the rack: more so indeed, for it is better to kill the body than to maim the mind. The spirit of man is more than his poor flesh; the war has reminded us of that. And if it has also reminded us that our prison systems are archaic, so much the better for the world.

At times, in gaol, a tide of pity rose in me for all life created that is caged by man.

Take a felon at one end of the scale, and a canary at the other. The felon is imprisoned for twenty years. For twenty years, less some small remission for good conduct, an abnormal brain lives in abnormal surroundings, where hope dies, and ideals fail. He has sinned against society, and therefore society murders his mind. Corporal and capital punishment, I have come to believe, are saner than the cruelties, immeasurable by "the world's coarse thumb and finger," suffered by the mind of man in solitary confinement or the common gaol. The sentimentalist who shudders at the cat and gallows forgets the worse, slow, hidden horrors that pass unseen in the felon's brain. Perhaps the sentimentalist does not realise them. Perhaps also the old lady who keeps a canary does not realise the feelings of her pet. She may think she is protecting it from the birds and beasts outside. But I feel now that I know what the canary feels. . . . However, it is difficult to argue about questions involving imagination.

I lived on hope, chiefly, during the days that followed. With nothing to read, no cutting instrument of any sort, no washing arrangements, and no one to speak to, the time passed hideously. I used to gaze at my watch sometimes, appalled at the slow passage of time. The second-hand had a horrible fascination for me. It simply crawled round its dial and each instant, between the jerks of the little hand, the precious moments of my youth were passing, beyond recall. Madness lay that way. If I had been a real criminal, I wondered, would I have repented? Unquestionably the answer was, "No!" Solitary confinement would have made me a permanent enemy of society.

There were no smiles and soap in that Military Prison, no scissors, no sanitation. There was nothing human or clean about it. Nothing but destruction will rid it of its vermin, or scour it of its taint of disease and death.

Perhaps the lack of scissors was the amenity of life whose absence I most deplored. Try to do without a cutting instrument for a month, and you will realise why it was that some sort of cutting edge was the first need of primitive man and remains a prime necessity to-day.

However, as a matter of fact, I did not remain a whole month without a cutting edge. Before a fortnight had elapsed I had bettered my position in many ways. I had secured a knife (which I stole from the restaurant), a wash-basin (sent from the Embassy), and pencil and paper from a friendly clerk. With these writing instruments I used to correspond voluminously with the other British prisoners, by various privy methods.

I had a regular routine for my days now. Early mornings were devoted to walking briskly up and down my room in various gaits--the sailor's roll, for instance, and the Napoleonic stride, and the deportment of various of my acquaintances. During this time I avoided thinking, but generally imagined some incident in which I took a distinguished part. In the forenoon I played games, such as throwing my soap to the ceiling and catching it again, or juggling with cigarettes, both lighted and unlighted. The afternoon generally passed in sleep, but the evening and nights were bad. It was then that the second hand of my watch began to exert its fascination. The electric light bulb, however, could occasionally be tampered with, and on these occasions there was always the hope that the sentries would get a shock in putting it right. Also I found amusement in my watch chain, which I made into an absorbing puzzle.

But, curiously enough, I found it impossible to write anything, except lengthy letters.

A real prisoner in a well-constituted prison does not enjoy his days any more than I did. On the other hand, he knows how long his sentence is going to last, whereas in my case I was confined during Djevad Bey's pleasure, or the duration of the war, and each day brought me nearer nothing--except insanity.

One evening, however, an Imperial Son-in-law entered my room, and lit my life with a certain interest. His father, who was a Court official, had betrothed him to a princess, and he had consequently assumed the title of Damad, or Son-in-law. This youth had had a remarkable career. While still a guileless lad, scarcely broke from the harem, he had used his revolver so injudiciously that he had seriously damaged one of the Imperial apartments, besides killing the elderly Colonel at whom he was aiming. Enver Pasha had of course himself a weakness for this sort of thing, but still, to save appearances, the Damad had to be punished. He was therefore condemned to three months' confinement in the Military Prison. Although nominally in residence there, he used, however, to leave prison every Friday to attend the Sultan's Selamlik, and only return on Monday night. Moreover, he not only thoroughly amused himself during his protracted week-ends, he also squeezed every bit of pleasure possible out of his prison days. Life was a lemon, which he sucked with grace. He was free to wander where he wished in the prison, and to eat and drink what he liked. The best of everything was good enough for the Damad. Grapes came for him from the Sultan's garden, and a faithful negro slave was always at his heels.

The Damad had rather charming manners. He knocked politely before entering my cell.

"Excuse my interrupting," he said, "but----"

"You are not interrupting me at all," I answered, getting up from my bed. "I do wish you would stop and talk. Have a cigarette? I haven't talked to anyone for a fortnight."

"I am so sorry, but I daren't talk to you. That is a pleasure to come. I wanted to borrow something, that's all. And, I say, will you allow me to offer you one of my cigarettes--they're the Sultan's brand, you know. Better take the box. Well, I saw you with an eyeglass through the window in the passage. Will you lend it me to appear at the next Selamlik?"

I was delighted, and said so. To my sorrow, the Damad instantly took his departure.

"Smuggle me in something to read," I said, as he left with profuse apologies for his hurry.

He nodded, and his long left eyelash flickered.

Next day his little nigger boy, when the sentry's back was turned, popped about twenty leaflets into my window. I seized them avidly, and found that they were the astounding adventures of Nat Pinkerton in French. Never have my eyes rested so gleefully on a printed page. I consumed them cautiously, else I should have gorged myself with excitement at a single sitting. Like an epicure, I made them last, by always breaking off at the critical juncture of the great detective's affairs. From that moment my life flowed in more agreeable channels.

"Devouring time, blunt though the lion's paws." . . . I suddenly understood Shakespeare's meaning afresh. Time had dulled the clawing of regret.

I had failed to escape, it is true, but there was always hope. Things were getting better. The women had been released. Thémistoclé only awaited a formal trial. My own condition had improved. I had been moved from my solitary confinement, just when I had secured a Bible, and a large tin of Keating's, wherewith to combat the devils of captivity. But any change is better than none at all, I thought. The mortal hunger for companionship is strong, and my new room, besides containing an officer, also enjoyed an excellent and varied view.

After a few days' experience of my new room-mate, however, who was a Bulgarian Bolshevik, I began to pine for solitude again. A more unmitigated Tishbite I have never seen, but fortunately he was smaller than I. When I found him washing his feet in my basin one night, I smote him, hip and thigh.

That Bulgarian has coloured my whole view of the Balkans. The less said about him, the better.

* * * * *

One day about thirty British officers arrived from the camp at Yuzgad, whence they had escaped and been recaptured on the occasion when Commander Cochrane and his gallant band of seven marched four hundred and fifty miles to freedom. All the party who arrived in the Military Prison were in uniform, and in excellent spirits. They were like a breath of fresh air in that sordid place. On being put into three rooms, these thirty brave men and true at once demanded beds to sleep on. In due time the beds arrived, in the usual condition of beds in that place. They might have been so many Stilton cheeses. Our thirty prisoners, despite the protest of the guards, carried out their couches into the passage, and lit two Primus stoves. Over these stoves they proceeded to pass the component parts of each bed, so that its occupants were utterly exterminated.

Imagine the scene. A dismal corridor, a flaming stove, Turkish sentries protesting with Hercules in khaki, cleansing the Augean stable. . . . But protests were useless. The smell of burnt bugs mingled with the other contaminations of the prison. Our officers had done in little what civilisation will one day do at large throughout that land.

* * * * *

A British officer, going to the feeding place, looked into a window which gave on to my room. But I was kept strictly apart from my fellows, and the sentry consequently tried to drag the officer away.

"Leave me alone, you son of Belial!" said he. "Isn't a window meant to look through?"

Windows in that prison were certainly not meant to look through.

From my new eyrie I had a composite view of startling contrasts. Down below, some soldiers were living in a verandah, behind wooden bars. Anything more animal than their life it would be impossible to conceive. Every afternoon at three o'clock a parade of handcuffed men were marshalled two by two, and then pushed into these dens. Beyond them lay the city of Stamboul with its clustered cupolas and nine-trellised alley-ways. And beyond the city were the blue waters of the Marmora.

Then there was the window in the passage through which the British officer had observed me. This gave me a view of the rank and fashion of the prison, so that I knew who was being tried, who received visitors, and so on.

And directly opposite me, in another face of the building, was yet another window, with curtains drawn. That was the window of the Hall of Justice. Directly under my perch, but rather too far to jump, were some telegraph lines which might possibly have provided a means of escape. Sentries used to watch me carefully, whenever I looked at these telegraph lines. I was considered a dangerous, indeed a desperate character, and my every movement was regarded with apprehension. Not only was no one (except now the Bulgarian) allowed to speak to me, but I was not even permitted to look at anything, or anyone, for long, without being bidden to desist. Whatever I did, in fact, I was told not to do.

Eventually I made a scene.

The immediate cause of the row was that I had a glimpse of a sitting in the Hall of Justice. I had often wondered what passed there, for at times faint screams used to hint of the infamies that passed behind those curtains.

One day I saw.

The Hall of Justice is a fine room, with a lordly sweep of view over the city and the sea. Why anyone chose such a situation as a torture chamber I do not know. But there it was. There was something dramatic about the beautiful prospect and the bestial people who sat with their backs turned to it, interrogating the Armenians.

"Every prospect pleases and only man is vile."

Very vile were the two Turkish officers, judges I suppose, who sat smoking cigarettes, while an old Armenian woman and her son stood before them to be tried. What passed I could not hear, but evidently her answers were not satisfactory, for presently the policeman who stood behind her kicked her violently, so that her head jerked back and her arms flung forward, and she was sent tottering towards the judges' table. Then the policeman took a stick as thick as a man's wrist, and began to beat her over the head and shoulders. Her son meanwhile had fallen on his knees and was crawling about the room, dragging his chains, and supplicating first the judges and then the policeman. He was imploring them, no doubt, to have pity on his mother's age and weakness.

She fell down in a faint. The policeman kicked her in the face, and then prodded her with a stick until she rose.

I wish the people who are ready to "let the Turk manage his own country" could have seen that savage pantomime.

I tried to get out to stop it, but was driven back with bayonets.

* * * * *

Djevad Bey, the Military Commandant of Constantinople, with a resplendent retinue, arrived one day to inspect us. With his long cigarette-holder, and long shiny boots, he swaggered round, followed by _ormulu_ staff officers and diligent clerks and pompous gentlemen in dog-collars. Everywhere around him was dirt, disease, destitution, and despair. But Djevad Bey in his shiny boots "cared for none of these things." He was himself, with his medals and moustaches, and that was enough.

"What more do you want, _effendi_?" he asked me after I had made a few casual complaints (for it was useless to take him seriously). "You have one of the most beautiful views in Europe from the garden."

"But I am not allowed into the garden."

"Have a little patience, _mon cher_," said he. "It is rather crowded with older prisoners now. But in a little time perhaps, when I have discovered the name of that forger . . ."

And with a condescending smile he passed on between ranks of sentries standing stiffly at attention, to inspect another portion of his miserable menagerie.

* * * * *

Ah, Djevad, _mon cher_, those days seem distant now! You and your popinjays have passed. . . .

[Footnote 9: Five shillings.]