Chapter 2

Sixty soldiers came marching into the camp. Captain Pericles, whose figure I had often admired at Athens, ran up to Hadgi Stavros, and kissed him.

"Good news, my dear godfather! The paymaster-general is sending £1,000 to Argos this morning by the path near the Scironian Rocks," said the captain.

"Splendid, my boy!" said the king. "I'll go with all my men at once. Guard the camp, and write out the report of our battle. Defeat me if you like, but leave ten of your best troops dead on the field. I am in need of recruits. Look after the three prisoners. They're worth £4,600."

As Hadgi Stavros marched out at the head of his men, they sang a song composed by their king when he knew Lord Byron:

Down the winding valleys a hillsman went his way; His eyes were black and flaming, his gun was clean and bright He cried unto the vultures: "Oh, follow me to-day, And you shall have my foeman to feed upon to-night!"

When Mrs. Simons saw that the brigands had gone, and the troops had arrived, she was wild with excitement. I told her of the real state of affairs; but she wouldn't believe me, and gave Pericles her money and jewels when asked for them. In the evening the king returned with his men, and the troops departed. Mrs. Simons then broke down.

"If you were an Englishman, you would rescue us, and marry my daughter," she exclaimed. "I suppose I must write to Barley & Co., and get Edward to send our ransom."

"Barley & Co. of Cavendish Square?"

"Yes," said Mary Ann. "Didn't you know my mother and my uncle were bankers?"

"Then I have found a way of escape," I exclaimed. "Hadgi Stavros banks with your firm. Do you remember the letter he was dictating when we arrived? That was to Barley & Co. about an investment."

"I see. I must explain the position at once to him," said Mrs. Simons.

"And he will want half a million or more ransom," I said. "No! Write at once to your agents in Athens to send you £4,600. Pay Hadgi Stavros; make him give you a receipt. Enclose this in the next letter from Messrs. Barley & Co., with the note--'Item. £4,600 personally remitted by our partner, Mrs. Simons, as per enclosed receipt.'"

I raised my head, and saw the sweet brown eyes of Mary Ann looking at me, radiant with joy. I then went to Hadgi Stavros, and explained that the £4,600 would be paid into his account at the Bank of Athens on the production of his receipt for that amount. He refused at first to give a receipt. He had never done such a thing. Then I took him on his weak side, and said that perhaps it was more prudent not to give one. If ever he were captured it might be used against him. This touched him.

"I will not give one receipt," he cried. "I will give two--one for Mrs. and Miss Simons, one for Hermann Schultz."

Alas! from my point of view the result was deplorable. The ransom of the two ladies was paid, and they were set free. But as Messrs. Barley & Co. could not recover any money on a receipt given to me, their agent refused to pay my ransom.

"It doesn't matter," said Mrs. Simons, as she and Mary Ann departed. "You can escape by the way down the cascade. Your first plan was impossible with two women, but now you are alone, it is admirable. Come and see us as soon as you get away."

That night I made friends with the ruffian set to watch over me, and I plied him with wine until he fell on the grass and was unable to rise. I then dammed the stream, and climbed down its empty bed. It was difficult work, as the rocks were wet and the night was very dark. I was covered with bruises when I reached a platform of rock about ten feet from the bottom of the precipice. Just as I was about to jump down, a white form appeared below, and a savage growl came from it. I had forgotten the pack of fierce dogs, which, as the King of the Mountains had told me, were the best of all his sentries. Happily, I carried my collecting case, and in it was a packet of arsenic which I used for stuffing birds. I put some of the powder on a piece of bread, and threw the poisoned food to the dog; but arsenic takes a long time to act. In about half an hour's time the creature began to howl in a frightful manner, and it did not expire until daybreak. It also succeeded in arousing the camp, and I was recaptured and brought before the king.

"I don't mind your trying to escape," he said, with a terrible look; "but in your wild prank you have, drowned the man I set to watch over you. Were I to give way to my feelings I would have you killed. But I will be merciful. You will merely be bastinadoed to prevent you from wandering out of bounds until your ransom is paid."

I received twenty strokes on my feet. At the third I began to bleed. At the fourth I began to howl. At the tenth I was insensible to pain. When I came to I was in such an agony that I would have given my soul to kill Hadgi Stavros. I tried to, but failed. But I would hurt him, though I knew I should die for it. So, with a torrent of invectives, I explained how I tricked him over the ransom of Mrs. Simons and her daughter.

"She's a partner in Barley's Bank, you fool, you ass!" I shrieked. "She will get back all the £4,000 on your receipt."

Hadgi Stavros turned pale and trembled.

"No," he said, very slowly; "I will not kill you. You have not suffered enough. Four thousand pounds! It is a fortune. You have stolen my daughter's fortune. What can I do to you? Find me, you brutes," he cried, turning to his men, "a torture of £4,000."

Then he left me in their hands.

"Treat him gently," he said. "I don't want him to get so exhausted that he dies before I begin to play with him."

As a beginning, they stripped me to the waist, and their cook put me close to a great fierce fire, where some lambs were being fried. The red cinders fell about me, and the heat was unsupportable. I dragged myself away on my hands--I could not use my feet--but the ruffian kicked me back. Then he left me for a moment to get some salt and pepper. I remembered that I had put the arsenic in my trousers pocket. With a supreme effort I rose up and scattered the powder over the meat.

"What are you doing?" said the cook. "Trying to cast a spell on our food?"

He had only seen, from a distance, the motion of my hand. I was avenged!

Suddenly I heard a cry: "The king! Where is the king?" And Dimitri, the son of Christodulos, came running up.

"Good God!" he said when he saw me. "The poor girl!"

The cook was so astonished that he forgot me for a minute; and I managed to crawl away and lay on the cold grass. Then Hadgi Stavros appeared. With a cry of anguish he took me gently in his arms, and carried me to the cave among the rocks.

"Poor boy!" he said. "How you have suffered! But you will soon be well. I once had sixty strokes of the bastinado, and two days afterwards I was dancing the Romaika. It was this ointment that cured me."

"But what has happened?" I murmured.

"Read that!" he cried, throwing me a letter. "What a pirate! What an assassin! If I only had you and your friend, one in each hand! Oh, he won't do it! Will he?"

The letter was from John Harris. It ran:

"Hadgi Stavros,--Photini is now on my ship, the _Fancy_, which carries four guns. She remains a hostage as long as Hermann Schultz remains a prisoner. As you treat my friend, so I will treat your daughter. She shall pay hair for hair, tooth for tooth, head for head. Answer at once, or I will come and see you.--JOHN HARRIS."

"I know Photini," I said to the king, "and I swear that she will not be harmed. But I must return to Athens at once. Get four of your men to carry me down the mountains in a litter."

The king rose up, and then groaned and staggered. I remembered the arsenic. He must have eaten some of the meat. I tickled the inside of his throat, and he brought up most of the poison. Soon afterwards the other brigands came up to the enclosure, screaming with pain, and wanted to murder me. I had cast a spell over their meat, and it was torturing them, they cried. I must be killed at once, and then the spell would be removed. The king commanded them to withdraw. They resisted. He drew his saber, and cut down two of the ringleaders. The rest seized their guns and began to shoot. There were about sixty of them, all suffering, more or less, from the effects of arsenic poisoning. We were only twelve in number, but our men had the steadier aim; and the king fought like a hero, though his hands and feet were swelling painfully.

The fact was that he had eaten some time before his men, and I could not therefore get the poison completely out of his system. But it was the arsenic that saved his life. He had at last to come and lie down beside me. We heard the sound of rapid firing in the distance; and suddenly two men entered our enclosure, with revolvers in each hand, and shot down our defenders with an extraordinary quickness of aim. They were Harris and Lobster.

"Hermann, where are you?" Harris yelled at last, with all his strength, as he turned and found nothing more to shoot at.

"Here," I replied. "The men you've just killed have been fighting for me. There has been civil war in the camp."

"Well, we've stamped it out!" said Harris. "What's the matter with the old scoundrel lying beside you?"

"It's Hadgi Stavros," I said. "He and his men have been eating some arsenic I had in my collecting case."

My friends managed to carry me down the mountain, and at the first village we came to they got a carriage and took me to Athens. The ointment used by Hadgi Stavros was, as he had said, marvelous; and in two days I could walk as well as ever. I at once called on Mrs. and Miss Simons.

"They departed yesterday for Trieste," said the servant, "on their way to London."

As I was returning to Hermes Street I met Hadgi Stavros and Photini.

"How is it that the King of the Mountains is found walking in the streets of Athens?" I said.

"What can I do in the mountains now?" he replied. "All my men are killed, wounded or fled. I might get others. But look at my swollen hands. How can I use a sword? No; let some one younger now take my place. But I defy him to equal me in fame or fortune. And I have not done yet. Before six months are gone, you will see Hadgi Stavros, Prime Minister of Greece. Oh, there are more ways of making money than one!"

And that was the last I saw of the King of the Mountains. On the advice of Harris, I at once returned to Hamburg, lest some of the remaining brigands found me out, and take vengeance for the spell I had cast on their meat. But some day I hope to go to London, and call at 31, Cavendish Square.

* * * * *

HARRISON AINSWORTH

Tower of London

William Harrison Ainsworth, born at Manchester, England, Feb. 4, 1805, was a popular rather than a great writer. A solicitor's son, he was himself trained in the law, but some adventures in journalism led him finally to the literary life, his first success as a writer of romance being scored with "Rookwood" in 1834. "Tower of London" was the fourth work of the novelist, and, according to Ainsworth himself, it was written chiefly with the aim of interesting his fellow-countrymen in the historical associations of the Tower. From the popularity of the romance it is reasonable to suppose that it fulfilled its author's hopes in this respect, though it must be confessed its history leaves a good deal to be desired. Here is not the place to discuss the rights and wrongs of Ainsworth's bold liberties in respect to the historical personages he introduces; but there is no doubt that the romance is told with vigour and dramatic movement, and it is an excellent example of the novelist's spirited style of narrative, though, judged on purely literary merits, like his other works, the "Tower of London" will not bear comparison with the masterpieces of Sir Walter Scott in the field of historical romance. Ainsworth died at Reigate on January 3, 1882.

_I.--Prisoners in the Tower_

Edward VI. was dead, poisoned, it was rumoured, by the Duke of Northumberland, Grandmaster of the Realm. For three days had an attempt been made to keep his death secret, so that the proud and ambitious duke might seize the persons of the Princess Mary and the Princess Elizabeth. But the former, warned in time, had escaped the snare; and the Duke of Northumberland, finding further dissimulation useless, boldly proclaimed his daughter-in-law, Lady Jane Grey, queen.

On July 10, 1553, Queen Jane, the wisest and most beautiful woman in the kingdom, though only sixteen years of age, was conducted in state to the Tower, where it was the custom for the monarchs of England to spend the first few days of their reign.

But the crowds who watched her departure from Durham House, in the Strand, were silent and sullen. Her youthful beauty and grace might win an involuntary cry of admiration, but the heart of the people was not hers. They recognised that she was but the tool of her father-in-law, whom, because of his overweening ambition, they hated.

All the pride and pomp of silken banners and cloth of gold could not mask the gloomy presage of the young queen's reign. The very heavens thundered; and owing to the press of boats that surrounded the procession, many small craft were overturned and their occupants thrown into the water. And if further signs of portending evil were wanted, they could be discerned in the uneasy whisperings of those lords of the Privy Council who were present, or in the sinister face of the Spaniard, Simon Renard, ambassador to the Emperor Charles V.

"This farce will not last long," he said to De Noailles, the French ambassador. "The Privy Council are the duke's secret enemies, and through them I shall strike the scepter from Jane's grasp and place it in the hand of Mary."

Elsewhere in the procession, Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, uttered in a low voice to Ridley, Bishop of London, his fears for the future; while certain lords of the Privy Council, who had planned the assassination of the Duke of Northumberland, and were aware that their plot had been discovered, approached the portals of the Tower in fear and trembling.

But there was one man at least who did not share the general depression and uneasiness. Cuthbert Cholmondeley, esquire to Lord Guildford Dudley, husband of Queen Jane, found much to interest him in the scene. The reception of her Majesty by Og, Gog, and Magog had already driven away the sense of portending evil from his mind when he caught sight of a girl's face in the crowd. It was only for a moment that he had sight of it; but it left such a deep impression on his mind that for the rest of the day he burned with impatience to discover who the girl might be.

Much had to happen before he could satisfy his curiosity. Once in the Tower, plots against Queen Jane and the Duke of Northumberland began to thicken. At a meeting of the Privy Council the duke compelled the lords, under threat of imprisonment, to sign a proclamation declaring Princess Mary illegitimate. Renard lost no time in turning to his own advantage the bad impression created by these tactics.

"Do you consent to Northumberland's assassination?" he whispered to Pembroke.

"I do," replied the Earl of Pembroke. "But who will strike the blow?"

"I will find the man."

This sinister fragment of conversation fell upon the ears of Cuthbert. He at once sent a warning missive to his master, telling him of the plot against the duke's life. Then, this duty performed, he set out to try and find the girl whose face had so impressed him. From the giant warders he learnt that she was the adopted daughter of Dame Potentia Trusbut, wife of Peter, the pantler of the Tower. A mystery surrounded her birth. Her mother had been imprisoned in the Tower by Henry VIII., and in her dungeon had given birth to Cicely--such was the name of the girl.

Magog, seeing Cuthbert's interest, good-naturedly carried him off with him to the pantler's quarters. Here a gargantuan feast was in progress, to which the three giants did full justice, devouring whole joints and pasties and quaffing vast flagons of wine, to the great delight of the pantler and his wife. But Cuthbert had no eyes except for Cicely. He was not content until he was by her side and was able to hear her voice. The attraction between them was mutual, and it was not long before they were whispering the first words of love into one another's ears.

While all was merriment, Renard and Pembroke made their appearance unobserved. They had intercepted Cuthbert's letter, and were anxious to satisfy themselves as to the identity of the rash youth who had dared to cross their path.

"Though we have intercepted his missive to Lord Dudley," whispered Renard, "he may yet betray us. He must not return to the palace."

"He shall never return, my lords," said a tall, dark man, advancing towards them, "if you will entrust his detention to me."

"Who are you?" demanded Renard, eyeing him suspiciously.

"Lawrence Nightgall, the chief gaoler."

"What is your motive for this offer?"

"Look there!" returned Nightgall. "I love that damsel. He has supplanted me, but he shall not profit by his good fortune."

"You are the very man I want!" cried Renard, rubbing his hands gleefully. "Lead me where we can speak more freely."

The three withdrew unobserved. Half an hour later Cuthbert dragged himself unwillingly from Cicely's side and passed into the open air. As he did so he received a blow on the back of his head which stretched him unconscious on the ground.

When he came to his senses he found himself bound by a chain in a gloomy dungeon, a ghastly, dreadful place, but a few feet in height. His first instinct was to try to loosen his bonds, but after vainly lacerating his hands he sank down exhausted.

Terrible recollections flashed upon his mind of the pitiless sufferings he had heard that the miserable wretches immured in these dungeons endured before death.

For a time these mental tortures were acute; but at last nature asserted herself, and he sank exhausted into sleep. He was awakened by a cry, and perceived the tall, skeleton figure of a woman standing by him. She placed a thin and bony hand upon his shoulder. He shrank back as far as his chain would permit, horror-stricken. The figure pursued him, shrieking, "My child! My child! You have taken my child!"

Suddenly she stopped and stood erect. A distant footstep was heard.

"He comes! He comes!" she cried, and with a loud shriek dashed from the dungeon and disappeared.

In another second Nightgall stood before him. The gaoler made no attempt to disguise the motives which prompted him to imprison the young esquire. No threats that Cuthbert could use had the least effect on him. He quailed before the charge that Cuthbert made at random--that he had murdered the child of the unfortunate wretch who had disappeared at his coming, but on the question of his release he was obdurate. If Cuthbert would agree to give up Cicely he should be released; otherwise he should meet with a secret death at the hands of Mauger, the executioner.

At this juncture, Cicely, who had been directed by the dwarf, Xit, appeared. To save the man she loved she boldly declared that she would wed Nightgall, provided that he would conduct his prisoner outside the walls of the Tower.

"Bring me back some token that you have done so, and I am yours," she said.

Nightgall consented, and agreed to withdraw while Cuthbert and Cicely arranged privately what the token should be.

Hurriedly Cuthbert gave her a ring to send to Lord Dudley, who, he knew, would at once effect his release. Then, accompanied by Nightgall, Cicely withdrew from the gloomy dungeon.

Unable to deliver the ring herself to Lord Dudley, Cicely entrusted that task to Xit. But the vanity of the dwarf prevented the execution of the plan. As he was exhibiting the ring to Og, Nightgall suddenly approached, and snatched it from him, and, without taking any notice of the little man's threats, made his way to Cicely. When he displayed the ring as the token that her lover had been set free, Cicely, shrieking "Lost! Lost!" fell senseless on the floor.

_II.--The Twelfth Day Queen_

While Renard's intrigues were maturing, and the Duke of Northumberland had left the Tower on a campaign against the Princess Mary, Cuthbert Cholmondeley was kept languishing in his terrible dungeon.

At long intervals Nightgall visited him, and once the wretched prisoner, whom the gaoler called Alexia, came to him, entreating his help against Nightgall.

At last Cuthbert decided upon a daring plan of escape. After several days' imprisonment he feigned to be dead. Nightgall, seeing him stretched on the ground, apparently lifeless, chuckled with delight, and, releasing the chain that bound his leg, bent over him with the intention of carrying his body into the burial vault near the moat. But a suspicion crossed his mind, and he drew his dagger, determined to make sure that his prisoner had passed away. As he did so, the young esquire sprang to his feet, and wrested the poniard from his grasp. In another second Nightgall was lying chained to the floor, where his prisoner had been a moment before.

Despite the gaoler's threats, Cuthbert set out, determined to liberate Alexia and made good his own escape. He wandered through the terrible torture chambers, released an old man confined in a cell called Little Ease, a cell so low and so contrived that the wretched inmate could not stand, walk, sit, or lie at full length within, and then, unable to discover the whereabouts of the ill-fated Alexia, returned to the gaoler, and, possessing himself of his keys and cloak, started forth once more. After wandering for a long time, chance at last brought him to a secret door, which led into St. John's Chapel in the White Tower.

While these events were in progress Cicely, despairing of her lover's safety, sought an audience of Queen Jane, and poured out her story. Moved by compassion, the queen gave directions for a search to be made, and, delighted by the grace and charm of Cicely, appointed her one of her attendants. Lord Guildford Dudley, procuring the assistance of Magog, burst open the door leading to the subterranean dungeons beneath the Devilin Tower, and eventually discovered Nightgall, who made a full confession of his crime as the price of his release.

Cholmondeley's arrival in St. John's Chapel was opportune. Renard, with Pembroke by his side, had just demanded the resignation of the crown by Queen Jane, and the queen, helpless but courageous, had ordered Lord Pembroke to arrest the Spaniard. Pembroke had refused to move, and at this juncture Cholmondeley stepped forward, and, advancing towards the ambassador, said, "M. Simon Renard, you are the queen's prisoner."

The Spaniard drew his sword, and, with the assistance of the Earl of Pembroke, kept Cuthbert at bay until they were both able to slip through the secret door.

Next day, Queen Jane was forced by the Privy Council to resign her crown, and that same night, accompanied by Cuthbert and Cicely, she escaped by a secret passage from the Tower, and, taking a boat, made her way to Sion House. Here, the following day, she and her husband were arrested, and learnt the news that the Duke of Northumberland was in captivity, and that Queen Mary had ascended the throne. Once more Lady Jane was led back to the Tower, and as she entered by the Traitors' Gate she saw Renard standing hard by, with a smile of bitter mockery in his face.

"So," he said, "Epiphany is over. The Twelfth Day Queen has played her part."

_III.--The Price of Pardon_