The Lady of the Shroud, Bram Stoker [most life changing books .txt] 📗

one of many.

My guns shall be trained on Ilsin, to which end I have come inshore.

You and your companions have free conduct back to port; such is due

to the white flag which you fly. Fifteen minutes will bring you back

whence you came. Go! And remember that whatever you may do amongst

your mountain defiles, at sea you cannot even defend yourselves.”

 

GOSPODAR (slowly and in a ringing voice). “The Land of the Blue

Mountains has its own defences on sea and land. Its people know how

to defend themselves.”

 

CAPTAIN (taking out his watch). “It is now close on five bells. At

the first stroke of six bells our guns shall open fire.”

 

GOSPODAR (calmly). “It is my last duty to warn you, sir—and to warn

all on this ship—that much may happen before even the first stroke

of six bells. Be warned in time, and give over this piratical

attack, the very threat of which may be the cause of much bloodshed.”

 

CAPTAIN (violently). “Do you dare to threaten me, and, moreover, my

ship’s company? We are one, I tell you, in this ship; and the last

man shall perish like the first ere this enterprise fail. Go!”

 

With a bow, the Gospodar turned and went down the ladder, we

following him. In a couple of minutes the yacht was on her way to

the port.

 

FROM RUPERT’S JOURNAL.

July 10, 1907.

 

When we turned shoreward after my stormy interview with the pirate

Captain—I can call him nothing else at present, Rooke gave orders to

a quartermaster on the bridge, and The Lady began to make to a little

northward of Ilsin port. Rooke himself went aft to the wheel-house,

taking several men with him.

 

When we were quite near the rocks—the water is so deep here that

there is no danger—we slowed down, merely drifting along southwards

towards the port. I was myself on the bridge, and could see all over

the decks. I could also see preparations going on upon the warship.

Ports were opened, and the great guns on the turrets were lowered for

action. When we were starboard broadside on to the warship, I saw

the port side of the steering-house open, and Rooke’s men sliding out

what looked like a huge grey crab, which by tackle from within the

wheel-house was lowered softly into the sea. The position of the

yacht hid the operation from sight of the warship. The doors were

shut again, and the yacht’s pace began to quicken. We ran into the

port. I had a vague idea that Rooke had some desperate project on

hand. Not for nothing had he kept the wheel-house locked on that

mysterious crab.

 

All along the frontage was a great crowd of eager men. But they had

considerately left the little mole at the southern entrance, whereon

was a little tower, on whose round top a signal-gun was placed, free

for my own use. When I was landed on this pier I went along to the

end, and, climbing the narrow stair within, went out on the sloping

roof. I stood up, for I was determined to show the Turks that I was

not afraid for myself, as they would understand when the bombardment

should begin. It was now but a very few minutes before the fatal

hour—six bells. But all the same I was almost in a state of

despair. It was terrible to think of all those poor souls in the

town who had done nothing wrong, and who were to be wiped out in the

coming blood-thirsty, wanton attack. I raised my glasses to see how

preparations were going on upon the warship.

 

As I looked I had a momentary fear that my eyesight was giving way.

At one moment I had the deck of the warship focussed with my glasses,

and could see every detail as the gunners waited for the word to

begin the bombardment with the great guns of the barbettes. The next

I saw nothing but the empty sea. Then in another instant there was

the ship as before, but the details were blurred. I steadied myself

against the signal-gun, and looked again. Not more than two, or at

the most three, seconds had elapsed. The ship was, for the moment,

full in view. As I looked, she gave a queer kind of quick shiver,

prow and stern, and then sideways. It was for all the world like a

rat shaken in the mouth of a skilled terrier. Then she remained

still, the one placid thing to be seen, for all around her the sea

seemed to shiver in little independent eddies, as when water is

broken without a current to guide it.

 

I continued to look, and when the deck was, or seemed, quite still—

for the shivering water round the ship kept catching my eyes through

the outer rays of the lenses—I noticed that nothing was stirring.

The men who had been at the guns were all lying down; the men in the

fighting-tops had leaned forward or backward, and their arms hung

down helplessly. Everywhere was desolation—in so far as life was

concerned. Even a little brown bear, which had been seated on the

cannon which was being put into range position, had jumped or fallen

on deck, and lay there stretched out—and still. It was evident that

some terrible shock had been given to the mighty war-vessel. Without

a doubt or a thought why I did so, I turned my eyes towards where The

Lady lay, port broadside now to the inside, in the harbour mouth. I

had the key now to the mystery of Rooke’s proceedings with the great

grey crab.

 

As I looked I saw just outside the harbour a thin line of cleaving

water. This became more marked each instant, till a steel disc with

glass eyes that shone in the light of the sun rose above the water.

It was about the size of a beehive, and was shaped like one. It made

a straight line for the aft of the yacht. At the same moment, in

obedience to some command, given so quietly that I did not hear it,

the men went below—all save some few, who began to open out doors in

the port side of the wheel-house. The tackle was run out through an

opened gangway on that side, and a man stood on the great hook at the

lower end, balancing himself by hanging on the chain. In a few

seconds he came up again. The chain tightened and the great grey

crab rose over the edge of the deck, and was drawn into the wheel-house, the doors of which were closed, shutting in a few only of the

men.

 

I waited, quite quiet. After a space of a few minutes, Captain Rooke

in his uniform walked out of the wheel-house. He entered a small

boat, which had been in the meantime lowered for the purpose, and was

rowed to the steps on the mole. Ascending these, he came directly

towards the signal-tower. When he had ascended and stood beside me,

he saluted.

 

“Well?” I asked.

 

“All well, sir,” he answered. “We shan’t have any more trouble with

that lot, I think. You warned that pirate—I wish he had been in

truth a clean, honest, straightforward pirate, instead of the measly

Turkish swab he was—that something might occur before the first

stroke of six bells. Well, something has occurred, and for him and

all his crew that six bells will never sound. So the Lord fights for

the Cross against the Crescent! Bismillah. Amen!” He said this in

a manifestly formal way, as though declaiming a ritual. The next

instant he went on in the thoroughly practical conventional way which

was usual to him:

 

“May I ask a favour, Mr. Sent Leger?”

 

“A thousand, my dear Rooke,” I said. “You can’t ask me anything

which I shall not freely grant. And I speak within my brief from the

National Council. You have saved Ilsin this day, and the Council

will thank you for it in due time.”

 

“Me, sir?” he said, with a look of surprise on his face which seemed

quite genuine. “If you think that, I am well out of it. I was

afraid, when I woke, that you might court-martial me!”

 

“Court-martial you! What for?” I asked, surprised in my turn.

 

“For going to sleep on duty, sir! And the fact is, I was worn out in

the attack on the Silent Tower last night, and when you had your

interview with the pirate—all good pirates forgive me for the

blasphemy! Amen!—and I knew that everything was going smoothly, I

went into the wheel-house and took forty winks.” He said all this

without moving so much as an eyelid, from which I gathered that he

wished absolute silence to be observed on my part. Whilst I was

revolving this in my mind he went on:

 

“Touching that request, sir. When I have left you and the Voivode—

and the Voivodin, of course—at Vissarion, together with such others

as you may choose to bring there with you, may I bring the yacht back

here for a spell? I rather think that there is a good deal of

cleaning up to be done, and the crew of The Lady with myself are the

men to do it. We shall be back by nightfall at the creek.”

 

“Do as you think best, Admiral Rooke,” I said.

 

“Admiral?”

 

“Yes, Admiral. At present I can only say that tentatively, but by

to-morrow I am sure the National Council will have confirmed it. I

am afraid, old friend, that your squadron will be only your flagship

for the present; but later we may do better.”

 

“So long as I am Admiral, your honour, I shall have no other flagship

than The Lady. I am not a young man, but, young or old, my pennon

shall float over no other deck. Now, one other favour, Mr. Sent

Leger? It is a corollary of the first, so I do not hesitate to ask.

May I appoint Lieutenant Desmond, my present First Officer, to the

command of the battleship? Of course, he will at first only command

the prize crew; but in such case he will fairly expect the

confirmation of his rank later. I had better, perhaps, tell you,

sir, that he is a very capable seaman, learned in all the sciences

that pertain to a battleship, and bred in the first navy in the

world.”

 

“By all means, Admiral. Your nomination shall, I think I may promise

you, be confirmed.”

 

Not another word we spoke. I returned with him in his boat to The

Lady, which was brought to the dock wall, where we were received with

tumultuous cheering.

 

I hurried off to my Wife and the Voivode. Rooke, calling Desmond to

him, went on the bridge of The Lady, which turned, and went out at

terrific speed to the battleship, which was already drifting up

northward on the tide.

 

FROM THE REPORT OF CRISTOFEROS, SCRIBE OF THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF THE

LAND OF THE BLUE MOUNTAINS.

July 8, 1907.

 

The meeting of the National Council, July 6, was but a continuation

of that held before the rescue of the Voivodin Vissarion, the members

of the Council having been during the intervening night housed in the

Castle of Vissarion. When, in the early morning, they met, all were

jubilant; for late at night the fire-signal had flamed up from Ilsin

with the glad news that the Voivode Peter Vissarion was safe, having

been rescued with great daring on an aeroplane by his daughter and

the Gospodar Rupert, as the people call him—Mister Rupert Sent

Leger, as he is in his British name and degree.

 

Whilst