Greek Wedding (3 page)

‘That's better than our Hudson River steamboats—but then of course they're larger. I expect your
Helena
is faster too.'

‘You really were in the Sultan's harem?' He shocked himself by the abruptness of the question.

‘Why, yes, I told you so.' And then, taking pity on him. ‘I expect you do not rightly understand what it means, Mr. Renshaw. But you speak Turkish?'

‘My father was here in the diplomatic service when I was a boy. But as to the harem'—how could she speak about it so casually?—‘I don't suppose any European knows much about that.'

‘No.' She had seated herself at the saloon table and stared down thoughtfully at her thin white hands. ‘Will it make you feel happier, Mr. Renshaw, to know that I was merely in training for the Sultan's favours? I was really beginning to hope that I was, simply, too old for him.'

‘Nothing of the kind,' said Cassandra Knight. ‘Remember what happened last week, when the golden bell rang. If it hadn't been for the Janissaries you'd be a Guzdeh by now.'

‘Darling Cass! You wouldn't want me to take second place even in the harem! But poor Mr. Renshaw is looking more perplexed than ever. It's all Greek to him. You should explain—if you really wish to trumpet my success—that the ladies of the Sultan's harem are as strictly regimented as the soldiers in his army—more successfully so, you might say, than those wretched Janissaries. We had our ranks, with their duties and privileges—' The savage irony of her tone belied the word. ‘First the Odalisque, trained by her preceptors in a thousand arts of seduction to please her royal master.' Her laugh was harsh. ‘Don't look so alarmed, Mr. Renshaw. I won't go into details, nor was I at all an apt pupil. Mere bad luck made me catch the Sultan's eye on his latest visit to the harem. I thought I'd be safe if I only looked sullen enough while the others sighed and ogled. It worked just the other way. When I was summoned out of that twittering crowd and met the royal eye for the first time
I knew my mistake. Sullen himself, Sultan Mahmoud was bored with his bevy of adoring houris. It was to me that he threw the handkerchief. I was to be a Guzdeh—marked for his pleasure. I knew then that I must escape or die.' She laughed again, showing perfect white teeth. ‘I had pretended toothache off and on ever since I reached Constantinople. They are lavish with their opium in the harem: I had enough saved to dispose of half my furious rivals let alone the two of us. But the air was already full of rumours about trouble with the Janissaries. I was not much enamoured of death. Time enough for that when the summons came. I had made friends with a Kadine, the mother of one of the Sultan's sons—in so far as friendship was possible in that place. Of course she wanted me out of the way—but she risked her life to help me. She knew, you see, that the Sultan intended to make an end of the Janissaries next time they beat their kettle-drums and went on the rampage. That would be our chance, she said. In the general chaos. She was right. And when I saw the
Helena
come steaming into the Golden Horn last week, it seemed like a direct intervention of Providence. Have you ever thought of yourself as the answer to prayer, Mr. Renshaw?'

‘Hardly.' It jolted him extraordinarily to hear her talk, so casually, of the suicide's death he had planned for himself. Had planned? Nothing was changed. It was merely to wait until he had got rid of these two women. ‘What I don't understand,' he said now, ‘is how it happened. How in the world did you come to find yourselves in the Sultan's power?'

‘Algerian pirates.' Her hands, so still before, writhed for a moment on the table. ‘They boarded us at night—just this side of the Straits of Gibraltar. We hadn't a chance—a merchant ship—taken unawares. If father had been captain instead of merely a passenger it would have been another story. As it was'—a long shudder shook her—‘he was cut down, in front of our cabin door. I don't know what happened to the others. Aunt Cass and I were set apart, right from the beginning. We were lucky, I suppose. Flattering, wasn't it? A gift from the Dey of Algiers to his master the Sultan. And never a chance of escape, till today. Oh, they treated us well enough—they wanted me in looks!' She rose, suddenly, furiously, to her feet and prowled across the room to the gold-framed looking-glass Brett had hung for Helena. ‘How I hate this white face, these useless—hands—'
She turned them over. ‘I actually blistered them rowing out here.'

‘Good gracious, so you did.' Her aunt was on her feet in a flash.

‘Oh, don't fuss, Aunt Cass.' And then, as the door opened to reveal a servant with a loaded tray: ‘Look, food! Real western food, and forks to eat it with. Will it shock you, Mr. Renshaw, if I admit to being most vulgarly famished?'

‘Of course not.' But it did shock him. Even at the best of times frail Helena had been above such mundane pleasures as food. He remembered her so well, sitting, gracefully drooped, like a snowdrop, a lily, through course after course of a London dinner, taking only a bite or two, here and there, of some specially favoured dish. He remembered, too, how he had studied her tastes in those happy weeks before their marriage, and urged the
Helena's
chef to lay in ample supplies of the fragile delicacies she liked best. Merely to have heard a story like Miss Vannick's would have brought on one of Helena's nervous spasms. And here was this extraordinary young woman proclaiming herself ‘vulgarly famished'.

He welcomed Captain Barlow's appearance with heartfelt relief and began at once to question him about the voyage to Zante.

‘One thing at a time.' Barlow was a hard man to hurry. ‘Let's get clear of the Dardanelles first. I wish I knew what kind of a posting system the Turks have along the shore. If any word of this affair gets to the narrows before we do, we're as good as dead, the lot of us. I've been thinking about it up there on deck. On engines alone, we should get there tomorrow evening some time. I mean to see to it that we don't enter the straits until after dark. You remember the nine days' wonder we were coming up? This time, with your permission, sir, I propose to burn enough kitchen waste on the boiler to give an even greater volume of smoke than usual. If they think we're on fire, they won't want to stop us. They're terrified of fire, the Turks.' He turned to explain this to Miss Vannick. ‘That's how the Greeks have managed to keep their fleet at bay—they send in fireships and panic them.'

Phyllida Vannick leaned forward eagerly. ‘What is the news of the Greek war? It didn't sound good: what we heard in the harem. Are the Turks really winning again?'

‘Why should they not?' Brett Renshaw broke in angrily. ‘I suppose it's understandable that you, Miss Vannick, as an American, may find yourself in sympathy with the Greek rebels, but it's more than I do. They're murderers, truce-breakers, pirates … why, they can't even agree among themselves. Was it two governments or three they had going at once, Barlow, when we were there? It's no wonder if they've lost Missolonghi at last. I'm just surprised they managed to hold it for so long.'

‘Lost Missolonghi?' If possible, Phyllida was whiter than ever, and her hand clutched convulsively on the stem of her wine glass. ‘Are you sure?'

‘I wouldn't say so otherwise. We stopped for water at Nauplia two weeks ago. They'd just had the news. As bad as it could be: the whole town was in mourning. Just like the Greeks; cut each other's throat one day; celebrate the funeral with pomp and circumstance the next. If their sailors had stood to their post, the Egyptian, Ibrahim Pasha, would never have been able to join the siege.'

‘He was there too?'

‘Yes. By all reports he's pretty well subdued the Morea. I suppose he thought he'd share the glory of Missolonghi with Reshid Pasha. The defenders saw the writing on the wall when he got there. They planned a breakout, the whole lot of them, women, children and all. Let me give you some more wine, Miss Vannick.'

‘But what happened?'

‘They were betrayed. By a Bulgarian, it's said. It might just as well have been a Greek. You can't trust them farther than you can see them. Look what happened to that leader of theirs, Odysseus. “Killed trying to escape.” I fancy I've heard that one before.'

‘Mr. Renshaw!' Was he pleased to detect a tremor in her voice? ‘Will you please tell me just what happened at Missolonghi?'

‘But I did. They planned a breakout, and were betrayed. The Turks were waiting for them. And that was that. Lucky for Lord Byron he didn't live to see that day.'

‘They were all killed?'

‘Of course they were. After all, they set the style. Look what happened to the Turkish garrisons at the beginning of the rebellion when they surrendered under promise of “safety”. And
here there was no question of a surrender. A terrible business, of course.' It was a belated acknowledgment of her white, still attention. ‘The women and children … Mr Meyer who edited the
Missolonghi Chronicle
… and I don't know how many Philhellenes, poor crazy fools.'

‘Crazy?' She had given up any pretence at eating. ‘Mr. Renshaw, you have not asked me why we came to the Mediterranean, my father, Aunt Cass and I.'

‘No. I thought it no affair of mine.'

‘Nor is it. But I shall tell you just the same. We came to look for my younger brother, who ran away from home four years ago. A “crazy Philhellene”, Mr Renshaw, and the last news we had of him was from Missolonghi.'

‘But that was a year ago, Phyl.' Miss Knight leaned forward to break the shocked silence. ‘He may have left long since.'

‘A year of siege and danger. Can you imagine that Peter would have considered leaving at such a time? Of deserting his friends?'

‘Miss Vannick.' This was Captain Barlow. ‘Mr. Renshaw's not quite right, you know. I don't want to raise false hopes, but a few of the defenders did manage to escape and join the brigand leader Karaiskakis in the mountains. But only a very few, mind.'

‘Oh, thank you! No—I'll try not to hope too much, but how can I hope…' She turned to Brett. ‘Mr. Renshaw, would it be too much to ask? Do you think we could stop at Nauplia and find out if there is any more news? They'll know there, won't they, if anywhere?'

‘I suppose we could.' It sounded grudging, even to him.

‘We'll have to stop somewhere for water,' said Barlow. ‘And to scour out the boilers. I'd thought of Smyrna, but with things as they are, I think we'd do well to keep right away from the Turks. And that reminds me: I'm afraid you and your aunt had best keep below decks tomorrow, Miss Vannick. We don't want to set tongues on shore wagging by the sight of women on board, and we'll be close in to land most of the day.'

‘Of course. God knows, we don't want to put you in any more danger than we already have. I've not begun to thank you properly.' She was speaking more to Barlow than Renshaw. ‘I don't see how I can. As for tomorrow, now I'm safe, I feel as if I could sleep all day. I'm only sorry it has to be in your cabin,
Mr. Renshaw.' His man had been busy moving his effects into Captain Barlow's cabin. ‘And poor Captain Barlow, too.'

‘That's all right, miss.' Aware of Brett's brooding silence, the captain answered for them both. ‘There are worse things happen at sea. I just hope you and your aunt will be comfortable. I'm afraid we've not much to offer you ladies—' And then, struck by a sudden thought: ‘Mr. Renshaw, would you think it presuming if I reminded you of the boxful of things in the hold?'

‘Yes!' He was on his feet as if a spring had snapped inside him. And then, with an effort: ‘I mean, no. Do whatever you please, Captain. It's your ship. Good night.'

‘Oh dear,' said Phyllida as the saloon door shut behind him.

‘What's the matter with the poor man?' asked Miss Knight.

‘You just bear with him, ma'am.' Captain Barlow was glad of the chance to explain. ‘He doesn't mean a word of it: not really. I know he must have seemed unwelcoming, harsh even, to you two ladies, but, you see, it's like this: he had the
Helena
specially built for his honeymoon. There wasn't anything good enough for his lady—for Miss Helena—not by his way of thinking. Planned and replanned, this boat was; designed and redesigned till I thought she never would be launched. Poor Mr. Renshaw. It took years … I never did know whether it was his idea to delay the wedding till the ship was ready, or hers. Though, mind you, I'd venture a guess. It was a bad idea for Mr. Renshaw; that's for sure. The ship was ready at last, and the day set for the wedding. We'd champagne on board, and quails in aspic and potted grouse and a lot of other knickknacks and kickshaws, and then, a week before the wedding, comes the news that the Duchess has had a son. Mr. Renshaw was the heir, you know. They'd been out of England, see, her and the Duke, and anyway, what with one thing and another—the old Duke being the age he was, and the state he was in—no one reckoned there was a chance. Except Miss Helena, if you ask me. Sharp, she was, though poor Mr. Renshaw never saw it. I always thought she was glad the ship took so long a-building. It gave her a chance to hedge her bets, don't you see? She certainly changed her mind times enough and set things back. She said her say pretty quick when the bad news came. No Dukedom, no marriage. Just like that. I never saw anything so downright cruel in my life, ma'am.' He had been addressing
himself throughout to Cassandra Knight. ‘Mr. Renshaw, he was brought up to be a Duke; it's what he's trained for, knows how to do, could do well though I admit you might not think so after seeing him today. But to have that taken away from him, so sudden, and the woman he loved, all in one breath like. Well, no wonder he's in a state. And you know what she did? Miss Helena?'

‘No?' Cassandra Knight leaned forward with gratifying interest.