CHAPTER LII.
After the defeat of Moses as a Turkish leader, and his return to his patriotic allegiance, there was a lull in active hostilities between the two powers. Amesa, like other of the prominent voivodes in Scanderbeg's army, took the occasion offered to look after his own estates. He had added somewhat to his local importance by marrying the daughter of a neighboring land-owner. But neither conjugal delights, nor the additional acres his marriage brought him, covered his ambition. His envy of Castriot had deepened into inveterate hatred.
The Voivode sat alone in the great dining hall of his castle. It was late in the night. As the blazing logs at one end of the room cast alternately their glare and shadows around, the rude furniture seemed to be thrown into a witching dance. Helmets and corselets gleamed bravely from their pegs, suggesting that they were animated by heroic souls. The great bear-skin, with its enormous head, lying at the Voivode's feet, crouched in readiness to receive the lunge of the boar's tusks which threatened it from the corner. Pikes, spears, bows and broad-mouthed arquebuses were ranged about, as if to defend their owner, should any demon inspire these lifeless forms for sudden assault upon him.
Amesa had been sitting upon a low seat between the fire and a half-drained tankard of home-brewed liquor, his brows knit with the concentration of his thoughts.
A slight sound without arrested his attention.
"Drakul is late, but is coming at last. If only he has brought me the red forelock of that fellow who used to be always crossing my track, and has now come back to Albania!" he said, in a tone of musing, but intended to be heard by the delinquent as the great oaken door creaked behind him. Raising his eyes, but not turning his head to look, Amesa changed his soliloquy into a volley of oaths at the comer.
"I thought your name-sake, Drakul, had run off with you, you lazy imp.[106] What kept you?"
"A long journey," was the reply.
Amesa started to his feet, for the voice was not that of Drakul. He faced one whose appearance was not the less startling because it was familiar.
"I have brought the red forelock myself," said the visitor.
Amesa stared stupidly an instant, then reached toward his weapon lying upon the table near.
"Stop!" said the man, laying the flat side of his sword across the Voivode's arm before he could grasp his yataghan.
"How dare you intrude yourself unbidden here!" cried the enraged Amesa.
"It required no daring," was the cool reply, "for I am the stronger."
"Help! Help!" shouted the voivode, as he realized that he would not be permitted to reach his weapon.
The door swung, and a band of strange men stood in the opening.
"I feared, noble Amesa," said the intruder, "that I should not be a welcome guest, and so brought with me a party of friends to help me to good cheer while under your roof. You need not disturb your servants to help you, for, if they should hear, they could not obey, as they are all safely guarded in their quarters. If they should come out they might be harmed. Let them rest. Retire, men! You recognize me, Lord Amesa?"
"Ay. You are Arnaud's whelp," sneered the entrapped man.
"More gentle words would befit the courtesy of my host," was the quiet reply. "But you are as much mistaken as when you took the simple witted Elissa on my commendation. Do not respond, Sire! In your heat you might say that which pride would prevent your recalling. I am a Moslem soldier, and you are my prisoner; as secure as if you were in Constantinople." The visitor threw off the Albanian cape, and revealed the elegantly wrought jacket of the Janizary Aga.
"And what would you have of me? Is there nothing that can satisfy you less than my life?" asked Amesa.
"My noble Amesa," said Ballaban Aga, taking a seat and motioning the Voivode to another. "Years ago I gave you my word in honor that I would serve you against Scanderbeg. I have come to redeem that pledge, and you must help me."
"How can that be, if you are an officer of the Moslems?" asked Amesa, taking the seat, and adopting the low tone of the other; for these words had excited in him all his cupidity, and stirred his natural secretiveness and habit of sinister dealing. His eyes ceased to glare like a tiger's when at bay; they shone now like a snake's.
"Amesa must enter the service of the Padishah."
"Impossible!" cried he; but in a tone that indicated, not indignant rejection of the proposition; rather doubt of its practicability.
"But first you must raise here in Albania the standard of revolt against Scanderbeg, claiming the title of king of Epirus and the Dibrias for yourself. Scanderbeg's sword will, of course, compel the next step—your safety in the Turkish camp. The Padishah will then become your patron, offering to withdraw his armies and restore the ancient liberties of the country, with the solitary limitation that you shall acknowledge the suzerainty of the Sultan. The revenues you may collect shall remain in your possession for the strengthening of your local power. The defection of Moses Goleme well nigh destroyed the leadership of Scanderbeg—yours will complete the work. Yet it will not be defection; rather, as Moses Goleme regarded it, the truest service of your country, because the only service that is practicable."
"But I cannot thus break with the patriot leaders," said Amesa, apparently having felt a real touch of honor.
"It must be," replied the Aga. "You cannot longer remain as you are, even if you would. You, Sire, have been guilty of some great crime. Nay, do not deny it! Nor need you take time to give expression to any wrath you may feel on being plainly accused of it," continued Ballaban, silencing Amesa more effectively by the straight look into his eyes than by his words. "My moments here are too few to talk about the matter, and you should have exhausted any feeling you may have had in private penitence heretofore, rather than reserve it until another person lays it to your charge. But the point is this:—Scanderbeg is aware of your crime, and awaits only the opportune moment to punish you as it deserves."
"How do you know that?" said Amesa, the bright gleam of his eye changing to a stony stare, as the color failed from his face, and he leaned back in ghastly consternation.
"It is enough that I know it. The Janizaries have not roamed these Albanian hills for twelve years without finding out the secrets of the country. The holes in the ground are our ears, and the very owls spy for us through the dark. But enough of words. Sign this, and set to it your seal!"
Ballaban presented a parchment, offering formally, in the name of the Sultan, the government of Albania to Amesa, on the condition set forth above.
"I would consider the"—began Amesa; but he was cut short by Ballaban—
"No! sign instantly! I have done for you all the considering that is necessary, and must be gone."
"But," began Amesa again, "so important a matter—"
"Sign instantly!" repeated Ballaban; and, pointing to the door where the soldiers stood waiting their orders—"or neither Amesa nor his castle will exist until the day breaks."
The baffled man took from a niche in the wall a horn of thickened ink, and, with the wooden pen, made his signature, and pressed the ancient seal of the De Streeses against the ball of softened wax attached to it.
"This will serve to keep you true: for if by the next fulness of the moon Amesa's standard be not raised against Scanderbeg's, this, as evidence of your treason, shall be read in all your Albanian camps," said Ballaban, placing the document in his bosom. "And should you need to confer with your new friends, your faithful Drakul may inquire at our lines for Ballaban Badera, Aga of the Janizaries."
With a low salâm he withdrew. A few muffled orders, a shuffling of feet, and the castle was as quiet as the stars that looked down upon it.