At last, by pressing and much questioning, I got the story from them, and here it is; for it was by no means so ordinary a matter as Denny’s modesty would have had me think. When the consternation caused by the cutting of our rope had passed away, a hurried council decided them to press on with all speed, and they took their way along a narrow, damp and slippery ledge of rock which encircled the basin. So perilous did the track seem that Hogvardt insisted on their being roped as though for a mountaineering ascent, and thus they continued the journey. The first opening from the basin they found without much difficulty. Now the rope proved useful, for Denny, passing through first, fell headlong into space and most certainly would have perished but for the support his companions gave him. The track turned at right angles to the left, and Denny had walked straight over the edge of the rock. Sobered by this accident and awake to their peril (it must be remembered that they had no lantern), they groped their way slowly and cautiously, up and down, in and out. Hours passed. Watkins, less accustomed than the others to a physical strain, could hardly lift his feet. All this while the dim glimmer which Denny had seen retreated before them, appearing to grow no nearer for all their efforts. They walked, as they found afterwards—or walked, crawled, scrambled and jumped—for eleven hours, their haste and anxiety allowed no pause for rest. Then they seemed to see the end, for the winding tortuous track appeared at last to make up its mind. It took a straight downward line, and Denny’s hard-learned caution vanishing, he started along it at a trot and with a hearty hurrah. He tempted fate. The slope became suddenly a drop. This time all three fell with a splash and a thud into a deep pool, one on the top of the other. Here they scrambled for some minutes, Watkins coming very near to finding an end of the troubles of his eventful service. But Denny and Hogvardt managed to get him out. The path began again. Content with its last freak, it pursued now a business-like way, the glimmer grew to a gleam, the gleam spread into a glad blaze. ‘The sea, the sea!’ cried Denny. A last spurt landed them in a cave that bordered on the blue waters. What they did on that I could by no means persuade them to tell; but had I been there I should have thanked God and shaken hands; and thus, I dare say, did they. And besides that, they lay there, dog-tired and beaten, for an hour or more, in one of those despondent fits that assail even brave men, making sure that I was dead or taken, and that their own chances of escape were small, and, since I was dead or taken, hardly worth the seeking.
They were roused by an old man, who suddenly entered the cave, bearing a bundle of sticks in his arms. At sight of them he dropped his load and turned to fly; but they were on him in an instant, seizing him and crying to know who he was. He had as many questions for them; and when he learned who they were and how they had come, he raised his hands in wonder, and told Hogvardt, who alone could make him understand, that their fears were well grounded. He had met a Neopalian but an hour since, and the talk in all the island was of how the stranger had killed Vlacho and been taken by Kortes, and would die on the next day; for this was the early morning of the feast-day. Denny was for a dash; but a dash meant certain death. Watkins was ready for the venture, though the poor fellow could hardly crawl. Hogvardt held firm to the chance that more cautious measures gave. The old man’s comrades were away at their fishing-grounds, ten miles out at sea; but he had a boat down on the beach. Thither they went, and set out under the fisherman’s guidance, pulling in desperate perseverance, with numb weary limbs, under the increasing heat of the sun. But their wills asked too much of their bodies. Watkins dropped his oar with a groan; Denny’s moved weakly and uselessly through the water that hardly stirred under its blade; Hogvardt at last flung himself into the stern with one groan of despair. The old fisherman cast resigned eyes up to heaven, and the boat tossed motionlessly on the water. Thus they lay while I fought my duel with Constantine Stefanopoulos on the other side of Neopalia.
Then, while they were still four miles from the fishing-fleet, where lay their only known chance of succour for me or for themselves, there came suddenly to their incredulous eyes a shape on the sea and a column of smoke. Denny’s spring forward went near to capsizing the boat. Oars were seized again, weariness fled before hope, the gunboat came in view, growing clear and definite. She moved quickly towards them, they slowly, yet eagerly, to her; the interval grew less and less. They shouted before they could be heard, and shouted still in needless caution long after they had been heard. A boat put out to them: they were taken on board, their story heard with shrugs of wonder. Mouraki could not be seen. ‘I’ll see him!’ cried Denny, and Hogvardt plied the recalcitrant officer with smooth entreaties. The life of a man was at stake! But he could not be seen. The life of an Englishman! His Excellency slept through the heat of the day. The life of an English lord! His Excellency would be angry, but—! The contents of Denny’s pocket, wild boasts of my power and position (I was a favourite at Court, and so forth), at last clinched the matter. His Excellency should be roused; heaven knew what he would say, but he should be roused. He went to Neopalia next week; now he was sailing past it, to inspect another island; perhaps he would alter the order of his voyage. He was fond of Englishmen. It was a great lord, was it not? So, at last, when Hogvardt was at his tongue’s end, and Denny almost mad with rage, Mouraki was roused. He heard their story, and pondered on it, with leisurely strokings of his beard and keen long glances of his sharp eyes. At last came the word, ‘To the island then!’ and a cheer from the three, which Mouraki suffered with patient uplifted brows. Thus came Mouraki to Neopalia; thus came, as I hoped, an end to our troubles.
More than the half-hour which the Governor had given me passed swiftly in the narrative; then came Mouraki’s summons and my story to him, heard with courteous impassivity, received at its end with plentiful assurances of redress for me and punishment for the islanders.
‘The island shall be restored to you,’ said he. ‘You shall have every compensation, Lord Wheatley. These Neopalians shall learn their lesson.’
‘I want nothing but justice on Constantine,’ said I. ‘The island I have given back.’
‘That goes for nothing,’ said he. ‘It was under compulsion: we shall not acknowledge it. The island is certainly yours. Your title has been recognised: you could not transfer it without the consent of my Government.’
I did not pursue the argument. If Mouraki chose to hand the island back to me, I supposed that I could, after such more or less tedious forms as were necessary, restore it to Phroso. For the present the matter was of small moment; for Mouraki was there with his men, and the power of the Lord—or Lady—of Neopalia in abeyance. The island was at the feet of the Governor.
Indeed such was its attitude, and great was the change in the islanders when, in the cool of the evening, I walked up the street by Mouraki’s side escorted by soldiers and protected by the great gun of the gunboat commanding the town. There were many women to watch us, few men, and these unarmed, with downcast eyes and studious meekness of bearing. Mouraki seemed to detect my surprise.
‘They made a disturbance here three years ago,’ said he, ‘and I came. They have not forgotten.’