"Don't you start hollering so loud," he said, severely.
She apologized, and presently Michael reached them.
"Wal, mister," said the Greek, "I guess you saw me kill that dog. Come and look at him."
He turned the dead man's face to the moon. On the forehead, on the chin, and on each cheek the flesh had been sliced away to form Π.
"Προδὁτης," explained the corporal. "Traitor in American. I'm an American citizen, but I'm a Greek man, too. I fought in the last war and was in Thessaloniki. I killed four Toiks and nine Voulgars in the last war. See here?" He pointed to the pale-blue ribbons on his chest. "I went to New York and was in a shoe-shine parlor. Then I learned the barber-shop. I was doing well. Then I come home and fought the Toiks. Then I fought the Voulgars. Then I went back to New York. Then last September come the mobilizing to fight them again. Yes, mister, I put my razor in my pocket and come over to Piræus. I didn't care for submarines. Hundreds of Greek mens come with me to fight the Voulgars. The Greek mens hate the Voulgars. But things is different this time. They was telling tales how our officers was chummy with the Voulgar officers. I didn't believe it. Not me. But it was true. With my own eyes I see this dog showing the plans of Rupel and other forts. With my own ears I heard this sunnavabitch telling the Voulgars the Greek mens wouldn't fight. My heart swelled up like a watermelon. My eyes was bursting and I cursed him inside of me, saying, 'I wish your brains for to become beans in your head.' But when we was alone I thought of what big mens the Greeks was in old times, and I said to him, 'κὑριε λὁχαγε,' which is Mister Captain in American, 'what means this what we have done to-night?' And he says to me, 'It means the Greek men ain't going to fight for Venizelo, who is a Senegalese and προδὁτης of his country.' And he cursed the French and cursed the British and he said that the Voulgars must be let drive them into the sea. But I said nothing. I just spit. Then, after a bit, I said, κὑριε λὁχαγε, does the other officers think like you was?' And he says all Greek mens what is not traitors think like him, and if I tell him who is for Venizelo in our regiment I will be a sergeant good and quick. But I didn't say nothing: I am only spitting to myself. Then we come to this place, and my heart was bursting out of my body, and I killed him. Then I took my razor and marked his face for a προδὁτης."
The corporal threw up his arms to heaven in denunciation of the dead man. They asked him what he would do, and he told them that he should hide on his own native island of Samothrace until he could be an interpreter to an English ship at Mudros, or until Greece should turn upon the Bulgarians and free his soul from the stain of the captain's treachery.
"Can you help us get to Samothrace?" they asked.
"Yes, I can help you. But what you have seen to-night swear not to tell, for I am crying like a woman for my country; and other peoples and mens must not laugh at Hellas, because to-night this σκυλἁκι, this dog, has had the moon for eats."
"And how shall we get to Samothrace?" they asked, when they had promised their silence.
"I will find a caique and you will hide by the sea where I show you. We cannot go back over the river to Greece. But how much can you pay for the caique? Fifty dollars? There are Greek fish-mens, sure, who was going to take us."