"Say, that's not the way to go escaping from the Voulgars," Yanni told them, reproachfully. "We got to go slow and keep out of sight."
The beach was very narrow and sloped rapidly up to low cliffs of sand continually broken by wide drifts and watercourses; but they were high enough to mask the moonlight if one kept close under their lee and one's footsteps were muffled by the sand. They must have walked in this fashion for a couple of miles when Yanni stopped them with a gesture and, bending down, picked up the cork of a fishing-net and an old shoe.
"Guess there's folk around here," he whispered. "I'm going to see. You sit down and rest yourselves."
He walked on cautiously; the sandy cliffs apparently tumbled away to a flat country almost at once, for Yanni's figure lost the protection of their shadow and came into view like a gray ghost in the now completely clouded moonlight. Presumably they were standing near the edge of the marshy estuary of the river between Bulgaria and Greece.
"How will he explain himself to any of the enemy on guard?" Sylvia whispered.
"He must have had the countersign to get across earlier to-night," Michael replied.
"It's nearly five o'clock," she said. "We haven't got so very much longer before dawn."
They waited for ages, it seemed, before Yanni came back and told them that there was no likelihood of getting a caique on this side of the river, but that he should cross over in a boat and take the chance of finding one on the farther beach before his captain's absence was remarked. He should have to be careful because the Greek sentries would be men from his own regiment and his presence so far down the line might arouse suspicion.
"But if you find a caique, how are we going to get across the river to join you?" Michael asked.
"Say, give me twenty dollars," Yanni answered, after a minute's thought. "The fish-mens won't do nothing for me unless I show them the money first. I'll say two British peoples want to go Thaso. We can give them more when we're on the sea to go Samothraki. They'd be afraid to go Samothraki at first. You must go back to where we come down to the sea. Got me? Hide in the bushes all day, and before the φεγγἁρι, what is it, before the moon is beginning to-morrow night, come right down to the beach and strike one match; then wait till you see me, but not till after the moon is beginning. If I don't come to-morrow, go back and hide and come right down the next night till the moon is beginning. And if I don't come the next night—" He stopped. "Sure, Yanni will be dead."