"All Cairo turned out to see the struggle. The Pasha's troops were under arms, and a strong party of his own guards, the very regiment to which I belonged, was marshalled to keep the ground. We were to run a distance of two hours[#] along the sand. Lances pointed out our course, and we were to return and finish in front of a tent pitched for the Pasha himself. His ladies were present, too, in their gilded arabas, surrounded by a negro guard. As I led my mare up they waved their handkerchiefs, and one in particular seemed restless and uneasy. I imagined I heard a faint scream from the interior of her araba; but the guard closed round it, and ere I had looked a second time it had been driven from the ground. Just then the Pasha summoned myself and my competitor to his tent. I cast my eye over my antagonist. He was considerably lighter than I was, and led a magnificent chestnut stallion, the best in the Pasha's stables; but when I looked at its strong but short form, and thought of Zuleika's elastic gait and lengthy stride, I had no fears for the result."
[#] About seven miles. The Asiatic always counts space by time, and an hour is equivalent to something over a league.
"I saluted the Pasha, and made my request. 'Highness,' I said, 'I claim a start of fifty yards and five thousand piasters. Let the money be paid, that I may take it with me and begin.'
"'It is well,' replied the Pasha; 'Kiātib,' he added, to his secretary, 'have you prepared the "backshish" for Ali Mesrour? Bestow it on him with a blessing, that he may mount and away,' and again the cruel eye twinkled with its fierce grim humour. Effendi, my heart sank within me when I saw two sturdy slaves bring out a sack, evidently of great weight, and proceed to lay the burden on my pawing mare. 'What is this?' I exclaimed, aghast; 'Highness, this is treachery! I am not to carry all that weight!'
"'Five thousand piasters, oh my soul!' replied the Pasha, with his most ferocious grin; 'and all of it in copper, too. Mount, in the name of the Prophet, and away!'
"My adversary was already in his saddle; the sack was fastened in front of mine. I saw that if I made the slightest demur, it would be considered a sufficient excuse to deprive me of my mare, perhaps of my life. With a prayer to Allah, I got into my saddle. Zuleika stepped proudly on, as though she made but little of the weight; and I took my fifty yards of start, and as much more as I could get. The signal-shot was fired, and we were off. Zuleika sniffed the air of the desert, and snorted in her joy. Despite of the piasters, she galloped on. Effendi, from that day to this I have seen neither my antagonist in the race, nor the negro guard, nor the gilded arabas, nor the Pasha's angry smile. I won my mare, I won my life and freedom; also I carried off five thousand piasters of the Pasha's money, and doubtless four times a day he curses me in his prayers, but yonder is the dawn, and here is the Danube. Sick and faint you must be, Tergyman! Yet in two hours more we shall reach Omar Pasha's tent, for I myself placed a picket of our soldiers on either bank at yonder spot, and they have a boat; so take courage for a little time longer, and confess that the breath of the morning here is sweeter than the air of a Russian prison. Who can foretell his destiny? There is but one Allah!"
I had not the tough frame of my Beloochee friend; before we reached the waterside I had fainted dead away. I remembered no more till I awoke from my fever in an hospital tent at head-quarters. On that weary time of prostration and suffering it is needless for me to dwell. Ere I could sit upright in bed the winter had commenced, the season for field operations was over, and the army established in cantonments. There was a lull, too, before the storm. The Allies had not yet put forth their strength, and it was far from improbable that the war might even then be near its conclusion.
Victor had determined to return to Hungary, and insisted on my accompanying him. Weak, maimed, and emaciated, I could be of no service to my chief, or to the great General who had so kindly recognised me. I had nothing to keep me in Turkey; I had nothing to take me to England. No, no, anywhere but there. Had I but won a name, I should have rejoiced to return into Somersetshire, to see Constance once again--to repay her coldness with scorn--perhaps to pass her without speaking--or, bitterer still, to greet her with the frankness and ease of a mere acquaintance. But what was I, to dream thus? A mere adventurer, at best a poor soldier of fortune, whose destiny, sooner or later, would be but to fatten a battle-field or encumber a trench, and have his name misspelt in a Gazette. No, no, anywhere but England, and why not Hungary? Victor's arguments were unanswerable; and once more--but oh! how changed from the quiet, thoughtful child--I was again at Edeldorf.
CHAPTER XXII
VALÈRIE