Like Another Helen

by George Horton

For hours murder, rapine and plunder ran riot in the streets of Canea. When the moon came up that night eight hundred dead bodies were lying stark and ghastly in the beautiful gardens.

At the first sound of distant firing, the women of Kostakes' harem were not greatly terrified. Another slaughter of Christians did not mean danger to them. Thoroughly ignorant, they believed that all the kings and potentates of the world were vassals of the Sultan, who was able to enforce submission whenever he chose. They had heard from earliest childhood that some day there would be a grand killing of Christians and other unbelievers, after which the earth would be inhabited by Turks alone. No doubt the prophecy was even now coming to pass.

"They are killing all the Christians," said Souleima, peeping through the gate. "All the Christians in Canea."

"Aren't you sorry for them?"

"Bah! why should I be? It's their own fault if they are Christians."

"I am sorry for the little children," said Ayesha with a shudder, thinking of her own little boy, that had died in infancy.

Souleima looked slyly at Ferende, who was sitting on the stone steps at the outer side of the court, her fingers in her ears. The sound of the guns made the ex-favorite nervous, and she wanted to think. She believed that a crisis had arrived in her life. The terrible Turk had been the bogey man of her infancy. Surely he was now conquering the world. Who would be queen of the domestic kingdom which Kostakes would rear, when he should return, covered with blood and glory? Would Panayota remain a Greek when all her countrymen were killed? Alone,—the only Greek in the world?

Ferende laughed scornfully at the thought.

The boom of cannon was heard. It sounded very clear and distinct and seemed to cause a slight tremor of the earth where they stood. They looked at each other with startled and wondering eyes. The sound was repeated. Then, in a moment, the Turkish quarter, which had been hushed to whispering silence, broke forth into a babel of feminine screams, cries of children and the noise of many frightened women, all chattering at once.

"What is it? O, what is it?" shrieked Ayesha and Souleima, in a breath. They looked toward Ferende, but she was gone. Again that dreadful "boom," and now shrieks are heard in the streets, and the sound of flying footsteps. Ayesha and Souleima pull the gate open and look out. They behold a panic. Women clutching their offspring however they can, or dragging them through the street by the arm; old men doddering with long staffs, or holding to the garments of their flying daughters; children darting after their elders, screaming, "Mama! mama!" Some of the Turkish women, in their terror, had not covered their faces. Others instinctively held handkerchiefs, or even bare hands, before their mouths as they ran. From all that shrill uproar an occasional word or syllable detached itself; cries to "Allah" and the "Virgin," supplications for present help to any god or saint that happened to be uppermost in the mind. And every time that terrible "boom" was heard out in the bay the tumult swelled like a wave rising to its crest. Ayesha and Souleima waited for no explanation, but, adding their voices to the general tumult, plunged into the throng and were swept along with it toward the nearest gate of the city.