Maurice had to exercise much circumspection in broaching the object of his visit. The old man was restive at the least suggestion that he should take a reward for his services, or even accept compensation for the losses he had suffered.
“Shall I be paid for keeping my honour unstained?” he said.
“That is not the way to look at it,” replied Maurice. “Your honour was concerned with protecting us as individuals, but through us you were doing a service to our King, to your own Sultan, and to the people of this country and of others. It is on their behalf that I come to you. If I had not succeeded in reaching Sofia, there might have been war.”
“Well, we are ready,” said the old man with a smile. “We are a free people; we obey none unless we choose; but if there is a war, we flock like butterflies.”
Finding that he was on the wrong tack, Maurice tried again. After a long argument he persuaded Giulika that the King’s honour demanded that he should make some recognition of the services rendered to him by a stranger, and assured the old man that he durst not return to England with the money he had brought. Giulika agreed that if the King’s honour was involved, it would not become him as an honourable man to do anything to smirch it, and consented to accept a sum that would enable him to rebuild his kula and replace the weapons and furniture he had lost.
Having succeeded on this point, Maurice turned to the question of Slavianski. In this, too, he found that “honour” was a good card to play. He pointed out that the Austrian had been entrusted with the duty of obtaining a paper on which his Government set much store; that he had soiled his honour by his failure; and that, by the traditional laws of Lek, the slaying of his man while asleep demanded blood. In this regard the vengeance taken by Slavianski had been moderate. He reminded Giulika that the Austrian was ill and weak, incapable of doing further harm, and for ever disgraced with his employers. By harping on this string Maurice in course of time aroused in the old man’s breast a feeling of sympathy for the Austrian, and he at last declared that he might go free.
While they were talking, a young man entered whom Maurice recognised as Leka, the man who had wounded Giorgio.
“Welcome, excellency,” said the man. “I am glad to see you again.”
“Is there still blood between you and Giorgio?” asked Maurice.
“Why, yes, excellency, there must be. We have besa just now; but when Christmas is past he must look out.”