The commander grunted, and on reaching the shore followed Wylie in silence. He looked narrowly at the wounded Roumis lying behind their screen of bushes, jerked out a question or two, and turned to Wylie again.
“I’ll take ’em,” he said. “It’s not strictly correct, but your Prince and you seem decent fellows, and there’s no need to let you in for worse than you’re in for already.”
“Lord!” It was Petros, who stood, breathing hard, at Wylie’s side; “a word from the Lord Romanos. He said, ‘Tell the Lord Glafko that they are brandishing their rifles. They will not talk much longer.’”
“No time to lose,” said Wylie, and he and the commander laid etiquette aside and worked with the sailors from the pinnace in carrying the wounded on board. Before the work was half done, torches began to move about in the direction of Ahmed Pasha, and shouts were heard.
“They have remembered, and are coming to search the battlefield,” said Wylie. “Heaven send they may go to the valley first!”
The torches were wandering in all directions, towards the valley and the barricade, and also towards the scene of the fight on the shore, across which the bearers were passing with their helpless burdens.
“Go on and get done as quick as you can,” said Wylie to the commander. “I’ll lead them astray.”
The Roumi dead had been laid near the barricade, ready for burial on the morrow, and Wylie shouted to the advancing warriors, asking if they sought them. As they followed his voice, he led them away from the beach, but to his surprise they seemed to have no thought of the foe, whether dead or alive. They pressed round him and hustled him back against the barricade, the construction of which he had himself superintended the day before.
“Traitor! You and your master have betrayed us to the Europeans!” was the cry, as the torchlight flickered on the fierce faces.
“There has been no betrayal,” said Wylie sharply. “You were warned that the warships would fire if we fought on Roumi territory, but you chose to do it.”