“I suppose you see,” said Wylie to Maurice, as he looked over his lists, “that we are practically left with the Slavs, while all the Greeks have followed Christodoridi? It’s just the old cleavage over again.”
“That’s bad. How has he managed it?”
“It didn’t want much management—I must do him the justice to say that. It comes simply from the geographical distribution of the people—the Slavs generally north and inland, the Greeks in most cases south and on the coast. It’s natural enough that the Greeks should be the fishing people, and I suppose it’s merely a coincidence that he has fixed on them.”
“We can hardly stipulate that either you or I should be always about with him, to make sure that he doesn’t use the position for his own advantage,” said Maurice, answering the doubt suggested by Wylie’s manner rather than his words.
“No, you gave up all possibility of that when you handed him over a share in the enterprise practically without conditions. By your new way of conducting family feuds he has as much right to lead as you have.”
“We are both under you,” said Maurice quickly. “You are Commander-in-Chief, and Christodoridi’s department of coast defence is entirely subordinate to you at headquarters.”
“I must show it by calling up the men for drill on convenient days. I have an idea that their alacrity in volunteering for him was not unconnected with the prospect of a blissful future in which every man would fight as he liked. But it may be necessary any day to get all our forces together. I hear this morning that a Roumi detachment has occupied Ahmed Pasha,”—this was the village on the mainland nearest to Karakula and the isthmus. “Very likely they intended a simultaneous attack on Karakula and Ephestilo, but now they may prefer to advance in force by land.”
In spite of this forward movement, however, the Roumi authorities were singularly tardy in taking any decisive step. Such news as filtered through to the insurgent headquarters ascribed the delay to intrigues at Czarigrad and to the divided councils of the Powers. Europe was united, it seemed, in coercing the insurgents, since the British warships blockading the Skandalo side of the peninsula were now reinforced by those of other nations, but it could not decide to what extent the Roumi Government was to be allowed a free hand. This respite was of service in allowing Prince Romanos to organise his scheme of defence, though it was dangerous owing to the steady consumption of provisions, which there were no means of replacing. In this particular also Prince Romanos proved himself useful. He had fixed his headquarters at Skandalo, and he discovered that the wary townspeople were contriving to make the best of both worlds by despatching secretly boat-loads of fresh provisions to the blockading ships. It could hardly be doubted that news was conveyed in the same way, and amid the loudly expressed opposition of the inhabitants, Prince Romanos requisitioned all the craft belonging to the town for the service of the Constitutional Assembly, and bought up all the provisions in store, and also the growing crops. The shopkeepers, seeing themselves deprived of the high prices which they had been in the habit of obtaining, were very angry, and the cultivators, who had sold their vegetables to the insurgents with the artless intention of selling them over again to the fleets, resented hotly their fields and gardens being placed under guard, but the leakage was stopped. Moreover, the fishermen scouts brought in now and then accessions of strength,—a boat-load of sympathisers from various countries, anxious to offer the remainder of their (generally discreditable) lives as a sacrifice upon the altar of Emathian freedom, or a collection of guns and ammunition—the ammunition never by any chance fitting the guns—which had been subscribed for by revolutionary circles in continental capitals, and brought thus far on its way by means of lavish bribery of Roumi officials. They obtained news also, through the accredited agents of Professor Panagiotis, who was working heroically with pen and telegraph to impress upon Europe the importance of the Hagiamavran experiment, and to discount in advance the failure which most people predicted for it. He adjured the insurgents to maintain their position at all costs. Europe was already at a loss to know how to deal with them, and the situation must become intolerable if it lasted much longer. Some of the Powers were already threatening to withdraw from the Concert unless more stringent measures were adopted, which the others would not allow, and the brightest hope for the future lay in the prospect that they would carry out their threat. Till then the insurgents had only to hold their ground, repelling all blandishments on the part of the Consuls or other representatives of the Powers, refusing any concessions from Roum, no matter how ample, that were offered without a European guarantee, and above all, remaining absolutely united.
This last counsel of perfection was the more difficult to follow that a distinct difference of opinion was beginning to make itself felt in the deliberations of the leaders. Prince Romanos was claiming—with studied moderation, but still as a right—the power of initiating minor operations without referring every detail to Maurice at the monastery and Wylie wherever he might happen to be. There were so many small triumphs possible, as he justly said,—such as cutting off a picket of Roumi soldiers, or waylaying a boat from the mainland on its way to the fleet and forcibly buying up its freight of provisions,—which would serve to raise the spirits of his men, but the opportunity for which would be lost were he compelled to send and ask leave before starting. Maurice hesitated to sanction these measures, considering that the comparative leniency of the Powers, in “keeping a ring” for the insurgents and seeing that the Roumis fought fair, demanded that the insurgents should abstain from aggressive movements in return. They ought to confine themselves to the defence of the peninsula, and not attack either Roumi soil on the mainland or Roumi vessels outside Hagiamavran waters. Wylie shook his head when this theory was broached in his hearing.
“Won’t work,” he said. “We can’t afford to stick to these rocks merely as a moral object-lesson for Europe. Provisions are running out, Armitage is probably hovering round outside the warships, trying to nose his way in, and can’t do it, and if we go on passively resisting we shall simply be starved out. Even a temporary foothold on Roumi territory means a chance of adding to our stores.”