“No, I’ll be brave and sail from Thessaloniki or we shan’t be home till midsummer.”
“Home!” she said longingly, but when he asked about her home, she flushed and returned to the subject of the authorities.
“You don’t think they will forget about us?”
“About you, possibly. Not about me, I’m afraid.”
Her mouth tightened. “Ah yes, of course, you are wanted for breaking the law. It slips my mind occasionally.”
She returned to Kyria Agathi and he cursed himself for reminding her of her unshakable belief in her own invincible superiority.
When the caravan stopped to camp that evening, James suffered in silence a thorough scolding from Kyria Agathi for not providing a tent for his sister. Cordelia was invited to share the Miltiades’ tent, quickly set up by their two efficient menservants. She ate with them, too, while James joined a group of men around another campfire.
Later, wrapped in his blankets out under the stars, he renewed his resolve to take her down a peg or two. Seducing her would not only be a pleasure, it would put a hefty dent in her armour of insufferable self-satisfaction.
He would have liked to wait until she missed his English conversation, if not himself, and came to him. However, she could not well seek him out among all the men, and besides he was supposed to be her brother and protector. So when the camp stirred at dawn he went to wish her good morning and take her a share of their provisions for breakfast. She seemed to have thought better of giving him the cold shoulder, especially as the Miltiades greeted him with pleasure and invited him to join their meal.
Content to let bygones be bygones, James treated her no differently from the day before, unless his hands lingered a little longer at her waist when he helped her mount and dismount.
They were riding together along a wide stretch of track after the midday break when the drumming of horses’ hooves approaching brought the cavalcade to a ragged halt. Around the curve of the hillside ahead came a detachment of soldiers, riding at an odd but speedy shuffling walk. James recognized them as Janissaries by the curious flaps of white cloth sticking up above their tarbooshes.
The Janissaries were once elite troops of men taken in boyhood from Christian families and raised as Moslems fiercely loyal to the sultan. Now more of a hereditary caste, they had actually overthrown Selim III in 1807 when he attempted to reform the army, and Mustafa IV a year later. However they were still, especially under a good officer, formidable fighters not to be despised.
Their leader shouted an order and the troop drew rein. Her eyes enormous, Cordelia reached across the space between their mules to clutch James’s arm.
“Our protection against brigands, remember?” he said lightly.
The officer started to move slowly along the mule train, asking questions, while one of his men rode along the other side with his rifle cocked. In no time the news travelled back along the line.
“They’re looking for two outlaws, a man and a woman, foreigners.”
Chapter 11
“They are Turks.” Cordelia had to force the words past the tightness in her throat. She felt cold all over and she did not dare look at James in case he saw how much she wanted him to deny what she was about to say. “They will not be able to guess from your speech that you are not a Greek. Tell them I bribed you to pretend to be my brother. They will let you go.”
“What the devil do you think I am?” He sounded furious, not grateful. She looked up and his glare confirmed his fury. “Do you really think me capable of hiding behind a woman’s skirts?”
“I didn’t m-mean...” she stammered.
“No.” His face and his voice gentled. “And if you did you had every right. I should never have come to you in Istanbul.”
“Don’t you think it might work?” she asked eagerly. “It would be silly for both of us to be taken unnecessarily. Then maybe you could rescue me later.”
“From armed soldiers?” He shook his head. She followed his gaze to where the two Janissaries approached along the line of mules, slowly but inexorably. “If I though there was even half a chance... But in any case, any moment someone is going to point us out as foreigners. Did you know our word for barbarian comes from the Greek for foreigner? The ancient Greeks had a low opinion of the rest of the world.”
Recognizing his attempt to distract her from the inevitable, Cordelia tried to smile. “Like the English,” she said. “Even Mama... Oh James, I don’t want to be his mistress!”
“Courage, dear girl. You’re English, remember. Stiffen the sinews and imitate the action of the tiger. Since we cannot escape them, shall we go to meet them?”
Cordelia saw the officer turn his head to stare at them as one of the travellers pointed, his companion nodding. The two soldiers started towards them.
“Yes,” she said, raising her chin. “Let us go to meet them.”
He took her hand and side by side they rode forward. Suddenly James squeezed her hand urgently then dropped it. “We have no reason to assume...” he started. “Damn, too late. Just follow my lead.”
Puzzlement warred with Cordelia’s fear. Did he hope the soldiers were chasing two different people? Did he mean to try to persuade them he and Cordelia were someone else? She did not know what, if any, papers he had on him, but hers clearly identified her as the woman wanted by Mehmed Pasha. If James gave a false name for her, it would soon be disproved.
“You are foreigners?” the officer asked in bad Greek. He was a tall man, made taller by his peculiar headdress. His long, swarthy face, adorned by a waxed moustache, had a mournful air, but his brown eyes were bright and watchful. “You speak Turkish? Follow me, please,” he went on when James assented.
He turned his mount and the second man fell in behind them, his rifle still at the ready. Cordelia suppressed a sudden urge to dig her heels into her mule’s flanks and flee. There was nowhere to go.
As they reached the head of the mule train, the muleteer called out in Turkish, “Excellency, we have long journey. We may go on?”
“No.”
The Greek scowled but did not protest.
The Janissaries had spread a rug on the ground beside the track. Dismounting, the officer courteously helped Cordelia down and invited her to sit. With a gesture he brought James to join them.
“I am Captain Hamid.” He addressed Cordelia: “And you are?”
Before she could answer, James interrupted. “My name is Preston,” he drawled. “I persuaded this lady to allow me to travel as her brother. Otherwise she has no connection with me. Let her return to the caravan.”
The captain heard him out but at once turned back to Cordelia. “Did this man force you to accompany him?” he asked.
Cordelia hesitated. James had told her to follow his lead, obviously hoping—she now realized—that Mehmed Pasha had nothing to do with the soldiers’ search. If so, and if she agreed that James had compelled her to travel with him, she might go free. Even if they were looking for her as well as James, she might avert from her own head Mehmed Pasha’s wrath at her departure. On the other hand, she would add a charge of abduction to whatever offences James had already committed.
She looked at him. His intent, urgent gaze told her to say yes, to seize the chance of freedom. But he had refused to save his own skin at her expense and she found she could do no less.
“No, he did not force me to take him with me. I felt I should be safer with an English gentleman as my escort.”
Captain Hamid glanced from her to James with a knowing look, and she realized he assumed they were lovers. She refused to dignify his assumption with a denial—which he would disbelieve anyway, no doubt.
“It is most fortunate that you have come to no harm, Meess Courtenay,” he said urbanely. “His Excellency, Mehmed Pasha eagerly awaits your arrival in Thessaloniki.”
So he had followed her trail! Inside her a last tiny seed of hope shrivelled.
“How did he find me?” she asked numbly, afraid for all those who had helped her escape.
“I do not know, Bayan. I was told only to search for you and Mr. Preston on the coast road and to bring any foreigners to Thessaloniki to be identified. Come, we must be on our way.”
He stood up and snapped out an order. The Janissaries had dismounted to let their horses graze. Two of them led over a pair of saddle-less mounts and transferred the saddles from the mules onto their backs.
“I don’t suppose the captain would be interested to learn those don’t belong to us,” James said, helping Cordelia to stand, “though he seems a decent enough fellow, on the whole. Polite to us, at least. Don’t despair.”
She recalled other occasions when he had said the same. He had proved right then, but now they were well and truly in the briars, entangled beyond any hope of extricating themselves. “Do you never despair?” she said drearily.
“A singularly useless thing to do,” he said with severity. “It stops you thinking. I daresay our muleteer will be relieved not to have lost the two mules along with the saddles.” He cocked his head with an expectant look.
“Two mules?” she gasped. “We hired three! What about our baggage? I must have my comb and a change of linen, if nothing else.”
James grinned at her. “Aha, you have started to think again. We shall need our blankets, too.”
“Captain Hamid.” Cordelia spoke in Turkish in a determined tone. “I cannot travel without my clothes and other things.”
“Of course not, Bayan.”
He bowed and sent a man to fetch the baskets and bundles. They were added to the burdens of the soldiers’ pack-horses, while Cordelia’s side-saddled horse was fastened by a leading rope to Hamid’s mount, James’s to that of his second-in-command.
“Permit me to help you up, Bayan,” the captain requested politely.
Much as she would have liked to, it was not a request she could refuse. He lifted her into the saddle.
As James in his turn mounted, he said, “Captain, Miss Courtenay is a lady. She cannot be expected to ride for hours on end like your men.”
“I will remember.” His smile was surprisingly charming. “Bayan, you must tell me please when you grow tired.” In a low voice he added, “You will have troubles enough, I think, when we reach Thessaloniki. I do not wish to cause unnecessary suffering before. Only, I must do a soldier’s duty.”
“Thank you, captain,” said Cordelia, grateful despite her heavy heart.
The rest of the troop was already on horseback. Captain Hamid swung into his saddle. At his signal, the Janissaries and their prisoners set off towards Thessaloniki.
Hamid was as good as his word. He let her rest or walk whenever she asked, and even let her disappear behind bushes without an embarrassing escort—after all, there was nowhere to run to. However, she was reluctant to try his patience and by the time they stopped for the night she was exhausted.
“I am almost used to being too tired to move,” she said wryly to James, flopping down on the rug spread for them. To her relief, he was being treated as honourably as she was, not like a common felon.
The road had wandered away from the sea and the camp was set up on the bank of a stream in a valley between two rocky hillsides. Between huge boulders and outcroppings of the mountain’s very bones grew enough grass to pasture the horses, while a belt of dark green firs higher up the slopes provided firewood. As the last light faded from the sky, fragrant blue-grey smoke curled upward from a circle of camp-fires. Soon the appetizing odour of shish kebabi browning on skewers wafted through the still air.
“Positively idyllic,” James murmured wryly as a Janissary brought them sizzling meat wrapped in rounds of flatbread. “The Turks really know how to put on a picnic.” He took a large bite.
“I’m not hungry,” Cordelia said. She caught his minatory eye. “All right, if you insist, I’ll eat to keep up my strength.”
“It’s what you told me, and very good advice too.”
After a day of fresh air and exercise, the first bite restored her appetite and she ate hungrily. Captain Hamid nodded his approval and called for more.
When they finished eating, a soldier brought water from the river for them to wash their hands. What Cordelia really wanted was a hot bath, or better still a Turkish hammam. She would have to do without until they reached Thessaloniki, and then it would be a prelude to a night with Mehmed Pasha.
The thought appalled her. Not that she was afraid of the sex act itself. Mama had never pretended not to enjoy her lovers’ attentions. But to be degraded to her mother’s infamous level, to lose her last chance of respectability, and worst of all to suffer the intimate touch of a man who disgusted her...Resting her forehead on her knees, Cordelia sat hunched in silent misery.
“You are tired, Meess Courtenay,” said Hamid kindly. “I shall have my tent put up for you at once. By Allah’s bounty it is a fine night and I shall be happy to sleep under the stars.”
Looking up to thank him, by the ruddy light of the fires she saw him exchange a glance with James. They must be worried about her ability to endure another day in the saddle. Perhaps she could postpone the evil day by pretending to be weaker than she really was, though in truth she felt limp as a dishcloth.
As the captain shouted for his subaltern and issued a stream of orders, James said, “He’s not a bad chap in his way. An officer and a gentleman.”
“Yes, I suppose we are lucky in that, if unlucky in everything else.”
He patted her back. “You’ll feel better in the morning.”
The small tent was pitched in the centre of the ring of camp-fires, and a soldier brought their baggage. As Cordelia retired into the tent, she saw many of the Janissaries already rolled in their blankets. Others stood about on sentry duty, a few beyond the fires facing outward, most inside the ring, facing inward, guarding the prisoners. Orange firelight cast the sentries’ flickering shadows on the tent walls, looming over her like ghosts, insubstantial yet threatening.
She shivered, although the heat of the fires made the air quite warm.
Spreading her blankets, she sat down, untied her head-kerchief, and pulled off her boots. After a moment’s thought, she took off the knee-length tunic and ankle-length petticoat Ioanna had given her. She still had on a stout cotton chemise, as well as her Turkish gauze shift underneath, not to mention the diamond cloth.