Tom Finch's Monkey Part 4

So saying, the old gentleman, bowing to me politely, took his departure from Sheerness dockyard, which I also left soon afterwards, pleased with all that I had seen and more than glad of having visited the place if only for the chance it afforded me of hearing his yarn.

CHAPTER THREE.

THE GREEK BANDIT.

A REMINISCENCE OF A YACHTING CRUISE IN THE AEGEAN SEA.

Some few years ago, when I was a youngster, I had what was then the great desire of my heart gratified by being allowed to accompany a party on a yachting cruise to the Mediterranean.

How I enjoyed myself, and how tragically our cruise nearly terminated, I will now proceed to tell.

There were six of us in all on board the yacht. There was dad, one; Captain Buncombe, two; Mr Joe Moynham, three; Bob, four; myself, Charley, five; and dog Rollo, six--though I think, by rights, I ought to have counted Rollo first, as he was the best of us all, and certainly thought the least of himself--brave, fine, black, curly old fellow that he was!

Just as you fellows in England were having the nastiest part of the winter, when there is no skating or s...o...b..lling, and only drenching rain and easterly winds, that bring colds and coughs and mumps, we were enjoying the loveliest of blue skies and jolly warm weather, that made swimming in the sea a luxury, and ices after dinner seem like a taste of nectar. We did enjoy ourselves; and had a splendid cruise up the old Mediterranean, going everywhere and seeing everything that was to be seen. Oh, it was jolly! The yacht stopped at Gibraltar, where we climbed the rock and saw the monkeys that lived in the caverns on the top; at Malta, where we went up the "Nothing to Eat" stairs mentioned in _Mids.h.i.+pman Easy_: and then, sailing up the Levant, the _Moons.h.i.+ne_--she was eighty tons, and the crack of the RYS--was laid up at anchor for a long time at Alexandria, while we went ash.o.r.e, going through the Suez Ca.n.a.l, across the desert to Cairo, and thence to the pyramids, after which we started for Greece.

You must know, before we get any further, that Bob and I didn't want to go anywhere near Greece at all! We had good reasons for this dislike.

There were dad and Captain Buncombe--who was what people call an archaeologist, fond of grubbing up old stones and skeletons, and digging like an old mole amongst ruins--continually talking all day long about Marathon and Hymettus, the Parthenon and Chersonese, the Acropolis, and Theseus and Odysseus and all the rest of them, bothering our lives out with questions about Homer and the _Iliad_, and all such stuff; so, I put it to you candidly, whether it wasn't almost as bad as being back again at school, making a fellow feel small who was shaky in his Greek and had a bad memory for history?

However, we had scarcely anch.o.r.ed in the Piraeus when some events happened which drove the cla.s.sics out of the heads of our elders; and I may say that thenceforth we heard no more about the ancients.

There had been a sharp squall shortly before, in which we had been amused by seeing the smart little zebeques, with their snowy white lateen sails, flying before the wind like a flock of small birds frightened by a hawk; and the _Moons.h.i.+ne_ was just coming up to the wind in order to let go her anchor, when Bob and I, who were close together on the forecastle, watching the men preparing for running out and bitting the cable, saw, almost at the same moment, a man's head in the water right in front of the yacht's forefoot; then--it all happened as suddenly as a flash of lightning--his hands were thrown up as if in entreaty, although we heard no cry, and he disappeared.

"Man overboard!" sang out one of the crew, who was pulling away at the jib down-haul in order to stow the sail, the halliards having been cast loose, "Man overboard!" in a voice which rang through the vessel fore and aft, and attracted everybody's attention.

"Hi! Rollo, good dog!" cried out Bob, turning round sharp to where the brave old fellow had been lying on the deck not a moment before, flopping his tail lazily, and with his great red tongue lolling out, as though he laughed cheerily at everything going on around him.

"Hi! Rollo!" said I too, in almost the same breath with Bob. "Fetch him out, good dog!" and I turned round also.

But the dog was gone.

Bob and I were "nonplussed." We had both seen Rollo there not--why, not a second before. And now he was gone.

However, we soon discovered the n.o.ble fellow and the cause of his absence.

The cry of "Man overboard!" had startled everybody, so that the anchor had not been let go; and the steersman's attention, naturally, having been taken up, the yacht had paid off again instead of bringing up, and her head had swung; consequently, what had been ahead of us just before was now astern, and we were quite confused as to our bearings.

While we were looking in perplexity in every direction but the right one, Captain Buncombe, who was at the wheel, and perhaps anxious to atone for his carelessness in letting the _Moons.h.i.+ne_ swing round, shouted out "Bravo!" waving his hat like a madman. Of course all our several pairs of eyes were turned on him at once.

"There he is--there he is--the brave old fellow!" cried the captain, letting go the helm in his eagerness, and pointing with his hat--waving hand to the water under the stern. "Look aft, you duffers! Where are your eyes? Bravo, Rollo! good dog! Hold up, old fellow! I'm coming to help you!" and with these words, before you could say "Jack Robinson,"

Captain Buncombe had thrown off his coat, pitched away the hat he had been waving, jumped over the taffrail of the yacht into the bosom of the blue Aegean Sea, and was rapidly swimming to where we could see dear old Rollo's black head and splas.h.i.+ng paws as he supported a man in the yacht's wake, and tried to drag him towards us in the _Moons.h.i.+ne_.

We gave a "Hooray!" which you might have heard at Charing Cross if you had been listening!

Captain Buncombe and Rollo, with their burden, were so near the yacht that there was no necessity for lowering the gig as we had hastened to do; and in a very little time we hauled them on board--Rollo jumping about in the highest spirits, as if he had been just having a quiet lark on his own account; but the rescued person was limp and insensible, though he presently came to by the aid of hot-water bottles and blankets. The _Moons.h.i.+ne_ then made another start, and succeeded better in anchoring in a respectable fas.h.i.+on, as she had always been accustomed to do.

The man was a handsome young fellow, with black hair and piercing eyes-- a Greek, he told us in French which he spoke fluently--although he had not that treacherous cast of countenance which most of his countrymen possess. He was profuse in the thanks which he bestowed broadcast for our saving him from drowning, although Rollo had really all the credit of it. His name was Stephanos Pericles, he said, and he was crossing to Salamis, when the squall came on, and his boat was upset. He had been dragged under water by the boat and almost suffocated before he could get to the surface, being quite exhausted when the dog gripped him. For Rollo had seen him before any of us, and had not waited for our directions as to what to do.

"I'm a soldier," he said, proudly tapping his chest, and looking round at dad and the captain, and Mr Moynham. "I've eaten your bread,"--he had dinner with us after he had got all right again, and we had settled down into that general routine in which our meals were attended to with the strictest punctuality--"and I shall never forget you have saved my life. By that bread I have eaten, I will repay you, I swear!"

Then turning to Bob and I, who were sitting on each side of him, and Rollo, who stuck close to him, as if under the idea that having saved him he was now his property--"And much thanks to you, little Englishmen, and your dogs I vill nevare forget, no nevare!"

He couldn't speak English as well as French. The evening had closed now, so Captain Buncombe told the crew to get the boat ready, and the Greek with many more fervent expressions of grat.i.tude, was rowed ash.o.r.e.

The next morning we had landed and after pottering about the port proceeded up to Athens, which much disappointed all of us, especially dad and the captain. It had a garish and stucco-like appearance; while the people looked as if they were costumed for a fancy ball, being not apparently at home in their national dress, picturesque though it was.

It was quite nightmarish for Bob and me to read the names on the shop fronts in the streets, and see the newspapers printed in the old Greek characters. Fancy "Modiste," and "Perruquier," as they will have the French terms spelt, in the letters sacred to Euripides and Xenophon. It seemed like walking in a dream!

We had inspected Athens, as I've said, and visited the plain of Marathon, which was offered by the Greeks to Lord Byron for sixteen thousand piastres, or about eight hundred pounds--alas for glory!--and returned on board the yacht for dinner again, when we were told that a messenger had been off in our absence and left a parcel for us. What do you think it contained? Guess.

Well, there was a splendid shawl, worth more than a hundred guineas, for Captain Buncombe, and a handsome jewelled pipe for dad; while Mr Joe Moynham had a case of Greek wines for his special self!

Bob and I were not forgotten either. He had a fine gun, with the stock inlaid with ivory, and carved beautifully; and I, a yataghan, decorated with a jewelled hilt, that was even more valuable than dad's pipe.

Rollo was presented with a grand gold collar, which Mr Joe Moynham said was like the one that Malachi, one of the Irish kings, wore in the days of Brian Boru; and, if you please, a lot of little purses, each containing a handsome present, were sent also in the parcel--a good big one, you may be sure--for distribution amongst the crew. It was princely grat.i.tude, wasn't it, in spite of the slighting way in which Mr Moynham had spoken of the modern Greeks and their ways? However, he had to "take it all back," as he said, when he drank the health of Monsieur Pericles--who seemed, by the way, to be much better off than his ill.u.s.trious ancestor, and whom we put down as the Sultan Haroun el Raschid in disguise--in a gla.s.s of the very wine that he had sent on board the yacht.

But that wasn't the end of it all, by any means:-- why, I am only just coming to my real story now.

Time rolled on--when I say "time," of course, I only mean hours and days as we mean, not years and centuries as the ancients calculated the lapse of time--and we managed to see everything that sight-seers see in the city of Minerva.

Having nothing else to look at close at hand, therefore, we determined to go on our travels, like Ulysses; not amongst the islands, which we had already visited, but towards the mountains, Captain Buncombe having made a vow ere he left England to see the ruins of Thebes, after which, he said, he would have no further object in life, and would perform the j.a.panese feat of the "happy despatch!"

We had horses, and mules, and donkeys for the journey; that is, dad and the captain rode horses, there were mules for our traps and food, which we had to take along with us, thanks to the hospitality of the regions we were going to, while the donkeys were for Bob and me and Mr Moynham.

That gentleman, who would be very positive when he liked, declared that no earthly consideration should compel him to mount the Bucephalus that was provided for him. He said that a horse was expressly stated by King David to be "a vain thing to save a man," and so why should he go against that ruling?

The first part of our journey went off as jolly as possible: the way was good; the scenery--although I confess I didn't trouble my head very much about it--though dad and the captain were in raptures with it-- magnificent; the halts, just at the right time, although all in cla.s.sic places, whose names Bob and I hated the sound of; the food was first- rate, and Mr Moynham so funny, that he nearly made me roll off my donkey every now and then with laughter. But towards evening, when we were all ascending a steep hill, with rocks and thick shrubbery on each side of it, through a narrow defile, a harsh voice suddenly exclaimed through the gloom, something that sounded like the Greek imperative Statheets! _Stop_! and then again another monosyllable, which we certainly understood better, "Halt!" A gun was also fired off at the same time; and, by the flash of the discharge we could see several long gleaming rifle barrels peering out from the bushes on either side of the way.

"Brigands!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the guides together, tumbling prostrate on the ground pell-mell, as if they had been swept down.

"Fascia a terra! Ventre a terre!" shouted out the same hoa.r.s.e voice again, and a volley was fired over our heads.

"Pleasant!" said Mr Moynham, throwing himself down with his face to the ground like the cowardly guides. "But I suppose we'd better do as these gentry require, or else they'll be hitting us under the fifth b.u.t.tonhole; and, what would become of us then?"

"Fascia a terra!" repeated the leader of the brigands, emerging from a clump of shrubbery at the head of the pa.s.s, motioning his arms violently at dad and the captain, who were inclined to show fight at first; but discretion proved the better part of valour, and they both dropped the pistols they had hurriedly drawn from their pockets, seeing that the rifle barrels covered them, sinking down p.r.o.ne on the earth like the rest of us.

Rollo, however, poor brave old fellow, made one dash at the ruffian as he threatened dad; and, seizing him by the throat, dashed him to the ground.

Poor fellow, the next moment he had a stiletto jammed into him, which made him sink down bleeding, with a faint howl, to which Bob and I responded with a cry, as if we felt the blow ourselves!

The moment dad and Captain Buncombe heard Rollo's howl and our cry, they jumped up again like lightning, and began hitting out right and left at the brigands who now surrounded us; and Mr Moynham was not behind, I can tell you! He b.u.t.ted one big chap right in the pit of the stomach, and sent him tumbling down the defile, his body rattling against the stones, and he swearing like mad all the time. Bob and I scrambled at them as best we could, catching hold of their legs and tripping them up; but they were too many for us, for the cowardly guides did not stir hand or foot to help us, but lay stretched like logs along the ground, although they were unbound. We were certain that they were in league with the robbers; and so, without doubt, they were, for, if they had only a.s.sisted us, now that their a.s.sailants had dropped their firearms, and were engaged in a regular rough-and-tumble fight, we could have mastered them, I'm sure, as, counting Bob and myself in, we were nearly man for man as many as they were.

The struggle did not last long, although dad and the captain held out bravely to the last, flooring the brigands one after another, and knocking them down as if they had been nine-pins. They were presently tied securely, with their arms behind them, and menaced with death if they stirred, by a brawny ruffian touching each of their heads with a pistol barrel. As for Bob and me, they did not think it necessary to tie us.

"Well, this is a delightful ending to our picnic," said Mr Moynham in lugubrious tones, as we all lay on the ground, with the exception of the guides, who appeared to mingle freely with the robbers, who were grouped in picturesque att.i.tudes around us, leaning on their carbines. "I wonder what's their little game?"

The leader presently gave an order, and our seniors were then each lifted on to a horse or mule, and tied securely there.

"At all events," said Mr Moynham, who kept up his spirits still wonderfully, "we sha'n't fall off, that's one comfort, and so we'll have the less bruises after the scrimmage!"