Complete Works of Bram Stoker (365 page)

“When all is safe, our men will attack the Tower.  We must let them do it, for they expect it.  A few men in the clothes and arms which we took from your captors will be pursued by some of ours.  It is all arranged.  They will ask the Turks to admit them, and if the latter have not learned of your father’s escape, perhaps they will do so.  Once in, our men will try to open the gate.  The chances are against them, poor fellows! but they are all volunteers, and will die fighting.  If they win out, great glory will be theirs.”

“The moon does not rise to-night till just before midnight, so we have plenty of time.  We shall start from here at ten.  If all be well, I shall place you in the Tower with your father in less than a quarter-hour from that.  A few minutes will suffice to clothe him in bullet-proof and get on his belt.  I shall not be away from the Tower more than a very few minutes, and, please God, long before eleven we shall be safe.  Then the Tower can be won in an attack by our mountaineers.  Perhaps, when the guns are heard on the ship of war  —  for there is sure to be firing  —  the Captain may try to land a shore party.  But Rooke will stand in the way, and if I know the man and
The Lady
, we shall not be troubled with many Turks to-night.  By midnight you and your father can be on the way to Vissarion.  I can interview the naval Captain in the morning.”

My wife’s marvellous courage and self-possession stood to her.  At half an hour before the time fixed she was ready for our adventure.  She had improved the scheme in one detail.  She had put on her own belt and coiled the rope round her waist, so the only delay would be in bringing her father’s belt.  She would keep the bullet-proof dress intended to be his strapped in a packet on her back, so that if occasion should be favourable he would not want to put it on till he and she should have reached the platform of the aeroplane.  In such case, I should not steer away from the Tower at all, but would pass slowly across it and take up the captive and his brave daughter before leaving.  I had learned from local sources that the Tower was in several stories.  Entrance was by the foot, where the great iron-clad door was; then came living-rooms and storage, and an open space at the top.  This would probably be thought the best place for the prisoner, for it was deep-sunk within the massive walls, wherein was no loophole of any kind.  This, if it should so happen, would be the disposition of things best for our plan.  The guards would at this time be all inside the Tower  —  probably resting, most of them  —  so that it was possible that no one might notice the coming of the airship.  I was afraid to think that all might turn out so well, for in such case our task would be a simple enough one, and would in all human probability be crowned with success.

At ten o’clock we started.  Teuta did not show the smallest sign of fear or even uneasiness, though this was the first time she had even seen an aeroplane at work.  She proved to be an admirable passenger for an airship.  She stayed quite still, holding herself rigidly in the position arranged, by the cords which I had fixed for her.

When I had trued my course by the landmarks and with the compass lit by the Tiny my electric light in the dark box, I had time to look about me.  All seemed quite dark wherever I looked  —  to land, or sea, or sky.  But darkness is relative, and though each quarter and spot looked dark in turn, there was not such absolute darkness as a whole.  I could tell the difference, for instance, between land and sea, no matter how far off we might be from either.  Looking upward, the sky was dark; yet there was light enough to see, and even distinguish broad effects.  I had no difficulty in distinguishing the Tower towards which we were moving, and that, after all, was the main thing.  We drifted slowly, very slowly, as the air was still, and I only used the minimum pressure necessary for the engine.  I think I now understood for the first time the extraordinary value of the engine with which my Kitson was equipped.  It was noiseless, it was practically of no weight, and it allowed the machine to progress as easily as the old-fashioned balloon used to drift before a breeze.  Teuta, who had naturally very fine sight, seemed to see even better than I did, for as we drew nearer to the Tower, and its round, open top began to articulate itself, she commenced to prepare for her part of the task.  She it was who uncoiled the long drag-rope ready for her lowering.  We were proceeding so gently that she as well as I had hopes that I might be able to actually balance the machine on the top of the curving wall  —  a thing manifestly impossible on a straight surface, though it might have been possible on an angle.

On we crept  —  on, and on!  There was no sign of light about the Tower, and not the faintest sound to be heard till we were almost close to the line of the rising wall; then we heard a sound of something like mirth, but muffled by distance and thick walls.  From it we took fresh heart, for it told us that our enemies were gathered in the lower chambers.  If only the Voivode should be on the upper stage, all would be well.

Slowly, almost inch by inch, and with a suspense that was agonising, we crossed some twenty or thirty feet above the top of the wall.  I could see as we came near the jagged line of white patches where the heads of the massacred Turks placed there on spikes in old days seemed to give still their grim warning.  Seeing that they made in themselves a difficulty of landing on the wall, I deflected the plane so that, as we crept over the wall, we might, if they became displaced, brush them to the outside of the wall.  A few seconds more, and I was able to bring the machine to rest with the front of the platform jutting out beyond the Tower wall.  Here I anchored her fore and aft with clamps which had been already prepared.

Whilst I was doing so Teuta had leaned over the inner edge of the platform, and whispered as softly as the sigh of a gentle breeze:

“Hist! hist!”  The answer came in a similar sound from some twenty feet below us, and we knew that the prisoner was alone.  Forthwith, having fixed the hook of the rope in the ring to which was attached her belt, I lowered my wife.  Her father evidently knew her whisper, and was ready.  The hollow Tower  —  a smooth cylinder within  —  sent up the voices from it faint as were the whispers:

“Father, it is I  —  Teuta!”

“My child, my brave daughter!”

“Quick, father; strap the belt round you.  See that it is secure.  We have to be lifted into the air if necessary.  Hold together.  It will be easier for Rupert to lift us to the airship.”

“Rupert?”

“Yes; I shall explain later.  Quick, quick!  There is not a moment to lose.  He is enormously strong, and can lift us together; but we must help him by being still, so he won’t have to use the windlass, which might creak.”  As she spoke she jerked slightly at the rope, which was our preconcerted signal that I was to lift.  I was afraid the windlass might creak, and her thoughtful hint decided me.  I bent my back to the task, and in a few seconds they were on the platform on which they, at Teuta’s suggestion, lay flat, one at each side of my seat, so as to keep the best balance possible.

I took off the clamps, lifted the bags of ballast to the top of the wall, so that there should be no sound of falling, and started the engine.  The machine moved forward a few inches, so that it tilted towards the outside of the wall.  I threw my weight on the front part of the platform, and we commenced our downward fall at a sharp angle.  A second enlarged the angle, and without further ado we slid away into the darkness.  Then, ascending as we went, when the engine began to work at its strength, we turned, and presently made straight for Ilsin.

The journey was short  —  not many minutes.  It almost seemed as if no time whatever had elapsed till we saw below us the gleam of lights, and by them saw a great body of men gathered in military array.  We slackened and descended.  The crowd kept deathly silence, but when we were amongst them we needed no telling that it was not due to lack of heart or absence of joy.  The pressure of their hands as they surrounded us, and the devotion with which they kissed the hands and feet of both the Voivode and his daughter, were evidence enough for me, even had I not had my own share of their grateful rejoicing.

In the midst of it all the low, stern voice of Rooke, who had burst a way to the front beside the Vladika, said:

“Now is the time to attack the Tower.  Forward, brothers, but in silence.  Let there not be a sound till you are near the gate; then play your little comedy of the escaping marauders.  And ‘twill be no comedy for them in the Tower.  The yacht is all ready for the morning, Mr. Sent Leger, in case I do not come out of the scrimmage if the bluejackets arrive.  In such case you will have to handle her yourself.  God keep you, my Lady; and you, too, Voivode!  Forward!”

In a ghostly silence the grim little army moved forwards.  Rooke and the men with him disappeared into the darkness in the direction of the harbour of Ilsin.

FROM THE SCRIPT OF THE VOIVODE, PETER VISSARION,

July
7, 1907.

I had little idea, when I started on my homeward journey, that it would have such a strange termination.  Even I, who ever since my boyhood have lived in a whirl of adventure, intrigue, or diplomacy  —  whichever it may be called  —  statecraft, and war, had reason to be surprised.  I certainly thought that when I locked myself into my room in the hotel at Ilsin that I would have at last a spell, however short, of quiet.  All the time of my prolonged negotiations with the various nationalities I had to be at tension; so, too, on my homeward journey, lest something at the last moment should happen adversely to my mission.  But when I was safe on my own Land of the Blue Mountains, and laid my head on my pillow, where only friends could be around me, I thought I might forget care.

But to wake with a rude hand over my mouth, and to feel myself grasped tight by so many hands that I could not move a limb, was a dreadful shock.  All after that was like a dreadful dream.  I was rolled in a great rug so tightly that I could hardly breathe, let alone cry out.  Lifted by many hands through the window, which I could hear was softly opened and shut for the purpose, and carried to a boat.  Again lifted into some sort of litter, on which I was borne a long distance, but with considerable rapidity.  Again lifted out and dragged through a doorway opened on purpose  —  I could hear the clang as it was shut behind me.  Then the rug was removed, and I found myself, still in my night-gear, in the midst of a ring of men.  There were two score of them, all Turks, all strong-looking, resolute men, armed to the teeth.  My clothes, which had been taken from my room, were thrown down beside me, and I was told to dress.  As the Turks were going from the room  —  shaped like a vault  —  where we then were, the last of them, who seemed to be some sort of officer, said:

“If you cry out or make any noise whatever whilst you are in this Tower, you shall die before your time!”  Presently some food and water were brought me, and a couple of blankets.  I wrapped myself up and slept till early in the morning.  Breakfast was brought, and the same men filed in.  In the presence of them all the same officer said:

“I have given instructions that if you make any noise or betray your presence to anyone outside this Tower, the nearest man is to restore you to immediate quiet with his yataghan.  It you promise me that you will remain quiet whilst you are within the Tower, I can enlarge your liberties somewhat.  Do you promise?”  I promised as he wished; there was no need to make necessary any stricter measure of confinement.  Any chance of escape lay in having the utmost freedom allowed to me.  Although I had been taken away with such secrecy, I knew that before long there would be pursuit.  So I waited with what patience I could.  I was allowed to go on the upper platform  —  a consideration due, I am convinced, to my captors’ wish for their own comfort rather than for mine.

It was not very cheering, for during the daytime I had satisfied myself that it would be quite impossible for even a younger and more active man than I am to climb the walls.  They were built for prison purposes, and a cat could not find entry for its claws between the stones.  I resigned myself to my fate as well as I could.  Wrapping my blanket round me, I lay down and looked up at the sky.  I wished to see it whilst I could.  I was just dropping to sleep  —  the unutterable silence of the place broken only now and again by some remark by my captors in the rooms below me  —  when there was a strange appearance just over me  —  an appearance so strange that I sat up, and gazed with distended eyes.

Across the top of the tower, some height above, drifted, slowly and silently, a great platform.  Although the night was dark, it was so much darker where I was within the hollow of the Tower that I could actually see what was above me.  I knew it was an aeroplane  —  one of which I had seen in Washington.  A man was seated in the centre, steering; and beside him was a silent figure of a woman all wrapped in white.  It made my heart beat to see her, for she was figured something like my Teuta, but broader, less shapely.  She leaned over, and a whispered “Ssh!” crept down to me.  I answered in similar way.  Whereupon she rose, and the man lowered her down into the Tower.  Then I saw that it was my dear daughter who had come in this wonderful way to save me.  With infinite haste she helped me to fasten round my waist a belt attached to a rope, which was coiled round her; and then the man, who was a giant in strength as well as stature, raised us both to the platform of the aeroplane, which he set in motion without an instant’s delay.

Within a few seconds, and without any discovery being made of my escape, we were speeding towards the sea.  The lights of Ilsin were in front of us.  Before reaching the town, however, we descended in the midst of a little army of my own people, who were gathered ready to advance upon the Silent Tower, there to effect, if necessary, my rescue by force.  Small chance would there have been of my life in case of such a struggle.  Happily, however, the devotion and courage of my dear daughter and of her gallant companion prevented such a necessity.  It was strange to me to find such joyous reception amongst my friends expressed in such a whispered silence.  There was no time for comment or understanding or the asking of questions  —  I was fain to take things as they stood, and wait for fuller explanation.