nikka fainted as we reached the mouth of the drain, which was fortunate for him, as it saved him the agony of the slippery climb over the rocks of the beach and the ruined jetty to the curlew. at its exit the drain or sewer was blocked by a heap of stones about four feet high across which it was difficult for men unhindered to pass in silence, let alone men carrying an inert body. but we achieved it finally, and stumbled as best we could on to the precarious footing of the jetty, the curlew was simply a black shadow nestling against the rocks.
as we approached, two figures jumped from the deck, and the slighter of them ran towards us.
"hugh!" came the whispered call. "hugh, are you there? are you safe? who are you carrying, jack? is it—"
i came first, holding nikka's feet. hugh and watkins, supporting his shoulders, were indistinguishable in the rear. it struck me as mildly humorous that betty's first anxiety should be so ingenuously revealed.
"hugh's all right," i answered cautiously. "nikka's hurt, though. keep quiet, you idiot."
"thank god!" she said inconsequentially, and sat down on the rocks and commenced to cry softly.
hugh exploded in a sentimental curse.
"here, watty," he growled, "you'll have to manage by yourself."
"very good, your ludship," muttered watkins.
i felt nikka's body sag, and looked back. watkins was plodding determinedly after me, panting so loudly under his burden as to lead me to cast a wary eye at the lightless bulk of tokalji's house. hugh and betty had melted into a single shadow-figure from which came vague murmurs and gasped interjections.
"damn!" i grunted. "what a hell of a time to pick for making love!"
"quite right, mister jack, sir," panted watkins.
we were both about done up, for nikka was heavy and we had to use superhuman care to avoid jouncing or dropping him on the rocks. but luckily vernon king reached us, and with his aid, we got nikka into a bunk in the tiny cabin. leaving king to take care of him, watkins and i returned to the cockpit. i was fighting mad at hugh for philandering and at betty for picking such an occasion for tears. but my rage was not proof against the bubbling joy with which they greeted me as they hopped aboard.
"meet the new lady chesby," whispered hugh.
"did you ever hear of such a thing?" said betty. "why, i had no more idea when i climbed out on those rocks—"
"no, i suppose not," i jeered. "well, children, let me tell you you chose a poor time for this. if you want my congratulations you must help us to make a quick get-away."
"he's right," agreed betty, tearing herself loose from hugh's arm. "we are crazy. jack, you loose the bow line. watkins, are the sweeps ready? prepare to cast off astern, hugh."
hugh and i were recouped with brandy and water and sandwiches, and fifteen minutes later, with the current to help us, we had worked out into the marmora; and betty judged it safe to have watkins turn over the engine and switch on the lights. i am bound to say her first thought then was of nikka. she put watkins at the wheel, with orders to stand west at low speed, and ducked into the cabin with us. the electric bulb shone down on nikka's white face beaded with sweat. his eyes were still closed. king had cut away his coat and shirt, and was bathing his head with water from the drinking-tank.
"how is he?" asked betty.
"he has not recovered consciousness yet," answered her father. "to tell the truth, i haven't tried hard to bring him around. i fear his shoulder is dislocated."
betty stooped over nikka, and felt gingerly of arm and shoulder.
"yes," she said, "it's dislocated. i have seen dislocations pulled out in the hospitals during the war. i think i can get his shoulder back if some of you will hold him down. it is bound to hurt him cruelly for the moment."
she spoke with crisp authority; her face was all keen intelligence. and i chuckled at the contrast with the way in which she had come aboard with hugh.
"we'll help," hugh told her now. "what do we do?"
she stationed us, hugh bearing down on his well shoulder, vernon king and i grasping each a leg. she took a deep breath, caught arm and shoulder in her strong young fingers, tugged, twisted with a wrench—a moan from nikka, lying half-conscious—and there was an audible snap. betty stepped back, flushed and trembling.
"there," she said, "it's in place, but i wouldn't do it again to-night for anything."
"good girl," i said.
"that's praise from sir hubert," she acknowledged shyly. "aren't you ever going to congratulate me, jack? oh, lordy, though, i've completely forgotten to tell dad."
"but that's quite usual, my dear," said my uncle whimsically.
"don't be a cynic like jack, old dear," she rebuked him with a kiss. "you know i really have to tell you when i'm engaged. it happened very suddenly, and jack blew me up for letting it interfere with business."
"i'm inclined to agree with him," said king. "i suppose the young man concerned is hugh."
betty regarded him admiringly.
"why, daddy! that's awfully brilliant of you! however did you guess?"
her father pinched her ear.
"occasionally, elizabeth," he said, "you appear to labor under the misconception that i fail to take any note concerning the ordinary routine happenings of the day. but if you prefer, i will base my apprehension solely on analytical grounds. you leap ashore. you call for hugh. you run towards him. you delay your reappearance. immediately afterward you announce your engagement. i must maintain the sequence of causes prior to the effect presents an argument grounded on irrefutable logic."
"you win on logical as well as mere human grounds, vernon," i said. "bet, i congratulate you, minx though you are. if nikka—"
and at that moment nikka opened his eyes, and sat up in the bunk, bumping his head.
"ouch!" he yelled. "where am i? what—"
he rubbed his shoulder reminiscently.
"i'm sore all over, but i have a feeling it hurt worse a little while ago. how did i get here? and hugh and jack?"
so we recounted to him the full story of our rescue, which, in turn, necessitated chronicling our adventures of the past twenty-four hours for betty and her father.
"i imagined, of course, that a mishap such as you describe had befallen you," remarked king when we had finished. "when nikka shouted his warning, watkins and i held a hasty conference on the roof and decided that your adjuration must have had sufficient urgency behind it to warrant our obedience, however reluctant we might be to abandon you. upon watkins' insistence, i preceded him down the rope. prior to his own descent, he loosened the grapnel, with an eye to the possibility of twitching it down, so that when he was some eight or ten feet from the ground—my estimate, naturally, is hypothetical, as it was impossible to gain any clear view of his accident—the rope came free above, and he was precipitated into an opening in the rocks which we had not hitherto perceived.
"i may say that we later determined in the daylight that it was practically invisible from the adjacent waters, and the hasty investigation i was able to make on my own behalf leads me to the provisional conclusion that we have stumbled upon a genuine archæological find. the ancient byzantium, as you doubtless know, was a city vying with our modern capitals in comfort and hygienic convenience, and its drainage system must have been—"
"yes, yes, daddy," interrupted betty, "but you are telling about last night, not the ancient byzants."
"byzantines, my dear," corrected her father. "the byzant was the standard coin of value of the eastern empire, indeed, of the known world."
"a thousand pardons, old sweetheart, but still, don't you see, you've left the boys high and dry? here, you'd better let me carry on."
"very well," answered king with the docility acquired by any man who spends much time in betty's company. "perhaps your narrative gifts will secure a more rapid description of our adventures, elizabeth."
"it's not my 'narrative gifts,' darling dad. it's that i can stick to the path. you see, boys, i heard watkins squawk when he fell. the only reason toutou and his friends didn't hear him was that they were so busy with you. i left the boat and scrambled over the rocks—nearly scared dad to death. he thought i was an enemy. watkins had disappeared into this opening. he had slid over the rock-pile that fills it to within three or four feet of the top, and he bumped his head badly. he thought he was in a cave, and i made dad get in after him and look around with a flashlight. so long as the rope and grapnel had come down, there was no way for toutou's gang to trace us, and i was wondering whether we couldn't make future use of a hiding-place almost in the enemy's camp."
"i say, that was clever of you!" said hugh admiringly.
we all chuckled, but betty thanked him with a smile.
"oh, i was a little heroine," she continued. "no movie heroine could have surpassed me. dad took a look, and announced that it was one of the old sewers, and seemed to run inland beneath tokalji's house. he wanted to follow it all the way in, but i decided there would be no opportunity for a rescue that night, and i made him and watkins come back to the curlew with me. we ran the launch to the wharf of a greek fisherman i know on the asiatic shore of the marmora. he agreed to take us up to constantinople in his boat, and to wait there for us all day to carry us back.
"we discussed the problem going up to constantinople, and we couldn't think of anything to do for you, short of going in ourselves and setting you free. we didn't know how to get into touch with nikka's uncle and his gypsy friends. manifestly, we didn't want to tell the police or the british authorities—although we would have done that if we had been unable to get to you to-night. watkins said that 'treasure or no treasure 'e wasn't going to see 'is ludship butchered like 'is uncle, whatever 'is ludship might say any time.' oh, watkins was lyrical, hugh."
"he's done damned good work," assented hugh gratefully. "bless his old heart. so you just went up to constantinople, and lay doggo?"
"just that. we slept most of the day, and after dinner sneaked away, and boarded the greek fisherman's ketch. we took the curlew about ten, i think, and steered straight for tokalji's house. and oh, hugh, if there hadn't been that opening from your dungeon!" the tears came into her eyes. "to think what nikka had to stand! and you others would have had it, too."
"if there hadn't been that there would have been something else," hugh reassured her. "and now we have a secret way to follow direct into tokalji's lair."
"but after you get in you will have a pitched battle before you can control the place," nikka pointed out. "i don't see that you are likely to profit very much by it unless you are willing to put the issue to the proof by cold steel."
there was no gainsaying this argument, and none of us was inclined to advocate wholesale slaughter, not even nikka, with his aching shoulder and memory of toutou's brutality. we had hashed over the subject pretty thoroughly by the time the curlew was docked, without discovering a solution of our problem, and from sheer weariness abandoned the discussion by mutual consent. it was too late to find one of the variable pera taxis, and we walked up through the deserted streets of galata, tenanted only by homeless refuges. in the hotel lobby we said good-night—it was really good-morning—and went to bed to sleep the clock around.
twenty-four hours rest made us fit. nikka's arm and shoulder were still lame, but he had watkins rub him with liniment that suppled the strained muscles, and declared that he was as game for a fight as any of us. and when watkins brought us an invitation to breakfast in the kings' sitting room we were able to muster a degree of optimism, despite the difficulties of the situation.
"it boils down to this," said hugh over his second cup of coffee. "we know that the instructions are correct and that we have a desperate crew of criminals to reckon with. our job is to trick toutou's crowd."
"but how?" i asked.
"ah, that's the question!"
"you can't trick them," snapped nikka. "they are as clever as we."
"then what can you do?" demanded betty.
"exterminate them."
"your proposal, nikka, seems somewhat—er—shall i say savage?" objected vernon king.
"we are fighting savages," retorted nikka swiftly. "i still feel as i did last night that i don't want to risk any of our lives, treasure or no treasure, beyond what is essential to our safety. but the fact remains there is but one kind of treatment those people will understand. they are clever, remorseless, merciless. you can—"
there was a knock on the door. watkins answered it. his back stiffened as he peered through the crack.
"a moment, if you please, sir," he said coldly, refastened the door and turned to us.
"mr. 'ilyer would like a word with your ludship."
hugh rose, his jaw set.
"i'll talk to him outside," he said.
watkins reopened the door, and bowed him out. we heard his first icy words:
"to what am i indebted for this—"
the door closed behind him, and we looked at each other, startled, uneasy. nobody said anything. we were all thinking of the conversation going on in the corridor.
the tense silence lasted for perhaps five minutes. then the door was reopened, and hugh entered.
"hilyer wants to talk terms," he announced. "in the circumstances, i didn't feel that we could afford to overlook any chance, and i have arranged that four of us will meet four of his crowd at hilmi's house at three this afternoon."
"i don't trust the dog," i said immediately. "why go to hilmi's house? why couldn't he talk here?"
"he said the only way he could prove that he has a certain trick up his sleeve would be for us to go there. he also pointed out that we need have no fear of treachery, as we only needed to leave word behind us where we were going."
"why parties of four?" asked nikka.
"obviously, we couldn't take betty," answered hugh, "and one of us ought to stay with her."
"if toutou is there i shall kill him on sight," warned nikka.
"i told hilyer we drew the line at that beast. besides hilyer and hilmi, there will be only hélène de cespedes and serge vassilievich."
"humph, i still don't see why we should go out of our way to talk to them," i grumbled.
"hilyer seemed in a reasonable frame of mind," argued hugh. "he said his crowd are sick of the whole business, that they as well as we are wasting time, and that we might as well compromise."
"i hope you have no such idea in your head," exclaimed betty. "you couldn't trust them, in any event."
"no, i haven't—not yet, anyway," returned hugh. "i told hilyer we had no reason to be discouraged, but he just grinned. he said it was a stalemate. what i am after is to feel out the enemy's position."
none of us could think up a valid reason for objecting to hugh's strategy, so it was agreed that he, vernon king, nikka and myself should keep the appointment at hilmi's house. betty said that she would take watkins and go for a sail in the curlew, and we all approved her plan because we considered her safest on the water.
after luncheon we escorted betty and watkins to the man-o'-war dock, saw them off and then walked through pera to hilmi's house in the rue midhat pasha. it was a handsome residence in the french style. as we approached it from the corner, a big automobile halted in front of the entrance, and hilmi, himself, appeared in the doorway, ushering out a stout personage, whose frock-coat, fez and predatory visage proclaimed the turkish official. the man scarcely glanced at us, merely climbed into his machine and drove away. hilmi, awaiting us on the doorstep, rubbed his hands together, with an oily smirk of satisfaction.
"your servant, gentlemen," he said, with mock humility. "did you happen to recognize my guest who departed as you arrived?"
"no," replied hugh curtly.
hilmi had a peculiar effect on you. he was a rat. you didn't so much hate him or desire to kill him as you did hanker to kick him or stamp on him.
he saw this, and his smirk became a sour grimace.
"follow me," he snarled.
we passed through a square hall, carpeted and hung with gorgeous persian, bokharan and chinese rugs, into a salon which was a bizarre combination of rickety french period furniture and priceless, solid oriental stuff. the rugs, as in the hall, were worth a fortune by themselves. hilyer, hélène and serge vassilievich were lounging on a couch, smoking cigarettes and talking in low tones. the men rose as we came in, hilyer with a swagger, the russian with a frown that presently focussed on my face—it seemed he had never forgotten or forgiven the beating i gave him in the gunroom at chesby.
hélène lay back against a pile of cushions, languorously at ease, beautiful as a tigress, a pleasant smile curving her faultless lips. other than the smile, she made no move to greet us.
"sit down, won't you?" said hilyer, automatically taking charge. "glad you came. cigarettes? cocktail? i assure you quite all right; taste 'em myself, if you like. no? right o! did they see your friend, hilmi?"
"he—" hilmi pointed a finger at chesby—"says he did not know him."
"ah!" hilyer lighted a fresh cigarette. "don't take my word for it, you chaps, but that man was youssouf mahkouf pasha, who is popularly known in this part of the world as 'the grand vizier's jackal.' you probably do not see why you should be interested in him and his presence here to-day. the fact is, however, that his visit to this house was timed so that you should have an opportunity to see him. we particularly desired you to see him, knowing that you—ah—" he smiled agreeably—"might be inclined to doubt the veracity of whatever we said to you.
"to cut a long story short, mahkouf pasha is a particular pal of our fellow club-member, hilmi. i don't mind lettin' you in on it that they've been in several deals together. now, we owe you a bit on account. last night, for instance. but i gather that you yourselves aren't able to ride clear on the strength of it."
he paused, and hugh caught him up.
"you have no right to suppose that," hugh retorted sharply. "we aren't asking terms. you are."
"i notice you aren't refusing to discuss terms," said hilyer with a glint in his eye.
yassilievich jerked a remark which we could not understand from the corner of his mouth, but hilyer waved it aside.
"go at the narrow ditch first, serge. there'll be plenty of time for the water-jump. i'm not tryin' to bluff you and your friends, chesby. i don't have to. as i told you this morning, i have an ace in my sleeve. bein' a gambler, that's my habit."
"so i've heard," said hugh with cutting emphasis.
hilyer never changed color, only eyed him curiously.
"you do get down on a fellow, don't you?" he commented. "as you know by now, there's but one way to dust me. you tried it once, and i haven't forgotten. i've a convenient memory of my own.
"well, never mind. the fact is, you are stumped just is much as we are. we are plugging around the course, and neither one of us can jockey a horse clear of the field. it's damn nonsense. gets nobody anywhere. sensible thing to do is to lay cards on the table, and make a deal."
"put down your hand," said hugh evenly.
"the treasure is somewhere around tokalji's house," answered hilyer promptly. "that's certain. to get to it you've got to get into tokalji's house. what's more, you've got to be able to stay a while in tokalji's house. and you can't do it. you haven't got a chance of doing it! but let's suppose a miracle happened, and you found the chance." he dropped his cigarette, and leaned forward, driving his clenched fist into his palm to emphasize every word. "still, we've got you stopped. how? hilmi's friend, mahkouf pasha. we've made arrangements with him, whereby in the event that we give up hope of any better deal, we denounce you and your treasure to him. he will then convey the information to the imperial government, and in return for his public service and for our assistance, he and we will be presented with a stipulated percentage of the treasure, as recovered."
he sat back on the couch, and crossed his knees.
"those are good cards, providing they are played right," hugh admitted. "but how is the imperial government going to secure the treasure's location from us?"
"if they don't secure the information, nevertheless you won't get the treasure. to be quite plain with you, our plan, in the event of the contingency i have outlined, would be to give you an opportunity to get to the treasure before calling in the government."
"yes, that would be the way to do it," said hugh, nodding impersonally. "what's your proposition?"
"seventy-five per cent. to us, twenty-five per cent. to you."
hugh laughed.
"i thought you wanted to talk business," he jeered.
hélène tossed away her cigarette.
"you're playing it too fine, montey," she remarked. "will you talk on a fifty-fifty basis, lord chesby?"
hugh turned to her.
"i don't know," he said frankly. "i want to think it over. i'll admit that by calling in the turkish government, you could stall me—and yourselves. but how can i trust you? what guarantees can you give us?"
"no guarantees we could give you would be binding," she answered with an insolent smile. "what's more, we don't have to give guarantees. we hold the whip-hand. you've no alternative but to trust us. as to thinking it over—" she flung a glance at hilyer, who nodded—"come back to-morrow. we'll give you that long."
"i'll take as long as i choose," returned hugh, with a flash of temper—he, like the rest of us, was becoming restive under the realization that they did hold the whip-hand. "and understand me, i mean what i say when i tell you that any compromise between us will be based on what we consider satisfactory guarantees."
hilyer yawned lazily.
"don't like it, do you? doesn't feel comfortable to be spurred. well, suit yourselves. so far as we are concerned, remember, we'd rather come to terms with you. we stand to get more out of you than from the turkish government. but if you try to trick us we won't be beyond denouncing you, even at the cost of losing any share at all."
his teeth clicked and his drawl became a measured threat.
"incidentally, this is not the only ace we have up our sleeve. our terms will be stiffer to-morrow than they are to-day, and progressively so from then on."
"that goes," added hélène de cespedes, rearing her lithe body erect, all pretense of languor gone. "that's legal tender, lord chesby. you people are backing a losing game. the cards are stacked against you. you lose, no matter what you do."
"we'll see about that," said hugh, rising, a spot of red on each cheek bone the one sign of the white-hot anger that seethed within him.
"must you go?" asked hilyer, his drawl resumed. "au 'voir, then. hilmi, will you see 'em out?"
