Kagig

“ He took no notice of the money, but one of the old gipsy women crept out and annexed it, and Kagig made no comment.
"He has not his concession with him. I can prove nothing to-night. I said you shall stand a test. You must choose. This German and those Turks are my prisoners. You have nothing to do with it. You may go back to Tarsus if you wish, and tell the Turks that Kagig defies them! You shall have an escort as far as the nearest garrison. You shall have fifty men to take you back by dawn to-morrow."
At that Rustum Khan turned several shades darker and glared truculently. ”

“ All fights are full of pauses, when either side could snatch sudden victory if alert enough. We stopped, and turned to look, as if our own lives were not in danger.
Kagig had the German off his feet, face toward the flames, kicking and screaming like a madman. He whirled him twice—shouted a sort of war-cry—hove him high with every sinew in his tough frame cracking—and hurled him head-foremost into the fire.
The Turks took the cue to haul off and stand staring at
Head foremost into the fire
us. ”

“ The Rajput's eyes were still ablaze with pagan flame, from watching Maga.
"To see whether thou hast manhood behind that swagger!" answered Kagig, and led the way. No man ever yet explained the racial aversions.
"Kopek!—dog, thou!" growled the Rajput, but Kagig took no notice and led on, followed by Monty and the rest of us. Maga and the gipsies came last, swarming behind us up the ladder through a hole among the beams, and clambering on to the roof over boxes piled in the draughty attic. Up under the stars a man was standing with an arm stretched out toward Tarsus. ”

“ A minute later we heard his voice uplifted in command, and the business of shepherding those women and children was taken out of our hands by a man who understood the business. The intoxicating sounds that armed men make as they evolve formation out of chaos in the darkness came in through open door and windows, and in another moment Kagig was back again with a hand on each door-post. ”

“ Kagig answered slowly with relish.
"That is my business!" growled Rustum Khan, but Kagig laughed at him.
"No Turk would believe a word you say—not one leetle word!" he said, snapping his fingers. "You are a good fighter. I saw your charge from the castle tower; it was very good. But I will send an Armenian on this errand. Go on, Lord Monty; I know the proper man."
"That's about the long and short of it," said Monty. "If we can induce Mahmoud to attack to-night, we've a fair chance of hitting him so hard that he'll withdraw and let us alone. ”

“ Often I heard her urge you men to follow me to Zeitoon and help to fortify the place!"
"Will you leave a good woman in the hands of Turks, Kagig? Come—come to the rescue!"
"It is too bad," said Kagig simply. "Such women suffer more terribly than the hags who merely die by the sword. Ten times by the count—during ten succeeding massacres I have seen the Turks sell Armenian wives and daughters at auction. ”

“ But an agreeable surprise made us feel at home before ever the fire leaped up to warm the creases out of saddle-weary limbs. We had given up thinking of Kagig, not that we despaired of him, but the gipsies, and especially Maga, had replaced his romantic interest for the moment with their own. Now all the man's own exciting claim on the imagination returned in full flood, as he arose leisurely from a pile of skins and blankets near the hearth to greet Monty, and shouted with the manner of a chieftain for fuel to be piled on instantly—"For a great man comes!" ”

“ Fred demanded.
"Ask him!" said Kagig. "He understands! If there should be treachery the straw will be set alight, and he shall know how pigs feel when they are roasted alive! Never fear—there will be no treachery!"
We followed him back to his own house, he urging us to make good note of the prisoners' condition, and to bear witness before the world to it afterward.
"The world does not know the difference between Armenians and Turks!" he complained again and again.
Once again we arranged ourselves about his open chimney-place, this time with Kagig on a foot-stool in the midst of us. ”

“ Then those cursed Turks set the house on fire behind me, and my companions dragged me away to come and find others to unite with us and make a stand! We found no others! Kagig—I tell you—those bloody Turks are auctioning our wives and daughters in the village church! It is time to act!"
"Hah! Who was it urged you in season and out of season—day and night—month in, month out—to come to Zeitoon and help me fortify the place? Who urged you to send your women there long ago?"
"But Kagig, you do not appreciate. To you it is nothing not to have women near you. ”

“ I say let us all go to Zeitoon and help Kagig!"
"Oh, bravo!" shouted Fred, but it was Will's praise that proved acceptable and made her smile.
"Second the motion!"
I added a word or two by way of make-weight, that did more as a matter of fact than her young ardor to convince those very skeptical men and women. No doubt she broke up their determination to sit still, but it was my words that set them on a course.
"Kagig will be angry when he comes. He's a ruthless man," said I, and the Armenians, men as well as women, sought one another's eyes and nodded. ”

“ Yet there was not any other explanation we could offer. A distant cloud of black smoke with bulging red under-belly rolled away through the darkness like a tremendous mountain range.
We stood in silence trying to judge how far away the thing might be, Kagig standing alone with his foot on the parapet, his goat-skin coat hanging like a hussar's dolman, and Monty pacing up and down along the roof behind us all. The gipsies seemed able to converse by nods and nudges, with now and then one word whispered. After a little while Maga whispered in Will's ear, and he went below with her. ”

“ It is only the West that can joke at itself in the face of crisis.
"If not to that," said Monty blandly, "then what agreements do you keep?"
Kagig saw the point. He drew a deep impatient breath and drove it out again hissing through his teeth. Then he took grim hold of himself.
"Effendi," he said, addressing himself to Monty, but including all of us with eyes that seemed to search our hearts, "you are a lord, a friend of the King of Eengland. If I were less than a man of my word I could make you prisoner and oblige your friend the King of Eengland to squeeze these cursed Turks!" ”

“ Monty smiled benignantly.
"It's all one, Kagig. Why labor the point? I'm going with you. Rustum Khan prefers to come with me." Kagig looked askance at Rustum Khan, but made no comment. "One hostage is enough for your purpose. Let me talk with my friends a minute."
Kagig nodded, and we four drew aside.
"Now," demanded Fred, who knew the signs, "what special quixotry do you mean springing?"
"Shut up, Fred. There's no need for you fellows to follow Kagig another yard. He'll be quite satisfied if he has me in keeping. That will serve all practical purposes. ”

“ So I sat down on Kagig's stool, to give them a better opinion of their advantage over me, there being nothing like making the enemy too confident. Then I held out the palm of my hand for inspection and tried to look like a man pretending he does not believe in magic. Whatever Maga thought, the old hag was delighted. ”

“ I even like the gipsies more than formerly. They are men of some discernment, and of action!"
"Man of blood!" growled Monty, "What of the Turkish owner and his seven sons?"
"They shall burn, too, if the sahib say so!"
"If they burn, so shall you! Where is Kagig?"
"Seeing that the sahibs' horses are packed and saddled. I came to find the sahibs. According to Kagig it is time to go, before Turks come to take vengeance for a burned road-house. They will surely say Armenians burned it, whether or not there is a German to support their accusation!" ”

“ So Fred Oakes fell to his old accustomed task, and played them marching accompaniments on his concertina until his fingers ached and even he, the enthusiast, loathed the thing's bray. In one way and another a little of the pall of misery was lifted.
Kagig sent us down bread and yoghourt at nightfall, so that those who had lived thus far did not die of hunger. Women brought the food on their heads in earthen crocks—splendid, good-looking women with fearless eyes, who bore the heavy loads as easily as their mountain men-folk carried rifles. ”

“ CHAPTER ELEVEN
"That man's dose is death, and he dies unshriven!"
NOW for a moment I became the unwilling vortex of that mob of anxious men and women—I who by my own confession knew Kagig, I who had sent Kagig a message, I who five minutes ago was on the verge of being hanged in the greasy noose that still swung above the ladder through the hole in the roof—I who therefore ought to be thoroughly plastic-minded and obedient to demands. ”

“ An Armenian insurrection has been nipped in the bud. Several villages are burning. The other inhabitants are very much incensed, and all foreigners are in danger—yourselves especially, since you have seen fit to travel in company with such a person as Kagig."
"What has Peter Measel got to do with it?" demanded Fred. "Has he been writing down all our sins in a new book?"
"He will identify you. He will also identify Kagig's agents. He brings a personal charge against a man named Rustum Khan, who must return to Tarsus to answer it. The charge is robbery with violence." ”

“ It was Monty who called Kagig's attention to the idiocy of tiring out the cattle before dawn, and then Kagig rode like an arrow until he could make the gipsies hear him. One long keening shout that penetrated through the drum of hoofs brought them to a walk, but they kept Maga in front with them, screened from our view until morning by a close line of mounted women and a group of men. The Turkish prisoners were all behind among the fifty Armenians from Zeitoon, looking very comfortless trussed up on the mounts that nobody else had coveted, with hands made fast behind their backs. ”

“ Imagination conjured up the shrieks of tortured victims, for we had all seen enough of late to know what would happen to any luckless straggler they might have caught and brought to make sport by the fires. But there was no imagination about the calls of Kagig's men, posted above us on invisible dark crags and ledges to guard against surprise. We slept in comfortable consciousness that a sleepless watch was being kept—until fleas came out of the ground by battalions, divisions and army corps, making rest impossible. ”

“ There he, too, fell asleep, and until two or three hours after dark we were a village of the dead.
To this day there is no explaining it. Certainly no human watch or ward saved us from destruction at the hands of roving enemies. I was awakened at last by a brilliant light, and the effort made by our two prisoners, still tied together, to crawl across my body. I threw them off me, and sat up, rubbing my eyes and wondering where I was.
In the door stood Kagig, with a lantern in his right hand thrust forward into the room. ”

“ I said, savage with pain (and the reasons he did not hesitate to assign to my strained ankle were simply scandalous) . "I'll wait until I find a man with honest ears."
"Try Kagig!" he advised me dryly.
And Kagig I did try. We came on him at our end of the bridge that overhung the Jihun River. Our party were waiting on the far side, and Fred hurried over to join them. Kagig was listening to the reports of a dozen men, and while I waited to get his ear I could see Fred telling his great joke to the party. It was easy to see that Gloria Vanderman did not enjoy the joke ”

“ I ordered, "and hold this flank until
Kagig makes a move." I did not doubt Kagig would fall back on Zeitoon
as soon as he could do that with advantage. Neither did I doubt
Ephraim's ability to spoil my whole plan if he should see fit. Yet
I had to depend on his powers as interpreter.
There are two ways of relieving a weak wing, and the obvious one of reenforcing it is not of necessity the best. I could see through the glasses a bowl of hollow grazing ground in which the dismounted Kurds had left their horses; and I could count only five men guarding them. ”

“ Observe: he goes with that bullet-food of men and women mixed, to hide them in reserve behind the narrow gut at the head of the ramp. The Turks are fools, as Kagig said, and their general is also a fool, in spite of Kagig. They propose to force that ramp. You see that by Frredd sahib's orders the firing on our side has grown greatly less. That is to draw the Turks on. See! It has drawn them! They are coming! The lord sahib will send for Frredd sahib to take command of that reserve, to man the top of the ramp in case the Turks succeed in climbing too far up it. ”

“ Fred was nearest the door, and opened it. Maga laughed aloud. I was nearest to Peter Measel, so it was I who took him by the neck and thrust him into outer darkness. Kagig kicked the door shut after him; but even so we heard him for several minutes grinding out condemnatory prayers.
"Now sleep, sportmen all!" said Kagig, blessing us with both hands. "Sleep against the sport to-morrow!"
"AND DELILAH SAID—"
Always at fault is the fellow betrayed
(Majorities murder to prove it!) ”

“ Then, when the light was scarcely born as yet, she suddenly drew rein at an open place where the track she had been following emerged out of dense bushes, and dismounted. From behind the bushes I watched, and presently I, too, dismounted to hold my mare's nostrils and prevent her from whinnying. That woman, Maga Jhaere, knelt, and pawed about the ground like a dog that hunts a buried bone!"
In front of us Maga was still arguing. Suddenly Kagig turned on her and asked her three swift questions, bitten off like the snap of a closing snuff-box lid. ”