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Rumour said he had been on the point of affiancing another to one of the men now in prison. I decided that Cetinje was no place for me, and that I would carry out my long deferred plan of a tour in the Albanian mountains. Sofia Petrovna pressed upon me an introduction to M. Lobatcheff, the Russian Vice-Consul at Scutari, and thither I went, leaving Cetinje to stew in its own juice.
The ethics of the situation were illustrated by Lobatcheff, who asked me whether I thought Montenegro safe for tourists. On my replying that I had had no difficulties, he told me that a Czech had very recently been murdered there for his money, and his body cut to pieces and hidden.
An educated Albanian is often a highly cultivated man, whereas even Lobatcheff was forced to admit that Paris and Petersburg could not make more of a Montenegrin than a Petar Plamenatz or a Marusitch. Nor was the Austrian Consul Kral better pleased with my Albanian travels.
But his rush to Petersburg and appeal to the Tsar met with rebuff and refusal. Russia was not yet ready for another war, as Lobatcheff sadly admitted. We became used to reports several times a week that war had begun somewhere or other.
No one now believed in "Constitution." The attitude of the populace on the Sultan's accession day showed this. No reforms or improvements had as yet been even begun. People said: "We will not give money to the Turks to buy gold braid for officers and guns to kill us with." Lobatcheff had gone to Mitrovitza to hold it as a Slav outpost.
M. Lobatcheff and Petar Plamenatz, however, gave all their energies to working on this element and keeping it as discontented as possible. Lobatcheff was very friendly to me. Being introduced by the Russians in Cetinje, I was expected to supply and convey information. The politics of the little consular world are funny.
Lobatcheff, the Russian Vice-Consul, was furious at the arrest of Marusitch, the ex-Russian military surgeon, declared him a harmless chatterbox, and said Prince Nikola had lost his head. So had all Montenegro. Neither party knew which would come out "top-dog"; each suspected the other, and spies and treachery were rampant.
When it was too late Lobatcheff came to beg me to consider the tale of the murder as strictly confidential. The Austrians were on no account to hear of it! Nor could I make him see that it was only fair to warn others beside Russians and English. In fact Lobatcheff's ideas were little less crude than those of Montenegro.
Petar Plamenatz left Scutari to defend the prisoners, and his consular colleagues including Lobatcheff foretold that all would receive heavy sentences, for they had no great opinion of Petar's powers. The trial proved highly sensational.
Even the French Consul and Lobatcheff, who did not conceal their anti-Albanian feelings, said: "Mon Dieu! what a people this would be if they had a just ruler!" The Mirdites were cautious. Their Abbot, Premi Dochi, waited to see which way the wind blew before committing his flock.