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I have seen in Cettinje, when the men were all on the frontier fighting, Turkish prisoners enough to take possession of the place if they had been disposed to rise and make a fight with sticks and stones. This was one of the most touching phases of that curious war, a warfare such as the world will hardly see again.
They aimed for a place called Podgoritza, which had a partially justifiable reputation for an inn, they missed the road and spent the night in the open beside a fire, rolled in the blankets they had very fortunately bought in Cettinje. They supped on biscuits and Benham's brandy flask.
When we awoke the Sirdar had already retaken his whirlwind course evidently grave news called him to Cettinje leaving the orderly's gallant horse dead behind him. "He kills many horses," said a peasant, shaking his head; "he rides fast always." We crossed the dry bed of the river and prepared for the hill in front of us. Suddenly Mike's horse plunged into a bog.
The scenery is exceedingly fine, and indeed the view from the road to Cettinje is claimed as almost unsurpassed in Europe. It leads into the Bay of Topla, and the steamer heads direct for Castelnuovo, leaving on the left the Sutorina, the lower part of the Canali valley, a portion of the territory of the Republic of Ragusa ceded to Turkey in 1699 to form a buffer state between herself and Venice.
"Looking for a husband, of course," said Barbara. And like all wise men when staggered by serene feminine asseveration we bowed our heads and agreed that nothing could be more obvious. Some weeks passed; but we heard no more of Jaffery Chayne. If he had planted his widow there, in Cettinje, and gone off to Central Africa we should not have been surprised.
I am going to America, dear heart, with an English gentleman who has been very kind to me. He was the English Consul at Cettinje, and when there were so many of us Hungarian lads lying sick of that awful cholera in the hospital at Slovnitza, his wife, a sweet, kind lady, used to come and visit us and cheer us up. She was very ugly and had big teeth and no waist, but she was an angel of goodness.
Our steamer had come, however, not to carry me to Scutari, but, and perhaps fortunately, to take me back to Rieka, whence I had to go to Cettinje to get a refit, for I was ragged, bootless as my errand to Scutari, and draggled with mud from head to foot; notwithstanding which, as soon as the Prince had learned of my arrival, though in the midst of a diplomatic dinner, he sent for me to come to the palace, and made me sit down with the company as I was and tell my story.
Jaffery, after burying his poor comrade, took ship with Liosha and went to Cettinje, where he entrusted her to the care of old friends of his, the Austrian Consul and his wife, and made her known as the widow of Prescott of Reuter's to the British diplomatic authorities.
We were sorry to say good-bye, he was lonely, and we liked him; but we lost no time, as we were seven hours from Podgoritza and goodness knows how far from Cettinje. The carriage and coachman were the same as yesterday's, but his expression was so lugubrious in the downpouring rain that he looked another man. Just outside the village he picked up a friend and put her in the carriage.
"It was ours," he said; "we only gave it up to Venice so that she should protect us from the Turk. If we do not hold Scutari, Montenegro can never become a state, so if we cannot keep her we might as well give up Cettinje. After all we are but taking back what was once ours." He was daily expecting the uniforms from Russia, and asked every soldier on the road for news.
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