Further Foolishness — 12 - Abdul Aziz has His: An Adventure in the Yildiz Kiosk
Then I woke up.
XII.
Abdul Aziz has His: An Adventure in the Yildiz Kiosk "Come, come, Abdul," I said, putting my hand, not unkindly, on his shoulder, "tell me all about it."
But he only broke out into renewed sobbing.
"There, there," I continued soothingly.
"Don't cry, Abdul.
Look!
Here's a lovely narghileh for you to smoke, with a gold mouthpiece.
See!
Wouldn't you like a little latakia, eh?
And here's a little toy Armenian--look!
See his head come off--snick!
There, it's on again, snick!
now it's off!
look, Abdul!"
But still he sobbed.
His fez had fallen over his ears and his face was all smudged with tears.
It seemed impossible to stop him.
I looked about in vain from the little alcove of the hall of the Yildiz Kiosk where we were sitting on a Persian bench under a lemon-tree.
There was no one in sight.
I
hardly knew what to do.
In the Yildiz Kiosk--I think that was the name of the place--I scarcely as yet knew my way about.
In fact, I had only been in it a few hours.
I had come there--as I should have explained in commencing--in order to try to pick up information as to the exact condition of things in Turkey.
For this purpose I had assumed the character and disguise of an English governess.
I had long since remarked that an English governess is able to go anywhere, see everything, penetrate the interior of any royal palace and move to and fro as she pleases without hindrance and without insult.
No barrier can stop her.
Every royal court, however splendid or however exclusive, is glad to get her.
She dines with the King or the Emperor as a matter of course.
All state secrets are freely confided to her and all military plans are submitted to her judgment.
Then, after a few weeks' residence, she leaves the court and writes a book of disclosures.
This was now my plan.
And, up to the moment of which I speak, it had worked perfectly.
I had found my way through Turkey to the royal capital without difficulty.
The poke bonnet, the spectacles and the long black dress which I had assumed had proved an ample protection.
None of the rude Turkish soldiers among whom I had passed had offered to lay a hand on me.
This tribute I am compelled to pay to the splendid morality of the Turks.
They wouldn't touch me.
Access to the Yildiz Kiosk and to the Sultan had proved equally easy.
I had merely to obtain an interview with Codfish Pasha, the Secretary of War, whom I found a charming man of great intelligence, a master of three or four languages (as he himself informed me), and able to count up to seventeen.
"You wish," he said, "to be appointed as English, or rather Canadian governess to the Sultan?"
"Yes," I answered.
"And your object?"
"I propose to write a book of disclosures."
"Excellent," said Codfish.
An hour later I found myself, as I have said, in a flag-stoned hall of the Yildiz Kiosk, with the task of amusing and entertaining the Sultan.
Of the difficulty of this task I had formed no conception.
Here I was at the outset, with the unhappy Abdul bent and broken with sobs which I found no power to check or control.
Naturally, therefore, I found myself at a loss.
The little man as he sat on his cushions, in his queer costume and his long slippers with his fez fallen over his lemon-coloured face, presented such a pathetic object that I could not find the heart to be stern with him.
"Come, now, Abdul," I said, "be good!"
He paused a moment in his crying-- "Why do you call me Abdul?"
he asked.
"That isn't my name."
"Isn't it?"
I said.
"I thought all you Sultans were called Abdul.
Isn't the Sultan's name always Abdul?"
"Mine isn't," he whimpered, "but it doesn't matter," and his face began to crinkle up with renewed weeping.
"Call me anything you like.
It doesn't matter.
Anyway I'd rather be called Abdul than be called a W-W-War Lord and a G-G-General when they won't let me have any say at all--" And with that the little Sultan burst into unrestrained crying.
"Abdul," I said firmly, "if you don't stop crying, I'll go and fetch one of the Bashi-Bazouks to take you away."
The little Sultan found his voice again.
"There aren't any Bub-Bub-Bashi-Bazouks left," he sobbed.
"None left?"
I exclaimed.
"Where are they gone?"
"They've t-t-taken them all aw-w-way--" "Who have?"
"The G-G-G-Germans," sobbed Abdul.
"And they've sent them all to P-P-P-Poland."
"Come, come, Abdul," I said, straightening him up a little as he sat.
"Brace up!
Be a Turk!
Be a Mohammedan!
Don't act like a Christian."
This seemed to touch his pride.
He made a great effort to be calm.
I could hear him muttering to himself, "Allah, Illallah, Mohammed rasoul Allah!"
He said this over a good many times, while I took advantage of the pause to get his fez a little straighter and wipe his face.
"How many times have I said it?"
he asked presently.
"Twenty."
"Twenty?
That ought to be enough, shouldn't it?"
said the Sultan, regaining himself a little.
"Isn't prayer helpful, eh?
Give me a smoke?"
I filled his narghileh for him, and he began to suck blue smoke out of it with a certain contentment, while the rose water bubbled in the bowl below.
"Now, Abdul," I said, as I straightened up his cushions and made him a little more comfortable, "what is it?
What is the matter?"
"Why," he answered, "they've all g-g-gone--" "Now, don't cry!
Tell me properly."
"They've all gone b-b-back on me!
Boo-hoo!"
"Who have?
Who've gone back on you?"
"Why, everybody.
The English and the French and everybody--" "What _do_ you mean?"
I asked with increasing interest.
"Tell me exactly what you mean.
Whatever you say I will hold sacred, of course."
I saw my part already to a volume of interesting disclosures.
"They used to treat me so differently," Abdul went on, and his sobbing ceased as he continued, "They used to call me the Bully Boy of the Bosphorus.
They said I was the Guardian of the Golden Gate.
They used to let me kill all the Armenians I liked and nobody was allowed to collect debts from me, and every now and then they used to send me the nicest ultimatums--Oh, you don't know," he broke off, "how nice it used to be here in the Yildiz in the old days!
We used all to sit round here, in this very hall, me and the diplomats, and play games, such as 'Ultimatum, ultimatum, who's got the ultimatum.'
Oh, say, it was so nice and peaceful!
And we used to have big dinners and conferences, especially after the military manoeuvres and the autumn massacres--me and the diplomats, all with stars and orders, and me in my white fez with a copper tassel--and hold discussions about how to reform Macedonia."
"But you spoilt it all, Abdul," I protested.
"I didn't, I didn't!"
he exclaimed almost angrily.
"I'd have gone on for ever.
It was all so nice.
They used to present me--the diplomats did--with what they called their Minimum, and then we (I mean Codfish Pasha and me) had to draft in return our Maximum--see?
--and then we all had to get together again and frame a _status quo_."
"But that couldn't go on for ever," I urged.
"Why not?"
said Abdul.
"It was a great system.
We invented it, but everybody was beginning to copy it.
In fact, we were leading the world, before all this trouble came.
Didn't you have anything of our system in your country --what do you call it--in Canada?"
"Yes," I admitted.
"Now that I come to think of it, we were getting into it.
But the war has changed it all--" "Exactly," said Abdul.
"There you are!
All changed!
The good old days gone for ever!"
"But surely," I said, "you still have friends--the Bulgarians."
The Sultan's little black eyes flashed with anger as he withdrew his pipe for a moment from his mouth.
"The low scoundrels!"
he said between his teeth.
"The traitors!"
"Why, they're your Allies!"
"Yes, Allah destroy them!
They are.
They've come over to _our_ side.
After centuries of fighting they refuse to play fair any longer.
They're on _our_ side!
Who ever heard of such a thing?
Bah!
But, of course," he added more quietly, "we shall massacre them just the same.
We shall insist, in the terms of peace, on retaining our rights of massacre.
But then, no doubt, all the nations will."
"But you have the Germans--" I began.
"Hush, hush," said Abdul, laying his hand on my arm.
"Some one might hear."
"You have the Germans," I repeated.
"The Germans," said Abdul, and his voice sounded in a queer sing-song like that of a child repeating a lesson, "are my noble friends, the Germans are my powerful allies, the Kaiser is my good brother, the Reichstag is my foster-sister.
I love the Germans.
I hate the English.
I love the Kaiser.
The Kaiser loves me--" "Stop, stop, Abdul," I said, "who taught you all that?"
Abdul looked cautiously around.
"_They_ did," he said in a whisper.
"There's a lot more of it.
Would you like me to recite some more?
Or, no, no, what's the good?
I've no heart for reciting any longer."
And at this Abdul fell to weeping again.
"But, Abdul," I said, "I don't understand.
Why are you so distressed just now?
All this has been going on for over two years.
Why are you so worried just now?"
"Oh," exclaimed the little Sultan in surprise, "you haven't heard!
I see--you've only just arrived.
Why, to-day is the last day.
After to-day it is all over."
"Last day for what?"
I asked.
"For intervention.
For the intervention of the United States.
The only thing that can save us.
It was to have come to-day, by the end of this full moon--our astrologers had predicted it--Smith Pasha, Minister under Heaven of the United States, had promised, if it came, to send it to us at the earliest moment.
How do they send it, do you know, in a box, or in paper?"
"Stop," I said as my ear caught the sound of footsteps.
"There's some one coming now."
The sound of slippered feet was distinctly heard on the stones in the outer corridor.
Abdul listened intently a moment.
"I know his slippers," he said.
"Who is it?"
"It is my chief secretary, Toomuch Koffi.
Yes, here he comes."
As the Sultan spoke, the doors swung open and there entered an aged Turk, in a flowing gown and coloured turban, with a melancholy yellow face, and a long white beard that swept to his girdle.
"Who do you say he is?"
I whispered to Abdul.
"My chief secretary," he whispered back.
"Toomuch Koffi."
"He looks like it," I murmured.
Meantime, Toomuch Koffi had advanced across the broad flagstones of the hall where we were sitting.
With hands lifted he salaamed four times--east, west, north, and south.
"What does that mean?"
I whispered.
"It means," said the Sultan, with visible agitation, "that he has a communication of the greatest importance and urgency, which will not brook a moment's delay."
"Well, then, why doesn't he get a move on?"
I whispered.
"Hush," said Abdul.
Toomuch Koffi now straightened himself from his last salaam and spoke.
"Allah is great!"
he said.
"And Mohammed is his prophet," rejoined the Sultan.
"Allah protect you!
And make your face shine," said Toomuch.
"Allah lengthen your beard," said the Sultan, and he added aside to me in English, which Toomuch Koffi evidently did not understand, "I'm all eagerness to know what it is--it's something big, for sure."
The little man was quite quivering with excitement as he spoke.
"Do you know what I think it is?
I think it must be the American Intervention.
The United States is going to intervene.
Eh?
What?
Don't you think so?"
"Then hurry him up," I urged.
"I can't," said Abdul.
"It is impossible in Turkey to do business like that.
He must have some coffee first and then he must pray and then there must be an interchange of presents."
I groaned, for I was getting as impatient as Abdul himself.
"Do you not do public business like that in Canada?"
the Sultan continued.
"We used to.
But we have got over it," I said.
Meanwhile a slippered attendant had entered and placed a cushion for the secretary, and in front of it a little Persian stool on which he put a quaint cup filled with coffee black as ink.
A similar cup was placed before the Sultan.
"Drink!"
said Abdul.
"Not first, until the lips of the Commander of the Faithful--" "He means 'after you,'" I said.
"Hurry up, Abdul."
Abdul took a sip.
"Allah is good," he said.
"And all things are of Allah," rejoined Toomuch.
Abdul unpinned a glittering jewel from his robe and threw it to the feet of Toomuch.
"Take this poor bauble," he said.
Toomuch Koffi in return took from his wrist a solid bangle of beaten gold.
"Accept this mean gift from your humble servant," he said.
"Right!"
said Abdul, speaking in a changed voice as the ceremonies ended.
"Now, then, Toomuch, what is it?
Hurry up.
Be quick.
What is the matter?"
Toomuch rose to his feet, lifted his hands high in the air with the palms facing the Sultan.
"One is without," he said.
"Without what?"
I asked eagerly of the Sultan.
"Without--outside.
Don't you understand Turkish?
What you call in English--a gentleman to see me."
"And did he make all that fuss and delay over that?"
I
asked in disgust.
"Why with us in Canada, at one of the public departments of Ottawa, all that one would have to do would be simply to send in a card, get it certified, then simply wait in an anteroom, simply read a newspaper, send in another card, wait a little, then simply send in a third card, and then simply--" "Pshaw!"
said Abdul.
"The cards might be poisoned.
Our system is best.
Speak on, Toomuch.
Who is without?
Is it perchance a messenger from Smith Pasha, Minister under Heaven of the United States?"
"Alas, no!"
said Toomuch.
"It is HE.
It is THE LARGE ONE!"
As he spoke he rolled his eyes upward with a gesture of despair.
"HE!"
cried Abdul, and a look of terror convulsed his face.
"The Large One!
Shut him out!
Call the Chief Eunuch and the Major Domo of the Harem!
Let him not in!"
"Alas," said Toomuch, "he threw them out of the window.
Lo!
he is here, he enters."
As the secretary spoke, a double door at the end of the hall swung noisily open, at the blow of an imperious fist, and with a rattle of arms and accoutrements a man of gigantic stature, wearing full military uniform and a spiked helmet, strode into the room.
As he entered, an attendant who accompanied him, also in a uniform and a spiked helmet, called in a loud strident voice that resounded to the arches of the hall: "His High Excellenz Feld Marechal von der Doppelbauch, Spezial Representant of His Majestat William II, Deutscher Kaiser and King of England!"
Abdul collapsed into a little heap.
His fez fell over his face.
Toomuch Koffi had slunk into a corner.
Von der Doppelbauch strode noisily forward and came to a stand in front of Abdul with a click and rattle after the Prussian fashion.
"Majestat," he said in a deep, thunderous voice, "I greet you.
I bow low before you.
Salaam!
I kiss the floor at your feet."
But in reality he did nothing of the sort.
He stood to the full height of his six feet six and glowered about him.
"Salaam!"
said Abdul, in a feeble voice.
"But who is this?"
added the Field-Marshal, looking angrily at me.
My costume, or rather my disguise, for, as I have said, I was wearing a poke bonnet with a plain black dress, seemed to puzzle him.
"My new governess," said Abdul.
"She came this morning.
She is a professor--" "Bah!"
said the Field-Marshal, "a _woman_ a professor!
Bah!"
"No, no," said Abdul in protest, and it seemed decent of the little creature to stick up for me.
"She's all right, she is interesting and knows a great deal.
She's from Canada!"
"What!"
exclaimed Von der Doppelbauch.
"From Canada!
