When they came up to Rumeli Hisar, first light was breaking and they were all almost dropping with fatigue. As they pulled in to the shore, a sleepy sentry roused himself to challenge them. 'Go fetch Evilya Pasha at once,' shouted Mahmoud.
The sentry stared at the boatload of people, soot-begrimed, tattered and, except for Selim, bareheaded. Standing up, the Prince added, 'Tell the Pasha that His Imperial Majesty requires his presence urgently.'
Suddenly the sentry caught sight of the splendid turban, bedecked with jewels and surmounted by an aigrette, worn by the figure slumped in the stern of the boat. His eyes started from his head and his mouth gaped open. Without another word he turned and ran up the steep slope.
Ten minutes later Evilya Pasha came swiftly padding down it in slippers and a hastily-donned robe. Briefly the Prince told him what had occurred. Salaaming profoundly to the Sultan, the Pasha expressed his distress and unshaken loyalty. Then the officers to whom he had sent to be roused with orders to follow him down, helped the refugees from the boat and up to the castle.
There the Pasha's chief wife welcomed Aimde and Fatima and took them to rooms that had been hastily prepared for them in the harem. Before they left the men, Aimee turned to Roger and said:
'Monsieur le Chevalier, it is to you we owe our lives; a debt we shall never be able to repay.'
Selim then took from round his neck a ribbon from which depended a magnificent star and crescent jewel which he wore on all occasions. Passing the ribbon over Roger's head, he said with tears in his eyes:
'My good friend, you are well named "le brave Breuc". While I am still Sultan it is my happiness to decorate you with the highest honour that it is within the power of the ruler of the Turkish Empire to bestow.'
Somehow Roger managed to stammer his thanks; but the pain in his hands and shoulder were agonising, and he was utterly exhausted. Later, his memory of what happened after that was only a vague knowledge that several people had undressed him, put soothing ointment on his wounds, bandaged them and got him between the cool sheets on a comfortable divan.
It was not until late in the afternoon that he awoke. Seated cross-legged on the floor opposite him he saw a Turkish manservant. As their eyes met, the man smiled, got up and left the room. Ten minutes later, he returned with coffee, rolls shaped like small quoits, sweet cakes and a large dish of fruit After his exertions of the previous night, Roger felt hungry and would have welcomed an English breakfast, with a choice of half a dozen hot dishes, and York ham to follow, washed down with good Bordeaux; but he made do as well as he could on the rolls, spread with roseleaf jam, and fruit.
When he had done, the servant held out for him a robe of Turkish towelling, then took him along to the Hamam. To him this was no new experience, as he had frequently availed himself of the Turkish baths when in Egypt. More than once he had felt ashamed by the fact that, as a whole, Orientals kept themselves cleaner than Europeans, the majority of whom had a bath only two or three times a year—and even most of the upper classes only once a week—whereas in Cairo and
Constantinople the public baths were used daily by the greater part of the population. This difference in custom had even led, right up to the preceding reign, to high-caste Turks finding Europeans so smelly that they had insisted on all Ambassadors being steam-bathed in the Seraglio before they were presented to the Sultan.
After sitting in the hot room for half an hour, while the perspiration trickled off him, Roger took a dip in the pool, then he was shaved and submitted to a massage that miraculously restored the vigour to his still-tired muscles. Back in his room, he found that fresh clothes of fine texture had been laid out for him, and that a doctor was waiting there to treat his wounds. They were only superficial and the salve applied early that morning had already done wonders.
When he had dressed, he was taken down to a small, arcaded court. A fountain was playing in the centre and seated on divans, smoking hookahs, were the Prince, the Kizler Aga and the Pasha.
Having greeted him warmly and thanked him again for all he had done the previous night, Mahmoud told him that the news was not good, but no worse than was to be expected. All the loyal men in the Nizam-i-jedad had been murdered, and many of the eunuchs. Bands of Janissaries were now roaming the city, seeking out and killing, wherever they found them, the higher officials who were known to have favoured the reforms introduced by Selim. Every shop was shut and every house barred. Many of them were being broken into, but large numbers of the wealthier class had had the sense to collect such valuables as they could carry and hurry to take sanctuary in the mosques. Meanwhile, Prince Mustapha had had himself proclaimed Sultan.
'Do you think the majority of the people will accept him?' Roger asked.
'I fear so. You see, he will have the support of many men in high places who resent His Majesty Selim's reforms and he is the Heir Apparent.'
Roger frowned. ‘I was not aware of that.'
'It is so. Unlike the European monarchies, with us the crown does not descend from father to son, but to the next eldest living Osmanli Prince, and Mustapha was born before I was. He is the son of Aimee’s husband, the Sultan Abdul-Hamid by an older Kadin.'
'What of the Army,' Roger enquired. 'Surely a great part of it must hate the Janissaries for the idle, privileged life they lead, while other troops are fighting? There must be many regiments that would support the Sultan Selim in an attempt to regain his throne.'
It was the Pasha who answered. 'You are right, Effendi. But most of them are either fighting the Russians, or engaged in putting down rebellions in the Balkan provinces. I have sent messengers to such Generals as I believe to be loyal; but there is no body of troops within many weeks' march of Constantinople sufficiently strong to defeat the Janissaries.'
'For how long, Pasha, do you think you can hold out here?'
The Pasha made a wry face. 'A week perhaps, but. not longer. My men are Bulgars, and can be relied on. But the castle is not provisioned for a siege. We should be starved out'
'Then we must leave here,' Roger declared promptly. 'With an escort of your men, the Imperial party should be able to reach some more distant place where they will be safer. Still better, they could set off in disguise as a small caravan of perhaps a dozen people.'
The Kizler Aga shook his dark head. 'It is too late for that, Effendi. By noon Prince Mustapha had learned where my Imperial Master has taken refuge. Outside the gates of the castle there are now many hundred Janissaries, and on the water side scores more in several galleys. We are already besieged.'
'Arc you expecting them to attack?'
'Not yet,' the Prince replied. 'For the moment Prince Mustapha must have his hands full in the city. He will probably come out here tomorrow and demand our surrender.'
'I'll not surrender,' growled the Pasha. 'Not unless I receive a direct order to do so from my Imperial Master.'
The Prince smiled at him. 'Good friend, you will receive no such order from the Sultan. He is in a sad state of depression, blaming himself now for having rejected my advice to take sterner measures with the Janissaries, and so bringing us all to this terrible pass. But the Sultan Valide has persuaded him to give me full authority to take all such decisions as are necessary. He will remain in his room; so at least we can die fighting.'
The evening that followed was one of the most unhappy that Roger had ever spent. It was not that he was afraid to die; as he thought he almost certainly would the next day or the day after, when the castle was attacked. He could not bear the thought of the fate that would befall the courageous and beautiful Aimee when she fell into Prince Mustapha's hands. She was only a little over forty and still infinitely more desirable than any Turkish beauty. Mustapha was, he had gathered, no fool. And no-one but a fool would kill such a pearl among women; but he would take his revenge by humiliating her. Since she had held the rank of Sultan Valide he could not possibly turn her over to his Janissaries. But he could give her in marriage as a junior wife to one of the most repulsive Pashas who had supported him.