"And before I could stop her she had taken up the pistol and shot herself through the head. "The shots had aroused the soldiers, and two or three burst in up the stairs. With the officer's pistol, for I had no time to reload mine, I killed the first, and he went bumping down the stairs, knocking one man over. Then I opened the window and dropped. It was not more than ten feet from the ground, and I had only a few feet to fall." He paused a moment and stood up, letting go of the rudder and raising his hands. "God, to whom vengeance belongs," he cried, "and blessed Mother of Jesus, and holy Nicholas, my patron, help me to keep my vow." He stood there for a moment in silence. "And my vow--" he said to Mitsos. "Your vow--your vow!" cried Mitsos. "The foul devils--your vow is to root out the Turk, and to-morrow I, too, will light tapers to the holy saints and make the vow you made. Christ Jesus, the devils! And you must show me how to keep it." "Amen to that," said Nicholas. "Enough for to-night, we will speak of it no more." He sat down again and took the rudder, and for five minutes or so there was silence, broken only by the steady hiss of the water round the boat, and then Mitsos, still in silence and trembling with a strange excitement, put about on the second tack. Nicholas did not speak, but sat with wide eyes staring into the darkness, seemingly unconscious of the boy. This second tack brought them up close under the sea-wall of Abdul Achmet, and the white house gleamed brightly in the moonlight. Then, as Mitsos was putting about again on the tack which would take them home, Nicholas looked up at it and spoke for the first time. "That is a new house, is it not?" he said. "Yes, it is the house of that pig Achmet," said Mitsos. "Why is he a pig above all other Turks?" "Because he took our vineyard away and said he would pay a fair price for it. Not a piastre has he paid. Look, there are a couple of women on the terrace." Two women of the house were leaning over the wall. Just as they went about Nicholas saw a man, probably one of the eunuchs, come up out of the shadow, and as he got up to them he struck the nearer one on the face. The woman cried out and said to him, "What is that for?" Nicholas started and looked eagerly towards them. "Did you hear, Mitsos?" he said, "she spoke in Greek." "One of those women?" said Mitsos. "And why not?" "How do you suppose she knows Greek?" "Yes, it is strange. We shall not get home in this tack." CHAPTER IV THE MIDNIGHT ORDEAL