The Wonder Package 2

"March 4. All day with Murad's men setting

wire entanglements under water; two Turkish destroyers

patrolling the entrance to the bay, and cavalry patrols on the

heights to warn away the curious.

March 6. Forts Alamout and Shah Abbas are being

reconstructed from the new plans. Wired areas under water and along

the coves and shoals are being plotted. Murad Bey is unusually

polite and effusive, conversing with me in German and French. A

spidery man and very dangerous."

"March 7. A strange and tragic affair last night.

The heat being severe, I left my tent about midnight and went down

to the dock where my little sailboat lay, with the object of

cooling myself on the water. There was a hot land breeze; I sailed

out into the bay and cruised north along the coves which I have

wired. As I rounded a little rocky point I was surprised to see in

the moonlight, very near, a steam yacht at anchor, carrying no

lights. The longer I looked at her the more certain I became that I

was gazing at the Imperial yacht. I had no idea what the yacht

might be doing here; I ran my sailboat close under the overhanging

rocks and anchored. Then I saw a small boat in the moonlight,

pulling from the yacht toward shore, where the crescent cove had

already been thoroughly staked and the bottom closely covered with

barbed wire as far as the edge of the deep channel which curves in

here like a scimitar.

It must have been that the people in the boat miscalculated the

location of the channel, for they were well over the sunken barbed[…]

"criss-crossed mesh of wires just below the surface of the water;

but I probed for an hour before I located anything. Another hour

passed in trying to hook into the object with the little

three-fluked grapnel which I used as an anchor. I got hold of

something finally; a heavy chest of olive wood bound with metal;

but I had to rig a tackle before I could hoist it aboard.

Then I cast out again; and very soon my grapnel hooked into what

I expected—a canvas sack, weighted with a round shot. When I got it

aboard, I hesitated a long while before opening it. Finally I made

a long slit in the canvas with my knife… .

She was very young—not over sixteen, I think, and she was really

beautiful, even under her wet, dark hair. She seemed to be a

Caucasian girl—maybe a Georgian. She wore a small gold cross which

hung from a gold cord around her neck. There was another, and

tighter, cord around her neck, too. I cut the silk bowstring and

closed and bound her eyes with my handkerchief before I rowed out a

little farther and lowered her into the deep channel which cuts

eastward here like the scimitar of that true believer, Abdul

Hamid.

Then I hoisted sail and beat up slowly toward my little dock

under a moon which had become ghastly under the pallid aura of a

gathering storm––

"A poor dead young lady!" interrupted the child, clasping her

hands more tightly. "Did the Sultan kill her, daddy?"

"It seems so, Ruhannah."

"Why?"

"I don't know. He was a very cruel and wicked Sultan."

"I don't see why he killed the beautiful poor dead lady."

"If you will listen and not interrupt, you shall learn why."

"And was the chest that Herr Wilner pulled up the very same

chest that is here on the floor beside me?" insisted the child.

"The very same. Now listen, Rue, and I shall read a little more

in Herr Wilner's diary, and then you must have your bath and be put

to bed––"

"Please read, daddy!"

The Reverend Wilbour Carew turned the page and quietly

continued:

March 20. In my own quarters at Trebizond again,

and rid of Murad for a while.

A canvas cover and rope handles concealed the character of my

olive wood chest. I do not believe anybody suspects it to be

anything except one of the various boxes containing my own personal

effects. I shall open it tonight with a file and chisel, if

possible."

"March 21. The contents of the chest reveal

something of the tragedy. The box is full of letters written in

Russian, and full of stones which weigh collectively a hundred

pounds at least. There is nothing else in the chest except a broken

Ikon and a bronze figure of Erlik, a Yildiz relic, no doubt, of

some Kurdish raid into Mongolia, and probably placed beside the

dead girl by her murderers in derision. I am translating the

letters and arranging them in sequence.

March 25. I have translated the letters. The dead

girl's name was evidently Tatyana, one of several children of some

Cossack chief or petty prince, and on the eve of her marriage to a

young officer named Mitya the Kurds raided the town. They carried

poor Tatyana off along with her wedding chest—the chest fished up with my grapnel.

"In brief, the chest and the girl found their way into Abdul's

seraglio. The letters of the dead girl—which were written and

entrusted probably to a faithless slave, but which evidently never

left the seraglio—throw some light on the tragedy, for they breathe

indignation and contempt of Islam, and call on her affianced, on

her parents, and on her people to rescue her and avenge her.

And after a while, no doubt Abdul tired of reading fierce,

unreconciled little Tatyana's stolen letters, and simply ended the

matter by having her bowstrung and dumped overboard in a sack,

together with her marriage chest, her letters, and the Yellow Devil

in bronze as a final insult.

She seems to have had a sister, Naïa, thirteen years old,

betrothed to a Prince Mistchenka, a cavalry officer in the Terek

Cossacks. Her father had been Hetman of the Don Cossacks before the

Emperor Nicholas reserved that title for Imperial use.

And she ended in a sack off Gallipoli! That is

the story of Tatyana and her wedding chest."

"March 29. Murad arrived, murderously bland and

assiduous in his solicitude for my health and comfort. I am almost

positive he knows that I fished up something from Cove No. 37 under

the theoretical guns of theoretical Fort Osman, both long plotted

out but long delayed.

April 5. My duplicate plans for Gallipoli have

been stolen. I have a third set still. Colonel Murad Bey is not to

be trusted. My position is awkward and is becoming serious. There

is no faith to be placed in Abdul Hamid. My credentials, the secret

agreement with my Government, are no longer regarded even with

toleration in the Yildiz Kiosque. A hundred insignificant incidents

prove it every day. And if Abdul dare not break with Germany it is

only because he is not yet ready to defy "the Young Turk party. The

British Embassy is very active and bothers me a great deal.

April 10. My secret correspondence with Enver Bey

has been discovered, and my letters opened. This is a very bad

business. I have notified my Government that the Turkish Government

does not want me here; that the plan of a Germanised Turkish army

is becoming objectionable to the Porte; that the duplicate plans of

our engineers for the Dardanelles and the Gallipoli Peninsula have

been stolen.

April 13. A secret interview with Enver Bey, who

promises that our ideas shall be carried out when his party comes

into power. Evidently he does not know that my duplicates have been

stolen.

Troubles threaten in the Vilayet of Trebizond, where is an

American Mission. I fear that our emissaries and the emissaries of

Enver Bey are deliberately fomenting disorders because Americans

are not desired by our Government. Enver denies this; but it is

idle to believe anyone in this country."

"April 16. Another interview with Enver Bey. His

scheme is flatly revolutionary, namely, the deposition of Abdul, a

secret alliance, offensive and defensive, with us; the

Germanisation of the Turkish army and navy; the fortification of

the Gallipoli district according to our plans; a steadily

increasing pressure on Serbia; a final reckoning with Russia which

is definitely to settle the status of Albania and Serbia and leave

the Balkan grouping to be settled between Austria, Germany, and

Turkey.

I spoke several times about India and Egypt, but he does not

desire to arouse England unless she interferes.

I spoke also of Abdul Hamid's secret and growing fear of

Germany, and his increasing inclination toward England once

more."