CHAPTER XVIII

THE CHAOUSH

The four soldiers who were leading Armenouhi and Vassinag away were rough peasants from the distant interior. They were unable to see any refinement or delicacy in their captives; for them such things did not exist; and they were acting in obedience to the Prophet. What the great Padishah bade, or what the religion of the Prophet sanctioned, could be no crime. Moreover, woman had no soul; she was made for man; and what mattered it who the man might be? As for those giaours, those Christian women, who were not even worthy of being the slaves of the soulless Moslem wives, what difference did it make what became of them? The Koran and the state were indulgent; they placed no restraint on the passions of their subjects. Such would have been the soldiers’ thoughts, if they had had any. But why should they think? The foolish Franks might do that; but for a good Moslem to think,--the Padishah forbade it.

The chaoush was of a somewhat better type of man than were his soldiers, for he came from an old family which could trace its history back to the conqueror Mohammed’s time, when Brusa was the Turkish capital. He began his active life in a regiment of the Imperial Guard at Yildiz. There he had an opportunity to see something outside the life of the ordinary Turkish soldier. Fridays, when the Sultan went to Selamlik, he had stolen glances at the distinguished foreigners and the beautiful women who were on the ambassadors’ stand. When on guard, he had often seen the ladies of the royal harem driving about the park; and sometimes, when their veils were thrown aside, he had glanced at their faces. Eight years in Constantinople had taught him to think. He envied the position and wealth of his superiors; he would compare the large houses on the Bosphorus with his own big ruin in Brusa; and he often dreamed of doing the Sultan some great favor, that with the baksheesh which he was sure to receive in return he might restore the old house, and, like his forefathers, live the life of an idle country pasha. But when his regiment was disbanded, he was as far from being a pasha as ever, and returned home almost penniless. Two objects militated against his life of ease and idleness,--his mother and his poverty; and forced by them both, he enlisted as a chaoush in command of the military patrol which guarded the country roads about Ak Hissar.