Shadow of a Hero

LEGEND

The Danube Pilot

NOW SELIM PASHA sent for his Captains and said, ‘Restaur Vax holds Potok and all Varina north of the Danube. Soon the Sultan will hear of his doings, and he will send armies with generals, and he will say to us who live here, “Why have you allowed our rest to be disturbed by a mere bandit?” And he will take from us our estates, and our sons he will send to his galleys and our daughters to harems, and our names will be no more.’

The Captains said, ‘We cannot fight Restaur Vax, though we are many more than he. He is too strong in his mountains, where he knows the goat-paths and the paths of the hunter, and can fall on us unawares.’

Selim said, ‘Then we must bring him across the river to our own lands, where the mountains are less, and strange to him. Go now through the land with your bazouks, and demand of the people more taxes than they can pay, and when they refuse punish them with great cruelty, so that they cry out to Restaur Vax to come to their aid.’

As he commanded, so it was done, until the West Varinians sent word to Restaur Vax saying, ‘Come to our aid, or we are no more a people.’ And Restaur Vax said, ‘We will go.’ But his chieftains said, ‘Selim will set watch on the river and send his bazouks against us while some of us are yet on the water and those who have landed are as yet unready.’

Restaur Vax said, ‘We will cross in the dark of the moon.’

His chieftains said, ‘This is madness. Who crosses the Danube in the dark of the moon? Only the hardiest pilots, and how can we trust them? All the pilots are Serbs and Bulgars.’

Restaur Vax said, ‘Let boats be gathered at Vosh. Selim will no doubt send us a pilot.’

And so it was, for a man came to Restaur Vax saying, ‘I am the hardiest pilot on all the river, from the White Mountains to the Inmost Sea. I will lead you over in the dark of the moon.’

Restaur Vax looked into his eyes and said, ‘You are a fine man. I guess you have many fine sons.’

The pilot said, ‘I have three fine sons.’

Restaur Vax, still holding his gaze, said, ‘I trust they are well.’

The man said, ‘They are indeed well.’

But Restaur Vax saw his eyes narrow as he spoke, and by that he knew that the man’s sons stood at that very hour in Selim Pasha’s courtyard, with ropes around their necks. Nevertheless, he told him that he should be their pilot, and they settled a price, and gave him food and wine. But as the man ate, Restaur Vax said to Lash the Golden, ‘Have this man watched in secret, and bring me word of all that he does.’

Then Restaur Vax took his horse and rode on the banks of the Danube, some kolons below Vosh, studying the further shore for a landing-place. On the second dusk, as he rode, he saw an old woman rowing towards the shore, but the current was swift with rains and she was weary with rowing, for she was indeed old, and in her struggle she let go of an oar and it was swept away. She, too, would have been swept away had not Restaur Vax ridden his horse out along a sand-pit and plunged into the river and thrown her a rope and so towed her ashore.

Then the old woman thanked him, but still she wept and said, ‘Now I have lost an oar, and I shall never see my sister again, for the winter is near and the current is already too great for me, and before the ice forms hard my sister will be dead, with no woman to care for her.’¹

Restaur Vax said, ‘Mother, you are old to be crossing this great river alone. Are you not afraid?’

She answered, ‘All my life I have lived by the river. I was born on the further shore, and on this shore I was married and widowed, and on the further shore I would wish to die, only I have no means to carry my goods across and now I have lost an oar. But I know this river as a farmer knows his fields. If I had my strength I could cross it in the dark of the moon.’

‘So you shall cross it,’ said Restaur Vax. ‘You and your goods. Soon I will send some friends, with a fine boat. They will load your goods aboard and then they will bring you to Vosh to wait for me.’

‘Nothing is given for nothing,’ said the woman. ‘I am old, but no fool. Why should you do this for me, who have nothing to give you?’

‘You are richer than you know,’ he answered. ‘You have half my country to give me. I am Restaur Vax.’

At that she blessed him, and said she would do all that he wished.

When Restaur Vax rode back to the mountains he asked Lash what their pilot had done.

Lash said, ‘He has built a signal fire on the point above Vosh, which cannot be seen from the quayside. Furthermore he has sent word to his brother to come to him.’

‘All goes well,’ said Restaur Vax. ‘Now this we must prepare, and this, and this. Let it be seen to.’

As the dark of the moon came near, Restaur Vax and the chieftains and their men, all save a few, travelled to Vosh, for they knew that Selim had spies still north of the river. Those few took a boat to the widow’s house and loaded her goods and gear aboard while it was still day, and then she went willingly with them to Vosh. As night came on they all gathered at the quay and boarded the boats which lay ready, and set sail, calling from boat to boat so that they should not be lost to each other. The pilot went with them, but when they were well clear of the quay, his brother ran to the place where the fire was laid ready, and lit it, as a signal to Selim on the further shore that the crossing had begun.

Then Restaur Vax put his pistol at the pilot’s head, as did the chieftains to those who were steering the other boats, and the old woman stood beside the tiller and said this way, or that, and so brought them down to the place where the boat lay with the old woman’s goods aboard. That they took also, and then crossed the river, still calling softly from boat to boat, and with the old woman still standing by the tiller and saying this way, or that, until she had brought them to the landing-place below her sister’s house.

It was still then night, so they made ready for battle, and the sister’s son guided them by goat-paths and the paths of the hunter to the landing-place opposite Vosh, where Selim lay in wait.

Then in the dawn the Captain of Artillery fired her cannon upon the bazouks, who had lain waiting all night and now slept, and Restaur Vax and the chieftains and their men fell upon them with pistol and with sword and slew them. Only Selim escaped, in a swift boat down the river, and fled to the Sultan in Byzantium, who fell into a rage at the news he brought and threw him into his deepest dungeon.

But Restaur Vax and the chieftains went hither and yon through the mountains and fell upon the bazouks wherever they were, before they could gather themselves into one army, and slew them.² And until all was done Restaur Vax gave orders that a guard was set on the house where the old woman now lived with her sister, to see that none should trouble them.

¹ The encounter with the old woman may be borrowed from The Adventure of Prince Ixil, an ancient magical romance, now lost, apart from a few fragments.

² The crossing of the Danube for the winter campaign of 1823–4 was accomplished by means of a ruse. Apart from exaggerations of her own role, the account in Marie McMahon’s Memoirs tallies with several of the details in the Legend.