Barnes. Pdf

 
Chapters 
49
`No doubt,' replied the Ambassador, looking away to Miss Logan for some clue as to the personality of her employer. `No 
doubt.' 
They remained a week in the Ottoman capital, by no means long enough for Miss Logan to become accustomed to the 
coarse stares she received at the tablet d'hôte. Then the two ladies gave themselves up to the Favaid-i-Osmaniyeh, a Turkish 
company running steamers to Trebizond. The accommodation was crowded and to Miss Logan's mind far filthier than anything 
she had previously encountered. She ventured upon deck the first morning, and was approached by not one but three potential 
beaux, each with his hair curled and exuding a powerful odour of bergamot. Thereafter Miss Logan, despite having been 
engaged for her experience, confined herself to the cabin. Miss Fergusson professed not to notice such inconveniences and to 
be positively intrigued by the scrum of third-class passengers on 
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board; she would occasionally return with an observation or a question designed to stir Miss Logan from her dismal state of 
mind. Why, her employer wished to know, were the Turkish women all accommodated on the left-hand side of the 
quarterdeck? Was there some purpose, be it of society or of religion, behind such positioning? Miss Logan was unable to 
furnish a reply. Now that they had left Naples way behind them she felt increasingly less secure. At the faintest whiff of 
bergamot she shuddered. 
When Miss Logan had permitted herself to become engaged for the voyage to Asiatic Turkey, she had under-estimated 
Miss Fergusson's pertinacity. The absconding muleteer, the swindling innkeeper and the devious customs-house officer were 
all treated to the same display of unthwartable will. Miss Logan lost count of the times their luggage was detained, or they 
were told that a buyurulda or special permit would be necessary in addition to the tezkare they had already procured; but Miss 
Fergusson, with assistance from a dragoman whose own brief display of independent thought had been snuffed out early on, 
harried, demanded and succeeded. She was tirelessly willing to discuss things in the manner of the country; to sit down with a 
landlord, for example, and answer such questions as whether England was smaller than London, and which of the two 
belonged to France, and how much larger the Turkish navy was than those of England, France and Russia put together. 
Miss Logan had further imagined that their journey, while devotional in its final purpose, might afford pleasant 
opportunities for sketching, the activity which had first established a bond between employer and companion. But antiquities 
held no charm for Amanda Fergusson; she had no desire to examine heathen temples to Augustus, or half-surviving columns 
supposedly erected in honour of the apostate Emperor Julian. At least she evinced an interest in the natural landscape. As they 
rode inland from Trebizond, hunting-whips at the ready against the expected dog-packs, they viewed mohair goats on hillsides 
of dwarf oak, dull yellow vines, lush apple orchards; they heard 
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grasshoppers whose ringing note seemed sharper and more insistent than that of their British cousins; and they witnessed 
sunsets of the rarest purple and rose. There were fields of corn, opium and cotton; bursts of rhododendron and yellow azalea; 
red-legged partridge, hoopoes and blue crows. In the Zirgana mountains large red deer softly returned their gaze from an 
apprehensive distance. 
At Erzerum Miss Logan prevailed upon her employer to visit the Christian church. The impulse proved at first a happy one, 
for in the graveyard Miss Fergusson discovered tombstones and crosses whose Celtic air recalled those of her native Ireland; a 
smile of approval crossed her dutiful features. But this unexpected lenity was short-lived. Leaving the church, the two ladies 
noticed a young peasant woman placing a votive offering in a crevice by the main door. It proved to be a human tooth, no 
doubt her own. The crevice, upon further examination, was found to be stuffed full of yellowing incisors and weathered 
molars. Miss Fergusson expressed herself forcibly on the subject of popular superstition and the responsibility of the clergy. 
Those who preached the word of God, she maintained, should be judged according to the word of God, and punished the more 
severely if found wanting. 
They crossed into Russia, engaging at the frontier post a new guide, a large and bearded Kurd who claimed familiarity with 
the requirements of foreigners. Miss Fergusson addressed him in what seemed to Miss Logan a mixture of Russo and Turk. 
The days when Miss Logan's fluent Italian had been of use to them were long past; having begun the journey as guide and 
interpreter, she felt she had dwindled into a mere hanger-on, with little greater status than the discarded dragoman or the 
newly-appointed Kurd. 
As the three of them proceeded into Caucasia, they disturbed flocks of pelican, whose earthbound ungainliness was 
miraculously transfigured by flight. Miss Fergusson's irritation over the incident in Erzerum began to calm. Passing the eastern 
spur of Mount Alageuz, they gazed intently as the broad bulk of Great Ararat slowly revealed itself. The summit was hidden, 
[p. 154]
enfolded in a circle of white cloud which glittered brilliantly in the sun. 
`It has a halo,' exclaimed Miss Logan. `Like an angel.' 
`You are correct,' Miss Fergusson replied, with a little nod. `People like my father would not agree, of course. They would 
tell us that such comparisons are all hot air. Literally.' She gave a pursed smile and Miss Logan, with an enquiring glance, 
invited her to continue. `They would explain that the halo of cloud is a perfectly natural phenomenon. During the night and for 
several hours after dawn the summit remains clearly visible, but as the plain warms up in the morning sun, the hot air rises and 
becomes vapour at a given height. At the day's end, when everything cools down again, the halo disappears. It comes as no 
surprise to ... science,' she said with a disapproving emphasis upon the final word. 
`It is a magic mountain,' commented Miss Logan. 

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J
ULIAN 
B
ARNES
: A History of the World in 10 ½