Treasure Hunt Tales: The Star of the South & Captain Antifer. Жюль Верн

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СКАЧАТЬ You came here without bringing it?”

      “Do you know what he asked?”

      “What does that matter?”

      “Fifty millions of francs!”

      “Fifty millions—”

      And there was a volley of oaths.

      “And so, you imbecile, this sailor knows of what importance this might be to him?”

      “There is no doubt of it.”

      “May Mahomet strangle me—and you, too!” exclaimed the irascible personage, striding about the room; “or, rather, that is my business as far as you are concerned, for I hold you responsible for all the misfortunes that may happen—”

      “But it is not my fault, Excellency! I was not in the secrets of Kamylk Pasha.”

      “You ought to have been, then; you ought to have found them out when he was alive; you were his notary!”

      And then came another broadside of oaths.

      This terrible man was Saouk, the son of Mourad, the cousin of Kamylk. He was then thirty-one. His father being dead, he found himself the direct heir of his rich uncle, and would have inherited an immense fortune if this fortune had not been put out of reach of his covetousness in the way we know.

      What had happened after Kamylk had left Aleppo, taking his treasure with him, to bury it on some unknown island, was briefly this:—

      In October, 1831, Ibrahim, with twenty-two ships of war and thirty thousand men, had captured Gazza, Jaffa, Caiffa, and Acre had fallen into his hands the year following, on the 27th of March, 1832.

      It seemed as though the territories of Palestine and Syria were to be finally severed from the Sublime Porte, when the intervention of the European powers stopped the son of Mehemet Ali in his career of conquest. In 1833 the treaty of Kataya was imposed on the Sultan and the Viceroy, and things remained as they had been.

      Fortunately for his safety during this much-troubled period, Kamylk had placed his riches in the cavity sealed by the double K, and had continued his voyages. Whither went the brigantine under the command of Captain Zo? In what parts, far or near, did he plough the seas? Did he visit farthest Asia or farthest Europe? No one knew save his captain and himself, for none of the crew were allowed to land, and none of them knew whether they were in the west or the east, the north or the south, for such was their master’s whim.

      But after their many peregrinations Kamylk was imprudent enough to return to the Levant. The treaty of Kataya having stopped the ambitious march of Ibrahim, the northern part of Syria having submitted to the Sultan, the rich Egyptian had good reason to suppose that there was no danger in his returning to Aleppo.

      As ill-luck would have it, however, in the middle of the year 1834 his vessel was driven by bad weather into Acre. Ibrahim’s fleet was then cruising off the coast, and Mourad, invested with official functions by Mehemet Ali, was on board one of the ships of war.

      The brigantine was flying Turkish colours. Was it known that she belonged to Kamylk Pasha! It matters little. She was chased, caught, carried by boarding, after a stout defence, which meant the massacre of the crew, the destruction of the ship and the capture of her owner and captain.

      Kamylk was at once recognized by Mourad. A few weeks later he and Captain Zo were secretly carried to Egypt, and imprisoned in the fortress of Cairo.

      But even if Kamylk had returned to his house at Aleppo it is probable that he would not have found the safety on which he reckoned. That part of Syria under Egyptian administration groaned under an odious yoke. This lasted until 1839, when the excesses of Ibrahim’s agents were such that the Sultan withdrew the concessions to which he had been forced to yield. The result of this was a new campaign on the part of Mehemet Ali, whose troops gained the victory of Nezib; whereupon Mahmoud began to fear for the safety of the capital of Turkey in Europe; and England, Russia and Austria had to intervene to stay the march of the conqueror, and assure him hereditary possession of Egypt, and the governorship for life of Palestine west of the Jordan.

      It is true that the Viceroy, intoxicated with victory, and encouraged by French diplomacy, refused the offer of the Allied Powers. But their fleets were sent against him. Sir Charles Napier captured Beyrouth and then Sidon, and then bombarded and captured Acre, so that Mehemet Ali had to yield, and recall his son to Egypt, leaving Syria entirely to Sultan Mahmoud.

      Kamylk Pasha had been too hasty in his endeavour to return to the country of his choice, where he thought of peacefully ending his troubled life. There he intended to remove his treasure, and with some portion of it pay his debts of gratitude—debts perhaps forgotten by those who had helped him. And instead of Aleppo it was Cairo that he found, thrown into a prison, where he was at the mercy of his pitiless enemies.

      Kamylk understood that he was lost. The idea of regaining his liberty at the cost of his fortune did not occur to him—or rather such was the force of his character, and his indomitable determination never to abandon his wealth to the Viceroy or Mourad, that he contented himself with an obstinacy that can only be ascribed to Ottoman fatalism.

      The years he passed in solitary confinement, separated from Captain Zo, whose discretion he never doubted, were anything but pleasant to him. In 1842, in the eighth year of his imprisonment, he managed, through the connivance of a gaoler, to send away a few letters, one of them to Captain Thomas Antifer of St. Malo. An envelope containing his will also reached the hands of Ben Omar, who had formerly been his notary at Alexandria.

      Three years afterwards Captain Zo died, and Kamylk remained the only one who knew where the treasure had been buried. But his health declined visibly, and the severity of his imprisonment could not but shorten a life which would have lasted for years beyond the walls of his cell. At length in 1852 he died, forgotten by those who had known him, without either menaces or ill-treatment forcing him to reveal his secret.

      Next year his unworthy cousin followed him to the grave, without having enjoyed the immense riches he coveted, and which had led him to such criminal devices.

      But Mourad left a son, Saouk, who inherited all his father’s evil instincts. Although he was then but twenty-three, he had lived a violent, unscrupulous life among the political and other bandits who then swarmed in Egypt. As the only heir of Kamylk Pasha, it was to him that the inheritance would have come had it not been put beyond his reach, and consequently his anger knew no bounds when—as he thought—the secret of the whereabouts of this immense fortune disappeared with the death of the Pasha.

      Ten years went by, and Saouk had given up all hopes of ever ascertaining what had become of the lost treasure.

      Judge then of the effect on him of a letter received early in 1862, inviting him to visit the office of the notary Ben Omar on important business.

      Saouk knew this notary: timid to excess, an arrant poltroon, with whom a determined man like himself could do anything he pleased. So he went to Alexandria, and unceremoniously asked Ben Omar for what reason he wished to see him.

      Ben Omar was most obsequious in his reception of this client whom he believed capable of everything, even of strangling him straightaway. He apologized for having put him to inconvenience, and said to him in his sweetest tone,—

      “But is it not the sole heir of Kamylk Pasha that I have the honour of addressing?”

      “Just so, the СКАЧАТЬ