The Blue Hour

Chapter 17: Reshid

"What exactly is this Russian strategy," asked a pretty young woman who had been introduced to him as Jane Seagrave.

"Sowing chaos," Sir Elliot said.

"How?"

Mrs Elliot gave her husband a dark look. He offered her a smile which begged forgiveness. "Through fear and hate," he said. "When the Balkan rebellions started, Ambassador Ignatieff advised the Sultan to ignore them even though Muslims had died in the insurrections. As a result, the Russian agents on the ground got time to build the revolt without having to fear Ottoman reprisals. But this laxity seemed unfair to Muslims who felt betrayed by their Sultan, so they took revenge into their own hands. Christians retaliated, and so on and so forth until we are stuck in a spiral of fear and hate, and..." Sir Elliot snapped his fingers. "The Bulgarian massacres."

"Sounds more like a bloody mess than a strategy," Jane said. The guests laughed.

"Perhaps. But this bloody mess, as you call it, feeds a centrifugal process which tears the empire apart," Sir Elliot said, ignoring another glare from his wife. "In fact, if the Sultan does not defend his Christian subjects from being massacred by Muslims, the Tsar has threatened to intervene militarily."

"And the Tsar would be right to do so," MacGahan exclaimed. "Those Christian rebels are our brothers and sisters and it is our moral duty - the duty of all Europeans - to stand by them."

"Oh dear, let's not speak of war tonight," Mrs Elliot said nervously.

"Don't be an idiot." The words, directed at MacGahan, were spoken by an unsmiling, bold man who had not uttered a word all evening, Jane's brother, William Seagrave, seated next to the hostess. All eyes turned to him. Reshid had been told William was a successful industrialist who had loaned the Porte important sums of money. "These are the facts, MacGahan," William said. "If the Tsar were to declare war on the Porte, the empire would loose within a week. The Tsar would gain control over the Balkans and over twelve million Christians, one third of the Sultan's subjects and the valuable territory they come with. Is that the gift you suggest we should hand the Russians?"

The guests laughed. MacGahan looked offended.

"Giving up on the empire would be very bad for business, the Queen would not allow it," the man to right of Jane said.

"Of course she would not," William muttered.

The grey-haired lady said: "I'm old enough to remember the last time we chased the Russians back to Moscow, and we would do it again in a heartbeat. The French and British defending the empire, together."

After a murmur of agreement around the table, a silence eddied.

Mrs Elliot turned to Reshid. "Mr Vambery, we are so fortunate you could come tonight. You know the Turk intimately, better than any one of us." She smiled gently as she let her eyes wander from one guest to the other, inviting them all to turn the page on the wretched Bulgarian massacres and the prospect of war. She would not let blood or war do further damage to her dinner party.

Reshid answered with false modesty. "Indeed, I have travelled throughout the whole of the empire and studied many of the different peoples here, not only the Turk."

"Mr Vambery is a scholar and has written books about his remarkable adventures," Mrs Elliot said. "He is quite a celebrity, and he speaks sixteen languages."

All eyes turned to him. He stood, pushed away the chair and said: "In fact, to thank our generous hosts for this exquisite dinner, I have brought with me a gift tonight."

There was a murmur of excitement. For a moment, Reshid left the room, and returned with pile of handwritten pages, bound together with thin leather straps, which he handed to Sir Elliot with a ceremonious bow. "This is my latest manuscript translated into English. It describes in great detail Russian activities in Central Asia."