THE VINEYARD
"This will make a hole in the Turks bigger than the hole in your roof," he said. "You have enough, I think. They will be hungry, these reeds; grind their food for them, and do not let them feel stint of that."
"Already?" asked Father Priketes.
"Already! It is August now, and when our vineyards are green with the fresh leaves in the spring, the juice of the greater vintage shall be spilled. And there will be a mighty gathering; the wine-press will be running red, and fuller than the vats of Solomon. Where can you stow the food for all these hungry throats?"
"There is room here, is there not?"
"Surely, room and to spare; but it would not be well to keep it here. Whoever enters here must carry a light; a chance spark, and he may cry to the Virgin in vain."
Father Priketes paused a moment,
"You shall take a walk with me to-morrow and we will see. You are satisfied at present?"
"I shall never be satisfied," said Nicholas. "I should not be satisfied if I saw all the armaments of angels in array against the Turk. But it is time to think of other things. Could you raise men at once?"
"Five hundred in one minute from within these walls," said Father Priketes, "and two thousand more in the time it would take an eager man to climb up here from Kalavryta."
Nicholas looked round again, smiling as a man smiles to look on one he loves.
"This feeds my soul," he said. "And swords too, little sickles for the gathering! Look you, perhaps we shalt not meet again till after our vintage has begun; but remember this: After four months from now, we eannot tell when the day of the beginning of the gather-
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