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1 - THE NUNNERY

A month before the Pasha was briefing Rory on his new mission, Vespers was being held in the chapel of a remote rural nunnery on the Neapolitan coast. It’s very remoteness attracted visitors seeking a “retreat”, or a respite from the real world - or women whose men folk wanted them safely hidden away. ,

Signora Marguarita Bianchi glanced at her daughter, Dora, as she knelt in the choir alongside her pretty friends Lucia and Teresa.

Indeed, as well as the heavily veiled old nuns, there were several other young women in the chapel and staying in the nunnery - all, like herself and her daughter, had been sent there by their husbands or fathers for safe keeping in these difficult days, whilst the rebellion against the French occupying army raged and ebbed.

What a beautiful girl Dora was, Marguarita thought - with her sleek black hair, flawless white complexion, slim waist and nicely swelling bosom. And she was still only 16. Clearly she was taking after her mother, Maria thought with a proud smile. The family resemblance was strong. Indeed several times they had been taken for sisters - for, although she was now in her early thirties, Marguarita had kept her figure and her looks.

But what a responsibility Dora was. Half the young men in the Kingdom of Naples seemed to be chasing her. But she was in love with a young man of good family, Giovanni Mattei, whom her parents much approved of.

But, of course, any scandalous rumours would put paid to their hopes of her making such a good marriage. The agricultural dealing business of Marguarita ’s husband had been seriously affected by the French occupation and his daughter’s dowry would now have to be much reduced. So a good marriage would be dependant on her looks and on her reputation for being an untouched virgin from a respectable family.

It was, however, a reputation that was under constant threat from the ill-disciplined French troops stationed in their hill-top town - for whom rape was just part of the perks of conquest.

Moreover, a good marriage for her daughter would also partly depend on her own reputation and beauty, and the way she had kept it, for there was an old Neapolitan saying: “Before you decide on a girl, look at the mother.”

No wonder, Nina thought, that when her husband had to travel up to Rome on business, he had insisted on his wife and daughter, going off to a convent on the coast.

‘You will both be quite safe there,’ he had said as kissed his lovely wife and pretty daughter goodbye.

Marguarita was not the only beautiful Italian woman attending Vespers in the isolated convent on the coast near Naples.

The most striking was the aristocratic looking, twenty-five year-old, Contessa de Santa Croce. Unlike the other women she was blond - a throwback to the Greek settlers of Southern Italy in the days before the Roman Empire.

Her penniless husband had decided to rejoin the Neapolitan Royal Court in the new temporary capital in Palermo in Sicily. Here, the Bourbon King of Naples was safe from the French invaders - thanks to the British Royal Navy that patrolled the Straits of Massena and prevented the French from crossing to Sicily. Meanwhile the young Conte had left his adoring young wife in the protection of the nuns.

There was also the handsome dark-eyed Nina, the young wife of a small landowner. She had her two-year old son with her.

And there was Nicoletta, the young wife of another small landowner who was still feeding her newly born daughter. Her flashing eyes and full figure had turned attracted the attention of many a young man and her husband had decided that she and her child would be safer in the nunnery whilst he was away for a month.

Then there was also Paula the pretty young wife of the mayor of a town occupied by the French. She was expecting a child in a few months time and her husband had judged that it would be prudent to send her to the nunnery to await her child.

And, of course, there were Dora’s two pretty friends, Lucia and Teresa. Their fathers were both officers in the Neapolitan Royalist Army which, defeated by the French and their local Republican allies, had fled with their King to Sicily. Fearful of the vengeance of the Republicans, their mothers had begged the nuns to shelter their daughters.

They were both secretly engaged to young officer’s in their fathers’ Regimens and they and Dora would hours talking longingly about their young men and their hopes of marriage.

Perhaps the saddest was the beautiful and nearly married Maria who had been forced to flee to the sanctuary of the nunnery in the middle of her rapturously happy honeymoon with her adored young husband - a honeymoon that had been violently interrupted when her husband had suddenly learnt that the French were looking for him as a potential rebel. He had had to flee to the mountains whilst she had sought safety in he nunnery.

These women all had three things in common: white complexions; sultry good looks; and the conviction that they were now quite safe in the nunnery.

They were all also in love with their husbands, or in he case of the three young unmarried girls, with their handsome young swains.

2. THE RAID

It was late that night when the Barbary Corsairs struck. There was no moon as, towing the ships boats that carried the landing party of Janissaries, and guided by the discreetly flashing lantern of the spy that they had landed the day before, the darkened Corsair ship quietly closed the little promontory on which the nunnery stood - separated from a nearby fishing village.

It was this very isolation that had made the nunnery so popular as a place of religious contemplation.

The boats were cast off and, with muffled oars, closed the jetty of the nunnery on which their colleague was now standing.

Without further orders the well-trained Janissaries of the landing party left a boat- keeper with each boat and then, dividing into two parties, quietly climbed up the paths that led to the nunnery. Whilst one party, in the guise of beggars, knocked on the door seeking shelter for the night, the other, larger, one would be forcing an entrance from the back.

The Corsairs were primarily after the valuable jewels and golden crucifixes that they had heard were in the chapel of the nunnery. Of course, they also knew that there was always the chance, when raiding a nunnery, of picking up some beautiful young women, but they also knew that the market for white female slaves, back in Marsa, was showing signs of collapsing.

Nevertheless, the Barbary Corsairs tradition of carrying off young white women was hard to throw off - and so, as a compromise, the landing party had been ordered to ignore the nuns and only to seize any exceptionally attractive young women staying in the nunnery.

Just in case, therefore, each man therefore carrying two long narrow cloths, one for binding a woman’s hands behind her back, and the other for muzzling her.

Also just in case, back onboard the Corsair ship, the ship’s two black eunuchs were preparing the large cages down in the hold, that were used to hold captives.

Marguarita and Dora were awoken by screams and seconds later the door of their room was burst open. Several moustachioed men in turbans and baggy trousers rushed in and pulled the two women out of their beds. The men were shouting at each other in some strange language.

The women cringed back in horror and embarrassment for the night was warm and they were only wearing muslin nightdresses. But the men made no attempt to rape them and instead bound their wrists behind their back with cloths.

‘What’s happening, Mamma?’ cried Dora. The word “Mamma” made the men look at each other and smile, but before Marguarita could say a word, she had been gagged with another cloth, and within seconds so too had Dora. It was all done so quickly and efficiently that clearly this was something the men had practiced.

The bound and half naked women were then hustled out of the room and downstairs.

They saw grinning men making off with the jewelled golden crucifixes from the chapel. Horrified they saw the Mother Superior on her knees, being flogged to make her reveal where the nunnery’s money was kept. They heard her scream and then hand over a key.

They were lined up in a row with the other young women staying in the nunnery. The nuns appeared to have been ignored. The other young women had also been tied and gagged, but the hands of Nina and Nicoletta had been fastened in front of their body to allow them to hold their small sobbing children.

A man who seemed to be in charge now came down the line humiliatingly inspecting the women. As he so two other men sanding behind them pulled down their nightdresses, baring their breasts.

He paused in front of Marguarita and Dora. Seeing their resemblance, he turned to Marguarita.

‘Su Figlia?’ he shouted in the mixed Italian, Catalan and Spanish that made up the Lingua Franca of the Western Mediterranean, including the Barbary Ports.

Dumbly Marguarita Nina nodded her agreement that Dora was her daughter, hoping that she would therefore be spared. How wrong she was!

The man laughed. A beautiful mother and daughter! They would fetch a good price even in a slump in the market! He gave an order and the two women were pushed across the room to join the where the Contessa was standing. She was looking terrified as one of the corsairs stroked her silky blond hair.

Meanwhile the leader of the Janissaries was feeling the milk-laden breasts of Nicoletta. He nodded. There was always a good demand for a beautiful woman in milk. Nervously holding her child, she too was pushed across to join the Contessa and Marguarita and her daughter.

Then he gave a cry of excitement. The slightly swollen belly of Paula had been bared. Grinning the leader can his hand over it. Again he nodded. A pretty expectant young woman should sell despite the downturn in the market. She too was pushed across the others.

The leader now inspected the two young girls, Lucia and Teresa. They would almost certainly be virgins. Again he nodded and both girls were pushed across to join the other group.

Now only the dark-eyed Nina and her two-year-old son remained. The leader stroked his short beard, hesitatingly. Was a young mother worth taking? Then he remembered how a certain slave dealer was particularly interested in such girls. Alright! He nodded.

All the young women staying in the nunnery had been selected. Glut in the market or not, they were just too desirable to be left behind.

The women were then forced down the path that led to the nunnery’s small and normally deserted small private jetty. They saw that several ships’ boats were waiting and they were pushed down into the largest.

Moments later more grinning Janissaries came down the path, laden with the treasures seized in the chapel. It had all had been a well planned and executed raid, and within moments the boats were on their way out to the darkened ship lying off the promontory.

Arriving alongside, most of the Janissaries climbed up the side of the corsair vessel so as to lighten the boat. In the darkness, slings were lowered from a book and silently hooked on. The boat was raised up and swayed on board, followed by the smaller boats. The standard of well-drilled seamanship onboard the corsair ship was high.

There was a slight altercation between the Rais, the Captain of the ship, and the leader of the Janissaries, who cursed for having brought back so many women at a time when the market for them was in decline.

But it was too late to send them back now - and any way, the leader of the Janissaries pointed out, the gold and treasure that they had brought back would certainly provide the merchants who had invested in this Corso with good dividends - even it the women did not sell well.

Meanwhile the ship’s two large black eunuchs had appeared and taken charge of the women. Each had a short whip tucked into the silken cummerbund went round his ample waist. The cringed back in horror - for these were the first black men that most of tem had even seen. And they seemed so big and frightening.

Speaking to both the Rais and to the two black eunuchs, the leader of landing party pointed to the blond Contessa, said: ‘She’s an aristocrat.’

Even the Rais was impressed. ‘Take special care of this one,’ he told the two black eunuchs. The white of their big eyes showed in the darkness. A real Contessa!

‘But that’s not all,’ added the leader of the Janissaries, pointing to Marguarita and Dora. ‘A mother and daughter!’

Again the Rais was impressed. He clapped the Janissary leader on the back, his anger now assuaged by the quality of the captives seized by he landing party.

Again the whites of the eyes of the black eunuchs showed. A really beautiful young mother and a pretty daughter were perhaps the most valuable Christian slaves of all.

The eunuchs now nodded and cracking their whips quickly started to drive the still bound women down below into the carefully locked Women’s Hold - and safely out of sight and reach of the randy crew.

Until the ship arrived back in Marsa, the Rais himself was the only whole man who would be allowed down here to inspect the women.