THE PARTING
It is only in the larger of the Turkish cities, where you hardly know
your next-door neighbor, and where people of the same religious faith
collect in quarters, that the Moslem and the Christian cannot live
in peace together. In the country village, where everybody knows the
secret thoughts of his neighbor, the feeling is no less kindly than
between the members of the different churches of a Christian country
town. The Moslem peasant counts his beads; the Christian, like the
Moslem, prostrates himself in prayer. Allah and Elohim were originally
the same name of the same God, revealed to the one through the prophet
Mohammed, to the other through Christ. The Christian children play
with the little Moslems in the courtyard of the mosque, and the little
Moslems join their Christian comrades in their games about the holy
well, and drink the holy water. The Moslem buys his goods of the
Christian merchant, and the merchant trusts him when he cannot pay.
Moslem and Christian work together in the field, and when their labor
is over, sit side by side in the inn to listen to the story-teller. The
one never asks the other whether he be Moslem or Christian; and the
friendship existing between them is often quite as enduring as if they
worshiped together.
All this was true of the people of Ak Hissar, and their unity of
purpose and unity of labor brought flourishing days to the little
village. Herant had his full share in the general prosperity; for his
mulberry trees throve, his business increased, and he became known
throughout the country, even as far as Constantinople, as a successful
raiser and buyer of cocoons. It was he who produced the silk for the
beautiful rugs and hangings for the Sultan’s palace at Yildiz, and for
the presents which His Majesty was pleased to bestow upon visiting
foreign princes. The Sultan recognized the services which he rendered,
honored him with a decoration, and invited him to the capital, to
become the manager of the various silk factories throughout the Empire.
The prospect of living in Constantinople appealed strongly to Takvor,
for he was studious, and had long ago absorbed the teachings of the
simple village school. Now at the age of fourteen, it was his one
great hope that in some way or other he might fulfill his first and
greatest ambition of becoming a physician. His single unhappiness was
that of leaving Armenouhi. Perhaps he should never see her again.
Although she was but ten years of age, she was far more developed
than a Western girl of those years, and already had been asked for in
marriage by the young money changer Badiark, who offered a suitable
dowry; but, contrary to custom, he was told that when she was older she
might answer for herself. The rejected suitor, seeing her the constant
companion of another, knew full well what that answer would be.
Armenouhi was greatly depressed by the thought of losing Takvor.
Naturally the few remaining days were spent together in their favorite
haunts. For the day preceding Takvor’s departure, the village priest
arranged a farewell picnic, to which all the children were invited.
Early in the morning the party climbed the eastern mountain, and upon
reaching the summit at noonday the priest’s good wife spread the long
white cloth upon the ground and heaped it with food for their hungry
mouths. Takvor was given the seat at the head of the table.
“Who shall be the lady of honor to sit with Takvor?” asked the priest.
“Armenouhi!” shouted the children, in concert, as if there could be no
other answer.
It was a happy party, and their peals of laughter rang over the
hillside. Takvor and Armenouhi alone were sad.
“Come,” he whispered, when dinner was over and the children began to
play; and the two wandered away from the others and sat down in the
shade of a tree, where the silence of the gentle spring day was broken
only by the distant voices of their playmates and the tinkling bells
of the sheep grazing on the mountain slopes.
The field was dotted with white anemones, and Takvor began to pick them.
“Oh, there is a happy omen for us,” cried Armenouhi, and she pointed to
a magpie hopping about in the grass.
“But yonder comes his mate, and the good omen is turned to bad,”
replied Takvor; “and there is a third magpie, and that foretells
calamity.”
“But what evil can be greater for us than your going on the morrow?”
There was no answer this time, and Armenouhi sat in silence and
watched Takvor picking the little white blossoms. As if to help, she
occasionally picked a flower and gave it to him.
Takvor made a wreath of the flowers and was placing it on her head,
when the red ribbon that held her hair became loose and fell. Both
reached for it, and for an instant both held it; they pulled, and the
ribbon parted. With her piece Armenouhi rearranged her hair; Takvor
put the other in his pocket.
That evening at home, when nobody was by to see her, Armenouhi selected
the largest and best of the blossoms, bound them together with the
ribbon from her hair, and laid them away between the leaves of a book.