By Far Euphrates A Tale 8

By Far Euphrates A Tale 8

"Do so, Kevork, and I thank thee many times." She gave him the string of

beads, and then her tongue waxed eloquent in praise of her friend. "She

is so good, so clever," she said. "She knows, oh, so many things! She

can speak and write English, not just a little as I do, but beautifully,

like a real American! She knows grammar and geography, and the counting

up of figures, and the story of the world. She does not want a

thought-string like that to help her." (Both Turks and Armenians are

accustomed, when thinking or talking, to finger strings of beads, called

_tebishes_, and to obtain some mysterious assistance from the process.)

"Oh! no. She would never use one at school, nor indeed would most of us.

But now she is going where she will have such _very_ hard lessons to

learn, that perhaps she may be glad of it. At least it will remind her

of her poor little Shushan. Tell her, Kevork, that Shushan puts a prayer

for her on every bead she sends her."

 

"I think it is a very foolish plan to teach all those things to girls,"

one of the old women observed. "They will be fit for nothing else in the

world but reading books, and who will mind the babies? And what will

become of cooking and washing and baking bread, not to talk of spinning

and sewing?"

 

"The girls of the American school at Urfa cook and bake and spin and sew

right well for their years," Shushan spoke up bravely. "And those who go

to Aintab, like Elmas, learn those things even better there. Oh, I wish

you could see Elmas in her home, working to help her mother, and taking

care of her little brothers and sister; you would know what she was

worth then."

 

This did not fall upon unheeding ears. Young Kevork made a mental note

of it; then turned quickly to ask his mother what she could manage to

give him in the way of clothing, as his cousin wished to set out on his

journey the morning of the day after next.

 

Meanwhile Jack was busily employed writing to his uncle, and to his

uncle's son. The former he told, briefly enough, of his father's death,

his own long illness, and the care and kindness of the people amongst

whom he had fallen. He asked him to write to him, and to send him money

for his journey home, and also to recompense those who had been so good

to him. He knew, of course, that he would have a considerable income of

his own, so he felt no difficulty in making this request. He concluded

with love to his relatives and enquiries after their welfare. To his

cousin he wrote more freely, and gave more particulars. But even to him

his words did not flow easily. He could not take up his life in his

hand, and look at it from the outside, so as to describe it to another.

He could only give details of his surroundings, and of this he soon

tired, being unaccustomed to write in English, or indeed to write at

all. He broke off abruptly, folded up the two letters in one, sealed the

packet, directed it to his uncle, and brought it to Thomassian.

 

Baron Muggurditch Thomassian was emphatically the courteous, cultured,

cosmopolitan Armenian. He had amassed a considerable fortune in his

business, which was that of a merchant of drugs; and to which he joined

some cautious and lucrative money-lending. Moreover, he had travelled

far, and seen much. He could speak several languages quite well enough

to make shrewd bargains in them; and he knew the art of spending as well

as of making money. He could appreciate music, poetry, and painting, no

less than luxuries of a more material kind. Yet Jack felt as if he could

never love him, never trust him even, as he did his friends in Biridjik.

"I don't know what it is," he said to himself; "for there is nothing

amiss with his looks, except perhaps something a little shifty about his

eyes."

 

Nothing, however, could have been more courteous than his response to

Jack's request that he would take charge of his letter, and see it safe

into some really reliable post-office.

 

"I am asking my friends to send money to bring me home," he added, by

way of explanation.

 

"How did you tell them to send it, Mr. Grayson?" asked Thomassian.

 

"I never thought of telling them how. I thought they would know

themselves," Jack answered simply.

 

"It is not so simple a matter as you think," said Thomassian.

 

"Then what must I do? Stay, could it be managed this way? You are going

to Aleppo?"

 

"Yes, Effendi."

 

"The English Consul there was my father's friend, and very kind to us.

He would let my uncle send the money to him, and would know how to send

it to me. I daresay he would write to my uncle too. You will ask him,

will you not, Baron Thomassian?"

 

"I will do it without fail."

 

"And I am very grateful to you," Jack said, giving him his hand in

English fashion, though the courteous Eastern did not fail to bow low

over it.

 

Next morning Muggurditch Thomassian went his way, taking with him Jack's

letter and Jack's chief friend Kevork, but leaving behind him what was

destined to be of still more importance in the life of the English

youth.

 

FOOTNOTES:

 

[1] The "perch" upon which the Turkish guard reposed was a kind of

booth, erected on the top of four poles, twelve or fifteen feet high,

planted firmly in the ground.

 

[2] Miss.

 

 

 

 

Chapter VI

 

ROSES AND BATH TOWELS

 

"He moved about the house with joy

And with the certain step of man."

 

--_Tennyson._

 

 

"Good-morning, Mr. John, I give you my salvation."

 

Very softly and sweetly fell the English words from the pretty lips of

Shushan. Jack stood before her (it was spring now) with a great basket

of spring flowers--glorious red anemones, fragrant wild roses, pink and

yellow--wild heliotrope, wild hyacinths, and other flowers for which we

have no name in England. They were not alone together, of course; Mariam

Hanum was there at her wheel, and two or three other women or girls of

the family, spinning or sewing. Shushan herself was bending over a piece

of the beautiful silk embroidery she had learned in Urfa, when the

entrance of the young Englishman with the flowers they all loved so well

made all look up together. Only the men and boys of their own family

might come in thus freely to the room where the women sat; for any

others the younger ones would have withdrawn, or at least have veiled

their faces modestly. Shushan, at her first home-coming, used to do so

for Jack; but the practice had gradually and insensibly fallen into

disuse. She had been learning English in the school in Urfa, and at this

time it was the greatest pleasure Jack had in life to hear her speak it.

She was not unwilling to do so, being most anxious to remember all she

had been taught.

 

"Is that right said, Mr. Yon?" she asked.

 

"It is very nice. And now, for my _salutation_, I give you my flowers.

Here are enough for everybody."

 

He laid the basket down beside Mariam, having first taken out a fragrant

nosegay of roses and heliotrope, carefully chosen and tied with grass.

 

"It is for saying a good lesson," he explained, as he offered it to

Shushan.

 

Jack was now a tall, handsome youth of eighteen. Of late he had grown

strong and active, and he took part as much as he could in outdoor life,

especially in riding. In the saddle he was utterly fearless, and he

began to be very helpful to Hohannes in the training of his young

horses.

 

A month after the departure of Thomassian, he began to look out for

answers to his letters. But in vain he watched and waited; nothing came

for him. Weeks passed away, and then months; still the silence was

unbroken. Jack was astonished, disappointed; sometimes, by fits and

starts, he was angry. It looked as if his English friends did not care

for him any longer, as if they chose to forget him. If it were not so,

why had they, all this time, made no effort to find out what had become

of his father and himself? Very well; if so it were, he could do without

them. He could not just then feel any pressing anxiety to leave

Biridjik; although of course he always meant to go back to England some

time or other. When he came of age, he would certainly go, for then he

could claim his inheritance.

 

But it was pleasant here. How richly glowed the Eastern sky! how

glorious the wealth of roses! how sweetly smelled the blossoming vines,

as he rode past the vineyards on the hills!

 

At last the vintage time came round again.

 

One fine autumn morning a string of horses, mules, and donkeys stood at

the door of the Meneshians' house. Upon them were packed two tents of

coarse black cloth--that cloth of Cilicia which the tent-maker of Tarsus

used to weave. Some thin mattrasses and rugs were thrown over the

bright-coloured saddles, and in the saddlebags were provisions, cooking

utensils, and a few changes of dress. Then the whole family, from old

Hohannes down to the youngest child, seated themselves, or were seated,

on the animals as best they could find a place; and the yearly visit to

the vineyards--the great autumn holiday of the Armenians--began.

 

If ever they shook off the deep melancholy which ages of oppression had

stamped upon their race, it was in the simple pleasures of those sweet

vintage days. The days were all too short for them, so they began them

very early, with the singing of a psalm or hymn together. Then they

dispersed to the different kinds of work allotted to them. Some stripped

the low trees of their wealth of clusters, others trod out the juice in

wooden troughs; again, others made it into sherbet, or into a kind of

sugar, or mixed it with starch and with the kernels of nuts for the

preparation of bastuc. Again, a company of happy children plucked the

large grapes singly from their stalks and laid them in the sun, on great

white linen cloths, to turn themselves into raisins. Their labours were