Paul Patoff | Page 6

less real energy of character, he must
have hated his brother; as it was, he silently disliked him, but inwardly

resolved to outshine him in everything, laboring to that end from his
boyhood, and especially after his father's death, with a dogged
determination which promised success. The result was that, although
Paul never outgrew a certain ungainliness of appearance, due to his
large and bony frame, he nevertheless acquired a perfection of manner,
an ease and confidence in conversation, which, in the end, might well
impress people who knew him more favorably than the bearing of
Alexander, whose soft voice and graceful attitudes began to savor of
affectation when he had attained to mature manhood. As they stood
together on the quay at Buyukdere, one could guess that, in the course
of years, Alexander would be an irritable, peevish old dandy, while
Paul would turn out a stern, successful old man.
They stood looking at the water, watching the caïques shoot out from
the shore upon the bosom of the broad stream.
"Have you made up your mind?" asked Paul, without looking at his
brother.
"Oh, yes. I do not care where we go. I suppose it is worth seeing?"
"Well worth seeing. You have never seen anything like it."
"Is it as fine as Easter Eve in Moscow?" asked Alexander,
incredulously.
"It is different," said Paul. "It corresponds to our Easter Eve in some
ways. All through the Ramazán they fast all day--never smoke, nor
drink a glass of water, and of course they eat nothing--until sunset,
when the gun is fired. During the last week there are services in Santa
Sophia every night, and that is what is most remarkable. They go on
until the news comes that the new moon has been seen."
"That does not sound very interesting," remarked Alexander, languidly,
lighting a cigarette with a bit of yellow fuse that dangled from his
heavy Moscow case.
"It is interesting, nevertheless, and you must see it. You cannot be here

at this time and not see what is most worth seeing."
"Is there nothing else this evening?" asked Alexander.
"No. We have to respect the prejudices of the country a little. After all,
we really have a holiday during this month. Nothing can be done. The
people at the palace do not get up until one o'clock or later, so as to
make the time while they fast seem shorter."
"Very sensible of them. I wonder why they get up at all, until their
ridiculous gun fires, and they can smoke."
"Whether you like it or not, you must go to Santa Sophia to-night, and
see the service," said Paul, firmly. "You need not stay long, unless you
like."
"If you take me there, I will stay rather than have the trouble of coming
away," answered the other. "Bah!" he exclaimed suddenly, "there is
that caïque again!"
Paul followed the direction of his brother's glance, and saw a graceful
caïque pulling slowly upstream towards them. Four sturdy Turks in
snow-white cotton tugged at the long oars, and in the deep body of the
boat, upon low cushions, sat two ladies, side by side. Behind them,
upon the stern, was perched a hideous and beardless African,
gorgeously arrayed in a dark tunic heavily laced with gold, a richly
chased and adorned scimiter at his side, and a red fez jauntily set on
one side of his misshapen head. But Alexander's attention was arrested
by the ladies, or rather by one of them, as the caïque passed within oar's
length of the quay.
"She must be hideous," said Paul, contemptuously. "I never saw such a
yashmak. It is as thick as a towel. You cannot see her face at all."
"Look at her hand," said Alexander. "I tell you she is not hideous."
The figures of the two ladies were completely hidden in the wide black
silk garments they wore, the eternal ferigee which makes all women

alike. Upon their heads they wore caps, such as in the jargon of fashion
are called toques, and their faces were enveloped in yashmaks, white
veils which cross the forehead above the eyes and are brought back just
below them, so as to cover the rest of the face. But there was this
difference; that whereas the veil worn by one of the ladies was of the
thinnest gauze, showing every feature of her dark, coarse face through
its transparent texture, the veil of the other was perfectly opaque, and
disguised her like a mask. Paul Patoff justly remarked that this was
very unusual. He had observed the same peculiarity at least twenty
times; for in the course of three weeks, since Alexander arrived, the
brothers had seen this same lady almost every day, till they had grown
to expect her, and had exhausted