"I'm not aware of it, if you have," I returned cheerfully.
"I'm having a hell of a time," he groaned. "The two selfs in me are wrenching at my soul. There's Nikka, the Gypsy freebooter, who has been dead for years, and against him fights Nikka, the artist and man of the town. Neither of them owns me. Until the other day—except now and then when the old self reared its head temporarily—I thought I had thrust the Gypsy behind me. But I was a fool to think so, Jack. God, what a fool! Why, the music in me always was Gypsy!
"But I thought I had submerged it, drowned it. I thought I was like you and Hugh. I know better now. Since we started east I have felt these half-dead instincts rising up in me, clutching at my soul, tormenting my intelligence. The hunger for the open road, contempt for order and law, the mastery of my own will, all these things call to me. And yet, Jack, I feel ashamed! I feel ashamed to bring you here, to have you meet the fellow downstairs, who, when all is said and done, is the agent through whom my people dispose of what they steal and smuggle.
"For that's the truth, Jack! My people are not like Toutou's gang. But they are Gypsies. They live by their own hands, and every man's hand is against them. They make their own laws, and abide by their own customs. They take what they need, and consider it their due. Kostabidjian spoke of my uncle's running cartridges to Albania. I know what it means. After the War there were vast stocks of ammunition scattered all over the Balkans, treasure trove to such wild peoples. The Allies ruled that it should be surrendered or destroyed. But do you suppose it was? Never!
"It was stolen, hidden and smuggled. I would swear that my tribe have sold it to Kemal Bey, to the Russian Soviets. Now, the Greeks and the Serbs are pressing down on the Albanians, and my uncle sells to the Albanians. If he can, too, he will sell to the Greeks and the Serbs; and he will take—steal, if you like—whatever of value he can get from all three of them.
"I tell you all this, because I don't want to fly false colors with you. I lived that life when I was a boy. But I should like to make you understand that in some way, by some esoteric, involved, well-nigh impenetrable process of psychology, it is not stealing in the sense that Toutou steals. My people have been outcasts for centuries; they have been bred up in this way of life. It is as natural for them to take what they need, and thrive on other people's needs, as it is for the Arabs to practice the same methods in battling the hardships of the desert.
"It isn't wrong in their eyes. Put it that way. And I—I can see it both ways, Jack. I can see how wrong it is, and I can see how right it seems to them."
I dropped my hand on his shoulder.
"You don't need to say all this to me," I told him. "Why, Nikka, it's—it's—"
"It's what? Hard to understand!"