“And how often do the ceremonies occur?” I asked, breathless with the interest he had aroused.
“Twice a year. The next one will be in six weeks.”
That night I could not sleep for the haunting remembrance of the uncanny wonders to which I had listened. I did not even go to bed. Sitting by the window I looked at the white minarets, faintly gleaming against the dark blue oriental sky. Yonder was Stamboul with its mysteries and its charm. Which of all those graceful peaks reared itself above the mosque of the dervishes? My desire to see that of which I had heard grew ever stronger as the hours passed, until I could stay quiet no longer.
My brother’s room was next to mine. To it I went, and with the unscrupulous cruelty of my age, I woke him.
He jumped up, rubbing his eyes. “What is it, child? Are you ill?”
“No,” I said, settling myself on the foot of his bed. “Brother, I want to go to the dervishes’ dance next month.”
“Upon my word!” he exclaimed. “Go back to bed at once, or I shall think you have gone crazy.”
“Brother, you have got to say that you are going to take me there.”
My brother was thoroughly awake by this time. He looked at me with a kind of despair.
“But didn’t you hear how dangerous it was—even for Damon Kallerghis? As for your going, you might as well prance off to prison at once.”