“I don’t mind going to prison, if I can see the dervishes first,” I persisted.
My brother, as I have said, was fourteen years older than I. He had been my playfellow and my instructor, and was now my guardian. Unfortunately, he was neither stern with me nor prudent himself. I knew that I could make him grant me this wish if I only stuck to it long enough; and when I returned to my room, an hour later, I went to sleep delighted with the thought of the extracted promise.
The next six weeks passed slowly, although we were busy with a number of preparations. We had, of course, to be provided with Turkish clothes, correct in every particular; and since, according to Osmanli custom, a lady never goes abroad alone, at least two other women, on whose courage and discretion we could count, had to be enlisted. It was not difficult to find men to accompany us. Any enterprise, the aim of which was to outwit the Turks, could not but appeal to Greeks. The two young men whom we chose were both government officials, but this did not in the least abate their enthusiasm for the enterprise.
At last the night of nights arrived. We met at the Kallerghis house, dressed there, and stole down the back way to two carriages awaiting us. These took us to the Galata Bridge, whence we proceeded on foot. A faithful manservant, dressed in the Anatolian salvhar, headed the procession, carrying a lantern. We women came next, and our escorts followed a little way behind, since Turkish women never walk in company with men.
Stamboul in the daytime is clamorous and overcrowded. The hundred and one cries of its pedlars and shopkeepers come at one from all quarters, and in half the languages of the earth, while one can hardly move about for the congestion of people. At night it is as silent and dark as the tomb. As we hurried along the narrow, crooked streets, we heard the occasional tramp of the night patrol, the sharp yelps of the dogs at their scavenger work, and that was all. I had never before seen Stamboul at night, and I doubt whether I shall ever wish to see it again.
I began to realize the enormity of our enterprise, and to appreciate that, had my brother been of a less adventurous temperament or a more careful guardian, we should never have been where we were at that hour. As we stumbled along over ill-paved alleys, which little deserved to be called streets, the bravery with which I had confronted the idea of possible dangers oozed out of me. Nursery tales of the ferocity of the Turks recurred to a mind which the consciousness of doing wrong made susceptible to fear. We were on our way to steal into a mosque, the door of which was strictly closed against us. We were dressed in Turkish clothes, and Christian women were forbidden under a heavy penalty to dress as Turks, except in the company of Turkish women. We were all Greeks, and the Turks had been our hereditary enemies since 1453. Had I had the courage at this juncture to demand that we returned, as I had insisted on coming, I should have been spared one of the most terrifying nights of my life; but I lacked this, and my shaky legs marched on through the unnamed and unnumbered streets to our destination.
The man who had been the primary cause of our risky enterprise awaited us at the arched gateway of the tekhe. He signalled us to follow him, and we entered an ill-lighted outer courtyard. Thence we went down a steep staircase to an inner one that must have been considerably below the street level. My recollections of our movements for the next few minutes are hazy. We walked through one crooked corridor after another till we came to what looked like an impasse. A young dervish was standing so flat against the wall that I did not notice him until Damon Kallerghis made a sign to him, to which he responded. He lifted the heavy leather portière, which I had taken to be the solid wall, and permitted us to pass under it, and, as it seemed to me, beyond any human protection. Up to this moment it was still possible for us to turn back; but when that leather portière closed behind us, we were in the dark tekhe itself.
An insane fear seized me. What if our guide had entrapped us here to our destruction? I did not stop to reflect how much persuasion it had required to get him to conduct us on this hair-brained escapade: I was simply afraid, and my fear robbed me of every vestige of common sense. Fortunately, beyond trembling till my teeth chattered, I attempted nothing.
A few yards farther over the stone floor, and we were pushed into a stall, and another leather portière closed us in. This was the end of our journey. The front of the stall was covered with lattice-work, and through its holes we could look down into a cavernous square arena, dark, save for a big charcoal fire smouldering in the middle. Around the arena ran an arcade, and under it we presently made out the reclining forms of many dervishes of different orders, and numerous Mohammedan pilgrims, quietly smoking. The stall on our right and left must also have been occupied, for we heard the scuffling of feet on the floor, and then silence.
I really cannot say how long we sat on our low stools, looking down on the weird scene beneath us, before the oppressive silence was broken by a fearfully plaintive sound which seemed to come from far away, and which, for lack of a better word, I shall have to call music. On and on it went, rising and falling, monotonous, dull, and melancholy. It penetrated the whole place, seeming to drug the atmosphere, till one felt as if any phantasmagoria of the brain might be real.