“‘If you can resist Mara,’ I told him, ‘you have more strength than I would give you credit for.’ And it was quite true; for Mara, who lived next door to the hotel, was a beautiful young thing, and they were much together.
“‘Mara is a flirt,’ said he.
“‘What matter,’ I returned, ‘so long as she flirts most with you?’
“‘But does she like me best?’ he mused. ‘There is this fellow in the Government railways who comes as often as he can to see her. He has the advantage of being a connection by marriage, and is very handsome. Really too handsome for a man. I am glad he does not live here all the time.’
“‘You have the advantage of living next door,’ I encouraged. ‘The one thing that might interfere is this idea of yours about being one of the comitajia.’
“‘Still,’ he protested, shaking his head doubtfully, ‘a man’s first duty is not to the woman he loves, but to the race he loves, because both she and he belong to it. You know our old song?’ And he sang there in the woods:
“‘Doucho, my soul, I love thee second best;
Thou art the dearest part of Serbia to me;
But after all thou art but a part, even as I am a part;
And it is Serbia, always Serbia, that together we love most!’
“Though not altogether satisfied with our conversation, I felt that in appealing to the boy’s love for Mara I had struck the right note, and I hoped that as time went on he would think more about her than about the comitajia. For, though one may be heartily in sympathy with revolutionary ideas, especially in the case of an oppressed race, one does not like to see a youth of whom one is really fond, heading toward disaster, even in such a cause. Moreover, as I have said, Gavrilo was not as solidly built as the average Serb, and I had the feeling that the burning spirit in him—and I assure you it was more like a living flame than anything I have seen in the nature of man or woman—must either be kept under control or else destroy his body.
“Consequently I was much relieved to see, as I returned from time to time, that the boy-and-girl romance between Gavrilo and Mara was naturally and charmingly developing into something more mature. This led me to hope the more that, as he turned from a youth into a man, Gavrilo would shed some of the violence of his revolutionary aspirations, and from the indications I judged that such a thing was indeed coming to pass. In order more fully to reassure myself, I more than once took occasion to lead conversations with him into such channels that, should he desire to do so, he could speak to me of the comitajia; but he always let the openings pass, seeming eager, now, to speak only of the lovely Mara.
“When, in the summer of 1913, I arrived for one of my periodical visits, Gavrilo came rushing to my room, and seizing both my hands told me that he and Mara were now betrothed. He was then eighteen and she seventeen—for you understand, of course, that these dark South Europeans develop younger than our people do. Both families were pleased, and I felt that the dangers I had feared for Gavrilo were past, and was duly thankful. I went out and bought a necklace for Mara, and when I gave it to her, she and Gavrilo made me clasp it around her neck, and he said to her, very seriously: ‘Yes, and our dear friend shall be the godfather of our first child. Is it not so, Maro doucho?’ And Mara, taking me by the hand, told me it was quite true, and that she was going to love me as much as Gavrilo loved me, and that, moreover, they were going to have hundreds of children, and that every one of the children should love me too. It was all indescribably naïve and pretty until Gavrilo unfortunately added: ‘Yes, our children will love you, and they will love us, but most of all they will love the idea of a free Serb race.’