ust face his fate and had ruthlessly
given him back his name; she had also deliberately set about to entangle
him in the silken cords of a social relation. But he knew within a
couple of days of his arrival at Buyukderer that he did not fear her.
No woman perhaps ever lived who worried a man less in friendship, or who
gave, without any insistence upon it, a stronger impression of loyalty,
of tenacity in affection to those for whom she cared. Although often
almost delicately blunt in words, in action she was full of tact. She
was one of those rare women who absolutely understand men, and who know
how to convey to men instantly the fact of their understanding. Such
women are always attractive to men. Even if they are plain, and not
otherwise specially clever, they possess for men a lure.

Mrs. Clarke had told Dion in Constantinople that she meant him to come
to Buyukderer. This was an almost insolent assertion of will-power. But
when he was there she let him alone. On the day of his arrival there
had come no message from the Villa Hafiz to his hotel. He had, perhaps,
expected one; he knew that he was relieved not to receive it. Late in
the afternoon he went for a solitary walk up the valley, avoiding the
many people who poured forth from the villas and hotels to take their
air, as the sun sank low behind Therapia, and the light upon the water
lost in glory and gained in magic. Gay parties embarked in caiques.
Some people drove in small victorias drawn by spirited, quick-trotting
horses; others rode; others strolled up and down slowly by the edge of
the sea. A gay brightness of sociable life made Buyukderer intimately
merry as evening drew on. Instinctively Dion left the laughter and the
voices behind him.

His wandering led him to the valley of roses, where he sat down by the
stream, and for the first time tasted something of the simplicity and
charm of Turkish country life. It did not charm him, but in a dim way
he felt it, was faintly aware of a soothing influence which touched him
like a cool hand. For a long time he stayed there, and he thought, "If I
remain at Buyukderer I shall often visit this place beside the stream."
Once he was disturbed by the noise of a cantering horse in the lane
close by, but otherwise he was fortunate that day; few people came
to his retreat, and none of them were foreigners. Two or three Turks
strolled by, holding their beads; and once some veiled women came,
escorted by a eunuch, threw s