in spite of her life of animal indolence, suddenly ran away
and took her daughter with her. She had fallen in love with a Greek whom
she had met in Constantinople, a man of forceful personality, enormous
moustaches, and no education, who was selling the tobacco crop from his
estate in Macedonia. Evanthia's father, now a man of nearly sixty, did
not follow them. He suffered a paroxysm of rage, broke some furniture,
and made furious preparations for a pursuit, when one of the servants, a
tall, cool Circassian girl with pale brown eyes and an extraordinarily
lovely figure, broke in upon his frenzy and told him an elaborate story
of how his wife had really gone to France, where she had previously sent
a sum of money, and how she herself had been implored to go with them
but had refused to desert her master. It was quite untrue, and took its
origin from the French novels she had stolen from her mistress and read
in bed; but it hit the mark with the man whose only domestic virtue was
fidelity. And the Circassian creature made him an admirable companion,
ruling the villa with a rod of iron, inaugurating an era of peace which
the old gentleman had never experienced in his life.

Evanthia had to adjust herself to new and startling conditions. The
swart Hellene stood no nonsense from his handsome mistress. He beat her
every day, on the principle that if she had not done anything she was
going to do something. When Evanthia began her tantrums he tried to beat
her, too, but she showed so ugly a dexterity with a knife that he
desisted and decided to starve her out. He cheerfully gave her money to
run away to Saloniki, laughing harshly when she announced her intention
of working for a living as a seamstress. She arrived in Saloniki to hear
stirring news. She was about to enter a carriage to drive to the house
of a friend of the Hellene, a gentleman named Dainopoulos, when a young
man with glorious blond hair and little golden moustache, his blue eyes
wide open and very anxious, almost pushed her away and got in, giving
the driver an address. This was the beginning of her adventures. The
young man explained the extreme urgency of his business, offered to do
anything in his power if she would let him have the carriage at once.
She got in with him, and he told her his news breathlessly: War. It
seemed a formidable thing to him. To her, life was war. She had no
knowledge of what war meant to him in his country. To her London,
Berlin, Pari