lers had dined well, but not too well, and were ready to
be happy, and to see in others the reflection of their own contented
holiday mood. It was delightful to be "on the loose," without
responsibilities, and with a visit to Brusa to look forward to in
the immediate future. They sat under the stars, sipped their coffee,
listened to the absurd music played by a fifth-rate band in a
garishly-lighted kiosk, and watched with interest the coming and going
of the crowd of Turks and Perotes, with whom mingled from time to time
foreign sailors from ships lying off the entrance to the Golden Horn
and a few tourists from the hotels of Pera. Just behind them sat their
guide, a thin and eager Levantine, half-Greek and half-Armenian, who,
for some inscrutable reason, declared that his name was John.

There was little romance in this garden set in the midst of the noisy
European quarter of Constantinople. The music was vulgar; Greek waiters
with dissipated faces ran to and fro carrying syrups and liqueurs;
corpulent Turks sat heavily over glasses of lager beer; overdressed
young men of enigmatic appearance, with oily thick hair, shifty eyes,
and hands covered with cheap rings, swaggered about smoking cigarettes
and talking in loud, ostentatious voices. Some women were there, fat and
garish for the most part, liberally powdered and painted, and crowned
with hats at which Paris would have stared almost in fear. There were
also children, dark, even swarthy, with bold eyes, shrill voices,
immodest bearing, who looked as if they had long since received the ugly
freedom of the streets, and learned lessons no children ought to know.

Presently the band stopped playing and there was a general movement of
the crowd. People got up from the little tables and began to disperse.
"John" leaned forward to his employers, and in a quick and rattling
voice informed them that a "fust-rate" variety entertainment was about
to take place in another part of the garden. Would they come to see
it? There would be beautiful women, very fine girls such as can only be
gazed on in Constantinople, taking part in the "show."

The young men agreed to "have a look at it," and followed John to
a place where many round tables and chairs were set out before a
ramshackle wooden barrack of a theatre, under the shade of some
pepper trees, through whose tresses the stars peeped at a throng and a
performance which must surely have surprised them.

The band, or a portion