n
buy for yourself any other woman you please whenever you want."

Fanutza looked at the Tartar. Though it was getting dark she could see
the play of every muscle of his face. Hardly had her father finished
making his offer, when Mehmet, after one look at the girl, said:

"I offer fifty gold pieces for the girl. Is it a bargain?"

Fanutza's eyes met the eyes of her father. She looked at him
entreatingly, "Don't give in to the Tartar," her eyes spoke clearly, and
Marcu refused the offer.

"I offer you fifty instead that you buy yourself another woman than my
daughter."

"No," answered the Tartar, "but I offer sixty for this one, here."

Quick as a flash Fanutza changed the encouraging glance she had thrown
to the passionate man to a pleading look towards her father. "Poor, poor
girl!" thought Marcu. "How she fears to lose me! How she fears I might
accept the money and sell her to the Tartar!"

"A hundred gold pieces to row us across," he yelled, for the night was
closing in upon them and the boat was being carried swiftly downstream.
There was danger ahead of them. Marcu knew it.

"A hundred gold pieces is a great sum," mused Mehmet, "a great sum! It
has taken twenty years of my life to save such a sum--yet, instead of
accepting your offer, I will give you the same sum for the woman I
want."

"Fool, a woman is only a woman. They are all alike," roared the gipsy.

"Not to me!" answered Mehmet Ali quietly. "I shall not say another
word."

"Fool, fool, fool," roared the gipsy as he still tried to catch
Fanutza's eye. It was already too dark.

"Not to me." The Tartar's words echoed in the girl's heart. "Not to me."
Twenty years he had worked to save such a great sum. And now he refused
an equal amount and was willing to pay it all for her. Would Stan have
done that? Would anybody else have done that? Why should she be
compelled to marry whom her father chose when men were willing to pay a
hundred gold pieces for her? The old women of the camp had taught her to
cook and to mend and to wash and to weave. She must know all that to be
worthy of Stan, they had told her. And here was a man who did not know
whether she knew any of these things who staked his life for her and
offered a hundred gold pieces in the bargain! Twenty years of savings.
Twenty years of work. It was not every day one met such a man. Surely,
with one strong push of his arms he could throw her father overboard. He
did not do it because he did no