Page:Alien Souls by Achmed Abdullah (1922).djvu/151

name to her husband, and it was not his fault that on his fourth visit the gypsy was looking from the narrow balcony where she was watering her starved, dusty geraniums. It was not his fault that suddenly her eyes opened wide—and that one of the flowers fell at his feet.

Gradually the Armenian looked forward with real pleasure to the Kurd's coming. For not only was it a link with his little native Turkish village, but also the fact of his being on such good terms with a Kurd, a hereditary master, served to heighten his importance and social standing among his countrymen.

There was only one thing to which he took exception, namely the Kurd's habit of inquiring after his health.

It was not the usual, flowery Oriental way, but a detailed inquiry: "How did you sleep? Did you perspire last night? Have you a headache? Does your body itch? Have you fever?" And always Mohammed Yar would study his hand intently, then release it with a flat, sympathetic sigh, until Krelekian one day lost his temper and made an ill-natured remark that the Kurd's association with the Arab doctor seemed to have developed in him a positively ghoulish instinct.

"You are like some cursed, toothless Syrian midwife," he exclaimed, "forever smelling out sickness and death—sniffing about like some carrion-eating jackal of the desert!"

Mohammed Yar spread his hairy paws in a massive gesture.

"I am sorry, my friend," he replied. "I meant only to— Never mind …"