Page:A child of the Orient (IA childoforient00vakarich).pdf/212

 "The man I was engaged to when I was a baby."

"Upon my word!" I cried with indignation.

"Now, Thunderstorm, you need not go ahead and blame him. His reasons are excellent, as his face is kind and his figure straight—like a cypress tree."

"You have seen him then?"

"Yes, he has been in Constantinople for the past two years, and I have seen him several times through the lattices of my window."

"And he refuses to marry you?"

"He does."

"On the ground"

"That he does not know me. You see, he is tainted with European culture, and he thinks a man ought to choose his own wife. I was chosen for him: therefore he does not wish to marry me."

"Why don't you give him up and marry some one else? There are plenty who would be glad to have you."

She shook her head. "It so happens that I want him and no one else. And what is more," she added illogically, "I respect his reasons. He says that he does not wish to be married to a woman he has not seen, and of whose character he knows nothing."

"Very well," I remarked. "Since you respect his reasons, and since you are modern enough