The Bond of Friendship

When they left, I went with them for some distance, and my little sister hung in a goatskin on my back. One of the Frankish gentlemen had me stand before a rock, and sketched me and her, so lifelike as we stood there, so that we looked like one being-I had never thought of it before, but Anastasia and I were really one person. She was always sitting in my lap or hanging on my back in the goatskin, and when I dreamed she appeared in my dreams.

Two nights later other men came to our hut, armed with knives and muskets. They were Albanians, brave men, said my mother. They stayed only a short while, wrapping tobacco in strips of paper and smoking it. My sister Anastasia sat on the knees of one of them, and when he was gone she had only two silver coins in her hair instead of three. The oldest of the men talked about which route they should take; he was not sure.

"If I spit upward," he said, "it will fall in my face; if I spit downward, it will fall in my beard!"

But they had to make a choice, so they went, and my father followed them. And soon afterwards we heard the sound of shots! The firing increased; then soldiers rushed into our hut and took my mother, myself, and Anastasia prisoners. The robbers, they said, had stayed with us, and my father had gone with them; therefore we had to be taken away. Soon I saw the robbers' corpses, and I saw my father's corpse too, and I cried myself to sleep. When I awoke we were in prison, but the cell was no worse than the room in our hut. And they gave me onions to eat and musty wine poured from a tarred sack, but ours at home was no better.

I don't know how long we were held prisoners, but many days and nights went by. It was our holy Eastertime when we were released. I carried Anastasia on my back, for my mother was ill and could only walk slowly, and it was a long way down to the sea, to the Gulf of Lepanto. We entered a church magnificent with pictures on a golden background. They were pictures of angels, oh, so beautiful!