"Why is it that he lets me go, without even trying to make me swear never to tell what I know?" Saidee asked Victoria, while all in haste and in confusion they put together a few things for the long journey. Saidee packed the little volumes of her diary, with trembling fingers, and looked a frightened question at her sister.
"I'm thankful that he doesn't ask us," Victoria answered, "for we couldn't promise not to tell, unless he would vow never to do the dreadful things you say he plans—lead a great rising, and massacre the French. Even to escape, one couldn't make a promise which might cost thousands of lives."
"We could perhaps evade a promise, yet seem to do what he asked," said Saidee, who had learned subtle ways in a school of subtlety. "I'm terrified that he doesn't ask. Why isn't he afraid to let us go, without any assurances?"
"He knows that because you've been his wife, we wouldn't betray him unless we were forced to, in order to prevent massacres," Victoria tried to reassure her sister. "And perhaps for the sake of getting his boy back, he's willing to renounce all his horrible plans."
"Perhaps—since he worships the child," Saidee half agreed. "Yet—it doesn't seem like Cassim to be so easily cowed, and to give up the whole ambition of his life, with scarcely a struggle, even for his child."
"You said, when you told me how you had written to Mr. Knight, that Cassim would be forced to yield, if they took the boy, and so the end would justify the means."
"Yes. It was a great card to play. But—but I expected him to make me take a solemn oath never to tell what I know."
"Don't let's think of it," said Victoria. "Let's just be thankful that we're going, and get ready as quickly as we can, lest he should change his mind at the last moment."
"Or lest Maïeddine should find out," Saidee added. "But, if Cassim really means us to go, he won't let Maïeddine find out. He will thank Allah and the Prophet for sending the fever that keeps Maïeddine in his bedroom."