Even after I had reassured him on these points he departed trembling, and I went down to the parlour to await Sendi Bey. In a few minutes he came, and I told him what had happened. He cross-examined me, became convinced that I knew nothing of his wife’s movements, and sent for the unhappy man at the gate, Yussuf.
“Why did you not run after your mistress?” he demanded sternly.
“I did, your Excellency, but she was nowhere to be seen. There was not a house where she could have entered, or a place where she could have hidden; but she was not in sight. I do not see how she could have run so fast. It is magic!”
Sendi Bey dismissed the man, then called the slaves and the eunuch, and ordered them to search the house, which they did without result. Then he gave orders that no one was to enter or leave the house without his permission, and that when the mistress returned she was to wait at the gate till he had spoken to her.
After we were alone together again, he exclaimed gleefully: “For once she has put herself in my power. On her return I shall go to the gate and make my conditions, and if she does not agree to them, she cannot come in.”
“But suppose she does not agree to them, and prefers not to come in?” I asked.
He laughed. “For once,” he repeated, “she has put herself in my power. If she does not agree, she will lose all her rights over her boy, since she left the house against my orders. She loves the boy, and she will agree. Now is the time to put an end to her coquettishness.”
Whatever satisfaction Sendi Bey and the absent, rebellious Semmeya Hanoum might find in the situation, for me it was rather uncomfortable. I was not able to go even into the garden, and ate a solitary luncheon and then dinner, all the slaves being at their posts to prevent any entry or egress. After finishing my novel, I was just preparing to go to bed when a slave came to me.
“My master would like to see you downstairs if you will be so good,” she said.
There was no one in the parlour when I arrived there, but presently the master came in from the selamlik.