"It is false," murmured the Khanum. But her white fingers twisted each other nervously. "It is a forgery."
"So false," replied Balsamides, with cold contempt, "that the adjutant is waiting outside, and a troop of horse is stationed within call to conduct you to the place of safety aforesaid. I can force you to lay his Majesty's signature on your forehead and to follow me to my carriage, if I please."
"Allah alone is great!" groaned the Khanum, her head sinking on her breast in despair. "Kadèr,—it is my fate."
"But if you will deliver me this man alive, I will save you out of the hands even of the Hunkyar. I will say that you are too ill to be removed from your house,—unless I give you my medicine," he added, flattering her hopes to the last.
"Give me time. I know nothing—what shall I say?" muttered Laleli incoherently, her thin fingers twitching at the stuff of her snuff-colored gown, while as she bent her head her short, coarse, black hair fell over her yellow cheeks, and concealed her expression from Gregorios.
"You have not much time," he answered. "The pain will soon seize you more sharply than before. If I arrest you, your sentence will be banishment to Arabia,—not for this crime, but for that other which you thought was pardoned. If I leave you here without help, my sentence upon you is pain, pain and agony until you die. It is already returning; I can see it in your face."
"I must have time to consider," said Laleli, her old firmness returning, as it generally did in moments of great difficulty. She looked up, tossing back her hair. "How long will you give me?"
"Till the morning light is first gray in the sky above Beikos," replied Gregorios, without hesitation. "But for your own sake you had better decide sooner."
Laleli was silent. She must have had the strongest reasons for refusing to tell the secret of Alexander's fate, for the penalty of silence was a fearful one. She felt herself to be dying, but the morphine had revived in her the hope of life, and she loved life yet. But to live and suffer, to go through the horrors of an exile to Arabia, to drag her gnawing pain through the sands of the desert, was a prospect too awful to be contemplated. As the effects of the last dose administered began to disappear, and her sufferings recommenced, she realized her situation with frightful vividness. Still she strove to be calm and to baffle her tormentor to the very end. If she had not felt the unspeakable relief she had gained from his medicine, she would have wished to die, but she had tasted of life again. The problem was how to preserve this new life while refusing to answer the question Gregorios had asked of her. She was so clever, so thoroughly able to deal with difficulties, that if she could but have relief from her sufferings, so that her mind might be free to work undisturbed, she still hoped to find the solution. But the pain was already returning. In a few minutes she would be writhing in agony again.
"I will wait until morning,—it is not many hours now," said Balsamides, after a pause. "But I strongly advise you to decide at once. You are beginning to suffer, and I warn you that unless you confess you shall not have the medicine."