“Zula is a name we have given to an Englishwoman who is in our care,” the King continued. “She was like you at first, but we soon cured her. She is useful now. She whiles away our idle hours with her songs and music; she sits at our feet, and we fondle her as we should our pet dog; but, like the dog, we make her know her place.”
Moghul Singh returned, and led into the room a young English girl. She was scarcely more than two-and-twenty, but her face bore traces of awful sorrow. A sweet face it was, but its beauty was marred with the expression of care and a look of premature age. She was attired in a long robe of light blue silk, embroidered with gold, and down her back fell a wealth of unfettered hair. She looked at Flora in astonishment as she entered, but turned instantly to the King, and making a low bow, said—
“What is your Majesty’s pleasure?”
“Here is a countrywoman of yours, Zula; she sets us at defiance. You must teach her to respect us, to yield to our will. She may listen to you, though she will not listen to us.”
“She is foolish, your Majesty, and her pride must be broken.”
“Well said, Zula. Her pride shall be broken,” remarked the King.
Flora turned with amazement to Zula. To hear one of her own race talk like that seemed almost too horrible to be real. She could scarcely believe the evidence of her own senses; but she managed to find tongue at last.
“Are you mad, woman?” she asked, “or have you forgotten that you represent a great and honourable nation?”
“Neither,” was the scornful answer. “But however great our nation, his Majesty here represents a greater and a mightier still. The weak should yield to the strong. I yield, as you must.”
“Never!” was the passionate exclamation of Flora. “Rather than yield to such an imbecile dotard as that, I would suffer any torture that the ingenuity of man could invent.”