Jill swung to and fro in a hammock slung between two palms at a very early hour indeed of this morning late in December.
She had neither veil before her face nor shoes upon her feet, and the flimsy mauve robe clung to the supple body as she restlessly swung, until she clapped her hands to summon her breakfast, and clapped them again sharply so that a figure came running at high pressure.
"Go, ask thy master if he will break bread with me in the shade of the palms, oh Laleah, and let not the shadows lengthen unduly in thy going for fear that I give thee cause to hasten thy footsteps!"
Which manner of speech shows that Jill had not unduly tarried either in acquiring knowledge of things Eastern. And Hahmed, as he stood before her and greeted her in the beautiful Arabian tongue, wondered if in all the world there could be found such another picture as that of his wife, with the riot of red-gold hair about her little face, which somehow seemed over white in the shade of the palm, and the blueness of her eyes, and the redness of her mouth, which neither the one nor the other smiled at his approach.
"Do sit down and help yourself!" said she indeed, and clapping her hands sharply ordered fresh food and drinks, both hot and cold, to be brought upon the instant.
And her next remark, after the breakfast of tea in a real teapot, a hissing kettle, strange loaves, purest butter, honey, and fruits of every conceivable colour had been laid upon a cloth upon the grass, fell like a bolt from the blue, though the man made no sign of disturbance from the impact.
"I want eggs and bacon, Hahmed!"
For a moment he pondered the remark, whilst he offered Jill a cigarette and lit one for himself.
"The eggs, my woman," and the musical voice made a poem even of the absurd words, "now that thou hast taught thy slaves to poach and scramble and prepare them in divers and pleasant ways, are easy—but bacon—no! that canst thou not have amongst these my people!"
And Jill swung ceaselessly to and fro, looking at the man sitting a few yards from her on a rug, before she answered in tersest English: