He had got half-way down the hall, when, upon a sign from the Arabian woman, hands caught him and held him, whilst a golden sound of laughter came from Zarah as she stood, a thing of love and hate, against the glittering Byzantine wall.
“Fear not, my children,” whispered Yussuf to “His Eyes” and Namlah the Busy some time later as they talked over the failure of their plans within the last few hours. “Even as the pounding of many grains of wheat goes to the making of bread, so is life learnt in many lessons. Dawn breaketh. To revenge the loss of thy son, my daughter, thy speech, my son, and mine eyes, we will bring about the downfall of the accursed woman. The proverb says ‘Three persons if they unite against a town will ruin it.’”
CHAPTER XIX
“Before the clouds appeared the rain came upon me.”—Arabic Proverb.
Two months had passed in which Zarah had absolutely failed to break her prisoners’ indomitable spirit; two months in which her passion for the white man and her hate for the white girl had grown deeper and fiercer.
With the density of some women, she clung with an extraordinary and ridiculous tenacity to the belief that, if she only threatened or cajoled enough and held her rival up plainly enough to ridicule or contempt, she would ultimately win Ralph Trenchard’s love.
Also did fear urge her to force or cajole him into becoming her husband.