“So, Féraz! you heard my summons?” said El-Râmi gently.
“I heard my brother speak,”—responded Féraz in a low melodious voice that had a singularly dreamy far-away tone within it—“Through a wall of cloud and silence his beloved accents fell like music on my ears;—he called me and I came.”
And, sighing lightly, he folded his arms cross-wise on his breast and stood erect and immovable, looking like some fine statue just endowed by magic with the flush of life. He resembled El-Râmi in features, but was fairer-skinned,—his eyes were softer and more femininely lovely,—his hair, black as night, clustered in thick curls over his brow, and his figure, straight as a young palm-tree, was a perfect model of strength united with grace. But just now he had a strangely absorbed air,—his eyes, though they were intently fixed on El-Râmi’s face, looked like the eyes of a sleep-walker, so dreamy were they while wide-open,—and as he spoke he smiled vaguely as one who hears delicious singing afar off.
El-Râmi studied him intently for a minute or two,—then, removing his gaze, pressed a small silver hand-bell at his side. It rang sharply out on the silence.
“Féraz!”
Féraz started,—rubbed his eyes,—glanced about him, and then sprang towards his brother with quite a new expression,—one of grace, eagerness, and animation, that intensified his beauty and made him still more worthy the admiration of a painter or a sculptor.
“El-Râmi! At last! How late you are! I waited for you long—and then I slept. I am sorry! But you called me in the usual way, I suppose?—and I did not fail you? Ah no! I should come to you if I were dead!”
He dropped on one knee, and raised El-Râmi’s hand caressingly to his lips.
“Where have you been all the evening?” he went on. “I have missed you greatly—the house is so silent.”
El-Râmi touched his clustering curls tenderly.