“But are you not ashamed to think such thoughts—you, the pupil of Murjânah Khânum? So immoral!”
“It is my fancy, there! Morality is not our business. We are strictly guarded. One gets a conscience—what you call a soul—when one has children. How droll you are! You talk just like a man. God knows I love you, and should like to be your durrah.” (The word means colleague in the married state.)
Gulbeyzah flung her arms round Barakah. A sound of footsteps in the passage made them turn and peep.
“It is a eunuch!” the Circassian whispered. “He has been there all the time. He attends you like your shadow, have you noticed? How sweet to be so precious; and so respected, for he keeps his distance!”
Barakah preferred these confidences with Gulbeyzah to the endless fuss and noise about the trousseau. The hive was in commotion over the approaching marriage; angry, Gulbeyzah told her, with the Pasha for his wish to shear the festival of ancient ceremonies regarded as the woman’s right. When approached upon this subject in a crowded conclave, she said that she was anxious to conform to all their customs—an answer which was hailed with cries of triumph.
Mrs. Cameron appeared one afternoon, the Consul’s envoy, to ascertain that all was well with the perverted girl. She was shown to the state-room, and there regaled with tea in glasses and sweet biscuits, in what was thought to be the English manner. The ladies pestered her with eager questions, persisting, despite frank denials, in regarding her as a near and dear relation of the bride. She glanced reproachfully at Barakah from time to time. “You’re quite at home with them, I see,” she said at parting. “It sounds unkind, but I must say I wish you weren’t. It is a fall for any woman bred as you were. How can you put that kohl round your eyes?... Good-bye, my dear, and don’t forget our compact.”
The visit leaving an unpleasant, sad impression, Barakah withdrew to her own room, alleging headache. She was lying on her bed with eyes half closed, endeavouring to lay the ghost of former days, when some one entered without knocking, shut the door with care, and crept towards her. It was a strange old woman. She sidled up with much grimacing; whispered “Yûsuf,” laid her shrivelled cheek upon her hand; “Yûsuf,” again, and smacked her lips delectably; “Yûsuf Bey, thy bridegroom,” and made the motion of embracing with ecstatic grins.
Barakah grew interested. She longed to see the man she was to marry and, fresh from Mrs. Cameron’s reproach, was feeling reckless. She tried to question the old woman, but without result. The crone kept nodding, “Yûsuf Bey” and “Come.” She had brought with her a habbarah and mouth-veil, which Barakah put on by her direction. Then they stole forth, the temptress in high glee.
But they had not made ten steps in the hall before two eunuchs pounced on them and stared into their eyes. One beat the hag, whose screams were frightful. The other, smiling, dragged back Barakah, pushed her inside her room and locked the door.