She would have been completely happy in those days but for embarrassment arising from a secret which she longed yet feared to tell. She was with child. Suspicion grew to certainty and still she put off the announcement, dreading the outcry of these candid women and the harîm ceremonies. It slipped from her by accident, one afternoon, and the fuss they made proved even worse than expectation.
Amînah Khânum brought Bedr-ul-Budûr to see her, saying:
“This girl of mine has news to tell you.”
The old Princess herself proclaimed the news with praise to Allah. A flush suffused the listener from head to foot.
“I too——” she murmured, and then stopped in great confusion. Amînah Khânum pounced on her with eager questions. Bedr-ul-Budûr knelt down before her in an ecstasy.
“Thou, too, art blest? And thou hast kept it secret all this while?” the Princess cried. “O Bedr, go and beg the lady Fitnah to come hither instantly!”
“No, no!” entreated Barakah, distraught with shame.
“Yes, yes!” replied the other, scoffing at her. “Is this the famed false modesty of England? Praise God Most High that thou art fruitful, praise Him loudly!”
The joy of Fitnah Khânum passed all bounds. She sent a messenger at once to Yûsuf, another to the Pasha, with the tidings. The Pasha came at once to pay his compliments to Barakah. Yûsuf came later, having thought it necessary to circulate the happy news among his friends. Ghandûr, who, as the water-carrier of the apartment, sat always in the alley, underneath the lady’s lattice, was heard intoning a loud song of triumph, three parts prayer, of which each verse concluded with: “Twin boys, in sh´Allah!”
Joy-shrieks resounded; the whole household smiled; her friends thronged round her, informed of her good luck as if by miracle, for black-shrouded newsbearers were ever flitting by shadowed walls, along the edge of crowded markets, linking the great harîms in one society, and what was done in one was known in all. And Barakah alone saw any call for shame or reticence.