"Then we can all speak together, and she shall be my friend. And she is beautiful?"
"I think her most beautiful, lady; but she is my sister, and it ill befits me to speak. You will see and judge for yourselves."
"We may now rejoin our companions," said the Queen Regent. "And you love Abbas Khan?" she continued, inquiringly.
"I do," replied the priest, "as I would a son."
"And have seen no fault in him?"
"None. He is true and gentle, as a brave soldier ought to be. We were by chance cast together when his wound broke out again, and I could not leave him till he was fit to travel. He would have died alone."
"And thy sister," asked the Queen, "do they know each other?"
"Not at all, except by hearsay; and she hath never seen or spoken to him. In the village where Abbas Khan was ill for a month or more we had a different lodging; and, if abroad, she was always closely veiled. Since we have been here we lodge with a painter, for whom Maria makes designs."
"Now may God bless thee for this assurance! I had feared that Maria's beauty might—might——"
"Nay, lady, she is bound to God by her vow, and he is too honourable to think of her; but I may tell you, who are as his mother, that from snatches of his dreams when he raved and occasional remarks, his heart hath gone out to the child who watched him in his first attack at Juldroog, Zóra."