But we must return to the Khan, whose active furashes had encircled several of the pillars of the cloisters with high tent walls, swept out the inclosures thus made, spread the carpets, and converted what was before open arches and naked walls and floors into a comfortable apartment, perfectly secure from observation. Ameena took possession of it, and was soon joined by her lord, who, in truth, was in nowise sorry after the fatigues of the day to enjoy first a good dinner, and afterwards the luxury of a soft cotton mattress, and to have his limbs gently kneaded by the tiny hands of his fair wife, while she amused him with a fairy tale, or one of those stories of intrigue and love which are so common among the Easterns.
The cool air of the Mysore country had apparently invigorated her, and the languor which the heat and the fatigue of constant travelling had caused in the Carnatic had entirely disappeared, and given place to her usual lively and joyous expression. She had thrown a deep orange-coloured shawl, with a very richly-worked border, around her, to protect her from the night breeze that blew chilly over the tent walls, which did not reach to the roof of the building they were in, and it fell in heavy folds around her, appearing to make her light figure almost more slender from the contrast. She was inexpressively lovely, as she now bent playfully over the Khan, employed in her novel vocation, and again desisting, began afresh some other story wherewith to beguile the time till the hour of repose arrived.
‘Alla bless thee, Ameena!’ said the Khan, after one of her lively sallies, when her face had brightened, and her eyes sparkled at some point of her tale,—‘Alla bless thee! thou art truly lovely to-night: the Prophet (may his name be honoured!) could have seen no brighter Houris in Paradise (when the will of Alla called him there) than thou art.’ ‘I am my lord’s slave,’ said the lady, ‘and to please him is my sole endeavour day and night. Happy is my heart when it tells me I have succeeded—how much more when I am honoured with such a remark from thine own lips, O my lord! And as to my beauty’—and here she threw a glance into the little mirror she wore upon her thumb,—‘my lord surely flatters me; he must have seen far fairer faces than mine.’
‘Never, never, by the Prophet!’ cried the Khan, with energy; ‘never, I swear by thine own eyes, never. I have but one regret, Ameena, and that cannot be mended or altered now.’
Ameena’s heart suddenly failed her, for Kasim came to her remembrance, and she thought for an instant that he might suspect.
‘Regret! what dost thou regret?’ she asked hesitatingly. ‘Anything that thy poor slave hath done? anything—’
‘Nothing, fairest, on thy part; it was for myself.’
Her heart was suddenly relieved of a load. ‘For thyself?’ she said gaily; ‘what dost thou regret, Khan Sahib?’
‘That I am not twenty years younger, for thy sake, Ameena,’ he said with much feeling. ‘Methinks now, to see these grey hairs and this grey beard,’ and he touched them as he spoke, ‘so near thy soft and waving tresses, I seem more like a father to thee than a husband: and yet thou art mine, Ameena. I would thou wert older, fair one!’
‘And if I were, I should not be so fair,’ she said artlessly.