‘Stay!’ he cried, a sudden thought seeming to strike him; ‘her father lives, does he not?’
‘Inshalla! Meer Sahib, who does not know Roostum Ali Beg at Hyderabad—the bravest amongst its warriors?’
‘Then he will be among the advancing army, surely,’ cried the young man; ‘and what matter if he is not? they will receive his daughter, and I will conduct her to them.’
‘To whom, Meer Sahib, to whom?’ she asked eagerly.
‘To the troops of Nizam Ali Khan, who attend the English,—they will be before the city to-morrow.’
‘Shookr Alla!’ cried the woman, lifting up her hands and eyes in ecstasy, ‘Shookr Alla! Oh, how I bless thee, Meer Sahib, for the news; that will lend her courage, that will make her beauteous eye flash again and her cheek glow; even should her father not be there, there will be a hundred others to whom the daughter of Roostum Ali Beg will be as a daughter. Ya Alla kureem! there is hope, there is hope at last; the day hath long been gloomy, but the evening is bright.’
‘Rather say the night, sister,’ said the cook; ‘let this pass as a hideous dream which hath occupied our senses; let us awake to a bright morning, to share days of happiness with the Khanum, and to pray Alla that his devout Syud may soon be joined to her.’
‘Ameen!’ said the nurse: but Kasim could not speak, his thoughts were too busy.
‘I will prepare all,’ he said, after a while, ‘a dooly and bearers shall he ready here; she must go at night. Dare she come here? will she, nurse?—will she speak one word to me ere she leaves us? wilt thou conduct her hither?’
‘On my head and eyes be it!’ said Meeran; ‘on my head and eyes!’