Azrael looked on darkly.
"Dost thou never pray?" said Mariska, turning towards her.
"Why should women pray? Their destiny is not in their own hands. Their fate depends upon their masters; if their masters are happy, they are happy also; if their masters perish, they perish with them. This is their earthly lot—and that is all. Allah never gave them a soul—what have they to do with the life beyond this? In Paradise the Houris take their places and the Houris remain young for ever. The breath of a woman vanishes with the autumn mist like the fumes of a dead animal, and Allah has no thought for them."
Mariska, with only half intelligible sorrow, looked at this woman who wished to seem worse than she really was.
Azrael crept closer up to her.
"And dost thou really believe that there is someone who listens to what the worms say, to what the birds twitter, and to what women pray?"
"Certainly," replied the young Christian woman; "turn to Him, and thou wilt feel for thyself His goodness."
"How can it be so? Why should He pay any attention to me?"
"It is not enough I know to clasp thy hands and close thy eyes. Thy petition must come straight from thy heart, and thy soul must believe that it will gain its desire."
Azrael's face flushed red. Hastily she cast herself down on her knees on the carpet, and pressing her folded hands to her bosom, stammered in a scarce audible voice: