Yes it would be a wrench to quit the little place, she reflected, as she began setting about her toilet for the night. It was agreeable going to bed late without anybody’s aid, when one could pirouette interestingly before the mirror in the last stages of déshabille, and do a thousand (and one) things besides[2] that one might otherwise lack the courage for. But this evening being in no frivolous mood, she changed her ball-dress swiftly for a robe-de-chambre bordered deeply with ermins, that made her feel nearer somehow to Yousef, and helped her to realise, in its various facets, her position as future Queen.
“Queen!” she breathed, trailing her fur flounces towards the window.
Already the blue revolving lights of the Café Cleopatra were growing paler with the dawn, and the moon had veered a little towards the Convent of the Flaming-Hood. Ah ... how often as a lay boarder there had she gazed up towards the palace wondering half-shrinkingly what life “in the world” was like; for there had been a period indeed, when the impulse to take the veil had been strong with her—more, perhaps, to be near one of the nuns whom she had idolised than from any more immediate vocation.
She remained immersed in thoughts, her introspectiveness fanned insensibly by the floating zephyrs that spring with morning. The slight sway-sway of the trees, the awakening birds in the castle eaves, the green-veined bougainvilleas that fringed her sill—these thrilled her heart with joy. All virginal in the early dawn what magic the world possessed! Slow speeding clouds like knots of pink roses came blowing across the sky, sailing away in titanic bouquets above the town.
Just such a morning should be their wedding-day! she mused, beginning lightly to apply the contents of a jar of Milk of Almonds to her breast and arms. Ah, before that Spina Christi lost its leaves, or that swallow should migrate ... that historic day would come!
Troops ... hysteria ... throngs.... The Blue Jesus packed to suffocation.... She could envisage it all.
And there would be a whole holiday in the Convent, she reflected falling drowsily at her bedside to her knees.
“Oh! help me heaven,” she prayed, “to be decorative and to do right! Let me always look young, never more than sixteen or seventeen—at the very outside, and let Yousef love me—as much as I do him. And I thank you for creating such a darling, God (for he’s a perfect dear), and I can’t tell you how much I love him; especially when he wags it! I mean his tongue.... Bless all the sisters at the Flaming-Hood—above all Sister Ursula ... and be sweet, besides, to old Jane.... Shew me the straight path! And keep me ever free from the malicious scandal of the Court: Amen.”
And her orisons (ending in a brief self-examination) over, Mademoiselle de Nazianzi climbed into bed.