The Duchess considered him. He had a beautiful face spoiled by a bad complexion, which doubtless (the period of puberty passed) he would outgrow.
“Consignment him come not two minute,” the youth replied.
“Ah Bachir? Bachir!”
“By the glorious Koran, I will swear it.”
“Be careful not to shake those Alexandrian Balls,” the Duchess peremptorily enjoined pointing towards some Guelder-roses—“or they’ll fall before they’re sold!”
“No matter at all. They sold already! An American lady this morning, she purchase all my Alexandrian-Balls; two heavy bunch.”
“Let me see your takings.”...
With a smile of triumph, Bachir turned towards the till. He had the welfare of the establishment at heart as well as his own, and of an evening often he would flit, garbed in his long gandourah, through the chief Cafés and Dancings’ of the city, a vast pannier heaped high with flowers upon his head, which he would dispose of to dazzled clients for an often exorbitant sum. But for these excursions of his (which ended on occasion in adventure) he had received no authority at all.
“Not so bad,” the Duchess commented: “And, as there’s to be a Court again soon, many orders for bouquets are sure to come in!”
“I call in outside hands to assist me: I summon Ouardi! He an Armenian boy. Sympathetic. My friend. More attached to him am I than a branch of Jessamine is about a Vine.”