“The Um-ul-Pasha and the Kitchuk Khanum Effendi.” This was Jamileh Khanum’s official title.
Cecil’s spirits rose with a bound. Here, at any rate, were foemen worthy of her steel, which was certainly not the case with the agas, who could only answer, “Khanum Effendi’s orders,” to all remonstrances, and she sprang up to follow the negress with keen anticipations of a coming struggle.
“Perhaps they are come to Mosul for Azim Bey’s wedding with Safieh Khanum,” she whispered to Um Yusuf; but the good woman shook her head in perplexity.
“Azim Bey not to be married until he seventeen,” she began, but just then their guide drew back a curtain and ushered them into the presence of the great ladies. Cecil had made up her mind what to do. The moment she observed that neither of the ladies made any reply or return to her salaam and salutation, she sat down at once without waiting to be invited, regardless of the contrast afforded by her travel-stained blue wrapper and yellow slippers to the wadded and fur-trimmed pelisse and trousers of green satin which formed the winter dress of the Um-ul-Pasha, or to Jamileh Khanum’s Parisian morning-robe of petunia velvet, with its front of costly lace. The ladies sat at the upper end of the room, facing her, the Um-ul-Pasha in the seat of honour in the corner of the divan, her daughter-in-law beside her. At a respectful distance sat Mdlle. Katrina, palpitating with eagerness. To this excellent woman conspiracy was the very breath of life. She would have plotted against herself cheerfully if she could by any means have imported sufficient mystery into the proceedings, and she had been the Um-ul-Pasha’s go-between with the outer world throughout her long series of plots. At her mistress’s command she now set to work to interpret her words to Cecil without further parley.
“Why have you not put on the clothes I sent you, mademoiselle?” was the first question.
“Because they are not suited to my circumstances,” Cecil replied at once. “I am a stranger and a prisoner, and the clothes seem to be intended for a festival.”
“What has that to do with you?” asked the Um-ul-Pasha. “Do you wish to scorn my gifts, mademoiselle?”
“Certainly not, your Excellency,” responded Cecil, politely. “I only wish to be sure that there are no conditions attaching to them.”
“Mademoiselle, your tone is unsuitable. Know then, that now that your term of service in the household of my son, the Pasha, has expired, I have determined to provide suitably for you, and I have found you a husband, who is willing to take you on my recommendation. And let me tell you, mademoiselle, that without my recommendation you would have had little chance indeed of obtaining a husband at all.”
“I am extremely grateful for the Um-ul-Pasha’s kind intentions, but I must respectfully decline her offer,” said Cecil.