“And why, pray?” demanded the old lady, through her interpreter. “Your betrothed husband is dead, so what obstacle is there?”
“Dr Egerton may be dead,” returned Cecil, her eyes filling with tears at this rough mention of her loss, “but that does not alter my feelings towards him. My heart is his still, and I will not marry any one else.”
“But we will make you,” cried Jamileh Khanum.
“You ought to know, Khanum, that a British subject cannot be legally married out here except under the British flag,” said Cecil, somewhat more calmly.
“Bah! who is to know or care whether the marriage is legal or not?” demanded Jamileh Khanum, contemptuously.
“There is a British vice-consul in Mosul, and I will appeal to him,” said Cecil, her colour rising angrily. The affair was becoming absurdly and irritatingly melodramatic, and she found it difficult to keep her own part of the conversation to the everyday level that she felt was safest.
“You speak like a fool,” said the Um-ul-Pasha. “As yet, praise be to God! our harems are sacred from the infidel. We will give out that you are a Yezidi captive, and the Frangis cannot touch you.”
“That will not help you,” said Cecil, as coolly as she could. “Do you think for a moment that when the bride’s proxies came to demand my consent to the marriage, anything would make me give it?”
“Yes,” said Jamileh Khanum. “We could force you to give it.”
“Could you?” said Cecil, very quietly. “Perhaps you would like to try?”