The benefactress withdrew to consult her books, but returned presently.
'Your wife,' she said, 'has gone out shopping, also to leave some cards, to fulfil an engagement with the French minister, and to engage a band of music for an entertainment at which Prince Schearazade is expected to be present. Wait patiently for her return, then confront her boldly, upbraid her, toss this liquor in her eyes, and then you shall see what you shall see.'
Sid Norman went to his late home, which was in the West End, the Fifth Avenue of Bagdad. He opened the door, but silence prevailed. Costly silks, and many extravagant and superfluous things, lay strewn about. He sat down in a rocking-chair and gazed at a full-length portrait of the Haroun Alraschid.
About noon the lady came in, with six shop clerks after her, bearing packages, tossed off her head-dress, and flung herself inanimately on the sofa.
'Ahem,' grunted Sid Norman, who was concealed in the shadow of an alcove.
Amina looked up. Furies! what an appalling rencontre! She looked as pale as the corpses which she adored; she would have shrieked, but had no more voice than a ghost; she would have fled, but was riveted as with the gaze of a basilisk.
'Dear,' said Sid Norman, with an uxorious smile, 'what ails you? Has the fast of Kamazan begun? Hardly yet, for this looks more like the carnival. How much gave you for this Cashmere, my love?'
A great sculptor was Sid Norman, for, without lifting a hand, or using any other tool than a keen eye and a sharp tongue, he had wrought out before him, carved as in cold marble, the statue of a beautiful, bad woman. Such is genius. Such is conscience!
'Mrs. Amina Sidi Ghoul Norman,' proceeded the husband, giving his wife time to relax a little from her rigor, 'is dinner ready? We want nothing but a little rice. Set on only two plates, a knife and fork for me, and a bodkin for you, if you please, madam.'
(A symptom of hysterics, checked by a nightmare inability of action.)