It was at a festival of the Hasaneyn that she met her fate. Accompanied by Miss O’Donald and two of the eunuchs, she went to visit the tomb of Hoseyn, for women at all times, says the narrator, are more attracted to the shrines of heroes than to even that of the Prophet himself. The mosque was so crowded with people that the dervishes could hardly find room in which to perform the zikr.
The eunuchs managed to force a way through the crowd so as to allow the princess to approach the tomb, and while she was saying her prayers at the shrine of the hero, she was disturbed by an uproar which arose not far off. Shouts of ‘a Christian’ resounded through the building. Sticks were raised and knives unsheathed by an infuriated mob, who surrounded a tall, fair-haired man who, with his back to the wall, was hitting out right and left to keep his assailants at bay. His turban had fallen off, and his fair and unshaven head showed only too clearly that he was not a Moslem.
‘It’s my brother,’ called out the governess, and appealed to those near her to go to his rescue. Zohra, who had now reached her side, first saw the blood-stained and handsome face of the young Irishman, and uttering a piercing scream, she ordered the assailants to desist. Seeing from her attendants that she belonged to the viceregal household, there was a slight pause, and those near her made way for her to reach the one they had been attacking. She took the young man by the hand and led him, through the murmuring crowd, into the street.
As they disappeared, loud cries of ‘Allahu! Allahu!’ resounded throughout the mosque. The princess threw her arms in the air and victoriously repeated the cry: ‘Allahu! Allahu!’—Such was their first meeting.
Two young mamelukes of the household of Abbas also happened to have witnessed the scene, and repeated every detail of it to their master. The narrator goes on to say that ‘Abbas was silent, like a serpent who coils itself in readiness for a spring.’
Spies were sent forth to find out who this man in truth might be. His name was O’Donald, and there was no doubt that he was the governess’s brother. He had first come to Egypt in 1840, when, after the siege of Beirut, Napier’s troops lay outside Alexandria. Fortune had then forsaken Mohammed Ali. He could not prevent his enemies from drinking Nile water as much as they pleased, and as the Arabs say: ‘He who has drunk Nile water will sooner or later return to the Nile.’
After the British troops had quitted Egypt, O’Donald resigned his commission and returned to Alexandria, where he had got a situation as manager to the overland route from that port to Suez. His sister had doubtless described his pupil to him, and had also entertained the princess with tales of his gallant deeds while serving in the army. Business matters had taken him to Cairo at the time of this festival, and his love of adventure had led to his disguising himself and entering a mosque forbidden to all save the believers.
Zohra, whose affections had so far been disengaged, was all too ready to fall in love with this handsome Irishman, whose praises she had so often heard from the lips of his sister. Beholding him for the first time bravely repelling the attack of the infuriated mob, he personified in her imagination the heroism of those who first spread the Mohammedan faith. To use the words of the narrator: ‘She was taken as in a whirlwind. Love consumed her as a fire. She wept through the whole of that hot night. She implored one of her sisters to help her to meet her lover, and on her refusal she bit her in the cheek.’
Miss O’Donald was alarmed at the state of her pupil and also for the safety of her brother. She wrote and warned him to keep away from Cairo, and if possible to get away from Egypt. Unfortunately the eyes of the young princess confirmed the glowing descriptions of her beauty which his sister had given, and the young Irishman seems to have been consumed with the same fire as that of his lady-love. Instead of keeping away from Cairo, he contrived to get his company to give him a post in that city.
On the third night of Bairam, when rich and poor, old and young, repair to the cemeteries to pray at the graves of their belongings, the young lovers seized on this opportunity to see each other once more. Zohra went with the women of her hareem to that great wilderness of tombs on the south-eastern outskirts of the city. She was not slow in recognising her lover in the apparently devout Moslem who came to pray at the tomb where she sat. The wailing of the women and the howling of the dervishes, performing the zikr, were a sufficient noise to prevent the words the two interchanged from being heard by Zohra’s attendants, and before they parted a future means of meeting had been arranged.