“Why?”
“Because a greater and more insurmountable obstacle than our difference of race and creed preventeth it.”
“But tell me what it is?” I demanded.
“Isbir showhyyah,” (“Have patience a little”), she replied. “Though I may love thee, my Amîn, thou canst never be my husband. I am as much a captive as any of my slaves, and, alas! far, far more unhappy than they.”
Why did she have slaves? I wondered. Slavery in Algeria had, I knew, been abolished since the overthrow of the Dey, although in the far south, beyond the Areg, the tribes still held many in bondage.
“Unhappy?” I cried. “What is the cause of thy misery? Art thou thyself a slave, or—or art thou wedded?”
She started, staring at me with a strange expression.
“I—I love thee!” she stammered. “Is not that sufficient? If I wish at present to conceal certain facts, why dost thou desire me to tell lies to thee? To my woman Messoudia thou didst take oath to seek no further information beyond what I give thee.”
“True, O Zoraida,” I said. “Forgive me. Yet the mystery that surroundeth thyself is so puzzling.”
“I know,” she said, with a tantalising laugh. “But when a woman loves, it is imprudent of her to compromise herself;” and she beat an impatient tattoo with her fingers, with their henna-stained nails, upon a derbouka lying within her reach.