Muhammad Pasha Sâlih was intensely worried. As he drove toward the
English Consul’s office, he let deep furrows ravage his benignant brow,
and combed his long grey beard with nervous fingers. The ever-shifting
crowds, the eager faces, the laden camels rolling on like ships upon
the sea of heads; the water-sellers clinking their brass cups, the
cries of salesmen and the floating odours--all the pageant of the
streets and all their rumour, which filled the sunlight and seemed one
with it, went by unnoticed.
In youth he had been wedded to a noble Turkish lady, the sweetest and
most gentle of companions. Never an angry word had passed between
them. But, alas! when all her children died soon after birth, Murjânah
Khânum had grown melancholy and retired from life. She still dwelt in
his house, was still the nominal head of his harîm; but for more than
twenty years she had been dead to pleasure. At first he had amused
himself with pretty slaves, being reluctant to infringe her dignity of
only wife. Then, at her instance, for she feared debauch for him, he
had espoused the daughter of a wealthy native, whom the caprice of a
former ruler had exalted. The marriage, besides raising his importance,
had brought him four male children. Yet at this moment, with the curses
of the termagant still ringing in his ears, he almost wished he had let
well alone and kept to concubines.
Allah knew that Yûsuf’s malady was not uncommon at his age; the cure
self-evident. The governess was not a heathen. She was of those who
have received the Scriptures, therefore marriageable. Moreover, being,
as he shrewdly guessed, of no consideration in her native land, she
might be tempted by a life of wealth and ease. To save his son from
death, he had besought the Englishwoman, imagining that her consent
would fill the house with joy-cries. Yet when the cause was won, the
only possible objection cancelled by the girl’s unlooked-for turn to El
Islâm, behold! the lady Fitnah’s grief was changed to fury. The wrangle
with her had perturbed him at a moment when he stood in need of all his
wits to brave the Consul. Well, Allah saw what trials he endured!
The carriage drew up in a quiet alley, before a gateway ornamented with
a coloured picture of lions great and small in funny attitudes. Two
Cawasses in silver-braided jackets with long dangling sleeves rose from
stools beside the threshold and saluted. Muhammad Pasha passed between
them, crossing a courtyard to a second door, wide open like the first.
There, in a whitewashed room, two Copts sat at a table, cutting pens.
They both sprang up at recognition of the visitor and strove to kiss
his hands, which he prevented by patting each upon the shoulder kindly.
“Is the Consul busy, O my children?” he inquired. “I have an errand of
importance. Please inform him.”
“Upon my head. I go at once, by Allah!”
One of the Copts leapt to an inner door and knocked thereon. Enjoined
to enter, he opened it just far enough for the introduction of his
body, and slipped in. Anon returning in the same respectful manner,
he beckoned to the Pasha. Then he flung the door wide open, and stood
aside, with eyes downcast and hands demurely folded.
Muhammad Pasha entered with a beating heart. His mission was of essence
delicate, and he was anxious to avoid all odour of offence towards a
foreign representative possessing influence. Having touched hands with
the Consul and exchanged greetings, he sat down on the extreme edge of
a chair, and toying with his amber rosary, thus broached his business:--
“Monsieur le Consul,”--the conversation was in French of the Byzantine
school,--“you remember the young lady whom you were good enough to
recommend as an instructress for my children. Can you inform me of her
origin, her previous history?”
“Excellency, I only know what she herself confided: that she was
educated at a religious institution for poor children of good family.
She has no relatives. She came here to be governess in an English
house which, by the father’s sudden death, was brought to poverty two
weeks before she came. She found herself here without a situation and
with little money; and as she was well recommended and impressed me as
respectable, I thought of you, remembering that you desired an English
governess. I trust that you are satisfied of her efficiency?”
“Altogether. She has been a month now in our house, and almost is
become like one of us. She is so charming. It is there, the trouble.
She is ravishing. Monsieur le Consul,”--here the Pasha changed his
tone for that of one who bares his heart, discarding courtesies,--“I
am very gravely troubled. The anxiety I suffer cuts digestion and
gives me frightful belly-pains. My son adores this demoiselle, and she
adores him. The affair deprives me of all taste for food. You see my
sufferings!”
“Continue, Excellency!” said the Consul grimly. He got up from his
chair and paced the room. The Pasha kept the corner of an eye upon him,
as he proceeded:
“What can I do? The demoiselle has been secluded from my household,
as I promised you. But youth leaps boundaries; love can speak through
walls. My son has seen her in the passages--their eyes have met--What
know I? Youth is fatal.”
Here the Pasha wiped his eyes.
“Monsieur le Consul, when I heard of this two days ago, I put my son in
prison; I went myself and reasoned with the demoiselle. I have reasoned
with them both, entreated, threatened; but without result. I fear my
son will die if he may not espouse her. The demoiselle implores me not
to cast her forth. She says--it is so touching!--that we are her only
friends, that she never met with kindness till she came to us.”
“Beg her to come this afternoon and see me,” pronounced the Englishman,
whose face had darkened by perceptible gradations as he listened.
“That is precisely what I come to ask: that you will scold her. God
knows how the responsibility has weighed upon me. She is not the match
I should myself have chosen for my son; but still I should be glad of
the alliance, because of the esteem I have for all the English. I stand
impartial in the case and greatly worried.”
“Thank you, Excellency. Send her to me this afternoon. Is there
anything else?”
The Pasha had already risen to depart.
“One thing.” He dropped his voice to a stage whisper. “In the frenzy
of her love she asks to be of our religion. She has made an oath of
her conversion before witnesses. (The Consul swore.) But have no care.
We will forget it, if”--the Pasha laid great stress on the condition,
and for once looked boldly in the other’s eyes--“if, after consultation
with you, she should wish to recant.”
“But you say that there are witnesses to her conversion,” cried the
Frank, with bitterness. “I fail to see how it can be forgotten. There
would be a riot.”
“The witnesses are of my house,” rejoined the Pasha suavely. “My
command is guarantee of their discretion.”
“Send her to me!” The final words were uttered from tight lips beneath
a formidable frown, as the Consul flung the door wide open for the
Turk’s departure.
“Sont-ils fanatiques, ces brutes-là? Peuh!” respired the Pasha, shaking
the dust from off his boots as he regained his carriage. “The girl will
have a cruel hour, poor floweret! That dog would like to kill her. But,
God be praised, the law of El Islâm is still sufficient to protect a
convert in a Muslim land!”
His thoughts of the lone foreign girl were full of kindness. She was
his daughter. He would care for her true happiness. And then the
thought of Fitnah’s rage, recurring, caused him to frown, and swear,
and gnaw his underlip.