let, like a lily in a garden of tulips, her
quiet face shining in that cruel and lustful place with the joy of a
task accomplished, and the sense of the presence of God.'[40]

Thus she stood, at the goal of her journey at last, in the presence of
the Grand Turk, she the Messenger of the Great King. There was the
Grand Turk, resplendent in his sable and cloth of gold. Opposite to
him stood the gentle Quakeress, in her plain garment of grey Yorkshire
frieze with its spotless deep collar and close-fitting cap of snowy
lawn. Only the Message was wanting now.

At first no Message came.

The Sultan, thinking that the woman before him was naturally alarmed
by such unwonted magnificence, spoke to her graciously. 'He asked by
his interpreters (whereof there were three with him) whether it was
true what had been told him that she had something to say to him from
the Lord God. She answered, "Yea." Then he bade her speak on: and she
not being forward, weightily pondering what she might say. "Should he
dismiss his attendants and let her speak with him in the presence of
fewer listeners?" the Grand Turk asked her kindly.' Again came an
uncourtly monosyllabic 'No,' followed by another baffling silence.

The executioner, a hook-nosed Kurd with eyes like a bird of prey,
stationed, as always, at the Sultan's right hand, began to look at the
slight woman in grey with a professional interest. He felt the edge of
his blade with a skilful thumb and fore-finger, and turned keen eyes
from the slender throat of the Quakeress, rising above the folds of
snowy lawn, to the aged neck of the Grand Vizier half hidden by his
long white beard. There might be a double failure in etiquette to
avenge, should the Sultan's pleasure change and this unprecedented
interview prove a failure! The executioner smacked his cruel lips with
pleasure at the thought, looking, in his azalea-coloured garment, like
an orange hawk himself, all ready to pounce on his victims.

Still Silence reigned:--a keen silence more piercing than the sharpest
Damascene blade. It was piercing its way into one heart already. Not
into the heart of the aged Grand Vizier. The Grand Vizier was frankly
bored, and was, moreover, beginning to be strangely uneasy at his
_protegee's_ unaccountable behaviour. He turned to his interpreter
with an enquiring frown. The interpreter looked yet more
uncomfortable--even terrified. Approaching his master, he began to
whisper profound apologies into hi