id, if you didn't think
I should be old and disagreeable?"

Suddenly the other's face changed. A queer look of extraordinary
eagerness, almost of slyness, transformed it, chasing away something of
its soft beauty. "Hush!" she said, "we can't talk of such things now.
Some time soon, perhaps! I forgot we were not alone. I must introduce
you to my Aunt Mabrouka, my father's widowed half-sister, who"--and her
voice hardened--"is like a second mother to me."

She stepped back, and an elderly woman, who had stood in the background
awaiting her turn (though far from humbly, to judge by the flashing of
her eyes), moved forward to welcome the Roumia--the foreigner.

Then for the first time Sanda realized that Ourieda, the soul of the
picture, was not the only human figure in it besides herself. Lella[1]
Mabrouka was a personality, too, and if she had been a woman of some
progressive country, marching with the times, most probably she would
have been among the Suffragists. She would have made a handsome man, and
indeed looked rather like a stout, short man of middle age, disguised as
an inmate of his own harem. She was dressed in white, Arab mourning,
considered unlucky for women who have not lost some relative by death,
and her square, wrinkled face, the colour of bronze, was dark and harsh
in contrast. If she had not been partly screened by a great flowering
pomegranate bush as she sat in her white dress against the white house
wall, Sanda would have seen her on entering the court; but it was
hopeless to try and appease the lady's scarcely stifled vexation with
apologies or explanations. Lella Mabrouka, being of an older generation,
had not troubled to learn French, and could understand only a few words
which her naturally quick mind had assorted in hearing the Agha talk
with his daughter. Ourieda acted as interpreter for the politeness of
her aunt and guest, but Sanda could not help realizing that all was not
well between the two. A tall old negress (introduced by the girl as a
beloved nurse), a woman of haggard yet noble face, stood dutifully
behind Lella Mabrouka, but stabbed the broad white back with keen,
suspicious glances that softened into love as her great eyes turned to
the "Little Rose."

[Footnote 1: Lella, _lady_.]

Honey could be no sweeter than the words of welcome translated by
Ourieda, and when Sanda's answers had been put into Arabic, Lella
Mabrouka received them graciously. Soon aunt and niece and servan