wafted to him over the still garden, from the window of
Ahmed's apartment, from the Selamlik.

When the song was finished, and the last notes had faltered softly
into silence, Ahmed rose from his divan and crossed to where she
sat. The room was full now of hot rosy light; the scent of the
orange flowers poured in through the windows; the girl's senses
grew confused and dizzy. Her cheeks were flaming with the
excitement and joy and effort and passion of her singing; her
eyelids were cast down, and beneath them her eyes watched, half in
terror, half in a strained delight, the blue Persian slippers
advancing silently over the matting on the floor towards her.

"Will Dilama stay with me to-night?"

The girl looked up, whitening to the lips, and slid to a kneeling
position. Terror at the thought of infidelity to Murad filled her;
he would infallibly find it out and avenge himself. Her face worked
convulsively; she stretched out her hands with a gesture of
despair.

"What my lord wills: I am the slave of his wishes."

Ahmed drew his level brows together, and for a moment lined the
serene beauty of his forehead. He gazed at her with a steady,
puzzled look, and at last a faint, half-quizzical smile relaxed his
lips. What could this strange idea, this whim be, so unlike all
Eastern maiden's usual fancies? He had not yet solved the riddle,
nor found the clue! he would do so, but in the meantime she must be
left her freedom. In all noble natures power brings with it a
terrible responsibility, and the habit of stern self-control and
long forbearance. Ahmed's complete power over the frightened piece
of humanity before him brought upon him the necessity practically
of surrender; for the Turk possesses one of the noblest and gentle
natures the human race can boast of. Ahmed remained silent for a
few seconds, and the girl gazed upon him with dilated, fascinated
eyes. She noted in a dazed way how the dark blue robe parted on his
breast and showed beneath a vest of gold silk, fastened a little to
the side by a single emerald; how the column of throat towered
above these, supporting the oval face and beautifully-modelled
chin, and above these again, and the commanding brows, shone
another solitary emerald between the folds of his turban on his
forehead.

Murad began to seem like a robber depriving her of all these
things. There is no fidelity in the body. Fidelity is a thing of
the mind, always at war with and striving to coerce