ven as the two passed, with one accord, called aloud as
they raised their right hands to heaven:

"Allah--Jal-Jelalah!" which, being translated, means: "Praise to God
the Almighty!" disappearing on a sign from their master as he turned to
explain to Jill that this being his first visit in six months, his
servants, with twenty-four weeks of grievances and domestic feud upon
their minds, and a near prospect of being able to unburden themselves,
were doubtlessly delighted to see their master.

Jill passed into the house too dazed to notice much of her
surroundings, heard the swish of silk curtains closing behind her, and
stood alone in a most exquisite room.

Six lamps, hung from the ceiling by bronze chains, threw a shaded light
upon the soft-toned Persian rugs covering the floor; a divan piled high
with silken cushions of every shade of mauve, covered with silken
sheets, and smothered in the white folds of a mosquito net, stood
against the far wall; there were small inlaid tables, piles of
cushions, and a dressing-table glittering with crystal and silver in
the light of the lamps, and a small fire which flung out sweet resinous
odours from the burning logs; stretching right across one wall, a low
cupboard showed gleaming satins and soft silks behind its open doors,
and through an archway of fretted cedar-wood she saw a Roman bath of
tiles, into which you enter by descending shallow steps, and over which
hung a lamp with glass shade of many colours. Little white tables
smothered in towels and bottles and little pots stood about, and across
a low seat was thrown a garment of shimmering gold and silver cobwebby
tissue. Dusty, tired Jill stretched out her arms, opened the cupboard
doors wider, and inspected the garments therein one by one.

And she frowned.

A net had been spun in which she had been caught, her silly ears had
listened to an absurd tale, she had stretched out a greedy hand to
pluck an unknown fruit to find it bitter; in one brief word she had
been fooled. Whereupon she pulled back the silken curtain, of the door
with a vicious rasp, which seemed to have spread to her voice when she
called aloud. The curtain swung back as the Arab entered, murmuring
the Eastern prayer of greeting, and though furious, and therefore ripe
to cut and hurt with woman's weapon, the tongue, the girl stood still
and silent for a moment, instinctively feeling that tale or no tale,
net or no, the great man before her was master