French and Oriental Love in a Harem

She led me on without any more ado, and we entered.

"Oh! the sycamores have grown splendidly," she said.

At that moment we noticed Mohammed coming down the steps, and walking

towards us.

"Ah, His Excellency has not forsaken his old ideas!" said my aunt; "he

still wears the costume of the true believers. As he is coming, let us

hurry on, to be polite."

The danger was impending, nothing could now save me from it. I summoned

up all my self-control. When I was a few steps off His Excellency, I

slipped away quickly and ran up to him.

"Be careful," I said to him in a whisper; "it is my aunt. Keep your

counsel, and don't let her suspect anything."

Then I went through the formal introduction, delivering it in the famous

sabir which I told you of. Mohammed in the same idiom was fashioning a

compliment as profound as it was difficult to understand, when my aunt

all at once answered him in the purest Turkish.--I felt myself quite

lost.

A minute afterwards we were ensconced in the drawing-room of the

"selamlik." My aunt described the object of her visit. I must tell you

that this rascal Mohammed played his part with the most affable gravity

imaginable, albeit somewhat timidly, as if he felt whizzing through the

air a shadowy reminder of the stick with which, no doubt, my uncle had

trained him. I kept my eye on him all the time, and his eye wandered

from me to my aunt with a distressed expression. Great drops of

perspiration started from his face. Finally, at a sign from me, he

generously promised his subscription, and on the whole got through the

ordeal very well.

My anxieties being now removed, I was beginning to breathe more fully,

when my aunt, just as the interview was coming to a close, expressed to

him, in the most gracefully delicate manner possible, her desire to pay

a visit to his daughters, whose acquaintance she would be delighted to

make.

I was stupefied. To have refused the entrée of the harem to a lady of

my aunt's rank would have been an offence to her; she was too well

acquainted with Mussulman customs for it to be possible to put her off

with any pretext. Mohammed, still maintaining his dignified attitude,

replied without any hesitation, by a gesture of delighted acquiescence,

and without the least embarrassment got up, saying that he was about to

inform them of their good fortune. I felt rather reassured. From the

manner in which the old fellow had acted "His Excellency," it was clear

that this was not the first time he had been called upon to "save the

situation."