I had already come to the conclusion that it would be better to calm
their minds, and thus avoid all inconvenient enquiries. I therefore gave
them an account, which after all was not far from the truth, namely,
that Omer-Rashid-Effendi was a rich Turk, "whose acquaintance I had the
honour of making at Damascus, and who had come to stay at Paris with his
family." I thus insured myself against any suspicion of mystery arising
in connection with my visits to the house in the Rue de Monsieur, in the
event of these coming to light by any chance.
Our relations, you will see, were thus defined once for all. This new
life is nothing but a succession of delights to my almées; and I have
really now attained the ideal in the way of harems, through the absence
of that monotony which is the inevitable result of the system of rigid
seclusion. Under the influence of our civilized surroundings, the ideas
of my houris are undergoing a gradual transformation. They have French
lady's maids, and their study of our refinements of fashion has opened
out quite a new world of coquettish charms to them. My "little animals"
have grown into women: this single word will convey to you the whole
delicious significance of this story of mine, the secret of which you
alone in the whole world possess.
As we had decided, Kondjé-Gul has been separated from her over-jealous
companions. Hadidjé, Zouhra, and Nazli have taken this measure to be a
confirmation of her disgrace, and knowing that she lives in a
sequestered corner of the house, they fancy their triumph more assumed
than ever. I can place implicit confidence in the discretion of my
servants--who wait on us like mutes in a seraglio: consequently
Kondjé-Gul and I are as free as possible. When I want to go out with
her, I pay a short visit to my wives, and after a quarter of an hour's
talk, leave them and go off in my carriage, in the recesses of which my
darling reclines. Now you see what a simple device it is and how
ingenious; still it involves a certain amount of constraint for me, and
an isolation hard to endure for Kondjé-Gul. She reads and devours
everything that I bring her in the way of books; but the days are long,
and Mohammed, with his time taken up by the others, cannot accompany her
out of doors. I therefore conceived the idea of taking her away from the
harem altogether, and thus relieving her of the contemptuous insults
which my other silly women still find opportunities of inflicting upon
her. The difficulty was to procure a chaperon for her, some kind of
suitable and reliable duenna whom I could leave with her in a separate
establishment; this duenna has been found.