e who is fairer than
Ustane.
Yet didst thou turn and call upon me, and let thine eyes wander in
the darkness.
But, nevertheless, she prevailed by Beauty, and led thee down
horrible places,
And then, ah! then my Beloved----

Here this extraordinary woman broke off her speech, or chant, which was
so much musical gibberish to us, for all that we understood of what she
was talking about, and seemed to fix her flashing eyes upon the deep
shadow before her. Then in a moment they acquired a vacant, terrified
stare, as though they were striving to realise some half-seen horror.
She lifted her hand from Leo's head, and pointed into the darkness. We
all looked, and could see nothing; but she saw something, or thought she
did, and something evidently that affected even her iron nerves, for,
without another sound, down she fell senseless between us.

Leo, who was growing really attached to this remarkable young person,
was in a great state of alarm and distress, and I, to be perfectly
candid, was in a condition not far removed from superstitious fear. The
whole scene was an uncanny one.

Presently, however, she recovered, and sat up with an extraordinary
convulsive shudder.

"What didst thou mean, Ustane?" asked Leo, who, thanks to years of
tuition, spoke Arabic very prettily.

"Nay, my chosen," she answered, with a little forced laugh. "I did but
sing unto thee after the fashion of my people. Surely, I meant nothing.
How could I speak of that which is not yet?"

"And what didst thou see, Ustane?" I asked, looking her sharply in the
face.

"Nay," she answered again, "I saw naught. Ask me not what I saw. Why
should I fright ye?" And then, turning to Leo with a look of the most
utter tenderness that I ever saw upon the face of a woman, civilised
or savage, she took his head between her hands, and kissed him on the
forehead as a mother might.

"When I am gone from thee, my chosen," she said; "when at night thou
stretchest out thine hand and canst not find me, then shouldst thou
think at times of me, for of a truth I love thee well, though I be not
fit to wash thy feet. And now let us love and take that which is given
us, and be happy; for in the grave there is no love and no warmth, nor
any touching of the lips. Nothing perchance, or perchance but bitter
memories of what might have been. To-night the hours are our own, how
know we to whom they shall belong to-morrow?"

VIII

THE FEAST,