cruel for the sake of cruelty? I love not to see suffering, or to cause
it. Let her come before me--quick now, before my mood changes," and she
hastily covered her face with its gauzy wrapping.

Well pleased to have succeeded even to this extent, I passed out into
the passage and called to Ustane, whose white garment I caught sight of
some yards away, huddled up against one of the earthenware lamps that
were placed at intervals along the tunnel. She rose, and ran towards me.

"Is my lord dead? Oh, say not he is dead," she cried, lifting her
noble-looking face, all stained as it was with tears, up to me with an
air of infinite beseeching that went straight to my heart.

"Nay, he lives," I answered. "_She_ hath saved him. Enter."

She sighed deeply, entered, and fell upon her hands and knees, after the
custom of the Amahagger people, in the presence of the dread _She_.

"Stand," said Ayesha, in her coldest voice, "and come hither."

Ustane obeyed, standing before her with bowed head.

Then came a pause, which Ayesha broke.

"Who is this man?" she said, pointing to the sleeping form of Leo.

"The man is my husband," she answered in a low voice.

"Who gave him to thee for a husband?"

"I took him according to the custom of our country, oh _She_."

"Thou hast done evil, woman, in taking this man, who is a stranger. He
is not a man of thine own race, and the custom fails. Listen: perchance
thou didst this thing through ignorance, therefore, woman, do I spare
thee, otherwise hadst thou died. Listen again. Go from hence back to
thine own place, and never dare to speak to or set thine eyes upon this
man again. He is not for thee. Listen a third time. If thou breakest
this my law, that moment thou diest. Go."

But Ustane did not move.

"Go, woman!"

Then she looked up, and I saw that her face was torn with passion.

"Nay, oh _She_. I will not go," she answered in a choked voice: "the
man is my husband, and I love him--I love him, and I will not leave him.
What right hast thou to command me to leave my husband?"

I saw a little quiver pass down Ayesha's frame, and shuddered myself,
fearing the worst.

"Be pitiful," I said in Latin; "it is but Nature working."

"I am pitiful," she answered coldly in the same language; "had I not
been pitiful she had been dead even now." Then, addressing Ustane:
"Woman, I say to thee, go before I destroy thee where thou art!"

"I will not go! He is mine--mine!" she cried in ang