'They not heeding and still urgently beseeching him to bring them further on their journey, the Consul dissembled and used guile. Therefore, the while he pretended all friendliness and promised to help forward their enterprise, he in truth set them instead on board a ship bound for Venice and no wise for Constantinople, hoping thereby to thwart their purpose, and to force them to return to their native land. Some of the company, discovering this after the ship had set sail, though lamenting, did resign themselves to their fate. Only this maid, strong in soul, would not be turned from her purpose, but declared constantly that Allah, who had commanded her to come, would surely bring her there where He would have her, even to the presence of the Grand Seignior himself. And lo! even as she spoke, a violent storm arose, the ship was driven out of her course and cast upon the Island of Zante with its rugged peaks; and there, speaking to the ship-master, she persuaded him to put her ashore on the opposite coast of the mainland, even at the place known as the Black Mountain; and thence she hath made her way hither on foot, alone, and hath met with nothing but lovingkindness from young and old, so she saith, as the Messenger of the Great King.' The Sultan's interest was aroused at last: 'Afoot--from the Black Mountain!--incredible! A woman, and alone! It is a journey of many hundreds of miles, and through wild, mountainous country. What proof hast thou that she speaketh truly?' 'My interpreter hath questioned her closely as to her travels. His home is in that region, and he is convinced that she has indeed seen the places she describes. Also, she carries ever in her breast a small sprig of fadeless sea-lavender that groweth only on the Black Mountain slopes, and sayeth that the sea captain plucked it as he set her ashore, telling her that it was even as her courage, seeing that it would never fade.' But the Sultan's patience was exhausted: 'I must see this woman and judge for myself, not merely hear of her from aged lips,' he exclaimed. 'Witch or woman--moonbeam or maiden--she shall declare herself in my presence. Only, since she doth dare to call herself the messenger of the Most High God, let her be accorded the honours of an Ambassador, that all men may know that the Sultan duly regardeth the message of Allah.' II On a divan of silken cushions in the guest chamber of a house in the city of Adrianople, a woman lay, still and straight. Midnight was long past. Outside, the hot wind could be heard every now and then, listlessly flapping the carved wooden lattice-work shutters of an overhanging balcony built out on timber props over the river Maritza, whose turbid waters surged beneath with steady plash. Inside, the striped silken curtains were closely drawn. The atmosphere was stuffy and airless, filled with languorous aromatic spices.