This double victory found her indifferent; she had exhausted all the emotions she could experience; she had so far distanced her rivals, that triumph over them no longer excited her vanity; the slaves around her were so submissive that she no longer took pleasure in commanding them. The pacha was tamed, tamed even to weakness, to cowardice; every one, even the lion, submitted to the power of the favorite, and with such unanimous accord, that in this harem, where every thing prostrates itself before her, and every thing is done in accordance with her will or her caprice, she has but a single enemy whom she cannot conquer; it is ennui. That threatened to increase daily, and to strengthen itself by the weakness of the others. The pacha went on the same day to the city; Baïla consented to accompany him; and after having remained a short time at Shivas, they had scarcely returned to Kizil-Ermak, when she appeared entirely different from what she had been at her departure. Gayety and vivacity had returned to her; the smile to her lips, joy to her eyes; she had refound her sweetest songs, her most graceful dances. She was charming in the eyes of Djezzar and even of Haïder. It was said she had been spontaneously metamorphosed by the way. The good humor of the favorite communicating itself to the pacha, and spreading from him far and near, all was joy in the palace that night. Baïla alone possessed the secret of this general joy. CHAPTER III. Shut up in her palanquin, in the suite of the master, as she was passing with the escort through one of suburbs of Shivas, on their return to the Red River, and was amusing herself with looking at the inhabitants, Turks and Christians, fly, pell-mell, in disorder, so as to hide or prostrate themselves at the sight of the pacha, she remarked one, who, remaining erect and motionless, did not appear to participate in the emotions of the crowd. Baïla was at first astonished that the guards, the _cawas_, did not force him to assume a more humble posture; she examines him with more attention and starts. He wears the dress of a Frank, and as far as she can judge through her double veil, and the muslin curtains of the palanquin, which were spangled with gold, his features are those of the unknown. By a movement quicker than thought, veil, curtains, all are at once thrown aside. It is he—their looks meet. The stranger is troubled. He is doubtless again overcome by the resplendent lustre of so much beauty; then, with an expression full of love, he raises his eyes to heaven, and places one hand upon his heart; he moves quickly in this hand a small brilliant, gilded object which Baïla could not distinguish, for the curtains had already fallen. This imprudent, daring scene, which occurred in the midst of a crowd, had no witnesses, all were flying or were prostrate on the ground.