“Oh, I am sure he doesn’t count the ones he has killed or divorced!” said Lady Haigh. “Well, in any case, Georgie, it would be very awkward. You might refuse to marry him, but he wouldn’t take a refusal. He would simply request Sir Dugald to settle the matter. If he was told that it was the custom in England to allow ladies their choice, he would say that at Kubbet-ul-Haj you must do as the Kubbet-ul-Hajis did. Then, if you still refused, he might do as the old man suggested, and murder us all to get hold of you. So you see that it is really necessary for you to cover your face, and I do it to keep you company.” “But with the veil, you will, of course, adopt the other dictates of Eastern etiquette,” said Sir Dugald, “which forbid a lady to speak to any man not of her immediate family?” “That would be dreadfully dull for me,” said Lady Haigh. “What should I do when you were busy?” “Far worse for me,” cried Georgia. “I protest against such treatment, Sir Dugald! Do you mean to condemn me to perpetual silence? I have no relations of any kind here.” “Ah, Eastern society makes no provision for the New Woman,” observed Sir Dugald. Georgia groaned. “I am so dreadfully tired of that name,” she said. “But I believe, Sir Dugald, that Eastern etiquette would oblige Lady Haigh and me to ride humbly behind with the servants while you gentlemen were cantering gaily in front--wouldn’t it? Is that to be the order of our going?” “No, I think we must make up our minds to disregard Ethiopian opinion in that respect,” said Sir Dugald. “Don’t be afraid, Miss Keeling, you shall lay aside your veils in the tents and when we get to our own quarters at Kubbet-ul-Haj. It is only in the streets and on the march that you need wear them.” “And really they are not so very bad,” said Lady Haigh, shaking out a heap of white drapery. “When I knew we must make up our minds to such garments I determined that they should be as little trouble as possible, so I got these _burkas_ made. I remembered seeing the women wearing them in the Panjab long ago. You see, the _burka_ is simply put on over everything, and covers you from head to foot without an opening--merely that embroidered lattice-work for the eyes. It gives you no trouble; whereas the _isar_, which the Baghdadi women wear, and which poor Cecil Egerton was obliged to adopt when she was governess at the Palace, is nothing but a sheet pure and simple. You have to hold it together in front with one hand and over your face with the other. No matter how bad the weather may be, you can never spare a hand to hold up your dress or your sheet drops; you must just trail through the mud. I could not stand that.”