Nur Jahan escorted her to the door of the harem, plying her with questions as to the treatment the patient ought to receive, and the means by which Georgia had gained her medical skill. The girl had already proved herself such an apt pupil that Georgia sighed again over the thought that a medical career was an impossibility for her, but she kept her promise loyally to Jahan Beg. The litter was not ready when they reached the harem courtyard, and while it was being prepared she stood in the doorway talking to Nur Jahan, but leaving the questions as to her own hospital experiences unanswered, devoted the time to reiterating her directions for the Queen’s treatment. Presently a burst of laughter and loud talking reached her ears from the rooms on the other side of the courtyard, and she looked across to a balcony in which the forms of several women could be descried. They were evidently attendants on the King’s second wife, Antar Khan’s mother, who was frantically jealous of her rival owing to her monopoly of the services of the doctor lady, and who had shown this feeling in various unpleasant ways. She was much too proud to invite a visit from Georgia, or even to feign illness as an excuse for summoning her, and therefore she and her faction chose to regard the doctor lady as the dirt under their feet. They drew aside their clothes when they passed her, affected to consider the rooms in which she had been received as unclean, and seized every opportunity of insulting her from a safe distance. The adherents of Rustam Khan’s mother, on the other hand, fully appreciated the reasons for this state of things, and exulted over their opponents on every possible occasion. They prided themselves on their exclusive possession of the doctor lady, and would have rejoiced in the opportunity of denying her services to the opposite party in a case of dangerous illness. They had just shouted across the courtyard the news of the satisfactory performance of the operation, and their rivals were naturally moved to wrath. Hence they had assembled in their balcony to point the finger of scorn at Georgia, and to jeer at her and Nur Jahan, whose own position in the Palace was so uncertain that she dared not run the risk of getting her husband into disgrace by appealing to the King. “Thou art very proud, O doctor lady,” cried a strong-lunged damsel, leaning over the rail of the balcony, “but when next we see thee thou wilt be entreating mercy at our lady’s feet.” Rahah translated the prophecy to her mistress at once, and Georgia, in sudden alarm, turned to Nur Jahan. “You are our friend, Nur Jahan? If you knew of any plot against the Mission, you would warn me?” “I would risk my life and all that I have to warn thee in such a case, O doctor lady,” replied Nur Jahan, earnestly; “but what I fear is a plot of which I should know nothing.”