But no sooner was his wife thus disposed of than George, saying he must write a letter and take it to the post, went out of the bedroom, closed the door, and after waiting just long enough, as he thought, to make Nouna think, if she was listening, that he had written a letter, he went out and down the stairs. But Nouna had too much native subtlety herself to be easily tricked. As soon as she heard the outer door of the flat close, she leapt out of bed, muffled herself up in a wrapper, and stepped out on to the balcony. She could see that there were lights in the rooms occupied by the Oriental Bazaar, and that the shadows of men passed and repassed quickly on the inner side of the striped blinds. Leaning over the iron railing, she watched in much excitement for her husband’s appearance in the street below. In a very few minutes she heard the wicket-gate in the _porte cochére_ open, saw George cross the street, and enter the house where Ben Hassan was established. She could have cried out to him from where she stood, frozen by a great terror lest these men, whom he had gone to punish, should be too strong for him and should do him harm. But then, would they dare, would they be able, even if they dared, to hurt him, the king of men? Little by little the seed sown by patient kindness, by conscientious effort, was moving in the earth and beginning to show itself alive. George was not now merely the handsomest, straightest, gentlest of voice among the men she knew, he was also the one person who never did wrong, who if he was angry proved in the end to have what she acknowledged to be a just cause at the bottom of his anger, whose rather surprising notions of what one ought and ought not to do were at least simple when one came to know him well; and whose opinion was now beginning to have so much weight with her that this evening it had even urged her in the strangest way to break through her habits and make an uncomfortable confession of her own accord. So she reasoned, arguing with herself as he crossed the road whether or not she should try from the height of the fourth floor to attract his attention. It would not be difficult, she felt. The influence she was secure in possessing over him would make him stop and look up at a call of her voice such as would scarcely be heard by the neighbours in the adjoining flats. Suddenly she drew herself erect, a thrill of passionate pride vibrating through her heart, and she laughed aloud and stretched her little hands to the dark sky. “He does not need my help, for he is one of God’s own sons,” she whispered, and looking up steadily into the eye of night she waited, with heart beating violently, but with head erect in valiant confidence.