To her astonishment the girl shook off her hand as if it had been a snake, and springing up from the couch, burst into a torrent of vituperation. Her lithe young form shook with passion, her delicate hands were clenched, and her voice rose into a shrill scream. The other women strove in vain to quiet her, and Mabel’s efforts to disarm her anger were fruitless, but the storm ceased as suddenly as it had arisen. Breaking off in the midst of a furious sentence, the girl threw up her arms in a gesture of utter despair, then dashed herself down again upon the bed, sobbing as though her heart would break. “What is the matter with her?” asked Mabel, astounded and somewhat offended by this reception of her friendly overtures. “What does she say?” Jehanara looked inquiringly at the Moti-ul-Nissa. A nod gave her permission to interpret, and she replied glibly-- “Why, Miss North, she says she hates you, that you’ve stolen away her husband with your airs and graces, and then come to gloat over her. You mustn’t mind what she says. It’s the way with these native women; they’re so sadly uncontrolled, you see.” “But I haven’t stolen away her husband. Tell her so. What can she mean? Who is she?” The other women, breathlessly interested, gathered round while Jehanara interpreted the answer to the girl, who sat up with streaming eyes, and poured forth a succession of fierce, abrupt sentences. “She says, Miss North, ‘I am Zeynab, called Rose of the World, daughter of Fath-ud-Din, the King of Ethiopia’s Grand Vizier, and the fair-haired woman’--that’s you, Miss North--‘has stolen from me the heart of Bahram Khan, my lord. She has beguiled him to cast me off--me, Fath-ud-Din’s daughter--that she may have his house to herself, and now she comes to mock me. But let her beware. The witch Khadija was not my nurse for nothing, and if poison can disfigure, or steel kill, or fire burn, she shall pay every _anna_ that she owes me.’ Don’t you go and take it to heart, Miss North; she’s a poor, wild, uneducated creature, not brought up like us.” “But she must be mad!” cried Mabel. “Tell her she is making some extraordinary mistake; that I wouldn’t touch her husband with a pair of tongs--that I hate the very sight of him. Tell her that nothing would make me marry him if he was free, that my religion would forbid it; and as he is married already, our law forbids it. Tell her that even if I wanted to marry him, my brother would see me dead first--that I would beg him to kill me before I stooped to such degradation.” Even Jehanara cringed before Mabel in her crimson indignation, and translated her words without comment. The women looked at one another doubtfully, and the Moti-ul-Nissa frowned. The forsaken wife spoke again in bitter disdain-- “It is a fine thing to talk thus, when the fair-haired woman has robbed me of my lord’s heart for ever. Since she cares so little for it, why did she not leave it with Zeynab?”