'Nothing!' echoed the latter, with a hideous laugh. 'Nay, sister, such as thou art at the mercy of a whisper. I have but to make it, and out thou goest, neck and crop, to the sound of the fifes and drums. Nay, more'; she rose slowly, and with the hour-glass of bent wood and parchment in her hand crossed to stand in front of the sullen figure, and go on drumming softly in imitation of a march. Then after a glance at the other drowsy figures in the room, she leant down to the girl's ear to repeat savagely--'Ay! and more. I can put thee in, as well as turn thee out. Put thee in the four walls of a real prison. Remember the stolen pearls, Sobrai!' The girl laughed defiantly, cunningly. 'Lo! hast thou thought of _that_ at last? but I am no fool, Leezie. I counted the cost ere I gave them in payment to thee. See you, _thy_ blame for receiving them is as _mine_ for taking them. That is the _sahib's_ law. And then, who is to say they are stolen? Not Jehân. He would not own his loss, if the owning meant that the city should know one of his women, Sobrai Begum, princess, was in Miss Leezie's house. That would be dishonour, for all it hath such a good name!' She essayed a giggle, but it failed before the coarse sensuous face, where the _blanc de perle_ of full dress still lingered in almost awful contrast to the veil of Eastern modesty. 'Listen, fool!' replied the past mistress in the rules and regulations within which vice is safer than virtue. 'Listen, and quit striving. Thou art mine. Not only as those others,' she flirted her hand from the drum to the dozing girls, 'whom fear of the fife and drum keeps in my power. I would not have taken thee without other leading strings, knowing thee as I do--wilful, ay! and clever too, girl--with patience, sure to do well'--she threw this sop in carelessly.--'But I found the reins to my hand. Or ever I took thy pearls, I knew there were more than Jehân's amissing; for the police come ever to us first.' 'More than Jehân's?' echoed Sobrai stupidly. 'What then?' 'This,' whispered Miss Leezie fiercely. 'Those four paltry pearls shall not be Jehân's leavings on the carpet, but earnest for the whole string of the same set; mark you, the same set,' she laughed maliciously, 'which thou didst steal from the Lady-_sahib_. It is all in the power of the police, and they are my friends. So if thou dost so much as raise thy voice, I will raise mine.' 'From the Lady-_sahib_,' faltered Sobrai, aghast. 'Ay, from the Lady--_sahib_. Hark! that will be the Lât himself coming to satisfy himself all is as it should be. Shall I tell him now, when I make my _salaam_ as is due, or wilt thou promise?' She paused, her hand on the _portière_, ere going into the balcony, and waited for a sign of surrender from Sobrai. 'But it is not true'--protested the latter. Miss Leezie laughed. 'As true as aught thou canst bring; since, as thou sayest, Jehân will not own up. Quick! shall I speak?'