In the years during which he had lain under the spell of her ripening
beauty he had accepted the situation willingly enough; later, when he
would have curtailed her interferences, it was too late; she had taken a
firm grip of the reins, and Asad was in no better case than many a
European husband--an anomalous and outrageous condition this for a Basha
of the Prophet's House. It was also a dangerous one for Fenzileh; for
should the burden of her at any time become too heavy for her lord there
was a short and easy way by which he could be rid of it. Do not suppose
her so foolish as not to have realized this--she realized it fully; but
her Sicilian spirit was daring to the point of recklessness; her very
dauntlessness which had enabled her to seize a control so
unprecedented in a Muslim wife urged her to maintain it in the face of
all risks.
Dauntless was she now, as she paced there in the cool of the orchard,
under the pink and white petals of the apricots, the flaming scarlet of
pomegranate blossoms, and through orange-groves where the golden fruit
glowed and amid foliage of sombre green. She was at her eternal work of
poisoning the mind of her lord against Sakr-el-Bahr, and in her maternal
jealousy she braved the dangers of such an undertaking, fully aware of
how dear to the heart of Asad-ed-Din was that absent renegade corsair.
It was this very affection of the Basha's for his lieutenant that was
the fomenter of her own hate of Sakr-el-Bahr, for it was an affection
that transcended Asad's love for his own son and hers, and it led to the
common rumour that for Sakr-el-Bahr was reserved the high destiny of
succeeding Asad in the Bashalik.
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