She's as ignorant and silly
as a kitten, and only a child in years. She told her 'love story' to one
of her negresses, who told Noura--who repeated it to me. Perhaps I
oughtn't to have listened, but why not?"
Victoria did not answer. The clouds round Saidee and herself were dark,
but she was trying to see the blue beyond, and find the way into it,
with her sister.
"She's barely sixteen now, and she's been here a year," Saidee went on.
"She hadn't begun to dance yet, when Cassim saw her, and took her away
from Touggourt. Being a great saint is very convenient. A marabout can
do what he likes, you know. Mussulmans are forbidden to touch alcohol,
but if a marabout drinks wine, it turns to milk in his throat. He can
fly, if he wants to. He can even make French cannon useless, and
withdraw the bullets from French guns, in case of war, if the spirit of
Allah is with him. So by marrying a girl brought up for a dancer,
daughter of generations of dancing women, he washes all disgrace from
her blood, and makes her a female saint, worthy to live eternally. The
beautiful Miluda's a marabouta, if you please, and when her baby is
taken out by the negress who nurses it, silly, bigoted people kneel and
kiss its clothing."
"She has a baby!" murmured Victoria.
"Yes, only a girl, but better than nothing--and she hopes to be more
fortunate next time. She isn't jealous of me, because I've no children,
not even a girl, and because for that reason Cassim could repudiate me
if he chose.
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