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Updated: July 20, 2025
"Does it please my lord that he fetch me to-morrow, and leave me in my father's tent to-night?" The Sheik laughed good-naturedly, his eyes fixed on the pleading, youthful face. "It pleases me not to leave you; but if you ask me, little one, I will not refuse. Let it be so." As he spoke Silka drained the coffee-cup he had given her, and by so doing bound herself to him henceforward.
How lovely she was, this young Bishâreen, who had looked on the yearly fall of the Nile but fifteen times lovely as the tall slender palm of the oasis, or the gold light on the river at sunset. Tall and straight, with the stately carriage and proud head of her race; smooth and supple, with every limb faultlessly moulded under the clear, lustrous skin. "Silka, Silka! I cannot marry the Sheik.
She knew Silka had never refused her anything since they had first played as babies together in the sand. Silka loved her. Silka had never denied her anything. She took her large earthenware jar, poised it on her shoulder, and went out of the tent into the hot light.
Silka lay on the sheepskin where her sister had left her, and turned her face to it, shaken with a storm of feeling that convulsed her slender body from head to foot. She heard none of the cheerful sounds of life stirring round the tent; she heard only Doolga's threat of the Nile, her passionate pleading for help.
I will throw myself into the Nile rather; Silka, help me!" "How can I?" "You marry the Sheik!" Doolga's eyes were alight with flame. Something of the tiger's glare shone in them. She bent forward and seized the other girl's wrists in a feverish grip. The clasp hurt and burnt like fire. Silka drew back instinctively, paling with surprise. "I marry the Sheik?" she repeated, "but " "Yes, you must!
"Darling Silka, you will consent? you will promise?" "Do you meet him often in the palm-grove?" returned Silka; it was now her eyes that were full of flame as she met her sister's. "Why Melun? Yes, whenever it was possible. To-night there will be no moon; I was going, but why should you ask?" She bent forward quickly, eagerly, some faint suspicion stirring in her.
At a few paces' distance from the main row of tents, the camels, lying down, made a velvet-like patch of shade on the gleaming gold of the sand, and herds of white goats stood near, their silky coats flashing in the morning sunlight. Silka looked out, too, over her sister's shoulder.
She was close to Silka, and she laid one arm softly round her neck and put her face close to hers. Such a beautiful oval face it was! the face that Silka loved: as she looked at it, her heart melted within her. "See, dearest Silka," continued the other coaxingly, "you have nothing to do but to unveil before the Sheik; you are just like me, only a thousand times lovelier.
He will not want me then, but you. You can say to our father: As I am fairer than my sister, he will give you two more camels. Father will be pleased with the camels, and I shall be left free to marry Melun." "But suppose I don't want to marry the Sheik either," said Silka, slowly stroking the curls of the sheepskin as she looked down upon it.
"I go to the Sheik in your stead because I love you, and to Melun in your stead because I love him," replied Silka firmly. There was a smile in her eyes, but her lips were pale, compressed, and sad. Doolga gazed at her in silence, both hands clasped tightly now over her swelling breast. Astonishment, gratitude, mistrust, and jealousy were all struggling together within it for mastery.
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