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Updated: May 23, 2025
That was because neither had seen the sudden light in Ourïeda's eyes after the face of Zakia had approached hers at the hammam. For the first day there was no solution of the mystery for Sanda, who had waited to hear she knew not what.
This, as it happened, was nearer to Ourïeda's room than Sanda's or even Lella Mabrouka's; and as, during the two days that followed, Zakia was almost constantly occupied in blanching the bride's ivory skin with almond paste, staining her fingers red as coral with a decoction of henna and cochineal, and saturating her hair and body with a famous permanent perfume, sometimes Lella Mabrouka and Taous ventured to leave the two girls chaperoned only by la hennena.
As she spoke the door opened and Lella Mabrouka came swiftly into the room, fierce-eyed as a tigress whose cub is threatened. She was tight-lipped and silent, but her eyes spoke, and all three knew that she had listened. Such words as she had missed her quick wit had caught and patched together. Ourïeda's wish to propitiate Zakia by not seeming to talk secrets before her had undone them both.
She hid the things in her clothing; and when she was turned out she still thought of me, not of herself. She knew I would go to the hammam before my marriage, and that Zakia had been sent for to bathe me and make me beautiful. So she gave her cousin there a present, and all the rest of the jewels she gave to Zakia, for a promise Zakia made. Nothing has Embarka kept of all my gifts.
Now and then, as she worked, Zakia stooped over her victim, bringing her old, peering face close to the bowed face of the girl to make sure the dye did not touch it.
But at last, in a room littered with pastes and perfume bottles, and lighted by the traditional long candles wound with coloured ribbon, Ourïeda spoke, in Arabic, that the hennena might not be hurt. "Zakia says I may tell thee our secret," she said. "At first she was afraid, but now she sees that she may trust thee as I do. Didst thou guess there was a secret?" "Yes," answered Sanda.
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