“They are like children, and must be treated as children.  But they can be very clever, too, when they want to trick.  I know that.  They can be as cunning as foxes, and as light-footed and swift as gazelles.  But all that they do and all that they are is just for men.  Women are made for men, and they know it so well that it is only about men that they think.  I tell you that.”

“No doubt it is true,” she said, smilingly accepting his assertions.

“Women will run even after the Chinese shadow of a man if they are not shut close behind the grilles.”

Mrs. Armine laughed outright.

“And so you Easterns generally keep them there.”

“Well, and are we not wise?  Are we not much wiser than the Mr. Armeens of Europe?”

His unexpected introduction of Nigel’s name gave her a little shock, and the bad taste of it for an instant distressed even her tarnished breeding.  But the sensation vanished directly as she remembered his Eastern birth.

“And you?” she said.  “Would you never trust a woman?”

“Never,” he calmly returned.  “All women are alike.  If they see the Chinese shadow, they must run after it.  They cannot help themselves.”

“You seem to forget that men are for ever running after the Chinese shadows of women,” she retorted.

“She thought of her own life, of how she had been worshipped and pursued, not pour le bon motif, but still—­”

She would like him to know about all that.

“Men do that to please women, as to please a child you give it a sand lizard tied to a string.  Put the string into its hand and the child is happy.  So it is with a woman.  Only she wants not the string, but the edge of a kuftan.”

It seemed to Mrs. Armine, as she listened to Baroudi, that she was permanently deposed from the place she had for long been accustomed to occupy.  He tacitly demanded and accepted her admiration instead of giving her his.  And yet—­he had serenaded her on the Nile that first evening of her coming.  He had bought Hamza and Ibrahim.  He had desired and tried to effect the swift departure of Nigel.  He had decreed that Marie must go.  And the Nile water—­with how much intention he had given it her to drink!  And he had plans for the future.  They seemed gathering about her silently, softly, like clouds changing the aspect of her world.

She had not turned that glove inside out yet.

She felt that she must alter her tactics, assert herself more strongly, escape from the modest position he seemed to be deliberately placing her in.  Where was her pride, even of a courtesan?

She lifted her coffee-cup, emptied it, put it down, and began to pull on one of her long white gloves.  Baroudi went on calmly smoking.  She picked up the second glove.  He sharply clapped his hands.  Aiyoub entered, Baroudi spoke to him in Nubian, and he swiftly disappeared.  Mrs. Armine pulled on the second glove.