“No,” replied Mary.  “He has never yet found a wife to suit him; but I know one created on purpose for him by God himself!”

“You little Khatbe!”—­[ A professional go-between]—­cried the governor.  “Well, settle the matter, and it shall be no fault of mine if the second wedding lacks magnificence.”

“And we will have a third!” interrupted the child, clapping her hands and laughing.  “My worthy escort Rustem....

“The colossus!  Why, child, to you all things are possible!  Have you found a wife for him too?”

“No, he found Mandane for himself without my help.”

“It is the same thing!” cried the governor jovially.  “I will provide for her.  But that must satisfy you, or else all those unbelievers whom we are settling here will drive us Moslem Arabs out of the land.”

The great man had often held such discourse as this with the child since she had entered his tent at Berenice, there to lay before him the case of the couple she loved, and for whom she had taken on herself great risk and hardship; she had pleaded so eloquently, so kindly, and with such fervent and pathetic words, that Amru had at once made up his mind to grant her everything that lay in his power.  Mary had done him a service, too, by bringing him the information she could give him, for it enabled him to avert perils which threatened the interests of the Crescent, and also to save the children of two men he honored—­the son of the Mukaukas, and the daughter of Thomas—­from imminent danger.

He found, on his return home, that the Vekeel’s crimes far exceeded his worst fears.  Obada’s proceedings had begun to undermine that respect for Arab rule and Moslem justice which Amru had done his utmost to secure.  It was only by a miracle that Orion had escaped his plots, for he had three times sent assassins to the prison, and it was entirely owing to the watchful care of pretty Emau’s husband that the youth had been able to save himself in the fire.  Obada had done all this to clear out of his path the hated man whose statements and impeachments might ruin him.  The wretch had met a less ignominious death than his judges would have granted him.  The wealth found hoarded in his dwelling was sent to Medina; and even Orion was forced to see the vast sums of which the Negro had plundered his treasury, appropriated by the Arabs.  The Arab governor thought it only right to inflict this penalty for the share he had taken in the rescue of the nuns; and the young man submitted willingly to a punishment which restored him and his bride to freedom, and enabled Amru to apply a larger proportion of the revenues of his native land for its own benefit.

The Khaliff Omar, however, never received these moneys, which constituted far more than half of Orion’s patrimony.  The Prophet’s truest friend, the wise and powerful ruler, fell by the assassin’s hand, and the world now learnt that the Vekeel had been one of the chief conspirators and had been spurred on to the rashest extremes by his confidence of success.