But this girl!  There she stood, immovably calm, like a warrior at the head of his tribe.  There was something in her mien that quelled him, and at the same time roused to the utmost his desire to make her feel his power and to crush her pride.  She was as much taller than the women of his nation as he was taller than any other captain in the Moslem army; prompted by curiosity, he went close up to her to measure her height by his own, and passed his hand through the air from his swarthy throat to touch the crown of her head; and the depth of loathing with which she shrank from him did not escape his notice.  The blood mounted to his head; he desired the interpreter to inform her that she was to hope for no mercy, and inwardly devoted her to a cruel death.

Pale, but prepared to meet the worst, Paula returned to the squalid room she occupied with her faithful Betta.

Her arrival at the prison had been terrible.  The guards had seemed disposed to place her in a room filled with a number of male and female criminals, whence the rattle of their chains and a frantic uproar of coarse voices met her ear; however, the interpreter and the captain of the town-watch had taken charge of her, prompted by Martina’s promise of a handsome reward if they could go to her next morning with a report that Paula had been decently accommodated.

The warder’s mother-in-law, too, had taken her under her protection.  This woman was the inn-keeper’s wife from the riverside inn of Nesptah, and she at once recognized Paula as the handsome damsel who had refreshed herself there after the evening on the river with Orion, and whom she had supposed to be his betrothed.  She happened to be visiting her daughter, the keeper’s wife, and induced her to do what she could to be agreeable to Paula.  So she and Betta were lodged in a separate cell, and her gold coin proved acceptable to the man, who did his utmost to mitigate her lot.  Indeed, Pulcheria had even been allowed to visit her and to bring her the last roses that the drought had left in the garden.

Susannah had carried out her purpose of sending her food and fruit; but they remained in the outer room, and the messenger was desired to explain that no more were to be sent, for that she was supplied with all she needed.

Confident in her sense of innocence, she had looked forward calmly to her fate building her hopes on the much lauded justice of the Arab judges.  But it was not they, it would seem, who were to decide it, but that black monster Orion’s foe; crushed by the sense of impotence against the arbitrary despotism of the ruthless villain, whose victim she must be, she sat sunk in gloomy apathy, and hardly heard the old nurse’s words of encouragement.

She did not fear death; but to die without having seen her father once more, without saying and proving to Orion that she was his alone, wholly his and for ever—­that was too hard to bear.