French And Oriental Love In A Harem - French and Oriental Love in a Harem Part 27
Library

French and Oriental Love in a Harem Part 27

I was unable to conceal my uneasiness.

"But this marriage is true then?" continued my poor Kondje with an anxious look in my face.

"Nothing is true but our love!" I replied, distressed by her fears; "nothing is true but this, that I mean to love you always, and always to live with you as I do now."

"But this marriage?" she again repeated.

It was impossible for me to escape any longer from the necessity of making a confession which I had intended to have prepared her for later on.

"Listen, my darling," I said, taking her by the hands, "and above all things trust me as you listen to me! I love you, I love no one but you; you are my wife, my happiness, my life. Do you believe me?"

"Yes, dear, I believe you. But what about her?" she added in a tremble.

"What about Anna Campbell? Are you going to marry her?"

"Come," I said, wishing to begin by soothing her fears; "if, as so often happens in your own country, I were obliged, if only in order to assure our own happiness, to make another marriage, would not you understand that this was only a sacrifice which I owed to my uncle if he required it of me--a family arrangement, in fact, which could not separate us from each other? What have you to fear so long as I only love you? Did you trouble yourself about Hadidje or Zouhra?"

"Oh, but they were not Christians! Anna Campbell would be your real wife; and your religion and laws would enjoin you to love her."

"No," I exclaimed, "neither my religion nor my laws could change my heart or undo my love for you. It is my duty to protect your life and make it a happy one; for are not you also my wife? Why should you alarm yourself about an obligation of mine which, if we lived in your country, would not disturb your confidence in me? Anna Campbell is not really in love with me: we are only like two friends, prepared to unite with each other in a conventional union, such as you may see many a couple around us enter upon--an association of fortunes, in which the only personal sentiments demanded are reciprocal esteem. My dear girl, what is there to be jealous of? Don't you know that you will always be everything to me?"

Poor Kondje-Gul listened to these somewhat strange projects without the least idea of opposing them. Still under the yoke of her native ideas, those Oriental prejudices in which she had been brought up were too deeply grafted in her mind to permit of her being rapidly converted by acquaintance with our sentiments and usages--very illogical as they often appeared to her mind--to a different view of woman's destiny.

According to her laws and her religion, I was her master. She could never have entertained the possibility of her refusing to submit to my will; but I could see by the tears in her eyes that this very touching submission and resignation on her part was simply due to her devoted self-control, and that she suffered cruelly by it.

"Come, why do you keep on crying?" I continued, drawing her into my arms. "Do you doubt my love, dear?"

"Oh, no!" she replied quickly. "How could I mistrust you?"

"Well, then, away with those tears!"

"Yes," she said, giving me a kiss, "you are right, dear: I am very silly! What can you expect of me? I am still half a barbarian, and am rather bewildered with all I have learnt from you. There are still some things in my nature which I can't understand. Why it is that I feel more jealous of Anna Campbell than I was of Hadidje, of Nazli, or of Zouhra, I can't tell you; but I am afraid--she is a Christian, and perhaps you will love her better than me. I feel that the laws and customs of your country will recover their hold over you and will separate us. That odious law which you once told me of, which would enfranchise me, so you said, and make me my own mistress if I desired to leave you, often comes back to my mind like a bad dream. It seems to me that this imaginary liberty, which I don't want at any price, would become a reality if you get married."

I reassured her on this point. There is a much more persuasive eloquence in the heart than in the vain deductions of logic. During this extraordinary scene, in which my poor Kondje-Gul's mind was alarmed by the conflict going on between her own beliefs and what she knew of our society, I was quite sincere in my illusions concerning the moral compromise which, I fancied, was imposed upon me as an absolute duty.

Singular as it may all appear to you, I had already been subjected too long to the influence of the harem not to have become gradually permeated by the Oriental ideas. The tie which bound me to Kondje-Gul had acquired a kind of sacred and legitimate character in my eyes.

However this may have been, her revelation disclosed an impending danger. It was clear to me that the news of the marriage arranged between Anna Campbell and myself could only have reached Madame Murrah through Kiusko. His relationship with my aunt had made him a member of our family, and he had been acquainted with our projects. I could easily understand that his jealous instincts had penetrated one side of the secret between Kondje and myself. He had at least guessed that she loved me, and that I was an obstacle to the attainment of his desires. He was following up his object. He wished to destroy Kondje-Gul's hopes in advance, by showing her that I was engaged to marry another.

With my present certitude of his mean devices, I began to wonder whether everything had been already let out through slips of the tongue made by Madame Murrah, in the course of those interviews which he had obtained with her either by chance or by appointment. For several days past I fancied I had remarked in him an increased reserve of manner. It was possible that, being convinced now of the futility of his hopes, his only object henceforth was to revenge himself on his rival by at least disturbing his feeling of security.

Yes! you are quite right: I love her! Why should you imagine I would wish to deny it, or dissemble it as a weakness? Did I ever tell you that the consequence of indulgence in the pleasures of harem loves would be to drown the heart, the soul, and the aspirations towards the ideal for the sole advantage of the senses? Where you seem to see the defeat of one vanquished, I find the triumph of my happiness and the enchantment of a dream which I am realizing during my waking hours. Compare with this secret and charming bond of union which attaches me to Kondje-Gul, the prosaic and vulgar character of those common intrigues which one cynically permits the whole world to observe, or of those illicit connections which the hypocritical remnant of virtue with us constrains us to conceal, like crimes, in the darkness. Deceptive frenzies they are, the enjoyment of which always involves of necessity the degradation of the woman and the contempt of the lover! You may preach and dogmatise as much as you like in your endeavours to uphold the superiority of our habits over those of the East, which you declare to be barbarous; you will never succeed in doing anything more than entangling yourself in your own paradox.

The fact is that in the refined epoch, so-called, in which we live, every description of non-legitimized union in love becomes a libertinage, and the woman who abandons herself to it becomes a profane idol. Whether she be a duchess, or a foolish maid, you may write verses over her fall, but you cannot forget it. The worm is in the fruit. My love for Kondje-Gul knows no such shame, and needs no guilty excuses.

Proud of her slavish submission, she can love me without derogating in the least from her own self-respect. In Kondje's eyes, her tender embraces are legitimate, her glory is the conquest of my heart. I am her master, and she abandons herself to me without transgressing any duty.

Being a daughter of Asia, she fulfils her destiny according to the moral usages and the beliefs of her native land: to these she remains faithful in loving me: her religion has no different rule, her virtue no different law.

That is why I love her, and why my heart is possessed by such a frank and open loyalty towards her. You speak to me about the future, and ask me what will happen when the time comes for my marriage to Anna Campbell? Well, the future is still in the distance, my dear fellow; when it comes upon me we will see what I will do! Meanwhile I love and content myself with loving!

Will that satisfy you? Oh yes, I confess my errors, I abjure my pagan vanities, and my sultanic principles. I give up Mahomet! I have found my Damascus road. True love has manifested itself to me in all its glory, shining through the clouds; it has inspired me with its grace, and my false idols lie prostrate in the dust----Would you like me to make you a present of my harem? If this offer suits you, send me a line, and I will forward what remains of it to you with all despatch: you shall then give it my news, for it is six weeks now since I have seen my two sultanas.

Only make haste--in eight days' time they are to return to Constantinople. The blessings of civilization are decidedly banes to these little animals. Liberty in Paris would soon ruin them. I have provided for them, and am sending them away.

I mention all this to show you in what happiness I bask. Reassured by my affection, and confident in the future, my Kondje-Gul has recovered that sweet serenity which makes our love such a delicious dream. As the fierce Kiusko is now unmasked, we laugh at his foolish plots as you may well imagine!

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XVI.

My aunt Gretchen van Cloth is in Paris!

Well, why do you assume your facetious tone on reading that? I know you and can guess your thoughts.

After all, Barbassou is a pasha, is it still necessary to remind you of that?

Well, the other day my uncle informed me that he would take me home to dine with him. I repaired to the boulevard at the appointed hour and we started in his brougham for Passy. On the way he told me what it was necessary I should know. We reached a rather nice looking house in the Rue Raynouard, from which you can see the boats floating down the Seine. There is a railing and a little garden in front. On hearing our footsteps, a young lady whom I at once recognised, from the recollections of my childhood, hurried to the door.

"Kiss your aunt," my uncle said to me: and I did as I was told.

We then entered a modest little drawing-room, the commonplace aspect of which, reminding one of furnished apartments, was improved by its general neatness and by a few bunches of flowers displayed in sundry odd vases. Three youngsters, the smallest of whom was between three and four years old, were eating bread and butter there. My uncle saluted each of them with a hurried kiss, and then they ran off to their nurse.

My aunt Gretchen is just reaching her thirty-fourth birthday. She confesses to her age. If she did not come from Amsterdam she ought to have been born there. She has blossomed like a flower among the tulips, and she looks like a Rubens, in that painter's more sober style, as in the portrait of the Friesland woman, with the prim pink and white flesh of the healthful natures of the North. You realise that good blood flows quietly and temperately beneath the pleasantly plump charms of this worthy Dutchwoman, who claims only her due, but is desirous of getting it. And she does get it. She has luxuriant light chestnut hair, and a very attractive face with the smiling, placid, and even somewhat simple expression of a good housewife, who is as expert in bringing up her children as in making pastry and pineapple jam. Being of a gay and amiable disposition, she greeted her husband with the ordinary, hearty affection of a woman who has never been a widow. After bringing him his foxskin cap she established him in a comfortable arm-chair, and then mixed his absinthe for him. I guessed that the captain was returning to old habits, with the dignified composure which he displays in everything.

They began to talk in Dutch, and as I looked at them without understanding it, my uncle said to me:

"Your aunt tells me that her kitchen range is too small to make any good _souffles_, and it worries her on your account."

"Oh! my aunt is too kind to disturb herself about such a trifling matter," I replied; "the pleasure I feel in seeing her again amply compensates me for this slight mishap."

"Well, instead of the _souffles_ you shall have some _wafelen_ and some _poffertjes_!" quickly rejoined my aunt with her kindly smile.

I remarked that she spoke French much better than formerly. However, probably on account of her voyages with the captain, who recruited his crews at Toulon, her Dutch accent has now become a Provencal one.

The dinner was delightful, substantial and plentiful, like the charms of my aunt, who was victorious along the whole line, and notably with the spicy sauce of a _gebakken schol_, which was excellently baked.

The conversation was simple and of a free and easy character, my uncle talking with all the freedom of a man who has a quiet conscience. He was as much at his ease in his Dutch household as any good citizen could be, and I perceived that my aunt knew absolutely nothing about him, unless it were the important position that he occupied in the spice trade. She gave him some news about the great doings of the Van Hutten firm of Rotterdam and Antwerp, in which he seemed to take a particular interest. It seems, too, that Peter van Schloss, junior, is married to a young lady of Dordrecht, who presented him with twins after six months of matrimony, a circumstance which my uncle found very natural. Old Joshua Schlittermans, having been utterly ruined by the failure of Gannton Brothers of New York, has now taken to drink.

When the coffee was served (Dirkie had brought it from Amsterdam, purchasing it on the Damplaatz, at the corner of Kalver Straat), my aunt filled a long porcelain pipe which my uncle took from her hands and lighted, puffing out clouds of smoke, with the serene gravity of some worthy burgomaster at home. We drank some schiedam and two sorts of dry curacoa. While my aunt sat knitting at the table she questioned me as to my occupations, asking me if I were working in my uncle's establishment; and upon my replying affirmatively to her, she gave me some very good advice, telling me to be very industrious so that I might take my uncle's place later on.

At half-past ten we rose from table and went into the drawing-room.

Dirkie got everything ready for a game of dominoes, and they began to play in the Dutch fashion. My uncle kept the markers, and noted the points made: he himself speedily scored between three and four hundred, and then, feeling satisfied with his success, he said:

"Well, give us a little music!"

My aunt did not require any pressing, but went to the piano in a very good-humoured manner. She opened the top so that the instrument might give out a louder sound, then passed behind and arranged everything; and suddenly I heard the splendid introduction of Haydn's seventh symphony in _F major_ bursting forth, while my aunt turned the handle with rare skill and gracefulness. (I recognised the superb instrument mentioned in the fourth legacy of the famous will.)