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“And so Azim Bey is the only one left?” said Cecil.

“Just so, mademoiselle. Emineh[01] Khanum, his mother, was, as I have said, the Pasha’s favourite wife, and on her deathbed she induced him to promise to make her son his heir. That was just after Mahmoud Bey’s first refusal to come home, and his Excellency was so angry that he consented at once. But it was a foolish wish of the poor mother’s to see her son the heir, for his brothers became incensed against him immediately, and he is a mark for the hatred of the whole harem. Now that his mother is dead, there is no one to protect him, and the Um-ul-Pasha (mother of the Pasha) and the other two wives hate him for the sake of the two elder sons. His Excellency has been obliged always to take him with him wherever he went, and to keep him in the selamlik (the men’s part of the house), instead of the harem when at home, to save his life; but he finds that the Bey, from being so much with men, is growing precocious and conceited, and he desires therefore to obtain a governess for him.”