He stood six-foot-four in his loin-cloth, as black and glistening as a
polished ebony statue. The enormous hands at the end of great,
over-long arms almost touched his knees; the chest and shoulders and
abdomen were hard as iron, rippling with muscle under the oiled skin;
the feet were huge and pink of sole, and the animality of the man was
intensified by a certain gleam of intelligence somewhere in the
impassive negroid face.

The woman, took no notice of the magnificent physique; it neither
repulsed nor attracted her--he was a slave.

"Run and give orders that no one is admitted! Hasten!"

"Mistress, a great noble waits at-----"

"Desirest thou thy tongue split, thou black dog, that thou answerest
Zulannah? Haste thee, and return!"

And far into the night they talked, those two, planning death or
destruction, anything as long as it attained the desire of the woman
who, looking into the future, took no notice of the mountain of
disaster beside her in the shape of the Ethiopian who desired and hated
her with all the bestial passion of his race.

Then, just as far down in the east the sky lightened, she sat suddenly
upright and clapped her jewelled hands.

"Know'st thou the eunuch who guards the harem empty of women in the
palace of--ah! the barbarity of the name!--E'u Car-r-den Ali? He who
perchance would give one-half, nay, all of his great wealth in return