straining and crying, 'He's there, I say, O wise woman! Shagpat! let's
into him.'

But Noorna clung to her, and spake in her ear, 'Wilt thou blow the fire
that menaces him, O Kadza? and what are two women against the assailants
of such a mighty one as he?' Then said she, 'Watch, rather, and avail
thyself of yonder window by the blue-painted pillar.'

So Kadza crept up to the blue-painted pillar which was on the right side
of the porch, and the twain peered through the window. Noorna beheld the
Dish of Pomegranate Grain; and it was on the floor, empty of the grain,
and Baba Mustapha was by it alone making a lather, and he was twitching
his mouth and his legs, and flinging about his arms, and Noorna heard him
mutter wrathfully, 'O accursed flea! art thou at me again?' And she
heard him mutter as in anguish, 'No peace for thee, O pertinacious flea!
and my steadiness of hand will be gone, now when I have him safe as the
hawk his prey, mine enemy, this Shagpat that abused me: thou abominable
flea! And, O thou flea, wilt thou, vile thing! hinder me from mastering
the Event, and releasing this people and the world from enchantment and
bondage? And shall I fail to become famous to the ages and the times
because of such as thee, flea?'

So Kadza whispered to Noorna, 'What's that he's muttering? Is't of
Shagpat? for I mark him not here, nor the light by which he's girt.'

She answered, 'Listen with the ear and the eye and all the senses.'

Now, presently they heard Baba Mustapha say in a louder tone, like one
that is secure from interruption, 'Two lathers, and this the third! a
potent lather! and I wot there's not a hair in this world resisteth the