Page:Marion Crawford - Khaled.djvu/148

 say that there are two kinds of beauty. Yours is that of the free woman of a pure and beautiful race; hers is that of the slave accidentally born beautiful.'

Zehowah gathered up her three long black tresses and laid them across her knees as she sat. Then she shook off her golden bracelets, one after the other, to the number of a score and heaped them upon the hair.

'Which do you like best?' she asked. 'The black or the gold? The day or the night? Here you see them together and can judge fairly between them.'

Khaled sought for a crafty answer and made a pretence of pondering the matter deeply.

'After the night,' he said at last, 'the day is very bright and glorious. But when we have looked on it long, only the night can bring rest and peace.'

He was pleased with himself when he had made this answer, supposing that Zehowah would find nothing to say. But he had only laid a new trap for himself.

'That is quite true,' she answered, laughing. 'That is also the reason why Allah made the day and the night to follow each other in succession, lest men should grow weary of eternal light or eternal darkness. For the same reason also, since you have a wife whose hair is black, I counsel you to take a red-haired one. In this way you will obtain that variety which the taste of man craves.'