Page:Weird Tales volume 32 number 05.djvu/90

610 I felt myself go weak all over, and had to press my hands together to keep them from trembling.

The idea of a nose-ring—"as if I were a bull," I'd thought when I first saw it—seemed far more tolerable when they put this diamond in my nose, and as they slipped the bracelets, amulets and anklets on me till I couldn't move without a tinkle I felt delight increasing till it was almost ecstasy. I was ready, eager, to go back with them and see myself in the long mirror, and when I looked at the reflection which smiled back at me I discovered something more. The new body which encased my personality—or soul, or spirit, call it what you will—was still a thing to be objectively considered and admired, but no longer with complete detachment. It was not I, yet it was I. I knew it was myself—it hurt me when I stumbled up against a tabouret, I could feel the pangs of thirst and hunger in it—yet it was like another person, also. I loved it as I might have loved an exquisite young girl if I'd retained my own body, and—please try to understand—at the same time I loved to be loved by me. It was a pleasure to behold myself, to preen and pose and posture at the mirror, and the sensation when I ran my hands along my arms or body was something like that which a cat must have when it's stroked until it purrs.

The slave-girls seemed to understand this perfectly, and instead of laughing in derision they gave nods and smiles of approval when, unable to resist the impulse, I crossed the room and kissed my own reflection in the looking-glass.

that Yousouf Pasha's house was orthodox, but I had not realized how it adhered to the old order. The periods of prayer were scrupulously observed with the prescribed prostrations and ablutions; throughout the month of Ramadan we fasted rigorously from sunrise to sunset, not taking so much as a sip of water or whiff of smoke by way of relaxation, but at night we stuffed ourselves with food and sweetmeats, and slept as much as possible by day.

There was no nonsense about Yousouf Pasha. He was lord and master of the selmalik and haremlik and everything within their confines. When, in the evening of my first day as his daughter, I was sent for by him, I found I had to kneel and press my hands flat to the floor, then lay my brow between them while I intoned formally, "Es-salaam, ya abu—the Salute, O my father." Not until he had responded, "Es-salaam, ya bent—the Salute on thee, O daughter," might I rise, and then I had to stand with folded hands and eyes cast down demurely till he bade me sit upon a cushion at his feet.

I began to remonstrate with him, speaking as an equal to an equal, but before I'd said a dozen words he broke in with, "Istaghfir Allah, ya bent—ask God's pardon, daughter!" Then he explained my status to me and left nothing to imagination.

By my criminal carelessness I had robbed him of his one ewe lamb and the possibility of making good his promise to his life-long friend at a single stroke. But I had atoned by offering to take the daughter's place, and signed a statement that I did it willingly. In reliance on that statement he had trafficked with a pair of slubbia necromancers, desert gipsies, workers of unclean magic and followers of Shaitan the stoned and rejected. It had cost him much gold to secure their services, for the necromancy which enabled him to change a man into a woman or a