He was a prisoner in this dreadful, gloomy
place where he must live like a second Man in the Iron Mask, without
recreation or exercise other than he could find in the walled garden
where grew the black cedar trees, and, so far as he could see, a
prisoner without hope of escape.
Moreover, he could no longer disguise from himself the truth; Jeekie was
right. The Asika had fallen in love with him, or at any rate made up her
mind that he should be her next husband. He hated the sight of the woman
and her sinuous, evil beauty, but to be free of her was impossible, and
to offend her, death. All day long she kept him about her, and from his
sleep he would wake up and as on the night of his arrival,
distinguish her leaning over him studying his face by the light of
the faintly-burning lamps, as a snake studies the bird it is about to
strike. He dared not stir or give the slightest sign that he saw her.
Nor indeed did he always see her, for he kept his eyes closely shut.
But even in his heaviest slumber some warning sense told him of her
presence, and then above Jeekie's snores (for on these occasions Jeekie
always snored his loudest) he would hear a soft footfall, as cat-like,
she crept towards him, or the sweep of her spangled robe, or the
tinkling of the scales of her golden breastplate.
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