A most refreshing story! I put on a sudden air
of sternness, and shot a question at her like a bullet.
"Are you making all this up, young woman?"
She started-looked quite scared.
"You mean I tell lies? But no. It is all true. Why shouldn't
it be true? How else could I have come here?"
The question was unanswerable. Her story was as preposterous as
her garments. But her garments were real enough. I looked long
into her great innocent eyes. Yes, she was telling me the truth.
She babbled on for a little. I gathered that her step-father,
Hamdi Effendi, was a Turkish official. She had spent all her
life in the harem from which she had eloped with this pretty
young Englishman.
"And what must I do?" she reiterated.
I told her to give me time. One is not in the habit of meeting
abducted Lights of the Harem in the Embankment Gardens, beneath
the National Liberal Club. It was, in fact, a bewildering
occurrence. I looked around me. Nothing seemed to have happened
during the last ten minutes. A pale young man on the next bench,
whom I had noticed when I entered, was reading a dirty pink
newspaper.
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