“What happened then?” she enquired curiously.

“I have been told by those who visited the Sultan that they were vouchsafed one jewelled finger, extended through the drawn curtains of the throne.”

“Curtains?” Yamina asked.

“I will show you a picture of it,” her father replied. “It is like a gigantic four-poster bed with a framework of silver gilt and encrusted with a dazzling array of precious stones, emeralds, rubies the size of hens’ eggs and its brocade hangings were, of course, stiff with pearls and gold.”

Because of the stories her father told her Yamina had found herself extremely interested in the Seraglio and the women who were immured there.

Their numbers, she learnt, exceeded three hundred, but that was not to say that the estimate was accurate, No one knew exactly how many were incarcerated in the Sultan’s harem.

And now, although it seemed incredible, Hamid was suggesting that she should enter the place of which someone had once said,

“Religion is pleasure and God the Sultan!”

‘I cannot do it – I cannot!” she whispered to herself.

And yet what was the alternative? To wait until the Turkish authorities or, more terrifying, a mob arrived to drag her from her hiding place? To run away into the open country and there starve to death?

To throw herself on the mercy of the British?

She knew, although she would hardly admit it to herself, that she would be treated with courtesy and perhaps generosity if she went to the Ambassador and told him the position she now found herself in.

But in fact what could he do but hand her over to the Turkish authorities?

She would be imprisoned, if she was not executed as a spy.

‘I really have very little choice in the matter,’ Yamina told herself.

Yet once again she trembled at the thought of going to Mihri and being shut up in the most terrifying, the most notorious and the most talked-about prison in the world – ‘The Harem of the Shadow Of Allah Upon Earth, The Prophet’s Successor, The Master of Masters’.

She realised that Hamid was waiting for her to speak and she felt renewed gratitude and affection for the man who had risked so much and who had remained loyal to them even though the country of her and her father was in fact at war with his.

“Why have you done this for us, Hamid?” she asked following the train of her thoughts.

“You made your home my home,” Hamid answered. “The Master and you, Mistress, are my people.”

It was said simply and with all sincerity and Yamina felt the tears come into her eyes.

“What can we do about the Master, Hamid?” she asked helplessly. “He must be buried, but where? How can we try to find a Priest without betraying ourselves?”

“I think, Mistress,” Hamid answered, “when you go, we burn house!”