I felt done for. How could we resist the law? My poor Kondjé cast
despairing looks at me.
"Madame Murrah being a foreigner, sir," answered the officer of the law,
"as you appear to understand, my only instructions are to accompany her,
and, in the event of opposition being made to her rights, to draw up a
report in order to enable her to bring an action against you in a court
of justice."
"Ah!" continued my uncle. "Well, then, sir! you may proceed, if you
please, to take down our replies. In the first place, then, the young
lady formally declines to return to her mother."
"That's false!" said the Circassian. "She is my daughter, and belongs
only to me! She will obey me, for she knows that I shall curse her
if----"
"Let us be quite calm, if you please, and have no useless words!"
replied my uncle. "It is your daughter's turn to reply.--Ask her, sir."
The commissary then addressed himself to Kondjé-Gul, repeating the
question. I saw her turn pale and hesitate, terror-stricken by her
mother's looks.
"Do you want to leave me, then?" I said to her passionately.
"Oh, no!" she exclaimed. Then turning towards the commissary, she added
in a firm voice: "I do not wish to go with my mother, sir."
At this the Circassian rose up in a fury.
Kondjé-Gul fell on her knees before her, supplicating her with tears, in
piteous tones.
In my alarm I rushed forward.
"Get her out of the room; take her away!" my uncle said to me sharply.
My poor Kondjé-Gul resisted, so I took her up in my arms and carried her
out. At the door I found Fanny, who had come up, and I left my darling
in her care.
Madame Murrah darted forward to follow her daughter, but my uncle had
seized her by the wrist, and forcing her down again, said to her in
Turkish: "We have not finished; and if you stir, beware!"
"Sir," exclaimed the Circassian, addressing the officer of the law, "you
see how violently they are treating me, and how they are threatening
me!"
All this had taken place so quickly that the commissary hardly had time
to intervene with a gesture. Onésime and Rupert were strolling about
outside the window.
"Excuse me for having sent this child out, sir," continued my uncle;
"but you are, I believe, sufficiently acquainted already with her
decision. Moreover, she is there to reply afresh to you, if you desire
to question her alone, secure from all influence and pressure. It
remains for me to speak now upon a subject which she ought not to hear
mentioned. After her refusal to follow her mother, which she has just
given so clearly, be so good as to add on your report that I also refuse
very emphatically to give her up to her."