"I didn't understand," she said, and her lips shook, so that the words were blurred.

She raised her hands to her neck and loosened the coils of pearls about it as though she meant to lift them off and return them to the giver.
"Oh, don't do that, please," said Shere Ali; and already his voice and his manner had changed.

The sullenness had gone.

Now he besought.

His English training came to his aid.