him the credit to
say that he seemed moved as he kissed his mother on both cheeks, for his
face was pale and he appeared to tremble a little.

The travelers were conducted to their rooms by Macaulay, and I saw no
more of them. But John insisted that I should dine with them in the
evening. In the mean while I went home, and found Gregorios reading, as
usual when he was not on duty at Yildiz-Kioeshk,--the "Star-Palace,"
where the Sultan resides.

"Have you deposited your friends in a place of safety?" he asked,
looking up from his book. "Have they all come,--even the old maid with
the green eyes, and the mad lady whom Patoff is so unfortunate as to
call his mother?"

"All," I answered. "They are real English people, and my old friend John
Carvel is the patriarch of the establishment. There are maid-servants
and men-servants, and more boxes than any house in Pera will hold. The
old lady seems perfectly sane again."

"Then she will probably die," said Gregorios, reassuringly. "Crazy
people almost always have a lucid interval before death."

"You take a cheerful view," I observed.

"Fate would confer a great benefit on Patoff by removing his mother from
this valley of tears," returned my friend. "Besides, as our proverb
says, mad people are the only happy people. Madame Patoff, in passing
from insanity to sanity, has therefore fallen from happiness to
unhappiness."

"If all your proverbs were true, the world would be a strange place."

"I will not discuss the inexhaustible subject of the truth of proverbs,"
answered Balsamides. "I only doubt whether Madame Patoff will be happy
now that she is sane, and whether the uncertainty of the issue of our
search may not drive her mad again. She will probably spoil everything
by chattering at all the embassies. By the by, since we are on the
subject of death, lunacy, and other similar annoyances, I may as well
tell you that Laleli is very ill, and it is not expected that she can
live. I heard it this morning on very good authority."

"That is rather startling," I said.

"Very. Dying people sometimes make confessions of their crimes, but to
hear the confession you must be there when they are about to give up the
ghost."

"That is impossible in this case, unless you can get into the harem as a
doctor."

"Who knows? We must make a desperate attempt of some kind. Leave it to
me, and do not be surprised if I do not appear for a day or two. I have
made up my mind to strike a