and with one last, upturned look at those mocking windows, he was
off down the road like a shot.

There were just two things to do. The first was to discover the
message hidden in those unknown words.

The second was to do exactly as that message bade.

CHAPTER XI

OVER THE GARDEN WALL

Two oil lamps flared in the little coffee-house. In one circle of
yellow light two bearded Sheiks were playing dominoes with
imperturbable gravity; the other lamp flickered over an empty table
beneath which the thin, flea-bitten legs of a ragged urchin were
showing in the oblivion of his tired sleep. In the shadow beyond sat
a young American with a keen, impatient face, and a one-eyed Arab
shrouded in a huge burnous.

"I make fine dragoman?" the Arab was saying proudly. "This is ver'
old coffee-house. Many things happen here, ver' strange----"

"Yes, but I'm sick of the doggone place," said Billy fiercely. "I
can't sit still and swallow coffee any longer. Can't we start now?"

"Too soon--too soon before the time. You say ten? Come, we go next
door. Nice place next door, perhaps--dancing, maybe."

There was noise enough next door, certainly, to promise dancing. The
strident notes of Oriental music came shrieking out the open
doorway, but as Billy stepped within and stared over the heads of
the squatting throng, he saw no sinewy dancers, but only two tiny
girls in bright colors huddled wearily against the wall. The music
which was absorbing every look came from the brazen throat of a huge
instrument in the corner.

"Lord--a phonograph!" thought the young man in disgust, resenting
this intrusion of the genius of his race into foreign fields.

The squatting men, their dark lips parted in pleased smiles, were
too intent upon the innovation to turn at his entrance, but the
little girls caught sight of him and ran forward, begging
clamorously, their bracelets clanking on their outstretched arms.

With a little silver he tried to soften the vigor of the one-eyed
man's dismissal. "This cheap place--no good dancers any more," the
Arab uttered in disgust. "New man here--no good. Maybe next door
better--eh?"

But next door was only a flight of steps and a lone little doll of a
sentinel, painted and hung like a bedizened idol. Only the dark eyes
in the tinted sockets were alive, and these turned curiously after
the strange young white man who had dropped a coin into her
outstretched hand and passed on so hurriedly.

"I do