was no London train that night and no accommodation in the neighboring
village.

"Sir Lionel urgently requests you to remain," the butler had assured
us, in his flawless, monotonous English. "He trusts that you will not
be dull, and hopes to be able to see you to-morrow and to make plans
for your entertainment."

A ghostly, gray shape glided across the darkened hall--and was gone. I
started involuntarily. Then remote, fearsome, came muted howling to
echo through the ancient apartments of Graywater Park. Nayland Smith
laughed.

"That was the civet cat, Petrie!" he said. "I was startled, for a
moment, until the lamentations of the leopard family reminded me of
the fact that Sir Lionel had transferred his menagerie to Graywater!"

Truly, this was a singular household. In turn, Graywater Park had been
a fortress, a monastery, and a manor-house. Now, in the extensive
crypt below the former chapel, in an atmosphere artificially raised
to a suitably stuffy temperature, were housed the strange pets brought
by our eccentric host from distant lands. In one cage was an African
lioness, a beautiful and powerful beast, docile as a cat. Housed
under other arches were two surly hyenas, goats from the White Nile,
and an antelope of Kordofan. In a stable opening upon the garden were
a pair of beautiful desert gazelles, and near to them, two cranes and
a marabout. The leopards, whose howling now disturbed the night, were
in a large, cell-like cage immediately below the spot where of old the
chapel alter had stood.

And here were we an odd party in odd environment. I sought to make out
the time by my watch, but the growing dusk rendered it impossible.
Then, unheralded by any sound, Karamaneh entered by the door which
during the past twenty minutes had been the focus of my gaze. The
gathering darkness precluded the possibility of my observing with
certainty, but I think a soft blush stole to her cheeks as those
glorious dark eyes rested upon me.

The beauty of Karamaneh was not of the typed which is enhanced by
artificial lighting; it was the beauty of the palm and the pomegranate
blossom, the beauty which flowers beneath merciless suns, which expands,
like the lotus, under the skies of the East. But there, in the dusk,
as she came towards me, she looked exquisitely lovely, and graceful
with the grace of the desert gazelles which I had seen earlier in the
evening. I cannot describe her dress; I only know that she seemed very
wonder