the
door. And now,' he said with a brisk yet courteous movement of his hand
to my arm, 'who the blazes are you, and what do you want to know?'

"I told him succinctly, and he nodded to each fact of importance as he
took it in.

"'Mind you,' I told him, 'I don't defend her behaviour. She shouldn't
have told her father she was married when she wasn't. He might have----'
Doctor Sadura made a gesture of flinging something away impatiently.

"'Oh, pardon me, but it wouldn't have made any difference with that old
humbug.' I looked at him in amazement.

"'I said humbug,' he insisted. 'A thorough old humbug. Do you know what
he's suffering from? Illusions of grandeur, we call it in the
profession. A form of megalomania. Oh, yes, he's got some money, no
doubt, or I shouldn't render him professional services. But he thinks he
owns the whole country clear up to Uskub. Burbles away for hours to me
about his plans for developing the territory. He's got a lot of
concessions that aren't worth the paper they are printed on. What's the
use of concessions when the government's going in and out like a wheezy
old concertina, when the agriculturalists simply wouldn't know what he
was talking about and would come out with long knives and sickles and
slash his developing parties about the legs? Rubbish! Illusions of
grandeur, I tell you. As for the girl, you know her better than I do.
The man who protected her, Kinaitsky, is a very fine chap indeed, but he
isn't the sort of person I'd introduce to my sisters, if you know what I
mean. Distinctly not.'

"'And yet I understand he married a Jewess not long ago,' I said.

"'Yes, very rich. Quite a different matter. Immense tobacco properties.
You see, although he is not an Ottoman, his family have lived under
Ottoman government so long that they are strong supporters of the old
regime. They are like us Jews. They are good business men and they lend
the old Ottoman families money in return for franchises which are very
profitable to people with affiliations in Paris and London, and so
forth. I don't say it's a perfect system,' Doctor Sadura went on, 'but
it suits the country.'

"'Then where does our friend with his illusions of grandeur come in?' I
enquired.

"'Nowhere, unless there was a revolution and a lot of these old estates
came into the market, and the new government found time to think of him.
But it is building on pretty rotten foundations, I can tell you. You
don't suppose he is