set it quivering as though it were a gong hung in my bosom.

Karamaneh was speaking.

Upon hands and knees, heedless of damage to my garments, I crawled up
beside Smith. One of the laths was slightly displaced and over this my
friend was peering in. Crouching close beside him, I peered in also.

I saw the study of a business man, with its files, neatly arranged works
of reference, roll-top desk, and Milner safe. Before the desk, in a
revolving chair, sat Slattin. He sat half turned toward the window,
leaning back and smiling; so that I could note the gold crown which
preserved the lower left molar. In an armchair by the window, close,
very close, and sitting with her back to me, was Karamaneh!

She, who, in my dreams, I always saw, was ever seeing, in an Eastern
dress, with gold bands about her white ankles, with jewel-laden fingers,
with jewels in her hair, wore now a fashionable costume and a hat that
could only have been produced in Paris. Karamaneh was the one Oriental
woman I had ever known who could wear European clothes; and as I watched
that exquisite profile, I thought that Delilah must have been just such
another as this, that, excepting the Empress Poppaea, history has record
of no woman, who, looking so innocent, was yet so utterly vile.

"Yes, my dear," Slattin was saying, and through his monocle ogling his
beautiful visitor, "I shall be ready for you to-morrow night."

I felt Smith start at the words.

"There will be a sufficient number of men?"

Karamaneh put the question in a strangely listless way.

"My dear little girl," replied Slattin, rising and standing looking down
at her, with his gold tooth twinkling in the lamplight, "there will be a
whole division, if a whole division is necessary."

He sought to take her white gloved hand, which rested upon the chair
arm; but she evaded the attempt with seeming artlessness, and stood up.
Slattin fixed his bold gaze upon her.

"So now, give me my orders," he said.

"I am not prepared to do so, yet," replied the girl, composedly; "but
now that I know you are ready, I can make my plans."

She glided past him to the door, avoiding his outstretched arm with an
artless art which made me writhe; for once I had been the willing victim
of all these wiles.

"But--" began Slattin.

"I will ring you up in less than half an hour," said Karamaneh and
without further ceremony, she opened the door.

I still had my eyes glued to the aperture in the blind, wh