"_That_ is what happens when I am _disobeyed_, Mademoiselle! Here is
your coffee, _drink it_!"

The tone was brutal, and Jill meekly put out her hand to take the
little porcelain and silver trifle the man was bringing to her, laying
it beside the emerald ring upon the table as he turned to fetch his own
cup.

"Drop that!"

Jill had not raised her voice, but a certain unmistakable quality in it
caused the man to wheel sharply.

He stared in blank amazement for a fleeting second, and then, still
carefully holding the cup, backed hastily and sideways out of the
direct range of a very small but very useful-looking revolver in Jill's
right hand.

There was a curious lifelessness in the whole situation, and a quite
distressing lack of drama until the oriental smiled contemptuously.

"Do not think to frighten me with that plaything, because I am totally
unafraid. We hear of the Englishwomen who shoot and ride like men,
but--well! we hear so many tales of Europe. Put up your little toy,
Mademoiselle, and remember in future that no one with any respect for
his life _ever_ gives me an order!"

With an indifference that was not in the least assumed, he raised the
cup he was still holding.

There was a crashing report in the luxurious room, a tinkling of broken
china, and a wisp of smoke between a smiling girl and a _very_
surprised man.

"Don't be a fool, and do as you're told if _you_ have any respect for
_your_ life," said Jill tersely, as she moved her hand slightly so that
her aim was on a dead level with a big button ornamenting an inch or so
of satin on the middle left of the man's undervest.

He stood like an image carved out of consternation, whilst streaks of
rage seemed to flash across his livid face. Be it confessed, he was
not in the least afraid, but no word in the Egyptian or any other
tongue could be found to express the depths of humiliation in which he
stood neck deep.

"Now, drink _this_ coffee!" said Jill pleasantly, pointing with her
left hand to the cup she had placed on the little table.

"_Never_!"

Jill smiled icily.

"I _thought_ as much. You scoundrel! So it is drugged, and I, having
drunk it, would have lain unconscious at your mercy. God! to think
that such brutes as you are allowed to live."

The man was watching the girl's every movement, ready to spring like a
cat from the area steps upon the unsuspecting sparrow in the road, but
neither her eyes nor her hand moved as she