You will return
with the treasure. Why have I not asked your word? Curiosity
will bring you back; curiosity. Besides this, you have an idea
that with your presence about, a flaw in the glass may be found.
Yes, you will be back. History is to be made; when you are old
you will glance at the page and say: `Look there; rather a
pretty bit, eh? Well, I helped to make it; indeed, had it not
been for me and my curiosity it would not have been made at all.'
Above all things, do not stop to talk to veiled women."
There was a chuckling sound. "I say, your Englishman is clever
now and then. In the gun barrels! Who would have looked for them
there? But why did he come himself? Why did he not trust to his
bankers? Why did he not turn over the affair to his
representative, the British minister? There were a hundred ways
of averting the catastrophe. Why did he not use a little fore-
thought when he knew how anxious we were for his distinguished
person?"
"Why does the moon rise at night and the sun at dawn? I am no
Cumaean Sybil. Perhaps it is the impulse which moves the woman
behind the power behind the throne; they call it fate.
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