[Illustration: 'Forty ducats!' cried Omobono, casting up his eyes, and preparing to bargain for at least half an hour.] 'I have the very thing,' said Karaboghazji. 'There are two girls who have waited on her and with whom she is much pleased. As for asking too high a price, forty ducats for the two is nothing. They are a gift, at that.' 'Forty ducats!' cried Omobono, casting up his eyes, and preparing to bargain for at least half an hour. 'If it is dear,' said Rustan, his face becoming like stone, 'may my tongue never speak the truth again!' Considering attentively the consequences of such an awful fate Omobono did not think that the Bokharian risked any great inconvenience if the imprecation should take effect. 'It is far from me,' said the secretary, 'to suggest that your words are not literally true, according to your own light. But you must be aware that the price of maid-servants has fallen much since yesterday, owing to the arrival of a shipload of them from Tanais.' Rustan shook his head and maintained his stony expression. 'They are worthless,' he said. 'Do you suppose I should not have bought the best of them? There has been a plague of smallpox in their country, and they are all pitted. They are as oranges, blighted by hail.' As Omobono had invented the ship and its cargo, he found it hard to refute Rustan's argument, which was quite as good as his own. 'May my fingers be turned round in their sockets and close on the back of my hand, if I have asked one ducat too much,' said the Bokharian with stolid calm. Omobono hesitated, for a new idea had struck him. Before he could answer, a door opened and Rustan's wife, who had put off her finery, ushered in Zoë, closely veiled and wrapped in the cloak she had worn on the previous night. It was, in fact, necessary that she should be delivered up in return for the gold, and the negress had supposed that the counting was almost over. 'My turtle dove,' said Rustan in dulcet tones, 'fetch those two girls who have waited on Kokóna Arethusa. The Venetian merchant will buy them for her.' The negress grinned and went out. By this time Omobono had made up his mind what to say. 'My dear sir,' he began, in a conciliatory tone, consider that we are friends, and do not ask an exorbitant price. I beseech you to be obliging, by four toes and five toes.' Omobono wondered what would happen after he had pronounced the mysterious words. Rustan looked keenly at him and was silent for a moment. Neither of them noticed that Zoë made a quick movement as she stood by the table between them. The Bokharian rose suddenly and went to shut the door. 'Where?' he asked as he crossed the small room. Omobono's face fell at the unexpected and apparently irrelevant question. Instantly Zoë bent down and whispered three words in his ear. Before Rustan turned back to hear the clerk's answer, she was standing erect and motionless again, and he did not suspect that she had moved.