'I know nothing, nor do I wish to know,' he continued, shrewdly examining their faces, 'of the part you played in the robbery at the casino. I only know that I will never countenance the repetition of any such attempt; you will have to choose between me and your brigandage.' He suddenly stamped his foot. 'Choose now! which is it to be?' 'Kyrie, Kyrie,' said Tsigaridis, 'you are our only hope.' 'Lift up your hands,' Julian said intolerantly. His eyes searched among the bronzed arms that rose at his command like a forest of lances; he enjoyed forcing obedience upon the crowd and seeing their humiliation. 'Very well,' he said then, and the hands sank, 'see to it that you remember your promise. I have no more to say. Wait, trust, and hope.' He carried his hand to his forehead and threw it out before him in a gesture of farewell and dismissal. He suspected himself of having acted and spoken in a theatrical manner, but he knew also that through the chaos of his mind an unextinguishable light was dawning. V Julian in the candour of his inexperience unquestioningly believed that the story would not reach Herakleion. Before the week was out, however, he found himself curiously eyed in the streets, and by the end of the week, going to dinner at the French Legation, he was struck by the hush that fell as his name was announced in the mirrored drawing-rooms. Madame Lafarge said to him severely,-- 'Jeune homme, vous avez été très indiscret,' but a smile lurked in her eyes beneath her severity. An immense Serbian, almost a giant, named Grbits, with a flat, Mongolian face, loomed ominously over him. 'Young man, you have my sympathy. You have disquieted the Greeks. You may count at any time upon my friendship.' His fingers were enveloped and crushed in Grbits' formidable handshake. The older diplomatists greeted him with an assumption of censure that was not seriously intended to veil their tolerant amusement. 'Do you imagine that we have nothing to do,' Don Rodrigo Valdez said to him, 'that you set out to enliven the affairs of Herakleion?' Fru Thyregod, the Danish Excellency, took him into a corner and tapped him on the arm with her fan with that half flirtatious, half friendly familiarity she adopted towards all men. 'You are a dark horse, my dark boy,' she said meaningly, and, as he pretended ignorance, raising his brows and shaking his head, added, 'I'm much indebted to you as a living proof of my perception. I always told them; I always said, "Carl, that boy is an adventurer," and Carl said, "Nonsense, Mabel, your head is full of romance," but I said, "Mark my words, Carl, that boy will flare up; he's quiet now, but you'll have to reckon with him."'