“Stop that,” said Charlie, giving the boy a shake which sobered him, and putting him down on the divan with no very gentle hand. “You are the Pasha’s son, are you? Why, you are as bad as the most foul-mouthed little blackguard in the streets. Don’t let me hear any more of such language, and don’t talk any nonsense to Miss Anstruther, or I’ll--I’ll keep her here at the Residency for six months on a medical certificate!” And Charlie went off whistling to the gate, only to be reminded by Sir Dugald that he was a non-combatant, and ordered to remain in the rear unless matters came to extremities, an order which seemed to him somewhat ludicrously unfair after the events of the day. As for Azim Bey, he shook his small fist after Charlie’s retreating form, and then, peeping round the curtain, glared solemnly and ferociously at Cecil. He found her, however, quite unconscious of his gaze, for the exhaustion had returned again after the momentary excitement, and she was lying still with closed eyes. Obeying Lady Haigh’s warning finger, Azim Bey tiptoed noiselessly into the room, and took up his post again on the divan, where he seemed inclined to remain. But this did not suit Lady Haigh, for the boy’s unchildlike ways always irritated her, and his fixed and solemn gaze now made her feel nervous, and she suggested that he should go up to the housetop and see what was going on. This he was graciously pleased to do, seeing that Charlie was safely out of the way, and for the next half hour he occupied himself satisfactorily in keeping Lady Haigh acquainted with all the details of the situation. The mob had temporarily turned their attention from the Residency to the shops near, which they were pillaging in search of arms, and Azim Bey’s shrill little voice grew excited as he described the scene. But a more important discovery than the damascened sword-blades and old-fashioned matchlocks, which were all that could be obtained from the armourers’ shops, and which did not promise to be of much use against an enemy protected by stone walls, was a great beam of wood, which was now dragged up in triumph by the mob with the evident intention of its being used as a battering-ram.