"Let me talk to this man," he said with authority, and Julia Redmond did not dispute him. In a tone different from the light and mocking one that he had hitherto used to the Arab, Tremont began to ask a dozen questions severely, and in his answers to the young Frenchman, Hammet Abou began to make a favorable impression on every one save the Marquise d'Esclignac, who did not understand him. There was a huge bamboo chair on a dais under a Chinese pagoda, and the Marquise d'Esclignac took the chair and sat upright as on a throne. Mimi, who had just been fed, came in tinkling her little bells and fawned at the sandals on Hammet Abou's bare feet. After talking with the native, Tremont said to his friends: "This man says that if he joins a Jewish caravan, which leaves here to-morrow at sundown, he will be taken with these men and leave the city without suspicion, but he must share the expenses of the whole caravan. The expedition will not be without danger; it must be entered into with great subtlety. He is either," said Tremont, "an impostor or a remarkable man." "He is an impostor, of course," murmured the Marquise d'Esclignac. "Come here, Mimi." Tremont went on: "Further he will not disclose to us. He has evidently some carefully laid plan for rescuing Sabron." There was a pause. Hammet Abou, his hands folded peacefully across his breast, waited. Julia Redmond waited. The Comtesse de la Maine, in her pretty voice, asked quickly: "But, _mes amis_, there is a man's life at stake! Why do we stand here talking in the antechamber? Evidently the war office has done all it can for the Capitaine de Sabron. But they have not found him. Whether this fellow is crazy or not, he has a wonderful hypothesis." A brilliant look of gratitude crossed Julia Redmond's face. She glanced at the Comtesse de la Maine. "Ah, she's got the heart!" she said to herself. "I knew it." She crossed the hall to the Comtesse de la Maine and slipped her arm in hers. "Has Monsieur de Sabron no near family?" "No," said the Marquise d'Esclignac from her throne. "He is one of those unfamilied beings who, when they are once taken into other hearts are all the dearer because of their orphaned state." Her tone was not unkind. It was affectionate. "Now, my good man," she said to Hammet Abou, in a language totally incomprehensible to him, "money is no object in this question, but what will you do with Monsieur de Sabron if you find him? He may be an invalid, and the ransom will be fabulous." The Comtesse de la Maine felt the girl's arm in hers tremble. Hammet Abou answered none of these questions, for he did not understand them. He said quietly to Tremont: "The caravan starts to-morrow at sundown and there is much to do." Tremont stood pulling his mustache. He looked boyish and charming, withal serious beyond his usual habit. His eyes wandered over to the corner where the two women stood together.