Douglas Pasha had, in fact, a most uncanny way of eluding the Turkish governors of the various provinces he visited. He came openly to them, and often enough called upon them in the most friendly manner possible, receiving from them the warmest welcome. Yet, under the silken cloak of friendship, and beneath the welcome which every well-bred man extends to another--and your Turk is a gentleman, whatever else you may say of him--there existed always, when Douglas Pasha turned up upon the scene, a feeling of doubt, of hesitancy, almost of danger, in the minds of those Turkish governors. Crafty themselves, they knew well enough that he had come to investigate every feature of the country, to ascertain what Turkish forces were maintained, to map the roads, no doubt, to investigate the progress of such railways as Turkey possessed, and to unearth a hundred different matters. It followed, therefore, often enough, that Douglas Pasha's exit from the palace of a governor was followed, almost automatically, by the dogging of his footsteps. Spies followed him from place to place, spies who watched his every movement like a company of cats; spies whom the cheerful and cunning Douglas Pasha on every occasion managed to elude. Thus, he was within a few days of the outbreak of war at Bagdad, where news of European matters had not yet reached the populace. Yet the governor knew that war was impending--that Turkish governor upon whom the Major had called that very afternoon, and who had bowed the gallant officer out of his palace, had smiled in such friendly fashion upon him, and who, once his back was turned, had snapped his fingers, had clapped his hands, and had set machinery in motion to have Douglas Pasha followed and watched. Yet, strange as it may seem, Geoff Keith's most excellent guardian was by no means the simpleton he seemed, and by no means ignorant of events then impending. He strolled down the centre of the Bazaar, a likeable figure in his dust-coloured travelling-suit, a tall, active man, with the face and the bearing of a soldier. He stopped to converse with an Arab dealer in brass-ware, seated cross-legged upon his little stall, and chatted with him as if he were himself a native. Then he passed on to another stall, leaving the Arab, usually so uninterested in the affairs of this world, keenly curious as to the nationality of the stranger who had addressed him. A dozen yards higher up, there was an Armenian Jew selling jewellery, and with him, too, Douglas Pasha chatted in the most pleasant manner and in the Armenian tongue; and then he strolled on for a while, till, noticing the angular figure of a big-boned Jew seated upon another stall, with a mass of embroidery laid out before him, he turned back and strolled towards him.