Raising my eyes, I beheld a second figure--that of Abû Tabâh--descending a similar ladder to the balcony of Inspector Carlisle's room. He gained the balcony and entered the room. Four seconds elapsed; he reappeared, unfurled a greater length of ladder, and came down to the flower-beds. Lithely as a cat he came to the projecting _mushrabîyeh_, swung himself aloft, and as I watched breathlessly, expecting him to enter in pursuit of the intruder, climbed to the top and began to mount the ladder descending from Major Redpath's room! He had just reached the major's balcony, and was stepping through the open window, when a most alarming din arose in the Harêm Suite; evidently a fierce struggle was proceeding in the apartments of the Mudîr's daughter! I scrambled down from the acacia and ran to the spot immediately below the window, arriving at the very moment that the central lattice was thrown open, and a white-veiled figure appeared there and prepared to spring down! Perceiving my approach: "Oh, help me, in the name of Allah!" cried the woman, in a voice shrill with fear. "Quick--catch me!" Ere I could frame any reply, she clutched at the palm tree and dropped down right into my extended arms, as a crashing of overturned furniture came from the room above. "Help them!" she entreated. "You are armed, and my women are being murdered." "Help, Kernaby Pasha!" now reached my ears, in the unmistakable voice of Abû Tabâh, from somewhere within. "See that he does not escape from the window!" "Coming!" I cried. And, by means of the palm trunk, I began to mount towards the open lattice. Gaining my objective, I stumbled into a room which presented a scene of the wildest disorder. It was a large apartment, well but sparsely furnished in the Eastern manner, and lighted by three hanging lamps. Directly under one of these, beside an overturned cabinet of richly carven wood inlaid with mother-o'-pearl, lay a Nubian, insensible, and arrayed only in shirt and trousers. There was no one else in the room, and, not pausing to explore those which opened out of it, I ran and unbolted the heavy door upon which Abû Tabâh was clamoring for admittance. The _imám_ leaped into the room, rebolted the door, and glanced to the right and left; then he ran into the adjoining apartments, and finally, observing the insensible Nubian upon the floor, he stared into my face, and I read anger in the eyes that were wont to be so gentle. "Did I not enjoin you to prevent his escape from the window?" he cried. "No one escaped from the window, my friend," I retorted, "except the lady who was occupying the suite." Abû Tabâh fixed his weird eyes upon me in a hypnotic stare of such uncanny power that I was angrily conscious of much difficulty in sustaining it; but gradually the quelling look grew less harsh, and finally his whole expression softened, and that sweet smile, which could so transform his face, disturbed the severity of the set lips.