The reply came at midnight. In the morning we took it to a Christian. We told him nothing of the kaimakam’s interpretation of the first. He puzzled over the characters for a few minutes, then wrote in French, ‘Telegraphed to you yesterday, Hilmi Pasha gives permission to proceed to Drama and take interpreter.’ We went back to the kaimakam. He offered us chairs, but we declined to sit. He offered us cigarettes, and we declined them. ‘Kaimakam Bey,’ said we, ‘we are going out of here to-morrow morning and our interpreter is going with us. Good-morning.’ We turned on our heels and left without salaaming to the bey or to any of his sitting satellites. The kaimakam jumped to his feet and followed us to the door shouting, ‘Ce n’est pas ma faute, messieurs. Ce n’est pas ma faute!’ An hour later an officer who had been attached to us during our sojourn at Djuma was ushered in by Sandy. He came to present the kaimakam’s compliments and to say that by a strange coincidence the permission we sought had just arrived from the Governor-General. [Illustration: RUINS OF KREMEN.] We rode away from Djuma-bala with a large escort, and made our way slowly through the wildest and most beautiful mountains I have ever seen. We worked around Perim Dagh to Mahomia; spent a night at Bansko, where Miss Stone had been ransomed; passed through the ruins of Kremen, the scene of a wicked massacre; dropped down the river Mesta by a long-untrodden path; crossed a trackless lava formation of many miles that resembled a vast boneyard of giant skulls and scattered skeletons. The trail was hard, and it took four days to get to Drama. CHAPTER XIII THE TRAIL OF THE INSURGENT