Pausing before a plate-glass window that adjoined the shop to adjust the flowing folds of his gandourah, and to hoist his flower tray to his small scornful head, Bachir allowed his auxiliaries to drift, mostly two by two, away among the crowd. Only the royal salad-dresser, Harry Cummings, expressed a demure inclination (when the pushing young grocer caressed his arm), to “be alone”; but Guy Thin, who had private designs upon him, was loath to hear of it! He wished to persuade him to buy a bottle of Vinegar from his Store, when he would print on his paper-bags _As supplied to his Majesty the King_. “Grant us, O Allah, each good Fortunes,” Bachir beseeched, looking up through his eyelashes towards the moon, that drooped like a silver amulet in the firmament above: in the blue nocturnal air he looked like a purple poppy. “A toute à l’heure mes amis!” he murmured as he moved away. And in the little closed shop behind the heavy moucharabi, now that they all had gone, the exhalations of the _flowers_ arose; pungent, concerted odours, expressive of natural antipathies and feuds, suave alliances, suffering, pride, and joy.... Only the shining moon through the moucharabi, illumining here a lily, there a leaf, may have guessed what they were saying: “My wires are hurting me: my wires are hurting me.” “I have no water. I cannot reach the water.” “They have pushed me head down into the bottom of the bowl.” “I’m glad I’m in a Basket! No one will hurl _me_ from a window to be bruised under foot by the callous crowd.” “It’s uncomfy, isn’t it, without one’s roots?” “You Weed you! You, you, you ... _buttercup_! How dare you to _an Orchid_!” “I shouldn’t object to sharing the same water with him, dear.... Ordinary as he is! If _only_ he wouldn’t smell....” “She’s nothing but a piece of common grass and so I tell her!” When upon the tense pent atmosphere surged a breath of cooler air, and through the street-door slipped the Duchess of Varna. Overturning a jar of great heavy-headed Gladioli with a crash, she sailed, with a purposeful step, towards the till. Garbed in black and sleepy citrons, she seemed, indeed, to be equipped for a long, long Voyage, and was clutching, in her arms, a pet Poodle dog, and a levant-covered case, in which, doubtless, reposed her jewels.