For if the girl had looked like this ... he could see that she would be a difficult little piece to withstand ... though any man with an ounce of sense in his head would have behaved as a responsible protector and not as a reckless school boy. "What happened?" he said quickly. "Oh, nothing happened--nothing that I know of. We got along very well, I thought, although now I remember that some people _did_ stare.... But I wasn't worried at the time. I thought it was just because I was an American and he was apparently a Turkish woman, but there was no reason why an American might not get a Turkish woman to act as a guide, was there?... And then Jack told me to go home first--he said it would be simpler that way and that he would slip over to some friend's or to some safe place and take his disguise off. He wore a gray suit beneath it, and the only funny thing was some black tennis shoes.... So I left him. And he hasn't been back since." She added as McLean was silent, "He told me that he had some engagement for that evening, so I did not begin to worry until the next day." "Now just how long ago was this?" "Two days ago. Day before yesterday afternoon." She looked anxiously at McLean's face and took alarm at his careful absence of expression. "Oh, Mr. McLean, do you think--" He brushed that aside. "And where was it--this reception?" "At an old palace, forever away on the edge of the city. I don't remember the street--we drove and I had the cab wait. But it belonged to a Turkish general. Hamdi Bey," she brought out triumphantly. "General Hamdi Bey." McLean did not correct her idea of the title. His expression was more carefully non-committal than ever, while behind its quiet guard his thoughts were breaking out like a revolution. Hamdi Bey.... A wedding reception.... The daughter of Tewfick Pasha.... In the secret depths of his soul he uttered profane and troubled words. That French girl, again.... So Ryder had not forgotten that affair, although he had kept silent about it of late. He had bided his time and taken that rash means of seeing the girl again--and he had involved this unknowing young American in a risk of scandal and deceived her into believing herself responsible for this caprice while all the time she had been a mere cloak and it had been his own diabolical desire.... Miss Jeffries was surprised to see a sudden sorry softness dawn in the young man's look upon her. And she was surprised, too, at his next question. "I wonder, now, if you were the young lady who took him to a masquerade ball--some time ago?" Lightly she acknowledged it. "You'll think I'm always taking him to things," she said brightly, but McLean's troubled gaze did not quicken with a smile. He was experiencing a vast compassion. She was so innocent, so unconscious of the quicksands about her.... Probably she had never heard a breath of that first adventure.