“I do not ask,” she goes on, choking back her sobs, “to be your wife again--that I know is impossible; but, in the name of mercy, allow me only once to hear her lips call me 'mother,’ and then welcome death. This is my prayer. See, I am at your feet--I beseech, entreat you not to say me nay. By all the love you once bore me, by the affection you felt toward your own angel mother, grant me this!” He may be made of ice, this man. Her wild entreaty thaws him out. “It shall be as you say, woman.” “God be praised!” “When your brother comes, I will investigate this claim you make. If you can prove its truth--well, I can say nothing more, only that, never having been divorced, you are still my wife in the eye of the law.” “It is very, very sad!” interrupts a voice, and turning, they behold the spider who has spun his web across Cairo Street--the sneering Turk who has never forgotten what happened twenty years ago. The woman shudders and trembles, but not so Samson Cereal, who stands there like the rock that has breasted many a storm in the panic days on 'Change. The wily Turk shrugs his shoulders and rubs his brown hands together, just as might an ideal miser contemplating his store of gold. “Yes, it is too very sad. It makes me think of ze play I gaze upon one night in She-cago. All ze years two loving hearts are wide apart. I myself bring them together, I am ze magician who plan ze meeting. For what? In order zat zay may continue to love as before, and build a bridge across ze dark chasm over which to walk again into life--into love? Bah! not much. By ze beard of ze Prophet, I am Aroun Scutari, a pasha--my hate lives forever! I do not forget that she belonged to me--my gold bought her--you stole her away, dog of an American! No longer it is night--day comes, and with it sweet vengeance. For this I have waited--for this I have lived. It pleased me to leave all and come here as a merchant, that I might repay my debt. That hour is here. It is my time to laugh. You shall see!” With which sarcastic words the Turkish plotter claps his hands loudly together. CHAPTER XXX. THE LAST ACT. In all Eastern countries, where call bells are unknown, servants are summoned by the clapping of hands, a custom handed down from Bible times. So when Aroun Scutari makes this signal he expects to have an answer. Nor does he make a mistake. From some other means of ingress figures appear--men ready to obey his bidding. They appear as though by magic; one, two, three in all, and their looks are certainly fierce enough to inspire alarm. Again the pasha claps his hands with all the gusto of a master of ceremonies. This business suits him exactly, he is quite at home.