The Pasha knocked with the gold-headed cane which he carried. He waited and then repeated the blow. No answer came.
‘Well,’ he said with a shrug, ‘we have given her fair warning. Let us enter. She knows you, my dear Wheatley, and will not be alarmed.’
‘But if Constantine’s here?’ I suggested, with a mocking smile. ‘Your life is a valuable one. Run no risks; he’s a desperate man.’
The Pasha shifted his cane to his left hand, smiled in answer to my smile, and produced a revolver.
‘You’re wise,’ said I, and I took my revolver out of my pocket.
‘We are ready for—anything—now,’ said Mouraki.
I think ‘anything’ in that sentence was meant to include ‘one another.’
The Pasha opened the door and passed in. Nothing seemed changed since my last visit. The door of the room on the right was open, the table was again spread, for two this time; the left-hand door was shut.
‘You see the fugitive is not in that room,’ observed the Pasha, waving his hand to the right. ‘Let us try the other,’ and he turned the door-handle of the room on the left, and preceded me into it.