“You flatter me, Prince.”
“No, I try to judge you. An ordinary man would not be eager to rush off to Khiva. Besides, you are an American.”
The appeal to my vanity was put astutely.
“If I were discovered I should have to get out the best way I could?”
“There might be some little trouble, but I don’t think it would be really serious—to a man of resource, that is. You would be quite authorized to put the blame on me.”
“And if the deception were not discovered?”
“It would be a short interview, and you would at the worst have to postpone your departure for one day.”
“You don’t anticipate any treachery? No assassination business, for instance?”
“Boreski has too much at stake. He would lose everything—including his worthless life, of course. About the strongest guarantee for your safety that you could have.”
He put the amazing proposal bluntly and argued the case with as much coolness as if it had been little more than a simple conventional matter of almost everyday routine.