When the American reached the room where Cara had been left it was deserted by the assassin's guards. With a sudden stopping of his heart, he saw her lying apparently lifeless on a stacked-up pile of rugs. In a terror that he scarcely dared to investigate, he laid his ear hesitantly to her breast, then, reassured, he gave thanks for the anesthetic of unconsciousness with which nature had blinded her to the tragedy beyond the closed door.
Two curtained carriages drove across Galata Bridge and in the mysterious quiet of Stamboul there was no ripple on the surface of affairs as other tourists haggled over a few piastres in the curio shops of the bazaar.
CHAPTER XXVII
BENTON SAYS GOOD-BY
Louis Delgado awaited Jusseret in an agony of doubt and fear.
The Frenchman was late. A dispatch from the frontier had announced his coming, but to the anxiety of Delgado delays seemed numberless and interminable.
At last an aide ushered him into the apartment where the new Monarch waited, his inevitable glass of Pernod and anisette twisting in his fingers. Jusseret bowed.
"Where is Martin?" inquired the King.