"Ah."
Miller's tone was reflective and impassive. He had found out one of the things he wanted to know. As he suspected, they were being taken to some remoteness, probably an island. He digested the information silently.
"You must pardon the want of—of finish in our arrangements," said Landon. "Your capture was entirely unpremeditated; you were a gift from the hand of fate. Your suggestion about my child undid you. The boy has become the pivot of Muhammed's existence. Queer, don't you think? I have never professed to plumb the depths of the Oriental mind."
"And Miss Van Arlen and Aylmer?" questioned Miller. "That was a matter of premeditation?"
"Nothing less than an inspiration, a stroke of genius conceived in a moment in Muhammed's brain. Premeditate? How could we premeditate? We expected you and you only, or your messenger, by the next day's boat."
Miller nodded.
"Miss Van Arlen and her companion are officially drowned," he said. "My own disappearance—how is that accounted for?"
"The matter is now probably engaging the interest of the Melilla police. They need distraction; theirs is a gray life," said Landon, pleasantly.
Again Miller nodded, perhaps unconsciously, and in assent to some deduction of his own mind. He kept his meditative air for a second or two, shrugged his shoulders again pessimistically, and then made a brisk gesture of acquiescence.
"And your terms—to myself—are what?" he asked.