Consequently, I could only come to one conclusion—I must escape, and the sooner the better. The question was, how could it be done?
I went to the open window and looked out, to find below me the beautiful court, with its trees, marble tank, and fountain of brilliantly clear water, in whose depths swam scores of great gold and silver fish, to which I could not help comparing myself as a fellow-prisoner in bright armour.
I looked round the court, which was surrounded by handsome erections, but I did not see a single face at any window. At a gateway, though, were half a dozen armed men, showing me that the palace was carefully guarded.
I went to another window, but it gave precisely the same view, except that I could see partly through the gateway, a place which at once had a great interest for me, as it might be the only path to liberty.
Salaman entered the room just then, and I asked him if I was at liberty to go into the next room.
“Oh yes,” he replied; “my lord is free to go where he likes. It was not safe out there on the forest hill. Here he is in a great city, surrounded by his friends.”
“His enemies,” I muttered.
“There are five rooms set apart for my lord. Will he come and see?”
I nodded, and followed him from the room in which I had slept, across a little hall or entry, out of which was the place with tiled floor in which I had had my bath, and then with a smile he drew back a curtain and I entered a handsome room, with a divan in the centre, and others about the walls. Then into another, evidently intended for smoking, and from that into one which was set apart for my meals, as a very English-looking breakfast was spread, and a couple of white-robed servants stood waiting to receive my orders.
My first move was in each case to the windows, to find that my apartments were in a corner of the court, and that all looked out on the goldfish-tank, but of course in different directions. But there was no tree near the walls big enough to be of use in an escape, and the tank, though it looked deep enough, was too far distant for a dive.