Her superb young figure revealed an unsuspected loveliness where the snowy symmetry of neck and shoulders and arms was delicately accented by the filmy black of her gown.
He had never seen such a beautiful girl; she seemed more wonderful, more strange, more aloof than ever. And this was what preoccupied and entirely engaged his mind, and troubled it, so that his smile had a tendency to become indefinite and his conversation mechanical at times.
Captain Sengoun drained one more of numerous goblets; gazed sentimentally at the Princess, then with equal sentiment at Rue Carew.
“As for me,” he said, with a carelessly happy gesture toward the infinite, “plans are plans, and if they’re stolen, tant pis! But there are always Tartars in Tartary and Turks in Turkey. And, while there are, 331 there’s hope for a poor devil of a Cossack who wants to say a prayer in St. Sophia before he’s gathered to his ancestors.”
“Have any measures been taken at your Embassy to trace the plans?” asked Neeland of the Princess.
“Of course,” she said simply.
“Plans,” remarked Sengoun, “are not worth the tcherkeske of an honest Caucasian! A Khirgize pony knows more than any diplomat; and my magaika is better than both!”
“All the same,” said Rue Carew, “with those stolen plans in your Embassy, Prince Erlik, you might even gallop a sotnia of your Cossacks to the top of Achi-Baba.”
“By heaven! I’d like to try!” he exclaimed, his black eyes ablaze.
“There are dongas,” observed the Princess dryly.