"Go back!" came in a whisper from Kâramanèh.
I saw the red lips moving and read a dreadful horror in the widely opened eyes, in those eyes like pools of mystery to taunt the thirsty soul. The world of realities was slipping past me; I seemed to be losing my hold on things actual; I had built up an Eastern palace about myself and Kâramanèh, wherein, the world shut out, I might pass the hours in reading the mystery of those dark eyes. Nayland Smith brought me sharply to my senses.
"Steady with the light, Petrie!" he hissed in my ear. "My scepticism has been shaken to-night, but I am taking no chances."
He moved from my side and forward toward that lovely, unreal figure which stood immediately before the model's throne and its background of plush curtains. Kâramanèh started forward to meet him, suppressing a little cry, whose real anguish could not have been simulated.
"Go back! go back!" she whispered urgently, and thrust out her hands against Smith's breast. "For God's sake, go back! I have risked my life to come here to-night. He knows, and is ready...."
The words were spoken with passionate intensity, and Nayland Smith hesitated. To my nostrils was wafted that faint, delightful perfume which, since one night, two years ago, it had come to disturb my senses, had taunted me many times as the mirage taunts the parched Sahara traveller. I took a step forward.
"Don't move!" snapped Smith.
Kâramanèh clutched frenziedly at the lapels of his coat.
"Listen to me!" she said beseechingly, and stamped one little foot upon the floor—"listen to me! You are a clever man, but you know nothing of a woman's heart—nothing—nothing—if seeing me, hearing me, knowing, as you do know, what I risk, you can doubt that I speak the truth. And I tell you that it is death to go behind those curtains—that he...."
"That's what I wanted to know!" snapped Smith. His voice quivered with excitement.