The room was thick with the reek of Jason's and Jolival's cigars and Rebecca recoiled a little as she entered and waved her hand before her face in an effort to clear the smoke. She looked thoughtfully at the two men, who were staring at her as though she had been the statue of the Commendatore come to life to demand an account of their misdeeds. Then, going to the window, she flung it open, letting in the cold, damp air from the garden.

"One does not smoke near the chamber of a woman in labor," she said sternly. "Moreover, men have no business in the women's quarters at such times. Go now."

The two men looked at one another, considerably taken aback by this quelling speech, but Rebecca was already opening the door by which she had just entered and pointing commandingly to the gallery.

"Go, I say! I will call you when it is over."

"But—but who are you?" Jolival managed to ask.

"I am called Rebecca," the strange woman deigned to answer. "Judah ben Nathan, the physician of the Kassim Pasha quarter, is my father. The lord Turhan Bey sent for me an hour past to attend a friend of his who is suffering greatly in childbed."

Satisfied with this information, Jolival turned meekly to the door, but Jason stood eyeing this autocratic female, whose headdress made her taller than himself, suspiciously.

"He sent for you, you say? I don't believe it. He has his own doctor in there."

"I know that. Jelal Osman Bey is a good doctor but his ideas on childbirth are those of a true believer of Islam. The woman must fight her own battle and it is necessary to wait the outcome before interfering. But there are times when it does not do to wait too long and so, if you please, do not waste any more of my time with idle questions."

"Come along," Jolival said, drawing the reluctant American away. "Leave it. Turhan Bey knows what he is about."

Neither he nor Jason had set eyes on the master of Hamayunabad since early the previous morning. He had appeared suddenly in the midst of the confusion caused by Jolival's cries for help and when Jason, who had also been awakened by the servants' clamor, had come to see what the matter was, the two men had found themselves face to face.

The meeting had passed off smoothly, in spite of Jolival's fears and the fumes of old brandy. Jason Beaufort had thanked his preserver warmly and with a perfect self-command. He had also contrived tactfully, and with unexpected delicacy for a man of his temper, to convey his regrets for the somewhat rough-and-ready treatment he had accorded to him when the true identity of the man was unknown to him and he had seen him only in the romantic guise of an escaped slave. Turhan Bey, not to be outdone in courtesy, had assured his erstwhile captain that he bore him no malice for usage which he had brought on himself. Then he had begged the American to consider his house his own and to call freely on his wealth and influence.

He had listened without expression to Jason's halting words of thanks for having taken the Princess Sant'Anna into his house and, in some sort, making up for the grave wrongs which he, Jason, had unconsciously done her, replying merely that it was the least he could do. Then he had bowed politely and withdrawn and they had not seen him since.

When Jolival had presented himself at the door of the pavilion where he dwelt, he had been informed that the lord Turhan Bey was at his warehouse.

After being sent packing by Rebecca, the two men wandered down the long covered passage which ran through the bare, wintry gardens to a brightly painted kiosk that rose up against the surrounding grayness like an outsized and improbable flower. Each was feeling awkward and out of place and neither could think of anything to say, although both of them were secretly relieved to have escaped from the smoke-filled atmosphere of the boudoir and the cries from the next room. The silence of the empty garden seemed to them delicious and each sought to prolong it as long as possible.

But their moment of respite was fated to be a brief one. Jason was just lighting a fresh cigar when the sound of running footsteps echoed along the gallery. An instant later Gracchus appeared. He was out of breath and scarlet with exertion, while the carroty hair stood up straight on his head. Obviously the news he brought was far from good.

"The brig!" he called out as soon as he caught sight of the two men. "She's not at her moorings!"

The color drained from Jason's face and as the boy stumbled, exhausted, almost at his feet, he seized him by the shoulders and hauled him upright again.

"What's that you say? Has she been stolen?"

Gracchus shook his head, opened his mouth, gasping for breath like a fish out of water, gulped painfully two or three times and managed to say: "Put… put her in quarantine, damn them! She's… riding at anchor… out in… the Bosporus, near the Tower of the Maiden…"

"Quarantine!" Jolival exclaimed. "But why?"

The onetime errand boy of the rue Montorgueil jerked his shoulders angrily.

"It seems one of the men on board her took ill and died suddenly of the cholera. They took the body ashore at once and burned it, but the port authorities insist on the ship's being quarantined. When we got there with Monsieur O'Flaherty she'd just put out from her moorings with one of my lord Turhan's men made to pilot her. It's dreadful, isn't it, Monsieur Jason? What are we going to do?"

Gracchus, whose delight at seeing his favorite hero once again—aided by such explanations as Jolival thought proper to give him—had made the harsh memories of their last encounter melt like butter in the sun, had been dispatched by Jason to find Craig O'Flaherty and instruct him to set about assembling a crew.

Unexpectedly enough, Jason's old lieutenant of the Sea Witch had not left Constantinople. Something in his Irish soul had responded to the color and poetry of the city, and also to the possibilities of the contraband trade in Russian vodka and the wines of the Crimea for a man with some small business sense.

Left to himself after Achmet Reis had taken the brig and some of those aboard her to the Ottoman capital, O'Flaherty had at first been at a loss what to do. It would have been possible, certainly, for him to have signed on with one or another of the British vessels which, like the frigate Jason, were frequent visitors to the Golden Horn, and so make his way back to Europe. But once again his Irish soul rebelled at the thought of treading an English deck, even with the object of returning to his native seas.

Furthermore, not only was he still a welcome visitor at the French embassy, where he called frequently to see Jolival, but he was also drawn by something stronger than himself to the American brig. He loved the ship almost like a child and when he learned that the Haseki Sultan had bought her and given her to Marianne, he had settled down to wait for Beaufort, like Marianne herself, with the same complete faith only rather more patience.

The early days of waiting had not been easy. He had no very clear idea what to do with himself but divided his time and what little money he had between the various taverns in the city and the shadow play in Seraskier Square, which delighted his boyish heart. He had gone on in this way until one day his thirst for alcohol had taken him into a certain tavern in Galata which was the haunt of the most fervent devotees of Bacchus of all the European shore.

There he had made the acquaintance of one Mamoulian, a Georgian from the region of Batum who was endeavoring, in the fumes of Greek and Italian wines, to forget the war that was slowly ruining him. For the hostilities between the Porte and Tsar Alexander had effectively put a stop to the profitable import of vodka, since no seaman worthy of the name was willing any longer to run the risks of taking his ship into Russian waters.

A friendship fostered by a few bottles of wine drunk in company had sprung up between the two, and they had agreed to form a temporary alliance. The end of the war was in sight and O'Flaherty for his part was unwilling to engage himself for any length of time, not wishing to outstay the brig in Constantinople.

As a result, leaving word for Jolival that he could be found at the bar known as the San Giorgio, which had become his favorite haunt, the Irishman had plunged happily into two smuggling expeditions, both of which were crowned with success and besides restoring his fortunes in a most agreeable way had made the time hang much less heavily on his hands.

As luck would have it, he had just returned from the second of these voyages and was back in Galata when Gracchus came looking for him with the news of Jason's arrival and his initial instructions. Craig O'Flaherty had promptly celebrated the happy event by downing an enormous glass of Irish whiskey, procured from heaven alone knew where, and had then set off, towing Gracchus after him, to cross the Golden Horn and hasten to the Phanar waterfront, to be greeted with the disconcerting sight which Gracchus had described.

The two of them had spent the whole day running up and down trying to find out where the brig was lying, so that sunset had caught them on the wrong side of the Golden Horn and they had been obliged to spend the night in a Greek tavern at considerable risk of being taken up by the watch.

There they had drowned their sorrows in a resinated wine which had left them both with aching heads, and at daybreak they had flung themselves into a boat to cross the water again and make their report.

Ignoring Gracchus's anguished query, Jason asked merely: "Where have you left Mr. O'Flaherty?"