"I know the name."

"And it is?"

"Yen Lou, the great mandarin Yen Lou of Pekin."

"Thank you, Popof."

I rush to the telegraph office, and from there I send a telegram to the
_Twentieth Century_.

"Merv, 16th May, 7 p.m.

"Train, Grand Transasiatic, just leaving Merv. Took from Douchak the
body of the great mandarin Yen Lou coming from Persia to Pekin."

It cost a good deal, did this telegram, but you will admit it was well
worth its price.

The name of Yen Lou was immediately communicated to our fellow
travelers, and it seemed to me that my lord Faruskiar smiled when he
heard it.

We left the station at eight o'clock precisely. Forty minutes
afterwards we passed near old Merv, and the night being dark I could
see nothing of it. There was, however, a fortress with square towers
and a wall of some burned bricks, and ruined tombs, and a palace and
remains of mosques, and a collection of archaeological things, which
would have run to quite two hundred lines of small text.