than not it is the victim's fate to be carried between two men, each
hold of a thigh, each determined to get ashore or to the boat first,
and each grimly resolved not to let go until three times the proper fee
shall have been paid. Of only these two things let the passenger
assure himself--fight how he may, he will neither escape their clutches
nor get wet. Rather they will hold him upside-down until the contents
of his pockets fall into the surf. Dry on the beach or into the boat
they will dump him. And whatever he shall pay them will surely be
insufficient.

But we had a privy councilor of England of our party, and favors were
shown us that never fall to the lot of ordinary travelers. Opposite
the Sultan's palace is the Sultan's private wharf, so royal and private
that it is a prison offense to trespass on it without written
permission. Because of his official call at the Residency, and of his
card left on the Sultan, wires had been pulled, and a pompous
individual whose black face sweated greasily, and whose palm itched for
unearned increment, called on Monty very shortly after breakfast with
intimation that the wharf had been placed at our disposal, since His
Highness the Sultan desired to do us honor.

So when the B. I. steamer dropped anchor in the great roadstead shortly
after noon we were taken to the wharf by one of the Sultan's
household--a very civil-spoken Arab gentleman--and three English
officers met us there who made a fuss over Monty and were at pains to
be agreeable to the rest of us. While we stood chatting and waiting
for the boat that should row us and belongings the mile-and-a-half or
so to the steamer, I saw something that made me start. Fred gazed
presently in the same direction.