"So she ought, by my faith. You are right, Monsieur le prophete! A
hundred thousand thanks! Farewell!" And staring about him, and
stretching his lank neck as high as he could, he strode away with his
scars, and white waistcoat and gaiters, and his bearskin shako.

I had been trying to see the person who sat in the palanquin. I had only
once an opportunity of a tolerably steady peep. What I saw was singular.
The oracle was dressed, as I have said, very richly, in the Chinese
fashion. He was a figure altogether on a larger scale than the
interpreter, who stood outside. The features seemed to me large and
heavy, and the head was carried with a downward inclination! The eyes
were closed, and the chin rested on the breast of his embroidered
pelisse. The face seemed fixed, and the very image of apathy. Its
character and _pose_ seemed an exaggerated repetition of the
immobility of the figure who communicated with the noisy outer world.
This face looked blood-red; but that was caused, I concluded, by the
light entering through the red silk curtains. All this struck me almost
at a glance; I had not many seconds in which to make my observation. The
ground was now clear, and the Marquis said, "Go forward, my friend."

I did so. When I reached the magician, as we called the man with the
black wand, I glanced over my shoulder to see whether the Count was
near.

No, he was some yards behind; and he and the Marquis, whose curiosity
seemed to be by this time satisfied, were now conversing generally upon
some subject of course quite different.

I was relieved, for the sage seemed to blurt out secrets in an
unexpected way; and some of mine might not have amused the Count.