turned to me, drawn perhaps by my stare, I was stunned, flabbergasted,
what you will, by realizing that Anthony himself was looking at me from
under the green turban.

The dark face was blankly expressionless. He might have been gazing
through my head. His eyes neither twinkled with fun nor sent a message
of warning; but somehow I knew that he saw me, that he had been
watching me for a long time. "You see the one I mean, don't you?" asked
Monny. "Well, that's the one I want. I'll take _him_."

She spoke as if she were selecting a horse at a horse show.

Anthony had brought this on himself, but I was not angry with Anthony.
I was angry with the girl for putting her finger into our pie.

"That's not a dragoman," I assured her. "If he were, he'd come and bawl
out his accomplishments, as the others do. He's a very different sort
of chap."

"That's why I want him," said Monny. "And if he isn't a dragoman, he'll
jump at being one if I offer to pay him enough. He's an Egyptian,
anyhow, by his clothes, or a Bedouin or something--although he isn't as
dark as the rest of these men. I suppose he must know a little about
his own city and country."

"It doesn't follow he'd tell travellers about them for money," said I.
"He looks to me a man of good birth and distinction in old fashioned
dress. Why he's lingering on the pavement in front of this hotel I
can't explain, but I'm certain he isn't touting. Probably he's waiting
for a friend."