Page:The Clue of the Twisted Candle (1916).djvu/332

brought with him, as I judged, one of his dancing girls, who apparently was privileged to see the sights of the palace.

"For a long time he stood in the doorway talking incoherently in a language which I think must have been Turkish, for I caught one or two words.

"Whoever the girl was, she seemed a little frightened, I could see that, because she shrank back from him though his arm was about her shoulders and he was half supporting his weight upon her. There was fear, not only in the curious little glances she shot at me from time to time, but also in the averted face. Her story I was to learn. She was not of the class from whence Salvolio found the dancers who from time to time came up to the palace for his amusement and the amusement of his guests. She was the daughter of a Turkish merchant of Scutari who had been received into the Catholic Church.

"Her father had gone down to Durazzo during the first Balkan war and then Salvolio had seen the girl unknown to her parent, and there had been some rough kind of courtship which ended