CHAPTER XIII.


We dined an hour after the train left. In the dining car were several
newcomers, among others two negroes whom Caterna began to speak of as
darkies.

None of these travelers, Popof told me, would cross the Russo-Chinese
frontier, so that they interested me little or not at all.

During dinner, at which all my numbers were present--I have twelve now,
and I do not suppose I shall go beyond that--I noticed that Major
Noltitz continued to keep his eye on his lordship Faruskiar. Had he
begun to suspect him? Was it of any importance in his opinion that this
Mongol seemed to know, without appearing to do so, the three
second-class travelers, who were also Mongols? Was his imagination
working with the same activity as mine, and was he taking seriously
what was only a joke on my part? That I, a man of letters, a chronicler
in search of scenes and incidents, should be pleased to see in his
personage a rival of the famous Ki Tsang, or Ki Tsang himself, could be
understood; but that he, a serious man, doctor in the Russian army,
should abandon himself to such speculations no one would believe. Never
mind now, we shall have something more to say about it by and by.

As for me, I had soon forgotten all about the Mongol for the man in the
case. Tired as I am after that long run through Samarkand, if I get a
chance to visit him to-night I will.