CHAPTER XXVIII.
SPEECH WITH NALADI If you were ever rudely aroused from pleasant dreams by a sudden dash of cold water in your face, you may partially comprehend my emotions upon hearing these words of greeting, and realizing that I was looking into the beautiful, pitiless eyes of the Daughter of the Sun, now sitting upright on the couch, happily smiling at my embarrassment.
"Nay, Geoffrey Benteen," she exclaimed, significantly waving her white hand as she noted my swift glance backward, "retire not thus suddenly.
You must be a marvellous woodsman to have attained this place through the watchful cordon of my guards, but 'tis not likely you would so safely run the gantlet of return.

You are not so fair of visage as your gay companion the Chevalier, yet now you are here I will enjoy a short time with you.

Yet first let us understand each other.

For what purpose do you invade my apartment so boldly ?" "I came," I replied, believing frankness would prove my best play in this crisis, "expecting to find not you, but your prisoner." "Ah! you are honest, if not complimentary," a quick flash of understanding in her bright eyes.

"So it was another woman for whose sake you came creeping recklessly through the night! God's mercy! I even ventured to dream my charms had pierced the dull armor of your cold English heart, yet here you merely stand and laugh at me,--would even flee my presence as though pestilence were upon my breath.