After showing the way to the house where the commander was to be found, he received a cigar from Manasseh, and acknowledged himself amply repaid for his trouble.
Manasseh advanced to the door and announced to a group of armed men lounging about it that he wished to see Diurbanu.
"The general is not to be seen just now," was the reply; "he is at dinner, and will not leave the table for some time yet." Manasseh drew a visiting-card from his pocket, and, first bending down one corner, sent it in to the general.

The bearer of it soon returned with the announcement that Diurbanu bade the visitor wait awhile, and meantime he was to be bound and confined in the cellar.

Manasseh assented to this peculiar reception.

"Many men, many manners," said he to himself.

It would have been easy enough for him to leap the railing of the porch and flee to the woods before the others could lay hands on him, but he had not come hither merely to run away again the next moment.
"Very well, go ahead and bind me," said he, good-humouredly, to the guards.