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But Sira had remained adamant, and Joro, abstractedly toying with his laboratory apparatus in the basement of his palace, tried to find the key to her change of heart. "Can't understand it!" he mused. "She always seemed to have all the royal instincts: cold to suitors, with that delicacy and reserve one finds ideal in a princess. She does all things well, handles a sword nearly as well as I do.
But the will of Chosroes was no longer revered, and Siroes, who gloried in the rank and merit of his mother Sira, had conspired with the malecontents to assert and anticipate the rights of primogeniture. It was determined by the conspirators, that Siroes, with the ensigns of royalty, should appear in the camp; and if the enterprise should fail, his escape was contrived to the Imperial court.
He had gone off to Cairo on leave where he was seized by Dr Tuke and put to bed in the Citadel. We had now pretty well completed our road, so on the 24th we left our comfortable camp and marched six miles to our new bivouac area in an olive grove just north of Beit Sira. We had to make a new road to link up with the Ram Allah road at Tattenham Corner.
And in addition to his zeal he carried into the struggle his exceptional ability, a knowledge of government and of people. He had need for all of his rare skill now. It had been an easy matter to carry forcibly the Princess Sira to his palace in Hanlon. Tolto was safely out of the way; Mellie had been dismissed. As for the other palace servants, they had been silenced with bribery or the stiletto.
He wants nothing now but your hand in marriage, and is prepared to cede to the royal cause all the advantages he has gained " "Not to mention," Sira interjected, "the royal prestige he will gain with the common people." Joro laughed, a little impatiently. "True, true! But after all, what does the support of the people amount to? They are powerless.
You must be nearly dead!" She conducted Sira into the hut, which was far neater and cleaner than its exterior suggested. "A lady!" she repeated. "In that heat! Young woman, what made you do it? Look at those arms near burnt! Let me take off that old sack. But wait!" She tip-toed to the door, threw back the faded curtain sharply.
"The prince can fight with his brains as well as with his sword." Sira submitted. "The whole thing would have been hopeless, if he hadn't invented the detonating ray that disposed of the warships. You remember those heavy explosions, shortly after we dropped in the hall, as one might say? Those were the last of them."
I, Deacon Homms, claim the reward!" the old man screamed. "She is the princess; I know her. She came out of the canal to tempt me! She is the Princess Sira. Now shall I at last enter the Palace of Joys! I claim the 100,000 dollars!" But he still had to catch Sira.
He utterly rejected the thought that Princess Sira had consented to his removal in this manner, or in any manner. That meant that she was being coerced, and Tolto's eyes grew small and hard at the thought. Presently he began to test the chains. They were of great hardness and toughness, and so smooth that he could not twist them, for the links slid over one another harmlessly.
All at once the tautness went out of her, and Sira leaned against the wall, divided between laughing and crying. "Tolto and his good friends were looking for you," the big man rumbled anxiously. "The teletabloids said there was a riot coming " He got no further. The gorilla-faced pursuer catapulted himself sideways through the portal, being too wide to go through in the regular way.
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