man with clever eyes
caught sight of him, and, after looking at him keenly, slackened his
pace as he approached him from the opposite direction. An observer
might have thought he saw something which puzzled and surprised him.
Marco didn't see him at all, and still moved forward, thinking of the
shepherds and the prince. The well-dressed man began to walk still
more slowly. When he was quite close to Marco, he stopped and spoke to
him--in the Samavian language.

"What is your name?" he asked.

Marco's training from his earliest childhood had been an extraordinary
thing. His love for his father had made it simple and natural to him,
and he had never questioned the reason for it. As he had been taught to
keep silence, he had been taught to control the expression of his face
and the sound of his voice, and, above all, never to allow himself to
look startled. But for this he might have started at the extraordinary
sound of the Samavian words suddenly uttered in a London street by an
English gentleman. He might even have answered the question in
Samavian himself. But he did not. He courteously lifted his cap and
replied in English:

"Excuse me?"

The gentleman's clever eyes scrutinized him keenly. Then he also spoke
in English.

"Perhaps you do not understand? I asked your name because you are very
like a Samavian I know," he said.

"I am Marco Loristan," the boy answered him.

The man looked straight into his eyes and smiled.

"That is not the name," he said. "I beg your pardon, my boy."

He was about to go on, and had indeed taken a couple of steps away,
when he paused and turned to him again.

"You may tell your father that you are a very well-trained lad. I
wanted to find out for myself." And he went on.

Marco felt that his heart beat a little quickly. This was one of
several incidents which had happened during the last three years, and
made him feel that he was living among things so mysterious that their
very mystery hinted at danger. But he himself had never before seemed
involved in them. Why should it matter that he was well-behaved? Then
he remembered something. The man had not said "well-behaved," he had
said "well-TRAINED." Well-trained in what way? He felt his forehead
prickle slightly as he thought of the smiling, keen look which set
itself so straight upon him. Had he spoken to him in Samavian for an
experiment, to see if he would be startled into forgetting that he had
been