Page:The Writings of Prosper Merimee-Volume 5.djvu/36

18 The servant opened his eyes wide without replying, and in the end asked me if I wanted anything. I told him to fasten my window, and I went to bed.

I slept solidly, neither dreaming of bears nor of thieves. In the morning, while I was dressing, someone knocked at my door. I opened it and found myself face to face with a very tall and finely built young man in a Bokhara dressing-gown, holding in his hand a long Turkish pipe.

"I come to beg your pardon, Professor," he said, "for having welcomed such a distinguished guest so badly. I am Count Szémioth."

I hastened to say that, on the contrary, my humble thanks were due to him for his most courteous hospitality, and inquired if he had lost his headache.

"Very nearly," he said. "At all events, until the next crisis," he added, with a melancholy expression. " Are you comfortable here? You must not forget that you are among barbarians; it would be difficult to think otherwise in Samogitia."

I assured him I was most comfortably entertained. All the time I was speaking I could not prevent myself from studying him with a very impolite curiosity; there was something strange