This interesting conversation had lasted for the hour and a half during which we walked about the streets of Kizil Arvat.  It was time to return to the station, and we did so.

Of course, matters did not end here.  It was agreed that the major should leave his seat in the third car and occupy that next to mine in the first.  We had already been two inhabitants of the same town; well, we would become two neighbors in the house, or, rather, two friends in the same room.

At nine o’clock the signal to start was given.  The train leaving Kizil Arvat went off in a southwesterly direction towards Askhabad, along the Persian frontier.

For another half hour the major and I continued to talk of one thing or another.  He told me that if the sun had not set, I should have been able to see the summits of the Great and Little Balkans of Asia which rise above the bay of Krasnovodsk.

Already most of our companions had taken up their quarters for the night on their seats, which by an ingenious mechanism could be transformed into beds, on which you could stretch yourself at full length, lay your head on a pillow, wrap yourself in rugs, and if you didn’t sleep well it would be on account of a troubled conscience.

Major Noltitz had nothing to reproach himself with apparently, for a few minutes after he had said good night he was deep in the sleep of the just.

As for me, if I remained awake it was because I was troubled in my mind.  I was thinking of my famous packing case, of the man it contained, and this very night I had resolved to enter into communication with him.  I thought of the people who had done this sort of thing before.  In 1889, 1891, and 1892, an Austrian tailor, Hermann Zeitung, had come from Vienna to Paris, from Amsterdam to Brussels, from Antwerp to Christiania in a box, and two sweethearts of Barcelona, Erres and Flora Anglora, had shared a box between them from Spain into France.

But I must wait until Popof had retired to rest.  The train would not stop until it reached Gheok Tepe at one o’clock in the morning.  During the run from Kizil Arvat to Gheok Tepe I reckoned that Popof would have a good sleep, and then, or never, I would put my plan into execution.

Hold! an idea!  Suppose it is Zeitung who makes a trade of this sort of thing and manages to make a little money out of public generosity?  It ought to be Zeitung, it must be!  Confound it! he is not at all interesting!  And here was I reckoning on this fellow.  Well, we shall see.  I shall know him by his photographs, and perhaps I may make use of him.

Half an hour went by, and the noise of a door shutting on the platform of the car told me that our guard had just entered his little box.  In spite of my desire to visit the baggage car I waited patiently, for it was possible that Popof was not yet sound asleep.

Within, all is quiet under the veiled light of the lamps.