“I care not whether I come in peace or no,” answered the Captain, “but I find no peaceful reception in Bouinaki.  Thy Tartars, Ammalat, have dared to fire upon a soldier of mine, of yours, a subject of our Tsar.”

“In very deed, ’twas absurd to fire on a Russian,” said the Khan, contemptuously stretching himself on the cushions of the divan, “when they might have cut his throat.”

“Here is the cause of all the mischief, Ammalat!” said the Captain, angrily, pointing to the Khan; “but for this insolent rebel not a trigger would have been pulled in Bouinaki!  But you have done well, Ammalat Bek, to invite Russians as friends, and to receive their foe as a guest, to shelter him as a comrade, to honour him as a friend!  Ammalat Bek, this man is named in the order of the commander-in-chief; give him up.”

“Captain,” answered Ammalat, “with us a guest is sacred.  To give him up would be a sin upon my soul, an ineffaceable shame upon my head; respect my entreaty; respect our customs.”

“I will tell you, in your turn—­respect the Russian laws.  Remember your duty.  You have sworn allegiance to the Tsar, and your oath obliges you not to spare your own brother if he is a criminal.”

“Rather would I give up my brother than my guest, Sir Captain!  It is not for you to judge my promises and obligations.  My tribunal is Allah and the padishah!  In the field, let fortune take care of the Khan; but within my threshold, beneath my roof, I am bound to be his protector, and I will be!”

“And you shall be answerable for this traitor!”

The Khan had lain in haughty silence during this dispute, breathing the smoke from his pipe:  but at the word “traitor,” his blood was fired, he started up, and rushed indignantly to the Captain.

“Traitor, say you?” he cried.  “Say rather, that I refused to betray him to whom I was bound by promise.  The Russian padishah gave me rank, the sardar[35] caressed me—­and I was faithful so long as they demanded of me nothing impossible or humiliating.  But, all of a sudden, they wished me to admit troops into Avar—­to permit fortresses to be built there; and what name should I have deserved, if I had sold the blood and sweat of the Avaretzes, my brethren!  If I had attempted this, think ye that I could have done it?  A thousand free daggers, a thousand unhired bullets, would have flown to the heart of the betrayer.  The very rocks would have fallen on the son who could betray his father.  I refused the friendship of the Russians; but I was not their enemy—­and what was the reward of my just intentions, my honest counsels?  I was deeply, personally insulted by the letter of one of your generals, whom I had warned.  That insolence cost him dear at Bashli ...  I shed a river of blood for some few drops of insulting ink, and that river divides us for ever.”

     [35] The commander-in-chief.

“That blood cries for vengeance!” replied the enraged Captain.  “Thou shalt not escape it, robber!”