I was no Russian prince to pay two hundred pounds for making a copy, yet this map was perhaps no less necessary to me than to him. I therefore decided, then and there, that at any cost I must have a copy, and at once began to think how it could be obtained....I went stealthily into his room to fit a key to his heirloom chest. The first time I was not able to note all the details of the key, and it was not until the third attempt, after numerous filings, that I succeeded in making one fit....I got into his room again and took the parchment from the chest. I took it to our room and throughout the night Pogossian and I traced all the details of the map, after having covered it with oiled paper. The next day I put the parchment back in its place....An eagerness which was not to be restrained arose in me to reach at any cost and without delay the places where, with the aid of this treasure, I could at last appease that desire for knowledge which during the past two or three years had given me no rest, gnawing me within like a worm. this perhaps Justifiable, but nevertheless—whatever way one regards it—culpable treatment of the hospitality of the Armenian priest, I talked things over with my still half-sick comrade Pogossian.
Well, sorry for any re-hashing.
