Page 125 - Adventure Magazine, 1921, July 18th

Adventure
120
I SUPPOSE it was the same China- her seemed to satisfy Madame Guigane.
man on guard at Madame Guigane "You trust your boys?" I asked.
with whom I had had a previous "I do not. A Chinaman is just an or-
meeting; anyway he let me in at once. Most dinary morta l. Lies an' steals."
Chinamen look alike to me, and m the dim- 11 You have nobody you can send along to
ne s of a faintly lighted passageway I can show me the way into Sin Chang's?"
not undertake to distinguish one from an- "Into Sin Chang's-you. I guess not,
other. hard ly. It's easy enough to get in. But
Madame Guigane was into the hall al- out-
most as soon as I, and, impatient ly taking "Do n't be silly, Don. You're not going
hold of my arm, showed me into one of her into Sin Chang's. It's honeycombed with
narrow, tiny, bizarre rooms, aflame with halls and doors. A mouse 'd get lost.
brilliant colors, billowy with pillows, and "T he thing to do, Don, is to call the
unventilated as a powder magazine. The police. They'll raise -- for a white girl-
only furniture in it was a chair, a low divan if they know she has white friends on the
hidden by pillows in vivid colors, a low teak outsid e."
table on which rested an oblong silver tray "Otherwise?"
with an alcohol lamp, needle, knives, scis- "Oh, I guess they would anyway."
sors, sponge- the implements of poppy "But you know they wouldn't :find her."
dozing. "They might. But you're not going in
I looked from them accusingly at her. there. Understand?"
She bared her lips so as to show her teeth, I nodded understandingly.
which were clean and white-and offered in Sin Chang's was about three blocks
evidence to prove that she did not smoke away. His household, together with such
enough to discolor them. shops, storage, and lodging-places as he had
Womanlike, she asked many questions about him for the better running-and con-
and repeated two or three-at some points cealing-of his business, she said, took up
four and five-times all that she had to tell. about a half of a block; by which I must not
And this was nothing more than she had understand that his control, or friends, were
with brevity told me two or three times over limited to that half of a block. There were
the telephone. a dozen ways of getting into his rooms,, and
She had heard nothing of Lord Bob, a hundred of getting out-or, she added, of
whom she knew personally, or of Jackman. not getting out.
The girl was still in the women's quarters, "You've been in-and out."
where she was attentively cared for. She Yes. She had been in, many times.
had been brought-from where, how or Where else was one to get opium? She
why, Madame Guigane did not know; but doubted if five pet cent. of the opium used
she had been brought in a large, queer- on the Pacific coast got into the country
looking yellow statue that fitted together without having passed through Sin Chang's
like a pill box. hands. She had to keep him in a good
The top slipped over the bottom-so of humor, make him presents, smoke with him
course there were no hinges. Had I drawn once in a while-Sin Chang . was easily
the edge of my knife lengthwise instead of flattered.
around the body I would without doubt "But not insulted," I suggested, remind-
have discovered how the statue was fitted ing her of certain remarks she had made to
together. The box, a heavy one, had some him once upon a time when he suggested
bullets in it, and the statue several dents something of the nature of "marriage."
and gashes-so Madame Guigane had been She flushed, and said-
told. "You are a mean, cold-hearted beast."
I said that I thought the police had tried Then slowly, but not angrily:
to intercept the box, and answered some "There are times when I hate you more
other questions without telling very much. than I ever hated anything in my life. An'
Somehow she seemed not to understand why I have hated some people, too. . . .
I showed at once such interest in the girl, What'll you give me if I get that girl out?"
yet had used such delay as to waste part of a "She's wealthy. Maybe she'll pay what-
night and a whole day; but the explanation ever you want."
that Lord Bob was hopelessly in love with For some incomprehensibl reason that