Nightfall found the Manchester's prow bearing into a thin mist. The rain had slackened to a fine diamond-drizzle; lightning no longer wrote livid ideographs upon the sky, but flashed far away in faded flares.

Trent did not see Dana Charteris at dinner, as he expected. "Dummkopf Englischer"—thus he was catalogued by a German merchant from Celebes who sat at the same table in the dining-salon and succeeded in drawing only monosyllables from him. The gentleman from Celebes was hot, damp and irritable, and he found fuel for his ill-humor in the Englishman who sat beside him and ate mangosteens with the air of one who liked such beastly heathen food.

After the meal Trent sought the smoking-room with a volume of lyrics, much to the disgust of his German dinner-companion, who, in passing, read, "Poems of Alan Seeger" over his shoulder. But Trent could not fix his attention upon the reading matter, and he sat with the book in one hand, a lighted cheroot in the other, and his interest nowhere in particular. He was suffering the first anÆsthetizing effects of a drowsy boredom.

"... You'll have to go higher than that if you want to see me!" rasped a voice close by, and there followed a click of chips, a laugh.

Clouds of grayish smoke, fanned into fantastic shapes by electric punkas, floated on dead atmosphere, personifying the languor that had suddenly quartered in Trent. A white-clad deck-steward slid through the vaporous whorls, serving frosty glasses of arrica, or whiskey and soda to those less favorably inclined toward exotic liquors.

"... But surely, my friend, you would resent it if we sent missionaries to your country," a voice not far behind him was saying; a quiet voice that separated itself from the drone of conversation, a voice with a peculiar, alien note that caused Trent to wonder, after he heard it, why it had not penetrated to him before. "Why, imagine the indignation of your—what do you call them, New Yorkers?—if Buddhist priests established a mission in that vast and bewildering city; if they so presumed as to try to press their creed upon those of another religion."

Trent was possessed of a desire to turn; he merely sat expelling smoke from his nostrils, listening without consciousness of eavesdropping.

Another voice, quieter still and more reserved—an American voice—answered. "The result of such a thing," it said, "would be ... well, in the first place no Christian would...."

"That is precisely it. Do you wonder, then," resumed the voice with the alien note, "that we resent the intrusion of missionaries? What does it matter if Deity is symbolized by Buddah, Mohammed or a Nazarene? God is one. No, my friend, you cannot convince me that it is better for my people to substitute your God for theirs. In other relationships they should be friendly, and they are, but in religion ... a colossal misunderstanding. My people are declining; soon, as a man of letters once said, the rust of our departed glory will corrode us and reduce us to the dust into which our empire has dwindled. Russian wine, Japanese greed and Western vices—a combination too strong for the slender potencies of our flesh. On the other hand, you Anglo-Saxons, Celts, Normans, Huns and Slavs will continue to build your empires; to fight among yourselves (there will be no war between East and West); to go forward in science and invention.... Yes, I am returning home."

The American voice asked a question. A laugh, selvaged with irony, answered it, and—

"No, I shall not attempt to 'enlighten' my people. I have studied in your universities, dipped into your learning; now, true to the blood, I go back. Perhaps, were you to see me in a few months, you would be shocked, for I shall be a 'barbarian'.... What? Satisfied? Yes, I believe I will. Your country has its dramas, its libraries—so very much—yet I could not but feel, when I was there, that the structure of your land is a—a Frankenstein, do you call it?—of self-stimulated delight, something soulless. Millions worshipping the false gods of body-pleasure; vassals of the senses, ignoring the fact that there are hungers above mere flesh-appetite."

The voice fascinated Trent, gave him a picture of deft fingers inlaying a mosaic; thoughts chosen with care and spoken as though filtered through many translations before they left the tongue in the integument of English.

"... I hope I have not offended you," the voice resumed. "I feel no rancour, you understand, only an ache—a very great ache—over this colossal misunderstanding.... You must go? Then, good night!"

A chair moved. After a moment a man in somber clerical garb passed and left the smoking-room. Trent closed his book; placed his burnt-out cheroot in an ash-bowl; got up. And the quiet voice behind him asked:

"Your pardon. Have you a match?"

Trent turned. Whatever he expected, he was surprised at what he saw. An Oriental of no common type. He registered an impression of bronze, almost beautiful, features; a high, Mongoloid skull; dark eyes, veiled by an impalpable haze of tobacco smoke; moist, sensitive lips, rather thin and too red. Features that drew and repelled him in the same instant—face of a Buddha, and eyes.... He groped in an effort to understand the eyes. The man wore tweeds with the air of one accustomed to Western clothing, and he had a poise, a finish to the minutest detail of dress, that, in a yellow man, seems sleek and "dossied" to the eyes of the Occident.

"Thank you," said the Oriental, as Trent gave him a match.

The Englishman nodded perfunctorily and left the smoking-room, a picture of the bronze, beautiful face, lighted by the flaring match, engraved upon his brain.

His curiosity led him to the purser's office where he consulted the register. His eyes paused as they encountered the name "Dana Charteris"; roved down the list of first-class passengers to a signature that stood out from the others by its very bizarrerie.

"Hsien Sgam," he mused aloud. "Hmm.... Sgam—Sgam.... Mongolian."

And he went to his cabin to fetch a raincoat, still thinking of the bronze face of Hsien Sgam.

2

Trent twice circled the promenade deck. The faint drizzle had ceased, but there was a dampness in the mist that moistened his face as with spray. Yet he could not bring himself to the point of turning in. The scene exerted an irresistible fascination over him. The spectral pallor of cabin walls; portholes aglow in the murk; a gentle vibration underfoot; the swish-swish of the tide against the hull.

On his third round of the ship he paused aft, at a point that yielded a view of gaping cargo-well and the steerage. He could see the forms of steerage-passengers—amorphous blurs in the hazy night. A tongue of yellow lapped out from a bleary deck-lamp and licked across crowded bodies, groping stanchions and hatches, touching twin ventilators that reared up, like phantom cobras, out of the jungle of human beings. Some one was piping on a reed flageolet—an eerie, tuneless wailing. He almost imagined the pink turban of Tambusami among the spot-like head-dresses below.

As he passed the wireless-house, at a turn of the promenade-deck, he caught a glimpse of green-shaded lights. A breath of tobacco warmly brushed his face; he heard the crackle of static trickling in.

It was not yet ten-thirty when he went to his cabin. He undressed leisurely, reflecting the while. Then, lighted pipe between his teeth, he established himself in his berth with a newspaper. But the restful churn of the engines had a somnolent effect upon him, and presently he tossed the news-sheet away, put out the light and settled himself for sleep.

And did not.

Of late, since the night he found Manlove in the ruined temple at Gaya, he had formed the habit of reviewing, after retiring, the incidents of the day. This habit clung. Sleep that a moment ago courted him, now evaded his advances. A picture of the Mongol created itself in illusive imagery before him. A woman's mouth—and a woman's hands, for the skin that touched his as he gave the Oriental a match had the feel of satin. Long hands, they were; but he fancied that beneath the silken smoothness was sinuous, fibrous strength. They.... But why in Tophet was he thinking of this Buddha-faced heathen? He shut his mind. But thoughts refused to be excluded from their dominion. Nor could he sleep. His eyelids rebelled against closing, and when now and then he succeeded in downing their resistance, it was only to have them lift the next instant and show him the dim monotony of the state-room, relieved by the murky gray porthole.

And as he stared at the porthole, contemplating it vindictively, as if it were responsible for his wakefulness, it suddenly darkened.

When he became fully cognizant of the fact that a face was peering in at him, it had vanished—but as he sat up, his every nerve alive, he witnessed a second apparition.

The murk outside the porthole gave birth to a hand that sank into the dim obscurity within, then reappeared, stamped momentarily in relief upon the gray circle, and withdrew into the foggy gloom that had yielded it.

Trent sprang from his berth. As his feet touched the floor, he heard a thudding sound on the deck; a low exclamation; running footsteps. At the door he fumbled with the lock, then stepped into the cross-corridor vestibule-way and rushed out upon the deck.

A nearby deck-lamp shone in the mist like a nebula-ringed planet, shedding paltry light upon moist timbers and begrudgingly revealing a pale turban as it disappeared around a projection of the deckhouse.

And there was not only one turban, for another followed the first!

Trent threw a glance right and left; broke into a run, his bare feet padding on the damp planks; paused at the corner of the deckhouse. A few yards beyond, a companionway spilled a plenitude of light. Voices came to him above the rumble of the steamer's screws; a woman's laugh. He stood motionless for a moment, hesitating; then, chagrined, returned to his cabin and switched on the light.

No recess from intrigue, even on the ship! Mystery ever at his heels. Was this another demonstration of the power whose hand he felt at Benares and Calcutta?

He fastened the wingbolts upon the brass-bound port-glass; pulled the curtain to insure against observation from outside. Not until then did the glittering object at his feet capture his attention. As he saw it a charge, as of an electric current, tingled the length of his body. It seemed unreal, impossible—until he picked it up. The contact assured him it was no vision, that he held in his hand a coral silver-chased oval with a broken clasp—the pendant that he had found in Manlove's dead fingers.

Cold anticipation settled upon him. He inserted a fingernail under the band that bound the oval; hesitated, stayed by a queer reluctance. He held what he believed to be a key to the mystery of Manlove's death. A single move and the name engraved within would be disclosed—the identity.... But suppose there was no name; suppose—

He pressed under the silver band ... and a knock sounded on the door.

3

Trent did not stir for a space of several seconds. Then, reluctantly, he placed the pendant under his pillow and opened the door.

A grotesque effigy grinned at him. After an intent scrutiny he recognized Tambusami—Tambusami, turbanless, blood welling from a cut in his cheek, but, despite the wound, smiling.

"I have him, Presence!" he announced.

"Who?"

The native looked amazed at what he evidently considered gross stupidity, and elucidated:

"The he-goat that came to your window! It was he who—"

Trent cut in. "Where is he?"

"There, Presence!"—with an indefinite wave of his hand. "By the wireless-house!"

"Why didn't you bring him here?"

"He is tied, Presence, to a—what do you call them?"

"Go watch him," Trent rapped. "I'll be there directly."

Trent slipped into trousers and coat and made his way aft, up a flight of iron stairs, to the turn of the promenade deck. There, in the zone of greenish light cast from the door of the wireless-house, he beheld a startling tableau.

Tambusani, in the grip of two white-uniformed men (from the wireless-house or the deck-watch, Trent surmised), was protesting and gesticulating excitedly toward a huddled figure by the rail. The latter was a native, bound to a stanchion with a pink turban-cloth, the end of which was stuffed into his mouth.

"I can vouch for that man," Trent announced crisply, coming up. "The other fellow"—pointing at the native by the rail—"is a thief. He tried to enter my cabin. My servant happened along and followed him up here."

He saw, then, that one of the uniformed men wore chevrons of gold sparks; the other was a deck-steward. To the latter he spoke first.

"Will you call the captain? I want a word with him.... Thanks." Then to the wireless-operator: "I'll take charge of this fellow now. And you might keep this affair quiet."

The operator smiled wisely (he didn't have to see credentials to spot 'em!) and withdrew into the room where the powerful machines buzzed and crackled.

"Now, you fellow," said Trent, removing the improvised gag from the "thief's" mouth. "Who put you up to this?"

Sullen eyes glowed. "Yonder devourer of pork lies, Sahib!"—with a venomous look at Tambusani.

"Son of a dog!" flung back the other. "Mohammedan whelp!"

"Stop it, both of you!" ordered Trent. "Tambusami, what have you to say?"

One hand pressed to his cheek, Tambusami explained.

"He is a liar and a thief, O Presence. It was he I caught in your room in Calcutta—who got away from me! I recognized him as he passed me in the steerage—and I followed. He went to your cabin and—"

Trent broke in, directing a question at the suspected one.

"Do you deny that?"

"I am an honest man, Sahib!"—sullenness giving away to fright. "That body-louse is a sink of lies!"

Trent pressed on. "Will you tell me who gave you that—? Well, you know what you dropped in my cabin."

"I am an honest man, Sahib! I was walking along the deck and—"

"Whose servant are you?"

"No man's. My name is Guru Singh. I go to Rangoon to—"

"If you're not a servant, then you had no business out of the steerage. I'm going to have you put in irons, and when we reach port you'll be taken up by the police—"

"No, no, Sahib! By Allah, I am an honest man!"

Trent reflected a moment before he spoke again. "You insist, then, that you didn't drop—something—into my cabin?"

"Yes, Sahib!"

The captain arrived at that juncture, a subordinate at his heels. Trent explained to him what had happened, adding—a shade too darkly, he thought—certain words that impressed upon that worthy officer his authority to conclude with: "And I want him locked up."

The captain gave an order to his subordinate, who hastened away, and Trent addressed Guru Singh in Hindustani, which he felt certain the master of the vessel did not understand.

"You would rather be put in irons than tell who your master is?"

"I have no master, Sahib!"

"Very well. We will see how you feel about it to-morrow."

Shortly two men appeared and led the protesting Guru Singh below—but not before Tambusami had rescued his turban-cloth.

"It is defiled," he said, looking at it regretfully and letting it drop over the rail.

"Come with me," directed Trent. "I'll take a look at your cut."

It was only a flesh wound Trent ascertained when they were in his state-room, and after bathing it in a sterilizing solution and binding it with an adhesive strip, he dismissed Tambusami with a brief commendation for his prowess.

"It is nothing, O Presence," declared the native, magnanimously. "With a lord who deals in magic medicines, why should not I watch over him, as a keeper over his cheetah?"

And the Englishman was not quite certain that Tambusami didn't wink as he went out.

Subconsciously, Trent had been thinking all the while of the coral pendant; now it filled his mind. Again he felt the chill anticipation. His hand shook as he jerked aside the pillow; shook, as he stared in blank stupefaction.

The oval was not there.

As yet scarcely believing, he stripped back the sheet; turned over the mattress; searched every crevice of the berth. But the pendant had disappeared. It rather dazed him. Stolen. Once more a mysterious hand had reached out and spirited away the oval. One thing it proved: that there were two elements at work, lurking elements. But how swiftly! He was gone only a few minutes!... Why in thundering hades hadn't he looked inside before he went on deck? What a monumental fool!

Which verifies for the millionth time the truth of a certain fable about an Equus caballus and a stable.

4

The next morning in the dining-salon Trent saw Dana Charteris, merely a glimpse—a smile and a nod. She was at a table across the room. However, later, as he was moving toward the purser's office, he came upon her aft on the promenade deck, elbows upon the rail, eyes upon the steerage. She turned as his step sounded behind her.

"Isn't it glorious?" was her greeting, motioning toward the sea where the sun had painted a glittering dragon on the intense blue.

"Quite," he agreed, having forgotten the purser in the eternal wonder of her eyes. "I hope you weren't ill last night?"

"Not physically. I was doing penance."

"I shouldn't think that would require all evening."

A smile. "Would you like to become father-confessor?"

"Perhaps."

She let her eyes rest upon him in a curious, contemplative look.

"How absolutely British!" she remarked. "An American would have agreed instantly, but you, being British, only commit yourself half-way."

"Isn't that diplomacy?" he asked, entering into her mood. She was revealing another side of her nature. Each time he saw her she unfolded more and bared to his gaze new and stimulating mysteries of her personality.

"Perhaps. But I sha'n't confess to you now—just for that.... I understand you didn't have a very quiet night."

The only surprise he betrayed was a tightening of the muscles of the jaw.

"Really?"

Her smile grew into a laugh. "Show some surprise, Stone-man, instead of trying to impress me with the fact that you've suddenly acquired an interest down there"—her white hand flashed toward the steerage. "You're wondering how I know it, and seething with curiosity. You wouldn't be human if you weren't."

"I'm not"—forcing a smile. "But if you wish it, then how do you know it?"

"Well, it's considered excellent marine etiquette to visit the wireless-house and worry the operator when one is bored—as I happened to be this morning in the interim between my rising hour and breakfast—"

"And as feminine charm is an 'Open Sesame' to the secrets of wireless-operators," Trent finished up, "this particular one told all he knew."

"Am I to accept that as flattery?"

"Is it?" he countered; then, eager to learn just how much she knew, he remarked casually: "Thieves are thick as mosquitoes in Asiatic countries."

"I know," was her unsatisfactory response, and, proof that a woman can be quite uncommunicative when she wishes, she diverted conversation into another channel. "I'm afraid, Mr. Tavernake, I've impressed you as being—well, a foolish flippant child."

His eyes met hers—barely a second.

"Why should you think that?"

She shrugged. "Oh, my endless talk of—of travel."

He took out his pipe, asked permission to smoke; filled the bowl and lighted it before he quoted:

She took him up: "Doesn't it go on with—"

He nodded. While she was speaking he thought of the andante appassionato comparison. Music always—she was that to him.

"Uncharted seas!" she repeated. "They've always lured me. I felt the call, but couldn't understand it until I read a tale several years ago. 'The White Waterfall' it was called. It seemed to open magic doors. After that, 'Treasure Island' again, and 'She.' Stevenson, Kipling, Conrad and Haggard—they are the masters that taught me the doctrine of Romance and Adventure. Oh, I've always wanted a crowded hour—excitement—the sting of winds not in books! I think after one excursion into the reality I'd be willing to settle back into my peaceful alcove of imaginings. Then I'd have food for my fancies—something to remember in the quiet that followed. Don't you think it would be alluring, in mellower years, to close your eyes and dream—of wanderings in the 'Caves of Kor'—or the time you spent on a pirate island?"

"It's youth," he philosophized to himself. "Youth craving the open spaces; hours of breathless living!"

"It would," he said aloud.

"But perhaps"—her voice sank to a dreamy tempo—"perhaps I'm having my adventure now."

(And many days passed before he understood what she really meant by that.)

Below them, in the steerage, a snake-charmer—a villainous-looking fellow with a scar across one cheek and a drooping eyelid—was making two cobras ripple to the sounds of a reed flageolet. The eerie, tuneless wails were reminiscent of the previous night when Trent stood on the same spot and looked below.

"What would you think, Mr. Tavernake," the girl began, her voice very solemn, "if you discovered that some one whom you trusted and believed your friend was secretly striving for the thing you were working for. Would you call it fair competition?"

He applied a match to his burnt-out pipe, then regarded her—quite as intently as she regarded him.

"Are you making me father-confessor, after all?"

She laughed, thus ending a very solemn moment.

"Good heavens, no!... But come, shall we take a walk?"

They tramped about the ship for nearly an hour; then he established her comfortably in a deck-chair and sat down at her side. They talked, mostly frivolously—conversation that only now and then carried a vein of seriousness. Not until after tiffin (he sat at her table, for she quite naÏvely suggested that he have the steward change his seat) did they part, she for her cabin, he for the purser's office, which place he suddenly remembered as his goal when he came on deck earlier in the day.

He consulted the passenger-list, lingering over each name in search of one that might seem likely as that of the person who had directed Guru Singh's activities. There were thirty-one first-class passengers, the majority English, with a scattering of Americans; the only Easterns were, namely, an Indian gentleman (Dr. Dhan Gopal Singh, of Calcutta University, his signature read), a Japanese and Hsien Sgam. Of the group only one seemed likely, and he by virtue of his name and nationality—Dr. Dhan Gopal Singh.

Trent then sought the captain and after a short conversation (during which he made a request that seemed rather extraordinary to the master of the Manchester) he visited the imprisoned Guru Singh. Abuses, threats, even promises of clemency, brought forth only: "I am an honest man, Sahib!"

His next move was to visit the steerage. A naked child with a ring in its nose begged for a gift; brown bodies lay asleep on mats; the cobras were still performing for the wicked-looking juggler. Stupid, unintelligent faces....

On the fore-deck a dark-skinned gentleman in European clothing was talking with the clergyman to whom the Mongol had expressed his beliefs the previous night. The former, Trent guessed, was Dr. Dhan Gopal Singh. One glance eliminated him as a suspect.

5

Toward dusk the captain of the ship approached Trent in his deck-chair.

"One of my men searched the steerage," he said, "and there wasn't a sign of the ornament you described." Then politely, if not a little curiously, "Was it of—er—particular value?"

"It had its significance," was Trent's meager reply.

"It's quite distressing, quite, to have thieves aboard. But in these waters.... Is there anything else I can do for you?"

There wasn't. And Trent went to his cabin to shave.

After dinner he and Dana Charteris walked another mile around the vessel; stood for some time in the bow, watching the flying-fish skim the glassy undulations in greenish, phosphorescent flashes; sat in their deck-chairs in the shadow of a looming cabin (and the spell of low-hung Oriental stars) and talked of inconsequentials.

For some time after she left, he sat sunken in cavernous absorption. He was aroused by a voice close by—a quiet familiar voice that asked if it were not a rare night. He turned to see a tall figure near his chair. Starlight dwelt on even mobile features, a high forehead, slender hands and eyes that looked inquisitively into his.

He answered that it was indeed a rare night. Whereupon Hsien Sgam politely enquired if he might occupy the chair next to Trent's. As he moved, the Englishman noticed that he slued slightly to the left—saw the twisted limb. The Mongol lit a cigarette. The flare of the match brought his face into ruddy prominence. In that brief moment Trent felt that ancient wickedness, refined to an exquisite degree, looked at him from beneath the bronze lids; then the match died and Hsien Sgam spoke in his quiet cultured voice, and Trent realized to what fantastic borders imagination can extend.

The Oriental asked perfunctorily if Trent intended to remain long in Rangoon, and ventured that it was a very quaint city; and, quite as perfunctorily, Trent responded that he wasn't sure how long he'd be in Rangoon, and that from all he'd heard it must be very quaint. Conversation threatened to pursue a dull course until Trent opened the subject of the political situation in Mongolia.

"Ah, Mongolia!" Hsien Sgam drew a deep breath. "It is there as it is elsewhere in the East. The Holy Lands, as you call them, are dead—sterile as eunuchs. Ghandi preaches—is Swaraj the word?—in India; China is locked in inner convulsions; Japan is a dragon with fire in its nostrils; Korea and Manchuria are but manikins that act as Tokyo directs; Siam, Indo-China, Malaya and Burma are the only peaceful spheres, and their people are children, thoughtless children. Asia has red wrath in her bowels. I am afraid for her. But Mongolia—you asked about Mongolia?...

"The world moves in cycles," the Easterner continued. "It is the inexorable law. Asia was at its—er—pinnacle about twelve hundred and twenty-seven; then Europe. Europe is dipping; next America—and after that?" The slender hands shaped into an oddly expressive gesture. "The failure of Sultan Baber was the beginning of a slow death for my country. Now there seems but one future—that of a base from which Japan can operate in Asia. Japan must have food, too, and already the Szechuanese and other border people have pressed into Mongolia and proved it fertile. And we have unworked mineral resources...."

"But Japan is apparently retrenching in her policy," Trent reminded him, finding himself interested. "What of the Allied Consortium?"

He imagined he could see a smile upon the Mongol's face.

"The Consortium is—forgive me—a bubble, a beautiful bubble with magic prisms and exquisite tints. Japan will see to it that loans to China are made as she wishes them."

"Japan improved Korea"—thus baiting conversation.

The reply came quietly, but vehemently. "Yes, my friend, Japan improved Korea. She scientifically reforested its mountains, built roads and railways, public buildings and sanitary houses.... But Japan slew soul to erect in its stead a structure without conscience or heart. Japan may improve China—but it is not for China, but for the time when Japan controls China and compels her four hundred millions to form a unit of her military organization."

Quiet ensued for a space. The myriad sounds that brew in the bowels of a vessel came to them—the jangle of bells, smothered by decks, and the ponderous, deep-throated roar of funnels.

"An example of Japan's purpose and her power is the cancellation of Mongolian autonomy," pursued Hsien Sgam. "When my people formed a government of their own, they expected the protection of Russia. But Russia failed. Semenov, the Cossack adventurer and agent of Japan, threatened invasion, and my people, frightened, appealed to China. The consequences you know. Hsu Shu-cheng, with four thousand troops, occupied Urga. Hsu forced the Hut'ukt'u to sign a petition returning Mongolia to China. Later it was learned that Hsu's troops were equipped with Japanese money."

Trent settled deeper in his chair, his eyes lifted to the roaring funnels where volumes of smoke were sucked up as by invisible vacua.

"But there is a key to supremacy in Mongolia," Hsien Sgam resumed. "It is the projected extension of the railway from Kalgan to Kiachta. Whoever finances that, thus linking China with Europe, through Mongolia, will be the sovereign power. Will Japan—or your Allied Consortium? I think, my friend, the former—unless it is prevented. And how can that be done?"

Trent took him up. "How?"

Hsien Sgam did not answer immediately. Finally:

"Mongolia can assert her rights—by force."

Trent lowered his eyes to the indistinct outline of the Mongol's face.

"She hasn't arms or ammunition or organization—and, furthermore, what good would a revolution do?"

Hsien Sgam answered the latter half of his question.

"It would give Mongolia self-government; and she could refuse a concession to any power to construct a railway through her territory. Organization? You spoke of that. No, they have no organization. But I have a dream—an ultimate—do you say Utopia? It is a union of the Mongols of Barga, the Buriats of Transbaikalia, the Chakhar tribe, the Khalkas, and even the Hung-hu-tzees, into a single unit—or, if you wish it, an empire. Tibet might be included. But that—that is only a dream. There is but one man who could possibly bring that about—and he is a pawn of China. The Dalai Lama...."

In the pause that followed, the glow of his cigarette showed Trent an imperial profile—like a bronze head of some Mongol conqueror he had once seen. A queer analogy struck him. Timur the Lame, who seared Asia with his vitriol. But there was an alien element in the likeness that he conjured—dust on the reflection. It haunted Trent and eluded analysis.

"The Church dominates Mongolia," the quiet voice went on, "and the Dalai Lama is its—how do you say it, Pope? He lost much power when the English drove him from Lhassa, but after years of wandering he came into his pontificate again. However, the President of China had a purpose in restoring him. He knew the power of Tubdan Gyatso—knew also that he would be safer in Tibet than Mongolia."

They smoked on. Presently Trent asked other questions, about customs and people and history. The subject swung to literature. Hsien Sgam talked at random of Chinese philosophers and poets: Confucius, Mencius, Lao TzÜ, Yang Chu, Kang-hsi. There were giant dimensions of mentality behind his speech. Every word was surcharged with restless energy; thoughts hot from the vortices of emotion. But, underneath, was a current of bitterness that surged up at intervals and injected into his usual calm a passionate, almost terrible, intensity. It was more evident when he referred to his affliction.

"My father, who was a prince of the house of Hlaje Khan, believed that one of his sons should be sent into your world and acquire learning and enlighten the people," he said. "I, being lame and never entering into physical activities, was considered a student—and I was sent. Among the elders it was looked upon as an honor, but those with whom I played as a boy and grew up.... Well, in Mongolia, as elsewhere, virtue is in muscle and cowardice in morality. I went into your world and—I say this with no meanness—it hurt me. I took back wounds. Many things I was taught, among them a realization of the truth of a certain Manchu proverb about women. Yes—I wonder, my friend, why I tell you this, but perhaps it is the night and the sea—a woman entered my life for the first time—a woman who came as a leopard and left the mark of her claws."

As he talked on, unfolding with a readiness that puzzled yet did not fail to interest Trent, the latter closed his eyes and smoked, and imagined he was transported, through some reversed medium of metempsychosis, across a dead interval of time and was listening to the voice of Timur the Lame. The stars drowsed above them, like sleepy eyes, and the ship was a dim, prowling world when they parted.

As Trent undressed he reflected upon the conversation with Hsien Sgam. He felt that he had looked upon a tragic anomaly in the person of the lame Mongol. Learning had refined his primitive impulses to a higher degree of intellectuality; affliction had warped his vision. Civilization, with him, was a varnish; he did not possess its essence. In a day less modern, when men were not so well equipped to kill one another, he might have risen to formidability; now, Trent felt, he could go no further than that group of idealistic radicals whose careers are meteoric, attaining little political significance and ending in the pathetic justice of a firing squad.

He wondered, too, if the encounter on deck was coincidence, or if Hsien Sgam had deliberately sought him. The Mongol would bear watching, he decided, simply for the reason that his own position was one of insecurity and tampering fingers might send it toppling.

Until he went to sleep the memory of Hsien Sgam haunted him, like the shadow of Timur the Lame cast down through the centuries.

6

Morning and another day of peacock-blue and gold.

After breakfast Trent visited the confined Guru Singh. The native was no more communicative than before but Trent did not press his point, for a better plan than blatant questioning had asserted itself.

When he returned to the deck he found Dana Charteris stretched out in her chair, her slim person a symphony in white.

"Good morning," was her greeting as she motioned him into the chair beside her. "I reached a very definite decision last night."

He smiled. Andantino con languore this time. There was a refreshing draught in the mood that he instantly felt—light, golden wine to the senses. Her eyes were like liquid amber.

"Really?"

"Yes. I used to think that all Englishmen were cold-mannered creatures and quite indifferent to their wives, as fiction has it. I've undergone a metamorphosis."

He continued to smile as he packed his pipe.

"Are you accusing us as a nation of polygamous practices?" he asked.

She made a grimace. "Please don't try to be clever or you'll spoil my opinion—and you know countries are judged by single representatives. I warn you that I'm in a desperately serious mood, despite all indications. As proof, I've been wondering if too much travel, too long a sojourn in foreign lands, doesn't affect one's ideas and philosophies—in other words, intoxicate one and leave a craving for the wine of exotic environment."

He contemplated the possibility that her remark was intended as personal; dismissed it; waited for her to continue. Which she did.

"Since you won't be human and ask why I think that, you force me to confess that I'm leading up to a—a personal example."

"Namely?"

"Well—yourself."

Another smile; he lighted his pipe. "Go on."

"Really, would you be satisfied in a prosaic English or American city—after—all this?"—with a vague gesture.

He didn't know; hadn't thought about it. Perhaps—perhaps not.

"I don't believe you would," was her opinion. "You've absorbed a certain amount of atmosphere that has poisoned you in so far as living elsewhere is concerned. I shouldn't be at all surprised, either, to learn that you think Indian and Chinese religions superior to ours?"

"Aren't they?"

"Are they?"

"You, yourself, spoke a few days ago, if I remember correctly, of the philosophies and doctrines of the East—doctrines that have nothing to do with mints or stock-exchanges, as you expressed it."

"Yes. But now I'm comparing the principles of religion—those adopted by our thinkers and real philosophers. Oh, we have our nobler types, who haven't been blinded by earth-dust! It may be a taint of the flesh in me, but I can't adjust myself to the belief that the ascetics and shrivelled yogis that I've seen are the proper habitations for pure spirituality. If the manifestation isn't wholesome, how can the inner conception be? You wouldn't fill an unclean vessel with holy water, would you? It's the methods and instruments through which the East voices its philosophies that I rebel against. That which mutilates, or even neglects, the body, can't be a true religion.... But really, I'm afraid I'm getting beyond my depth. What I originally intended to say is this: occultism is dangerous to those of the West, minds and bodies of a different substance than those of the Orient. I knew a man who became interested in theosophy. After a time he entered some secret cult that had a temple in the Himalayas. It grew to be an obsession, and now ... well, he tried to touch flames that were not conceived for man-tampering and they seared him."

Trent chuckled. "In other words," he said, "you're afraid I'm a Buddhist or a Mohammedan at heart, or, if by good fortune I'm not, you wish to warn me against exotic religions." Another chuckle. "It's flattering. What other conclusions have you drawn?"

"Just at present," she responded, smiling maliciously, "I think you're horrid."

He sobered. "Please go on. It's like looking into your house from the neighbor's window. I'm really interested."

"Or curious? Men who have not ventured into matrimony are, as a rule, inquisitive. And that suggests another question. It seems to me that one alone would be much more receptive to these"—she smiled—"these paganisms than one in union with another. Loneliness—that is, isolation—is food for heresies."

That showed him an old vista at a new angle. There was no misinterpreting her meaning.... Women. A few, but none of consequence; puerile passions and brief affairs of the starlight, never the full ruddy glow of a riper devotion, the finding of the One Woman.... And again, that might not have been her meaning at all. She—At a sudden inspiration he spoke—before he considered.

"Why, no, I'm not married, if that's what you mean."

She gave him a queer look—half smiling, half vexed. There was a faint suffusion of color in her cheeks.

"I'm not quite sure," she announced, swinging her feet to the deck, "but I've almost decided that you're impossible. However, I'll leave you alone to decide for yourself."

And she did.

7

At dinner Trent sensed a change in Dana Charteris. She was quite friendly, even inquired banteringly if he were angry because of the manner in which she left him that morning, but there was, invisible, indefinable, a reserve in her attitude that forbade a resumption of the former intimacy. This troubled him.

Later, on deck, he was brought out of his reflections by the sound of uneven footsteps. Hsien Sgam approached. He was dressed in white and seemed to Trent almost grotesque—the twisted limb and the beautiful, yet strangely sinister, face!

In the course of conversation he asked Trent's business. The answer brought forth a short discourse upon precious stones. He then touched the war—inquired if Trent had "seen service," as he termed it in a thoroughly Occidental way. Realizing that he was being catechized, Trent replied guardedly. In the East, quizzed the Mongol? No, on the Western front, Trent lied. In the infantry, Hsien Sgam assumed? Yes, the infantry....

Of course Trent had traveled a great deal, he presumed. Well, a bit, the Englishman admitted. If it were not too impertinent (thus the Mongol) he imagined Mr. Tavernake had not always been "of the trade." He had the appearance of—well, a soldier rather than a "business man"; one eager for ranges and color and action, so to speak.

It was then that Trent became more communicative. He was rather a soldier of fortune, he acknowledged; intrigue lured him. But the Mongol was as wary as he, for, perceiving the change in tactics, he turned the talk into another channel.

A few minutes later he moved on. Trent watched him limp off and puzzled over this anomaly of a man. What was his object in catechizing him? He could not even surmise; but he determined to take a drastic step toward finding out.

His first move led him to the purser's office. Closing the door quietly behind him, he said:

"I would like to borrow your pass-key a moment."

"Sorry, sir," came the polite reply, "but it's against orders. I can unlock your door—if you've lost the key—but—"

"Suppose you call the captain," Trent suggested.

"Tell him Mr. Tavernake wants to borrow the key. I'll be responsible for it."

While the purser was telephoning, Trent scanned the register. "Hsien Sgam—No. 227," he read.

"It's all right, sir," reported the purser, hanging up the receiver, a new note of respect in his voice.

Trent circled the deck, assured himself that Hsien Sgam was in the smoking-room, then went aft to cabin No. 227. A turn of the key, a glance behind into the vestibule-way, and he was inside. He locked the door; drew the curtain across the window.

A thorough search gained him little knowledge. Only clothing and a hand-grip containing perfunctory toilet articles; there were no letters, not even a passport. Evidently the Mongol carried all papers of importance upon his person.

Hardly assured, yet satisfied to a degree, Trent returned the key to the purser and made his way toward his cabin—and as he rounded a corner of the deckhouse he almost collided with Dana Charteris. She backed, half in surprise, half in fright, to the rail, and gripped the white enameled iron.

"Oh!" she flared. "You do appear at the most inopportune times!"

And she stalked past him, entering the cabin before he could recover himself enough to speak.

Perplexed, he continued to his state-room. "Inopportune, indeed," he muttered as he closed the door—for as she darted to the rail he saw her fling something overboard, an object that flashed white as it shot past the scuppers.

He sat down on the edge of the berth; filled his pipe.

What was she carrying that she did not want him to see? It could not have been of value or she would not have disposed of it in that manner. But....

He ran his fingers through his hair; puffed on his pipe.

Was it possible—? No, the very suspicion was preposterous; he was surprised that it should even occur to him. Yet, he acknowledged, a certain king of Ithaca believed in the beauty of Calypso. Forcing himself to face the situation, he reviewed his short acquaintance with Dana Charteris in a cold, scrutinizing light. The result was not altogether pleasing. Their midnight encounter on the portico at Benares was hardly reassuring, now that he looked at it through a different lens, nor was the meeting in the Chinese quarter, in Calcutta.... Intermezzo! Would it end in discord? He smiled grimly, confessing to himself that grave doubts (and, deeper than doubts, an ache that was not physical) had arisen from this new development. Had he been a fool?

He fortified his mind against such thoughts. What substantial reason had he to suspect that her interest in him was other than personal? (Personal! That word was fine ego.) The incident on deck—Well, he evaded, it might have been anything that she threw overboard, a handkerchief ... or.... At least, he would not be so unjust as to suspicion her—or anyone, he enlarged—upon such meager suppositions.

Only partially satisfied, he retired. He did not go to sleep for some time—and when he awakened in the morning, with the sun raining bronze needles at the blue sea, his first recollection was of the incident on the previous night. Considered in daylight, it lost its dark significance, but, nevertheless, made him vaguely uneasy.

This brooding discontent grew with the day. Dana Charteris was not in the dining-salon at breakfast, nor did she come on deck during the morning. He sat near her chair, waiting, his mind barred against either condemnation or justification. He would reserve his decision until he heard what she had to say. When she appeared (and it seemed that she never would) she could probably clear the incident with a few words, an explanation that would no doubt shed a light of absurdity upon his apprehensions.

But she did not appear, not even at tiffin, and he passed a restless afternoon. He walked the vessel from bow to stern, from bridge to the torrid depths where beings heaved fuel into her hungry stomach, impatient with the unseen forces that controlled his affairs.

He saw Hsien Sgam several times, but avoided him, for his mood was not a friendly one. A short interview with Guru Singh—who clung to the integrity of his honor—only served to irritate him, and a few minutes later when he came upon Tambusami, in the steerage, confabbing with the snake-charmer (he of the scar and the drooping eyelid) he snapped him up in his laconic way for having removed the dressing from his cut.

(And it would not have improved his mental estate had he seen the manner in which the snake-charmer's afflicted eye watched him leave the steerage.)

The sun sank. Its sullen crimson bled upon cirrus clouds; faded with dusk; was absorbed as night bound the sky with gauzy blue and stars came forth to cool the fevered pulse of day.

Trent had just taken his seat in the dining-salon when Dana Charteris entered. White shoulders rose above the silver-cloth and flame-blue tulle of an evening frock. The startling shade of blue challenged out the deeper tints of her eyes; her pallor was made more lustrous by red lips and russet-gold hair. At sight of her he felt the blood throb in his throat.

"I hope you haven't been ill," he said as he placed her chair.

She smiled in a rather strained manner, he thought.

"I've been a poor sailor to-day."

A pause; then he plunged. "I should like to have a word with you—alone."

She met his gaze unsmilingly. For a moment he thought she would refuse.

"There's to be a dance to-night—you knew it?" He shook his head. "Suppose I give you—the third?"

"I'd prefer not to dance," he returned solemnly.

"Then we'll go on deck."

8

The night was blue and moonless; no ordinary blue, but the clear, rich shade found in the depths of a sapphire, and it poured out as from an invisible fountain, blending the sky and sea; it caught a thousand stars in its flood and they, like diamonds cast into an unstirred pool, pulsed with lazy insolence above the oily swells.

Trent, leaning on the port rail, pipe between his teeth, heard the throbbing violins cease. He straightened up sharply. There was a patter of applause from the main salon; an encore. He knocked the dottle from his pipe and sauntered nearer the doorway; there he waited impatiently for the encore to end.

Once more the violins ceased; a ripple of applause. But the music did not resume. Several couples emerged from the salon. Dana Charteris appeared as Trent was within several paces of the door; paused a moment in the frame, her hair glimmering in the brazen light. Then she saw him; joined him.

"Shall we walk?" she asked. He thought there was a tremor in her voice.

"Yes."

Their mutual inclination led them toward the fore-deck. In the bow, beyond a monster coil of rope, they halted as with one accord. He stood looking out over the blue-black sea; she backward, across decks, at the huge funnels where smoke piled upward into darkness.

"Miss Charteris," he began, quite calmly, "I daresay you know why I asked for a word with you."

She was still watching the smoke. "I daresay I do," she replied, not so calmly.

He went on.

"I'm going to be frank—even abrupt. Will you tell me what you threw overboard last night?"

Silence followed. The big ship throbbed, but it seemed far away, part of another world; in his sphere there was but the girl, himself and the stars. He thought he saw her shiver—although it was not chilly.

Finally she spoke.

"Before I answer, there's something I must say. You are frank; I, too, will be frank." Her eyes shifted to his face. "I feel sure you're aware that I am not so stupid as to believe your name is Tavernake—or that you are a—a jeweller. Furthermore, you know I saw you in uniform in Benares. Your story about the brother was—rather flat." She smiled faintly. "I'm no child, Mr.—yes, I'll continue to call you Tavernake. I have imagination; I have guessed you are engaged in some sort of important work—work that you must not be distracted from. At first, I didn't care—particularly—or perhaps I was weak. So I let myself drift along. It's so easy to drift, isn't it?"

A new tone had come into her voice; a softer, more poignant quality. It carried to him a lofty exhilaration. He knew it was dangerous, yet, for the while, it thrilled him. The looming masts beyond the coil of rope were transformed, in his eyes, into the enchanted rigging of a dream ship.

"... So I took the easiest course—because I found you interesting. Then it suddenly occurred to me that perhaps I was interfering with your duty. I knew I must stop. I resolved to—to end our friendship as easily as possible, without hurting you—or me. I hoped, after my outburst last night, you wouldn't try to see me again; that you'd be angry."

She smiled; let her hand rest lightly, he knew unconsciously, upon his arm.

"You understand? To-day I was—well, afraid of you and of myself. I had my meals served in my state-room. But I realized I had acted in a way that would seem strange to you; so I came out to-night to explain. If I give you my word that what I did last night is of no consequence to you, will you spare me the embarrassment of explaining? It will be embarrassing, Mr. Tavernake, very. Yet it was such a small incident!"

Her hand slipped from his arm; she lowered her eyes. Trent, watching her, felt that at last he had explored to the inner shrine of that arcanum in her eyes. He saw altar-flames there.

"Don't you think it wise," she resumed, looking up, "that we discontinue our association—not our friendship—now, to-night? To-morrow, in Rangoon...."

Her voice died out in silence. They were quite alone, there in the bow, lifted, so it seemed, into a realm of blue starlight. Her face swam in the shadow, very close to his own. He obeyed an impulse. He took her in his arms; kissed her. Her eyes were closed, but an instant later the lids lifted. What he saw was not rebuke, but surprise, astonishment. Vaguely, from that other world, came the strains of music. It seemed an endless period before she spoke.

"I—I have this dance...."

She turned; paused, as if to speak; disappeared behind the coil of rope.

Trent did not stir for some time. Then it was to draw out his pipe. He lighted it calmly; inhaled the smoke. For at least a half hour he stood there, the wind in his face, smoking steadily. When he left the bow and moved aft to walk, to accelerate his brain, a figure emerged from the door of the smoking-room and joined him. A figure that limped, that fell in with Trent.

"I have been looking for you," the Mongol announced.

Trent smiled an amiable contradiction of his real feelings.

"Shall we sit down?" He halted.

"No. I merely wish a moment of your time to explain my actions of last night, and to ask a question."

The orchestra was playing, and the music came as a bitter-sweet reminder to Trent.

"Well?" and the word was almost abrupt.

"I presume you think me very inquisitive"—Hsien Sgam's eyes were upon him, watching him closely—"and I have been. But I had a purpose. I wished to sound you, as they say in America; to find out if your business connections were permanent, and—well, other things, too."

Silence followed.

"Suppose," the Mongol resumed, "I were to say that plans for such a—you recall what we discussed the other evening? Well, suppose I were to say I spoke the truth: that there is a possibility of my dream crystallizing into reality; also that we need men who have had military experience, who can command. Soldiers of fortune, as it were, to cast their lots with a worthy cause...."

Trent's eyes evenly met his. He smiled, very slightly.

"Are you—making an offer?" he asked quietly.

Another silence. Then Hsien Sgam laughed.

"Perhaps I am; perhaps I am not. But if you are interested, go to the House of the Golden Joss, in Rangoon, to-morrow night. I will be there."

And with that he limped off and vanished in the door of the smoking-room.

Trent stared after him. Presently he laughed, without humor.

Of a certainty, he told himself, there was madness in the night.

The Manchester swung into the Rangoon River some twenty hours late. Trent, who had risen early, saw the dome of the Shwe Dagon in the dawn, like a rippling flame against the purple haze. Before the ship dropped anchor, he sought the captain.

"I've decided not to press charges against the fellow confined below," he announced. "Let him go—but not until a half hour after we come to anchor."

The captain, his eyes following Trent's receding shoulders, reflected that he'd see the blighter in blazing hades before he'd let him off so easily. But, not being clairvoyant, he could not know that Trent had a few minutes before issued certain specific instructions to Tambusami.

Later, after Trent had concluded with the tiresome customs details, he saw Dana Charteris. She was preparing to go ashore. She wore the black hat with the sheaf of cornflowers and wheat about the crown, and her face, shadowed by the wide brim, had the pallor of ivory.

"I suppose I ought to say something," he began, halting in front of her, "but I don't know whether I want to ask your forgiveness for what occurred last night."

It was a strained moment, for both were painfully conscious. She averted her face.

"Perhaps," she suggested, "it would be better to say—nothing."

Then she looked at him; smiled; extended her hand.

Not until she was gone, a creature of white and russet-gold in the sunshine, did he remember that he did not know her address. This realization brought a new and enveloping sense of isolation.... Interlude! And this was the end—andante dolento!