Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Description: Montanye's only known full length novel. The text used is from the Australian Womens' Weekly, which published it as a supplement in a single installment. A gentleman crook travels the world looking for the artefacts of the title.

MOONS IN GOLD

C. S. Montanye

1936

Philadelphia Enquirer: Sunday Novel Supplement 4 April 1937

Australian Women's Weekly 18 Dec 1937.

C S Montanye's only known novel length story.

Published in hardback by Lippincott in 1936.

Contents

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2

Chapter 3 | Chapter 4

Chapter 5 | Chapter 6

Chapter 7 | Chapter 8

Chapter 9 | Chapter 10

Chapter 11 | Chapter 12

Chapter 13 | Chapter 14

___________________

One

PARIS flashed by in its eternal pursuit of pleasure. The singing lilt of its nocturnal melody crept in through the windows of a room on the third floor of the shabby Hotel Le Grand Due. The tall, slim, debonair man who was shaving by the dresser light whistled a bar of its gay music. His lathered brush kept time to the tempo of the tune. The rhythm seemed to inspire the gliding strokes of the razor that slid over his lean, weathered face.

He was careful to shave accurately around the narrow thread of the jaunty black moustache that gave him a measure of his careless, devil-may-care air. But when the blade moved to his sideburns he considered the grey at each temple with a frown.

"Youth!" he lamented. "Quicksilver in the golden bowl of time! A red rose fading in the garden of summer! Yesterday's wine, made sour by the hours. Stark tragedy, Tim."

The man he addressed was laying out a suit of evening clothes. He was short, stocky, bland and yellow-skinned. His slant eyes were the trademark of his nationality. In all respects Wang Shim was the model servant.

He laid his master's trousers precisely over the footboard of the bed and bowed.

"Youth," he announced, "is the rising sun that sets too soon."

The man who called himself Captain Valentine laughed.

"Perfect, my dear Tim. I may always count on you to supply the final simile. Now for a clean shirt and the streets of this Queen City."

The Chinese gestured.

"Honorable master, I can supply similes, but no shirt. The laundry did not return your package this afternoon. When I went for it at six o'clock stoutly barred doors prevented admittance."

Valentine glanced at the watch strapped to his left wrist. His eyes narrowed thoughtfully. For him the evening was of paramount importance. There was the matter of Baron Grunoff, the pretty singing girl of the Moulin Bleu, the business responsible for his fortnight in Paris. The hour had advanced. It was close to nine o'clock.

"Must my plans be ruined because of the lack of a shirt?" he inquired. "Must we struggle on in poverty because a laundry happens to be shut? Borrow one for me, Tim. The gentleman who resides at the end of the hall. I've seen him several times. His name is Crayshaw, he's British from his bowler to the polished tips of his capable boots, and he's my size and build. Ask Mr. Crayshaw to lend me a shirt."

The Chinese let himself quietly out of the room. Captain Valentine's lean face darkened. He was at the low ebb of his resources. Financial climaxes that never troubled him anywhere in the world invariably cropped up in Paris.

The door opened, Wang Shim came in. "The honorable gentleman was out. I knocked on many doors. The only one who offered a shirt was a small Frenchman on the floor below. I thanked him and declined, the cuffs were frayed."

Valentine fumbled in his kit bag. He produced a key. It was made of brass, the ingenious invention of a London locksmith who was serving a twenty-year sentence in an American prison. Valentine called the device a master-key. It opened all doors, solved the secrets of every lock into which it slipped. A hundred times it had more than repaid the large sum he had given for it.

"Wait here," he directed. "If our friend Crayshaw returns before I do engage him in conversation. Speak loudly so I'll hear you."

The hotel corridor was empty. Captain Valentine slid the key into the lock of the door of the darkened room at its end. He gave the barrel on the shaft a preliminary twirl. The key fit itself snugly into the wards and tumblers of the lock. A turn and Valentine stepped across the threshold.

He shut the door soundlessly and switched on a single light. The room was similar to the one he occupied. A small pile of luggage was heaped in a corner. The initials T.C. were on the bags. Continental hotel labels plastered them. Evidently Crayshaw was something of a globe trotter. Valentine went to the dresser, opened it and looked over the haberdashery it contained.

Almost the first thing he saw was a flat automatic of American manufacture. He pushed the blue steel threat of it aside and delved deeper into the drawer. He discovered, presently, a clean evening shirt wrapped in cellophane. Another drawer yielded a wing collar. He considered a small sheaf of correspondence pushed in behind the other collars. From where he stood he could see writing in purple ink on green stationery. A faint aroma of perfume floated from the drawer. He caught a line or two of distinguished chirography. "My dear Thomas: I will be in Paris―" Valentine pushed the drawer shut, snapped off the light and let himself out.

A minute later he was in his own quar-ters. He finished dressing, let the Chinese knot his black tie, and put on his collapsible opera hat.

"The Honorable Captain is not taking his service pistol?"

Valentine shrugged.

"This is Paris, Tim. We are part of a civilised pattern. You may clean and oil my gun when you have nothing better to do. Meanwhile, I am off to the carnival of night life. Don't trouble to leave a light for me. I may be late."

Twenty minutes later Valentine alighted in front of the Moulin Bleu on the rue de Douai. He purchased a ticket and went in.

THE girl was petite, dark and pretty. She had the face of a wondering child, the smile, fixed and stiff, of a bisque doll, the twinkling feet of a wood nymph.

Captain Valentine's flashlight pencil roamed over the playbill. He found her name. She was Clothilde Vallier, but they called her Chichi. He had heard something of her sudden popularity. Paris adored Chichi. She was feted, toasted, sought after. She gave the blase metropolis a new kind of thrill. Her lack of sophistication, her naive innocence and radiant smile became charms that aided and abetted her rise to fame and fortune.

And she, Valentine reminded himself, was the reason for the Baron Grunoff's visit to Paris.

The senile, aged member of an aristocracy that had become debris beneath warring guns of conflict, had found the second flowering of youth in the garden of Chichi's enchantment. A widower with grown sons and daughters, Grunoff came from his native Hungary to pay homage to the former milliner. Valentine knew that. He knew other things, too.

He turned and looked at the lower left proscenium box. Chichi had finished her song and was bowing in the round, amber glow of the spotlight.

Valentine got up and turned into the aisle. A troupe of negro musicians with strange, cacophonous instruments had taken its place before the curtain. He left the theatre to their bedlam.

The stage door was around the corner from the rue de Douai. The usual lounges idled at its portal. They stepped aside as the adventurer went past them. He spoke to the custodian who read an evening newspaper in a backless, rickety chair.

"Mademoiselle Vallier," Valentine said crisply. "Where shall I find her?"

The other hesitated, looked at him and supplied directions.

"Upstairs, m'sieu. The first door to the left. Her name is on it."

Stage hands were arranging the next scene behind the curtain. They tugged on ropes and pushed painted canvas into place. Two of them were rolling out a length of carpet. Others stood furniture in designated spots. Some girls of the ensemble in scanty, glittering costumes came down the stairs. They smiled admiringly at Valentine, whispered and laughed together.

He knocked on Chichi's door. A stout woman opened it. She spoke in French:

"What is it you want?"

"First," Valentine said, "a civil tongue. I must see Mademoiselle Vallier at once."

"Who is it, Luci?"

Over the woman's shoulder the adventurer smiled at the little lady of the chansonettes. She stood with a purple robe around her. Cold cream was smeared over her smooth cheeks. Her eyes were like dark stars in the white heaven of her pretty face. She clutched the robe more tightly, walking toward the door.

"You want to see me?" To the woman she said swiftly: "That is all, Luci. Come back in ten minutes."

"As you wish," the other grumbled.

Captain Valentine moved into the dressing-room. It was small, airless and warm. He rested against a trunk. He searched the girl's face. Her smile was no longer fixed and stiff. Her rose-red lips curved in a friendly, anticipative smile.

"Will you come and have supper with me, Chichi?"

She shook back her shining curls. "But who are you, monsieur?"

"An admirer."

She laughed. It was a low, musical cadence of pleased merriment. She sat down before the dressing table, giving him a sly, sidelong glance.

"I have so many admirers," she murmured. "They all wish to take me to supper."

"But you will come with me?"

She sighed, shaking her head. "Maybe some other night."

"You are engaged this evening?"

She made a quick grimace and hid it in another kindling smile.

"Yes"

"Engagements can sometimes be broken." "Not this one, monsieur. It is so important."

Valentine opened his silver cigarette case. He passed it to her, striking a match on the placard stating in French that smoking was prohibited.

"You supper with wealth, perhaps?"

"With the Baron Grunoff," she told him frankly.

Valentine's laugh was genuine.

"That old sack of bones! You, with your radiance and loveliness! Impossible! You will be wasting your time! Mademoiselle, let me beg of you―"

She blew smoke rings pensively.

"Out of the question. The Baron is also my admirer. Suppose he is old, what of it? You will be old some day, so will I. You will look like him―"

"Heaven forbid!" The adventurer's grey eyes mirrored amusement. "I can promise you something else, too."

"And that?"

"I will never wear a wig. Seriously, Chichi, where is he taking you? I would like nothing better than to dine at the same cafe and adore you from a distance. Good logic. If he thinks I'm interested he will be jealous and jealousy pays good dividends."

She turned the cigarette over in her slender, white fingers.

"I'm afraid you will have to be disappointed. I dine with him at his villa."

Captain Valentine feigned a sigh.

"Some other night then. I will come back here and get you. Possibly to-morrow."

Out in the stage door alley, the adventurer moved more quickly. The byplay of the dressing-room had had its own significance. Before he would be able to act he had to
know where Grunoff was taking the girl. So they were going to his villa. Rapidly, the adventurer computed the exact amount of his finances. Bois d'Or was some nine miles from the city. On the rue de Douai he chartered a taxi, settled back against the worn upholstery and brooded as the vehicle scuttled off toward the Golden Wood.

Valentine reviewed the events of the past month. It was quite by chance that he had learned the Baron Grunoff had withdrawn from a safe deposit vault in a Budapest bank his world-famed collection of opals. The jewels were known as the Moons in Gold. Their history had been fateful. Once part of a king's collection, they were fifteen of the most perfect Jewels existent. Opals set in virgin gold chalices! Opals steeped in romance, intrigue! Opals with the remembrance of bloodshed and death hidden deep within their iridescent depths. They were the prize above all other prizes that Valentine intended to capture.

They chugged through the hamlet of Muelle. Bois d'Or was no more than a mile further on. The landscape changed. Open fields gave way to wooded parks. Chateaux loomed up behind high gates. Gardens dreamed in the pale moonlight and once a dog ran out and barked after them.

A turn in the road and the taxi driver spoke over his shoulder:

"The residence of Baron Grunoff is here, monsieur. We have arrived."

Valentine alighted. He surveyed his surroundings quickly. He saw ivy-grown walls, gardens, terraces.

"Draw up the road, put your lights out, and wait for me," Valentine directed. "Double fare if you're discreet."

"That," the taxi driver announced, "is my middle name, monsieur."

Valentine went between tall bronze gates that stood hospitably ajar. He skirted the cut stone drive. He stopped and sniffed the faint reek of petrol.

Close to the house. Valentine melted into the shadows. There was a possibility a servant might be up and prowling about. He vaulted a low stone balustrade running parallel with a flagged terrace, cut sharply to the left and so came upon the many windowed jut of a conversatory. For a long minute the adventurer stood motionless. Finally he examined the windows for the presence of an alarm system. He found no wires it might be necessary to ground, but made an important discovery an instant later.

One of the windows was not only unlocked, but open to the night. More, a metal flower box had been placed accurately beneath its ledge to make a convenient step.

From the conservatory he stepped into a passage that brought him to a circular foyer.

The moonlight filtered wanly in, striking silver sparks from a crystal chandelier. Heavy rugs underfoot muffled his steps. A pair of graceful, leopard-seated chairs flanked a towering chest atop which an ormolu clock ticked sombrely with the dignity of its years. A spiral stairway curved up. Its delicately wrought rail was metal. At the foot of it Captain Valentine strained his ears. The single light he had seen from the roadway impressed itself upon his memory. But no sound came from the regions above. With a shrug he set his patent leather-shod feet in motion and mounted the stairs.

The landing he climbed to was broad. It ran in two directions from a point south of the stairs. Doors lined it. He looked for the light but found no sign of it.

Valentine used his flash briefly. He entered a room beyond the junction of the corridor. The door clicked shut after him, his torch moved about long enough to show him he was in a small smoking or lounge-room. Heavy portieres divided it from the chamber it connected with. Its windows looked out over the flagged terrace.

The minutes dragged past. From somewhere far away a train whistle shrilled. Valentine finished a second cigarette and consulted the luminous dial of his wrist-watch. What seemed an interminable length of time was, in reality, no more than fifteen minutes. He stiffened, his nerves tightening. The door of the room creaked, the draught grew more pronounced. Someone had come in, was passing behind him.

Quiet footfalls ended at the portieres. They fluttered as they were pushed open. A subtle drift of perfume trailed across the room. The adventurer's lean face hardened when he caught a breath of it. Somewhere, that same night, he had breathed the identical fragrance. He had no time to ponder its puzzle. He decided to learn who had gone through the portieres, what the purpose of the second midnight caller was.

Careful to make no sound, Valentine got up and moved through the dark shoals.

The adjoining room opened into a third chamber which, like the other, was shut off from it by the same drape of heavy portieres. It was a card room if the furniture were any guide. A light yellowed the carpet below the hang of the second pair of portieres.

Closer, Valentine parted their lustrous folds and peered through.

The first thing he saw was the villa's surreptitious visitor. It was a woman standing, silent and motionless, near a centre table. As the adventurer stared wonderingly, the full realisation of beauty impressed itself upon him. This woman was lovely, dowered with a glamor and charm so intense their magic held him in a momentary spell.

Then, suddenly he heard her gasp. Quickly, her hand darted to the lamp's dangling chain. Like a sun plunged behind lowering clouds, the light went out. A door opened and closed. Again the silence lay heavy and undisturbed.

Captain Valentine touched the button of his pencil torch, brushed the portieres aside and went into the room. It took him no more than a round of seconds to find and interpret the cause of the woman's alarm.

Sprawled in a corner, his face pressed to the sullen carpet, a man lay in a contorted heap. An ominous red circle welled from beneath his head. His outflung hands were closed in the tight, nerveless grip of death!

Two

THE handiwork of the Prince of Oblivion was no novelty to Captain Valentine. He had looked upon death countless times in his Journey along the adventure trail. He knew enough about it to decide the man on the floor before him had been dead at least an hour. But he was hardly prepared for what he saw when the yellow ring of his torch fell fully on the side of the dead man's face. Valentine turned him over. He bent closer, his eyes narrowed to slits. For an instant he thought there must be some mistake. Then he drew a breath, positive of the identification.

The man on the floor was the owner of the dress shirt the adventurer had borrowed earlier in the evening. He was the Thomas Crayshaw of the Hotel Le Grand Duc!

Captain Valentine investigated further. Death had been caused by some terrific blow that had struck Crayshaw's skull at a point several inches above his left ear. It had evidently been delivered by a blunt instrument. The wound was round with no jagged edges. He had been struck down from the rear, probably collapsing in his tracks without ever seeing his assailant. Valentine straightened up. From outside he heard the chug of a departing motor. The pant of the engine dwindled, but not before he recognised its tempo. Someone had borrowed the taxi he had arrived in from Paris! The woman?

His speculations ran the scale of surmise. In view of what had happened the matter seemed fairly clear. Crayshaw, a crook after the Grunoff opals, had come out to Bois d'Or to steal them. He had gained admittance to the house, and reached the room where the Moons in Gold reposed behind a barricade of steel. Then, someone who had either followed or been concealed in the chamber, had dealt death with unerring accuracy.

That much was obvious. But who was the killer? Who had snapped the thread of Crayshaw's mortal existence? And where, in the shadow drama, did the woman fit?

Captain Valentine moved his shoulders. The paramount question was were the Moons in Gold still in the safe? Had they ever been there? He remembered that all of an hour must have elapsed since Crayshaw had been done away with. Sixty minutes! In that length of time anyone might have leisurely solved the combination of the safe, removed the opals and driven away in a car with a leaky fuel line. Valentine went closer to the book shelves. He propped his torch up and gave the dial a preliminary twirl.

Part of his past successes had been due to his ability to solve the cryptic secrets of combinations. He possessed an intuitive, uncanny ability to read the click of a marking dial and mathematically figure out a string of numbers sufficient to open a strong box. He set to work, his ear tuned to the sounds his delicate touch on the knob inspired. He jotted down the first three numbers, stopped suddenly and turned his head.

On the driveway the pant of an approaching automobile grew louder with the passing seconds. Valentine stuffed paper and pencil in his pocket. The silk handkerchief he whipped out hastily rubbed away tell-tale fingerprints. The pencil torch snapped off. A dozen steps carried him to the window. He stared out, down into the night-ridden gloom bulking before the main entrance to the villa. A large, open touring car had stopped directly in front of it. Men were climbing out. In the glare of the machine's headlamps the adventurer saw the flash of uniforms.

Gendarmes! Police from Paris! He whirled around, cursing his luck as he made his way back to the first room. Had the woman notified them? He slipped into the corridor and peered over the metal hand-rail of the wide-margined stairs.

The crystal chandelier flowered into light. A voice ordered in French:

"Upstairs! Hurry!"

Valentine ran down the corridor. He found, as he had hoped, double glass doors opening out on a balcony. He exchanged the hall for the glazed tiles of the elevated verandah. Voices from the corridor told him the police had gained the landing. Heavy vines grew luxuriantly from the ground to the balcony on its western side. Buttoning his topcoat, the adventurer climbed down them. He adjusted his hat to its usual jaunty angle, put on his gloves, lighted a cigarette and sauntered around to the front of the villa. As he expected, a gendarme had been left on guard there.

Valentine walked up to him. It was too dark for the other to clearly see his face.

"What is this?" he demanded, in an annoyed tone. "What brought you here at this time of night? Who sent you?"

The gendarme moved his feet uneasily. "I don't know, monsieur. We―"

Valentine gauged the distance to the car He said impatiently.

"No excuse! Get me the one in charge― instantly!"

"But, monsieur―"

"Instantly!"

The gendarme turned, undecided. Valentine's left arm swung out and up. His fist crashed against the other's jaw. The blow had power and force enough behind it to send the gendarme reeling up against the stone wall of the entryway. He careened off it. Valentine's right fist administered a finishing punch. The man's knees buckled. Without a sound he dropped on the first step of the broad entrance.

"Henri! You, Duval! Who is down there with you?"

The question came from the balcony. Valentine sprinted to the car. He slipped in under the wheel, turned on the ignition, kicked the starter and roared down the driveway.

The adventurer abandoned the car at a spot where it would not be found until morning. He considered the idea of leaving a note of thanks for the Prefecture de Police, thought better of it and, several streets beyond, took a cab back to the shabby Hotel Le Grand Duc.

For the second time that night he used his master-key to gain admittance to Thomas Crayshaw's room. He was there no more than five minutes. He returned to his own chamber, turned on the low light in the lamp near his bed and removed top-coat and hat. He mixed himself a whisky and soda and dropped into a chair. After a minute he lighted a cigarette, his face an expressionless mask that hid a conflict of thought.

"To-morrow," Valentine said under his breath...

WANG SHIM brought Captain Valentine's breakfast on a covered tray from the restaurant down the street where his credit had been stretched to the breaking point. The servant's yellow face was bland as usual. He set the tray down, laid the four folded morning newspapers his master had ordered precisely beside him, bowed.

The newspapers contained no reference to Crayshaw's untimely death at the Bois d'Or. The adventurer let his meditative gaze roam out of the windows and across the rooftops below. He finished his breakfast and considered his wardrobe. For the excursion he contemplated he selected a grey flannel suit that had been made for him by Whiteside, one of Bond Street's most exclusive tailors. With it went a soft felt hat and the tan boots Tim had polished to a high lustre. The hour was something after eleven o'clock. Valentine picked out a light malacca stick and hung it over his left arm.

Outside the day was clear and cool. Paris sparkled. Stopping for a boutonniere, the adventurer walked as far as the rue du Pont Neuf. He turned a corner midway down its length and ascended the steps of an old-fashioned private house. The concierge admitted him. Valentine found himself in a pension little different from hundreds of others in the city.

"I should like," he announced, "to see Mademoiselle Ormonde. Is she at home?"

"Mais oui, monsieur. I will communicate with her. If you will wait― in here―"

He took the Captain's coin, ushered him into a musty parlor and went out. For a few minutes Valentine amused himself by looking at the curios in a glass cabinet that held a proud position between the front windows. He turned at the sound of the concierge's voice:

"In here, mademoiselle."

The woman who slowly entered the room had black hair, full, sensitive lips and a warm, exotic beauty. Again Valentine thrilled at the sight of her. He could remember no one in all the world who possessed such charm and allure. Beauty, in the past, had left him uninspired, disinterested. But with this woman, this Adele Ormonde, it was different. The sight of her aroused something indefinable, deep within him.

"You wish to see me?"

"You are Mademoiselle Ormonde?"

"And you are Captain Valentine."

"Exactly. I'd like to talk with you." She surveyed him impersonally.

"Concerning what, Monsieur Captain?"

Valentine smiled.

"Shall we say a spot known as the Golden Wood?"

She could not entirely conceal her startled surprise. Her red-lipped mouth parted. The dusky eyes retreated behind their long lashes. He saw her slender hand tremble.

"You are from the police?" she half whispered.

He shook his head.

"The police are my enemies. Mademoiselle, let us be frank. We may be of mutual help to each other. I know something about you. I know that the Thomas Crayshaw who was killed last night in Baron Grunoff's villa was in your employ. I know you were at the villa, discovered his body there, and departed hastily in a taxi I left waiting on the main road. You see, frankness is necessary."

She watched him intently as he spoke. Her expression turned from surprise to wonder. Her eyes seemed to darken.

"How do you know these things, Monsieur Captain?"

Valentine shrugged.

"There is no mystery to it. Last night I borrowed one of Crayshaw's shirts. He, as you know, has been living at the Hotel Le Grand Duc. I, also. In the drawer of his dresser were letters― from you. I took the liberty of removing them after I returned from the Bois d'Or last night. It was not advisable to let the police discover them. The address of this pension was on several of them."

She studied him intently.

"Why did you go to the villa?"

Captain Valentine smiled thinly.

"For the same reason Crayshaw went― to help myself to the Moons in Gold!"

He waited to observe the effect of his statement. Her expression was enigmatic. Her hauntingly beautiful face remained unchanged. She inclined her dark, lustrous head.

"I see. Then you are a― thief."

The adventurer took a fresh cigarette from his case and regarded her with an eagerness it was difficult to conceal. What was her nationality? Russian? He knew the Slavic type of woman. French? He shook his head. There was none of the gaiety of the Parisienne in her sombre beauty or mannerisms. She spoke French fluently, with a perfect accent, but he was confident she was not a native. Spanish or Italian? Again he moved his head negatively. Her nationality was as complex as her identity. Both were a mystery.

"Why was there nothing in the newspapers about Monsieur Crayshaw?"  she asked out of the silence bulking between them.

"The police are probably conducting a secret investigation. They often do. When they are sure of their prey they will make the matter public."

She looked across the musty room.

"Failure is not pleasant." Her low, contralto voice took on a hard, new note. "Monsieur, who could have murdered Thomas Crayshaw?"

Valentine touched the flower in his buttonhole.

"Anybody in the world. Perhaps you have an opinion."

"I have."

He bent to her inquiringly.

"Is it one you would care to share?" She laughed.

"With a self-avowed enemy? Hardly."

"Meaning, you have no wish to impart any information that might aid me in getting back on the trail of the opals? In other words, you feel reasonably certain the Moons in Gold were taken from the Baron's villa last night before our arrival there?"

"I am sure of it!"

Valentine consulted his watch.

"In that case," he murmured politely, "there is nothing for me to do except say adieu and bow myself out of the picture."

"A minute, monsieur." When he turned to her she smiled for the first time. Her face lighted. Some of the reserve that gave her the intense beauty and strange glamor vanished. Her hand crept out and fell on his arm. It was perfect with its slender tapering fingers and white skin. "Perhaps we can strike a bargain. All should be fair in our trade, monsieur. No favorites, no favors and the reward to the cleverer one."

"You are suggesting―"

There was a challenge in the look she gave him when she made her eyes level with his.

"I have a slight clue. To follow it I need a man's help. If you will assist me you are at liberty to use whatever information you may be able to obtain. I shall not hamper or hinder you, but I will give you fair warning. I intend to find the opals. To do so I will use every effort to frustrate you. You understand?"

"Perfectly, Mademoiselle Ormonde."

She got up, confronting him. The previous night, viewed through the crack in the portieres, he had thought she was tall. Standing beside him her shining crown of raven hair hardly reached his shoulder. He was conscious of her subtle charm, more pronounced, more bewildering to his mind and senses than ever.

"You don't like the idea?"

"On the contrary, I accept your terms without reservation. I will help you in anyway you suggest."

"Knowing I will trick you at the first opportunity?"

Valentine threw back his head and laughed.

"My dear lady, I am no novice in this game we play. I am, as it happens, an old hand. Trick me, indeed? I will enjoy the experience."

She moved her hand from his arm.

"Come back at four o'clock this afternoon. You may take me for a cocktail at Leuchars' American Bar."

The adventurer bowed over her hand. "At four, Mademoiselle Ormonde." "You will not forget?"

"It is something," he assured her gallantly, "I shall think of with pleasant anticipation."

WHEN he turned into the Avenue Montaigne, Valentine continued on as far as the jewellery shop of the famous Hatzfeld. The establishment drew him to its windows like steel filings to a magnet. Behind protecting bars jewels made an iridescent bonfire on a background of purple plush. Watches, brooches, bracelets, tiaras, diamond pendants, rings, chains of sparkling jewels and the nacreous shimmer of pearls. The adventurer mentally put the price he could obtain on various items in the assortment that captured his fancy. He was busy with his game of valuations when in the polished plate glass of the window he saw a car draw up and stop at the kerb.

The next minute a liveried footman climbed nimbly out, opened the door of the limousine, and assisted the Baron Grunoff to alight.

Valentine waited. He walked as far as the corner and back. Five minutes had elapsed since the Baron had gone into the shop. The Captain went through its revolving door. The establishment's elaborate setting was modernistic. Glass, chrome, corn-yellow damask on walls and chairs. A lavender rug sprawled underfoot. The salesmen were suave, frock coated. The atmosphere was one of exclusive luxury.

The Baron Grunoff sat on a long bench toward the rear of the shop. His upturned silk hat. gloves and stick were beside him. His wig looked freshly brushed. In one claw-like hand he held a diamond pendant suspended on a glittering chain. His fingers caressed the jewels lingeringly.

"Let me see something else." His voice was cracked thin. "I want the finest pendant you have."

Valentine hovered beside him. He asked to see a string of pearls. A salesman brought a case. The adventurer leaned over the counter. Thoughtfully he ran the pearls through his fingers, feeling their texture, weighing them speculatively. To obtain better light he apologetically pushed aside some of the diamond chains and pendants the Baron had been considering. His elbow brushed two of them to the lavender rug. When he leaned to retrieve them his knee touched the Baron's cane. That, in tum, upset the silk hat on the bench.

Valentine murmured his regrets. He returned the hat to its former position and put the diamond chains back on the counter. Turning to the pearl strings he spent a few more minutes appraising them.

"I think," he decided, "I will bring the lady in and let her make her own selection."

Outside, the adventurer walked north. He signalled for a taxi.

"Park across the street from Hatzfeld's," he directed. "There is a limousine in front of the store. When it leaves I want you to follow it. You understand?"

"Perfectly, m'sieu."

No more than ten minutes elapsed before Baron Grunoff came out and crossed the pavement. The footman helped him into his car. It purred away. Valentine's taxi backed, turned and started briskly after it. From the Place de la Concorde the limousine hurried down the rue de Rivoli. It continued on a half-dozen streets before it drew into the kerb before a small hotel.

When Valentine entered the building he was In time to see the Baron disappear in a creaking lift. He went to the clerk's desk.

"Mademoiselle Vallier I have an appointment."

"Her suite is on the third floor."

"Thank you."

At Chichi's door Valentine looked up and down the corridor. No one was in view. He listened before he used his master-key. The door he warily unlocked opened into a small ante-chamber. Flowers decorated a vase on a table. There were one or two chairs, a mirror. He could imagine Chichi using the glass for a last happy glance before she let herself out.

He smiled thinly. On the table Baron Grunoff's silk hat, gloves and cane were conveniently laid.

"You will come to luncheon with me, my dear, I have a surprise for you. Such a surprise!"

Grunoff's cracked, thin tones floated down the hallway.

"Tell me what it is," Chichi pleaded.

Captain Valentine picked up the Baron's silk hat. He turned it upside down. Like a prestidigitator about to produce rabbits he tapped it twice, reversed it and deftly caught the diamond chain and pendant that slid from its side lining.

Five minutes later the taxi-driver opened the cab's door for him.

"Where now, m'sieu?"

Out of memory Valentine produced the address of a dealer in stolen Jewels whose prices he knew were fair and honest.

"Rue du Debarcadere," he directed, "number six."

"I AM," Captain Valentine murmured, "overcome with curiosity."

Adele Ormonde set her silver cocktail cup on the small table between them. She dipped the long ash from her Russian cigarette. For a minute she listened to the weaving strains of the stringed orchestra that played from four to six in Leuchars' rococo foyer.

"Without some curiosity," she said, "nothing would be accomplished."

"True. It is the key that unlocks a thousand mysterious doors."

The woman raised her dark eyes.

"What door do you wish to open, Monsieur Captain?"

"Need you ask? I've been trying to solve you since I saw you last night at the villa."

Her gaze was enigmatic. "You have succeeded?" Valentine laughed.

"To the contrary. You leave me completely baffled. Who are you, mademoiselle? What are you?"

Her smile mocked him gently.

"Questions you must answer yourself."

"I suppose so. Let us turn from that locked door to another. What is the clue you spoke of this morning?"

Her red tipped fingers toyed with the cocktail cup. She made sure she was not overheard when she spoke again.

"I saw Thomas Crayshaw two nights ago. If you read my letters to him you are familiar with our rendezvous here in Paris. The other night he told me he had an assistant, an aide."

She stopped, her dark head averted.

"Who was the aide?"

"A man known as The Rat. Perhaps you have heard of the Court of Beggars on the Left Bank?"

Valentine nodded.

"Of course, it is a paradise for thieves." Adele Ormonde drew a breath.

"Crayshaw found The Rat there. He knew him. Once or twice The Rat had helped him in the past. He used him this time to watch the villa at Bois d'Or, to run errands, drive his car."

Captain Valentine selected a cigarette from his silver case.

"What else?"

"The last time I saw Thomas Crayshaw alive," she continued, "he told me he thought he had made a mistake. He said he didn't trust The Rat, I think―"

"You think The Rat might know something?" he added, when she paused.

"I am sure of it."

"To go to the Court of Beggars you need a companion."

"A man."

"And I am that man?" Captain Valentine stood. "I am at your service, Mademoiselle Ormonde..."

Three

THE cab that took them across the city rolled toward the Pont Neuf. Valentine felt a tingle of expectancy.

The Captain looked out of the window beside him.

"We are close to our destination. A word of advice. Keep a tight hold on your purse, mademoiselle. There are many light and clever fingers in the place we are about to penetrate."

The cab stopped. The neighborhood, even by day, was unprepossessing. Warehouses and dingy buildings, old as time, huddled together like aged, decrepit men. Valentine was familiar with the section. He cut through an alley between one of the warehouses and the sprawl of a building used for the distribution of hotel supplies. They passed through a rear yard where trucks backed on a structure housing impoverished art students. Windows were thrown open to catch the breeze. A piano played a melody with monotonous regularity. A voice lifted in song came down to them distantly.

Valentine pushed open a door in a corner of the yard. Adele Ormonde carefully picked a way between puddles of oil and petrol. She looked around curiously at the high-walled enclosure they entered. It appeared to be a storage space for the district's refuse. Mouldy, broken furniture. Quantities of lead and brass pipes. Barrels of glassware and cracked crockery. Bales of mangy carpets. Pictures, lamps, bric-a-brac. Chandeliers of all ages and descriptions.

"The junk shop of the wealthy Monsieur Lesearte," Valentine explained. "He made a fortune out of the trash of Paris. This way, mademoiselle."

Another door opened into another alley. From there they went down some steps and came out in a cobbled courtyard.

Valentine walked as far as the north side of the courtyard. A crumbling stone building with latticed doors was a hive of grumbling conversation. The adventurer slipped his arm under Adele Ormonde's. He opened the double latticed doors and passed into a low-ceiled, wanly lighted room. It was crowded with men drinking at a narrow bar, lounging in chairs, sleeping in bunks along the wall or staring apathetically at the filthy floor. The reek of tobacco and alcohol mingled with that of unwashed skins. On every hand the adventurer caught the sly, furtive glances cast in their direction.

"We're looking for The Rat," Captain Valentine said to one of the men serving drinks at the bar. "It is important we get in communication with him at once. Is he here?"

"He's upstairs― sleeping. I'll get him for you."

The man spoke to a thin, gaunt youth whose chin was black with beard stubble. Valentine chose a spot to wait close to the doors, where the air was better.

The Captain's gaze focused on the rear of the place. Presently the one who had gone upstairs returned. He was followed by a wizened, undersized man who rubbed sleep from his deep-set, red-rimmed eyes. The Rat was a chinless individual, dark, thin-faced and shabby. He wore a striped jersey, brown trousers and cracked shoes. The tang of whisky hung about him.

"You wanted to see me?" he began.

"Outside," Valentine said.

The Rat's crafty glance roamed over Adele Ormonde. It centred on her leather handbag.

"What do you want to see me about, m'sieu?"

"Come out and I'll tell you. There's nothing to be afraid of."

The Rat moved his shoulders. "I have nothing to fear."

In the courtyard the woman turned swiftly.

"I'm willing to pay for information," she said. "You will come with me. I will make it worth your while. I have some questions to ask you."

The Rat frowned at the adventurer. "Is it all right, m'sieu?"

Captain Valentine laughed.

"Certainly. Don't you trust the lady? I thought you said you had nothing to fear. Do what she asks. However," he added, "I would make her pay well for the information she wants."

They went past the refuse and trash and into the yard where the trucks stood. Another minute and they were through the alley and back on the street. Valentine opened the door of the cab that still waited at the kerb.

"I hope, he said, "I may be permitted to ride with you. Conveyances are scarce here and it is getting late.

Her smile was as bland as her voice.

"Of course you shall ride with us, Monsieur Captain. One minute while I speak to the chauffeur. I know a place where we may talk quietly and without danger of being overheard.

She consulted with the driver. The Rat climbed quickly into the cab. The adventurer stood beside the open door. He was conscious of something in the depths of her eyes when she passed him to enter the vehicle. He caught the subtle drift of her perfume.

Then, so rapidly that he was taken completely off guard, the door was yanked out of his hand and slammed shut. Simultaneously the cab, with a burst of speed, shot away. Valentine leapt for the running board, missed it and stumbled to his knees.

The next instant the vehicle had disappeared around the corner.

BACK at his hotel, Valentine found Wang Shim busy with a small electric iron and one of his best shirts. The Chinese held all laundries in contempt.

Valentine shut the door.

"I have work for you, Tim." "I am honored."

"You know the Court of Beggars?"

"Like the wrinkles on my father's brow." The Captain moved closer to him. He lowered his voice.

"Among the habitues there is one who answers to the name of The Rat."

"Names often reveal characters," Wang Shim murmured.

"I want you to find this Rat," Valentine explained. "Find him and bring him here."

Wang Shim's bland yellow face remained expressionless. Only a note of inquiry in his voice betrayed his surprise.

"At what hour?"

"Immediately, as soon as you can find him. He's a covetous person. It shouldn't be hard to excite his avaricious fancies. You might tell him you know of a wealthy Englishman whose rooms are open for plundering. Offer him half of what is obtained. He'll come along readily enough."

Wang Shim put on his hat. "To hear is to obey."

The room darkened. Lights across the street broke out in yellow smears. The rumble of the evening traffic increased. Somewhere a clear soprano voice sang a familiar aria from "Faust." Not until he heard footsteps in the hall, did the adventurer move. He stood, taking up a position to the left of the door. When he recognised Wang Shim's quiet footfalls he clamped his fingers around the heavy butt of his service pistol.

"I have a key," he heard the Chinese say.

"Hurry!" another voice ordered in French.

"Here!"

A key clicked. The door opened. The familiar scent so noticeable at the Court of Beggars drifted to Valentine. A man passed him. Wang Shim shut the door and locked it from the inside.

"Make a light!" The Rat rasped.

"Darkness hides a thousand eyes," the Chinese stated quietly.

He turned on the reading lamp. Captain Valentine closed in on his visitor. The nose of his gun bored into the other's back.

"Good evening, Monsieur le Rat. I am the wealthy Englishman you have come to plunder. Sit down. I want to talk to you. But first― his knife, Tim. You will probably find it up his sleeve."

The man's deep-set, red-rimmed eyes narrowed. His thin face shadowed when Wang Shim lifted his striped jersey and took a short-bladed dirk from his belt.

"What do you want of me now?"

Valentine shoved the service pistol back in its scabbard.

"The same thing Mademoiselle Ormonde desired― information. The difference is that she paid for hers, I shall obtain mine gratis. You understand?"

"I don't know what you're talking about." The adventurer nodded to Wang Shim.

"There should be a premium for stupidity of this kind. What do you think, Tim?"

"A stupid man takes everything for granted," the Chinese replied. "Our guest was suspicious from the instant I encountered him. Great persuasion was needed to invite him here."

"Naturally, inasmuch as he has money. It might be a good Idea to learn the approximate amount Mademoiselle Ormonde paid him. Turn his pockets inside out."

In a minute or two a stack of crumpled money littered the table.

"The cache is empty," Wang Shim announced.

Valentine stirred the money with a finger. "A thousand francs. What did you tell Mademoiselle?"

The Rat blinked.

"I don't know what you are talking about."

Valentine turned.

"Go down into the street," he directed Wang Shim. "Return with a gendarme. We will have this reticent gentleman locked up."

"You can't frighten me," The Rat said thinly.

Valentine dipped the ash from his cigarette.

"No one is attempting to do that. I have given you an opportunity to speak. You have refused, that is all."

The Rat's face mirrored a cunning look. "I suppose you will tell the police I broke in here and robbed you of that money. M'sieu, it won't work. There are a dozen people at the Court of Beggars who saw me leave there with your man."

"ROBBERY," the Captain informed him, "has nothing to do with it. I am quite sure the Chief of Surete will be interested to know exactly what part you played in a certain murder at the Bois d'Or."

His words had the desired effect. The Rat seemed to shrink into himself. His hands moved uneasily along his baggy, corduroy trousers. For a minute he stared into the adventurer's cold, mobile face.

"You would not dare― "

"Get a gendarme!" Valentine said to Wang Shim.

"With despatch, Honorable Sir."

Wang Shim picked up his hat. The Rat stood quickly.

"Wait! Monsieur. I will tell you all I know. I worked for Monsieur Crayshaw. He wanted particulars concerning Baron Grunoff's villa. Through him I found employment as a gardener there. He paid me little. Monsieur Crayshaw did. He was tight-fisted, stingy. Is it any wonder that when the other gentleman approached me I listened to him? He was exactly the opposite of Monsieur Crayshaw. He was generous. There were no strings on his purse."

Valentine bent forward.

"Who was the other gentleman?"

"A Monsieur Ravenel, a Robert Ravenel."

"This Ravenel came to you at Bois d'Or?"

"Yes, one day while I was in the garden. He made an appointment to meet me here in Paris on my Sunday off. Why shouldn't I have served him? He paid me more than Crayshaw."

"Of course. One more thing. Think carefully and be truthful. Where did your Monsieur Ravenel live?"

There was a pause. The Rat shook his head.

"He never told me."

"I think," Valentine said curtly, "we will have to have that gendarme after all."

"M'sieu, I swear I do not know!"

There was a ring of truth in the Rat's harsh, vibrant cry. The adventurer faced him.

"Where did you meet him on your Sunday off?"

"At Bergeau's, on the Street of the First Shell."

"I know the place," Wang Shim said softly.

Valentine thought fast.

"Keep our friend company for a half hour, Tim." He handed over his service pistol. "In thirty minutes turn him loose. You may return his money. After that begin packing."

Wang Shim bowed.

"The fox speaks and the rabbit hastens to obey. We are about to journey again along the endless road?"

"I have every reason to believe such will be the case."

With a glance at the slouched figure of The Rat, Captain Valentine let himself out of the room. He went down to the street. For the first time in hours expectancy was like a stimulant. Robert Ravenel! Bergeau's! At last he had a definite lead, a clue that meant something. He directed his steps toward the narrow, twisting Street of the First Shell.

Bergeau's was half-way along it. A famous restaurant and cafe, highly favored by tourists, the place was still thronged with its dinner crowd when Valentine reached it. He was confident of success. He had money again and nothing had quite the Open Sesame effect of ready cash.

A busy head-waiter paused long enough to take the tip the adventurer thrust into his perennially cupped palm.

"You know a certain Monsieur Ravenel?"

"Oui, m'sieu. Until lately he dined here nightly."

"I am to understand he no longer is a patron?"

"Exactly, m'sieu. From what he said Wednesday night, Monsieur Ravenel has left Paris."

Valentine nodded. He expected as much. With the opals in his possession there was no reason for Ravenel to loiter in Paris.

By this time he had put many miles behind him.

"One thing more. By any chance do you happen to know where Monsieur Ravenel resided?"

The head-waiter lifted a brow.

"It is queer you ask me that, m'sieu."

"Why?"

The man shrugged.

"Because, earlier this evening, a lady made the same inquiry."

"What did you tell her?"

"The same thing I will tell you. To the best of my knowledge and belief Monsieur Ravenel had an apartment on the rue Adelphi, number forty-eight. Once he telephoned, asked that dinner and a bottle of wine be sent him there."

The captain added another banknote to the first.

"You are," he said, "a person of real ability."

The taxi Valentine picked up was in the rue Adelphi within ten minutes. The street ran north and south, cutting across the Avenue de Brissac. Number forty-eight was a three-storey building of respectable appearance, divided in the new Continental manner into small suites that were leased furnished to transients. Ravenel's name appeared in the foyer directory, but had been crossed out with a single pencilled line. Valentine noted the apartment number and went up to the second floor.

The adventurer knocked on the door. There was no answer. He dropped a hand to its knob. It was unlocked, proof that its tenant had departed, that anyone interested in the suite was welcome to enter and inspect it.

A centre gas fixture responded to the match Valentine struck when he went in. He found himself in a small living-room, tastefully though inexpensively furnished.

A desk caught and arrested the Captain's attention. He went to it. It was a stout, well-made piece, built of Flemish oak. With true French thrift the landlord had saved the hardly used blotters, ink bottle and two pens on the rack. Valentine looked at the waste paper basket under the desk. That had been emptied. Not even a scrap of paper was visible within it. He stood there, his lean face meditative, his eyes musing.

At length, he fished out the two blotters and looked at the few ink marks on them. Once, following a custom anything but novel, such a blotter had betrayed an important secret. He took both into the bedroom and held them in front of the dresser mirror. The antiquated trick revealed a broken line or two of writing.

Plane from Le Bourget sometime

Twice the adventurer read the words. Then, as he dropped the blotter on the bureau, his hand darted out and turned off the light. A fraction of a second later the warning creak of the door he had heard gave way to the sound of voices.

"Ha! Somebody has left the light burning!" a man said.

"This is where Monsieur Ravenel resided?" an authoritative voice inquired.

"Right here, monsieur. An excellent tenant. Quiet, orderly and prompt with his rent. I never had any cause for complaint in the fortnight he was here. What has he done that you should be interested in him?"

The second man ignored the question. "I will look around," he stated briefly.

Captain Valentine glided to the window. Fortunately it had been left half open to air the room. He looked out. There was enough light for him to determine that the stone ledge jutting out between the first and second floors was not too far below to reach. He blessed his height as he slid across the sill and lowered himself against the side of the building. His strong fingers clutched the edge of the sill.

How long he remained there Valentine had no accurate way of deciding. His hands grew numb. His arms ached. His feet were hot and cold by turn, but he knew what it would mean if he were discovered. The two men who entered were the landlord and a police officer. To Valentine the visit was significant. Already the Surete had struck his lead.

Something winked out in his face. The distant slam of a door confirmed the impression the light in the living-room of Ravenel's suite had been extinguished. The Captain straightened up. He took a fresh hold on the sill, urged himself sinuously up to it, swung a leg over and dropped down on the bedroom floor.

As he did so the voice, spiced with the note of authority, came out of the gloom. It said:

"Stand where you are, monsieur! Do not make a move!"

Four

"WHAT is it you want?"

"You, monsieur! I thought you'd come creeping out of your concealment! One moment while I make a light. I warn you, a single move and I will shoot!"

Through Valentine's mind the thought of the empty closet with the open door surged sharply. He heard the police officer fumbling for what was probably an electric torch. That meant one of his hands at least was engaged. If there was ever a moment of certainty in which to act it was the sixty seconds ticking off in the darkness.

The adventurer's lunge carried him half-way across the room. He struck an invisible object with the force of a catapult. A grunt of surprise was synchronous with the clatter of a falling gun. Before Valentine's onslaught his adversary, taken off guard, had little chance to offer much resistance. The Captain's fist smashed off the peak of the officer's jaw. His right thudded against that portion of the anatomy between the ribs. Both blows, with all of Valentine's power behind them, sufficed.

The man collapsed with a choked gasp. The adventurer caught him before he slumped to the floor. It was the work of a minute to bundle him into the closet and shut the door. With a breath Valentine pulled down his waistcoat, adjusted his well draped coat and let himself out of the apartment.

He turned towards the Avenue de Brissac and from there made a hurried way to the rue du Pont Neuf. The danger of being followed was slight.

His mind came back to the business at hand as he ascended the steps of an old-fashioned private house that had come to be familiar to him. The same concierge he had spoken with on the occasion of his first call admitted him. This time the man knew his purpose and spoke quickly:

"Mademoiselle Ormonde has left, monsieur."

"I thought as much. By any chance did she furnish you with a forwarding address?"

The concierge rubbed his chin on the back of his hand.

"You are Monsieur Valentine? Mademoiselle left a letter for you. One minute, I will get it. I have it in my hutch."

He came back and handed the adventurer an envelope.

"What time did Mademoiselle depart?"

"Directly before dinner, monsieur. She returned and seemed in a hurry. Her orders flew thick and fast. Tina helped pack her trunks. Phillipard called for them in his express waggon. Pouf! In an hour she was gone― like that!"

The man snapped his fingers. Valentine jingled some coins in his pocket.

"And this Phillipard; he, naturally, is aware of the trunks' destination."

"I know, too, monsieur."

The coins changed ownership. "Where were they sent?"

"To the storehouse, to be held until Mademoiselle Ormonde gives further orders."

But he had a letter.

To Valentine that was of supreme importance. For all of her casual air of transcience, she had not forgotten him. He began to feel an inner glow. His imagination warmed, drawing her close to him in fancy. It was so easy to remember her vivid, exotic beauty. Hair of raven black. Eyes that were twin pools of midnight mystery, lips colored with scarlet allure. He wondered if he had fallen in love― if, at last, the one thing that had meant so little in his crowded, adventurous life had blossomed in his heart.

He withheld the temptation of opening and reading Adele Ormonde's note until he returned to the Hotel Le Grand Duc. Wang Shim had completed preparations for their departure. Valentine's luggage was neatly lined up on one side of the room. The Chinese sat before the open window, placidly smoking a cigarette.

He snapped it out into the dark when his master entered.

"Our guest has left and we, too, are ready to move on. I put your pistol under the pillow of your bed. The police came again to look at the room down the hall."

"Did they trouble themselves to knock on our door?"

Wang Shim shook his head.

"They passed without pausing. Evidently this chamber appears to be no link in the shadowy chain of events that interests them.

The blind man gropes past the willow to stumble over its roots. Often a molehill obscures a view of the mountain."

Valentine took the letter from his pocket. He broke its seal, drew out the enclosure. The faint, elusive scent of her perfume brought the Baron Grunoff's villa at the Golden Wood back to him. The hotel room, Wang Shim and the voice of Paris faded from his mind, leaving him alone with his letter and his vision.

The folded sheet of notepaper was creamy in color, heavy in texture. She had dipped her pen in violet ink. The chirography was distinctive; graceful, full of character.

Captain Valentine read what she had written :

"Mon cher Capitaine: I have not yet determined whether I am sorry I tricked you this afternoon. If there is honor among thieves I am guilty of treason. For your services I am gratefully appreciative. I want you to know that. Adieu, Captain Valentine."

THE tri-motor ship winged steadily through a world of sun and sky. Far below, lost in an illimitable well of space, the English Channel lay at the feet of Dover Cliffs. The six passengers for London amused themselves diversely. One read, another dozed and two were engaged in a card game that Valentine decided was the last gesture of complete inanity.

For want of something better to do he continued to watch the card game. One of the two men slowly but surely impressed himself upon the adventurer's consciousness. He was a small, well but plainly dressed person, unmistakably French, though the English he used had hardly any accent. A thread of a closely-clipped moustache decorated his rather long upper lip. His eyes were brown, large, expressive. Had he been several inches taller he would have been distinguished.

The plane began a gradual descent. The world took shape beneath its wings. The English countryside, green and serene. The pile of London in the distance. The silver of rivers, and, far away, the flat expanse of the sea-toy villages that mushroomed grotesquely into houses and streets as the landing field sprang up beneath them.

The two card players ended their game and thanked each other. The man who had dozed yawned, sat up and stretched. The reader put away his illustrated magazine. Only Wang Shim remained stolidly immovable.

Valentine surreptitiously considered the little Frenchman. His companion, a typical Britisher from his respectable derby to his square-toed boots, consulted his watch. His ruddy face beamed.

"You must let me have your card," he said to the Frenchman. "I make this trip twice a month. Paper novelties, you know. I buy them in Paris and sell them in London. Brownell's my name. Markham Brownell. I'm with Whimple and Hastings, on Melton Street. You'll find them in the telephone directory. If you're staying in town for any length of time I'd like you to have dinner with me. Maybe," he added almost wistfully, "we could play Comrade after it."

"It would be a pleasure, I assure you," the other said in a tone that told Valentine he had no intention of ever seeing Brownell again. He took a wallet from his pocket and handed over a card. "My name is Andre Masset."

Brownell took his card and shook hands. "I hope I'll see you soon again."

London again!

Valentine felt the keen exhilaration of a returned exile to a place he knew and loved.

The adventurer always stayed at a quiet, unpretentious hotel on Charterhouse Square. It was called the Spaulding. He rented three rooms with a bath and waited for Wang Shim's arrival. Valentine and the Chinese never travelled as friends or man and servant. Tim was a positive identification. The Captain, prudently, when they journeyed together, kept to himself.

An hour after he had registered at the Spaulding Wang Shim came in.

"You have unpacked," he began, eyeing the opened luggage.

"Did you observe anything of interest after the landing?"

Wang Shim shook his head.

"Nothing except the small man who played cards."

Valentine looked up from the kit bag he was taking haberdashery from.

"Masset? What about him?" Wang Shim smiled thinly.

"I had the impression he wanted to know my destination. I instructed my cab-driver to travel in a wide circle. I looked at many interesting landmarks before I was satisfied the small gentleman had given up pursuit. The wise man fears the hawk when there is a shadow in the sky."

It was after six when Valentine left Fenchurch Street Station for Stepney. He made certain no one had followed him from the Spaulding. He wore a dark tweed suit, a soft grey felt hat and carried a serviceable stick. He knew the neighborhood he was about to penetrate and John Royle's friends and clients. Danger lurked there as great as any in the labyrinths of the Parisian underworld. He remembered one experience that had almost ended disastrously for him. To the Stepney district belonged the first skull he had ever cracked.

He passed saloons and markets, warehouses and tea storage buildings. Halfway down Farthing Road, wedged in between a garage and a mouldy second-hand furniture store, a narrow building blinked at the fading sun with a grime-smeared face. An almost obliterated sign told the passerby that W. Robinson conducted an upholstering business therein. A group of urchins played some game on the cracked and broken pavement. As Valentine approached a hard rubber ball whizzed past his head.

He descended basement steps. With experience born of many visits, he pushed aside a rusty iron mail-box and pressed the bell concealed behind it. After a minute or more an unshaven, bulky youth loomed up on the inner side of the grille door.

"Is Royle inside?"

The youth shook his head.

"He won't be back until after seven."

"I'll wait."

The other surveyed him slowly. "And who might you be?"

"The Lord Mayor or Clark Gable. Open up and save your questions. My name's Valentine."

"Captain Valentine?" The bolts jangled as they slid back. The iron door opened. "I'm sorry. I've often heard Royle speak of you. I'm new here."

"After seven? Is there anyone about?" Again the youth shook his head.

"Nobody but me. We've had to be careful lately. For awhile the police were watching us."

As he spoke he led the way down a passage.

Further in the rear of the building was Royle's apartment. The adventurer recalled its gaudy appointments. In his own way Royle lived like a monarch. He had collected its furnishings at Mayfair and Belgrave auctions. The rugs and objets d'art had once graced homes of wealth and fashion. Valentine looked around the dusty ante-room before he selected a chair near the table with the lamp.

"So the police have been curious? Odd. It isn't like Royle to give them an opportunity to pry into his business. What happened?"

The youth moved his broad shoulders idly.

"He don't know. He thinks, Royle does, that some stuff he bought was handed in by a Yard man trying to get a line. Royle wouldn't touch it. It was right after that we began to be watched. My name's Gaffney," he added.

Valentine lighted a cigarette.

"I've been in Paris recently. There I heard considerable talk about a clever person who calls himself Robert Ravenel. I wonder if you know anything of him."

Gaffney wrinkled his forehead in thought. "Can't say I do. Ravenel? No, he's a new one."

"But you do know Eric St. Julian?"

"The ace of them all?" Gaffney sat up. "I should say I do. Did you read about the haul on Curzon Street at Seamore Place Tuesday night? Nothing's been said about who done it but it's St. Julian all right. You can't fool me."

Gaffney got up suddenly.

"I almost forgot. Royle told me to feed the kittens. Got six of them, he has. Want to come along?"

"I'll wait here."

GAFFNEY left the room. He shut the door after him, his foot-steps dying away on the stairs and landing overhead.

The muted bell of the telephone whirred. The adventurer got up and went over to it. He unhooked the receiver.

"Yes?"

"May I speak with Mr. John Royle?"

At that instant Valentine felt a thrill surge through him. The low, musical voice of the woman who spoke was as familiar as his own face in the glass. Hours had elapsed since he had last heard it, but it came to him as fresh and inspiring as if they were still at Leuchars' American Bar, sharing cocktails and listening to the murmurous stringed music!

He shot a glance at the closed door by which Gaffney had left. He disguised his own voice, his fingers tightening around the telephone.

"This is Royle speaking. What can I do for you?"

"It is a rather delicate matter. I should like to see you personally, privately. Can this be arranged?"

"It might. Who are you?"

"You wouldn't know my name. I arrived in London yesterday from Paris. It was while there that I heard of you."

"How did you hear of me?"

"It is a long story. Possibly you might remember the name of Thomas Crayshaw."

"Very well. Are you a friend of his?"

"A close friend. Mr. Royle, I will make it worth your while if you will see me tonight."

Valentine's mind worked in split seconds "You're sure it's important?"

"Vastly."

"Farthing Street, after dark, is no place for a lady. If the matter is urgent I'll stretch a point. Suppose I come and see you? Will that be satisfactory."

The wires hummed and buzzed, there was a pause. Out of it she said:

"That will be agreeable."

"I don't usually do such things," Valentine informed her, "but seeing as how you're a lady and a friend of Tom Crayshaw, I'll do it. What's your name and where shall I come?"

"The name is Ormonde. Adele Ormonde. I have rooms at ten Clifford Square West. What time do you think you'll be here?"

The adventurer calculated rapidly. "Say ten o'clock."

"I shall expect you then. Thank you and good-bye."

Valentine had hardly rung off and was back in his chair before he heard Royle's voice outside. The door opened and the former mobsman, whose fence was the largest in London, entered.

Royle closed the door and swung around.

"Valentine!"

The adventurer looked the man over. Considerable water had flowed under the bridge of time since they had met.

"You hardly expected me to-night."

"I'm glad to see you," Royle said. "I'm always glad to see you."

He made no move to shake hands. Royle never did with his clients, regardless of how well he knew them. He went across and ushered the adventurer into his rear apartment.

Royle brought out a bottle of brandy and a siphon of soda. A small, electric cooler yielded ice cubes. Royle made drinks and pushed one across to Valentine.

"Nothing like a spot of brandy to put you right after a hard day's work," he stated.

It was his stereotyped remark. The adventurer looked at the man over the rim of his tall glass.

"Busy, are you?"

"Never too busy to trade with you." Royle leaned forward. "What have you got this time? Something fancy. I'll wager. Pearls, maybe. You were always a great one for pearls."

Valentine sampled his drink. It was good.

"I didn't come to sell you anything, Royle. This time I'm looking for information."

The other's face mirrored surprise. "Information?"

"Concerning a certain Robert Ravenel. It's important I get in touch with him immediately. I've lost his trail. You're the only man in London able to guide me back to it. You see, I have every reason to believe Ravenel is in London."

The former mobsman rattled the ice in his glass.

"Ravenel, eh? Never heard the name. Don't know him. Who might he be''

The Captain looked into the depths of the muddy colored eyes. He knew a tingle of disappointment. Royle was telling the truth. The trail he had spoken of seemed, at that moment, obliterated.

"I've been in Paris," he explained. "This Ravenel's a high-class crook. I thought he might be one of your clients. It seemed likely he'd be coming here with something choice."

"What for instance?"

Captain Valentine paused so that what he said might have the proper dramatic effect:

"The Baron Grunoff's famous opal collection― the Moons in Gold!"

Something blazed in John Royle's eyes. His expression was unchanged, but Valentine could feel the invisible electrical spark his statement had kindled.

"The Moons in Gold? You are trying to tell me they have been stolen from Grunoff?" Royle asked.

"You didn't know it?" Royle shook his head.

Valentine smiled to himself.

"In that case," he said suavely, "I'll waste no more of your time or mine. I had hoped you knew something about Ravenel and the opals."

Five

"I WILL want," Captain Valentine told Wang Shim an hour later, "my evening clothes, the suit Whiteside made. With it I shall wear my ruby studs and links. Lay them out at once."

"Immediately, Honorable Sir."

The adventurer moved restlessly about the living-room of the hotel suite.

"Tim, you remember John Royle's place on Farthing Road?"

"As the sun in the noonday sky."

"Good. You needn't wait to help me. I will knot my own tie to-night."

The Chinese bowed.

"Your wish is my command. I am to go to this Royle's place?"

"With all possible speed. I want you to watch it. Observe carefully those who enter and leave. I'm confident Royle knows something of the Moons in Gold. Return here with whatever you learn," Valentine ordered.

When the adventurer dressed he stood before the mirror. The glass reflected his image. He was perfectly turned out, slender, debonair, and distinguished.

When he was sure no one dogged his steps. Valentine hailed a taxi and climbed in:

"Ten Clifford Square West."

The address was in an elderly section of the city that was neither shabby nor pretentious. The houses were all of a similar type, better class lodging establishments or private homes. Valentine alighted, dismissed the cab and found himself in the vestibule of Number Ten. Adele Ormonde's name was over one of the bells. He pressed it, entered and mounted a flight of stairs. A door opened to the left. A girl in a maid's uniform looked out.

"Miss Ormonde?"

"Who shall I say is calling, please?"

"The name is Royle."

"Yes, sir. Won't you come in?"

The captain was surprised at the elaborate setting of the lounge room into which the girl ushered him. A cannel coal fire burned brightly in a basket grate.

Velvet portieres whispered as they parted: "Mr. Royle, I―"

The words ended in a choked exclamation. Valentine turned from the coal fire. What he saw quickened the tempo of his pulses. Adele Ormonde stood framed against the portieres she had come through. She wore a white evening gown that was a chalice for her loveliness. Her hair, softly waved and lustrous, was like a dark coronet. An emerald-and-diamond bracelet girded her left arm. Her eyes were as bright and alive as if they had absorbed the glow of the fire.

Her delicately tinted face, sensitive mouth, and beauty sent a tremor through the adventurer which was at once painful and delicious.

"I'm sorry if I startled you. It was necessary for me to see you again. I had to resort to underhand methods to make this meeting possible. Forgive me."

She studied him, her curved lips parted. "I don't quite understand." Valentine bowed over her hand.

"It is really quite simple. I happened to be at Royle's when you telephoned. I answered, disguised my voice and―"

He straightened up with a gesture.

"I didn't imagine I'd ever see you again," she said slowly. "You received my letter?"

"The concierge gave it to me."

"I am sorry I tricked you."

He shrugged.

"It was my own fault. You gave me fair warning. Perhaps I underestimated your capabilities. It was what I needed. Often one becomes lax and heavy-witted. A thing like that is a tonic."

"How did you know I was in London? Did you know, until you heard me on the telephone?"

"I was sure you had come here. Why not? Our friend Robert Ravenel gave every indication of leaving Paris for London. Why not you― too?"

Valentine leaned forward.

"How did you know about John Royle." She showed her white, even teeth in a quick smile.

"You, yourself, gave me that clue. Have you forgotten Leuchars'?"

Valentine laughed.

"Of course. I had forgotten― not the American Bar― but that I had mentioned Royle to you. Tell me, what was your purpose in having him up here to-night?"

"I thought," she said frankly, "I might be able to buy further information."

"Royle claims to have no knowledge of Ravenel. I talked with him a short time ago. He told me, and I have no reason to doubt him, that he never heard the name before."

"Then we have reached a blank wall."

"Apparently."

She looked at him.

"But you are not giving it up?"

The adventurer shook his head. "I never give up."

He heard her sigh, soft and suppressed. She considered him curiously.

"Do you really want to help me?"

"Yes."

"Why this change of heart, m'sieu?"

Valentine looked up into the heaven of her eyes,

"Because," he explained, "I am in love with you."

He sensed rather than saw her start of surprise. She seemed to draw away from him. Her face went blank. Only the tremulous flutter of her lingers gave him to understand she had heard― and felt― the meaning of what he had said.

"How can you love me?" she half whispered. "You know nothing about me―"

"I know you are the only woman in my life who has made me dream of things I never wanted before."

She turned quickly.

"Be truthful. What do you think I am?"

"An adventuress― a thief!"

She inclined her dark head slowly. "And yet you say you love me?"

Valentine prisoned her hands tightly in his.

"I love you as you are. Whatever you or I happen to be― whatever life has made us― whatever pattern we assume in the design of it― one thing is unalterable. I love you as you are now, regardless of change or future circumstances."

She got up and went to the fire. The bright gleam of it painted her white gown with rosy fingers. She stood silent, thoughtful until Valentine joined her. He took her in his arms. She was limply passive in his embrace. Her lips were cool and unresponsive when he kissed her.

"I don't love you," she said. "I could never love you."

He released her reluctantly. "Because of what I am?"

She made no answer. Her eyes moved to the clock. He understood the significance of her look.

"Then this time it is really adieu?"

She touched his hand with her tapering white fingers.

"It must be. Our roads go in different directions."

"Roads sometimes meet beyond the city," he reminded her.

She shook her head.

"Not ours. Never, ours. Good-bye, Monsieur Captain."

He left her standing in the glow of the ruddy coals. He knew he would remember that final glimpse of her through all the days and nights on the adventure trail.

VALENTINE walked. The air was damp and chilly, the forerunner of fog. London's lights painted the low-hanging clouds. He had covered a mile before he grew aware that, for the second time that night, he was being followed.

He continued at the same leisurely pace until he reached an avenue. A hotel occupied one corner. In front of it was a public taxi stand with a half-dozen or more idle cabs waiting for business.

Captain Valentine purposely engaged the chauffeur of the first taxi in conversation while he stood in full view among those pedestrians walking in either direction.

"You know where Charterhouse Square is?"

"That I do, guv'nor."

Valentine added details.

"Drive me to the Savoy first. Take plenty of time. I'm in no hurry."

"Right, guv'nor. If I'm in too much of a rush you tell me. Get right in, sir. Looks like we're due for a bit of a fog. The Savoy? Yes, sir."

Valentine entered the taxi by its right hand door and left by the opposite door. It took no more than a round of seconds for him to step up on one running board and down on the other. The driver, bent over as he shifted gears, didn't see him. Before the cab was well under way Valentine darted up to the second vehicle in line. The man at the wheel of that conveyance was leaning toward the kerb, listening to the rapid instructions shot at him by someone who had hurried out of the crowd.

"Follow that taxi!" a voice rapped. "Don't lose sight of it! Double fare!"

"Right-o!"

Valentine had opened the cab's outer door and was sitting in the far corner when the one who engaged the vehicle hopped in. The man shut the door with a slam, snapped his cigarette away through the open window, and perched himself on the very edge of the seat, strained forward so he might observe the winking tail light of the taxi ahead.

Captain Valentine chuckled.

"Really, Monsieur Masset," he murmured, "you have gone to considerable trouble to-night to shadow me. I am flattered."

The one on the edge of the seat swung around with a nervous start. He swore in French. He peered at the adventurer as if he were riding with a ghost.

"You―"

"Farthing Road, Clifford Square West, and now this thoroughfare. I thought it was about time we met. Monsieur, if you have such a burning interest in my coming and goings, why bother to dodge around after me. I am a reasonable person. You need only to come out in the open, tell me exactly what you want, and I will be most happy to answer any questions."

Musset's surprise subsided. He pushed himself further back on the worn leather upholstery. He continued to stare into Captain Valentine's smiling face.

"Never mind following that other cab," he said to the driver.

"Where do you want me to go?"

"Tell him," Valentine suggested, "the Club Pantheon. It is an excellent spot for entertainment and― conversation. I am in the mood for a dash of gaiety, Monsieur Masset. Will you be my guest at the Pantheon? I insist; after all this trouble I have put you to I feel guilty of causing you great inconvenience. The least I can do is make amends by playing host."

Masset came to a quick decision.

"The Club Pantheon," he said to the driver.

Valentine nodded.

"Thank you. And I promise, Masset, I will not ask you to play Comrade either."

For the first time the flicker of a smile crossed the small man's serious face. He helped himself to a cigarette. When a match flared the advenurer saw his brown eyes were still filled with wonder.

"You are a clever man, monsieur," he said, grudgingly.

The taxi drew into the open space fronting the popular night resort. A bearded Russian in doorman's livery opened the door of the cab for them. Valentine knew the man was a former member of Royalty. He saluted him in the manner of the Imperial Horse Guards, of which the man had been an officer. The other's face brightened. In Russian he mumbled:

"Glory that is spent can never be regained."

"Take heart," Valentine counselled in the same tongue. "No one can banish your to-morrow."

Masset listened suspiciously.

"A friend of yours?" he inquired, as Valentine led the way Into the brilliantly lighted foyer.

"A friend of all London. That man was once in the confidence of the Czar."

Blodgett, the manager of the Club Pantheon, came briskly forward.

"Captain Valentine! This is a pleasure. It has been a long time since you have visited us. A table for two? I have one reserved but you may occupy it."

The adventurer thanked him.

"Something on the balcony, Nell, If you please. This is more business than amusement."

A few minutes later Valentine and Masset faced each other through the golden illumination made by their table lamp.

"Now," Valentine began, "we can talk. I hope you will gratify my curiosity. Flying over from Paris I tried to trace back and link the past with the present. Where have we met before, Monsieur Masset?"

"Then you don't remember?"

"I haven't the slightest recollection, unfortunately."

"You don't recall the Baron Grunoff's villa at Bois d'Or?"

"I recall it perfectly. But you―"

"I was there that night," Masset said briefly.

Valentine's grey eyes narrowed slightly. "I begin to comprehend― a little. Please continue."

"I have come to take you back to Paris, Monsieur Robert Ravenel!"

The words, delivered with melodramatic intensity, mode Captain Valentine throw back his head and laugh.

"So you think I am Ravenel?"

"I am sure of it."

The adventurer selected a cigarette from his case.

"Why?"

Masset shrugged.

"That would be disclosing my hand. Sufficient, that I have evidence enough to weave a damaging case around you. We will go back to Paris in the morning. If you are guiltless of the murder of Crayshaw, the Englishman, and the theft of the Baron's opals, you will have an opportunity to prove it. The Chief of the Surete will be interested in anything you may tell him."

Captain Valentine's face hardened.

"Don't be a fool, Masset. Within ten minutes I can reassure you on the question of my identity. I am no more this Ravenel than you are.'"

"You will have to prove it."

"I shall― easily. And, my dear fellow, by so doing I will save you considerable official embarrassment. When we leave here we shall go to Scotland Yard. Inspector Vannis is a friend of mine. You will respect his word?"

"I will respect the word of any Scotland Yard Inspector."

"Good. Then that's settled. Another bottle of wine, Monsieur Masset? Something more to eat? Don't let's hurry away from this agreeable place. Do you like jazz? Being a detective perhaps you can tell me why the American negro is so proficient in its playing. Are they all brought up on banjos and saxophones? When do they have a chance to pick cotton?"

Valentine broke off. His casual, wandering glance focused on a man and woman who stood in one of the openings that led to the polished dance floor. He crushed the tube of tobacco between his fingers. Within him something flared up hotly. He looked again to make certain his gaze had not tricked him. There was no mistake. The woman, radiant in her white evening gown, was Adele Ormonde. But for once Valentine was less interested in her than in her companion.

"Monsieur, you are burning the cloth!" He paid no attention to Masset's exclamation. At that moment he knew the blend of a dozen thoughts, ideas and questions. The man with Adele Ormonde was tall, slender, suave and polished. Captain Valentine recognised him immediately.

He was Eric St. Julian, the master-thief and arch-rogue of all Europe!

Six

WITH an effort the adventurer steadied himself. He had always prided himself upon his ability to control his emotions. The face he turned to Masset wore a faintly bored smile.

"The cloth, of course. I shall have to speak to my tobacconist. He is rolling these cigarettes entirely too loosely."

He emptied his fingers into a cloisonne ash receiver and drained his glass.

"I think," the detective said, "we will go directly to Scotland Yard."

Valentine pushed his chair back. "Excellent. Let's start."

From the balcony they descended to the brilliantly lighted foyer. The adventurer retrieved hat and stick.

He led the way under the awning that stretched from the entrance of the Club Pantheon to the kerb. The Russian doorman came up to meet them.

"You wish a taxi"

"Don't trouble, there goes one now."

Abruptly, Valentine hurried to the kerb. He whistled shrilly. The taxi he hailed stopped. Another, passing in the opposite direction, applied its brakes. Valentine sprinted into the middle of the street. He cut sharply to the left, ducked in behind the second cab and doubling back, pulled open the door of an empty, parked limousine. He climbed nimbly into it, conscious of the police whistle Masset blew.

Valentine wedged himself under the wheel in the driver's seat and watched the confusion in front of the night club.

The scream of the police whistle brought people running out of the Pantheon. In the gathering fog they were grotesque, animated figures. The taxi that had stopped went on. The second cab rolled away after it. Watching, Valentine saw Masset standing on the running board of the taxi that pulled out last. The adventurer laughed under his breath. He waited several more minutes before he left the car in which he had taken refuge. He walked swiftly down three streets before he found an unengaged vehicle.

"The Spaulding, Charterhouse Square."

He had no time to lose. Masset must know of his address. He must pack and leave with all haste. He thought about Wang Shim. If Tim had not returned from Farthing Road― if the Chinese, following his orders, still watched Royle's, it would complicate matters. But the bland Wang Shim, when the adventurer reached the hotel, was in the bedroom, engrossed with the problem of what silken pyjamas his master should wear.

"Hurry," Valentine ordered. "We're leaving here at once! How long will it take you to pack?"

"When the mind is concerned the hands work quickly. In fifteen minutes the luggage will be ready."

"Make it ten!" Valentine said shortly.

"Trouble rides in quick pursuit?"

"A pace behind us."

Wang Shim nodded gravely.

"Then we will travel rapidly to outdistance it. While I am busy with the luggage I should like to tell you what I learned to-night."

The adventurer, changing from evening clothes to tweeds, listened with interest.

"What?"

"I reached Farthing Road to find it almost deserted. The abode of John Royle was in darkness. I discovered a suitable place where, unobserved, I could watch. I composed myself to patience. The wise man waits for events to shape themselves. Time passed. I had almost despaired of beholding a guest enter the place I watched with all consuming attention when, to my elation, a motor car turned into the street and stopped at Royle's."

Captain Valentine knotted a cravat. "Who was in the car, Tim?"

Wang Shim deftly transferred the contents of the dresser to the open kit bags on the bed.

"A single passenger, a man. He went into Royle's house. He was there twenty-two minutes exactly. I moved my vantage point to behold him better when he emerged. Perhaps you remember the street light a pace away from the basement entrance. The car was stationed almost directly beside it. I had no difficulty in recognising the gentleman when he left."

Valentine turned from the mirror as the Chinese paused. He reached for a cigarette.

"You recognised him?"

"The man," Wang Shim said quietly, "was Eric St. Julian."

The cigarette dropped from the Captain's fingers. He wheeled around and stared into the inscrutable yellow face.

"St. Julian? You're sure?"

"Can the dog forget the flea?"

Valentine's mind surged with thought. St Julian at Royle's! John Royle's secret knowledge of the Moons in Gold! St. Julian in Paris! Blond hair-dyed.

Wang Shim closed and locked the first kit bag.

"I followed Eric St. Julian. It was difficult― clinging to the rear tyre of his vehicle until he reached an avenue where I was able to drop off and engage other means of transportation. I persisted and Gods smiled upon my perseverance. At length I found the fox's lair. This," he added, taking a scrap of paper from his pocket, "marks its location."

The adventurer seized the folded piece of paper. He opened it. Wang Shim had written something in Chinese characters on it.

"What does it say?"

"QUEEN STREET, the third house from the corner, on the north side."

For a long minute Valentine stood hesitant, his face a thoughtful mask. He reached a decision quickly.

"Take these bags and transfer them and yourself to the Continental House on Bays head Avenue. Take one room there and wait for my return."

The Chinese bowed.

"I will move as directed."

Valentine's watch showed him the hour had lengthened. He thought of the Club Pantheon. He still had time to follow out the impulsive plan that had come to him on the heels of Wang Shim's disclosures. He paid his bill at the Spaulding, remembered Andre Masset, and said to the night clerk on duty:

"I have been called back to Paris. My servant and I are leaving. Forward all communications to the Angleterre on the rue Richelieu."

Queen Street, the huddle of London. The Captain had no recollection of its whereabouts. The fog had thickened. Through it, traffic moved cautiously. He found a crawling cab, its windows powdered with moisture.

"Queen Street, driver. Think you can find it in this souper?"

"I know it like the palm of my hand," he was assured.

"Good. Take me there."

The cab moved off through an opaque world. Captain Valentine had no idea of their route. Distinguishing landmarks were blotted out by the swirling mist. At least a half-hour ticked off before he felt his vehicle slow down.

"Queen Street," he was informed.

"Drop me at the third house from the corner on the north side."

The cab felt its way warily forward for another space. It stopped again.

"This is about it."

Valentine gave the man a substantial tip and dismissed him. The house he confronted was shrouded in the fog. He peered at it. From what he could determine it was in darkness. He mounted the dripping front steps and found himself faced by a heavy oak door.

He produced his master-key and pushed the lock shield aside. He remembered another door he had opened, days or years ago.

He waited until his eyes grew accustomed to the heavy gloom. Objects, a shade lighter than the encompassing murk, took shape. His pencil flashlight cut a bright slice through the darkness. It showed him rooms on the left side of the entrance recess where he stood. Its slender beam picked out a two sectioned stairway to the rear. No sound filtered through the quiet to announce the presence of occupants. He felt as much alone as he might have in the Gobi desert.

The first room was appointed as a study. Valentine surveyed it in the torch light. He went on, looking into the other rooms. He had the impression St. Julian had probably leased the place furnished. Then the stairs drew his attention. He went to the floor above. There were three bedrooms and a bath. He examined them by turn, glancing in for signs of occupancy. The last room appeared to be the only one in use.

Captain Valentine decided to see what the study might reveal and for that purpose went down the landing and descended the stairs.

ODDLY, he felt the stir of his pulses. It was as if they were telegraphing a warning. He strained his ears when he reached the study door. Still the absolute silence remained unruffled. Strange.

Valentine's knee struck against a leather chair. He winced. The legs of the chair slid along the polished floor. In the quiet its noise was eerie. He straightened, listening. The echo it created was replaced by a new note. The torch snapped off as, low but audible, the muted clash of curtain rings on a pole gave way to a sharp click. Electric light, coming on in full blaze in an overhead chandelier, half blinded Valentine.

A voice said:

"I wouldn't advise you to do anything but remain where you are― with your hands elevated a trifle!"

Gradually the adventurer's dazzled gaze cleared. He looked into the mocking face of the man he had last seen dancing with Adele Ormonde. In St. Julian's right hand an automatic levelled in a threat that raised Valentine's hands quickly. St. Julian's fingers drew the Captain's service pistol from his shoulder holster. With a gesture the man dropped it into a drawer of the secretary, turned the key and pocketed it.

"Sit down, Valentine," he invited affably. "I hardly expected to find you here. Your footprints were rather evident on the wet steps outside. I was careful to make a quiet entry. Looking through my luggage, were you? I thought you'd never come downstairs."

The adventurer matched St. Julian's amiability. He laughed pleasantly.

"I about decided you and Royle had struck a bargain."

St. Julian made a grimace.

"Don't mention Royle's name to me! I'd advise you to have no dealings with him. He's a Shylock, a profiteer. If I told you what he offered me for the Baron's opals you wouldn't believe it!"

"I've always thought that Royle was no man to deal with when the plunder was valuable. I'm glad you didn't close with him."

"You're glad?"

"Because," Valentine continued smoothly, "it gives me another chance. Once Royle has the Moons in Gold they would be lost beyond any hope of recovery. In your possession―"

He broke off with a shrug. St. Julian's strange, colorless eyes, flecked with hazel, retreated behind their lids.

"Always an optimist," he chided.

"Perhaps. You left a rather open trail in Paris. So open that it was hard to suspect you were Ravenel. I could forgive the imaginary Ravenel for the clues left behind but not the clever Eric St. Julian."

"I suppose you found The Rat?" "Quite easily."

"And my apartment on the rue Adelphi?"

"Without trouble." St. Julian nodded.

"And this house as well." He moved his shoulders. "Too bad such bulldog persistency must go unrewarded.

Valentine smiled.

"The chapter," he reminded him, "is far from finished."

"You think so? I will write the last words when the proper moment arrives. Meanwhile, it intrigues me to converse with you. We are like two rival potentates, meeting for the first time on common ground. I hardly expected to entertain the notorious Captain Valentine to-night here, at the point of an automatic. By the way, it appears that we are both interested in the same lady. Another reason for our mutual concern."

The captain said nothing. He knew he was in a tight corner.

"Perhaps," St. Julian was saying, "you haven't heard the latest report on the Baron. I hear that he quarrelled with the charming Chichi― after he had given her a string of pearls, or some trifle. Grunoff has gone back to his Budapest. Senile old idiot. I wonder if he knows the extent of the favor I did him when I removed the opals from his villa.

"You are," Valentine said, "a benefactor. I wonder how you met Mademoiselle Ormonde."

St. Julian gave him a quick look.

"Didn't she tell you? No? Lamentable. Proof again of what a small universe we inhabit. I never dreamed the charming lady I had admired from a distance in Paris would be interested in the Moons in Gold. She was at Foyet's one afternoon. Her distress was obvious." He shrugged. "It was not hard to engage her in conversation. I am, as you doubtless realise, sympathetic by nature. I had no trouble in winning her confidence, drawing her out, learning the cause of her being so distrait."

The ticking of a clock somewhere impressed itself upon Valentine.

St. Julian looked at his watch.

"Sometime to-morrow," he continued, "I am leaving London― with Mademoiselle Ormonde. I am combining business with pleasure. You will be interested to know that, having spurned John Royle's offer, I have already cabled Jan van Domm. As you are aware, the Orient at this season is a fairyland of flowers. The lady believes I am on the trail of Ravenel and that he has gone to Shanghai. Presently, we two shall depart. Van Domm shall buy the opals, Adele Ormonde will entertain me and when I am a little jaded I will turn her over to one of the song masters in the tea houses there. With her beauty she should fetch a good price."

Valentine felt his muscles tense. His slender, sinewy figure went taut. Something shook him in a torment of white-hot rage. He had never known it before. It was alien to his swaggering, egotistical nature.

It brought him to his feet, careless of the gun in St. Julian's hand. It urged him breathlessly forward.

St. Julian pulled the trigger, but the adventurer's luck was good. The weapon clicked futilely. St. Julian hurled it at him. Valentine dodged and the automatic ricochetted off the secretary and slid across the floor. He had him in the next minute. Valentine's steely fingers clamped themselves around St. Julian's throat till he became unconscious.

The bell rang sharply, shrilly― imperatively. The heavy bronze knob shook as someone twisted it agitatedly. Valentine looked out through the wet glass on one side of the main panel. He had a misty glimpse of a small, damp figure on the stoop. He half expected to see the official helmet of a London bobby― shadowy, sinister visitors from the Yard.

He slid back the bolt and opened the door.

"What is it?"

The late caller crowded in closer.

"Where's the boss? I've got to see him straight off! It's important, it is."

"He went out. He won't be back for an hour or more. What's your message?"

The man peered up at him. From what Valentine could make out he was small and thin, typical of the slum district, shabby and furtive.

"Who are you?"

"I'm a friend of St. Julian! Out with it. What's the trouble?"

The other drew a breath.

"It's that girl, guv'nor! The boss told me to get her luggage. Her place is on Clifford Square West. I went around about twenty minutes ago. The first thing I seen was a plant on the corner. A Yard man, guv'nor, as I live and breathe! Then―"

Through Valentine something coldly ominous crawled. He had forgotten Masset? He had left an open trail from Clifford Square West, the room where the coal fire burned in its basket grate. What more natural than for Masset, when outwitted, to double back and investigate with the help of Scotland Yard? What more natural than for him to take Adele Ormonde into custody for questioning.

In the darkness of the study the captain heard faint sounds that told him St. Julian was returning to consciousness. There was no time to lose. He joined the small man on the stoop, pulling the door shut behind him.

"Get a cab and come with me!" he ordered quickly.

Together they plunged into the fog. "Where are we bound, guv'nor?"

"Clifford Square West!"

THEY went forward cautiously through a white, vaporous world. The fog had thickened. It clamped down over London's streets like an inverted bowl.

As the cab moved on the one beside Valentine grew restless.

"What's your name?" the adventurer asked.

"Blauvelt, Sandy Blauvelt."

"I've heard St. Julian speak of you," Valentine lied. "You can help all of us to-night."

"And get marched off to prison for my trouble?"

"Not if you do what I say."

"What's that, guv'nor?"

The adventurer leaned close to him. He spoke rapidly. He let his words penetrate and sink in. His idea, born of desperation, was a frail straw afloat on the sea of his dilemma. He was still explaining when their vehicle reached Clifford Square West.

Valentine rubbed moisture from the window and stared out. It was too foggy to see anything clearly. He opened the left-hand door while the taxi-driver applied the brakes.

"Remember..."

With that single word he dropped off, rounded the taxi and continued on as far as the ornamental iron fence that was on either side of the entrance into the building. He stood there, waiting.

Out of the fog Blauvelt's voice rose argumentatively:

"What are you bringing me here for? Where are we?"

The taxi-driver answered belligerently:

"Clifford Square West, where you told me to come!"

"You're balmy, you are! I never told you to come here!"

"Who's balmy?"

"Go on, roll your blinkin' ark! I'll walk!"

"Not until you pay your fare! Ask the feller you're with where you told me to go!"

"I'll tell you where you can go! Feller I'm with? There's nobody here! If you ain't balmy―"

The taxi-driver's voice rose higher: "Wait! Where are you going―"

Two figures passed Valentine in the fog. Somewhere across the street glass crashed. Blauvelt's high pitched laugh drifted back.

"You can collect when you get me!"

The adventurer opened the front door of the house. For the second time that night he stood on Adele Ormonde's threshold. His knuckles rapped out a hasty summons; it seemed an eternity before she answered.

"Scotland Yard is about to pay you a visit!" Valentine gripped her hand. "You've only a minute or two to get away from here!"

She searched his face anxiously.

"This isn't a trick on your part?"

"I swear―"

She had changed from the white evening gown to a dark travelling suit. Without further questions she snatched up a light tweed coat and pulled a small, rakish hat over her dark hair. With a breath she surveyed the quiet room behind her. The reflection of the dying fire scattered its glow like Jewels on the rugs.

"I'M ready." She spoke in a low, quick whisper. "A boy was to come for my luggage. When he didn't arrive I got the house porter. There's nothing except―"

She picked up a large, flat pocketbook. Valentine closed the door, locked it from the outside and led the way to the stairs. She gave him a dubious glance when he started up the steps but made no comment, following without hesitation. He knew his ruse to draw the enemy away from the front door below would be of short duration. The men who passed him outside probably awaited the arrival of an inspector from the Yard to take charge. The fog was a blessing in disguise. In all likelihood it had delayed the arrival of the law. And, with any luck, it would be a shield for the idea and plan Valentine put into effect.

They climbed to the top storey of the building. Some of the transoms over the doors they passed were painted with light. In one suite a radio played gypsy music. In another a card game was in progress. Fragments of laughter and conversation drifted out.

At the end of the top floor landing Valentine found what he sought. This was a short flight of iron steps with a door at their head. He opened it and let a swirl of the fog in. Beside him, the woman waited his next move.

"Across the roof," he directed. "Listen!"

From the regions below a door had opened and closed. Voices floated up. The stairs echoed to the tread of ascending feet. Another minute and there came a pounding on the door of the apartment on the second floor. The adventurer nodded. Adele Ormonde's eyes widened.

"And I asked you," she breathed, "if it were a trick!"

He led her out on the roof.

"Take my arm, stay close to me! No use risking a fall. This way―"

They passed from roof to roof, groping a way through the mist. At length the Captain's steadying hand on her arm halted her. He waited a minute, looking back, his head averted, to catch the sound of any possible pursuit. None came. The fog-ridden Square remained respectably quiet.

"Luck's good. Now for an exit and―" He found the roof door of the building they were on. It was locked but yielded to the Captain's master-key. Another space and they leisurely descended carpeted stairs, left by the front door and emerged again into the damp, white night.

"Where, now?"

Valentine shaped a course east.

"I want to talk with you. I've learned something of paramount importance to-night.

"What does it concern?"

"You!"

"I― I haven't any too much time. I am to meet someone―"

"Yes, I know. It's about that someone that I must tell you. Give me a few minutes, mademoiselle. I think I can convince you of one thing. That is, how cleverly you've been duped."

They reached some main thoroughfare where lights were murky in the misty tapestry let down over the city. At a cab rank Valentine engaged a taxi.

"Drive around until I tell you where to go," he ordered.

He sat down beside Adele Ormonde. He lighted two cigarettes and handed her one. The red tips of them were like watching eyes in the dark. The fragrance of her perfume crept to him.

For a long minute she sat silent.

"What did you want to tell me, Monsieur Captain?"

"You will hardly believe me," he began It will sound fantastic, unreasonable. Nevertheless it's the truth. That man you were at the Pantheon with to-night. He is the one who is helping you."

He could feel her start of surprise. "You knew I was there?"

Valentine laughed under his breath.

"The man who has promised to aid you in finding Ravenel is Eric St. Julian, the self styled master-thief of the Continent who, among other things, happens to be the murderer of Thomas Crayshaw! Eric St. Julian, alias Robert Ravenel!"

He expected her gasp of dismayed wonder. Instead, except for an involuntary start, she remained still beside him. The cigarette trembled between her tapering fingers, but her voice was steady when she spoke again:

"You expect me to believe that?"

Valentine's hand tightened over her arm. "You must believe it! Every word of it is true! When I left the Pantheon to-night I went to Queen Street, to St. Julian's quarters. He surprised me while I was attempting to find the opals. At the point of his gun, confident that what he said would never be used, St. Julian made revelations I otherwise couldn't have learned. He told me you were accompanying him to Shanghai. He boasted that he intended selling you into the slavery of a Chinese tea house, to the song master who'd pay the highest price!"

Again the crimson tip of the cigarette trembled.

"What else?"

"St. Julian has the opals! He's taking them to Shanghai to dispose of them. John Royle wouldn't pay his price. Mademoiselle, I had to tell you this! Once in Shanghai with St. Julian your fate is sealed! You have no more chance to outwit him than to batter down an impregnable wall with, your hands!"

The cab turned a corner and slowed in the cross currents of Trafalgar Square's traffic.

"And yet," she murmured, "I shall keep my appointment with St. Julian and make the journey."

Captain Valentine leaned wonderingly to her.

"Despite what―"

SHE wound down the window and dropped her cigarette out of it.

"Despite what you've told me!"

"You mean―"

For the first time she showed animation. "I will tell you something. I hadn't intended to, but I shall. It goes back to that night at the Bois d'Or, at Grunoff's villa. When I arrived there I went toward the villa through the gardens on the south. A service road leads out of it. Where it joins the highway is a thick clump of shrubbery. Parked there, that night, well hidden, was a large black automobile. A man was at the wheel. He didn't see me, didn't know that I was there. Before he started the car he lighted a cigarette. The match flared up and for a second I saw his face."

Listening, Valentine's pulses increased their beat. At that instant he seemed to understand her coolness, her own ingenuity, cleverness and courage.

"And the face you saw was that of―"

She turned to him with a throaty exclamation.

"St. Julian, alias Ravenel!"

The adventurer caught her fingers in his.

"Mademoiselle, the odds are too great! Believe me, you haven't a chance, not one! I, too face the East. Let me get you the opals― bring them to you and put them in your hands! It would be an added incentive for the greatest coup of my career!"

He heard the little breath she drew.

"You are gallant, kind, generous! No, I've dedicated myself to this adventure. I shall go through with it― to the end! After all, what is life but a chance, a gamble?"

"Who are you?"

For the first time she laughed.

"Still your lady of mystery! And you, too, go to Shanghai? Monsieur, perhaps we shall meet there."

Valentine's pressure tightened on her fingers.

"I fancy you will need me― more there than here― or in Paris. It will be very different in the Orient. Civilisation is only a thin veneer for its age-old passion. You must be on guard every instant― every waking and sleeping hour. I beg you to watch St. Julian. You must know what he is, what he's capable of! I can't let you go until you promise―"

"You will let me go." Her voice was vibrant, expressive. "You know I can take care of myself― that I will play the hand through to the last trump card!"

"How can I stop you?" Valentine whispered.

He took her in his arms for the second time that night. When he found her lips with his they were warmer, more responsive. For an eternity that lived within one breathless minute he held her close and safe. She stirred, breaking away from him.

"In Shanghai then, Monsieur the Captain."

There was music in Valentine's heart. A song of gladness that awoke some trumpeting theme of romance. Shanghai. Jade and silk. Opalescent fairy towers in a saffron shimmer. Ivory japonica and silver blossoms on the Tree of Life. Opals, fire-flecked and glowing.

Moons in Gold with an ancient allure, glamorous, precious!

"In Shanghai," he said unsteadily.

Seven

THE Ceylon Empress, of the Far East Line, rolled down the Bay of Biscay. On A deck, Captain Valentine, from the depths of his chair, watched the sky turn from flame to copper as the sun began a circling descent.

He travelled alone. Wang Shim had been sent to Paris for the Express to Brindisi. In Italy Tim would take a twenty-three knot mail packet to Port Said where, in a week, he would meet the Ceylon Empress.

At dusk the sea grew rougher. The captain was accustomed to the whims of Biscay. Always a good sailor, he went in to dinner, interested in his fellow passengers. About a dozen had made the London departure, people availing themselves of a leisurely journey through the Strait of Gibraltar and into the blue Mediterranean. Valentine catalogued the passengers mentally, filing a description of each away for future reference.

There were, among others, Sir Esme Brayling, bound for the Embassy at Singapore. The man was tall, typically British from his monocle to his well-polished boots. Valentine was more interested in the man's wife. Small, blonde, with some of Mademoiselle Vallier's youthful charm and vivacity, Lady Brayling reminded him of those animated girls who decorated the chorus of the latest London hit revue.

In the smoking-room, where inevitable bridge was in progress at one table, the adventurer studied the players. There was the chance Masset had placed an emissary on the Ceylon Empress. Valentine watched the faces of those at their game, took in the details of their dress and social standing. His gaze moved from Jens Jorgensen, a heavy-set, cold-faced Dane, to the pinched, leathery features of a Lawson Clarke. The latter was young, in the middle twenties, a youth who, from his conversation, had recently spent a year on a Broadway stage in New York. Clarke spoke of his juvenile singing role in an American operetta, of a vacation he was planning in China.

The third man at the table was Benton Ledyard. In between hands Ledyard asked questions concerning the Province of Chihli. Apparently the concern he represented had an oil concession, wells in that north-eastern stretch of China. The man was likeable, attractive, indubitably one of background and breeding.

The fourth bridge player made Valentine speculative. At dinner one of the ship's officers had introduced him to Anthony Cardeaux. Sophisticated and polished, with a veneer of culture, Cardeaux's small stature, keenly intellectual face and sombre eyes made Valentine think of Masset. It seemed that Monsieur Cardeaux was in the wine business. He was bound for Port Said and from there would go to the Gulf of Aden. Valentine noticed he played a clever, masterful game. When the scores were finally added Cardeaux pocketed his winnings, thanked his companions and lighted a cigarette.

"You do not play?" he asked Valentine.

"Occasionally."

Cardeaux arranged the flower in his buttonhole.

"Possibly," he murmured, "you find the game of life more intriguing."

"Possibly."

Cardeaux nodded.

"Would you care to join me in the bar? What is it our friends, the Americans, say― for a nightcap?"

A waiter brought their order to one of the small tables in the rear of the ship's cafe. Cardeaux's sombre glance wandered from the label on his bottle to the adventurer.

"Monsieur," he continued, "I have had a rather unusual experience since coming aboard. Would you care to hear it?"

"By all means, I am," the captain informed him, "always interested in the unusual."

Cardeaux settled back in his chair.

"Last night my stateroom was visited during my absence. The strange part is that I can find nothing missing. My luggage was investigated, turned inside out, and left scattered about. My papers were gone through, my attache case sliced open. Obviously the intruder was looking for something specific. What do you make of it?"

Valentine sampled his whisky and soda.

"You have in your possession something of extreme value?"

"Nothing. What little money, an inconsiderable sum, I carry with me. Monsieur, I have the feeling my unknown visitor was after something else. I think he was trying to learn my identity."

The same thought had crept through Captain Valentine's mind. He tapped a cigarette on the table top, lighted it, smiled.

"But you are Monsieur Cardeaux, of Marseilles?"

The other laughed.

"Indisputably so. I have been that gentleman for a good many years, monsieur."

"Enemies?"

"Not one― that I am aware of."

"Then," Valentine said, "your caller made a mistake. He was looking for someone else, got into the wrong stateroom. You spoke to the purser?"

Cardeaux shook his head.

"But no. So long as there was nothing taken―"

Later in his cabin Valentine went back over what Anthony Cardeaux had told him. He wondered if, by chance, the investigation of the wine importer's stateroom had any significance that might link it with his own presence on the ship.

Valentine put on his shantung pyjamas switched the overhead light, relaxed on the bed.

The cabin was on the port side of the Ceylon Empress. Valentine occupied it in solitary isolation. He always paid a premium to be alone, except in rare cases when Wang Shim's presence was necessary. Presently he slept.

He had no way of knowing how long he had been unconscious, what had aroused him with such abrupt suddenness. He came awake with a start, his nerves taut, his mind clear, his heart thumping. The cabin was in darkness. The curtains at the window fluttered in the sea wind, the engines rumbled. The Ceylon Empress still rolled and pitched in the trough of disturbed waters.

Stiffly still, Valentine knew that somewhere in the gloom, no more than two or three feet distant, someone stood, watchful and waiting!

Careful to control his breathing and keep it in the same lethargic, even tempo, he slipped a hand under his dented pillow. His fingers closed about the gun concealed there. The chill of its steel held a comforting touch. With his other hand he search for the flashlight left with the folded blanket at the foot of the bed. But the torch was gone, in all probability had rolled to the floor during one of the ship's shiftings.

He next sought the tiny reading light above his head. The bulb had been removed. His finger tightened on the trigger of the weapon in his hand.

"You will kindly," he announced in a low, quiet voice, "remain where you are! Move and I fire!"

A throaty exclamation choked off abruptly whatever reply would have been made. He expected swift attack, the lunge of the unseen assailant. Rapid footsteps echoed on the floor. A cool draught told Valentine his caller preferred a desperate attempt at escape. He had reached the cabin's door, had opened it partly, within a round of split seconds.

The adventurer's bare feet went over the side of the bed. He hurled himself in the direction of the door. The effort to block the intruder's exit failed signally. Valentine's outstretched hand brushed hair. His ring caught a strand of it, yanked it from the head that ducked to evade his grasp. A heel savagely ground itself against the Captain's instep and his caller was gone!

When Valentine flung open the cabin door, the corridor, dim with its ceiling lights, was empty.

He went back, switched on the electricity, nursed his foot and ankle. A sharp, cruel blow.

In the stateroom's light his gaze was drawn to the ring on the smallest finger of his left hand. Part of its rough design, catching the hair his hand had touched, retained it. Valentine saw a strand of long, pale gold hair, a souvenir so revealing and enlightening that his locked lips curved in a spreading smile. So it had not been Cardeaux or any other man! The one who had crept stealthily into his cabin was a woman! Again his glance rested on the strand of golden hair caught glistening in the ring.

Why, Valentine mused, was Lady Brayling interested in his luggage?

THE sea calmed. Spain loomed up on the port bow, the sun beat down brazenly and shuffleboard grew desultory. The bar's business increased as the weather warmed. Valentine, glass in hand, talked with Jorgensen, the Dane.

The man was interested in sulphur, went to great lengths to explain its uses, its prices in the world's market.

He was relieved when the sulphurous conversation finally fumed out. Lawson Clarke, looking for a fourth at bridge, drew the adventurer aside.

"Care to take a hand?" Clarke inquired. "Our friend Jorgensen had enough at the last session."

Valentine declined with tactful thanks and took an illustrated magazine out on deck His eye ran down the line of chairs. Almost at the end of the row he glimpsed Brayling and his wife. The man had a brief case opened on his lap. He was sorting through official-looking documents. The woman smoked pensively, a Turkish cigarette wedged in her long black holder. Valentine, whose chair was next to theirs, sat down and opened his magazine.

He was conscious of limpid blue eyes moving speculatively in his direction. A breath of perfume mingled with the aromatic fragrance of tobacco. Over the rail the sea sparkled, a sun-painted, ruffled floor. A few passengers wandered past, doing the deck mile for exercise. Finally, Sir Brayling removed his monocle, polished it vigorously, returned it to his eye and coughed.

"Coming in for a nap, Lois?"

"Presently."

Brayling smothered a yawn.

"Don't know why I'm so totally done in. Change of weather, I presume. I didn't sleep very well last night. Too much pitching and rolling, kept waking up."

The woman changed the subject.

"You'd better trot along and send your radio."

"Jove, that's right. Almost forgot it."

Brayling shoved his papers back in their leather container and left.

After a space Valentine closed the magazine and settled further back in the deck chair. The sun struck sparks from the huge square cut diamond in a ring she wore. He appraised it idly, noting the emeralds surrounding the jewel. Royle would pay top price for a thing like that. Who was she? What, he asked himself again, had she expected to find in his luggage?

Was she representing Masset, the Yard― or someone else?

He spoke slowly:

"You're bound for Singapore, Lady Brayling?"

The cigarette moved in his direction.

"Government business, such a bore."

"Life's often that. And yet," Valentine added, "there are certain highlights to make it bearable. I had one a few hours ago."

"Really?"

Her carefully shaped brows lifted.

"I was," he continued, "visited in my cabin during the dark hours."

The cigarette remained motionless, its smoke blowing towards him. Her look was one of polite interest.

"A― thief?"

Valentine shook his head.

"I hardly think so, although my baggage seemed to be the object of the intruder's call."

She smiled, a warm, red-lipped smile.

"What did you do― frighten him away?"

"Unfortunately it wasn't a 'him,' it was a 'her.' Yes, she got away cleverly."

"Without leaving a hint of her identity?" The question was couched in a tone that held a note of regret. "Too bad. Now, I suppose, you are as much in the dark as you were this morning."

Valentine shook his head.

"Not exactly. My unknown caller left a souvenir― some of her hair, attached to my ring."

Still the blue eyes met his blandly.

"Indeed! It sounds like a clue in a detective story. Tell me, was she a blonde?"

"I would say," Valentine murmured thoughtfully, "her hair was exactly the color of your own."

Lois Brayling looked seaward. A fishing smack had made its turn and was running with the wind.

She got up. To-day she wore a black and white checked raglan coat over a smart knitted sports frock. Her small feet were shod in capable buckskin shoes. She looked young, no more than twenty-four or five, the well-groomed English tourist. Despite her youth her poise was that of a much older person. She had either, Valentine decided, known life's seamy side or had absorbed some of her husband's urban dignity.

He sighed a little as he watched Lois Brayling disappear down the deck.

During dinner and afterwards, Valentine kept the blonde wife of Sir Esme within range of his quizzical gaze. He had become expert in the art of watching a person and not having his keen regard felt. When she and her husband went into the cafe for their coffee and liqueurs, the adventurer was seated at a rear table, close to a fluted column. He drew in behind it, half turning his back, but seeing them in a mirror that faced him. He watched them sit down, saw them order, noticed the blue eyes drift idly about the smoke-filled room.

There were two or three loungers at the bar. One, Lawson Clarke, was doing coin tricks for the amusement of one of the bar men and a steward. Clarke flipped a shilling into the air, caught it, rubbed his hand and opened it, showing that what he held was a penny. He made that disappear by a quick movement and snap of his fingers. It was elementary sleight-of-hand work, but it made the barman's eyes grow round with wonder.

"I don't know how you do it, sir. It's remarkable."

Clarke chuckled.

"It's not the trick itself, it's the tricky way it's done. The hand is quicker than the eye, George. Good-night."

He turned and started toward the door that opened into the salon adjoining. Clarke was slim, small, the typical musical comedy dancing man type. There was rhythm to his walk, to the swing of his shoulders. As he passed the table occupied by the Braylings the blonde woman reached for her liqueur glass. The brocaded satin bag on her lap slipped to the floor.

Clarke stopped, leaned quickly and picked it up.

"So careless of me." The blue eyes lifted to his. "Thank you."

"A pleasure," Clarke murmured politely, and went on.

Captain Valentine felt a thrill of interest. The hand was quicker than the eye, but not quite quick enough. In the mirror he had seen Clarke palm the folded scrap of paper Lady Brayling pressed into his fingers when he returned the bag. The adventurer tapped his highball glass retrospectively. She was communicating with Lawson Clarke. For what reason and why the secrecy?

On deck, Valentine wandered into the cardroom. Bridge had started. Cardeaux, Benton Ledyard. Clarke and another passenger were playing. The Captain dropped down on a lounge, watching the game. He wondered what Lady Brayling had written on the piece of paper she had given Clarke. A rendezvous? A warning of some kind? He made up his mind to keep Lawson Clarke under observation, no matter how long or late he had to stay up.

The Ceylon Empress pressed on steadily. The sea was quiet. Stars wheeled in the blue sky, towing a luminous moon up to take its place as the Admiral Ship in their glittering armada. The hour lengthened, the bridge game reached its final rubber.

Ledyard stood, stretched and yawned. "How much am I in the red for?"

Cardeaux, figuring rapidly, named a precise amount:

"In your money― sixteen dollars."

Lawson Clarke finished his drink, pulled down his waistcoat.

"I'm on the winning end?"

"Five pounds."

Clarke took the money, said good-night and went out. Ledyard stared after him.

"That guy," the American murmured, "has the luck of the devil!"

"Either that," Cardeaux said, "or he plays his cards well."

"I'll say it's luck," Ledyard grunted.

Valentine slipped unobtrusively out on deck. Clarke's stateroom was on the other side of the ship. The adventurer made his way to the promenade deck. It was dark enough there to suit his purpose. He took up a stand in the shadows near a covered lifeboat where he could watch the door opening into the stateroom corridor below.

Minutes spun the span of a half hour and nothing happened. It was when the Captain decided he was on a false scent that he first saw a figure emerge on the promenade deck at a point a dozen yards beyond. Lady Brayling stepped out and into the faint glow of the stars.

The red tip of a cigarette burned a crimson hole in the night. Lawson Clarke hesitated at the top of the stairs, searching the murk for a glimpse of the one who came quickly toward him.

"That you, Lois?"

The woman loomed up beside Clarke.

"We can talk here, there's no one about," she said hurriedly. "But be quick. If Esme wakes up and finds I'm gone―"

"I'll be quick enough," Clarke promised. "Why didn't you get word to me to-day? What happened last night? I've been waiting to hear from you. When I saw you talking with him on deck this afternoon―"

"I had to find out if he suspected!"

"What?"

Valentine heard the quick breath she drew.

"I wasn't successful last night, Lawson. I did exactly what you told me, but he woke up before I could open his luggage"

Clarke's exclamation blended annoyance and apprehension into a low snarl.

"Why weren't you careful? I told you it was risky! What happened? If he found out―"

"He didn't," she assured him swiftly. "That's why I talked with him on deck; I wanted to be sure."

Clarke's anger subsided.

"Nothing but failure!" he complained, snapping his cigarette away. "Delford's waiting for word at the hotel in Port Said. I was supposed to have radioed him before this. You know how he is when there's a slip-up."

"I'm almost certain," she went on quietly, "that he's the man."

"Why do you think that?"

Valentine could almost see her shrug. "I don't know, I suppose it's intuition."

Clarke laughed mirthlessly under his breath.

"We'll have to do better than that. Delford wants proof, not intuition. Stone doesn't entirely fit the description of the man who calls himself Captain Valentine. Naturally he could have shaved off the black moustache and grey sideburns, yet―"

Far below the engines pounded in steady vibrant measures.

"Why is he so important?" Lois Brayling asked. "You've never told me that."

"I don't know myself," Clarke answered shortly. "The thing came in a hurry, last minute orders. The Tilbury Docks were to be kept covered. Stone was the only one who came aboard this ship bearing any suggestion of likeness to Captain Valentine. I'm confident that if you can get in his baggage you'll be able to turn up something in the way of proof. You've got to try again, Lois."

Her question came after a long minute.

"How?"

"That's your problem. You're a smart woman, use your wits. He's a man and you're attractive."

"I'll do my best, Lawson."

She went down the stairs, leaving Clarke to move to the rail.

Finally he stepped away from the rail, descended the steps and disappeared through the corridor's door. Captain Valentine lighted a cigarette and moved out from the shelter of the lifeboat's shadows.

A sudden decision took him to the deck below. It was late. The salons were deserted, the few passengers had retired. Making sure that Clarke was in his own quarters, the adventurer went forward. His destination was the door of the Brayling suite, choicely located amidships. A crack of dim light showed at the transom. Inside Valentine heard movement, the deep regular breathing of Sir Esme, a faint patter of feet as they crossed and recrossed the carpeted floor. Valentine knocked quietly.

"Who is it?"

The whispered query was followed by the turn of the knob. Blue eyes stared out questioningly. They widened when they saw Valentine. Evidently she had expected a steward with a message, or Lawson Clarke who had forgotten some final word.

"If it isn't too late," the adventurer murmured. "I'd appreciate a few minutes of your time― on deck."

She regarded him, frowning.

"But that is impossible, Mr. Stone."

"Important," Valentine corrected.

"I'm about to retire. To-morrow―"

"To-night, now!" He leaned toward her. "You want information concerning a certain Captain Valentine," he said significantly. "I can supply it!"

Her red lips parted. She retreated a step, darting a glance at what the adventurer knew was the bed in which Sir Esme slumbered heavily. She caught up a light camel's hair coat, shut the door soundlessly and looked at him askance.

She made no comment, voiced no inquiry until he had escorted her to the promenade deck at a point not far from where she had kept her clandestine rendezvous with Lawson Clarke so short a time previous. She turned up the collar of her coat, held him with her eyes.

"What― how do you know that I― I―" The adventurer completed her wondering question:

"That you are anxious to discover the identity of the gentleman in question? That is something I can't reveal at the moment. I brought you up here so that you might learn whatever you think necessary to pass on to Clarke. What would you like to know?"

Her piquant face was a study in bewilderment. For the second time her hand tightened over his arm. The urge of an irresistible impulse carried her close to him.

"Who are you?"

The adventurer freed his arm, gave her a bow that was both pseudo-dramatic and flamboyantly embellished with a sweeping flourish.

"I," he announced, "happen to be the Captain Valentine whose stateroom you visited last night!"

Eight

FOR Valentine there was always a certain amount of satisfaction in the stupefied surprise following the skilful playing of a trump card.

"Captain Valentine!" Lois Brayling said sibilantly.

His manner changed, turned brisk, blunt "Tell Clarke that. It will save you another excursion to my cabin. Besides, you won't find anything in my bags to link me with the one you want."

Her first agitation dwindled. She considered him intently, as if not quite certain whether to believe him.

"Why have you told me? How did you know―"

"As Captain Valentine it's my business to know things, Lady Brayling."

"But―"

He lost some of his patience.

"Don't be a fool! Give Clarke the information he wants. I'll sit with you on deck in the morning. Then you can go to him and tell him you pumped me, learned I've been in Paris recently, that I sent my Chinese servant on ahead to Port Said―"

She understood then. "You listened!"

"To every word."

Her glance was still strained, confused.

"What's Clarke doing, blackmailing you?" asked Valentine.

She gave an imperceptible start, facing him suddenly, an inner disturbance changing her expression, making her face almost haggard in the moonlight. She appeared on the verge of saying something, checked herself and shook her head.

"I― can't―"

"Of course not. Perhaps we'd better say good-night― or good morning― temporarily. At ten in the deck chairs, Lady Brayling. Pleasant dreams."

Towards noon the following day he saw Lawson Clarke coming out of the radio office. Earlier, as agreed, Valentine had spent half an hour in his deck chair conversing with Lois Brayling for Clarke's benefit. His plan moved smoothly along for, in the radio shack, with a pencil poised over a company blank, his gaze had found and rested on the message Clarke filed.

The adventurer read:

Ronald Delford

Hotel du Thebes et Orientale Port Said

February 14th. Positive. Alone. Send instructions. Clarke.

Valentine wrote out his own message in code, addressed it to Tim at the Bazaar Alahdi, paid its transmission and lingered to talk with the operator. He was in perfect humor when, changing from tweeds to flannels, he wandered down to the bar. The iron was in the fire now. Remained only the necessity of discovering what tight hold Lawson Clarke held Lady Brayling in.

The hours slipped by. The Ceylon Empress reached and trudged over the blue floor of the Mediterranean.

Port Said stood just ahead now. The afternoon before the ship was due to reach Egypt's northern gate, Valentine loitered in the shade of the bridge's overhang. His cigarette supply was almost exhausted. He made a note to replenish it at the emporium of Simon Artz when he went ashore at Port Said. Then he caught a glimpse of Lawson Clarke coming down the stairs from the deck above and promptly forgot everything except the radiogram he saw Clarke shove in his pocket.

For the first time since it had left London the Ceylon Empress faced stormy weather. With the crimson sunset the wind had died, leaving the sea glassy, black and ominous. In the west a haze bank piled up formidably. The heat had increased, the dining-room

Stewards seemed limp as they served. The adventurer escaped Jorgensen at the meal's conclusion and went out on deck. Most of the passengers were on the promenade. He could hear their voices and laughter. Sir Brayling, in white linen, emerged from the main salon, polished his monocle and, alone, headed for the bar. Ledyard, the American, appeared after a space and stopped for a word:

"Confoundedly hot."

He moved on, following Sir Esme's trail, and Valentine went to his cabin.

The fans stirred up the heavy air. He put on a shantung lounging suit, kicked his bare feet into slippers and opened his last tin of cigarettes. To-morrow at this time he would be with Wang Shim.

VALENTINE switched off the electricity. Lightning, like a blade in the hands of a sword dancer, slashed brilliant streaks in the sombre sky. He watched it, fascinated as always by its pyrotechnic display. Thunder rumbled distantly and rain began to fall. Heavy, splashing drops brought the first breath of cool air to the oppressive night. He turned on his side to see better and this action, he decided later, undoubtedly saved his life.

The husky cough of a revolver sheathed with an American silencer occurred at the same time its lead missile cut past the adventurer's head and flattened itself on the steel rim of the porthole!

Valentine made two swiftly synchronised moves. The first rolled him off the couch and dropped him on all fours to the floor. The second propelled him up to and against the man who lashed out desperately with the weapon in his hand. The adventurer warded off a blow that would have crushed his skull. He had been caught unprepared, the thunder had blotted out the opening of the stateroom door, but the need of self preservation was a stimulant and goad that put fury into his attack. He drove a knee to the man's stomach and hurled him back against the washstand. A flare of lightning showed him the pinched, leathery face of Clarke. Valentine laughed as he crashed a fist fully into the pale target of it.

After that he had no difficulty in wrenching the weapon free, tossing it to the bed and dragging Clarke to his feet. He held him against the wall until he turned on the lights. Then he pushed him contemptuously to the cushioned couch and stood off, hands on his flat hips, looking at him with ironic amusement.

"Delford sent instructions?"

Clarke raised a hand to his mouth. A trickle of blood crept from one corner of it, dripped off his chin. He wiped it away, making no attempt to conceal his surprise and chagrin. He bent over weakly. When he lifted his gaze again his eyes were sullen and defiant.

"Well, what are you going to do about it?"

"That," Valentine told him, "remains to be seen." He waited until his first flare of anger diminished. Long ago he had learned the advisability of taking the initiative only when his nerves were steady and his mind unhampered by the blaze of rage. "Answer me, Delford's message told you to get rid of me? You needn't bother to lie, I saw both the radiogram and the facial expression you brought down from the wireless office this afternoon."

Clarke took out his handkerchief and pressed it against his mouth.

"What do you intend doing with me? Let's get it over. I took a pot shot at you and missed. All right, now it's your turn."

The adventurer surveyed him meditatively.

"Strange as it may seem I'm going to give you a chance. Instead of having you held on a charge of attempted murder, I'm going to let you talk yourself out of this. It all depends on what you say and how true it is."

"What do you want me to tell you?"

Valentine dipped a hand into the cigarette tin.

"Why the man at Port Said wanted me killed."

Thunder detonations died in successive echoes. Clarke moistened his lips.

"I can't answer that, I don't know."

"Who is Ronald Delford?"

The other drew a breath. "Harren, Victor Harren."

Valentine straightened up. It had been a long time since he had heard that name. More than three years had elapsed since the elegant Vic Harren, blackmailer and confidence man supreme, had slipped out of England to evade the tightening net of the law.

"Harren?" Captain Valentine repeated. "And you don't know why he wanted me removed?"

"No, that's the truth."

"Tell me about Lady Brayling. How did she get mixed up in this?"

Some of Clarke's defiance gleamed in his eyes.

"I don't―"

Valentine's long arm curved out. His hand fastened over Clarke's throat. He pushed him deep into the cushions, making his fingers vice-like in their grip.

"Tell me!"

The man choked, coughed and gasped. The adventurer jerked him erect, released and pushed him away.

"She― Lois― worked for Vic in London once―"

Valentine's lean face set in severe lines. In a flash he understood, had the reason. Something like pity tempered his feeling for the woman. She might have deceived her husband, concealed a lurid past from him, but she had never thrown off the dark yoke Victor Harren placed on her shoulders and that, he knew, must give her no peace. How strong and compelling Harren's hold, was proven by the fact the former blackmail king had only to speak and she hastened to obey.

"You're in Harren's employ?"

Clarke nodded.

"I got back to London― broke. There were no stage engagements. I tried the cinema, everything. I borrowed, lived from hand to mouth. Then, about a month ago, I ran into an old pal of Vic's. He was looking for someone to do a job, all expenses paid. I didn't care what it was― anything to get some decent clothes, three meals a day. He said it would be easy, that Lois would work with me. I didn't know it meant murder―"

Valentine walked to the door. He opened it, held it wide.

"That's all, get out!"

THE city at the mouth of the Suez Canal baked in the sun-glare. Low, narrow, treeless, it spread between the Mediterranean and Lake Menzala.

Slowly, the Ceylon Empress moved to the floating wharf. On deck, Valentine stared down into the swarm of beggars, mendicants and pedlars all gesticulating, shouting. His gaze moved to the huddle of Port Said. Its sounds, smells, animation were familiar. He watched the liner ease up to the dock sent out to receive it. Beside him, Benton Ledyard took in the colorful spectacle with high interest.

"Seen anything of our friend Clarke?" he asked.

"Not since last night." Ledyard frowned.

"Odd. He promised to go ashore with me, show me the sights. There was a bar he spoke of where they sell palm wine. He didn't come in for breakfast and his cabin was empty when I knocked on the door a few minutes ago."

"Did you try the baggage room?"

The American shrugged. "No, but it's an idea. See you later."

The first of the natives came aboard with the famous Galli-Galli man, prestidigitator extraordinary. He was a small, wiry Arab in flowing white.

Ledyard returned.

"Can't find him anywhere. I'm not going to wait. Do me a favor, if you see him tell him I've gone ashore."

LOIS BRAYLING, in green and white, came on deck, her husband following. She looked wan, tired, troubled. Her blue eyes widened a trifle when she saw the jaunty figure of Valentine.

A few minutes later Valentine pushed a way through the ring of beggars in the sun-scorched, narrow street. Grimy hands implored alms. Fezzes, at a shilling each, were thrust in his face. Necklaces, jade jewellery, spices and a hundred and one flimsy trinkets were offered him. Finally he got by the persistent rabble and to the awning fronting the coffee shop where Wang Shim, immovable as the de Lesseps statue, stood waiting.

"The eye is made glad by the sight of my Master," the Chinese announced. "I have engaged a table inside, offered suggestions as to how you like your coffee brewed."

"Thoughtful Tim. It's good to see you again," Valentine said with genuine feeling.

The Arab proprietor bowed obsequiously. "The best table in my shop for the arriving tourist. This way, if you please."

He made a ceremony of parting dangling curtains, blew, dust from the circular table behind them and hurried back to his counter. Valentine sat down opposite Wang Shim.

"What news?" he asked eagerly.

"Eric St. Julian and the woman passed this way two days ago, Honorable Sir. They boarded a Peninsula and Oriental Line ship. A fine, comfortable, white vessel. I was on the wharf when they departed."

"Mademoiselle Ormonde is all right?"

"She appeared," Tim answered, "in the full radiance of her beauty."

"You received my message?"

"Out of the air," Wang Shim said.

He waited until the coffee was poured, the dirty curtains dropped in place.

"What of the man?" the Captain asked. Wang Shim turned his thin yellow hand palm up.

"I have followed him daily. All there is to know," he explained simply, "I know. Presently I will impart my knowledge. Now, I would suggest, you try this beverage."

Valentine chuckled.

"An excellent idea." He lifted his cup. "To the success of our venture, Tim!"

The Chinese touched the pottery rim of his cup to the other.

"Success," he quoted, "means obedience to the wisdom of the parables in the Book of Youthful Instruction. How may anyone fail when the recipe for victory is so plainly marked?"

The coffee finished, they went into the hot streets again. Mongrel dogs, snapping and snarling, ran past. Levantines, Egyptians and Arabs jabbered in a parade before the open bazaars. Wang Shim struck off to the east.

"You wish to see this man, Master?"

"At once."

"My feet hurry in his direction."

They rounded a corner between the open shops of rival fruit merchants and found themselves in a constricted cut walled in by low, two-storey buildings with flat, parched roofs. The odor of unburied refuse was sickening. Half-naked Arab children wandered the gutters, turning over the trash with short wooden sticks.

"I thought," Valentine said, "the man we seek had quarters at the Hotel du Thebes et Orientale."

"By night only. During the heated hours of the day he retreats to this miserable neighborhood. His business, master, seems only the writing of letters. He despatches them to all quarters of the globe, mostly to the England I am sure he comes from."

Wang Shim slowed.

"Here," he continued, lowering his tone, "is where the one of letters wields his unholy pen."

Valentine appraised the building Wang Shim indicated. It was no different from those on either side of it. White, except where time and rain engraved it with stain and corrosion, it had an air of poverty blighted weariness. Wang Shim led the way past, speaking rapidly:

"There are two doors. I would suggest the adjoining house, Honorable Sir. It was vacated yesterday morning and by the roof one may enter the place you are interested in. If it meets with your approval―"

"It does."

Wang Shim pushed open the unlocked door of the house he mentioned. Valentine followed him into day-gloom and stench. With a certainty that told the adventurer this was not his Oriental servant's first visit to the place, Wang Shim dragged a short ladder from behind a sagging door.

He carried it to a point on the south side of the end room, propped it against the wall and mounted it nimbly. With the flat of his hands he lifted and pushed aside the square wooden lid covering the opening to the roof.

"We must bend low," he said, "lest we be observed by the curious in the street. Levantines, I have learned, frequently meddle in what does not concern them."

They crossed to the next roof. From Wang Shim's attitude, the adventurer knew caution was necessary. The roof lid there was in better condition, it slid wide on well oiled hinges. Soundlessly, Tim pushed it sideways and listened at the opening.

"I'll go first." The captain fit his feet to the ladder. "Remain here, on guard."

He descended to a landing paved with a splendid strip of finely-woven rug. The doors of the rooms were shut. From the rear, downstairs, voices mingled in conversation. The adventurer made sure no one watched him and continued to the first floor.

At the foot of the stairs he drew his gun, hesitated long enough to be certain the coast was clear. Then, slowly and discreetly he made his way to a half-open door and into the room it shielded. Drawn shutters blanketed it with grey murk. It was furnished simply and was clean. At one end, four steps led to a low mezzanine, over the iron rail of which rugs hung, and so down into another chamber.

The second room was a magnet that held Captain Valentine's entire attention. From where he stood he had a view, between the rugs on the mezzanine, of the room and its occupants.

He saw Victor Harren at a small writing table.

The captain's gaze moved from Vic Harren to the woman seated across from him. Lady Brayling nervously fingered her white suede handbag. The sun intruded through the shades at the windows, lighted her face, gave her blue eyes the color and depth of the fear haunting them.

As Valentine watched, she turned her eyes to the narrow jewelled octagon ticking on her left wrist.

"I― I have to go, Vic," she said, her voice anxious. "I promised to lunch with my husband at the hotel. If I am late―"

Harren made a gesture.

"Keep your seat, I'm not finished with you yet." He pushed himself back in the chair. "Clarke failed me by a wide margin― I'll take care of that later. You're here and the matter dovetails neatly. My dear Lois, I am lamentably short of ready cash. What was promised me for keeping Captain Valentine from the final stage of his journey will not be forthcoming. You can see the position I'm in."

His voice was soft and persuasive. It was the sort of wheedling tone that had always been highly successful in dealings with his hapless victims. Lois Brayling must have recognised its power. She stirred uneasily, watching him closely.

"That hasn't anything to do with me, Vic."

"Hasn't it? Don't be too sure. Someone has to make up this deficit. Why not you?"

She strained forward. "You mean―"

Harren shrugged.

"My hold is still one hundred per cent, perfect, my dear. Suppose I have luncheon with you and Sir Esme at the hotel. I'm confident he'd be interested in what I couldn't tell him regarding your youth."

"But you wouldn't! You swore on your word of honor―"

"Honor?" Harren laughed coldly. "I discarded that some time past. No, dear Lois," he resumed in the same purring voice, "honor plays no part in this. As I was saying, Sir Esme undoubtedly would like to learn what his wife's activities were before he found her in the ensemble of one of Bobby Langford's first revues. You understand. Don't let's waste time. How much money have you with you?"

"Four pounds," she faltered.

Harren picked up a match. He fixed it between his teeth, chewed on it. Motionless, Valentine awaited his next words. He knew what they would be.

"I admire your husband's taste in jewellery. That square cut diamond, for instance. Let me see it. And the watch, the brooch at your throat, that other ring. They're all valuable and saleable."

"What can I tell him?" she cried thinly. Harren threw the match away and smiled broadly.

"The truth― that you were robbed!"

"But―" The woman breathed faster. "If you can wait, I'll send you money from Singapore! I promise―"

The man shook his head.

"Promises never pay immediate bills. You will not be passing this way again for some time, Lois. I'm sorry, it's the best I can do."

She inclined her blonde head. There was a moment of hesitation. Then, slowly, her unsteady fingers stripped off her rings, opened the brooch and removed the tiny jewelled watch. She laid each in tum on the table. Like a croupier raking in chips, Harren's curved arm drew them to him. He held the square cut diamond to the light, watching it sparkle and glitter.

"Is that all?" Lady Brayling asked dully. "May I go now?"

Harren got to his feet.

"Certainly, I will see you to the door. She made no reply when he opened the door that led into the passage. Valentine, while Harren shot back the bolts at the entrance to the street, crossed the mezzanine and stepped into the room the two had left. He gathered up Lois Brayling's jewellery, dropped it in his pocket and sat down in the chair she had so recently occupied.

In the hall a telephone jingled. Harren finished locking the front door after his visitor and went to answer it. His voice floated in:

"Yes? Speaking. What's that? Clarke's body has been picked up in the outer harbor? Fell off the Ceylon Empress? How lamentable. Thank you for notifying me. Yes, I will take charge of the body―"

He hung up after another word or two and came humming into the room. Captain Valentine, lounging in the chair, smiled languidly.

"Poor Clarke. It is lamentable. All this might have been avoided had he, instead of practising dance steps, used a rifle range to perfect his aim."

"Valentine!"

The blackmailer's gaze levelled on the empty table top. A hot stain of color crimsoned his sunken cheeks. His lips twitched convulsively. The hands hanging at his sides clenched themselves into fists.

He stood with his back to the wall, his narrowing eyes venomous.

"Still up to your old tricks, Vic. As the twig is bent, I suppose, or something to that effect. How do you avoid the bearded Sikhs? What magic has kept you out of Scotland Yard's embrace?"

Victor Harren sucked in a breath. "What are you doing here?"

"I came," the adventurer informed him, "to ask you a question."

"What is it?"

The Captain smothered his yawn with the back of a hand.

"Nothing you can't answer. Who was willing to pay you for my abrupt demise aboard the Ceylon Empress? It puzzles me."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Quite so." Valentine's gun slid into his hand. He swung its nose around until it covered Harren. "In which case we'll have to refresh your memory. Isn't that a letter file over there in the corner? We'll go through it, check its contents. You undoubtedly have had correspondence with the person desirous of my death."

The expression on the haggard face changed. A look of a sudden guile replaced the former vehement stare. Harren sat down.

"After all, I have nothing to lose. Suppose I answer your question. Will you give me back what Lady Brayling left for me?"

Valentine's laugh held a note of real mirth.

"Vic, you are getting old!" He leaned forward, ripped the words out forcefully.

"Who's the man?"

Harren straightened as if struck.

"St. Julian, Eric St. Julian! He agreed to pay me five hundred pounds to get rid of you! He got in touch with me before he left London for Brindisi. I saw him here, a few days ago. He told me he has something you want. He was afraid you'd overtake him and get it. That's the truth, Valentine!"

The adventurer stood. St. Julian? The explanation tied in perfectly with the events of past weeks. Who else but St. Julian, fearful for the Moons in Gold, would want him out of the way?

"I think he said, "that it all. You might show me out."

In silence Harren opened the hall door. He stood aside. As Valentine passed he whipped out a flat automatic with a dexterity the adventurer didn't think him capable of. Its short barrel rammed against the Captain's back.

"Stand still! Get into the room! I'm not through with you― yet!"

Hands elevated, the adventurer walked into the chamber. Harren stood him against the wall, licking his seamy lips.

"I hope your aim is better than that of your late agent," Valentine murmured.

The other took the gun from its shoulder scabbard where the Captain had replaced it. The blackmailer's satisfaction brightened his face.

"Where's Lady Brayling's jewellery?"

"If I give it to you will it be the price of my freedom?"

"Worried?" Harren taunted.

"I have every reason to be. Clarke failed but what's to prevent you from still collecting your fee? Isn't that the idea?"

Victor Harren's teeth showed in a twisted smile. "I thought of that the minute I saw you!"

"So did I. Which is why I took the precaution of bringing an assistant with me. Harren, you haven't a chance. See, I have only to sidestep like this, knock your gun hand aloft, and―"

Fitting action to words, Valentine's surprise move came in the next breath. The gun in Harren's hand exploded harmlessly. The adventurer forced the arm back until a cry of agony came from the compressed mouth of the blackmailer. Harren struck against the table, pain showing in every line of his face. He was in that position, bent tortuously back, when Wang Shim came into the room.

Like a cat the Chinese leapt on Harren. A knife flashed in the single ray of sun that filtered through the blinds. With a choked scream, Victor Harren sagged to his knees, plunged forward, and fell heavily.

An hour later, in one of the shaded rooms off the wide verandah of the Hotel du Thebes et Orientale, the adventurer smoked a cigarette and gave Wang Shim a small package and a letter.

"You will deliver both to Lady Brayling. You will find her aboard the Ceylon Empress. You will know her because her hair holds the gold of the sun and her eyes the blue of the Mediterranean. Simply hand her these and do not wait for an answer."

The Oriental bowed.

"I will act swiftly to accomplish your errand." He weighed the small package, held it to his ear. "It ticks, Master."

"It's a watch, among other things, not a bomb," Valentine said. "Hurry, I need you back here. There is much to discuss and plan before we sail toward Shanghai on Friday."

Nine

PAST the curio shop of the Dutchman, Jan van Domm, the night life of Shanghai marched in colorful pageant.

In a rear room of van Domm's shop two men lingered over their coffee and liqueurs. One was the Dutchman, fat, pink cheeked, guilessly bland, blue-eyed. He rolled a cigar between thick lips, enjoying its rich flavor. Opposite, slender, wiry, and as debonair as usual, Captain Valentine smoked a cigarette and peered musingly about the place.

Van Domm sucked on his cigar, his guileless blue eyes dreaming. He moved his carpet slippered feet and loosened his silk shirt at his thick throat. Insects hummed around the glass-slabbed Malay lamp that gave the room its dim, restful illumination.

"You are thinking, eh?" he grunted. The Captain looked up.

"You must know why I came to Shanghai."

"I have not," van Domm said frankly, "the slightest idea. Occasionally I hear of you. You are in Russia, on the Riviera, in Siam." He made a gesture. "You are as difficult to keep track of as a coin changing hands."

Valentine regarded the man quizzically. He knew he could trust Jan van Domm. There were few he believed in, had faith in. The Dutchman was one of that small number. Stolid and phlegmatic he had turned to his curios and stolen gems after years of tobacco planting. Valentine had tested van Domm's honesty and found it rang true.

"St. Julian has been here?" he began slowly.

"Last week. I forget the exact day. Wait, I will tell you precisely." He picked up an ivory hammer and struck a tiny bronze gong beside him. A shimmering Minsin tapestry at the rear of the room parted. A youth who wore spectacles came in. He was thin, hatchet-faced, narrow-chested. Valentine remembered him as August Framm, the Dutchman's assistant. "Bring me my appointment book," van Domm requested.

"It is in the safe."

"Then open the safe." When Framm went out, van Domm sighed. "Stupid. He will never learn, that boy."

Framm returned within a few minutes with a book in leather covers.

"There is a customer in front, a tourist interested in fans. I must hurry back to wait on him."

Van Domm said nothing. He moistened a thumb and turned the pages in the book. Valentine saw they were crowded with his fine, meticulous writing.

"Here it is. On Wednesday last at eleven o'clock in the morning St. Julian came here." He shut the book. "He came to ask what I would pay for a collection of opals known as the Moons in Gold. You have heard of them, eh?"

"Frequently," Valentine answered dryly.

The Dutchman gently tapped the ash from his cigar.

"I told him I would have to see the stones. He made an appointment for ten o'clock that night. He said he would bring them here. All day I dreamed about the opals. The finest in the entire world. Opals with a history, with traditions! Opals so magnificent that men have died for their possession. Opals stained with blood, that have left ruin in their trail!"

Captain Valentine bent tensely forward.

"Did St. Julian return at ten that night?" van Domm blew a puff of smoke at the low ceiling.

"Neither that night nor since."

The lids dropped over Valentine's eyes. "Odd. Do you think―"

The other moved his fat shoulders.

"He either changed his mind― was lying― or was frightened off. "

"He wasn't lying!"

"Ah, then you do know something!"

"I know," Valentine said crisply, "that St. Julian beat me to the opals by minutes. He killed a man to get them. I followed him from Paris to London, and from London here. I have made a vow with myself. Before the last petals fall from the plum trees in the Mandarins' gardens you shall bargain with me for the Moons in Gold!"

"So," van Domm murmured.

"Where are St. Julian's headquarters?"

The Dutchman's blue eyes moved to the adventurer's hawk-like face.

"He told me nothing. He simply made the appointment. Beyond that I have no information."

Valentine got up. He knit his brows in thought. Why hadn't St. Julian returned to the curio shop? What had prevented him? Had he left Shanghai?

"Perhaps," he said, "I had better start back to my hotel. The hour is getting late."

"You have many things to do?" van Domm hinted. He made no move to arise. His spatulate fingers dropped to Valentine's arm. "Moons in Gold, eh? Something worth while. Bring them in when you have them, and I will be as generous with you as I have been in the past."

The front portion of the shop was deserted save for August Framm. The thin youth with the spectacles sat hunched on a stool at one counter reading a month-old Holland newspaper. He nodded to the Captain as the latter went. Chimes made music when Valentine opened and shut the door after him.

The Street of the Bazaars was filled with pedestrians. Prayer rugs hung from dim balconies. Figures lounged in doorways. At the corner a better lighted avenue rumbled with the night's traffic. Valentine had gone no more than a dozen steps before Wang Shim loomed up beside him.

"The set of your shoulders is as revealing as the printed page to the gaze of a philosopher. Honorable Master. You have learned nothing."

"I walk in complete darkness," Valentine told him.

The Chinese made a gesture.

"Yet knowledge lights a thousand lamps."

"Perhaps. I had hoped that to-night we would dine on the luscious tongues of humming birds and prickle pears preserved in the golden juice of honey. Instead, Tim, I must eat the bitter cake of disappointment."

Wang Shim stepped closer to him.

"While I waited my unsleeping eyes beheld a watcher. The shop your illustrious presence honored was carefully observed by a man who loitered further down this street."

Valentine turned quickly. "What became of him?"

"He disappeared a few minutes before you came. He went in the opposite direction to that which we now walk."

"A Chinese?"

"A foreign devil, master. As tall as you, heavier in build, unfamiliar in appearance."

"And you think he was watching me?"

"I am as confident of it as the night is of the sunrise."

Valentine tightened his lips.

"You should have followed him, Tim."

"To disobey your command would be to cut off my right hand. However, I did as well. I despatched a young friend of mine, one Loo Ling. Later he will report to me."

"Admirable, Tim," Valentine commended. "You forget nothing. Return to the hotel― or wherever you told your friend to meet you― and wait for me. I shall go to the Cosmopolitan Bar and ponder my problems for a half hour."

The Chinese melted into the light-shot darkness of the avenue. Valentine turned south on it.

The hotel where he had taken lodgings was not far from the Cosmopolitan Bar. He shaped a leisurely course towards it. It was halfway down International Road. It was called the Royal and was operated by three brothers who had served an apprenticeship in San Francisco. They were Greeks who had solved the problem of Chinese labor.

The Captain's quarters were on the second floor. Two cool, airy rooms faced a balcony that overlooked a poppy garden below. He turned on a light, took off his linen coat and noted the time. Tim had not yet returned. He pulled a chair around to catch what faint breeze there was and lighted his pipe. He was tired. The fruitless search of the seven days had enervated him. His head tipped forward. He remembered to lay the pipe on the table beside him, pushed out his long legs, and dozed off.

A clock was striking somewhere when Valentine straightened. His expedition days had given him a cat-like sense of subconscious hearing. The faint rattle of the door-knob took him to his feet. He turned as Wang Shim came into the room.

"I am late, Master."

"What news?"

WANG SHIM'S inscrutable face remained expressionless. He bowed as he drew a step closer.

"I went to the Palace of a Thousand Delights on the Wishing Well Road. There I encountered Loo Ling after he had sent a messenger to me. The one he followed from the Street of the Bazaars is there now― waiting for someone."

"Who is he?"

The Chinese spread his fingers wide in an empty gesture.

"I do not know. I have never seen him before. He is a white devil. English, I would judge, from my poor powers of observation. He is in the Room of the Sleeping Dragon. You cannot fall to identify him. His hair is the color of the sun-set."

Captain Valentine buckled on his shoulder scabbard, pulled his linen coat over it and picked up his hat. He went down the hotel stairs to the street. The night greeted him with the shimmer of its stars and the subtle fragrance of almonds. A sedan chair went by. A rickshaw drew even with him. He climbed into it.

"The Palace of a Thousand Delights."

The rickshaw rounded a broad, tree-lined thoroughfare. The famous fantan establishment of a Cantonese syndicate stood on one corner. Darkness bulked between the place and the rambling, wooden building known as the Palace of a Thousand Delights. Once it had been a celebrated night resort, a paradise of sing-song girls and bunks where those in search of dreams could find the heaven of the poppy. In recent years the tourist trade had gilded the sinister reputation of the Palace. It had become, more or less, a spot for sight-seers who witnessed only what its proprietor chose to reveal. Valentine was aware that behind the show put on for the curious, danger in its varied guises still lurked.

He paid and dismissed the rickshaw boy. He passed from the main corridor to the rear. Clean rice matting paved the floor. A Chinese in a brocaded mandarin coat with wide sail sleeves got up from his seat at the foot of the staircase.

He made a low, obsequious bow.

"Stars of evening shine brightly in the blue of the benign heavens, Honorable One."

Valentine recalled the answer.

"Yet, at dawn," he said, "the sun dissolves the night in the glowing bowl of morning."

The Chinese stepped aside.

"The way is clear, Illustrious Visitor."

The Captain went up a narrow flight of stairs. He was in that portion of the building forbidden the tourists. He had passed from the modern, civilised Shanghai to the old city with its ancient traditions.

Several sing-song girls squatted before the taborets, cooking the gum on long needles. Occasionally a sigh of contentment drifted from one of the bunks. The quiet was broken by the sputter of toasting opium, the felt-padded whisper of a girl's feet as she moved.

One of them approached the adventurer She lifted her liquid, oval eyes.

"The Bunk of the Drowsy Lily." "It awaits you."

The girl guided him to the south wall. She brushed aside the soft, cotton curtains Valentine climbed into the bunk, arranging them in place after he stretched out within it.

"I am ready," he announced.

The girl returned with his pipe. She leaned over the edge of the bunk. The adventurer took it and pressed a coin in her yellow hand.

"One came to-night with flame-colored hair," he whispered.

The sing-song girl nodded. "One came."

"He is here now?"

She dropped her voice to a lower pitch. "He is across from you."

Valentine let the curtains fall as she returned to her taboret. He laid the pipe on the groove beside him, propped his head against the duck feather pillow and touched the flat bulge in his linen coat made by his service pistol.

Minutes ticked away on the luminous dial of his watch. He kept his gaze focused on the opposite bunk. A half hour elapsed before he detected signs of movement there. Presently the cotton curtains fluttered. A hand pushed them aside. A man looked out between them.

"Luan-li."

A girl got up from her taboret and went to him. The man spoke rapidly in perfect Chinese:

"In a few minutes a friend of mine will come here. You understand? He will ask for me― Dave Slade. Is that clear?"

"As the water in the Pool of the Lotus Blossom."

"When he comes take him into the ante-room. Tell him the bunks are all engaged. Then let me know."

Coins jingled as they exchanged hands.

"Your command is, engraved on my memory," the girl told him.

Slade? Valentine thought fast. He couldn't remember anyone by that name. The man expected a visitor. What did that mean? He was to wait in the ante-room? Valentine moved in the bunk. The ante-room, he recalled distinctly, was on his side of the Room of the Sleeping Dragon. He smiled to himself. Not for nothing had he requested the Bunk of the Drowsy Lily.

He slid a hand down along its panels. His fingers found and touched the wooden contrivance that allowed the panelling to be pushed apart. He tested it, rolling up the thin wooden wall until he was able to see into the faintly-lighted chamber on its other side. For a long minute he scrutinised the room carefully. Concealment there was made possible by screens that stood, brightly painted, along the north end of the ante-room. Quietly, Valentine transferred himself from the bunk to the other room.

He pushed the panelling back in place and took up a stand behind the last screen in line. He hadn't long to wait. No more than five minutes elapsed before the door opened and the girl who had spoken with the read-headed Slade ushered a man in. Valentine, as the wan glow of a Tulip lamp fell on the newcomer, stiffened. He had seen the other no more than a few hours previous. His thin figure and spectacles couldn't be mistaken.

Slade's friend was August Framm, von Domm's clerk!

The newcomer fingered his hat nervously while the sing-song girl spoke:

"You are to wait here. The one you have come to see will join you."

She left the room while Framm wandered about restlessly. Valentine's service pistol left its holster. He stepped out from behind the screen.

"Good morning, Mr. Framm," he began quietly. "It might be an excellent idea for you to meet me instead of Slade. What do you think?"

Framm's hat dropped to the matting. He reached to pick it up. An exclamation of surprise and dismay escaped his tight lips.

"You― I thought―"

"Quickly!" Valentine ordered. "We're leaving here― together! A word from you and I'll kill you!"

His left hand gripped Framm's arm. He pulled him in behind the screens, pressing the nose of his gun hard against the youth's narrow chest. In that position he held him while the door opened.

Slade's voice said inquiringly:

"I thought you told me he was in here? Say, what―"

The rest of it trailed away. The patter of feet broke out. The sing-song girl answered in Chinese:

"He must have gone out. I told him to wait―"

Slade swore under his breath.

"I'll look for him downstairs. If he comes up again, tell him to stay here until I get back."

The door swung softly shut. The smile on Valentine's lips bit deeper into its corners. Framm was trembling violently in his grip. A paroxysm of terror shook his slender frame, van Domm's clerk peered up at Valentine with wide, alarmed eyes.

"Fortunately," the adventurer murmured, "I seem to recall a rear exit. We will go this way― "

He pushed aside a screen designed with cabalistic characters. He urged Framm through the curtained egress behind it and out onto a shallow landing. The stairs there were wide enough for two to descend side by side. A door at the foot of them opened on a terrace that faced the garden. Except for the fading shine of the stars the darkness was absolute.

"What are you going to do?"

Valentine went on down the garden's centre path before he spoke again. He disregarded Framm's agitated question.

"How did you come here?"

"In― in a car. It is parked on the Wishing Well Road."

The Captain's sense of satisfaction deepened. Things were beginning to move smoothly.

"Car? Good. We'll use it."

A gate in the wall led to a covered alley, the alley through to the street beyond. Framm's vehicle, an ancient car of American manufacture, stood under a tree, not far from the gate. Valentine made sure the redheaded Slade was not in evidence before he pushed Framm into its front seat.

"Where do you want me to go?" the youth asked, his nervousness still apparent in his tone.

"You might," Valentine suggested, "take me to the Street of the Bazaars. I'm sure your employer will be interested in hearing how you tried to keep an appointment with Slade."

It was a chance shot, a carefully planned remark.

"No, no! Don't ask me to do that! Herr van Domm is none too well pleased with me as it is! He will―"

"Exactly," the Captain interrupted. "I know what van Domm's temper is when aroused. Suppose you drive along while I ask you a few questions. I know a thing or two about Dave Slade," he added convincingly, "and I'd like to learn why you, van Domm's trusted clerk, attempted to see him at this early hour."

Framm looked up at him again.

"And― and if I refuse to answer your questions?"

Captain Valentine smiled. "I hardly think you will."

The youth at the wheel squared his narrow shoulders. "What is it," he said finally, "you want to know?"

ALWAYS adept in getting to the bottom of perplexing problems, Valentine wasted little time in drawing out the information he desired.

"Why did you want to see Slade?"

It was as if purging himself of his story restored some of Framm's lost equanimity. His voice grew steadier.

"It is a long explanation. I shall tell it to you from the beginning and hope you will be fair about it."

"That depends on how truthful you are. It wouldn't pay to deceive me," Valentine advised. "I have the habit of being able to recognise the truth when I hear it."

"A week or ten days ago," Framm continued, "Slade came into the shop. Herr van Domm was out at the time. I'm sure Slade knew that. He asked me if I would like to earn some money for myself. I was interested because, for the past six months, I have been trying to save enough to get back to Holland. I loathe this infernal city. I came, expecting to make a fortune and my dream since I discovered the impossibility of it has been to go home."

"What did Slade want you to do?"

Framm pushed his spectacles higher on his thin nose.

"He offered me as much as I'm paid a week to give him certain information. He said that at some time within the next few days following his call an Englishman would come to the shop. He described him to me in detail. Slade said the man's real name was St. Julian, but that he might use a nom de plume. Do you want me to give you the description Slade gave me?"

"It is unnecessary. I happen to be acquainted with the gentleman. What else?"

Framm drew a breath.

"I was to eavesdrop if possible and tell Slade what conversation I heard between St. Julian and my employer. I was to learn, if I could, St. Julian's address. Briefly, I was to pass on to Slade every scrap of information I could obtain concerning the man."

"But you didn't learn much?" Framm shook his head.

"Nothing. That is beyond the fact that St. Julian did come to the shop and talked for a few minutes with Herr van Domm. He was to return but he never came back."

"Continue. There must have been a new angle," Valentine said, "that will explain to-night."

"On Tuesday," August Framm went on, "I saw Slade again. I told him I had been unsuccessful. He gave me half the money he had promised. Then he said there was someone else who had recently arrived in Shanghai whom he wanted observed. That person was you."

"And a little while ago," the Captain added, "you went to the Palace of a Thousand Delights to give Slade the particulars of my visit and conversation with your employer."

"Yes."

Valentine rested an arm against the side door of the small car.

"I have always," he stated pleasantly, "had an intense dislike for those who spy and pry into other people's affairs. It is unpardonable."

"But I needed the money so badly!" Framm whined.

"By betraying van Domm's confidence, as well as the matter I discussed with him to-night," Valentine declared, "you might have jeopardised my life. For a paltry sum you would have had me murdered!"

"I― I didn't know it was as serious as that," the youth faltered.

"It might have been! I'll give you a chance to clear yourself. Instead of betraying me to Slade you will betray Slade to me! The man is interested in me.

"What do you know about Slade?"

"You mean―"

"Come, come. You're not half as stupid as you've made van Domm believe. You know something more than you've told me.

What?"

"That is all―"

"What?"

The amiable note in Captain Valentine's voice gave way to a sharp snap.

"I know that Slade is to meet a― a―" He broke off with a quick exclamation. "I can't tell you! He'll kill me if I do!"

"I'll kill you if you don't!"

The car had left the city limits. It travelled one of the highways that ran north. Traffic was infrequent. Now and then they passed plodding figures.

"To-night― on a junk up the river― Slade had a rendezvous with some man who was to supply information― about the opals! He told me he was going there after he saw me."

"Where on the river?"

"The Chungtu Wharf."

"Where is the junk?"

"Anchored off the shore."

Valentine lighted a cigarette.

"Where do you want me to go now?" August Framm asked.

"To the Chungtu Wharf."

"You won't say anything to Herr van Domm?"

The Captain threw his cigarette away and looked at his watch.

"Not unless I find you've tried to trick me. "But you wouldn't do that," he added, "van Domm must have told you something about my reputation. Usually an amiable person, I can, with very slight provocation, become a most unpleasant one to deal with. For that reason, and to remain in good health and spirits, you have been sensible. You've told me the truth; you are assisting me In every possible way. Isn't that so―"

He heard Framm swallow. "Yes, that is true."

"When we reach the Chungtu Wharf," the adventurer resumed, "you will wait for me in the car. I will go out to the junk, board it and interview the gentleman your friend Slade was to see."

Framm shivered perceptibly.

"You will never come back alive!"

Valentine laughed. "You think not?" He moved his shoulders. "I have come back from more formidable things than a Chinese junk anchored in a sluggish river." He caught the faraway glimmer of lights. "We're getting somewhere. What's the name of the village yonder?"

"Chungtu."

Ten

TWENTY more minutes and Framm's small car was passing through the sleeping town. The lights Valentine had seen in the distance were at the railroad station. The car followed twisting, narrow streets to the crowded banks of the river.

He saw Framm's spectacled gaze intent upon the moored vessels. The thin youth from the curio shop turned to him quickly.

"From what I heard I thought―"

"There'd only be one junk with, perhaps, a dinghy waiting to take me out to it? Whose boat is it?"

"I don't know."

Valentine opened the door beside him.

"In which case I shall have to find out. Wait here. It might even be a good idea to catch up on your lost sleep. I'll be back presently."

He went down the wooden walk that led to the wharf. He had to discover aboard which junk the man was to meet the one who awaited him. Something told him he had no great amount of time to waste in fruitless search. In all likelihood Slade was not far behind him.

The sound of oars took Valentine closer to the wharf's edge. In the murky half light a three-oared sampan drifted toward the dock. Voices spoke in Chinese. The water sighed under the blades propelling the boat. One of its crew, naked save for slippers and loin cloth, scrambled nimbly from the sampan's bow to the wharf. The adventurer stood waiting. The man's yellow body glistened like some sea-risen figure.

He approached, spreading his arms wide. "May the gods torment me in their wrath, Son of the Sun. We are late," he said in Chinese. "T'sing Hu could not present himself. I am his son and heir, sent to convey you to the junk. I hope your illustrious presence has not graced this humble wharf for too great a time."

"I am displeased," the Captain replied, "but you can make amends. Take me to my destination without further delay."

"I kneel to ask forgiveness," the man said. "We are ready, my two brothers and I."

To Valentine the arrival of the sampan represented another smile on the face of

Fate. He climbed down into it, steadying himself, peering back through the shadows.

The sampan cleared a fishing smack and headed toward a junk that seemed larger than the others. It was, anchored almost in the middle of the stream. One lantern winked in the rise and fall of the tide. Closer, the Captain saw its high poop and bare sticks.

"I am near my destination?" he asked.

"You have reached it," he was told.

The sampan drew in under the junk's counter. The Chinese who spoke caught the hang of a rope ladder that snaked down from the leeward rail. He held it as steady as possible. Valentine took his cue and fitted his feet to its hemp rungs.

"You are to wait," he ordered.

"For a thousand nights, Master."

The greasy planks of the deck echoed to Captain Valentine's tread. Except for the single lantern forward there were no other lights. He searched the gloom, advancing toward the squat outline of a bow deck house.

At the raised threshold of the deckhouse door, Valentine's gun slipped into his hand. He lowered his head, listening. A thin crack of light showed under the drawn curtain at one open window, but the silence was heavily oppressive. Instinct seemed to tell him that the junk was deserted, uninhabited. He regarded the crack of light a moment longer. His left hand flattened out on the rough surface of the door. He pushed it wide, bringing the barrel of his pistol up simultaneously. He stepped in, the weapon he held lowering. The single occupant of the deckhouse, stretched on the floor, was no formidable foe.

The man lying there was, Captain Valentine saw at once, either mortally wounded or dead!

A widening crimson pool seeped out from under Blauvelt's right side. Valentine's fingers detected the faint beat of a weakening pulse. He ripped open Blauvelt's worn coat. Scarlet splashes told him what had happened. The man had been shot in the stomach― at close range, if the scorch marks on the jacket meant anything. Death was only a matter of minutes.

The adventurer laid Blauvelt on the couch. The man moaned, one hand twitching convulsively. A cracked pitcher half filled with stale water stood on the floor near the stove. Valentine used it to bathe Blauvelt's face. He uncapped his leather-covered pocket flask and forced whisky between the dying man's clamped teeth. The stimulant was effective. The shut eyes fluttered open. The trembling hand relaxed. A sigh replaced the thin moans.

"He― they shot me!"

The adventurer's probing gaze fastened on Blauvelt's face. He bent over him.

"Who shot you? What happened?"

The other sighed again. He tried to raise his hand: He let it fall heavily to his side. His lips smiled stiffly.

"You can't fool him, guv'nor... He's too smart... All the time he knew about it... He didn't say anything... He waited... He got me all right―"

Out on the river Valentine heard the pant of some motor craft. His fingers tightened on Blauvelt's arm.

"Tell me what happened!" he urged.

Blauvelt's eyes peered into his own. There was no recognition in them, nothing except a blank, wavering stare.

"You can get the stuff, Dave... if the lady doesn't beat you to it... He doesn't know she's after the opals, but I do. I seen her going through his luggage. He thinks he's fooled her, but she's using him―"

His ghastly laugh awoke eerie echoes. Swallowing painfully, Blauvelt clawed the dirty couch cover. Valentine leaned closer to him.

"Where is St. Julian now?"

The man's blank eyes peered up and past him. Into his question the adventurer put a compelling, insistent note. Valentine repeated his query:

"Where is St. Julian now?"

Blauvelt pressed his face against the pillow. His voice, when he spoke again, faded to a thin, gasping whisper. The adventurer strained his ears to catch the almost unintelligible words:

"The Temple― of the―Three Buddhas―" The blank eyes closed. Blauvelt's thin body twitched, relaxed. When the Captain felt for his pulse he detected no further spasmodic beat. He got up, moved away from the couch. He turned the lamp out. stepped through the deckhouse door and came to a halt, his strained nerves taut.

FROM the port side of the junk he was able, in the faint streaks of the approaching dawn, to see figures swarming over the windward rail. The first to reach the deck shouted some curt order. The voice was that of the red-headed man of the Room of the Sleeping Dragon in the Palace of a Thousand Delights.

Slade, as Valentine figured, had not been far behind!

He rounded the deckhouse, plunging toward the starboard rail. Slade's bellow pursued him like an irate demon:

"Stop! You―"

A shot cracked. Something whistled perilously past the adventurer's head. It served, if anything, to accelerate his rapid movements. It took less than a second to climb to the junk's rotting rail. For another fleeting instant he stood poised.

Then, like an arrow sprung from its bow, he knifed the sluggish current of the river in a deep, clean dive that carried him well away from the junk tenanted by a dead man and those who crowded its rail.

It was mid-afternoon of the following day. Dressing leisurely with Wang Shim's aid, the Captain reviewed the events of the past hours. He had reason for neither satisfaction nor disappointment. He might or might not have stumbled across a valuable clue in Sandy Blauvelt's final words.

The flower Valentine arranged in his buttonhole was a bright spot against the granite grey of his suit. He surveyed the effect critically, then announced to Tim:

"I have an errand for you. You remember those who last year accompanied us to the Desert? Find out how many would be willing to go with me to Lengchau."

"I shall do so this afternoon. May I inquire what price you are willing to pay?"

Valentine took the hat and stick handed him.

"The terms will be the same as on the other expedition. I am leaving for the Polo Club. If all goes well I shall meet you here some time close to seven o'clock."

"I shall wait your august presence at that hour," Wang Shim murmured.

The Polo Club was beyond the Golden Peacock Road, several streets from the Bank of the Orient. It was patronised by the Americans and Europeans who lived in or near Shanghai. They were a wealthy set with their own strings of ponies.

Valentine discovered a match was in progress. The lawn fronting the side boards was made colorful by the pastel tints of feminine frocks. Out before them a cavalcade of white-hatted horsemen charged in pursuit of a willow ball. Now and again a gong clanged. Applause sounded whenever a goal was made. Valentine watched the game for a moment or two. A page in livery, apparently recalling him pleasantly, gave him a smile of welcome when he entered the clubhouse.

"Your name," the adventurer stated, "was― and is― Murdock, James Murdock. Is that correct?"

"It is, sir. You always called me Jimmy when you were here. That was a long time ago, sir."

"So it was. A hundred rice moons have waxed and waned since then. Here, Jimmy, take this coin and add it to your others. You might, at the same time, tell me if Mr. Krausburg is still with you."

"Yes, he is, sir."

"And he happens to be within the building now?"

"Upstairs, asleep in his room. He never," the page explained, "gets up until five o'clock."

"The penalty of turning night into day. Don't ever do it, Jimmy. The moon is a whimsical, romantic thing but the sun is a masculine, rugged piece of molten architecture. There's something strong and heartening about it. Don't ever make the mistake of swapping it for a handful of silver."

"I won't, sir. I hate the night shift."

"You might tell me," Valentine resumed, "where Mr. Krausburg's room is. I think I'd like to renew my acquaintance with him."

"I'll be glad to take you up, Captain."

"Don't trouble. Voice directions and I'll find my way."

The top floor of the clubhouse presented a long corridor. Most of the employees connected with the establishment had their quarters on it. Valentine went along until he found a brass number plate that corresponded with what the page had told him. He knocked quietly. When there was no answer he listened. He was able to hear the faint but regular sound of breathing from within. The Austrian proprietor, Krausburg, slept the deep, untroubled sleep of the righteous.

Valentine tried the knob. The door, he found immediately, had been locked from the inside. It opened at the turn of his master key. He stepped into a shade-drawn chamber ornamented with articles of Krausburg's apparel. The heavy smell of defunct cigars cloyed the air. The hot sun strove vainly to penetrate the dark shades hanging motionless. From the polo field the gallop of horses and the crack of the wooden ball made a thin, distant sound.

Valentine surveyed the sleeper. Krausburg lay on his left side, his greasy face supported on his crooked arm. His greying hair was dishevelled, his mouth hung open and his chest rose and fell with the tempo of his rhythmic breathing. The adventurer walked over to the bureau.

He appraised the litter on its top. A starched dress collar, a crumpled evening tie, keys, a wallet, and a heap of I.O.U.'s scribbled on the regulation cards the Austrian gave those clients whose credit he knew was good. For the rest there were toilet articles, a bulging ostrich-skin bill fold, a cigar-cutter, a couple of letters and a pair of gloves.

Valentine picked up the wallet. He opened it and glanced at the thick sheaf of money it contained. Methodically he began to count it, his stick under one arm, his hat pushed back on his high forehead.

At length he separated the money into two piles. One he put back in the wallet, the other he folded into his pocket. He turned as the bedsprings vibrated. Krausburg, propped up on one elbow, was covering him with a short-barrelled derringer which, it was apparent, he had snatched from under his pillow.

"Stand where you are! I'll take a look at you!"

The man leaned to reach for the window shade. He elevated it, letting in a flood of sunshine. Valentine smiled mockingly.

"So sorry to have disturbed you, Krausburg. One who works as industriously as you deserves his rest. I tried to be as quiet as possible. Probably you, like myself, sleep with one ear tuned to the sounds of night, as the Chinese say. By day the same ear probably works overtime."

Krausburg lowered his bare feet to the floor. Valentine knew he had been recognised, but the man gave no indication of surprise. Schooled in a profession replete with continental denouements, the gambler had long since learned to control his emotions.

"What are you doing in my room?" he grated.

The adventurer indicated the wallet.

"I dropped in to pay myself back what you owe me."

Krausburg drew his heavy brows together.

"I don't know what you're talking about. I don't owe you anything!"

"I differ with you. True you don't owe me anything now, but you did up until say, two or three minutes ago. I've helped myself."

The man's face changed. An ironic smile crossed it.

"Is that so? Once I had an idea you were one of these slick gentlemen who live by their wits. Your swank and swagger might have deceived the others here but it didn't fool me. I kept an eye on you."

"An eye on me," Valentine amended, "and a finger on the button that controlled your roulette wheel!"

The nose of the derringer lowered slowly. The smile left Krausburg's thick-lipped mouth.

"So that's it?"

"That," the adventurer informed him politely, "is unquestionably it. I kept a record of my losses in your room during my last visit to Shanghai. As it happens now I'm a little pressed for ready cash. What more natural than to look up my creditors?"

KRAUSBURG shoved his feet into straw slippers and reached for a pongee robe. He draped it over his pyjamas, still staring at the debonair, amused man who faced him.

"You're not going to get away with this, Valentine. Who's going to believe any cock-and-bull story like yours? You wait months and then come back here and rob me. We'll see about this!"

He got up and headed for the telephone on a table in the corner.

"I wouldn't call the desk," Valentine said pleasantly. "It might prove slightly disastrous. After all, I would hardly come unprepared."

Krausberg stopped and turned.

"What do you mean by that?"

"I mean," Valentine explained, "a good many of your patrons who played here during the month I lived at the club are still in Shanghai. I suppose now, that you've built up a bank account and reputation, you've removed the magnets and control button. Still, I'm certain those who dropped large sums along with my petty losses would be interested in hearing how they had been bilked. They, too, might wish to recover what they lost."

Krausburg went back to the bed. He thrust the derringer under the pillow. For a minute he thought over the adventurer's threat. At length he ran a hand through his uncombed hair, lighted a cigarette and jerked a thumb in the direction of the bureau.

"Write me a receipt."

"I knew you'd be sensible," the Captain murmured. "A receipt, naturally. You have paper and pen?"

"Use the back of one of those envelopes. Word it like this: 'I have on this day'― date it― 'been paid in full'― fill in the amount you've taken and sign it. There's a fountain pen in the drawer."

Valentine found the pen, uncapped it, and picked up one of the letters. He removed its enclosure, reversed the envelope, and wrote as directed. As the pen shaped words, the letter he had taken from the envelope intruded between what he wrote and his vision. Though upside down he was able to see distinctive and familiar chirography. He was careful to make his glance casual while he finished and added his signature with a flourish.

He turned then, holding the envelope in his left hand, waving it to dry the ink. His right hand crept behind his back. His fingers groped for and touched the letter that interested him. He pulled it further into his grasp, folding it to make it small enough to palm while he diverted Krausburg's attention with running comments:

"Give me that receipt and get out!" Krausburg said belligerently.

Valentine had the letter. He stepped away from the bureau and handed the man the envelope. As Krausburg read it the adventurer's right hand dropped into the pocket of his flannel jacket. "Au revoir, Monsieur Krausburg. Or shall we make it a plain adieu? You with your receipt and I with the money. I can assure you none of it will go back to your croupier's rake."

"Get out!"

With a smile and a shrug Valentine opened the door.

He went back to the streets beyond the clubhouse grounds. His fingers itched to produce the letter he had helped himself to, but he restrained the impulse until he was halfway down one of the main thoroughfares. He directed his steps toward the Cosmopolitan Bar. When he reached it he took a table behind the screens, ordered a drink, and composed himself with a cigarette.

For the second time in his career he beheld Adele Ormonde's writing. He spread the letter on the table before him. It was written in German. There was no superscription. It began with "Emil, dear friend." Valentine remembered that Krausburg's first name was Emil.

" 'If convenient to you,' " he read, " 'I wish you would come to see me on Tuesday afternoon, any time between three and six. There is a matter I should very much like to discuss with you. I would appreciate learning whether Tuesday will be convenient.' "

It was signed, "Sincerely yours, Adele."

In the lower, left hand corner was an address, Victoria Street, the Hotel Empire. Valentine put the note back in his pocket. Tuesday had come and gone. He narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. Again chance had given a new twist to the shadowy path he walked. Once before the woman's letters in Thomas Crayshaw's room had led him into the maze of the labyrinth. Might he hope that this new lead which he had accidentally come upon would be of equal importance?

He finished his drink. The better part of the afternoon had fled. It was approaching the twilight hour. Shanghai made ready for its third rice moon and evening meal. Valentine looked at his watch, asked directions and set out for Victoria Street.

His destination lay close to the public gardens at Manchu Walk. The lily pools there were painted with the declining gold of the sun. Swans floated majestically in the pond below the miniature waterfall. A few venerable Chinese still lingered on the rattan benches under the yulan and cherry trees. The hoted was diagonally across from the park. It was an old building with narrow windows. From time to time brick additions had been added to it so that it pushed its length halfway down Victoria Street and almost to the doors of the most popular restaurant in the city.

Captain Valentine availed himself of the register. He had no difficulty in finding Adele Ormonde's name. Her suite was listed as 206 on the second floor. As an afterthought he looked for St. Julian's registration. If the man was staying there― or had made it his temporary headquarters― he had probably used an alias. The English clerk saw the Captain turn the pages.

"May I be of assistance?"

"I wondered if a Mr. St. Julian, at any time during the month, happened to be a guest here. Perhaps I'd better describe him."

The clerk shook his head when the adventurer had finished.

"I don't recall anyone answering to that description, sir."

"Thank you."

Turning away, the adventurer continued past the reading room toward stairs he observed in the rear of the lobby. He didn't wish to be announced. If Adele Ormonde were in her suite he wanted to meet her without his presence being heralded in advance. To that end he ascended to the floor above and reached her door.

The hall was decorously quiet. No sound emanated from the room at which Valentine paused. He used his master-key when no one responded to his knock. He found himself in a cool, high-ceilinged chamber furnished as a sitting-room. Its two French doors were closed to the balcony outside.

A door to the left led to a bedroom of similar size.

At the vanity dresser the adventurer dropped down on the teakwood bench. He noticed a clipping folded under one of the cosmetic jars. It was cut from a Shanghai newspaper that reprinted items from the British Press. This particular article had originally run in the "London News." Valentine held it to the light that seeped in through the draperies at the window. The account had to do with Baron Grunoff's famous opal collection. At last the news of their theft had been made public. From London, where the Baron was now staying, came the information that he offered a reward of ten thousand pounds for their return.

The captain whistled softly to himself. Ten thousand pounds! As much as Jan van Domm would pay. He put the clipping back under the jar that weighed it down. At the same moment he heard a door open in the other room of the suite.

Valentine listened. As quietly as it had opened the door shut. Its latch clicked. Footsteps broke out on the floor. They came toward the bedroom. The Captain was on his feet, hat in one hand, stick in the other when Slade appeared on the threshold.

"Looking for someone?"

The red-headed man whose shot had missed him by inches on the junk stopped short in his tracks. His expression was a curious mingling of surprise and dismay. He peered at the adventurer as if doubting what he saw. Valentine laughed.

"I assure you I'm no ghost. Let's go back into the other room. The chairs look as if they might be more comfortable there. Oh, yes, before I forget. Here's something that might interest you― and the gentleman who employs you." He lifted the jar and picked up the clipping, "Read this when you have an opportunity."

WHILE he spoke Valentine ushered Slade back into the sitting room. The other's first surprise dwindled.

"What are you doing here?" he asked bluntly.

"Isn't that rather an inane question?"

Slade's look was lowering, hostile. "You tricked me last night, but you won't the next time!"

"That remains to be seen."

Slade thrust his head forward.

"Smart, aren't you, twisting Framm around your finger and getting out to the junk while I ran around in circles looking for him. All very clever on your part, but it isn't going to do you much good. I won't miss the next time."

The adventurer moved his shoulders.

"Personally, I'd suggest an hour's practice daily at a rifle range. It helps considerably. By the way, how did you happen to find your way here?"

Slade's color deepened.

"You're so smart," he sneered. "Suppose you tell me."

Valentine pretended deep thought.

"Let me see. I'd hazard a shrewd guess and say that a certain Mr. Krausburg tipped you off. Rather, tipped off the gentleman whose payroll you decorate."

He saw he had scored. Slade's face was a mirror for fresh surprise.

"You've seen Krausburg― he told you!" Slade swore. He'll regret it! He―"

He checked himself abruptly Valentine reached for his cigarette case, twirled his lighter and looked at the twilight shadows piling up in the corners of the room.

"I think," he remarked, "we'll part company. Life is a series of hails and farewells. Until the next time then. In the interim convey my regards to the unknown gentleman in whose service you perform so diligently. Good afternoon, Mr. Slade."

Valentine let himself out. In the lobby he made inquiries concerning Adele Ormonde. The English clerk could tell him nothing other than she had not relinquished her suite.

"She had a caller last evening just before I went off duty," the clerk explained. "A gentleman. I remember distinctly. He waited twenty minutes or more in the lobby here after he was announced."

"Do you happen to remember his name?" Valentine asked.

The clerk thought for a moment. "Yes, I do."

"What was it?"

The other nodded as if to confirm his own recollection.

"He was a Mr. Ravenel, sir," he replied.

THE Polo Club drew

Valentine to its lighted interior like a moth to the yellow flame of a lamp. Logic told him that the Austrian, Krausburg, could do more than refill his empty wallet. The man who had the gambling concession at the club knew something of Adele Ormonde's whereabouts.

The hours dragged slowly by. The kaleidoscope of the dance revolved in quickening tempo. Those who passed and repassed might have been enjoying themselves at any London or New York night resort. Trim, sun-tanned men, impeccable in black and white. Their wives, or the wives of other exiles, in bewildering gowns.

By twelve o'clock the crowd had increased. Captain Valentine ordered a final drink and prepared himself for the business confronting him. He went up the stairs and walked the corridor as far as the large front room where roulette held sway. The place was filled.

He looked for the greasy Austrian but failed to see him.

"Monsieur Krausberg is about?" he asked one of the barmen in French.

"Monsieur Krausberg has not been here this evening," was the reply.

The Captain raised a brow.

"Indeed. I trust he is not ill. I should like to see him. Can you tell me where I can find him?"

"You will have to speak to Louis. You know him?"

"Very well. Thank you; Louis then, by all means."

In his capacity of manager who watched the croupier and skilfully smoothed away any wrinkles of misunderstandings on the part of the patrons, Louis was at the edge of the crowd around the table when Valentine spoke to him. Recognition was immediate in the depths of his large dark eyes. The adventurer was confident Krausberg had not mentioned either the afternoon call or his payment of the old debt. Such a matter was not to the Austrian's credit. He would never admit that anyone had forced him to pay what he had mulcted them of.

"Monsieur the Captain! It is a long time since you have been here. I'm glad to see you."

"The joy," Valentine said, "is mutual."

"You are playing?"

The adventurer shrugged.

"Perhaps later. At the moment I am anxious to renew my acquaintance with Monsieur Krausburg. I have one or two wealthy friends I should like to bring here to test their luck. You might tell me where Krausburg is."

Louis slipped the thin gold wafer of a watch from the pocket of his brocaded waistcoat.

"He should be back at any moment. Midnight, he told me when he left at nine. You may wait here or―"

"Downstairs," Valentine murmured. "Does he still use that formidable yellow Daimler?"

"So you remember? Yes, the same Daimler but now it is a deep maroon and it has four lights in front instead of two. A power house, monsieur."

They both laughed. With a few well chosen words Valentine excused himself and moved off. From the lounge below he made his way down the main walk, to the right, and reached the parking space near the stables.

No more than twenty minutes elapsed before the swinging glare of double headlights dazzled him. The Daimler came to a panting halt directly beside the sedan that was the adventurer's refuge. Krausburg had hardly switched off the lights and stopped the motor before Valentine was beside him.

"Good evening, Emil, my friend. I've been waiting some time for you."

Krausburg grunted.

"You― again? What is it now?"

"I'm becoming lamentably lax in the matter of getting all my information at once," Valentine declared. "This afternoon, for instance. There are certain things I should have asked that were completely forgotten in my extreme pleasure of seeing you once more. I realised that shortly after I left you."

Krausburg sat motionless at the wheel. "Yes? What reminded you?"

"A letter. A note from Mademoiselle Ormonde. It was on your bureau, in the envelope I wrote my receipt on. I slipped it in my pocket while I was drying the ink."

"You are a thief!" Krausburg said hotly.

"No one, myself least of all, has ever denied it," Valentine stated. "That letter's important to me― more important than anything else. I know Mademoiselle Ormonde. I have been looking for her. For a week I've searched Shanghai. I must find her! Now that's clear you will answer my questions and you will answer them truthfully and without evasion. If you hesitate or attempt any subterfuges I shall be forced to use somewhat unpleasant methods to loosen your tongue. You understand perfectly."

"What do you want me to tell you?"

"Where did you meet Mademoiselle Ormonde?"

"In Vienna."

"She is an Austrian?"

"A Hungarian. I used to work for her family. As a youth I was in the service of her father. He is the―"

So intent was Valentine upon Krausburg's statement that he only half heard and paid little attention to the rustling sound that came from the rear of the car. He was off guard, relaxed and unable to make a move towards protecting himself, when a hand curved out of the gloom behind the front seat and clamped itself over his mouth. He made one or two ineffectual efforts to break the muzzling hold before, with the swiftness of lightning, something swished down to strike him a glancing blow at a point several inches above his right ear.

Without a sound Valentine doubled up and pitched headlong into the dark chasm that opened to receive him.

AFTER a time, like a bubble rising from a still, secret depth, consciousness came back to him. His head throbbed. He felt giddy and nauseous. He opened his eyes to the flickering shine of a peanut-oil lamp burning on a wicker table.

He was stretched out in a carved, wooden bunk. What Valentine saw was a low ceiled, poorly furnished room that contained three men.

Without surprise the adventurer recognised the redheaded Slade. The others he could not remember having seen before. One was short, his companion taller, and all were indisputably English. It was not difficult for the Captain to decide what had happened. Krausburg had allowed plenty of time for those in the rear of the Daimler to pick a propitious moment for their attack.

Slade, an inch of cigarette tucked in the corner of his mouth, sat in a chair, his feet elevated to the table. The other two lounged indolently. The tall man sucked on a blackened cutty pipe. The third man was busy manicuring his nails with a formidable jack-knife.

"Must be two o'clock, Dave."

Slade changed the position of his feet.

"What difference does it make, you're not going anywhere."

There was a knock at the door. A Chinese with a withered face and hands folded into his sail-sleeves presented himself on the threshold. He bowed.

"The tray is now ready. Shall it be brought in?"

Slade turned his head. "What tray?"

The Chinese bowed again.

"Ten thousand pardons. I thought this was the room to which the food was to be brought."

"Food?" Slade straightened up. "You're dead right. This is the room." He winked at the other two. "Bring it right in."

The Chinese stepped aside.

"Enter," he said to someone in the hall.

It took all of Captain Valentine's control to restrain the exclamation that surged to his lips at the sight of the Chinese who carried in a tray heaped with dishes.

How had Tim gotten there? There was no time for questions. He awaited some signal on the part of his servant that might indicate the way was paved for his escape. But Wang Shim made no move. With all of his customary proficiency he placed polished chopsticks in each of the three bowls, set the bowls on porcelain plates and handed one to each man.

It was, the adventurer saw, smoothly done. With plates in their hands his captors were at a momentary disadvantage when it came to reaching for their weapons. They began to eat rapidly.

Finished serving them, Wang Shim picked up a heavy rice bowl. For the first time he looked at the bunk. Valentine caught what his slant eyes signalled and prepared himself accordingly. It took Wang Shim a fraction of a second to snuff the peanut oil lamp with his left hand and use the rice bowl effectively with his right. A howl of pain and the crash of breaking crockery followed.

Valentine swung out of the bunk. He collided with an invisible figure, cracked a fist into it and surged forward. The door, partially ajar, showed him Wang Shim standing near it. Slade, spinning around, blocked the adventurer's way. A torrent of waterfront oaths, inspired by Tim's strategy, rose above the shrill cries of the other two. Hands slid off Valentine as he struck out with both fists. Into the blows he put all of his lithe, sinewy strength. They served to clear his path.

Slade careened off the table and collapsed on the floor.

"Master!"

Wang Shim's guiding hand fell on the Captain's arm. He whisked him through the door and into a broad, faintly-lighted recess where the withered Chinese stood, motionless as a statue carved from yellow stone.

"Where are we?"

Wang Shim answered without checking his rapid pace.

"In the rear of the Palace of a Thousand Delights! We must leave immediately. There are others, close at hand, who would prevent it! This way―"

He threw open a second door. A musty breath of damp air blew against Valentine's face. Just before he went over the threshold he saw Wang Shim turn and make some sign with his hand. The Chinese who stood immovable returned it and glided away.

"Where now"

"Through a passage past the Three-tiered Pagoda of Eggs and out into the Wishing Well Road. I know the way."

They hurried down what the adventurer saw was an underground passage. At one point there were steps leading to a series of subterranean chambers. Valentine had the impression of men busy at some task, moving like grey phantoms in a vale of shadows.

"The rat catchers of Wu Chi," Wang Shim explained. "They are setting their traps for another night's work."

They mounted a narrow stone stairway that was barricaded by an ancient door painted with the Ten Omens of Ancestral Wisdom. Wang Shim's thin hand went between its gilded slats. Another minute and it swung open. He stood aside to let Valentine pass into a tiled ante-room where a brazier trickled joss smoke. No one questioned or stopped them. They went through another door and came out upon the poppy garden.

"Shall I summon a conveyance?" the Chinese asked.

"WE'LL walk. I want to get my blood in circulation," Valentine replied. "Tell me how you happened to be so conveniently at hand."

They set off for the hotel.

"You told me you walked in danger. Two swords cut a larger slice than one. I followed. When you stepped into the car within the parking space before the building where the music played, I was close. I watched him drive you to the place we have just left. Other men joined them. You were carried through the door we left by."

Valentine nodded.

"How did you get in?"

"The Old One is a friend of my respected family. His name is Weng Cho. I had little difficulty enlisting his aid. The ingenuity of a guileless person will undermine nine mountains. What happened you are aware of."

Again the Captain nodded. He said nothing until they were to their destination. Then he laughed.

"Tim, to borrow some of your philosophy: A bad coin has two sides. Fortunately I left most of the money I obtained this afternoon safe in the hotel. They took my pistol but they left me a more dangerous weapon. You found some of those who accompanied us on past expeditions?"

"Five in all. They are ready to leave when you are," Wang Shim assured him.

Eleven

VALENTINE spent the next two days in preparation. On the third morning the small auxiliary fishing smack he chartered left the docks below the railroad yards and headed up the swollen, muddy river. The five men Wang Shim had rounded up came aboard an hour before they sailed. The cabin was loaded with provisions and ammunition. The adventurer kept an eye on the motor while Wang Shim, at the helm, wove a devious course through the shipping.

"At Wong Fai's we shall go ashore," Wang Shim said, after the midday rice meal. "Once my brother helped him with his crops. He has the eye of the all-seeing eagle. He may tell us something of interest."

Valentine shook his head dubiously. "I'm worried, Tim."

"Why, Master?"

"Am I losing valuable time in a fruitless journey? Is it likely St. Julian would bring the opals up here and risk losing them to the river pirates? What would be his purpose?"

"The dying man aboard the junk told you the truth. Men about to enter the Kingdom of Melodious Joys do not lie."

"But they can," Valentine said, "speak in delirium. Blauvelt thought I was Slade that night. He didn't recognise me."

"All the more reason," Wang Shim pointed out, "why his words should bear the seal of perfect faith and sincerity."

The adventurer peeled an orange. He made a habit of using them to quench a thirst aroused by the brazen sun.

"What is your opinion? You know the story. Why do you think St. Julian came up here?"

Wang Shim's saffron face turned to the east bank of the river. In the distance the Captain glimpsed the sprawl of a rice plantation in the fields of which coolies worked.

"My poor belief may be as futile as the struggles of a rabbit in the claws of a tiger. Humbly, I would suggest that possibly the man you speak of made this trip to do business with someone other than the Dutchman of the Street of the Bazaars."

"You mean―"

Wang Shim gestured briefly.

"Pirates have money, more than plodding shopkeepers. You have heard of the robber Lao Ting, possibly. Up there," he continued, indicating the distant twist of the river, "Lao Ting is an Emperor in his own right. Why shouldn't St. Julian sell where there is a market? And why shouldn't Lao Ting purchase? I have heard that jewels are his weakness― gems and women with beauty equal to that of a young peach blossom smiling at an azure sky. Yonder is the abode of my brother's late employer. I shall go ashore and make discreet inquiries."

"One thing more," the adventurer said. "Why would this Lao Ting buy the opals? Wouldn't it be more in keeping with his character to relieve St. Julian of them without payment?"

For the first time Wang Shim smiled.

"Lao Ting is one of charm and culture. What he wants he pays for in gold. Of course, it is his way to assassinate the seller and recover his money at a later date. That is only natural. If St. Julian deals with him I have no fear he will ever trouble you again."

Later Wang Shim had a coolie row him ashore in the smack's dinghy. He was gone for more than an hour. The adventurer spent the sixty minutes stretching an awning across the cockpit.

At length the creak of oars aroused him. The coolies hauled the dinghy alongside the smack so Wang Shim could climb out. He crawled under the awning and handed Valentine an ivory tube.

"My friend sends greetings to the intrepid foreign devil who passes before his front door. This tube contains a parchment scroll from the Book of the Observances."

"What did you find out?"

Wang Shim leaned forward.

"Blauvelt's words were truthful. No later than yesterday morning the white ship of St. Julian went up the river!"

Valentine's pulses leapt. "Your friend is sure?"

"There can be no question or doubt. St. Julian stopped here and went ashore to obtain a cask of water."

Valentine's fingers tightened over the other's arm.

"Did they see a woman aboard?"

For a minute Wang Shim was silent. He bowed gravely.

"She, too, was observed, Master."

The river again. Under Valentine's ministrations the engine, full speed ahead, sent the rumbling echoes of its exhaust across the sun-gilded water. The fishing smack nosed out into the middle channel. The rice plantation with the sweating coolies dropped away behind them.

The day lengthened, died. The green walls along the shore turned to black barriers, impenetrable, mysterious. The Chinese dozed on the cabin roof. Wang Shim, motionless as the statue of one of his mythical gods, kept vigil at the wheel. Valentine's pipe burned out, was replenished, burned out again. Twice he gave anxious eye to the fuel tank.

"We are nearing the cove," Wang Shim announced, when the twilight was split by the silver of the rising moon.

"You're sure?"

"The river will bend presently. The cove lies beyond. From there to the Temple of the Three Buddhas is no more than a hundred yards."

Another minute and the river began to turn. The shore came closer. Its damp breath blew against the adventurer's face with grateful coolness.

Valentine reached for the throttle. With a breath he reduced the speed from full to half, shutting it off altogether when, before him, he saw the white motor cruiser that lay at anchor in the mouth of a cove. He raised himself so that he might observe it better. Against the pageant of gloom the boat, spectral and motionless, might have been a phantom ship.

The motor ceased its staccato drumfire. Wang Shim touch the adventurer's arm.

"His boat!"

The Captain came to an instant decision. "I'll board her!"

The orders he rapped out stirred the Chinese from their half sleep.

Wang Shim's boat hook caught the port stern rail. Touching his automatics to make certain they were ready for use, Valentine transferred himself from the smack to the cruiser. He stepped down on a well holystoned deck. He stood listening, half expecting a lead greeting. He moved forward to a small companionway. Gun in hand he descended the steps, arriving in the main cabin at the foot of it.

HIS first glimpse was of a table heaped with empty dinner dishes. Next, the luxury of exquisite fittings, carved wall panelling, impressed themselves upon him. But he had eyes only for the man who, in a silk lounging suit and bright red sandals, sat at the table, decanter and syphon convenient to his reach.

Eric St. Julian surveyed his visitor lazily, a half smile turning down the corners of his shapeless mouth.

"If you had arrived an hour earlier," he began, "we could have included you for dinner. Since you left Vic Harren dead at Port Said I've been wondering when you'd catch up with us. Poor Vic, I thought I could count on him. No matter, you're here and we must entertain you. I can," he added, "unreservedly recommend the Scotch."

The adventurer studied the man with sword-sharp intentness. St. Julian's pleasant urbanity was anything but deceiving. It was like him to converse amiably while reaching for a weapon with which to deal death. Valentine took no chances. His automatic covered him in a mute reminder of what a false move would mean.

"Where is Mademoiselle Ormonde?"

The master-crook knocked the ash from his cigarette.

"Why should you think she's aboard this boat?"

"Where is she?"

The other brushed back his hair with a languid hand.

"Is it possible the celebrated Captain has succumbed to romance? Is the old, time tested but slightly shopworn adventurer in love? What else can I assume? In London your concern was all for the lady. And now, again, she is your first thought."

"Where is she?"

St. Julian tinkled a bell that brought a Chinese servant in.

"Ask Miss Ormonde to come here."

"Lady sleep, taking nap."

"WAKE her up. And, Wong, another bottle of Scotch."

St. Julian yawned again. Valentine waited, his fingers tight about the automatic, his mind crisscrossed with a thousand thoughts, hopes, ideas. Then, soft in the quiet, footsteps halted at the cabin's forward door. It opened slowly and the one he had thought and dreamed about for so long was before him.

"You!" she exclaimed.

Her gaze locked with his. One hand fluttered nervously to her breast. He drank her in thirstily, like a traveller who had crossed an arid desert to find an oasis at its end.

St. Julian broke the spell with a sardonic laugh.

"This," he announced, "is a happy meeting. Fancy such a distinguished guest coming all this way to visit us. We should celebrate."

"Why did you come?" she whispered. Valentine moved closer to her. "To take you back with me."

The hiss of the siphon St. Julian used was like that of a snake. The adventurer kept his gaze locked with hers. For him the cabin, the starry river outside and the wilderness dropped away leaving them alone together in a world of their own making.

"He― he'll never let me go!"

Her words were tremulous, tinctured with bitterness. St. Julian lifted his glass and squinted at its contents.

"That, my dear," he observed, "was well said. Let you go? I'm afraid I can't deny myself the pleasure of your continued company," He looked at Valentine.

The adventurer's questioning gaze made Adele breathe faster.

"He knows!" she murmured.

"Knows?"

Eric St. Julian chuckled.

"Knows that Mademoiselle Ormonde was fully aware from the first that I am St. Julian and not the gentleman who promised to use his private detective agency experience to aid her in finding the Grunoff opals. Her deception was a trifle transparent. I wanted to find out exactly what her game was― that, in addition to being interested in her as a woman, I've learned." His smile grew sardonic. "I know who she is, why she is so anxious to obtain the Moons in Gold. I wonder," he added, "if you can say as much, Valentine."

The adventurer turned from Adele Ormonde.

"Where are the opals?"

St. Julian moved his shoulders.

"Beyond your reach, I'm afraid. They are, to be exact, in a safe deposit vault in a Shanghai bank."

"He's lying!"

The woman's throaty cry made St. Julian's smile vanish.

"You think so?"

"You came up here to sell the opals to a Chinese!" Her red mouth quivered. "You didn't think I knew that! I inadvertently overheard Wong talking to the cook. They were on deck, near my window, the other morning. I distinctly heard Wong say you were coming here to make a sale."

St. Julian toyed with his glass.

"Exactly, but you didn't hear him say what I intended to sell. You cannot tell me that you heard the word 'opals' used."

"And they're in a Shanghai bank?" Valentine cut in.

"Safe behind steel walls and bars. A problem," St. Julian stated, "to tax even your ingenuity."

"Let me see the bank receipt for the safe deposit vault."

For a minute or two St. Julian sat frowning. He shrugged again, ringing the bell for Wong.

"Go to my cabin," he directed, when the servant appeared. "Bring me my small black leather satchel. It is on the shelf in the closet."

There was a silence following Wong's departure. St. Julian smoked placidly. He inched up the left sleeve of his lounging coat to look at the time marked on the watch strapped to his wrist. Outside the adventurer could hear the low jabber of the Chinese on the fishing smack. Adele Ormonde seated herself, lapsing into what Valentine knew was worried meditation. It was the reappearance of Wong, carrying what his master had ordered him to get, that brought animation back to her.

She watched while St. Julian took the bag from the Chinese. Valentine moved a step closer.

"Open it!"

"All in good time. You are," St. Julian murmured, "probably the most impatient person I've ever met. Do you remember that night in Queen Street? Finesse is a matter of a well regulated existence. Haste makes―"

"Open it!"

St. Julian turned his back, leaning over the bag. A key clinked on its ring. Adele Ormonde's vibrant cry and Valentine's forward surge were synchronous. The adventurer's automatic jammed hard against St. Julian's back― an instant before the man plucked a weapon of his own from the open bag at his feet.

"I was about to show you a pearl-handled revolver, Valentine." His suavity remained unshaken. "You're more or less interested in guns. Take a look at this one. Observe the, beautiful way it is made. Notice―"

Valentine moved to an open porthole. He tossed the gun through it. There was a splash in the river, Adele Ormonde's deep sigh of relief.

"I don't seem to find what you want," St. Julian murmured. "Odd. I was certain it was here."

"Don't bother to send for any more artillery," Valentine told him. "St. Julian, I've wasted enough time. I've come for the Moons in Gold!"

"My dear chap, I assure you your errand is fruitless. I haven't them here, unfortunately."

"Then what did you come to sell?"

The man jerked his head up. He listened. Through the night quiet Valentine heard the rise and fall of oars. St. Julian looked at him.

"You want to know why I came to this wilderness? You want to know what I'm about to dispose of? You must have forgotten Queen Street, what I told you that night. I invariably keep my word. Perhaps you'll understand better in a few minutes."

Valentine's lean face hardened. He heard the nudging scrape of the arriving boat as it reached the cruiser. Chinese voices sounded shrilly. Another minute and the companionway doors were flung wide.

The man who stepped through them was tall. His ocherous face, sunken cheeks and slant eyes, together with the long moustache that hung pendulously from his upper lip, reminded Valentine of one of the Masks of Animals he had seen in the New Year Procession at the time of his last visit to Shanghai.

"I welcome you to my humble craft, Lao Ting!" St. Julian said. "May your exalted presence give it a lasting honor!"

The pirate's gaze fastened on Adele Ormonde.

"This is the petal of the Plum Tree I have come to pluck?" he asked. "This is the white woman you would sell me?"

Valentine levelled the automatic in his hand. The two shots he fired point-blank made one echo. He saw the Chinese in the rich robes plunge forward anad fall face down, half across a chair. Then, in the next confused minute the loud outcry of those who had come down the steps with Lao Ting brought answering shouts from those in the boat.

Like shadowy, half formed figures in a nightmare, the Chinese who poured into the cabin made it a stage for drama patterned with death and bloodshed.

Firing as he backed across the room. Captain Valentine thrust himself in front of the woman with the dark eyes and raven hair.

THE next minutes always remained with the adventurer as the most hectic in his long, eventful career. The cabin lights winked out, leaving it as dark as the night that raised the luminous moon higher over the rim of the eastern world. The stabbing flame of his automatic smeared the murk long enough for him to distinguish faces.

With his left arm around the woman beside him, he forced and shot his way to the stairs. Later he understood he would never have gained them, never would have progressed more than a few worthless feet, had it not been for a counter attack launched overhead. Wang Shim's party had come aboard the cruiser. Their yells added to the din. Revolvers spat venomously. A man screamed. There was a medley of noises, a furious struggle, hand to hand and rough and tumble, on the deck. A figure collided with Valentine. The cold slither of a knife sliced past him. He pulled the automatic's trigger and by sheer bodily strength fought his way to the deck. He couldn't see Adele Ormonde, but he felt the tremble of her hand, the quiver of her body as, together, they reached it.

The thought of the pirate's tender gave Valentine an idea. He located it in the next breath. It was a long, narrow, sharp pointed bong boat of the kind used by natives for eel spearing. A single strand of hemp held it fastened to the Sea Lily. The Captain gripped the arm of the woman as he urged her across the deck.

"We're leaving in this boat! Hold it steady for me! Take an oar! Push off the minute I drop down!"

He helped her over the rail and into the bong boat. One of the Chinese had glimpsed his strategy. The man ran toward him. shouting. Valentine fired, cast off and grabbed the forward set of oars all within the eternity revolving in a watch tick.

They had, he saw, cheated certain disaster by the proverbial width of a hair. The Junk, slow moving but as ineluctable as doom, was close enough now for its clinging figures to leap aboard the white cruiser. A prodigious pull on the sweeps drove the bong boat out and into the shelter of blackness, welcome and concealing. He propelled the craft forward, his satisfaction shadowed by reluctance. He hated to leave Wang Shim to his fate. Yet, he assured himself, to linger and attempt a rescue against such odds, meant only disaster for all of them. He had, first of all, to think of the one who helped him row. Her capture would be worse than death; her safety must be paramount. He pulled harder on the oars, watching for signs of pursuit. None came. The riotous uproar they had left began to dwindle and fade out as Lao Ting's Chinese were reinforced by the yellow horde from the Junk.

The bong boat's sharp prow grated on sand. Valentine shipped the oars and stepped into shallow water. The shore sloped down there, thicketed with heavy underbrush. He searched until he found an opening. He herded Adele Ormonde through it and stood staring across the cove. As an afterthought he went back and hauled the bong boat up and in behind a screen of protecting shrubbery. It was when he had finished and straightened that he saw the first flash of flame burst from the Sea Lily's bow.

The fire grew while he watched. Valentine's heart sank. The thought of Tim, trapped like a rat on the blazing cruiser, sent a cold chill through him. Wang Shim, his faithful friend, his companion of the journey down the adventure trail, philosopher, scholar and helpmate.

Adele Ormonde's voice came unsteadily, wonderingly:

"We got away!"

Valentine turned swiftly to her.

"Thank Heaven! Another sixty seconds and we couldn't have made it. But I've lost something― something that can never be replaced. A friend," he explained, when she questioned him with her eyes.

Her hand tightened over his.

"I think I understand. You mean the one you call Tim."

The adventurer nodded dully.

"No use standing here. They'll scuttle back to the junk now they've finished plundering and burning. The question is will they look for us. Do they know the reason for Lao Ting's rendezvous? If so they'll make a search for the white woman he came to buy."

In its faint light Valentine saw the marking of an overgrown trail. He led the way down it, his arm once more around the woman in white.

Presently the path ended. Before them Valentine was able to discern the ruins of what had once been a temple. Huge stone blocks littered the clearing. Framed against the night sky and the gloom piled by the trees in the rear of it, the Temple of the Three Buddhas still retained vestiges of past splendor.

Of a sudden the fire was blotted out. The far away chatter of voices came to them from the Sea Lily on the wings of the wind. The adventurer's hand closed about Adele Ormonde's arm.

"This isn't a pleasant predicament. Our fate depends on whether the junk leaves― if they know of our escape. If it stays they will undoubtedly look for us. They know we can't get very far."

There were some cigarettes in Valentine's waterproof case. He lighted two and handed her one. He recalled another instance when the red tips of their cigarettes had been like watching eyes in the gloom. The tobacco seemed a stimulant. Some of her former fear was replaced by a changing, brighter mood.

"What happens to us now?" she inquired. "I mean, if they should decide to make a search."

The adventurer rested against the grass grown stones behind him.

"Nothing very amusing. I use my gun on you and then on myself. Two shots and we save ourselves a considerable amount of trouble." He shrugged. "I've had some first-hand experience with Chinese torture methods."

She shivered.

"I think," she murmured, "I prefer Paris."

He felt her tremble again. She drew nearer to him. After a time her dark head found a resting-place on his shoulder.

It was some time towards the dawn when the adventurer's nerves vibrated. The sixth sense that always telegraphed the presence of danger shook him out of what had been overpowering drowsiness. His hand clamped about the automatic in his lap. His quick, alert movement woke the woman. She sat up, the pressure of Valentine's arm over hers warning silence. He bent forward, parting the spear-grass cautiously.

THE sullen spread of the approaching day lighted the clearing weirdly. Black shadows had turned to grey. Half tones of light and shade threw the Buddhas into sharp relief and gave the ruins an eerie touch. Standing a little away from the edge of the clearing. Valentine was able to distinguish the figure of a man.

The gun lowered. An involuntary exclamation sprang to his lips. He stood quickly, leaving the niche. His voice, low and excited, spoke one word:

"Tim!"

Wang Shim wheeled around and hurried to him.

"Master."

His wet garments and drawn, weary look told of a night that had been filled with climaxes. Valentine's servant bowed before him.

"What happened? How did you get here?"

Wang Shim spread his arms wide.

"I beheld your departure from the deck of the cruiser. I saw you sever the mortal cord of the one who would have halted your flight. My heart rejoiced at your escape. Then, like the clap of thunder following the lightning bolt. Lao Ting's hatchet men swarmed down upon us. Combat was as futile as the wings of the humming bird in a gale. We offered little resistance. Those who had not been slain made the river their objective. I was one of them. Since then I have been proceeding perilously through the forest, searching for you."

He squatted down beside the adventurer. "The junk is still in the cove?"

"As motionless as the hands of an unwound clock."

"Do you think they suspect we escaped?" The Chinese gestured.

"No one can solve the workings of the Oriental mind. It is possible they wait for the morning to break. The day has ten thousand eyes to see with, the night is blind."

Valentine nodded. He looked at the anxious face of the woman whose head had rested on his shoulder for so many hours.

"I have a feeling Tim's deductions are correct," he told her.

"What are we to do?" she asked.

May I offer a humble suggestion?" Wang Shim spoke earnestly. "Not far from here is the Shrine of the Lustrous Moon. Often as a boy I came with my respected father to soothe my soul with its peace and comfort. It affords better concealment than this spot. I would be honored to guide you to it."

Valentine seized upon the suggestion.

"The Shrine by all means. In another hour it will be morning."

Wang Shim struck off to the east. It took some minutes for him to discover an overgrown path.

Wang Shim broke off abruptly.

"Someone has come along this path at no distant date," he announced. "Behold, tiny particles of woollen fabric attached to the thorns of this creeping vine! The pious walk with their faces turned to the sun, the wise man watches the ground under his feet. Twice, too, I have observed footprints in the soil."

They went on for another space. Again Wang Shim stopped to point out a foot-print to the black earth, a declivity from which rotting leaves had been scattered.

"A shoe," Valentine mused. "A man's shoe." He caught Adele Ormonde's glance. "Did St. Julian leave the cruiser for any length of time?"

"He might have. It was so hot," she explained. "Yesterday I spent all morning to my cabin. There was an electric fan there. I was tired from the strain of the trip."

"And while you were to the cabin St. Julian could have come ashore?"

She inclined her dark head. "Yes, easily."

They penetrated the last barrier made by the tangle of underbrush and came out on another clearing. The Shrine of the Lustrous Moon, erected at a later date than the Temple of the Three Buddhas, had more successfully withstood the ravages of time. Fronting them was an altar. Made of white marble, with the Dragon of Heaven motif chiselled into its polished surface, it reared majestically.

Valentine saw that Wang Shim was puzzled by the footprints. He lost them close to the Shrine, but went on to the pagoda on the left. It grew lighter. Suddenly she stooped and picked up something.

"Confucius tells us the dog that leaves no trail has gone nowhere. I have discovered something. This is my find. Honorable Master."

He opened his yellow hand. Valentine took from it half a burned cigarette. He brushed it off and looked at its trade-mark.

"Isis. Wasn't there a tin of these cigarettes ta the cabin of the Sea Lily?"

She understood what he meant.

"Of course, they were St. Julian's brand!" Her eyes widened. "Then, it must mean that―"

"He came here and no longer than a few hours ago. Why? For what purpose?"

"I would suggest a visit to the pagoda where my find was made," Wang Shim murmured.

The electrical thrill of a new and sudden hope whipped Captain Valentine's blood to quicker flowing.

The interior of the pagoda held the odor of decaying wood. Dust swirled when the door, emblazoned with symbols, was pushed wide enough to admit them. Light crept in through cracks and crevices.

Wang Shim used his strength to fling one of the metal shutters open. Valentine pointed to a table. There, in the dust, someone had recently rested a hand. The marks of thumb and fingers were easily distinguishable.

"What do you think?"

Adele Ormonde's question lifted Valentine's speculative gaze.

"I think St. Julian came here― with the opals! He took no chances with Lao Ting or my arriving unexpectedly. Probably the menace he was careful to circumvent in Shanghai had something to do with it also. I think the Moons in Gold are here!"

"Where?"

Valentine took up a position in the centre of the room.

The bare floors and walls were without visible trap doors or secret panels. Valentine's gaze darted over them. The furnishings, moldly and dust-covered, offered nothing of interest. Then, he told himself, it must be the planked floor or the rotten walls.

"Tap!" he ordered Wang Shim. "See If you can't get a hollow note out of this floor."

He started with the east wall, examining it, striking it with his knuckles, going over it with careful attention. Wang Shim began an inspection of the floor. The sun rose higher. The matutinal choiring of birds increased, but to the captain there was no sound except the methodical rapping and the quick, expectant breath of the woman.

"No hollow notes," Wang Shim announced at length. He stood, brushing off his knees. "Possibly outside. He―"

Valentine shook his head.

"He came in here. He stood by that table. He rested his hand on it. I'm certain that―" He broke off quickly. The palm he balanced against the wall felt the touch of metal. When he turned to discover what it was he found that a square of rattan had been artfully laid over a strip of zinc, the edge of which protruded through and touched his Angers. "Tim! Here―"

HE pressed harder, but with no success. The butt of his automatic aided. With it he hammered out the rotting wood and battered down its zinc lining. The sunshine slanting in through the half open door lighted the compartment Valentine found. He heard Adele Ormonde's faint cry as he reached in and lifted out a mahogany box!

When he laid it on the table he saw the lid was embossed with a crest.

"The Grunoff coat-of-arms!" the woman exclaimed. "The Moons in Gold―at last!"

When the adventurer lifted the unlocked lid he was hardly prepared for the sight that greeted him.

When he turned he found Adele Ormonde staring transfixed at the fifteen opals. Wang Shim stood a pace distant, his face inscrutable.

"So it's ended?"

The Captain shook his head.

"It has just begun. To get these back to Shanghai will be more difficult than the quest." He shut the lid, picked up the mahogany box and handed it to the Chinese. "Carry this, Tim. We'll start for the Temple. It's light enough to learn whether the junk is sailing."

In single file they retraced their way along the half obliterated trail. It was easier to keep to it now. Adele Ormonde was strangely silent. When Valentine looked back at her he saw her expression was enigmatic, her eyes shadowy. Wang Shim brought up the rear, the box under his arm. Without mishap they reached the barrier before the clearing where the ruins of the temple lay.

Captain Valentine's hand flashed up in a signal to halt. He warned them with a glance. Through the screen of the underbrush he caught a glimpse of moving figures on the other side of the Three Buddhas. Voices came to him. When he made a wary investigation he found a half dozen of Lao Ting's followers had come ashore.

Valentine was careful to make no noise. He drew the two with him close enough to hear his low whispering.

"We'll stay here― wait and see what they do. There's a boat hidden in the shrubbery below the bank. No use running any risk. It looks to me as if they're not searching for us― they seem to be doing some sort of work."

Eventually the clearing emptied. Sound of crackling in the underbrush was replaced by the creak of oars, the splash of water. Valentine had no way of knowing if they had discovered his hidden boat. Were they towing it back to the junk? Had escape been cut off as effectually as a door shut and locked in their faces?

"They've gone," he announced. "We'll cross the clearing as soon as I make sure they didn't leave a sentry to watch."

He crept out from the underbrush and moved slowly across to the opposite side of the ruins. At a point where thinning trees gave a view of the cove he took up a stand. The musical gush of a tinkling stream running past his feet was the only sound. Out in the cove he saw a sampan crowded with the six who had been at work. Two wooden hogshead weighed the sampan down and told the reason for their coming ashore. They had wanted water.

The adventurer's gaze shifted. The charred hulk of the Sea Lily had drifted into shore. It was down in the bow, half afloat. The fishing smack he had chartered was off a rocky ledge at the extreme end of the cove, too distant to determine what damage had been done by the fire. He watched the junk round the promontory and disappear from view. Then he called his two companions.

"There's a chance," Valentine told them, "the junk's withdrawal is a ruse. If they suspect we're ashore they'll give us a clear berth to come out in the open."

"If they suspect," Wang Shim pointed out, "why would they leave the smack? These men are not stupid. I have reason to know that."

"True." Valentine frowned at the sun dazzled water. "Tim, I'm taking the bong boat. I'm going out to have a look at the smack. You and Mademoiselle Ormonde remain here, concealed. I'll be the decoy if it is a ruse. I'll make sure that everything's right before I come back for you. Wait!"

The adventurer found the boat where he had left it. He pushed it into the shallow water and went out to the smack. When he climbed aboard he found he corpse of one of his coolies sprawled in the cockpit. He dragged the limp figure to the rail and heaved it overboard. The bow and counter waist of the craft were badly scorched.

There was considerable cleaning to be done before Adele Ormonde could be brought aboard. Souvenirs of the previous night's affray stained the decks. He made a rapid examination. Everything else seemed to be in order. The propeller he feared had been fouled by the marine growth close to the shore and the rocks, responded to the engine when he started it. The dial on the fuel tank told him there was enough petrol to reach Yuen Yan.

He pulled the painter of the bong boat In and prepared to go back and get the two on shore.

It was when he was ready to lower himself into the boat that Valentine glimpsed an unexpected visitor. Coming into the cove was an auxiliary smack somewhat similar to his own but larger overall, with a wider beam and more deck space. It shaped a course toward him In another minute he saw men at its windward rail, looking in his direction.

The engine stopped and an anchor splashed.

A dinghy put out and approached him.

Twelve

WHILE he waited the arrival of his unknown visitors, the adventurer stood motionless, his lean face shadowed, his gaze cold and speculative.

There were two men in the dinghy. Both, as it drew closer, were familiar. The man at the oars had been in the room at the Palace of a Thousand Delights when the adventurer returned to consciousness in the bunk there. Valentine gave him no more than a brief glance. His gaze, questioning and alert, riveted on the one with him. He blessed the foresight that had made him instruct Wang Shim and the woman to stay under cover until he returned to them. The second man, attired in under-shirt and stained duck trousers, was the red-headed Slade!

The dinghy drew alongside. Slade grasped the rail and pulled himself aboard. The blaze of triumph in his face was like a flame. He laughed.

"Seems like we're just in time. Getting ready to leave?"

"I was considering it," Valentine said.

Slade jerked a thumb in the direction of the other smack.

"Better come with me before you do. A friend of yours wants to have a chat with you."

"Who?"

"You'll find out soon enough. Pull up closer, Harry. We're taking this gentleman back with us." To Valentine he ordered: "Get in."

The adventurer obeyed without comment. Curiosity played a large part in his ready compliance.

At a word from Slade Valentine boarded the second smack. A man seated in the stern looked up as he climbed the rail. He was gross and repulsive with his muddy colored eyes, flat nose and partially bald, massive head. He wore blue serge trousers. A perspiration-damp shirt was open at his thick throat. He smiled crookedly as Valentine confronted him.

"Glad you came over. Sit down. How about a spot of brandy?" John Royle suggested. "Nothing like a drink to put you right."

"How did you know I was up here?" Valentine asked.

Two men came out of the cabin. One was Gaffney, the thick-witted youth of Farthing Road. The other was the man from the palace of a Thousaand Delights.

"We had a job getting wind of you," Royle admitted. "Dave finally saw you around the docks at Shanghai. Once he picked up your trail it wasn't hard to keep you covered. We watched you start up the river. We figured you were after St. Julian. We thought we'd let you go on ahead, get the stones from him and then turn them over to us."

Captain Valentine nodded.

"All very clever and simple. There's only one flaw. I don't happen to have the Moons in Gold."

The lids dropped over Royle's strange eyes.

"No? Then what happened to St. Julian?"

"I haven't," the adventurer told him, "the faintest idea. I did come up to relieve him of the jewels. He told me they were in a safe deposit box in a Shanghai bank. While we were talking a pirate junk arrived. I shot my way clear, went overboard and spent the night hidden ashore. The junk left an hour ago. I just finished cleaning up my boat when you appeared."

Royle's small mouth tightened. "Do you expect us to believe that?"

Valentine shrugged.

Royle's fat face darkened.

"I'll make you a proposition, Valentine. Give me the Moons in Gold― tell me where you've put them― and I'll let you have a share of the Baron Grunoff's reward. I'll see that you get safely back to England or wherever you want to go."

The adventurer laughed.

"I always imagined your intelligence was of a higher order. Even if I did have them I wouldn't allow myself to be taken in by such overwhelming generosity. Royle, I'm afraid your long journey from London has been in vain. St. Julian's probably floating down the river, full of Chinese bullets. The opals are in a Shanghai bank. What can you, I, or anyone else do about it?"

He saw that he had the ex-mobsman at a disadvantage. Royle was patently baffled. The adventurer's story was colored with verisimilitude.

John Royle went into his cabin. The red-headed Slade came back to the stem. Another space and the auxiliary engine began to rumble.

"We're going down the river," Slade said shortly. "The boss is making up his mind what to do with you. You'll find out after awhile."

"In the interim," Valentine suggested, "I'd appreciate a little food. I was about to dine when you interrupted me."

"Get him something to eat," Slade told Harry. "I'll keep an eye on him."

The promontory dropped away when they reached the bend in the river. Valentine stared back over the curdy wake. Royle had made another mistake. He had left the fishing smack and the bong boat anchored in the cove. A new tide of relief flowed through him. Wang Shim's agile mind would grasp the way out of their plight. He borrowed a cigarette from Slade, ate what Harry brought him and relaxed watching the shore slide past.

The adventurer raised himself. Ahead, planted directly in their way. a towering junk loomed, two shades darker than the encompassing murk. While he peered at it. Valentine's pulses drummed. The floating palace of the late Lao Ting had stopped to pick up more loot. Not only had it observed the fishing smack that morning, but it had made plans to intercept it on its return down the river.

The man at the wheel spoke huskily:

"The chart says shoal water on either side. If I throw her over we'll go aground."

"Keep her steady," Royle ordered. "Give them a hail, Dave."

Slade's shout rolled across the water in decreasing echoes. The Junk came closer. What had all the earmarks of a direct collision was averted when the helmsman jammed the wheel hard alee. The fishing smack cut sharply to the left. For a hundred yards it glided unhampered. Then its keel struck mud. It listed and stopped.

Royle's oaths were drowned out by sudden cries from the junk. It had swung around at a point no more than a dozen feet distant. Its starboard side rose like a huge wooden wall above them. Lights broke out bruptly. Slade's yell was simultaneous with the Chinese that dropped down nimbly on the smack.

Royle, ducking down behind the cabin's roof, blazed away with double guns. The others opened up a withering fire that drove the first invaders to the bow.

Valentine drove his knee into the stomach of one attacker, crashed a fist into the face of another and vaulted the rail. He dropped into the ooze of the river bed, flung himself headlong into the warm current and crouched in the protection of the fishing smack's port quarter.

He located the shore and began a slow, difficult way toward it. Half walking, half swimming, tearing his feet from the slime that sucked them down, he eventually reached deeper water. He was exhausted when he made the yeng grass and reeds at the river bank. He was able only to grasp them, urge himself up on the sand and fall face down, panting. His lungs burned with the stress of his breathing. He felt as if he had been caught between the buffers of some gigantic machine, turned in its revolving maw and then spewed out.

It was too dark yet to definitely determine where he was. He must be close to Yuen Yan. From what Tim had told him there were roads leading to and from the trading post. Inactivity was a goad that made Valentine anxious for action. Between this dawn hour and the morning he must decide upon some course to keep the fishing smack with Wang Shim and the woman he loved away from the yellow horde infesting the junk.

THE adventurer started south. A narrow strip of sand and silt edging the shore made his passage unhampered. After a time he saw the red rim of the sun come up. Night turned to day in one wheeling minute. He knew better than to let his anxiety force him to a pace sufficient to burn up his energy.

How long he trudged on Valentine had no accurate way of determining. His watch, watersoaked from his swim ashore, had stopped. Eventually, when he judged it to be aproaching the noon hour, the sight of distant craft at anchor and the vague shapes of buildings made him forget his weariness.

Yuen Yan, little better than a handful of houses, lay scattered where the forest ended. Fish nets squaring off an area of the river explained the chief industry of the trading post's inhabitants. Sampans were moored to several docks. The Captain searched vainly for a power boat anchored among them. On one wharf three coolies were cleaning their morning catch. The sharp, unpleasant smell of fish increased as he went closer. Yellow faces under cone shaped hats lifted to peer at him.

"Who is the great merchant prince of this splendid settlement?" the adventurer asked, in his best Chinese.

One of the men got up and bowed.

"Chin Lu."

"Where will I find his abode?"

"I will take you to it."

"To interrupt such worthy work as you perform," Valentine told him, "means you must be well paid. May I beg you to accept a small token of my gratitude?"

He dropped a coin into the odoriferous hand extended eagerly to receive it.

"May the gods conspire to bring you contentment. If you will follow me I will take you directly to Chin Lu."

A bell in the house of Chin Lu tinkled musically. Valentine's guide held brief conversation with the woman who opened the door. Finally he stepped aside with a sweeping bow.

"I am advised that Chin Lu is at his morning rice. He will see you immediately. Enter without hesitation. His doorsill is honored by the feet you place upon it."

The faint aroma of joss cloyed the warm, stuffy air of the building. The woman's pattering steps ended where the narrow passage terminated before double, closed doors. She opened them and Valentine found himself in what was apparently the room where Chin Lu conducted whatever business he was engaged in.

Chin Lu came out from behind the counter. He waved the woman away after a few rapid words and turned to Valentine. The adventurer looked into a pair of evasive, slanting eyes. He was familiar with the Chinese coolie and laborer. He had acquired the knack of gauging them with fair precision. Chin Lu impressed him as being crafty and avaricious.

"This day," the Chinese began, with the usual flowery greeting, "shall be one inscribed upon the Household Tablets with a pen of gold. In what way may I serve you best?"

"I wish to rent a boat." Valentine explained, "preferably of the type that moves swiftly."

"I have a sampan I can place at your disposal for a modest sum."

"I need a boat with an engine."

Chin Lu folded his hands into the sleeves of his blue jacket.

"I can supply only a sampan."

"With sails?"

"Yes, and rapid as the wind itself. You travel south?"

"I plan to go up the river."

Chin Lu bowed.

"In either direction you will find my craft worthy of your presence."

"What is the price?"

Chin Lu hesitated before naming a figure. It was exorbitant but Valentine expected as much.

"Very well, I'll pay what you ask. Prepare it so that I may leave at once. I will need three boatmen."

"I have them."

"And while you're engaged in getting the sampan ready see that I am brought tea and rice cakes."

Chin Lu struck a gong. The woman who had admitted the adventurer came quietly in.

"Serve our respected visitor with our finest tea and our best cakes. Make certain he is comfortable. I will return directly."

The Captain had finished what was brought him when Chin Lu opened the double doors and entered the room. He was with a stocky Chinese, naked except for short black cotton pants. He stood to one side while Chin Lu turned to Valentine.

"The sampan is ready."

Later, the adventurer reproached himself for his lack of foresight. The fact that Chin Lu made no mention of immediate payment should have warned him. He was anxious to be off, to be on his way, and for that reason was less cautious than was his custom. With a word to the woman who removed his dishes, he stepped past the stocky Chinese to follow Chin Lu.

It happened with disconcerting and split-second suddenness.

The half-naked Chinese leapt on him with the nimble agility of a tree cat. His queue, black, oily and deadly as a garroter's noose, coiled about Valentine's throat. It drew tight, shutting off his breath with an abruptness that left him purple-faced, strangling and helpless.

It was a simple task for Chin Lu to securely truss him. The queue was loosened. Valentine was pushed into a room connecting with the office and left to the bitter tide of his reproachful thoughts.

Thirteen

A LONG time passed.

He lay on the clean matting, face turned to the ceiling. A spider wove a delicate, filmy web above him. He watched, ironically comparing his own plight with that of the first hapless fly that would blunder into the silky meshes of the trap. The simplicity with which he had been taken was a blow to his vanity. He wondered if he were growing senile, if he were losing his grip.

He judged it to be well on in the afternoon when the door opened and Chin Lu entered.

The man brought a bowl of water. Valentine drank thirstily. The unusual attention puzzled him. Chinese seldom made a practice of administering to their victims. Indubitably, Chin Lu had an incentive for his act of kindness.

"You have rested?" he asked solicitously. "My body has, but my mind is tired. Why am I here? I trusted your hospitality."

Chin Lu made a gesture.

"If you had told me you were going down the river I would not have interfered. There is some good reason for your journey north. The white devil does not venture beyond Yuen Yan. Why should you wish to travel there? Perhaps there is a connection between the boat that passed two days ago and you."

"Even so," Valentine said, "why should you keep me here?"

Chin Lu's shifty eyes met his own briefly. "I hold you so my brother may have the honor of conversation with you. He will know what to say and do."

"Your brother?"

The Chinese bowed.

"He is the Illustrious Lao Ting."

Valentine's mouth tightened. That meant the junk, as he suspected, was returning to the trading post. He felt the quickening beat of his heart.

"I understand. When will your brother arrive?"

"With the first stars of evening. Until then you shall remain my guest. Presently you will have your rice and fish. Until then I leave you again to retrospection."

The door closed. Valentine pondered the new turn of events. The situation had grown more complex. He was to await the coming of the one he had killed in the cabin of the Sea Lily!

A star grew visible through the window. As if its appearance was a signal. Valentine heard shouts from the riverfront. The voices, echoes of vibrant movement and patter of footsteps outside the room's closed door, told him the junk had returned to Yuen Yan.

Verification came a few minutes later. Chin Lu and the same stocky, half-clad Chinese whose queue had been the adventurer's undoing, presented themselves. Valentine was jerked to his feet.

"The ship of my brother is at the wharf," Chin Lu announced ceremoniously. "We will go down and meet it."

Between the two men, Valentine left the house. He passed the building stuffed with the nondescript litter of trash and descended the slope to the same dock where, that morning, he had addressed the three fish cleaners.

A bonfire blazed on the shore. In its glare the towering sides of the pirate junk appeared off the end of the wharf. It was tying up, swinging clumsily around so that it could be moored at both ends. Already some of those aboard were dropping down on the dock. With a word to his companion, Chin Lu left Valentine and went forward to meet them.

A hand on his arm halted the adventurer. The one beside him spoke in Cantonese:

"We shall wait here."

Suddenly the wharf was crowded with the yellow rabble. The Captain saw Chin Lu pass among them and vanish. The babel of voices made a bedlam. Someone shouted a shrill command and a measure of quiet followed. Then Chin Lu reappeared, pushing his way through them. His arm went up and Valentine was propelled forward.

Chin Lu's face seemed carved from stone, but his evasive eyes burned with a fanatical light when the adventurer confronted him.

"My brother," he announced, "has not returned. The all powerful Lao Ting has been gathered unto his ancestors. He was destroyed by a foreign devil in the white boat I spoke of to-day!"

Valentine looked at him steadily.

"What has that to do with me?"

Chin Lu turned. He spoke to one of the Chinese in the throng behind him. The man stepped clear of the group.

"Look carefully," Chin Lu ordered. "You say that you were close beside Lao Ting when the lightning of death struck. You unleashed the bolts of doom. Hold the say you remember the face of the one who torch so you can behold the white devil."

A flaring torch was brought so close its pitch heat made Valentine's skin crawl. The one Chin Lu had spoked with peered into his face.

"He is the man!"

A cry gathered volume. There was a restless movement toward Valentine. Chin Lu stepped in front of him, lifting both hands.

"Stop! I will deal with my brother's murderer! Take him to the junk! No one must lay a finger on him! Have you forgotten the Ancient Wisdom that tells us, "Those who have passed into the Upper Air leave a duty with their relatives on earth'? Lao Ting has passed Beyond. 'Though you set a monkey on horseback yet will his hands and feet remain hairy.' I will deal with this man in my own way!"

The adventurer was hustled down the dock. A rope ladder had been flung over the side of the junk.

"Climb!" he was instructed. The stocky Chinese thrust an arm around him. "I will hold you steady."

The reek of foul air swirled through the open hatches when Valentine reached the deck. A few dim oil lamps gave wavering illumination. Chin Lu had remained on the dock. The throng there was dispersing, breaking up in groups that made their way to the settlement's buildings. The adventurer's guard unlocked and opened the slatted door of a cubicle built in under the poop. There were three such spaces, narrow cells designed for those unfortunates who fell into the clutches of the pirate crew. The door shut in Valentine's face. The key turned in the lock. The stocky Chinese looked between the bars.

"May no dragons disturb your slumber," he mocked. "In the morning, with the sun, Chin Lu will arrange for you to meet the Fiery God of Vengeance. Who knows? Maybe the honor of turning the wheels of the rack will be mine."

He moved off. Close to the door of his cell, Valentine peered out over the deck. A half-dozen Chinese sprawled, resting, along the bulwarks. Propped up against the aft mast, a small hunchback sat cross-legged, smoking his metal pipe, gravely, methodically.

Eventually the hunchback tapped the last ashes from his pipe, put it in his short pongee coat, stretched and went over to squat a foot away from Valentine's cell. He rubbed his face with both hands.

"To-night the pale moon of the Third Rice Season shines brightly in the blue of the benign heavens, Honorable One."

The Captain was not certain he had heard correctly. Something caught in his throat.

"Yet at dawn," he answered, "the sun dissolves the night in the glowing bowl of morning."

The other inclined his head. When he spoke again his tone was a discreet whisper.

"Here, on the junk, I am known as Wu Chi. If you will seat yourself and turn your back I might be able to sever the bonds that prison your arms."

To Captain Valentine the words were like a mumbling in a disordered dream. Was it a trick? Did some other admirer of Lao Ting wish to cheat Chin Lu of his revenge? Often the followers of a bandit or pirate, overcome with hero worship, went to extreme lengths to even the score when their idol was slain. In any event quick death was preferable to the torture of the rack that awaited him in the morning.

The sharp blade of Wu Chi's knife, handled with all the delicacy of a surgeon, sliced the bowline.

"LET your ears receive what I am about to utter. Wu Chi's whisper came to him again. "I have a key that will unlock the door of your prison. It will be difficult to leave this junk. There are still many aboard."

"I understand."

"You will take the chance?"

"I will take any chance!"

Wu Chi nodded.

"Then I shall tell you this. A rope hangs from the deck to the river. It is between the two lanterns on the outside rail. Beyond giving you that advice I can be of no further aid. Here is the key. Wait until I have disappeared from view before employing its use."

Valentine's fingers tightened over an iron key.

"Wait! One thing more. Who are you?"

Wu Chi stood. He made a pretence of yawning. Under his breath he answered:

"Wang Shim will tell you that― if the gods reward your efforts and take you safely back to him."

"Then Wang Shim passed down the river! Is he―"

But there was no response. Wu Chi, moving away, was swallowed up in the gloom of the deck.

It took all of his control to follow Wu Chi's instructions. He counted the seconds that spun their web of minutes. He waited until a cloud draped the moon, cutting off its bright shine. Then the iron key slid into the lock so smoothly that it reminded him of his own master-key. He turned it. The lock clicked over and back. The slatted door swung ajar. Valentine sidled out of it, keeping to the darker shadows that bulked below the poop.

To reach the designated spot where the rope hung he had to pass one of the lanterns. Weaponless, he stood no chance against an attack. He urged himself on, taking plenty of time so that his slow movements would not disturb the slumbering Chinese. He passed the lantern, reached the rail, felt along it until his hand touched the thin, tight knot of the rope dangling over the wooden side of the junk.

The light, elusive breeze of the river blew against his face. He took a deep breath, swinging a leg across the broad rail. A pace away a Chinese mumbled in his sleep. His mutterings disturbed the man next to him. He sat up, yawning, and shook his comrade roughly.

"Must you summon trumpet blasts to march you into the Kingdom of Rest? Be quiet, lie still!"

Valentine straddled the rail.

The one who had been aroused moved to change his position. His glance drifted somnolently to the adventurer. He peered bewildered, his face a study in blank surprise that momentarily held his tongue in check. The Captain took full advantage of the man's silence. Wrapping his legs around the rope and careful not to burn his hands in a quick, downward descent, he slid into the darkness crouching below.

He reached and dropped into the river an instant before the alarm was raised. The water was deep off the end of the dock. There was no pursuit. Those on the junk seemed intent upon lighting the black flood of the water around it with their flares. Without mishap he reached the row of lights that had beckoned him on.

Valentine went ashore. A minute later he knocked on the door of a two-storey building whose balcony was hedged with potted plants before a Kaiu Lung tapestry embroidered with the rich symbol of the Sun.

After a time the door opened. A benevolent Chinese looked out at him through gold-rimmed spectacles.

"What is your wish?"

The adventurer indicated the river.

"I have come a long way and escaped many dangers. I would avail myself of your roof, your food, and in the morning transportation to Shanghai. I am willing to pay well for these things."

The man before him bowed.

"Enter," he invited. "You will find peace and safety within my humble home."

IN the morning of the second day following his departure from the home of Li Duck, the venerable rice planter with whom he had taken refuge, a mail packet with Valentine aboard passed under the Bridge of the Camel Back. A freight train on the Peiping line crawled along the shore. A half-hour later the adventurer was in Shanghai.

It was all as he had left it, an epitome of the East; the East, alluring, insolent, singing its age-old, subtle siren song in the wanderer's willing ear, insinuating itself once again into its niche in his heart, flattering him, winning him with the vague caress of its fragrant, almond scented breath.

In front of the hotel Valentine paid and dismissed his driver. The clerk at the desk bowed as if he had left only half an hour previously. A few Europeans in the lobby looked at him curiously. His clothing, worn, dirty and dishevelled, together with the beard stubble on his lean, bronzed face gave him a disreputable appearance. He made inquiries concerning Wang Shim, was told his servant had not been at the hotel for days, and went directly to his rooms.

He opened the balcony doors to the morning air, ran a hot tub, shaved and after a drink, stretched out for what he expected to be an hour's sleep. When he awoke it was to find the noon had come and gone; a clock across the room showed him it was well towards three. He had soaked up the necessary amount of rest that revitalised him, made him active and alert again. A match blazed in his fingers for a cigarette. He let it burn its length, watching the door of the bedroom open.

Wang Shim stepped across its threshold.

"I have prepared your white linen suit, Master. With it I would suggest the light brown shirt and the darker cravat. I―"

"Tim!"

Their hands met in a tight, glad grip. For an instant Wang Shim's pleasure lighted his face. Then, like a curtain being drawn across an open window, his expression turned enigmatic.

"I had no wish to disturb your slumbers. I walked with quiet feet. Those in charge of the desk below told me you had returned this morning. We arrived late last night."

"Where is Mademoiselle Ormonde?"

"Safe. I have been in communication with her. She is coming here within the hour."

Valentine waved him into a chair. "Sit down, tell me about it."

Wang Shim seated himself opposite.

"We observed the second boat when it reached the cove. We saw you go aboard and, later, leave on it. The vessel we had made our journey in was a great temptation. I remembered the teachings in the Book of Youthful Instruction. 'Other eyes see the same things that you do.' Those of Lao Ting's band must have observed the craft you left upon. They would watch for it somewhere down the river and for us."

Valentine nodded. "What else?"

"We waited until the cool of the evening. We followed a forest trail until we reached one of the narrow roads east of Yuen Yan. An ox-cart helped us in our travels. We purchased small quantities of food along the way. At Kinlang we exchanged the ox-cart for a railroad coach. The train was slow. As I said, it was late when we reached this city."

"The opals?"

Wang Shim went into the bedroom. He returned with the mahogany box emblazoned with the Grunoff heraldry. The adventurer was dazzled again by the flash and fire of the fifteen perfect stones. For a long moment he filled his gaze with their splendor, finally he shut the box and turned back to Wang Shim, recounting his own experiences.

"Who is Wu Chi?" he inquired.

A slow smile spread across Wang Shim's yellow face.

"He aided you? I had hoped he might."

"You―"

The other opened his hands.

"Wu Chi is really Loo Ling, the intelligent, capable youth who was of service to us before we left Shanghai. When you first spoke of the expedition to the Temple of the Three Buddhas my humble mind conceived the idea of sending Loo Ling on in advance. I had heard that Lao Ting was always anxious for new members in his band. I disguised Loo Ling with an artificial wooden hump and gave him a new name. I thought it might be a wise precaution to have a friend among the enemy."

As he finished speaking there was a knock on the door. Valentine got up hastily.

"Mademoiselle! Entertain her while I dress and don't let her leave, Tim, You understand?"

"To the letter, Master."

She was sitting where the sun intruded when Valentine went into the living-room. Her face was half in shadow. He stood drinking in her intense beauty. The raven black hair, the dusky eyes of mystery behind their shadowy lashes, the full-lipped, sensitive mouth. She sensed his presence and looked up.

"You sent the opals with Tim?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because they are yours." Valentine shook his head.

"I have no claim to them. Long ago that night in London I vowed to get them only for you. You want them, you came half across the world to get them, take them and do what you will with them."

She studied him pensively.

"YOU are in a generous mood, Monsieur Captain."

He shrugged.

"Perhaps I have reason to be. Finding you again, knowing that our drama has ended successfully and satisfactorily, is ample cause for it. I can remember no occasion when I have been happier than at this minute."

The pulse in her white throat stirred to a quicker beat. Her crimson lips parted. Before she could speak there was an interruption. The draperies, drawn back at the French doors opening on the balcony, rustled. A man stepped from behind them, a flat automatic glinting in his right hand. His low, drawling tone sliced the quiet of the room with knife-like sharpness.

"Don't be too sure of it, Valentine. There is always a rift in everyone's lute. Sorry I have to provide one in yours."

Eric St. Julian, slim and debonair in white flannels, moved further into the room. The adventurer stared at him as though he were a ghost. In that tense instant of meeting he told himself he might have known the master-thief, with the luck of the devil, had miraculously escaped death aboard the ill-fated Sea Lily.

"St. Julian!" Adele Ormonde whispered. The other laughed.

"Exactly. You weren't the only ones to get out of the cabin of the cruiser the evening Lao Ting visited it. But enough of explanations. My ship sails in twenty minutes. I am exchanging Shanghai for Japan. I have often wished to see Fujiyama." His gaze darted to the table. "I see you have thoughtfully arranged to have the opals ready for me. With your permission I shall take them."

He wedged the mahogany box under his left arm. Captain Valentine tried vainly to snatch an inspiration out of the new and unexpected pattern fate had woven. Tim had gone out of the room shortly after his own entrance. There was no weapon within reach― nothing to use against the sardonic, smiling St. Julian.

"I warn you!" Valentine's voice was like polished steel, "No matter where you go I will find you! I will hunt you down and kill you! Your only salvation, your only hope, lies in leaving the opals here!"

St. Julian chuckled.

"Always the actor, Valentine. Do you think your threats disturb me? They don't, in the slightest. I have been and always will be more than a match for your swaggering egotism. Let me do a little warning on my own behalf. I'll shoot if you make so much as a move to stop me!"

He began backing to the French doors. Adele Ormonde sat transfixed, bent forward, her eyes wide. Valentine, to the left of her, stood motionless. He could think of nothing better than the decrepit ruse used in fiction, stage productions and on the cinema screen so many countless, wearisome times. He employed it now, taking it out of its moss-grown confinement.

His tone rose, strident, forceful:

"All right, Tim! Let him have it!"

Instinct was stronger than logic with St. Julian. He half turned to confront the imaginary menace behind him. Valentine's lunge carried him to his old enemy with swift certainty. He reached for and gripped St. Julian's pistol wrist. The mahogany box clattered to the floor. The Moons in Gold rolled across the carpet in winking balls of fire. The adventurer twisted and wrenched the automatic from the hand that sought to aim it, smashed his heel down on St. Julian's foot and struck with his left fist.

St. Julian took the blows with a grunt of pain. In no way did he acknowledge surrender. Instead, he swept into combat with a fury quickened by pain.

Dazed by the frenzy of St. Julian's offensive, Valentine pitched against the wall. A fist dashed in his face. Lights broke in varied colors before his swirling vision. St. Julian whirled around. Adele Ormonde had retrieved the automatic. She stood midway between the upturned table and the door, the gun levelled in her hand.

"I'll take that!" St. Julian panted. "A gun, my dear, is a dangerous toy! If you don't mind―"

He leapt to one side and started for her. Valentine had him in the next breath. The adventurer's arm clamped about St. Julian's neck. He drove his knee into the small of the man's back with such terrific force that the other sagged limply in his arms.

"Let me have the automatic. I don't trust this gentleman. It may be―"

But St. Julian was finished. His knees buckled under him. When the Captain released him he collapsed on the floor. A shadow passed between St. Julian's crumpled figure and the balcony. The woman's smothered exclamation lifted the adventurer's head. A man who had been watching the proceedings from the outside balcony stepped into the room.

He was a small, well, but plainly dressed person. A thread of a closely clipped moustache decorated his rather long upper lip. His eyes were brown, large and filled with expression. The last time Valentine had seen him was in the gathering fog outside the Club Pantheon in London.

"I will take care of him," Andre Masset murmured in French. "I have been looking for him for a considerable time. I shall take him back to Paris where he will be tried for the murder of Monsieur Crayshaw at the villa in the Bois d'Or."

Masset leaned over St. Julian. When he straightened up Valentine saw that handcuffs manacled the master-thief. The detective jerked St. Julian to his feet.

"How―"

Masset smiled at the woman's wondering cry.

"I have full and complete evidence. The confession of The Rat for one thing, fingerprints; evidence that cannot be disputed." He turned his brown eyes fully upon the adventurer. "Monsieur, not so long ago you tricked me. I do not hold it against you. Your advice that night saved me from a stupid blunder. I really thought you were this Ravenel, as St. Julian called himself. Now, monsieur, I will give you advice. If I were you I would send Monsieur Hatzfeld, the jeweller, a cheque to pay for the diamond chain you removed from his establishment in the silk hat of the Baron. From the reward offered for these opals you can well afford it."

St. Julian's hazel-flecked eyes burned venomously.

"The not-so-happy proverbial ending," he sneered. "So I am about to be conducted back to Paris to pay for Crayshaw's death? Would you care to make a wager? I'll give you odds that you'll never arrive there with me, Monsieur Detective."

Masset shrugged.

"What good is winning when you'll never be able to pay me? A dead man's money is unlucky."

He turned to the woman beside Valentine. St. Julian laughed under his breath.

"Au revoir, my dear Adele and you, Captain Valentine. We shall, I promise, meet again."

Two native policemen had come into the room. Wang Shim in the hall looked curiously over their shoulders. Masset, with a flourish, turned his prisoner over to them. He lingered another minute.

"I would," he said, "guard the opals well, Mademoiselle Grunoff. The next time they are stolen it might not be possible to recover them."

Fourteen

THEY had finished dining together in the garden restaurant of the hotel. Valentine waited until their coffee and liqueurs were served. He opened his cigarette case, watching her retrospectively while her white, tapering fingers selected a cigarette and held it to the tiny flame of the candle.

"Mademoiselle Grunoff," he murmured.

She smiled at him enigmatically, cryptically. In the hotel an orchestra played some American dance number. The gay rhythm of it drifted out to the garden.

"Adele Ormonde Grunoff. My mother was French."

"You might," he said, "have told me long ago."

She shook her dark head.

"Thief and adventuress! After all, they were much better suited to my role."

Valentine winced.

"Why, mademoiselle?"

She moved her sloping shoulders. To-night she wore a severely plain evening gown and no jewels except a narrow strand of pearls creamy as the skin they rested against.

"You mean why did I want the Moons in Gold so badly? Because, Monsieur the Captain, they are really mine― or will be at a later date. My father, as you know, is elderly and inclined to be a trifle indiscreet. For some time I have been aware of his infatuation for Mademoiselle Vallier. I knew something of the extravagant promises he made her, something of the gifts he lavished on her. When he took the opals, the Moons in Gold that would be rightfully mine, from the vault in the bank, I thought it was time to intervene."

Valentine tapped the ash from his cigarette.

"So you got in communication with Crayshaw. Tell me about it."

For a minute she listened to the syncopated beat of the music.

"At one time he was a chauffeur for my family. My father discharged him when he learned of a London prison record. Crayshaw had given one of the gardeners his address. Perhaps it was foolish of me I realise now he would probably have kept the opals― but then he was the only one I could turn to. He promised to help for, of course, suitable remuneration."

The adventurer laughed.

"You hired him to steal what would some day be yours from the villa in the Golden Wood. Not a bad idea. No wonder you were familiar with the grounds and the house."

There was a little silence between them. In the street on the other side of the garden the cosmopolitan night life of Shanghai flowed in either direction. Bells tinkled, sing-song voices blended, the vibrant stir of the city tiptoed to them through the echoes of the music.

"And now it ends―" She leaned forward. "One more favor, monsieur."

"Anything."

Her cigarette smoked out in the lacquered dish beside her. She studied him, her dark eyes mysterious as they had been the first night he had seen them.

"You will take the Moons in Gold to my father and receive the reward. He is well able to pay it, and it is only right that you have it. I am not afraid now that he will do anything imprudent with the opals. The folly of his romance with the singing girl of the Moulin Bleu is, I have been told, over. He has been ill, unable to leave his room―"

"I'm entitled to nothing," Captain Valentine assured her.

Her smile was slow, languorous.

"Yet you will do as I ask, because I ask it. You have always heeded my wishes. Tell me that you'll fulfil this last request."

The adventurer looked deep into her eyes. In their limpid depths he saw something that struck fire in his heart.

"It shall be," he told her, "as you wish." Once more their glances met. There was death in Valentine's soul. Never for him what other men worked for, slaved and fought for. Never love, a home, family. His face hardened. In that minute he knew he was turning away forever from what she offered, what her heart was so anxious to give. He loved her more than life, but he would never see her again.

"It's getting colder. Shall we go in?"

She stood, silhouetted against the light of the flickering candles. Still the voice of the city murmured to them over the garden wall. Silver bells, shuffling feet, creak of hurrying rickshaws. Her face saddened, something seemer quenched within it. When he draped her wrap over her white shoulders she shivered a little in its silken folds.

"We can," she said slowly, "say good-bye in the morning."

They walked the path leading to the flower-banked terrace. In the morning. Valentine told himself, he would be on his way, the Moons in Gold in his kitbag, his destination the other side of the world. In that moment when their eyes had met he had said good-bye to her, reverently, stirred by an emotion greater than any he had ever known or would know again. No further words were necessary.

This was an end and another beginning.

The End

Table of Contents

- Chapter 1
- Chapter 2
- Chapter 3
- Chapter 4
- Chapter 5
- Chapter 6
- Chapter 7
- Chapter 8
- Chapter 9
- Chapter 10
- Chapter 11
- Chapter 12
- Chapter 13
- Chapter 14