thing you want,
let me know and I'll have it sent over in the afternoon before you sail.
This will be a good trip for you, and when you come back, by that time
I'll have a good job for you."

Mr. Spokesly decided to take a carriage. As he bowled along he turned
over in his mind the chances of seeing Evanthia Solaris again. He had no
faith in her ability to make an effectual departure from Saloniki. Yet
he would not have taken a heavy wager against it. She had an air of
having something in reserve. He smiled as he thought what an education
such a woman was. How she kept one continually on the stretch matching
her moods, her whims, her sudden flashes of savage anger and glowing
softness. And he thought of the immediate future, moving through
dangerous seas with her depending upon him. If only she could do it!
This was a dream, surely. He laughed. The least introspective of men, he
sometimes held inarticulate conversations. He had often imagined himself
the arbiter of some beautiful woman's fate, some fine piece of goods.
There was nothing wicked in this, simply a desire for romance. He was a
twentieth-century Englishman in the grand transition period between
Victorianism and Victory, when we still held the conventional notions of
chivalry and its rewards. It should not be forgotten that when a knight
actually did win a fair lady he had some voice in her disposal; and it
was a vestige of this instinct which appeared in Mr. Spokesly as
speculations concerning Evanthia's future.

He decided to go in and look up his elderly friend in the Olympos. He
found him standing in the entrance, holding a black, silver-headed cane
to his mouth and whistling very softly.

"Why, here you are! You _are_ a stranger! What do you say if we have a
couple? Not here. I know a place a little way along. How have you been
doing now?"

Mr. Spokesly said he had been busy on a new job and hadn't had much time
for going out.

"On that little Greek boat, isn't it? I must say you've got a great old
cock for a commander."

"What do you know about him?"

"Oh, I just happen to know the story and it may not be true after all.
But they do say he had a Chink wife and practically lived like a Chink
up-river. And you know what that means for an Englishman. However,
that's neither here nor there. This is the place."

He pushed open a couple of swing doors and they entered a large,
barn-like room filled with tables and chairs. At the back a small stage