ould play his game
with the man who limped. He smiled inwardly as he put his wares back into
the carved box. A thousand gold! At any rate, he would press the man into
a corner. There was something about this affair that convinced Ling Foo
that his noon visitor would pay high for two reasons: one, to recover the
glass beads; the other, to keep out of the reach of the police.

Ling Foo considered that he was playing his advantage honestly. He hadn't
robbed or murdered anybody. A business deal had slipped into his hands and
it was only logical to make the most of it. He kotowed several times on
the way out of the parlour, conscious, however, of the searching eyes of
the man who had balked him.

"Well!" exclaimed Jane. "What in the world do you suppose is going on?"

"Lord knows, but something is going on. You couldn't buy a jade necklace
like that under five hundred in New York. This apple-green seldom runs
deep; the colour runs in veins and patches. The bulk of the quarried stone
has the colour and greasy look of raw pork. No; I shouldn't put it on just
now, not until you have washed it. You never can tell. I'll get you a
germicide at the English apothecary's. Glass beads! Humph! Hanged if I can
make it out. Glass; Occidental, too; maybe worth five dollars in the
States. Put it on again. It's a great world over here. You're always
stumbling into something unique. I'm coming over to dine with you
to-night."

"Splendid!"

Jane put the jade into her hand-bag, clasped the glass beads round her
neck again, and together she and Dennison walked toward the parlour door.
As they reached it a tall, vigorous, elderly man with a gray pompadour
started to enter. He paused, with an upward tilt of the chin, but the tilt
was the result of pure astonishment. Instinctively Jane turned to her
escort. His chin was tilted, too, and his expression was a match for the
stranger's. Later, recalling the tableau, which lasted but a moment, it
occurred to Jane that two men, suddenly confronted by a bottomless pit,
might have expressed their dumfounderment in exactly this fashion.

In the lobby she said rather breathlessly: "You knew each other and didn't
speak! Who is he?"

The answer threw her into a hypnotic state.

"My father," said Dennison, quietly.

CHAPTER V

Father and son! For a while Jane had the sensation of walking upon
unsubstantial floors, of seeing unsubstantial objects. The encounter did
not seem real, human. Fath