e was a heavily curtained archway.
Irritably, I pulled the curtain aside, learnt that it masked a
glass-paneled door, opened this door--and found myself in a small
court, dimly lighted and redolent of some pungent, incense-like perfume.

One step forward I took, then pulled up abruptly. A sound had come to
my ears. From a second curtained doorway, close to my right hand, it
came--a sound of muffled _tapping_, together with that of something
which dragged upon the floor.

Within my brain the words seemed audibly to form: "The man with
the limp!"

I sprang to the door; I had my hand upon the drapery ... when a woman
stepped out, barring the way!

No impression, not even a vague one, did I form of her costume, save
that she wore a green silk shawl, embroidered with raised white
figures of birds, thrown over her head and shoulders and draped in
such fashion that part of her face was concealed. I was transfixed
by the vindictive glare of her eyes, of her huge dark eyes.

They were ablaze with anger--but it was not this expression within
them which struck me so forcibly as the fact that they were in some
way familiar.

Motionless, we faced one another. Then--

"You go away," said the woman--at the same time extending her arms
across the doorway as barriers to my progress.

Her voice had a husky intonation; her hands and arms, which were bare
and of old ivory hue, were laden with barbaric jewelry, much of it
tawdry silverware of the bazaars. Clearly she was a half-caste of some
kind, probably a Eurasian.

I hesitated. The sounds of dragging and tapping had ceased. But the
presence of this grotesque Oriental figure only increased my anxiety
to pass the doorway. I looked steadily into the black eyes; they looked
into mine unflinchingly.

"You go away, please," repeated the woman, raising her right hand and
pointing to the door whereby I had entered. "These private rooms. What
you doing here?"

Her words, despite her broken English, served to recall to me the fact
that I was, beyond doubt, a trespasser! By what right did I presume to
force my way into other people's apartments?

"There is some one in there whom I must see," I said, realizing,
however, that my chance of doing so was poor.

"You see nobody," she snapped back uncompromisingly. "You go away!"

She took a step towards me, continuing to point to the door. Where had
I previously encountered the glance of those splendid, savage eyes?

So engaged was I