BARBER

Opening the door with a key which he carried, the boy admitted Sir
Lucien and Sin Sin Wa to the dimly-lighted interior of a room the
pretensions of which to be regarded as a shaving saloon were supported
by the presence of two chairs, a filthy towel, and a broken mug. Sin
Sin Wa shuffled across to another door, and, followed by Sir Lucien,
descended a stone stair to a little cellar apparently intended for
storing coal. A tin lamp stood upon the bottom step.

Removing the lamp from the step, Sin Sin Wa set it on the cellar floor,
which was black with coal dust, then closed and bolted the door. A heap
of nondescript litter lay piled in a corner of the cellar. This Sin Sin
Wa disturbed sufficiently to reveal a movable slab in the roughly paved
floor. It was so ingeniously concealed by coal dust that one who had
sought it unaided must have experienced great difficulty in detecting
it. Furthermore, it could only be raised in the following manner:

A piece of strong iron wire, which lay among the other litter, was
inserted in a narrow slot, apparently a crack in the stone. About an
inch of the end of the wire being bent outward to form a right angle,
when the seemingly useless piece of scrap-iron had been thrust through
the slab and turned, it formed a handle by means of which the trap could
be raised.

Again Sin Sin Wa took up the lamp, placing it at the brink of the
opening revealed. A pair of wooden steps rested below, and Sir Lucien,
who evidently was no stranger to the establishment, descended awkwardly,
since there was barely room for a big man to pass. He found himself in
the mouth of a low passage, unpaved and shored up with rough timbers in
the manner of a mine-working. Sin Sin Wa followed with the lamp, drawing
the slab down into its place behind him.

Stooping forward and bending his knees, Sir Lucien made his way along
the passage, the Chinaman following. It was of considerable length,
and terminated before a strong door bearing a massive lock. Sin Sin Wa
reached over the stooping figure of Sir Lucien and unfastened the lock.
The two emerged in a kind of dug-out. Part of it had evidently been in
existence before the ingenious Sin Sin Wa had exercised his skill upon
it, and was of solid brickwork and stone-paved; palpably a storage
vault. But it had been altered to suit the Chinaman's purpose, and one
end--that in which the passage came out--was timbered. It contained a
long counter and many shel