Coryndon expected to see, he did not know. He was following his
natural instinct when he threw aside the chase and capture of Mhtoon Pah
and burst into the cellar-room. It was small and close, and smelt of the
foul, fruity atmosphere of mildew. The ceiling was low, and crouching in
one corner was a small boy, clad only in a loin-cloth, who stared at
them and screamed with fear.

"The Chinamen, the Chinamen!" he shrieked. "Mhtoon Pah, the Chinamen."

"Absalom," the name came to Coryndon's lips, as he stood staring at him.
"My God, it must be Absalom."

He had spoken in English before he had time to think, and he turned to
see if his self-betrayal had struck upon the confused brain of Leh Shin,
but Leh Shin knew nothing and saw nothing but the face of the boy his
enemy loved. He had placed the lamp on the floor and was feeling for his
dagger, his eyes fascinated and his lips working soundlessly.

Coryndon caught him by the shoulder and snatched his knife from his
hand.

"Fool," he said. "Wouldst thou ruin all at the end? Listen closely and
attend to me. Now is the moment to cry for the police. Thine enemy is in
a close net; show me swiftly the way by which I may go out of this
house, and sit thou here and stir not, neither cry out nor speak until
thou hearest the police. By the way I go out will I leave the door open,
and some will enter there, and others at the front of the house."

He turned to look at the boy, who pointed at the Chinaman and continued
to shriek for Mhtoon Pah. It was no moment for hesitation, though
Coryndon's thoughts went to the shop and the front door. By that door
Mhtoon Pah might already have escaped, but even allowing for this, there
was time to catch him again. He followed the way pointed out by the
shaking hand of Leh Shin.

"If thou fail in aught that I have told thee, or if the boy escape or
suffer under thy hand, then is thine end also come," he said, as he
stood for a moment in the aperture that led into a waste place at the
back of the house; and then Coryndon ran through the night.

The rain had come on, teeming, relentless rain that fell in pitiless
sheets out of a black sky. The roads ran with liquid mud and the stones
cut Coryndon's bare feet, but he ran on, his lungs aching and his throat
dry. It is not easy to think with the blood hammering in the pulses and
the breath coming short through gasping lungs, but Coryndon kept his
mind fixed upon one idea with steady determinatio