ry
exactly and in libellous terms his suspicions of his manager.

The diary provided Mr. Milburgh with a great deal of very interesting
reading matter, and now he turned to the page where he had left off the
night before and continued his study. It was a page easy to find, because
he had thrust between the leaves a thin envelope of foreign make
containing certain slips of paper, and as he took out his improvised
book mark a thought seemed to strike him, and he felt carefully in his
pocket. He did not discover the thing for which he was searching, and
with a smile he laid the envelope carefully on the table, and went on at
the point where his studies had been interrupted.

"Lunched at the London Hotel and dozed away the afternoon. Weather
fearfully hot. Had arranged to make a call upon a distant cousin--a
man named Tarling--who is in the police force at Shanghai, but too
much of a fag. Spent evening at Chu Han's dancing hall. Got very
friendly with a pretty little Chinese girl who spoke pigeon English.
Am seeing her to-morrow at Ling Foo's. She is called 'The Little
Narcissus.' I called her 'My Little Daffodil'--"

Mr. Milburgh stopped in his reading.

"Little Daffodil!" he repeated, then looked at the ceiling and pinched
his thick lips. "Little Daffodil!" he said again, and a big smile dawned
on his face.

He was still engaged in reading when a bell shrilled in the hall. He rose
to his feet and stood listening and the bell rang again. He switched off
the light, pulled aside the thick curtain which hid the window, and
peered out through the fog. He could just distinguish in the light of the
street lamp two or three men standing at the gate. He replaced the
curtain, turned up the light again, took the books in his arms and
disappeared with them into the corridor. The room at the back was his
bedroom, and into this he went, making no response to the repeated jingle
of the bell for fully five minutes.

At the end of that time he reappeared, but now he was in his pyjamas,
over which he wore a heavy dressing-gown. He unlocked the door, and
shuffled in his slippers down the stone pathway to the gate.

"Who's that?" he asked.

"Tarling. You know me," said a voice.

"Mr. Tarling?" said Milburgh in surprise. "Really this is an unexpected
pleasure. Come in, come in, gentlemen."

"Open the gate," said Tarling briefly.

"Excuse me while I go and get the key," said Milburgh. "I didn't e