ched his lodging-house he sought the Burmese landlady. She
greeted him with a smile and a stiff little shake of the hand. He owed
her money, but that was nothing. Had he not sent her drunken European
sailor-man husband about his business? Had he not freed her from a
tyranny of fists and curses? It had not affected her in the least to
learn that her sailor-man had been negligently married all the way from
Yokohama to Colombo. She was free of him.

Warrington spread out a five-pound note and laid ten sovereigns upon
it. "There we are," he said genially; "all paid up to date."

"This?" touching the note.

"A gift for all your patience and kindness."

"You go 'way?" the smile leaving her pretty moon-face.

"Yes."

"You like?" with a gesture which indicated the parlor and its contents.
"Be boss? Half an' half?"

He shook his head soberly. She picked up the money and jingled it in
her hand.

"Goo'-by!" softly.

"Oh, I'm not going until next Thursday."

The smile returned to her face, and her body bent in a kind of kotow.
He was so big, and his beard glistened like the gold-leaf on the Shwe
Dagon Pagoda. She understood. The white to the white and the brown to
the brown; it was the Law.

Warrington went up to his room. He was welcomed by a screech from the
parrot and a dignified salaam from James, who was trimming the wick of
the oil-lamp. For the last year and a half this room had served as
headquarters. Many a financial puzzle had been pieced together within
these dull drab walls; many a dream had gone up to the ceiling, only to
sink and dissipate like smoke. There were no pictures on the walls, no
photographs. In one corner, on the floor, was a stack of dilapidated
books. These were mostly old novels and tomes dealing with geological
and mathematical matters; laughter and tears and adventure, sandwiched
in between the dry positiveness of straight lines and squares and
circles and numerals without end; D'Artagnan hobnobbing with Euclid!
Warrington was an educated man, but he was in no sense a scholar. In
his hours of leisure he did not find solace in the classics. He craved
for a good blood-red tale, with lots of fighting and love-making and
pleasant endings.

James applied a match to the wick, and the general poverty of the room
was instantly made manifest.

"Well, old sober-top, suppose we square up and part like good friends?"

"I am always the Sahib's good friend."

"Right as rain!"