r, even if his abnormal, rangy
height were not taken into consideration, as a hill man, perhaps
Tibetan, perhaps Mongolian. Certainly he was no river-man.

It seemed improbable that the window-breaker could have been released
by the heartless Shanghai police so quickly; yet out of his own
adventurous past Peter could recall more than one occasion when
"squeeze" had saved him embarrassment.

There was no constraint in the pose of the man on the sampan's flat
roof. With indifference his narrow gaze flitted from the face of
Bobbie MacLaurin to that of Miss Vost, and wandered on to the stern,
sharp-eyed visage of Peter Moore.

Here the casual gaze rested. If he recognized Peter Moore, he gave no
indication of it. He studied Peter's countenance with the look of one
whose interest may be distracted on the slightest provocation.

An intelligent and wary student of human nature, Peter dropped his eyes
to the man's long, claw-like fingers. These were twitching ever so
slightly, plucking slowly--it may have been meditatively--at the hem of
his black silk coat. At the intentness of Peter's stare, this
twitching abruptly ceased.

The sampan whacked alongside. The big man tossed a small, orange-silk
bag to the deck. He climbed the ladder as if he had been used to
climbing all his life.

"I don't care for his looks," remarked Miss Vost, looking up into
Peter's face with a curious smile.

"Nor I," said Bobbie MacLaurin.

The richly dressed stranger vaulted nimbly over the teak-rail,
recovered the orange bag, and approached MacLaurin. His head drooped
forward momentarily, in recognition of the authority of the blue
uniform.

He said in excellent English: "I desire to engage passage to Ching-Fu."

"This way," replied the _Hankow's_ captain.

"You seemed to recognize him," said Miss Vost to Peter, when they had
the deck to themselves.

"Perhaps I was mistaken," replied Peter evasively. He suddenly was
aware of Miss Vost's wide-eyed look of concern.

Impulsively she laid her hand on his arm. She had come up very close
to him. Her head moved back, so that her chin was almost on a level
with his.

"Mr. Moore," she said in a low, soft voice, "I won't ask you any
questions. In China, there are many, many things that a woman must not
try to understand. But I--I want to tell you that--that I think you
are--splendid. It seems so fine, so good of you. I--I can't begin to
thank you. My--my feelings prevent it."