a conceit that rankled
anybody. And there were always volunteers, hardened by the buffets of
this life, to cast water upon that same fire.

So, humming a gay little tune, Peter snapped on the light, bathing the
milk-white room in a liquid mellowness, opened the port-hole, wound his
watch, hung it on the curtain-bar which ran lengthwise with his berth,
pushed the flowered curtains at either end as far back as they would
go, in order to have all the fresh air possible, and----

Peter gasped. He declared it was absolutely impossible. Such things
did not happen, even in this world of strange happenings and of
stranger stirrings below the surface of actual happenings. His
self-complacencies came shattering down about his ears like mountains
of senseless glitter, and he stooped to recover the object which was
lying upon, almost ready to tumble from, the rounded, neat edge of the
white berth.

A rose of cameo! The hot breath from his lips, which drooped in
astonishment and chagrin, seemed to stir the delicate petals of the
exquisitely carved red rose which reposed in its mountain of soft gold
in the palm of his trembling hand. The fine gold chain, like a rope of
gold sand, trickled between his fingers and dangled, swinging from side
to side.

The impossible thought pounded at the door of his brain and demanded
recognition. Romola Borria had been a visitor to his room. But why?
He had no secrets to conceal from the prying ears of any one, not now,
at all events, for he had destroyed all evidences depending upon the
excursion he had made from Shanghai to Len Yang, and from Len Yang to
Mandalay, to Rangoon, to Penang, Singapore, and Batavia.

Naturally, his first impulsive thought was that Romola Borria was
somehow entangled with those who ruled the destinies of the hideous
mountain city, which crouched amidst the frosty emerald peaks on the
fringe of Tibet. He had felt the weight of that ominous hand on other
occasions, and its movements were ever the same. Night stealth,
warnings chalked on doors, the deliberate and cunning penetration of
his secrets; all of these were typical machinations of the Gray Dragon,
and of those who reported back to the Gray Dragon.

No one would break into his stateroom who was not the tool of Len
Yang's unknown king. Thus the finger of accusation was brought to bear
tentatively upon Romola Borria.

Yes, it was incredible that this girl, with those scarlet stripes
across her brea