eat shot. The bullet had bored clean
through, had struck the metal L-beam of the bunk, and rebounded into a
pile of bedclothes. Dented and scorched, Peter examined this little
pellet of lead, balancing it in the palm of his hand.

"Every bullet has its billet," he quoted, and he was glad indeed that
the billet in this case had not been his vulnerable cerebrum.

Snapping off the light, he drew the sheet up to his neck and lay there
pondering, listening to the whine of the ventilator-fan.

The haggard, distressed face of Romola Borria swam upon the screen of
his imagination. This woman commanded his admiration and respect.
Despite all dissemblings, all evasions, all actual and evident signs of
the double-cross, he confided to his other self that he was glad he had
kissed her. What can be so deliciously harmless as a kiss? he asked
himself.

And wiser men than Peter have answered: What can be so harmful?

CHAPTER VIII

Night brings counsel, say the French. Only in sleep does one mine the
gold of truth, said Confucius.

When Peter was aroused by the golden dawn streaming through the
swinging port-glass upon his eyes the cobwebs were gone from his brain,
his eyes were clear and of a bright sea-blue, and he was bubbling with
enthusiasm for the new-born day.

His ablutions were simple: a brisk scrubbing of his gleaming, white
teeth, a dousing of his hands and face in bracing, cold water, with a
subsequent soaping and rinsing of same; followed by a hoeing process at
the mercy of a not-too-keen Japanese imitation of an American
safety-razor.

Assured that the deck below his port-hole was spotless, he ventured to
the dining-room, half filled and buzzing with excitement.

He was given to understand by a dozen gesticulating passengers that
some time in the course of the night a deck-passenger, a Chinese
coolie, from Buitenzorg to Hong Kong, or Macao, had fallen overboard,
leaving no trace.

It was whispered that the helpless one had been done away with by foul
means. And Peter became conscious during the meal that his fat and
jovial little captain was looking at him and through him with a glance
that could not be denied or for long avoided.

Wondering what his Herr Captain might know of the particulars of last
night's doings, Peter sucked a mangosteen slowly, arranging his
thoughts, card-indexing his alibis, and making cool preparations for an
official cross-questioning. Clever lying out of his difficult