throat of a
swarthy Chinese, whose face was round as the Mongolian moon, and as
yellow.

The Chinese wiped his knife coolly on the fallen man's black jacket.
"Why, my good friend, should he attack you, unless----" He paused
again, and searched Peter's face with those keen brown eyes, no longer
sad.

"Unless what?" he asked, bluntly. "This man is from Len Yang."

He heard the girl utter a sharp gasp, and a queer light was dawning in
the other's face.

"Unless you are"--he hesitated--"unless you are the one man in the
world I wish you might be." He laughed. "Are you--Peter Moore, known
in some parts of China as--Peter the Brazen?"

Peter nodded slowly.

With a delighted cry the young Oriental sprang to him and seized his
hand. "Do you hear, Naradia?" he exclaimed. "This is _Peter Moore_!"

And Peter permitted his suspicions to drift, as he thought of the dead
man on the floor, and of the reason why he died. He was compelled to
admit that the stranger had saved his life.

"We must talk this over," the young Chinese was muttering. "Why, I
could not have arranged it more suitably!" He seemed to collect
himself then. "Before we talk, let us get rid of this man."

He picked up the dead coolie by the waist, lifted him easily to the
window, and dropped him, as if he were a sack of rice, into the mud.
He whistled twice. Immediately three shadows were given up by the
caravansary. These gathered up the dead man and vanished.

"They will dispose of him," said the stranger, helping himself to a
cigarette. He paused with the flaring match in his fingers and looked
at Peter quizzically. "My name is Kahn Meng. And I am _not_ from
Shanghai."

Peter nodded agreeably, although the explanation explained nothing.

"I have returned to China to attack and capture the city of Len Yang.
I came from there originally. Exactly five years ago I galloped over
the great drawbridge to study the classics in Peking. Fortunately I
met a man. He was an American missionary. He said to me: 'Kahn Meng,
the classics are dead. Betake yourself to America, where you will find
the fountain of modern knowledge.' Of course, the missionary was a
Harvard man."

Peter frowned slightly.

"What you don't understand probably, Mr. Moore, is why I can leave Len
Yang and return at will. I can't. I escaped from Len Yang at night.
I am returning with a thousand men at my back. Those men have occupied
this village. My conscience forb