“Where shall we go to-night!” asked Percival, as eager at the end of this eight hours’ tete-a-tete as he had been at the start.

“To the ball, of course,” said Bobby.  “The hotel is giving it in honor of the Saluria.”

“Heavens! what a bore!  Can’t we dodge it?”

“You can if you want to.  Andy’ll take me.  He’s just waiting to see if you renig.”

“Renig?” repeated Percival.

“Yes,” said Bobby—­“fluke, back out; you know what I mean.”

That settled it with Percival.  Five minutes before the hour appointed he was waiting impatiently in one of the small reception-rooms to conduct Miss Boynton to that most abhorred of all functions, a public ball.  What possible pleasure he was going to get out of standing against the wall and watching her dance with other men he could not conceive.  He assured himself that he was acting like a fool, and that if he kept on at the pace he was going, Heaven only knew what folly he might commit in the four days that must pass before he reached Hong-Kong.

Hong-Kong!  The word had but one association for him.  It was the home of his eldest and most conservative sister, a lady of uncompromising social standards, who recognized only two circles of society, the one over which her mother presided in London, and the smaller one over which she reigned as the wife of the British diplomatic official in the land of her adoption.

At the mere thought of presenting Bobby to this paragon of social perfection, Percival shuddered.  He could imagine Sister Cordelia’s pitiless survey of the girl through her lorgnette, the lifting of her brows over some mortal sin against taste or some deadly transgression in her manner of speech.  Of course, he assured himself it would never do; the idea of bringing them together was wholly preposterous.  And yet—­

A Chinese youth, with a handful of trinkets, slipped into the room, and furtively proffered his wares.

“Very good, number-one jade-stone.  Make missy velly plitty.  Can buy?”

Percival motioned him away, only to have him return.

“Jade-stone velly nice!  Plitty young missy wanchee jade-stone.”

“Did she say she wanted it?” demanded Percival, with sudden interest.

The boy grinned.  “Oh, yes.  Wanchee heap!  No have got fifty dollar’.  Master have got.  Wanchee buy?”

Percival tossed him the money and lay the pendant on the table.  Then he resumed his pacing and his disturbed meditations.  If he could only keep himself firmly in hand during those next four days, all would be well.  Once safely anchored in the harbor of his sister’s eminently proper English circle, the song of the siren would doubtless fade away, and he would thank Heaven fervently for his miraculous escape.  Meanwhile he listened with increasing impatience for the first flutter of the siren’s wings,

“Wanchee Manchu coatt?” whispered an insidious voice at his elbow, and, looking down, he saw the enterprising lad with a pile of gorgeous silks over his arm and cupidity writ large in his narrow eyes.