“In England, you know, the ladies smoke a great deal.  Personally I may be a little prejudiced.  I don’t know that it is sinful, especially when one uses such good judgment—­in orientals.”  And then he was powerless to hold himself back.  He smiled at her frankly, unafraid.  “I don’t believe you smoke,” he added.

He rose to his feet, still smiling across at her, like a big brother waiting for her confidence.  She was not alarmed at the directness with which he had guessed the truth.  She was no longer embarrassed.  She seemed for a moment to be looking through him and into him, a strange and yearning desire glowing dully in her eyes.  He saw her throat twitching again, and he was filled with an infinite compassion for this daughter of the man he had killed.  But he kept it within himself.  He had gone far enough.  It was for her to speak.  At the door she gave him her hand again, bidding him good-night.  She looked pathetically helpless, and he thought that someone ought to be there with the right to take her in his arms and comfort her.

“You will come again?” she whispered.

“Yes, I am coming again,” he said.  “Good-night.”

He passed out into the drizzle.  The door closed behind him, but not before there came to him once more that choking sob from the throat of Miriam Kirkstone.

IX

Keith’s hand was on the butt of his revolver as he made his way through the black night.  He could not see the gravel path under his feet but could only feel it.  Something that was more than a guess made him feel that Shan Tung was not far away, and he wondered if it was a premonition, and what it meant.  With the keen instinct of a hound he was scenting for a personal danger.  He passed through the gate and began the downward slope toward town, and not until then did he begin adding things together and analyzing the situation as it had transformed itself since he had stood in the door of the Shack, welcoming the storm from the western mountains.  He thought that he had definitely made up his mind then; now it was chaotic.  He could not leave Prince Albert immediately, as the inspiration had moved him a few hours before.  McDowell had practically given him an assignment.  And Miss Kirkstone was holding him.  Also Shan Tung.  He felt within himself the sensation of one who was traveling on very thin ice, yet he could not tell just where or why it was thin.

“Just a fool hunch,” he assured himself.

“Why the deuce should I let a confounded Chinaman and a pretty girl get on my nerves at this stage of the game?  If it wasn’t for McDowell—­”