There many drunken beasts, with their pay in
their pockets, seek each his favorite sin; and for those who love
most the opium, there is, at all too regular intervals, the Sign of
the Open Lamp.
We went there, Colonel Hughes and I. Up and down the narrow
Causeway, yellow at intervals with the light from gloomy shops,
dark mostly because of tightly closed shutters through which only
thin jets found their way, we walked until we came and stood at
last in shadow outside the black doorway of Harry San Li's so-called
restaurant. We waited ten, fifteen minutes; then a man came down
the Causeway and paused before that door. There was something
familiar in his jaunty walk. Then the faint glow of the lamp that
was the indication of Harry San's real business lit his pale face,
and I knew that I had seen him last in the cool evening at
Interlaken, where Limehouse could not have lived a moment, with the
Jungfrau frowning down upon it.
"Enwright?" whispered Hughes.
"Not a doubt of it!" said I.
"Good!" he replied with fervor.
And now another man shuffled down the street and stood suddenly
straight and waiting before the colonel.
"Stay with him," said Hughes softly. "Don't let him get out of
your sight."
"Very good, sir," said the man; and, saluting, he passed on up the
stairs and whistled softly at that black depressing door.
Pages:
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76