fusion. A Chinaman driving a pig before him jostled against Dick but his expression was so smiling and friendly he could not take offense. He walked along, his head in a whirl. How was he to find her in this mystic maze which was Singapore?
Then he met Wing Lo, the gentle, faithful servant.
"Would it not be well," Wing Lo whispered softly, "to search for the beloved mistress in the great house, her former home, from which she fled? It is a grim, bleak house wherein a thousand tragedies might lie buried."
It was an excellent suggestion and Dick acted upon it. To have rushed blindly through the tempestuous city without any design at all would have been useless.
He longed to rush off at once on his quest, but he refrained. Before going he decided he must buy suitable clothes. The delay was irksome but it was necessary. Toward evening Wing Lo led him to the great house which stood in the center of a vast garden like a great gray elephant. At the gate Wing Lo left him.
"For me to go farther," he explained, "would only plunge you into grave danger. By the household of Mortimer Davga I am not liked. I do not think they would hesitate at any means to exterminate me. But I shall be in the neighborhood and if I divine that you are in need, I may come to you."
So they parted and Dick Varney walked up the crooked flower-bordered path that led to the house.
The garden was a rug of lovely
flowers and stately trees that stood
out in silhouette against the sky. It
seemed impossible that danger could lurk
in such a charming garden. And then a
snake came hissing out from the bushes.
Dick had barely time to spring aside to
avoid it. It broke the spell. After that
even the gorgeous flowers seemed deadly.
Sudden death might lurk in those lovely
blossoms.
He hurried on until before him loomed the monstrous gray house, vast, bulky, shapeless. It must have been designed by an architect in the last stages of insanity or by one of utterly morbid tendencies. It was all of gray without even the slightest trace of color to form a contrast. It might have been some monstrous prehistoric animal resting for a moment in the garden.
As Dick walked up the steps that led to the house the door was flung open and a rather repulsive Chinaman stood before him. He was elegantly dressed but his face was mottled yellow. His nose was shapeless, his lips thick. His eyes were tiny and crafty. They were shifty eyes that seemed to take in everything at a single glance. He would have made, to judge by his appearance, an excellent henchman for Genghis Khan, whose cruelty surpassed any other person in Chinese history.
He bowed low as Dick Varney entered. "I wish to see Mr. Mortimer Davga," he announced simply.
"I will lead the way," replied the Chinaman, "and acquaint the master with the fact of your presence."
Dick followed him through velvet-carpeted halls, halls heavy with delicate vases, lacquer screens, rich tapestries and fantastic lanterns. Finally they emerged into a great room that might have been a gorgeous corner of a vast museum. The walls were lined with cabinets of curios, precious jades and art objects that would have enthralled a collector. In the center of the room was a massive table littered with heaps of books and documents, maps and diagrams. Mortimer Davga
sat behind the table busy writing. This
