"Thank you."

Okiu looked out into the night; his arms were folded, his legs very wide apart, his back turned toward the secret agent. Usually there is something peculiarly disconcerting in a squarely turned back; it is so blank, it tells so little. However, this was not so in the case of Okiu.

His bland, lineless face told nothing; whereas in his att.i.tude there was a purpose which Ashton-Kirk read easily. And, reading it, he looked carefully but swiftly about the room.

The table was between himself and the closed door; a pair of heavy curtains hung behind him. To all appearances these protected some open book shelves, but a rapid swing of his light stick showed the secret agent that their real purpose was to conceal a doorway. Calmly he sat back in his chair, nursing his cane, his keen eyes upon the figure at the window.

"I think," now resumed Okiu, "that I remarked at the time how short a s.p.a.ce there was between your forming the acquaintance of Dr. Morse and his death. You meet him one night and he dies the next."

The tongue clicked against the roof of the mouth pityingly; it were as though the coincidence excited his grief.

"I have always understood that you Americans were an impatient people.

You have the reputation, whether deserved or not, of forcing things which do not happen as promptly as you would have them. This in itself is an excellent trait at times, for it saves one from imposition of many sorts. But it does not always serve." Here Okiu turned and faced the secret agent. His face was as bland and meaningless as ever, and his voice was low pitched and gentle, as he proceeded. "No," said he, "it does not always serve. As it has resulted in this case, Dr. Morse is dead, and you have not benefited in the least."

Ashton-Kirk looked at him with steady eyes; there was not the slightest surprise in the secret agent's face, and his tone was unruffled as he replied:

"I think I understand."

"I am quite sure that you do," replied Okiu, with equal suavity. He resumed his seat at the table; and once more he began lovingly to flutter the leaves of the ancient book. "That the methods pursued in this case should be resorted to by a barbarous nation," said he, and a gleam of mockery appeared in the slanting eyes, "would be the expected thing; but that a Christian government should so stoop is something of a surprise."

"Oh! You were surprised, then?"

"Only mildly. You see, I have been employed upon many international occasions, and know the requirements of a secret agent. When the case demands it, he does not hesitate. But," and here the smooth hands gestured their disapproval, "this case did not demand it. Nothing was to be gained by the mere death of this Englishman."

Ashton-Kirk nodded.

"In that," said he, "I agree with you."

"I do not know," continued Okiu, "what put you upon the scent, but that a person possessing sufficient ac.u.men to strike it at all should at the same time be so great a bungler as to do that," and one leveled finger indicated the Morse house, the lights of which could be seen through the window, "astonishes me."

Ashton-Kirk bent the light cane into a bow across his knee; his expression was that of a man waiting for an expected something to be said or done. There was now a pause of some duration. Okiu studied the man before him in the same impersonal fashion with which a man studies a mounted insect, then he resumed:

"I have heard of you very favorably, and had counted upon one day having the pleasure of testing myself against you; but now----" again the remarkable hands gestured, this time to complete the sentence.

"I'm sorry you have been disappointed."

"You are not nearly so sorry as I, believe me." The heavy lids drooped over the piercing eyes in a way which Ashton-Kirk had already come to regard as a warning of something ulterior. "You have been searching the house?" he asked.

Ashton-Kirk laughed lightly.

"Who has not?" he inquired.

Okiu joined in the laugh.

"It has all been labor wasted," said he. "Dr. Morse was not the man to leave valuable property lying about." Again he regarded the secret agent intently, and once more resumed: "I suppose by this time you have not so much hope of coming on anything as you once had?"

Ashton-Kirk allowed the cane to spring back straight; with a look of unconcern he made reply.

"On the contrary," said he, "I was never quite so sure as I am just now."

Okiu stared, and then came slowly to his feet.

"You have found it?"

"No." And Ashton-Kirk yawned contentedly. "But I could place my hands in a very few moments upon the person who has."

At this the palms of the j.a.panese came together softly.

"Why," said he, and his voice was full of gentle surprise, "perhaps I have been mistaken in my opinion of you, after all."

"Perhaps," answered Ashton-Kirk.

But for all the secret agent's seeming ease of manner, at the soft slap of the Oriental's hands, his every sense had grown alert; and now his ear caught a rustling behind him which said plainly that some one had stepped quietly into the room. An instant later, a peculiar, high scent as of an Eastern oil reached his nostrils; and though he did not turn his head, he knew that the newcomer was the wrestler, Sorakicha.

CHAPTER XVI

IN THE DARK

Though Ashton-Kirk was as sure Sorakicha stood behind him as he would have been had his eyes rested upon him, he did not turn his head. The man's entrance had been effected almost without sound; the rustling of the curtains had been no louder than a lightly drawn breath.

"And now," reflected the secret agent, calmly, "he is waiting behind me until he is told what to do. I trust that I shall be sufficiently fortunate as to catch the signal."

But he continued to lounge back in his chair with crossed legs, balancing the stick lightly between his fingers. Okiu stood regarding him with careful attention.

"Yes," he continued, "I now see that it is probable that you are what I have always understood you to be--a man of exceptional talents. No one,"

with a slow smile, "cares to admit that he is dull of perception, but I confess, sir, that in this matter, in which I have been judging you, you may have been more successful than I have imagined."

"It is more or less difficult to follow the workings of a mind, the owner of which is not under one's immediate observation," returned Ashton-Kirk, philosophically. "So, looking at the matter from that point of view, you have nothing to chide yourself for."

But Okiu paid no attention to this; apparently he was grappling with a more concrete matter.

"What you have said interests me," he said. "And so," putting his hands upon the table, and leaning across to the other, "the paper has been found?"

"You might call it finding it, if you were at loss for an expression,"

replied Ashton-Kirk. "Though on second thought, I confess I should apply another term, myself."

"We will not discuss terms," said Okiu gently. "Let us call the matter of getting the desired thing what you please; there are more important matters to think about just now." He still bent forward, his hands resting upon the table; his expressionless face was held close to that of the secret agent. "And so," said he, "you could place your hand upon the person who now has the paper, could you? That is interesting. And still more interesting is the fact that you could do it in a very few moments."

Ashton-Kirk nodded and smiled.

"It gives us all a certain satisfaction to learn that we are interesting," said he. "This is so almost at any time. But at a moment like this--when interest is created in a person who had utterly lost confidence--it is doubly pleasing."

"Perhaps," said Okiu, and the purr in his low-pitched voice was more p.r.o.nounced than the secret agent had ever heard it before, "you have occasion for satisfaction; and then perhaps you have not."

Ashton-Kirk met the black, heavy-lidded eyes squarely.