Mr. Endacott shook his head.
“He has the Body,” he repeated.
There was a pattering of feet outside; feet that passed swiftly across the pavement of blistered heat. A little troop of porters entered and sought shelter. The foreman advanced and stood silent before Wu Ling’s desk.
“Speak,” Wu Ling directed.
“We waited on the dock,” the man recounted. “We waited in the heat. Hours went by. Then, as the ship moved away, the Englishman leaned over the rail. He called out to us, ‘There is nothing to send back.’ Then he disappeared.”
“So you returned,” Wu Ling murmured.
“So we returned,” the man assented.
Wu Ling rose to his feet and stood at the window. There was a clamour of sirens blowing through the sultry, stagnant air, a waving of handkerchiefs from a distant dock. A great steamer was drifting out, her bows set westward. Wu Ling watched her gathering speed through the lazy sea, leaving behind her a wake like a rope of snow in the deep blue of the waters which she parted. The smoke belched from her funnels. Somewhere on board her was Gregory Ballaston and his booty. Endacott laid his hand upon the arm of Wu Ling whom he loved.
“The young man has done ill,” he said, “but the Soul is ours.”