“See ol’ Jesse tomorrow—” he said drowsily, “got—lot of business—”
Yeh Ling stooped and his slim fingers encircled the man’s wrist. The pulse was weak but regular.
“It is good,” he said, turning to the old carver of ivory. “Every morning there must be air in this room. No other smoker must come, you understand, Yo Len Fo? He must be kept here.”
“This morning he wanted to go out,” said the keeper of the establishment.
“He will stay for a long time. I know him. When he was on the Amur River, he did not leave his house for three months. Let there be one pipe always ready. Obey.”
He went softly down the stairs and into the night.
Only once did he glance back as he made his unhurried way to the side door of the Golden Roof. But that glance was sufficient. The man he had seen loafing at the entrance of the alleyway was watching him. He saw him now walking on the other side of the road, a dim, secretive figure. Yeh Ling slipped into his private door, bent down and raised the flap of a letter-slot. The man had come to a halt on the other side of the road. The reflected light from the blazing signs on the main street illuminated his back, but his face was in shadow.
“It is not a policeman,” said Yeh Ling softly and then as the man strolled back into the darkness, he called his stunted servant.
“Follow that man who wears a cap. You will see him on the other side of the road, he is walking toward the houses of the noisy women.”
A quarter of an hour later the stunted man came back with a story of failure and Yeh Ling was not surprised. But the watcher was neither policeman nor reporter, of this he was sure.