"What? Where did she go?"
"That I don't know."
"The devil! Any man with her?"
"No, señor. Shall I take you to her room?"
"No. She fooled you."
"That is not possible, for the two women were here at the same time. I can prove that, señor."
"I have seen the Nordstrom woman. The description of the woman in the pith helmet agrees absolutely."
"I cannot help that, señor. They were here at the same time, though they did not meet."
"All right. If I find you haven't told me the truth, we'll lock up the place. You are not very good Americans around here. Good night." Outside in the street Morgan of the Intelligence—who switched from uniform to mufti frequently—pushed back his hat, perplexed. "Two? Impossible! A trick. I'll set a man to watch. I'll quiz that marine again. If he didn't describe the Nordstrom woman, I'll eat my hat!"
Could he have peered into one of the thousand huts of bamboo and nipa palm, in the Tondo, he might have been convinced of one thing—that there was still a thrill left in the dizzy old world for men even as blasé as himself. A woman, wearing the gay little costume of a high-caste Chinese woman, sat on a cushion, her legs curled under her. She was smoking a cigarette. From a brass bowl at one side of her rose faint spirals of smoke. Into this bowl she flicked the ash. There was a smile, inscrutable, on her lips—the smile particular to one god and one woman, Buddha and Mona Lisa. By and by she picked up a fresh cigarette; but she did not light it. She broke it in two. In fancy it was a man.