I spoke, in what I suppose was an excited whisper.
“Please let me speak with you,” I said. “Please let me speak with you!”
Still no sound.
Then it was that I opened the door—the shrunken door that would not lock.
Hôtel de Chine, Peking, April 5th—or 6th.
TIS sometime in the very early morning. Peking is still. Even in this rookery of night birds every light is out but mine. I had to stop writing a while back and go for a long hard walk—around the Legation Quarter, outside the walls. But now I shall force myself to write down the rest of it. I shall not go to bed until it is done. It is too absurd that a scientist of proved ability and of highly trained will power should be overcome by his emotions in this way.
I have just tiptoed to the shrunken door that so inadequately separates her room from mine. I heard her irregular breathing: and, while I stood there, caught a low jumble of words spoken with the thick tongue of the sleeper.
And she stirs restlessly in her bed. Even from my chair I can hear that.