“So,” she said, in Chinese, “you have come at last.” Sin Sin Wa smiled. “They watched the old fox,” he replied. “But their eyes were as the eyes of the mole.”
Still aside, contemptuously, the woman regarded him, and:
“Suppose they are keener than you think?” she said. “Are you sure you have not led them—here?”
“The snail may not pursue the hawk,” murmured Sin Sin Wa; “nor the eye of the bat follow his flight.”
“Smartest leg,” remarked the raven.
“Yes, yes, my little friend,” crooned Sin Sin Wa, “very soon now you shall see the paddy-fields of Ho-Nan and watch the great Yellow River sweeping eastward to the sea.”
“Pah!” said Mrs. Sin. “Much—very much—you care about the paddy-fields of Ho-Nan, and little, oh, very little, about the dollars and the traffic! You have my papers?”
“All are complete. With those dollars for which I care not, a man might buy the world—if he had but enough of the dollars. You are well known in Poplar as ‘Mrs. Jacobs,’ and your identity is easily established—as ‘Mrs. Jacobs.’ You join the Mahratta at the Albert Dock. I have bought you a post as stewardess.”
Mrs. Sin tossed her head. “And Juan?”
“What can they prove against your Juan if you are missing?”