"'But why should he do such a thing? Had he anything against Turner?'
"'Captain, you do not understand. He merely was tired of the vessel; and freights are becoming very poor. He wanted his insurance. He had no thought of disaster so he now assures himself; what he had in mind was for the ship to sink discreetly in pleasant weather. Yet he was willing enough to run the chance of wholesale murder.'
"I got up and began pacing the floor; the damnable affair had made me sick at heart, and a little sick at the stomach.
"'Thus the gods have struck,' said Lee Fu behind me, in that changeless voice that for a moment seemed to concentrate the echo of the ages. 'There is blood at last, Captain—twenty-seven lives, and among them one dear to us—enough even to convince one of your race that a crime has been committed. But I was mistaken in much that I foresaw. The criminal, it seems, is destined not to suffer. He has escaped the gods.'
"Can't you bring him to a reckoning? Isn't there some way—'
"Lee Fu shook his head. 'No, Captain, he is amply protected. What could I accomplish in your courts with this fantastic tale, and for witnesses a coolie and a sampan man?'
"I continued to pace the floor, thinking dark thoughts. There was a way, of course, between man and man; but such things are no longer done in the heart of civilization, except in sudden passion or jealousy.
"Pacing rapidly, and oblivious to everything but the four walls of the room, I nearly ran into Sing Toy coming in with a message from the outer office. He whispered a word in Lee Fu's ear.
"'Ah!' exclaimed Lee Fu sharply. I started, whirled around. His voice had lost the level, passive tone; it had taken on the timbre of action.
"'Send him in,' he said in Chinese to Sing Toy.