The moon had slipped out of view, letting the stars, now unrivaled, come down to the very edges of the ravine. The slopes opposite were white and the watchtower suffused by a weary brightness which showed every crack, the irregular lines of every stone, like the wrinkles in the face of an aging man. But the shelf where Nancy stood was steeped in blackness. The girl was cold and miserably afraid, wondering why she had not gone back with Edward, for the tomb avenged her impudence by filling her mind with ghostly fears. Dawn seemed years away. Nancy imagined hostile shapes, things without heads, without limbs, creeping down the cliff behind her.
And at the moment when the tension of her nerves was intolerable she heard a noise, the sound of running feet, a low laugh, a scuffle in the trees. A heavy figure came running up the path, up the steps. The girl was too frightened to jump; instinctively she shrank below the railing of the platform. But the moonlight had betrayed her; she had been all too clearly outlined against the whiteness of the hill beyond. Suddenly she realized that strong arms had seized her, and lifted her from her crouching position, half torn the singlet from her shoulders in forcing her round to meet the savage vehemence of a kiss.
To Nancy this swift shame was unutterable. She had the Chinese loathing of a kiss as a disgusting act suited only to the dalliance of a brothel. She fought like a maddened lioness, scratching, biting, trying to claw the face of her assailant, while the man, checked for a moment, since evidently he had looked for complaisance, replied with cruel fury, ripping her vest open to the waist, choking her till the girl knew she was sinking hopelessly into submission. Just when she had too little strength to know or care what might follow she felt the arms of the man relax. Someone, she did not know who, caught her as she fell limp across the tottering railing.
"Good God!" said a voice in English. "It's Nancy! And I thought it was Kuei-lien."
The voice woke the fainting girl more effectively than a dash of icy water. She stood up abruptly, still bewildered, but understanding that the creature who had attacked her so unreasonably was her father; that he had mistaken her for his mistress. A swift rippling laugh revealed the presence of Kuei-lien herself, very much amused to see the daughter involved in the amorous chase she had been leading the father.
"You will be so boisterous, you clumsy fellow," she said in tart Chinese. "Fancy hugging your own daughter. How absurd!"
But the father was not amused. He turned angrily to Nancy.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded of the girl, who was trying to hold the torn fragments of her singlet over her breast. "What right have you to be spying on us like this?"
Nancy had never been addressed in such harsh tones.
"I was not spying," she stammered.