will find paper and ink in the escritoire. Write me an order and I promise to attend to the matter personally.” 100 100 “And search through everything at your leisure!” Cleigh blushed, and he heard his son chuckle again. He had certainly caught a tartar—possibly two. With a twisted smile he recalled the old yarn of the hunter who caught the bear by the tail. Willing to let go, and daring not! “Still I agree,” continued the girl. “I want my own familiar things—if I must take this forced voyage. But mark me, Mr. Cleigh, you will pay some day! I’m not the clinging kind, and I shall fight you tooth and nail from the first hour of my freedom. I’m not without friends.” “Never in this world!” came resonantly from Cabin Two. Cleigh longed to get away. There was a rumbling and a threatening inside of him that needed space—Gargantuan laughter. Not the clinging kind, this girl! And the boy, walking straight at Dodge’s villainous revolver! Why, he would need the whole crew behind him when he liberated these two! But he knew that the laughter striving for articulation was not the kind heard in Elysian fields! 101 CHAPTER IX “If you will write the order I will execute it at once. The consulate closes early.” “I’ll write it, but how will I get it to you? The door closes below the sill.” “When you are ready, call, and I will open the door a little.” “It would be better if you opened it full wide. This is China—I understand that. But we are both Americans, and there’s a good sound law covering an act like this.” “But it does not reach as far as China. Besides, I have an asset back in the States. It is my word. I have never broken it to any man or woman, and I expect I never shall. You have, or have had, what I consider my property. You have hedged the question; you haven’t been frank.” The son listened intently. “I bought that string of glass beads
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