Me tell you." From a window Louise had watched the colloquy, and she knew, as well as though she stood beside them, what was being said.

Li Choo had told the truth: he had got the cash, and he would do the job.

But not alone from Joel Mazarine did he get money.

Only two mornings before, Louise, for all the extra work he had had to do during Orlando's illness and without thought of bribery, had given him a beautiful gold ten-dollar-piece with a hole in it.

If the piece had been minus the hole, Li Choo would have returned it to her, for he would have served her for nothing till the end of his days, had it been possible.