Page:Ballinger Price--Fortune of the Indies.djvu/160

 Mark's guide explained. "Melican man not often catchem piecee moonlight on him." With which remark he whisked off again.

It was dark here and unwholesome. The houses were unlighted and there seemed to be a sinister murmuring, instead of the shrill, unconcerned babel of the crowd through which they had passed earlier. Mark looked back with a slight shiver to the moonlight on the pond, and then went on, to find his guide smiling beside an open dark doorway.

"Velly nice temple," the man explained, softly. "You see Chinee-man say he players velly click. You mebbe catchem one little incense for joss, all same Chinee-man."

Mark mistrusted the temple. He stepped back carelessly.

"No time," he said. "Must go hotel-side again. Come again some other time."

With a swift look around at the almost deserted streets where only a few Chinese grinned impassively at the "foreign devil," the guide seized Mark suddenly and thrust him within the place. The door clanged to with a substantial crash, and Mark felt other hands grasp him.