Page:Mr. Wu (IA mrwumilnlouisejo00milniala).pdf/295

 boat and of the boatmen's eyes, she stopped and untied Basil's arms. It was not easy work, although she had a knife. And Mrs. Gregory could give no help.

They stumbled into the boat as best they could, but not without aiding hands, the mother and son. Ah Wong scrambled in nimbly. And at a word from her the watermen lifted their poles—and they had left Kowloon.

They leaned against each other, the English mother and her boy, as the small craft crossed the bay, but not a word was spoken by either of them or to either of them. They huddled together dumb with relief and with exhaustion, and almost numb with the horror they had known.

Unobtrusive, stolid, commonplace in manner as in her humble amah garb, Ah Wong directed and enforced everything.

Ten million stars came out and specked with diamond dust the grave, blue sky. The moon came up and rippled with silver and with gold the rippling water. And before the night-flowers of Kowloon had ceased to lave their faces with the fragrance which was "good-night," the fragrance of the night-flowers of Hong Kong Island rushed out to them and buffeted them with sweetness.

The world was very placid. The night was radiant. The night was very still. And the smiling indifference of the night was cruel. At least, the English woman felt it so. Basil felt nothing. Ah Wong was scheming.

She disembarked them. She paid the boatmen. She tidied her mistress, and tidied Basil as best she could. She got them up the Peak, and she smuggled them into the hotel at last, almost unobserved.

"Too tlired talk to-night," she told Hilda imperatively. And she said it as imperatively to Robert Greg