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Rh “That’s rum—very rum indeed. How did you come to hear about the man?”

“You know him, then?”

I’ve met him once. And I know something of him—not quite as much as I should like to. But it surprises me that any one else in England should even have heard of him. He's a great man in his way—mandarin class and all that, you know—but that's not the crux of the matter. There’s good reason to suppose that he’s the man behind it all.”

“Behind what?”

“Everything. The world-wide unrest, the labour troubles that beset every nation, and the revolutions that break out in some. There are people, not scaremongers, who know what they are talking about, and they say that there is a force behind the scenes which aims at nothing less then the disintegration of civilisation. In Russia, you know, there were many signs that Lenin and Trotsky were mere puppets whose every action was dictated by another’s brain. I have no definite proof that would count with you, but I am quite convinced that this brain was Li Chang Yen’s.”

“Oh, come,” I protested, “isn’t that a bit far-fetched? How would a Chinaman cut any ice in Russia?”