half-furtive glance about him, but the curious agitation had apparently been unnoted, and presently his face had once more regained its speculative, slightly sardonic expression.

Suddenly a distant gun boomed the hour of sunset. At the same instant the marble ceased its erratic career, the wheel stilled and the youngest of the gaming trio and the master of the place—Philip Ware, a graceful, shapely fellow of twenty-three, with a flushed face and nervous manner—pushed the scattered counters across the table with shaking fingers.

"My limit to-day," he said with sullen petulance, and flipping the marble angrily into the garden below, crossed to a table and poured out a brandy-and-soda.

Daunt's gray eyes had been looking at him steadily, a little curiously. He had known him seven years before at college, though the other had been in a lower class than himself. But those intervening years had left their baleful marks. At home Phil had stood only for loose habit, daring fad, and flaunting mannerism—milestones of a career as completely dissolute as a consistent disregard of conventional moral thoroughfares could well make it. To Yokohama he was rapidly coming to be, in the eyes of the censorious, an example for well-meaning youth to avoid, an incorrigible flanêur, a purposeless idler on the primrose paths.

"Better luck next time," said one of the others lightly. "Come along, Larry; we'll be off to the club."

The older man rose to depart more deliberately, his great size becoming apparent. He was framed like a wrestler, abnormal width of shoulder and massive head giving an effect of weight which contrasted oddly with aquiline features in which was a touch of the accipitrine, something ironic and sinister, like a vulture. His eyes were dappled yellow and deep-set and had a peculiar expression of cold, untroubled regard. He crossed to the farther side and looked down.

"What a height!" he said. "The whole harbor is laid out like a checker-board." He spoke in a tone curiously dead and lacking in timbre. His English was perfect, with a trace of accent.

"Pretty fair," assented Phil morosely. "It ought to be a good place to view the Squadron, when it comes in to-morrow morning. It must have cost the Japanese navy department a pretty penny to build those temporary wharves along the Bund. They must be using a thousand incandescents! By the decorations you'd think the Dreadnaughts were Japan's long lost brothers, instead of battle-ships of a country that's likely to have a row on with her almost any minute. I wonder where they will anchor."

The yellowish eyes had been gazing with an odd, intent glitter, and into the heavy, pallid face, turned away, had sprung sharp, evil lines, that seemed the shadows of some monstrous reflection on which the mind had fed. Its sudden, wicked vitality was in strange contrast to the toneless voice, which now said: "They will lie just opposite this point."

"So far in?" The young man leaning on the balustrade spoke interestedly.

"It seems as though from here one could almost shoot a pea aboard any one of them."

"You might send me up some sticks of Shimosé, Doctor," said Phil with satiric humor, "and I'll practise. I'll begin by shying a few at this forsaken town; it needs it!"

The big man smiled faintly as he withdrew his eyes, and held out his hand to the remaining visitor. The degrading lines had faded from his face.

"I'm distinctly glad to have seen you, Mr. Daunt," he said. "I've watched your trials with your aëroplane more than once lately at the parade-ground. I saw the elder Wright at Paris last year and I believe your flight will prove as well sustained as his. It's a pity you can't compete for some of the European prizes."

"I'm afraid that would take me out of the amateur class," was the answer. "It's purely an amusement with me—a fad, if you like."

"A very useful one," said the other, "unless you break your neck at it. I wonder we haven't met before in Tokyo. I have an appointment to-night, by the way, with your Ambassador. Come in to see me soon," he said, turning to Phil. "I'm at home most of the time. Come and dine with me again. I've only an indifferent cook, as you have discovered, I'm afraid, but my new boy Ishida can make a famous cup of coffee and I can always promise you a good cigar."

"Doctor Bersonin's the real thing!" said Phil, when the other had disappeared. "He's a scientist—the biggest in his line—but he's no prig. He believes in enjoying life. You ought to see his villa at Kisaraz on the Chiba Road. He's worth a million, they say, and he must make no end of money as a government expert." He paused, then added: "You seem mighty quiet to-night! How does he strike you?"

Daunt was silent. He had seen that strange look that had shot across the expert's face—at the sound of a laugh! He was wondering, too, what attraction could exist between this middle-aged scientist with his cold eyes and emotionless voice and Phil, sparkling and irresponsible black-sheep and ne'er-do-well, who thought of nothing but his own coarse pleasures. Frequently, of late, he had seen them together, at theater or tea-house, and once in Bersonin's motor-car in Shiba Park in Tokyo.

"You don't like him! I can see that well enough," went on Phil aggressively. "Why not? He's a lot above any man I know, and I'm proud to have him for a friend of mine."

"There's no accounting for tastes," returned Daunt dryly. "At any rate, I don't imagine it matters particularly whether I like Doctor Bersonin or not. There's another thing that's more apropos." He pointed to the decanter in the other's hands. "You've had enough of that to-night, I should think."

Phil reddened. "I've had no more than I can carry, if it comes to that," he retorted. "And I guess I'm able to take care of myself."

Daunt hesitated a moment. To-day's call had been a part of his consistent effort, steadily growing more irksome, to keep alive for the sake of the old college name, the quasi friendship between them and to invoke whatever influence he might once have possessed.

"I'm thinking of your brother," he said quietly. "You say his yacht came into harbor from Kobe to-day. He'll scarcely be more than a week in the temple cities, and any train may bring him after that. You'll want all the time you've got to straighten out. You'll need to put your best foot forward."

A look that was not pleasant shot across Phil's face. "I suppose I shall," he said savagely. "A pretty brother he is! He wrote me from home that if he found I'd been playing, he'd cut his allowance to me to twenty dollars a week. I'd like to knock that smile of his down his throat—the cold-blooded fish! He spends enough!"

"He's earned it, I understand," said Daunt.

"So will I, perhaps, after I've had my fling. I'm in no hurry, and I won't take orders always from him! I've had to knuckle down to him all my life, and I'm precious tired of it, I can tell you."

Daunt's eyes had turned to the broad expanse below, where the white sails of vagrant sampan drifted. In the road he could hear the sharp tap-tap of a blind amma—adept in the Japanese massage which coaxes soreness from the body—as he passed slowly along, feeling his