Tales of Chinatown | Page 8

China," she replied. "Somehow I don't think I shall ever see China
again. But my father is rich, and it is dreadful to think that we live here
when there are so many more beautiful places to live in."
"Then why does he stay?" asked Durham with curiosity.
"For money, always for money," answered Lala, shrugging her
shoulders. "Yet if it is not to bring happiness, what good is it?"
"What good indeed?" murmured Durham.
"There is no fun for me," said the girl pathetically. "Sometimes

someone nice comes to do business, but mostly they are Jews, Jews,
always Jews, and------" Again she shrugged eloquently.
Durham perceived the very opening for which he had been seeking..
"You evidently don't like Jews," he said endeavouring to speak lightly.
"No," murmured the girl, "I don't think I do. Some are nice, though. I
think it is the same with every kind of people--there are good and bad."
"Were you ever in America?" asked Durham.
"No."
"I was just thinking," he explained, "that I have known several
American Jews who were quite good fellows."
"Yes?" said Lala, looking up at him naively, "I met one not long ago.
He was not nice at all."
"Oh!" exclaimed Durham, startled by this admission, which he had not
anticipated. "One of your father's customers?"
"Yes, a man named Cohen."
"Cohen?"
"A funny little chap," continued the girl. "He tried to make love to me."
She lowered her lashes roguishly. "I knew all along he was pretending.
He was a thief, I think. I was afraid of him."
Durham did some rapid thinking, then:
"Did you say his name was Cohen?" he asked.
"That was the name he gave."
"A man named Cohen, an American, was found dead in the river quite
recently."

Lala stopped dead and clutched his arm.
"How do you know?" she demanded.
"There was a paragraph in this morning's paper."
She hesitated, then:
"Did it describe him?" she asked.
"No," replied Durham, "I don't think it did in detail. At least, the only
part of the description which I remember is that he wore a large and
valuable diamond on his left hand."
"Oh!" whispered Lala.
She released her grip of Durham's arm and went on.
"What?" he asked. "Did you think it was someone you knew?"
"I did know him," she replied simply. "The man who was found
drowned. It is the same. I am sure now, because of the diamond ring.
What paper did you read it in? I want to read it myself."
"I'm afraid I can't remember. It was probably the Daily Mail."
"Had he been drowned?"
"I presume so--yes," replied Durham guardedly.
Lala Huang was silent for some time while they paced on through the
dusk. Then:
"How strange!" she said in a low voice.
"I am sorry I mentioned it," declared Durham. "But how was I to know
it was your friend?"
"He was no friend of mine," returned the girl sharply. "I hated him. But

it is strange nevertheless. I am sure he intended to rob my father."
"And is that why you think it strange?"
"Yes," she said, but her voice was almost inaudible.
They were come now to the narrow street communicating with the
courtway in which the great treasure-house of Huang Chow was
situated, and; Lala stopped at the corner.
"It was nice of you to walk along with me," she said. "Do you live in
Limehouse?"
"No," replied Durham, "I don't. As a matter of fact, I came down here
to-night in the hope of seeing you again."
"Did you?"
The girl glanced up at him doubtfully, and his distaste for the task set
him by his superior increased with the passing of every moment. He
was a man of some imagination, a great reader, and ambitious
professionally. He appreciated the fact that Chief Inspector Kerry
looked for great things from him, but for this type of work he had little
inclination.
There was too much chivalry in his make-up to enable him to play
upon a woman's sentiments, even in the interests of justice. By
whatever means the man Cohen had met his death, and whether or no
the Chinaman Pi Lung had died by the same hand, Lala Huang was
innocent of any complicity in these matters, he was perfectly well
assured.
Doubts were to come later when he was away from her, when he had
had leisure to consider that she might regard him in the light of a third
potential rifler of her father's treasure-house. But at the moment,
looking down into her dark eyes, he reproached himself and wondered
where his true duty lay.

"It is so gray and dull and sordid here," said the girl, looking down the
darkened street. "There is no one much to talk to."
"But you