A search-party of twenty men,
hastily mustered and conducted by Kerry and Seton Pasha, had explored
every house, every shop, every wharf, and, as Kerry believed, every
cellar adjoining the bank, between Limehouse Basin and the dock gates.
Where access had been denied them or where no one had resided they had
never hesitated to force an entrance. But no trace had they found of
those whom they sought.
For the first time within Kerry's memory, or, indeed, within the
memory of any member of the Criminal Investigation Department,
Detective-Sergeant Coombes had ceased to smile when the appalling
truth was revealed to him that Sin Sin Wa had vanished--that Sin Sin
Wa had mysteriously joined that invisible company which included
Kazmah, Mrs. Sin and Mrs. Monte Irvin. Not a word of reprimand did the
Chief Inspector utter, but his eyes seemed to emit sparks. Hands
plunged deeply in his pockets he had turned away, and not even Seton
Pasha had dared to speak to him for fully five minutes.
Kerry began to regard the one-eyed Chinaman with a superstitious fear
which he strove in vain to stifle. That any man could have succeeded
in converting a chandu-khan such as that described by Mollie Gretna
into a filthy deserted dwelling such as that visited by Kerry, within
the space of some thirty-six hours, was well nigh incredible.
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