" She laughed softly.
"You forgot Sin Sin Wa. If there had been no Lola you would never have
escaped from Buenos Ayres with your life, my Lucy. You forgot that
English pride, and did not ask me where I got them from--the ten
thousand dollars to buy your 'honor' back."
She became silent, as if listening to the dead man's reply. Finally:
"No--I do not reproach you, my dear," she whispered. "You have paid me
back a thousand fold, and Sin Sin Wa, the old fox, grows rich and fat.
Today we hold the traffic in our hands, Lucy. The old fox cares only
for his money. Before it is too late let us go--you and I. Do you
remember Havana, and the two months of heaven we spent there? Oh, let
us go back to Havana, Lucy. Kazmah has made us rich. Let Kazmah
die. . . . You smoke with me?"
Again she became silent, then:
"Very likely," she murmured; "very likely I know why you don't smoke.
You have promised your pretty little friend that you will stay awake
and see that nobody tries to cut her sweet white throat."
She paused momentarily, then muttered something rapidly in Spanish,
followed by a short, guttural phrase in Chinese.
"Why do you bring her to the house?" she whispered hoarsely. "And you
brought her to Kazmah's.
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