Evening star., 1921-04-03

pox and always speag Of It by some
other name. the popular comment on
a patient being. He is painted with
the flowers Of heaven"
so our friend. the thief here. may
be the Cerulean Leopard. as well as
the Green Leopard. may her
Yes. or to put it after the manner
OF the ancient poets:
"'ching Yu Yuen Tien,
Ching Yu hsia Esao!"
And what. pray. might that mean.
sir? I am afraid my rather prosaic
mind cannot quite grasp it in the
original" laughed the inspector.
"Why. that simply means:
".Blue as the arching heaven,
Green as the grass below"
The mornings interview ended, with
a mutual agreement to have the pic
ture Of Green Leopard reproduced
and the description Of him given to
every foreign and native odicer on
the force, together with instructions
to watch carefully for him at every
known rendezvous of bad characters.
Wang Foo thought it best to fall in
with all these suggestions Of the
English police. though as he rode
away down the bund in his rinrik-
asha he kept repeating to himself
the words: 1T is perfectly useless,
perfectly useless; they will never find
him that way" A week passed away
and the utter failure of the search
proved that he was correct. In the
meantime he had been carrying on
his own Independent line of inquiry
suits. Let US follow him and see
what 40me 0f fheSe were
First of all. he sought out his old
friend. the tao tai. who had just
retired from Office and was living in
native villa ON the bank of the
river. and took counsel with him
Green Leopard and the most likely
way to apprehend him. This, Of
course, in addition to the official re-
port and request that had been sent
into the native authorities by the
would amount to nothing. because
of the simple fact that the reward
or squeeze" was considered by the
tao tars police to be utterly in
adequate. When they were closeted
the villa, and when the triple sign of
che Sacred Brotherhood had been
made by the waving of the lighted
incense in the air. Wang Foo began.
He Is from TAX Yoi (Grand Delight),
our own native village in the Canton
district"
You are quite sure Of this? en-
quired the tao tai. who seemed rather
troubled by this announcement:
Positive. your excellency: here Is
(letter from our brother. the abbot Of
of Heaven. He feels the disgrace as
keenly as we do and begs that we
will do all in our power to shield
the reputation OF the village"
Does that mean that we are to
We are to assist him to escape?"
"Ah! That is just the question that
has troubled me. We are between
the two horns Of the dilemma, as the
Europeans say. we must seek to pro-
any participation in a crime-there
lies the problem. But. come what
may, our very first duty is to find
him. In what direction shall we
turnT'
The tao tai thought for a moment
or two and then slowly answered. ut
is written in the Book of Fate. is it
not, that. Within the half-moon of
the commission of a crime the guilty
one will seek the Interpretation Of
his dreams from the tellers Of for
tunes? We must watch the seer. to
''And he is-?'' anxiously inquired
Wang Foo. as he took his little
leather notebook out of his sleeve and
prepared to make a careful record.
'The guardian Of the Ivory Sampan
at the little shrine back of the seven
story pagoda."
And why should he want to go
there?"
Because the Ivory sampan is the
sacred emblem and treasure of our
goddess at TAX Yoi. and whenever
the children Of southern Canton may
wander. they will be sure to go there
to ease their troubled consciences."
True! True" exclaimed the detec-
tive. as on the eve of a great discov-
cry; ":how strange I had not thought
of that before" And bidding his ex-
cellency. goodbye. he gave him the
pledge Of secrecy and returned to his
waiting sedan chair.
Il \ y
MIHEN Green Leopard arrived in
w Shanghai with his ill-gotten
gains. having come up by a coasting
steamer and changed at Foochow to
avoid suspicion. he naturally decided
that the safest thing for him to do