Two gunshots sounded from within the building, very close to him. Moments 
later, someone knocked at his door. Carl wrapped his duster around him, in case 
someone decided to fire through the door, and peered out through the peephole. 
To his surprise, he saw a white-haired Anglo gentleman with a handlebar 
mustache, gripping a semiautomatic. Carl had met him yesterday in the hotel 
bar; he was here trying to clear up some kind of business before the fall of 
Shanghai.