oyed.

As in all large cities, there is a night side to the life of Peking. If
you traverse the streets at night you will find shops which have been
closed all day opening for the trade of the night workers. You will see
people who have slept through all the daylight hours walking through the
streets to their nightly toil. You will see about the same things, only
on a smaller scale, that you see in the daytime.

This night was no different from any other, except that there were more
men who did not appear to have any particular business there lounging
along the streets. Now and then these loiterers, walking slowly along
the business ways, slipped unostentatiously into alleys and narrow
by-ways and so on into basement and garret halls where others of their
kind were assembled.

When Ned looked out of his window, listening meanwhile to the steady
boring sound at his door, he saw a light at a window opposite to the
building in which he stood waving slowly to and fro. There was a long
vertical motion, and then the light moved from side to side again.

Ned counted the slow strokes. Left to right, right to left, back again
and yet again!

"Six," he mused, "and all in action!"

The mouse-like gnawing at his door continued, the sounds seemingly
louder than before. The intruder was evidently gaining courage!

Presently the boy leaned out of his window, which was on the third floor
of the hotel, and watched the entrance below. There appeared to be a
great rush of customers at that time. At least a score of natives
passed in at the large door.

Then Ned turned to the right and studied the window of the room next to
his own on that floor. There was a light in that room, too, but it
seemed to be a red light. Then it changed to white, then to blue.

Ned laughed and began drawing on his clothes. Still the boring
continued, and Ned bent over to see if he could discover any holes in
the stile of the door.

There being no light in his room and, presumably, one in the corridor
outside, he thought he might be able to see when a cut through the stile
had been made. There were no indications of a break yet, and Ned
settled back on his bed to wait.

Just at that moment he hardly knew what he was waiting for. He had been
very busy all the afternoon, laying plans and conferring with a man who
came from the police bureau, and who appeared to be working under
instructions from the boy. Ned considered his plans as near