ope. "Don't you agree, Knox?"

Burton fixed his lazy stare upon the speaker.

"Don't blame poor old Singapore," he said. "There is no spot in this
battered world that I have succeeded in discovering which is not changed
for the worse."

Dr. Matheson flicked ash from his cigar and smiled in that peculiarly
happy manner which characterizes a certain American type and which lent
a boyish charm to his personality.

"You are a pair of pessimists," he pronounced. "For some reason best
known to themselves Jennings and Knox have decided upon a Busman's
Holiday. Very well. Why grumble?"

"You are quite right, Doctor," Jennings admitted. "When I was on service
here in the Straits Settlements I declared heaven knows how often that
the country would never see me again once I was demobbed. Yet here you
see I am; Burton belongs here; but here's Knox, and we are all as fed up
as we can be!"

"Yes," said Burton slowly. "I may be a bit tired of Singapore. It's a
queer thing, though, that you fellows have drifted back here again. The
call of the East is no fable. It's a call that one hears for ever."

The conversation drifted into another channel, and all sorts of topics
were discussed, from racing to the latest feminine fashions, from
ballroom dances to the merits and demerits of coalition government. Then
suddenly:

"What became of Adderley?" asked Jennings.

There were several men in the party who had been cronies of ours during
the time that we were stationed in Singapore, and at Jennings's words
a sort of hush seemed to fall on those who had known Adderley. I cannot
say if Jennings noticed this, but it was perfectly evident to me that
Dr. Matheson had perceived it, for he glanced swiftly across in my
direction in an oddly significant way.

"I don't know," replied Burton, who was an engineer. "He was rather an
unsavoury sort of character in some ways, but I heard that he came to a
sticky end."

"What do you mean?" I asked with curiosity, for I myself had often
wondered what had become of Adderley.

"Well, he was reported to his C. O., or something, wasn't he, just
before the time for his demobilization? I don't know the particulars; I
thought perhaps you did, as he was in your regiment."

"I have heard nothing whatever about it," I replied.

"You mean Sidney Adderley, the man who was so indecently rich?" someone
interjected. "Had a place at Katong, and was always talking about his
father's millions?"

"That's the