," he said. "I can't afford
to lose any help he may be able to give us."

Whiteside was pardonably piqued.

"I don't know if your Ling Chu will be able to do very much in the way of
trailing a taxicab through London." And then, recognising something of
the other's distress, he said more gently, "Though I agree with you that
every help we can get we shall need."

On their arrival at the Bond Street flat, Tarling opened the door and
went upstairs, followed by the other. The flat was in darkness--an
extraordinary circumstance, for it was an understood thing that Ling Chu
should not leave the house whilst his master was out. And Ling Chu had
undoubtedly left. The dining-room was empty. The first thing Tarling saw,
when he turned on the light, was a strip of rice paper on which the ink
was scarcely dry. Just half a dozen Chinese characters and no more.

"If you return before I, learn that I go to find the little-little
woman," read Tarling in astonishment.

"Then he knows she's gone! Thank God for that!" he said. "I wonder----"

He stopped. He thought he had heard a low moan, and catching the eye of
Whiteside, he saw that the Scotland Yard man had detected the same sound.

"Sounds like somebody groaning," he said. "Listen!"

He bent his head and waited, and presently it came again.

In two strides Tarling was at the door of Ling Chu's sleeping place, but
it was locked. He stooped to the key-hole and listened, and again heard
the moan. With a thrust of his shoulder he had broken the door open and
dashed in.

The sight that met his eyes was a remarkable one. There was a man lying
on the bed, stripped to the waist. His hands and his legs were bound and
a white cloth covered his face. But what Tarling saw before all else was
that across the centre of the broad chest were four little red lines,
which Tarling recognised. They were "persuaders," by which native Chinese
policemen secretly extract confessions from unwilling criminals--light
cuts with a sharp knife on the surface of the skin, and after----

He looked around for the "torture bottle," but it was not in sight.

"Who is this?" he asked, and lifted the cloth from the man's face.

It was Milburgh.

CHAPTER XXXIII

LING CHU--TORTURER

Much had happened to Mr. Milburgh between the time of his discovery lying
bound and helpless and showing evidence that he had been in the hands of
a Chinese torturer and the moment he left Sam Stay. He had read of the