It filled
the room, just as it had filled the big hall at the Kirkstone house,
the almost sickening fragrance of agallochum burned in a cigarette. It
hung like a heavy incense. Keith's eyes glared as he scanned the room
under the lights, half expecting to see Shan Tung sitting there waiting
for him. It was empty. His eyes leaped to the two windows. The shade
was drawn at one, the other was up, and the window itself was open an
inch or two above the sill. Keith's hand gripped his pistol as he went
to it and drew the curtain. Then he turned to the table on which were
the reading lamp and Brady's pipes and tobacco and magazines. On an
ash-tray lay the stub of a freshly burned cigarette. Shan Tung had come
secretly, but he had made no effort to cover his presence.
It was then that Keith saw something on the table which had not been
there before. It was a small, rectangular, teakwood box no larger than
a half of the palm of his hand. He had noticed Miriam Kirkstone's
nervous fingers toying with just such a box earlier in the evening.
They were identical in appearance. Both were covered with an exquisite
fabric of oriental carving, and the wood was stained and polished until
it shone with the dark luster of ebony.
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