Portuguese and Italian sailors Miles had seen, on rare visits aboard some lumber schooner bound for Sicily or the Canary Islands. At Admiral’s Light, however, nothing could bring them ashore, still less up into the tower. And this sing-song gabble, as instinct told him, came from no Latin throat. The dry, scuffing steps began once more. Suddenly, out of the darkness, claw-like fingers clutched the sides of the trap-door,--fingers of an impossible, horny yellow, ending in blue talons. For one spasmodic instant, Miles, had he stood on open ground, might have bolted. Then as up from a pit, a reassuring black felt hat bobbed through the opening, and tilted back to disclose a human face. Eyes hard and bright as black glass peered from under lids curiously in-folded, of double thickness; the saffron cheeks were smooth as a babe’s; and indeed, in that strange face, as in a changeling’s, baby innocence conflicted with reptilian age and wisdom. Without alteration, without sound, it rested there for a moment, at the level of the floor, as though decapitated; then sank from sight. Miles had stared in fascination. Waking to anger, part at his own fear, part at its cause, he shouted:-- “Stop! Who--what are you after?” The light scuffing descended rapidly. Miles leapt for the black square, plunged through it, and down the twisting stair. The thin scantling shook and buckled under their double weight. He jumped the lower steps, just as the tower door slammed open to let a black figure bound out into the lantern light. A scurrying pair of thick white soles, as he caught up the lantern by the bail, guided his pursuit; he gained on them, and running his hardest to the gully bridge, gripped in his right hand the fluttering fullness of a silken jacket. “Stop!” he cried. “You--” The fugitive tugged, wriggled, surrendered, and turned a grinning face. “No can do,” he panted, nodding and ducking amiably. The felt hat was gone, and his bobbing crown showed a high, shaven forehead, bound with neat black coils of braided hair. “But in pictures they hang down,” thought Miles. “A queue!” He had never before seen a Chinaman. “What do you want?” he asked severely. His captive, smiling and nodding, the calmer of the two, repeated,-- “No can do, no can do.” Plainly, the man’s English went no further. Miles released his grip, and, feeling rather foolish, stepped back to consider. Like a spring released, and with instant, mechanical precision, the Chinaman vaulted the bridge-rail, landed on the steep bank below, and darted upward, crashing into the alders. His escape, like his first appearance, had the facility of acts in a dream.