A furtive figure, bearing a burden upon its shoulder, moved up the slope and disappeared. A moment later the police were leaping ashore. George deserted his boat and went running heavily after his passenger. “After them!” cried Coombes. “That’s _Sin Sin Wa!_” Around the mazey, rubbish-strewn paths the pursuit went hotly. In sight of Dougal’s Coombes saw the swing door open and a silhouette—that of a man who carried a bag on his shoulder—pass in. George Martin followed, but the Scotland Yard man had his hand upon his shoulder. “Police!” he said sharply. “Who’s your friend?” George turned, red and truculent, with clenched fists. “Mind your own bloody business!” he roared. “Mind yours, my lad!” retorted Coombes warningly. “You’re no Thames waterman. Who’s your friend?” “Wotcher mean?” shouted George. “You’re up the pole or canned you are!” “Grab him!” said Coombes, and he kicked open the door and entered the saloon, followed by Inspector White and the boat’s crew. As they appeared, the Inspector conspicuous in his uniform, backed by the group of River Police, one of whom grasped George Martin by his coat collar: “_Splits!_” bellowed Dougal in a voice like a fog-horn. Twenty cups of tea, coffee and cocoa, too hot for speedy assimilation, were spilled upon the floor. The place as usual was crowded, more particularly in the neighborhood of the two stoves. Here were dock laborers, seamen and riverside loafers, lascars, Chinese, Arabs, negroes and dagoes. Mrs. Dougal, defiant and red, brawny arms folded and her pose as that of one contemplating a physical contest, glared from behind the “solid” counter. Dougal rested his hairy hands upon the “wet” counter and revealed his defective teeth in a vicious snarl. Many of the patrons carried light baggage, since a P and O boat, an oriental, and the _S. S. Mahratta_, were sailing that night or in the early morning, and Dougal’s was the favorite house of call for a _doch-an-dorrich_ for sailormen, particularly for sailormen of color. Upon the police group became focussed the glances of light eyes and dark eyes, round eyes, almond-shaped eyes, and oblique eyes. Silence fell. “We are police officers,” called Coombes formally. “All papers, please.” Thereupon, without disturbance, the inspection began, and among the papers scrutinized were those of one, Chung Chow, an able-bodied Chinese seaman. But since his papers were in order, and since he possessed two eyes and wore no pigtail, he excited no more interest in the mind of Detective-Sergeant Coombes than did any one of the other Chinamen in the place. A careful search of the premises led to no better result, and George Martin accounted for his possession of a considerable sum of money found upon him by explaining that he had recently been paid off after a long voyage and had been lucky at cards.