Detective and mystery stories; Drug traffic -- Fiction
Sin Sin Wa made no reply. To his indoor attire he had added a
pea-jacket and a bowler hat; and the oddly assorted trio set off
westward, following the bank of the Thames in the direction of
Limehouse Basin. The narrow, ill-lighted streets were quite deserted,
but from the river and the riverside arose that ceaseless jangle of
industry which belongs to the great port of London. On the Surrey shore
whistles shrieked, and endless moving chains sent up their monstrous
clangor into the night. Human voices sometimes rose above the din of
machinery.
In silence the three pursued their way, crossing inlets and circling
around basins dimly divined, turning to the right into a lane flanked
by high, eyeless walls, and again to the left, finally to emerge nearly
opposite a dilapidated gateway giving access to a small wharf, on the
rickety gates bills were posted announcing, “This Wharf to Let.” The
annexed building appeared to be a mere shell. To the right again they
turned, and once more to the left, halting before a two-story brick
house which had apparently been converted into a barber’s shop. In one
of the grimy windows were some loose packets of cigarettes, a
soapmaker’s advertisement, and a card:
SAM TÛK
BARBER
Opening the door with a key which he carried, the boy admitted Sir
Lucien and Sin Sin Wa to the dimly-lighted interior of a room the
pretensions of which to be regarded as a shaving saloon were supported
by the presence of two chairs, a filthy towel, and a broken mug. Sin
Sin Wa shuffled across to another door, and, followed by Sir Lucien,
descended a stone stair to a little cellar apparently intended for
storing coal. A tin lamp stood upon the bottom step.
Removing the lamp from the step, Sin Sin Wa set it on the cellar floor,
which was black with coal dust, then closed and bolted the door. A heap
of nondescript litter lay piled in a corner of the cellar. This Sin Sin
Wa disturbed sufficiently to reveal a movable slab in the roughly paved
floor. It was so ingeniously concealed by coal dust that one who had
sought it unaided must have experienced great difficulty in detecting
it. Furthermore, it could only be raised in the following manner:
A piece of strong iron wire, which lay among the other litter, was
inserted in a narrow slot, apparently a crack in the stone. About an
inch of the end of the wire being bent outward to form a right angle,
when the seemingly useless piece of scrap-iron had been thrust through
the slab and turned, it formed a handle by means of which the trap
could be raised.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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