They packed the boxes together, wrapped the large and heavy cubes in the squares of cloth and lashed them to hang from the bamboo poles. Four of them, then, Mr. Doane, Rocky himself and the servants, each balanced a pole over his shoulders and lifted the bulky cubes. The old man, who surely, now, was the viceroy, carried a European hand-bag. There were other parcels.... They made their way along a nearly dark corridor and out into the moonlight. Here, in a porch, stood four silent figures--Dixie Carmichael he distinguished first; then Hui Fei, wearing a short coat and women's trousers and a loose cloak. Her hair was parted and lay smoothly on her pretty head, glistening in the moonlight.... And the little princess was there, clinging to the hand of her sister and rubbing her eyes. They moved silently on, all together, following a path that wound among shrubbery, over an arching bridge to a gate. Rocky could dimly see the timbers studded with spikes and the long hinges of bronze. The servant, with a great key, unlocked the gate, which closed softly behind them. The pole weighed heavily on Rocky's unaccustomed shoulder. There was a trick of timing the step to the swing of the bales, that, stumbling a little, he caught. He was to remember this--the little file of men and women gathered from the two ends of the earth and walking without a spoken sound down through a twisting, sunken Chinese road to the Yangtze. And sensing the gathering drama of his own life, brooding over it with slowly increasing nervous intensity, he found himself coming awake. If this kept on he would soon be excitedly beyond sleep. But it didn't matter. They were saving Hui Fei. Not a word of explanation had been offered; but it was coming clear. As for the rest of it, he asked himself how it could matter. The presence of Miss Carmichael, a dangerous girl, an adventuress--he was thinking quite youthfully about her--who might easily be capable of anything, who could in a moment destroy the hope that was the only foundation, thus far, of his new life, and perhaps would choose to destroy it--even this, he tried to tell himself, couldn't possibly matter. Over and over, stumbling and shuffling along, he told himself that; almost convinced himself that he believed it.