He was glad when morning came, and Mr. Helping-to-decide, awaking from his heavy sleep, had sufficiently regained his senses to discuss ways and means. It soon appeared that the trusty Korean servant who was to have assisted Bob towards the Japanese lines was absent, having gone to keep a watch on the Manchu brigands. Mr. Helping-to-decide accordingly proposed that Bob should remain with him until the man returned, and impressed upon him the advisability of keeping within doors in order not to attract attention. Bob was by no means pleased at the prospect of spending even one day within these close walls, but seeing no help for it he submitted with a good grace. It was a dreary time. During the morning he was left to himself, and to while away the hours he found nothing better to do than to look out, through a slit in one of the tissued lattices, at what went on in the street. But after the mid-day meal, Mr. Helping-to-decide proposed a game of "go", which Bob knew from previous experience might be spun out to any length. They were in the midst of the game, when there was a great shouting and hurry-scurry in the street; then the clatter of galloping horses. Mr. Helping-to-decide sprang up in agitation, and Bob, going to his slit, saw a troop of Cossacks headed by a tall Manchu galloping up the street, followed by a band of riders, whom from their features and habiliments he concluded to be Manchu bandits. Mr. Helping-to-decide stood in quivering helplessness. The horsemen reined up before his house; some of them went round it in both directions, and the terrified owner turned his white face to Bob and groaned. When the house was surrounded, the commander of the Cossacks shouted something which neither Bob nor the Korean understood. But the cry was immediately repeated in the vernacular by the tall Manchu; he had dismounted and was approaching the house with the apparent intention of forcing an entrance through the sliding lattice. "What does he say?" asked Bob. "He says, hon’ble sir, ’Bring out the spy’," faltered Mr. Helping-to-decide. "This is indeed a critical moment. I am at a loss—flabbergasted. I am driven to conclusion it is all u.p." The Manchu had now come to the wall of the house, and bellowed what was evidently a threatening message. "’If the spy is not brought out instanter,’" translated Mr. Helping-to-decide, "’he will conflagrate this residence and adjacent village, with incidental murder of inhabitants.’" Mr. Helping-to-decide wrung his hands in impotent despair. "I shall give myself up," said Bob.