Tian Shan continued reading a Chinese paper which he had been allowed to retain. He was not at all interested in the companion thrust upon him. He would have preferred to be left alone. The face of the absent one is so much easier conjured in silence and solitude. It was a foregone conclusion with Tian Shan that he would never again behold Fin Fan, and with true Chinese philosophy he had begun to reject realities and accept dreams as the stuff upon which to live. Life itself was hard, bitter, and disappointing. Only dreams are joyous and smiling. One star after another had appeared until the heavens were patterned with twinkling lights. Through his prison bars Tian Shan gazed solemnly upon the firmament. Some one touched his elbow. It was his fellow-prisoner. So far the boy had not intruded himself, having curled himself up in a corner of the cell and slept soundly apparently, ever since his advent. “What do you want?” asked Tian Shan not unkindly. “To go to China with you and to be your wife,” was the softly surprising reply. “Fin Fan!” exclaimed Tian Shan. “Fin Fan!” The boy pulled off his cap. “Aye,” said he. “’Tis Fin Fan!” THE SING SONG WOMAN I Ah Oi, the Chinese actress, threw herself down on the floor of her room and, propping her chin on her hands, gazed up at the narrow strip of blue sky which could be seen through her window. She seemed to have lost her usually merry spirits. For the first time since she had left her home her thoughts were seriously with the past, and she longed with a great longing for the Chinese Sea, the boats, and the wet, blowing sands. She had been a fisherman’s daughter, and many a spring had she watched the gathering of the fishing fleet to which her father’s boat belonged. Well could she remember clapping her hands as the vessels steered out to sea for the season’s work, her father’s amongst them, looking as bright as paint could make it, and flying a neat little flag at its stern; and well could she also remember how her mother had taught her to pray to “Our Lady of Pootoo,” the goddess of sailors. One does not need to be a Christian to be religious, and Ah Oi’s parents had carefully instructed their daughter according to their light, and it was not their fault if their daughter was a despised actress in an American Chinatown. The sound of footsteps outside her door seemed to chase away Ah Oi’s melancholy mood, and when a girl crossed her threshold, she was gazing amusedly into the street below—a populous thoroughfare of Chinatown. The newcomer presented a strange appearance. She was crying so hard that red paint, white powder, and carmine lip salve were all besmeared over a naturally pretty face. Ah Oi began to laugh. “Why, Mag-gee,” said she, “how odd you look with little red rivers running over your face! What is the matter?”