The “push-man” had been violently poked under the chin by the back of the suddenly halted ’rickshaw, and he lay groaning and doubled up several feet away. The ruffianly escort, taken by surprise, ran a little distance before they could wheel and return to the scene. Captain O’Shea had a moment in which to get his bearings and take stock of the situation. Darting for the nearest wall, he braced his back against it and stood waiting. The big swarthy rascals in the blue blouses fiercely jabbered together, gazed up and down the almost deserted street, and with no more delay drew knives from their baggy breeches and charged with heads down. O’Shea threw up his revolver for a snap-shot at the foremost of them. The hammer clicked. There was no report. He pulled the trigger again with the same result. For the third time the hammer fell with the same futile, sickening click. This was his finish. The thing was absurd, incredible. Raging, he grasped the weapon by the barrel and ran forward to swing the butt against the nearest shaven head. A long knife ripped at him and slashed his sleeve. He cracked the man’s head, but the others were at him like wolves. He dodged and tried to take to his heels, but the two ’rickshaw men blocked his path. One of the assassins had worked around behind him and was trying to trip and get him down so that they could cut him to ribbons at their leisure. The knives hemmed him in. He slipped and fell upon one knee. The ruffians laughed. Then, lo and behold! they were scampering frantically away, yelling in fear, scrambling over walls like monkeys, diving into the stables and court-yards, flying for the lower end of the street. In a twinkling Captain O’Shea was alone, magically snatched from death. White and shaking, he stood and gazed at a near-by corner of the crooked thoroughfare. Filing past it came a squad of British bluejackets in white clothes, and the sun winked brightly on the polished metal of their rifles and cutlasses. Beside the lieutenant, in front of them, strode a tall, slim-waisted man in khaki uniform whom O’Shea recognized as Inspector Burke. O’Shea’s assailants had been warned in time to scurry to cover before the British party had more than a flying glimpse of them. At a quick order shouted by the lieutenant, the sailors scattered into the yards and squalid buildings, but the fugitives had escaped by a dozen dark and devious exits to vanish in the labyrinths of the teeming, mysterious native city. Inspector Burke was pounding O’Shea on the back and exclaiming vigorously: “My word, old chap! What sort of a bally row is this? The beggars nearly did for you. Lucky we happened along, wasn’t it?” “Tis all of that,” earnestly replied the shipmaster. “And who are ye, anyhow? Is this a fairy story or a play right out of the theatre? You came on the stage about one second before the curtain rung down.”