He would have continued retailing reminiscences of his late employer, but Tarling cut him short, and with a curt good night withdrew. Milburgh accompanied him to the front gate and locked the door upon the three men before he went back to his sitting-room smiling quietly to himself. "I am certain that the man was Milburgh," said Tarling. "I am as certain as that I am standing here." "Have you any idea why he should want to out you?" asked Whiteside. "None in the world," replied Tarling. "Evidently my assailant was a man who had watched my movements and had probably followed the girl and myself to the hotel in a cab. When I disappeared inside he dismissed his own and then took the course of dismissing my cab, which he could easily do by paying the man his fare and sending him off. A cabman would accept that dismissal without suspicion. He then waited for me in the fog and followed me until he got me into a quiet part of the road, where he first attempted to sandbag and then to shoot me." "But why?" asked Whiteside again. "Suppose Milburgh knew something about this murder--which is very doubtful--what benefit would it be to him to have you put out of the way?" "If I could answer that question," replied Tarling grimly, "I could tell you who killed Thornton Lyne." CHAPTER XV THE OWNER OF THE PISTOL All trace of the fog of the night before had disappeared when Tarling looked out from his bedroom window later that morning. The streets were flooded with yellow sunshine, and there was a tang in the air which brought the colour to the cheek and light to the eye of the patient Londoner. Tarling stretched his arms and yawned in the sheer luxury of living, before he took down his silk dressing-gown and went in to the breakfast which Ling Chu had laid for him. The blue-bloused Chinaman who stood behind his master's chair, poured out the tea and laid a newspaper on one side of the plate and letters on the other. Tarling ate his breakfast in silence and pushed away the plate. "Ling Chu," he said in the vernacular of Lower China, "I shall lose my name as the Man Hunter, for this case puzzles me beyond any other." "Master," said the Chinaman in the same language, "there is a time in all cases, when the hunter feels that he must stop and weep. I myself had this feeling when I hunted down Wu Fung, the strangler of Hankow. Yet," he added philosophically, "one day I found him and he is sleeping on the Terrace of Night." He employed the beautiful Chinese simile for death. "Yesterday I found the little-young-woman," said Tarling after a pause. In this quaint way did he refer to Odette Rider. "You may find the little-young-woman and yet not find the killer," said Ling Chu, standing by the side of the table, his hands respectfully hidden under his sleeves. "For the little-young-woman did not kill the white-faced man." "How do you know?" asked Tarling; and the Chinaman shook his head.