“You would not take money for helping me when I was hurt,” she said, “and I presume you will refuse to take it for what you are doing now. But I should like you to know that Mr. Barrett and I will always, always be your friends. If”--she looked across at him, no more a part of his rude surroundings, than was she--“if ever there comes a time when we could be of use to you, you have only to tell us. Please remember that.” “I will remember.” “I cannot help but feel,” she went on, and with a sincere desire to prove her gratitude, rather than to pry out any secret of his, “that you do not belong here--that you are in more trouble than I am. For what can a man of your rank have to do in a little town like this!” He was not displeased with her. “The ancient sage,” he said slowly, “mounted himself upon a black ox and disappeared into the western wilderness of Thibet. Doubtless others, too, seek seclusion for much thinking.” “But you are not the hermit kind,” she declared boldly. “You belong to those who stay and fight. Yet here you are, separated from your people and your people’s graves--alone and sorrowful.” “As for my living people, they are best without me; as for my people dead, I neither worship their dust nor propitiate devils. The wise one said: ‘Why talk forever on of men who are long gone?’” “Yet----” she persisted. He left the stove and came near her. “You are a woman, but you know much. You are right. My heart is heavy for a thing I cannot do--for the shattered dreams of the men of Hukwang.” He beat his palms together noiselessly, and moved to and fro on soft sandals. “Those dreams were of a young China that was to take the place of the old--but that died unborn.” She followed his words with growing interest. “I have heard of those dreams,” she answered; “they were called ‘reform.’” “Yes. And now all the dreamers are gone. They had voyaged to glean at Harvard, Yale, Cornell, and in the halls of Oxford. There were ‘five loyal and six learned,’ and they shed their blood at the Chen Chih Gate. One there was who died the death that is meted a slave at the court of the Son of Heaven. And one there was”--his face shrank up, as if swiftly aging; his eyes became dark, upturning slits; as one who fears pursuit he cast a look behind him--“and one there was who escaped beyond the blood-bathed walls of the Hidden City and gained the Sumatra Coast. Then, leaving Perak, in the Straits Settlements, he finally set foot upon a shore where men, without terror, may reach toward higher things.” “And was he followed?” she whispered, comprehending. “He fled quietly, quietly. For long are the claws of the she-panther that is crouched on the throne of the Mings.” Both fell silent. The Chinese went back to the stove, where the fire was dying. The white woman, wide awake, and lost in the myriad of scenes his tale had conjured, sat by the table, for once almost forgetful of her charge.