that I could not leave that train without detection--at any rate so long as it stood in the station. But if I waited until it started, and then jumped, I might yet outwit the enemy. This course I followed, though without the smooth success I had hoped. I waited too long before jumping, and came the very disastrous cropper which resulted in this bloody cockscomb you have been good enough to patch for me; and even at that sacrifice I did not elude my two ruffians. As I fell I had a blurred consciousness of other bodies falling from the train, and I know that they fell with more agility than I did, for they were up and upon me in an instant. I began to lay about me, but not dangerously, for my head was swimming and I had frankly given up hope of getting out of the imbroglio alive, when I realised that there was more in it than at first appeared. There were three mirky shapes on that mirky railway track--we were over a hundred yards out of the station--but one of them was fighting on my side. I plucked up heart, and gave one of the roughs such a taste of the fighting blood of the Poynings that he fell backwards across the metals, struck his head, and lay still. The other appeared to have had the worst of it with my ally, and the next thing I knew, I had grabbed the suitcase and was bundling back along the track with Lo Eng--to whose battling abilities throughout I would take this occasion to bear the very warmest testimony. You'd better ask him what happened after, for the world was waltzing around me again, and my recollection becomes valueless as evidence.' Lo Eng waited for a sign from Philipson, then delivered himself to this effect: 'I feared that Mr. Poyning would be followed back into Shanghai, so I followed him myself, all the way to the station. There it was as I feared. I do not know how those men knew he was the gentleman they were looking for, but they did know. I could see that he knew he was being observed by them too. They were so intent on Mr. Poyning that they did not see me get into the next carriage of the Wusung train. When they jumped out, I jumped also. Then we fought, as Mr. Poyning has said, and left those two men on the rails and ran back to the Nanking train. It was just moving. He was so injured that he could not get up from the ground, so I climbed into the train with the suit case and pulled him up behind me. It was very difficult to do, and by the time we were on board, the train was moving too fast for me to get off again. I had no ticket, but Mr. Poyning paid my fare to the conductor. Then I bound his head, which was bleeding, and he fell asleep until we reached here this morning. We have not been followed since.' Philipson rose from his chair and patted the servant's shaven head. 'You have done well, Lo Eng,' he said. 'You are a boy to be proud of.' The expression of dog-like fidelity on the man's face deepened. 'Master is going up country?' he said.