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court cases in which Mock Don Yuen had been called upon to testify, and a two-page document composed entirely of Chinese characters. Written by the tong leader, perhaps? In any event it must have had something to do with him, else it wouldn’t have been in his file. Quincannon removed the document and folded it into his pocket.
    The desk drawers yielded nothing of interest, and the slim accumulation of briefs, letters, and invoices in the file drawers was likewise uninformative. None contained any direct reference to either the Hip Sing or Kwong Dock tongs, or to Fong Ching under his own name or any of his known aliases.
    The only interesting thing about the late Mr. Scarlett’s office, other than the document in Mock Don Yuen’s file, was the state in which Quincannon had found it. What had the previous intruder been searching for? And whatever it was, had he left with what he’d come after?
    *   *   *
    The Scarletts’ home address, in the polyglot neighborhood known as Cow Hollow, turned out to be a three-story wood-and-brick apartment building with an ornate façade. They had lived there only a short while, Andrea Scarlett had said, having moved from “a less comfortable” residence at her insistence once the Hip Sing arrangement had been made.
    The windows facing the street in their third-floor apartment were all dark. But this proved not to be because Mrs. Scarlett had retired for the night. Quincannon knocked several times, loud enough to rouse even the heaviest sleeper. Not at home at this hour?
    The second of his skeleton keys opened the locked door. A hasty search revealed no sign of her. Each of the four large rooms was empty and showed no signs of disturbance.
    The apartment was chilly, long unheated either by gas or coal fire in the living room fireplace. The sheets on the carelessly made four-poster bed were likewise cold. Nothing in the kitchen indicated that a meal had been prepared or eaten recently. If Andrea Scarlett had been home since her visit to the agency offices late that afternoon, it had been only briefly.
    Quincannon resisted the urge to conduct a more thorough search, stepped out, and relocked the door. Well past midnight now. Where was his client at this hour? Hiding out somewhere, unable to bear remaining alone in her home? Possibly. She had been most concerned about her husband during the morning’s interview, but the fact that she had seen someone lurking about the premises the night before had made her afraid for herself as well.
    Her absence was worrisome, in any event. Very.
    *   *   *
    In his rooms on Leavenworth, Quincannon lay sleepless and brooding for much of what remained of the night. Bing Ah Kee’s missing corpse, Scarlett’s murder and the attempt on his own life, the search of the lawyer’s offices, Little Pete, the Kwong Dock, the Hip Sing, the potential actions of Price and Gentry and the Chinatown flying squad. Andrea Scarlett, suddenly a widow and certain to be an understandably upset client. And Sabina and her new swain.
    It was the Sabina question that plagued him most into the wee hours. The others would be resolved, one way or another, in relatively short order. But Sabina’s involvement with this Montgomery gent was a mystery—one he’d only just learned about by accident, and that she steadfastly refused to discuss—that could have long-reaching implications and might not be solvable at all, depending on the seriousness of her interest in Montgomery and his in her. If it was merely an interlude, an innocent infatuation, then there was no cause for concern. Ah, but if it was serious to the point of intimacy, perhaps even engagement and marriage …
    Thunder and blazes! Quincannon’s heart was hard enough when it came to the female sex, but not indestructible. His partner, the object of his unrequited desire, was the one woman who could break