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many time you come before?”
    “Seven.”
    The young man nodded. “Give me the message.”
    From one pocket inside his checked jacket the caller produced an envelope and passed it across the counter. It was acknowledged by another nod, dropped on a ledge, and the big messenger went out. The young Chinaman went on writing.
    A minute or so later, a point of light glowed below the counter, where it would have remained invisible to a customer had one been in the shop.
    The envelope was placed in a tiny cupboard and a stud was pressed. The light under the counter vanished, and the immobile shopman went on writing. He wrote with a brush, using India ink, in the beautiful, difficult idiograms of classic Chinese.
    Upstairs, in a room the walls of which were decorated with panels of painted silk, old Huan Tsung sat on a divan. He resembled the traditional portrait of Confucius. From a cupboard at his elbow corresponding to that in the shop below, he took out the message, read it and dropped message and envelope into a brazier of burning charcoal.
    He replaced the mouthpiece of a long-stemmed pipe between his wrinkled lips.
    On a low-set red lacquer stool beside the divan was a crystal globe, similar in appearance to that upon the long, narrow table in the study adjoining Professor Hoffmeyer’s office.
    Nothing occurred for some time. Huan Tsung smoked contentedly, reflection from the brazier lending a demoniac quality to his benign features.
    Then the crystal globe came to life, like a minor moon emerging from a cloud. Within it materialized a gaunt, wonderful face, the brow of a philosopher, green, fanatical eyes in which slumbered the fires of an imperious will.
    Below, in the shop, but inaudible in the silk-walled room above, a phone buzzed. The patient writer laid his brush aside, took up the instrument, and listened. He replaced it, scribbled a few pencilled lines, put the paper in the cupboard, and pressed the button.
    Huan Tsung, with a movement of his hand, removed the message. He glanced at it—and dropped the sheet into the brazier. The face in the globe had fully materialized. Compelling eyes looked into his own. Huan Tsung spoke.
    “You called me, Doctor?”
    “No doubt you have later reports.”
    “The last one, Excellency, just to hand, is timed 7.26 p.m. Nayland Smith left Centre Street at seven twenty-three. Our agent, following, carried out the operation successfully.”
    “Successfully!” A note of anger became audible in the sibilant tones. “I may misunderstand you. What method was used?”
    “B.W. 63, of which I have a little left, and the feathered darts. I instructed Sha Mu, who is expert, and he succeeded at the second attempt. He passed the police car undetected and retired in safety. Nayland Smith was taken, without being removed from the car, to the Rockefeller Institute.”
    Huan Tsung’s eyes were closed. His features wore a mask of complacency. There was a brief silence.
    “Open your eyes!” Huan Tsung did so, and shrank. “They think Professor Lowe may save him. They are wrong. Your action was ill considered. Await instructions to establish contact.”
    “Excellency’s order noted.”
    “Summarize any other reports.”
    “There are few of importance. The Emir Omar Khan died in Teheran this morning.”
    “That is well. Nayland Smith’s visit to Teheran was wasted. Instruct Teheran.”
    “Excellency’s order noted. There is no later report from Moscow and none from London.”
    Silence fell. The green eyes in the crystal mirror grew clouded, filmed over in an almost pathological way. The cloud passed. They blazed again like emeralds.
    “You have destroyed that which might have been of use to us. Furthermore, you have aroused a nest of wasps. Our task was hard enough. You make it harder. A disappearance—yes. I had planned one. But this clumsy assassination—”
    “I thought I had done well.”
    “A legitimate thought is the child of wisdom and experience. Thoughts, like children,