He was
known locally as the Mandarin Quong."
"Did you learn anything respecting how he had come by his injury,
Doctor?"
Matheson smiled in his quiet fashion, and selected a fresh cigar
with great deliberation. Then:
"I suppose it is scarcely a case of betraying a professional
secret," he said, "but during the time that my patient was
recovering from the effects of the anaesthetic he unconsciously
gave me several clues to the nature of the episode. Putting two
and two together I gathered that someone, although the name of
this person never once passed the lips of the mandarin, had
abducted his favourite wife."
"Good heavens! truly amazing," I exclaimed.
"Is it not? How small a place the world is. My old mandarin had
traced the abductor and presumably the girl to some house which I
gathered to be in the neighbourhood of Katong. In an attempt to
force an entrance--doubtless with the amiable purpose of slaying
them both--he had been detected by the prime object of his
hatred. In hurriedly descending from a window he had been
attacked by some weapon, possibly a sword, and had only made good
his escape in the condition in which I found him. How far he had
proceeded I cannot say, but I should imagine that the house to
which he had been was no great distance from the spot where I
found him.
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