THE SIAMESE CAT
Yet Owen's thoughts tugged forward. If Laura should be safe, then their luck held. If not—but he clenched his fists against that uncertainty.
Beside the gate into which their coolies veered, stood a carriage. Through the window, as they spun past, Owen saw the white figure of a single occupant. Next moment he had leapt from the rickshaw and run forward; for towards them, down the carriageway, his eyes green fire against their lanterns, raced Chao Phya, back arched, tail hoisted, like a galloping monkey. The beast wavered, stopped, crouched, dodged, and with long, stealing steps began to slink aside to the croton shadows. Owen caught him up, and sprinting, forged alongside Aunt Julia's rickshaw.
In the road ahead, at the verge of the lantern glow, a bulky white shape struggled to rise from the gravel. Above it a smaller man, with
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