THE SIAMESE CAT
Scarlett limped along the corridors, sighted the bright slit of a threshold. His knock was lost in a smothered uproar of applause. He opened the door, and went in.
Among blue, filmy layers of cigar-smoke, the strong glow of unshaded lamps lighted the faces Of a ruddy, laughing company: men lounging in unbuttoned tunics, or bare-armed in their cinglets, filled both room and verandah. All watched a jovial giant who stood swaying on a battered billiard-table, rolling his grizzled head with the gusto, real or feigned, of drink. The singer, responding to his encore, bellowed:
I've jist com' frae a weddin' 'r a funeral,
'R a chriss'enin 'r a somethin'-o'-th'-kind.…
At a corner table, apart, Owen spied the burly little man of the doorway. He held beneath a lamp the rebellious body of Chao Phya, and seemed to study the silver collar. Skirting
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