mysterious and superior about the whole Chinese race, that there was
some Chinese organization known as the Six Companions, which, so far as
I could make out from him, was ruling very nearly (and secretly, of
course) the entire habitable globe. For one thing it had some governing
connection with great constructive ventures of one kind and another in
all parts of the world, supplying, as he said, thousands of Chinese
laborers to any one who desired them, anywhere, and although they were
employed by others, ruling them with a rod of iron, cutting their
throats when they failed to perform their bounden duties and burying
them head down in a basket of rice, then transferring their remains
quietly to China in coffins made in China and brought for that purpose
to the country in which they were. The Chinese who had worked for the
builders of the Union Pacific had been supplied by this company, as I
understood from Dick. In regard to all this Peter used to analyze and
dispose of Dick's self-generated romance with the greatest gusto,
laughing the while and yet pretending to accept it all.

But there was one phase of all this which interested Peter immensely.
Were there on sale in St. Louis any bits of jade, silks, needlework,
porcelains, basketry or figurines of true Chinese origin? He was far
more interested in this than in the social and economic sides of the
lives of the Chinese, and was constantly urging Dick to take him here,
there and everywhere in order that he might see for himself what of
these amazing wonders were locally extant, leading Dick in the process a
merry chase and a dog's life. Dick was compelled to persuade nearly all
of his boasted friends to produce all they had to show. Once, I recall,
a collection of rare Chinese porcelains being shown at the local museum
of art, there was nothing for it but that Dick must get one or more of
his Oriental friends to interpret this, that and the other symbol in
connection with this, that and the other vase--things which put him to