indifferent opening.

"We were all quite surprised when Mr. Dunsack called yesterday," she
said. "He isn't in the least a friend of the family. Grandfather went to
sea with his father, but even they didn't speak for years in Salem. The
Dunsacks are a little common."

"I know," Taou Yuen replied. "Mr. Dunsack--a long time in Canton, at the
American agents. China is bad for men like him. Black spirits get in them
and the ten sins."

"He stared at you in the rudest way."

"He never saw a Manchu lady before. In China the dog would not have
passed by the first gate. Here it is nothing to be a Manchu or an
honorable wife; it is all like the tea houses and rice villages. Men walk
up to you with bold eyes. I tell Gerrit and he laughs. I stay in the room
and he brings me shamefully down. This Mr. Dunsack comes and the wise old
man talks to him like a son. He touches your mother's hand. He sees the
young girls like white candles."

"We wouldn't let him really bother us," Sidsall explained; "probably if
he comes again we'll all be out."

Taou Yuen made a comment in Chinese. "A bad thought is a secret knife,"
she continued; "it is more dangerous than the anger of the Emperor, a
sickness that kills with the stink of bodies already dead."

This seemed rather absurd to Sidsall. She considered once more the
introduction of the subject of her new concern; but, in spite of Taou