I was just about to turn to the right into a narrow and nameless alley, lying at right angles to the Thames, when I pulled up sharply, clenching my fists and listening.

A confused and continuous sound, not unlike that which might be occasioned by several large and savage hounds at close grips, was proceeding out of the darkness ahead of me; a worrying, growling, and scuffling which presently I identified as human, although in fact it was animal enough.  A moment I hesitated, then, distinguishing among the sounds of conflict an unmistakable, though subdued, cry for help, I leaped forward and found myself in the midst of the melee.  This was taking place in the lee of a high, dilapidated brick wall.  A lamp in a sort of iron bracket spluttered dimly above on the right, but the scene of the conflict lay in densest shadow, so that the figures were indistinguishable.

“Help!   By Gawd!  they’re strangling me------”

From almost at my feet the cry arose and was drowned in Chinese chattering.  But guided by it I now managed to make out that the struggle in progress waged between a burly English sailorman and two lithe Chinese.  The yellow men seemed to have gained the advantage and my course was clear.

A straight right on the jaw of the Chinaman who was engaged in endeavouring to throttle the victim laid him prone in the dirty roadway.  His companion, who was holding the wrist of the recumbent man, sprang upright as though propelled by a spring.  I struck out at him savagely.  He uttered a shrill scream not unlike that of a stricken hare, and fled so rapidly that he seemed to melt in the mist.

“Gawd bless you, mate!” came chokingly from the ground—­and the rescued man, extricating himself from beneath the body of his stunned assailant, rose unsteadily to his feet and lurched toward me.

As I had surmised, he was a sailor, wearing a rough, blue-serge jacket and having his greasy trousers thrust into heavy seaboots—­by which I judged that he was but newly come ashore.  He stooped and picked up his cap.  It was covered in mud, as were the rest of his garments, but he brushed it with his sleeve as though it had been but slightly soiled and clapped it on his head.

He grasped my hand in a grip of iron, peering into my face, and his breath was eloquent.

“I’d had one or two, mate,” he confided huskily (the confession was unnecessary).  “It was them two in the Blue Anchor as did it; if I ’adn’t ’ad them last two, I could ’ave broke up them Chinks with one ’and tied behind me.”

“That’s all right,” I said hastily, “but what are we going to do about this Chink here?” I added, endeavouring at the same time to extricate my hand from the vise-like grip in which he persistently held it.  “He hit the tiles pretty heavy when he went down.”

As if to settle my doubts, the recumbent figure suddenly arose and without a word fled into the darkness and was gone like a phantom.  My new friend made no attempt to follow, but: