with it toward a rear shed.

Garland went to the cabin. The room which he entered opened into the
restaurant and was the Chinaman's den. Its only furniture was a bunk with
a coil of dirty blankets, a chair and table, on which stood an adding
machine, the balls running on wires. Near it was the ink well and bamboo
pen and small squares of paper covered with Chinese characters. One door
led into the restaurant and another into the kitchen. In this room, lit
by a wall lamp, its window giving on a tangled growth of shrubs, sat
Knapp sprawled before the stove.

Their greetings were brief, and drawing up to the table they began the
plans for the next night's work. Through the window the air came cool and
moist, fighting with the odors of cooking and the rank, stifling Chinese
smell. On the silence without rose the horses' soft whinnyings to one
another and then the Chinaman's returning passage through the grass and
the rasp of the closing door. He put a bottle and glasses before the men,
slipped speechless into the restaurant, and returned, an animated shadow,
with the lamp in his hand. This he set on the table in his own room, and
sitting before it, began moving the balls in the adding machine. Upon the
low voices in the kitchen, the dry click of the shifted balls broke in
sharp staccato, followed by pauses when, with a hand as delicate as a
woman's, he traced the Chinese characters on the paper.

It was he who heard first. His hand, raised to move a line of the balls,
hung suspended, his eyes riveted in an agate-bright stare on the wall
opposite. He half rose; his meager body stiffened as if the muscles had
suddenly become steel; his face turned in wild question to the room
beyond. He was up and had hissed a terrified, "Look out, boss, someone
come!" when a rending blow fell on the door.