"Oh, yes," she sighed contentedly, "I do some translating for them and other little things, but I do not have a worry. They provide for me.
"But this!" She pressed the cameo to her lips. "This comes from another time, the long lost, beautiful past when I was a child with my father in Venice. That is why I prize it so. Can you blame me?"
"No! No!" The little French girl's tone was deeply earnest. "I cannot. I, too, have lived long in Europe. France, my own beautiful France, was my childhood home.
"But tell me!" Her tone took on an excited note. "If you know so much of these mysterious Chinese, you can help me. Will you help me? Will you explain something?"
"A few days ago," the little French girl leaned forward eagerly, "I saw the most astonishing curtain. It burned, but was not consumed, like the burning bush."
"You saw that?" It seemed that the little lady's eyes would pop from her head. "You saw that? Where?"
"Over yonder." Jeanne waved a hand. "In that Chinese temple."
"I--did not--know it--was--here." The little lady spoke very slowly.
"Then you have seen it!" In her eagerness Jeanne gripped the arms of her chair hard. "Tell me! What is it? How is it done? Could one borrow it?"
"Borrow it? My child, you do not know what you are asking!
"But you--" She lowered her voice to a shrill whisper. "How can you have seen it?"
Quite excitedly and with many a gesture, the little French girl told of her visit to the Chinese temple on that rainy afternoon.
"Oh, my child!" The little lady was all but in tears as she finished, tears of excitement and joy. "My dear child! You cannot know what you have done, nor how fortunate you are that you escaped unharmed."
"But this is America, not China!" Jeanne's tone showed her amazement.
"True, my child. But every great American city is many cities in one. On the streets you are safe. When you pry into the secrets of other people, that is quite another matter."
"The Chinese people seem to be simple, kindly, harmless folks. So they are, on the street. But in their private dealings they are the most secretive people in the world.
"That temple you visited!" It was her turn to lean far forward. "That is more than a temple. It is a place of business, a chamber of commerce and the meeting place of the most powerful secret society the Chinese people have ever known, the Hop Sing Tong."