I’d do anything, Vee. He bowed over her hand, venturing to drop a kiss on it’s leathery surface. To reach the Sha-mien—and particularly the Hotel Victoria—one crossed a narrow canal, always choked with rocking sampans over and about which swarmed yellow men and women and children in varied shades of faded blue cotton. Her teeth were chattering so hard that she had to clench them for fear of biting off her own tongue.