Of gray mist.
O Rose,
Perhaps in your fragile
Loveliness
You are but a ghost,
The ghost of a slim
Young girl
Whose passing
Multiplied the sorrows
Of the world."
Now it so happened that in those days there lived in old Canton a girl of such peerless beauty that people gazed upon her face in speechless wonder. So beautiful she was her father who was a mighty Mandarin directed her to hide her face from the insolent gaze of passers-by. Her name was Lotus Blossom. Her father, the Mandarin, like the father of Hung Long Tom, was a collector of jades and ambers. He was a frequent visitor at the house near the Pearl River and while the two gem connoisseurs sipped tea and talked in hushed voices about shimmering jewels, Lotus Blossom
and Hung Long Tom walked hand in
