1954
While visiting Saigon, Smith is approached by two rival factions who both want him to travel to Northern Indonesia and steal a Gutenberg Bible which had been left behind by its owner when the Communists took over the area. Smith must deal with precarious border crossings and an enemy officer who has currently is in possession of the book.
1954
Smith is in possession of an ornamental teapot that can be used as a weapon. He soon finds himself trying to save a young woman from a forced marriage.
1954
Another story of lost love. A blind man on a Hong Kong street hears a woman singing inside one of the clubs there. He knows she is his old love Renee but he can't find his way to her. He hires Smith, whom we first see on the Hong Kong-Macao ferry, impersonating a loud, rich tourist--bait for a badger gamer who once partnered with Renee. The man's information leads him to Renee, who refuses to meet her old love again because she is ashamed of the way she's lived since they were separated. The man will not give up. But Renee has gone into hiding. Smith believes she will try to leave Macao on the Kowloon ferry and decides not to let the boat out of his sight. The best place observation post is onboard. A passenger who loses his passport can watch the ferry constantly because neither Macao nor Hong Kong will let him disembark...
1954
In his own oblique way, Smith is helping a woman who received a message in a bottle. He arranges for a man named Smith to be shanghaied on the boat she has chartered to track down the author of the message. His idea is to escort the woman secretly because her crew is what's known as motley, ethically. The boat reaches an island where an exiled general has gone nutty and rules a few bewildered natives and castaways. Smith's client said she was looking for her lost husband, but she knows the general too. And she notes with interest that the general emptied his country's treasury on his way out. She thinks the island emperor needs a consort. Some think the island needs a regime change. Smith thinks everyone needs a jailbreak. In the end, Smith philosophizes that few searchers have the good fortune to learn that there's no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow-and adds that, of course, every rainbow has two ends.
1954
A retired British officer hires China Smith to find the grave of his son who died a hero's death on Sumatra during World War II. Finding no one to guide him into the jungle area he needs to search, Smith creates a fake treasure map as a ruse to create interest in his search. Unfortunately, the guides he attracts are more interested in stealing his map than in searching the jungle for the missing war hero.
Thu, Apr 1, 1954
In Macao, a pawnbroker finds a hunched-over woman draped in black rifling a display case full of costume jewelry. She kills him. The nervous Mr. Qoit of Great Eastern Underwriters hires Smith on another case. He wants Smith to recover the Manchu Necklace, thirty emeralds set in gold, stolen from the touring actress Kate Orleans. Smith finds that Kate is conducting her own search. He also finds that much of the Macao underworld believes he masterminded the theft. He thinks he might find the real thief by offering to buy the necklace. Kate's disappointed lover Franz believes the rumor and visits Smith with a gun--he ruined himself to buy the necklace for Kate. Qoit believes the rumor too and swears out a warrant for Smith. Meanwhile, the only trace of the necklace is the loose emerald Smith found mixed with the costume jewelry in the pawnbroker's shop.
1954
China Smith finds his life threatened by a gang leader and to continue living Smith must help the criminal locate a stash of gold.
Sun, May 23, 1954
Countess Von Idall waits in a teahouse one night for a man who is knifed in a nearby alley. Not long after, she sends Smith to burglarize a refugee camp and find out what happened to one of its detainees. Inside, Smith gets directions from a boy who doesn't speak and finds his way to the records office. When the commander of the camp surprises him, Smith is unimpressed. He knows the captain released a certain inmate who has since disappeared, and there was kumshaw (bribe money) in the mix. The commander admits that he released the detainee to a prominent local businessman named Bergdahl. This Bergdahl is planning to emigrate and Steffi Von Idall wants to stop him because he owes her family a fortune. The missing man knew Bergdahl in earlier days, under his real name. With an affidavit from the man, Steffi could have forced Bergdahl to pay up if he wanted to enter the U.S. using his new false identity. Bergdahl solved his problem with murder. But the little refugee boy was a silent witness, and Smith has won games with smaller hole cards.
1954
A pilot is hired to drop a payroll for a planter in the remote jungle. When the cash goes missing the pilot is accused of theft. Smith is hired to investigate but the presence of a beautiful woman complicates things.
1954
A charter pilot is waylaid in an alley and told his wife will die if he fails to obey orders. The following day he boards an airplane that is to carry a wheelchair-bound dignitary and his nurse to Taiwan. Also on board are a wealthy businessman and his secretary. But Smith got there first. In fact, posing as the pilot, he managed to search all the passengers. Someone anonymously hired him to prevent trouble on the plane. His first assignment is to find out what his assignment is--what he's supposed to guard against. That question is answered when the pilot heads for Red China. Smith's next assignment, then, is to get the plane to Taiwan. He'd also like to know who his client is.
1954
A young Chinese woman has asked China Smith to find a mute, the only person alive who knows the location of a fortune in gold.
1954
A frightened rumor spreads among "the coolies and rickshaw boys" of Hong Kong: the dragon walks. A remittance girl named Marnee hires Smith to protect her frightened fiance, Justin Kobol. Kobol leaves his home to hide with her on Red Dragon Hill, an artists' colony but at the foot of the hill sits a cryptic legless storyteller who tells Smith that "the young man's shadow arrived before him, asking many questions." A man called Mr. Ronald has come back to Hong Kong after an absence of twelve years and Kobol's father has been murdered. A crime and a treasure from twelve years ago have wakened the dragon.
1954
Chinese thugs break into the Macao warehouse of the Concord Sugar Company, knock the night watchman unconscious--and leave. The company wants to know why burglars don't steal. Carol, who owns the company in partnership with her uncle Edgar, hires Smith. Her uncle has been coming and going furtively. She wants to know if he is being blackmailed. Smith has a novel way of finding out. He throws knives at Edgar. He reasons that a blackmailer will try to keep his victim alive and therefore reveal himself. And Smith is paid to let Edgar live. The money comes from a reporter for the Macao Weekly Mail, "one of those professionally anti-American papers with a foreign sponsor." Soon Smith has three puzzles to solve: What does lovely Gretchen, a blackjack dealer, have to do with a Communist newspaper? Why is the newspaper ready with a headline story about something that hasn't happened yet? What is Edgar hiding from his niece?
1954
While visiting Hong Kong, China Smith is hired by a woman to secretly serve as a bodyguard for her husband, a retired British naval officer. A crooked astrologer has warned her that her husband will die within the week and he has begun to receive threatening letters. When Commander Tilson is found dead in his aquarium, Smith is accused of drowning the old man
1954
Babykins, the parrot from Ton King, is the celebrated partner of dancer Ming Toy. He pulls the strings that cause parts of her costume to fall away. Her troupe arrives in Singapore from Malacca, a town where jewels are missing. Ming Toy's manager Tony hires Smith to recover Babykins, irreplaceable and stolen. But bird in hand, Smith finds Ming Toy performing with an identical parrot. And her dressing room contains a photograph of the man who supposedly stole Babykins. Smith switches birds "as an experiment" and watches the human beings with curiosity. Before long there is death real and faked in a walk-in safe, gunfire and the unsafe operation of heavy equipment, a parrot's vengeance, and a honeymoon present for Ming Toy.
1954
The Mokuhana has been impounded in Saigon for smuggling. The owner, Countess Van Idall, brings Smith from Hong Kong to apply his deviousness to getting the vessel back. She also hires a lawyer named Nordam to bail out the crew because she needs the captain, Babcock, to testify in her favor. But Smith finds out that Nordam is also Delaht of Colonial Steamship Lines. He has schemed to acquire the Mokuhana at half its market value. Smith finds proof of this in the ship's log, but it will do no good in Delaht's home court. The solution is a bit of piracy. It impresses the Countess, who wants to reward him with a permanent berth as a captain.
1954
Smith is sentimental about lost loves. So when Marine Pvt. Kip Adamson hires him to find a woman he lost in the evacuation of Tsin Tao five years ago, Smith wheedles information out of an obstinate Irish nun, Sister Brigid, and his own cynical sometime companion, Countess Steffi Von Idall. He also helps the private evade Mannion of the shore patrol. But mysteries start to pile up--the woman may be dead and Smith's client may know it. There comes a devious nun to the rescue.
1954
China Smith is hired to recover six stolen gold shipments and discover who is working on the inside to aid the thieves.