Kitabı oku: «In Red and Gold», sayfa 8

“Shall I make a definite offer – for the paintings and the jewels?”

“No.” Kane considered. “Let him set a price. Then we will make our offer.”

“It is safe to say, Mr. Kane” – Doane was remembering experiences of men in church and educational work who had had to approach the great capitalists for gifts of money – “that you could sell half the paintings for what you might pay for the two collections at this time. That would enable you to give the other half, as a collection bearing your own name, to one of the art museums at home, at no cost to yourself.”

Kane smoked thoughtfully. “I presume, Mr. Doane,” he said, “that the predicament you spoke of can not interfere in any way with the safe delivery of the collections.”

Doane considered. How much did this man know? That Japanese, behind his mask of a smile, would be deep, of course. With a sudden sinking of the heart, Doane perceived that Kane might easily know the whole story. But even if he did he would admit nothing. He trusted no one; that was his calm cynical strength. He would trade to the last… Another swift, if random, perception of this tense moment was that much of the common talk regarding the “inscrutable” East was utter nonsense. Read in the light of history and habit the Oriental mind was anything but deeply mysterious; it was, indeed, very nearly an open book. Whereas the Western mind, with its miraculous religion, its sentimentality and materialism and (at the same time) its cynically unscrupulous financial power, could be baffling indeed.

Desperate now, seeing no other way through, Doane spoke out from his tortured heart. “Mr. Kane, the simple fact is that his excellency has been condemned to death, and his daughter to a fate that will almost certainly end in death for her as well. They are seizing his property…”

“Who are they?”

“The Imperial Government – the empress dowager and her crew. They are sending the chief eunuch, Chang Yuan-fu, to take his paintings and jewels, and his daughter, to Peking. Frankly, it may be necessary to hurry matters – smuggle the things out. But the fan paintings can be packed in parcels, the scrolls rolled small on their ivory sticks, the jewels gathered in a few boxes. Once in white hands they would be safe. I think. I believe I can arrange it. The porcelains and carvings you would probably have to leave behind.”

His voice died out. Dawley Kane was coolly appraising him. Their minds were not meeting.

“As you are stating it now, it is a different situation altogether,” said Kane, the ring of tempered metal in his voice. “Obviously the man to deal with is the eunuch, What’s-his-name.”

“But – really – ”

“He would have the collections complete including the porcelains and the carvings. I should want them all. He would be ignorant and corrupt, of course; we could buy him for a song. And there would be no risk. Yes, let him get possession. Then if you would like to approach him for me I will be glad to see that you make something for yourself.”

Doane drew in his breath. Slowly he said: “But that, Mr. Kane, seems a good deal like taking a profit out of the viceroy’s misfortune.”

But he caught himself. To Kane, who had made enormous profits out of wrecked railways, who had cornered stocks and produce and mercilessly squeezed the short sellers, this would be sentimentality.

Doane heard himself saying: “I’m sorry. I could hardly undertake it, Mr. Kane.” And walked away. His failure was complete. Worse, if there had been any gaps in the information supplied by the ubiquitous little Kato, they were filled now. The finely balanced machine that served so smoothly as a brain in the head of the great American, would be working on and on. Through the Japanese he could easily enough reach Chang Yuan-fu from Hankow after the tragedy that now hovered so close over the old viceroy and all that was his. He could make what he and his suave kind would doubtless regard – the slang word came grimly – as a killing.

The white men had made a small fire of dry rushes and thwarts from the boats. There sat Hui Fei, the sleeping little princess in her arms; and, beside her, Rocky Kane. Near by, where the men had spread coats on the ground, Miss Means and Miss Andrews slept side by side.

Doane walking toward the group – stopping, moving away only to turn irresolutely back – saw young Kane reach over and take the child into his own arms, and saw Hui Fei smile at him. He strode away then, struggling to believe that she could do that. But she had… After all, she knew only that he had acted outrageously toward her, had then apologized publicly, boyishly, and now had brought her little sister ashore, himself falling exhausted on the bank. With those few facts, out of her impulsively young judgment she could strike a balance in his favor. Even at his worst he had bluntly admired her; for that she might, in the end, forgive him. And his youth would call to her.

Deane, indeed, forced himself to consider the boy dispassionately. The wild oats of any spoiled youth with too much money at his disposal, if brought together, and closely scrutinized, would make an appalling showing. Wild young men did, of course, recover. There was in this boy a note of intensity – passionate, eager – that was by no means all egotism. And there was in the father a hard sort of character that had proved itself indomitable, and that must be taken into account. Yes, it was a simple fact, that many a young fellow had gone farther wrong than had Rocky Kane without wrecking his adult life. You couldn’t tell. And there they were, the eager moody boy and the lovely girl, who was oddly, quaintly conspicuous in her opera wrap, sitting very close, talking in low tones while he walked alone. It was torture… yet it wras an awakening. He told himself that it was better so… Pacing back and forth, dwelling on the quick changeableness of youth, its ardor and sensitive hopefulness, he thought – reaching out for fellowship as will always the hurt soul – of other lonely lives, of Abelard and Jean Valjean, of St. Francis, even of Christ. It was odd – from his present philosophical position of something near Taoism he felt the legendary Christ as a profoundly human and friendly spirit, immeasurably more tender, finer, gentler than the theological structure of thought and conduct that had been erected in His name. He had thought himself very nearly around the circle, back to essential good… This process could bring only humility. Life began to matter less. Love was a tormenting problem of self; the mature soul must in some measure attain selflessness if it were not to go down in the trampled dust of life. Worldly success was an accident. It was hardly desirable; hardly mattered. That he had within the hour pinned his hope to money, fairly fought for it, began to seem incredible.

The viceroy found hint standing quietly by the river, turning from the slowly dying fire out there to the slowly spreading glow in the eastern sky.

“I like to think,” remarked his excellency, smiling in friendly fashion, “that when the first Buddhist patriarch, Bodhidharma, miraculously crossed the river on a reed plucked from the southern bank, it was not far from here, near my home.”

“Was not your city of Huang Chau the home of Li To?” asked Doane.

“Indeed, yes!” cried his excellency. “In some of his excursions on the river he undoubtedly passed the site of my home.”

Doane quoted from that most famous of rhapsodists in musical Chinese: “‘One who has hearkened to the waters roaring down from the heights of Lung, and faint voices from the land of Ch’in; one who has listened to the cries of monkeys on the shores of the Yangtze Kiang and the songs of the land of Pa’… That” – he was musing aloud, reflectively as the Chinese do – “was written three full centuries before William of Normandy first set foot on British soil… Li Po so described himself.”

They talked on, of life and philosophy, in, language interwoven with classical allusions. Friendship, the finest relationship in Chinese civilization, as it stood, had come to them… It brought a kind of peace. Doane failed to recognize this sensation as in some degree but a phase of his painful exaltation. It seemed to him then that his struggle, no matter what atonement might lie before, was over. He forgot again the Western vigor that was, and to the last would be, driving his spirit.

Meanwhile the swiftly growing acquaintanceship of Huj Fei and Rocky Kane was weaving its bright-tinted weft in and out through the dark warp of Rocky’s ill-spent youth. His eyes followed the slightest movement of her slim hands and rested dog-like on her finely modeled head about which the shining wet black hair lay close. To his quick youth she was an exquisite fairy. He felt her as perfume in the air he breathed. Her voice, when she drowsily, prettily spoke, fell on his ear like music in an enchanted land. He could say little; he had never before so lost himself.

She tried daintily to conceal a yawn. And he, clasping the child in both arms, turned away to hide its brother. Then, very softly, she laughed and he laughed.

“You must try to sleep,” he said gently.

“I can no’ let you keep my sister. You, too, are ver’ tire’.”

“It’s nothing. I love to hold her. Really! You see, my life hasn’t been this way. Maybe, if I’d had a sister…” He stopped; suddenly, vividly sensing what he had been; a hot flush flooded his sensitive face. He could only add then: “I want you to sleep. It may be hours before the boat comes for you. It’s been such a horrible night – such a nightmare…”

“But you mus’ res’, too. One of the servan’s will take my sister.”

“No!” he cried, low, fiercely, “I won’t let any one else have her!” Sensing crudely that the child was a chord between them, he tightened his hold. The little head rolled back on his arm; he bent over, tenderly kissed the soft cheek, then looked over it at Hui Fei, staring. During one brief moment their eyes met full in the flickering yellow light.

She turned away; in lieu of speech looked about for a spot to lay her head.

“Here!” He laid the child on the ground; and, surprised to find himself collarless and coatless, took off his waistcoat, rolled it up and placed it for a pillow. “It’s really pretty well dried out,” he added, with an embarrassed little laugh… Then, as she still said nothing, went on, “Do just lie down there. I’ll keep awake. We can’t count on the servants; they’re all scared to death.”

Still she hesitated. “I’m afraid I am ver’ tire’,” she finally remarked unsteadily. “I can’t think ver’ clearly.”

“Listen!” said he, hardly hearing. “I’ve got to tell you something. I’m not good enough so much as to speak to you.”

“Please!” she murmured. “I don’ wan’ you to talk abou’ – ”

“I don’t mean that. It’s other things too.” His voice broke, but after a moment he pressed on, a determined look on his curiously youthful face. “I’ve done every rotten thing I could think of. I’m – well, I guess I’m just a criminal. No, listen – please! It’s true. I’m to blame for this awful fire – smoking opium in my cabin. It was my lamp – it must have been. I fell asleep. But I knew better, of course… Oh, God, it’s terrible! All those lives, all this suffering! And you – I’ve nearly killed you – when it was you…” Here, creditably, he caught himself. “Don’t think I’m talking wildly. I’m getting at something. Seeing you, meeting you – and now, this – well, I’ve never seen anybody like you. It’s bowled me off my feet. I know what love is, now – Oh, please! I’ve got to get this out. I love you. I’m crazy about you. I can say that because pretty soon that boat’ll come and you’ll go and I’ll never see you again. It’s right, too! I’ve got to start again – alone and prove that there’s good stuff in me somewhere…”

“I’m ver’ tire’,” she murmured wistfully; and resting her head on the rolled-up waistcoat she lay still.

If she had only let him finish! There had been something – some point – he was getting at. He hadn’t meant to tire her or hurt her… When the tall eunuch came for the little princess he angrily drove the fellow away. For Hui Fei was sleeping now, peacefully, like the warm little child in his arms.

An English gunboat was the first relief craft to arrive; in the cool dawn; a tiny craft, built for the river, with a white freeboard low as a monitor’s and bridge structure forward of the thin high funnel. The small boat that came ashore made a number of trips, taking off the passengers and the surviving white officers of the Yen Hsin.

His excellency refused, with calm courtesy, to set foot on the English gunboat that was built for the river; he would wait for the junk that had been sent for.

Dawley Kane found his son, nodding, with the picturesquely-clad child in his arms. The boy, glancing at the sleeping Hui Fei whose head rested comfortably on the rolled-up waistcoat, gave the child now to the patiently waiting eunuch, then fairly dragged his father to the boat. With the Japanese, Kato, and oddly distant to the big mate and the suddenly exotic-appearing viceroy in his richly embroidered satins who had been after all only casually, for a few days, in their lives, they embarked.

They had nearly reached the gunboat when those on the bank heard young Kane’s voice raised in hot protest. There was a moment of argument; then a splash. The boy could be seen then swimming back to shore. And Dawley Kane, turning his back, went on to the gunboat, stepped aboard, and disappeared. Rocky clambered, dripping, up the bank; came straight to Duane, a staring, exhausted youth, very white.

“I can’t do it.” he panted. “They’re just told me – Kato and the pater – about this terrible trouble of the viceroy’s and – and Miss Hui Fei’s… The pater said it was time I – got clear of any new entanglement. I quit him. Oh, I suppose you’ll think me a – damn fool, but” – at this point he nearly broke into tears – “but I love that girl, Mr. Doane! If I can’t be of some use to her – now, in this awful trouble – I don’t want to live. Will you – help me? And let me help?”… And, all blind confidence, he offered his hand to the big mate; who took it.

The gunboat hoisted anchor and swung about, heading down-stream. Passing her, upward bound, came a large junk, with the rig of a trader from Szechuen, her single huge rectangular sail, brown-umber ‘n tint and closely ribbed with battens of bamboo, flat against the one mast that towered clumsily amidships. The eight long sweeps, in the low waist and forward, moved rhythmically in time with the syncopated, wailing chant of nearly a hundred oarsmen. The tai-kung crouched, bamboo pole in hand, just within the prow.

The hull was of cypress, stained from stem to stern with yellow orpiment and rubbed to a polish with oil. The high after-deck structure, all of fifty feet in length, terminating in a projecting gallery-twenty feet or higher above the water, was carved everywhere in intricately decorative designs; as were, also, the roof over the tillerman’s stand on the deck house and the gallery railing (just within which stood a row of flowering plants in yellow and green pots). The many small windows along the sides were glazed with opalescent squares of ground oyster shells and glue; those across the stern (under the gallery) with stained glass.

To no one aboard the gunboat or among the still waiting groups on the bank did the thought occur that this craft might be engaged in other than peaceable business. Her like were not an uncommon sight along the always crowded river. The passing attention she drew was merely that aroused by a richly decorative object moving beautifully (with a remarkably detailed reflection) through the flat water, that itself glowed under the red and gold of the early morning sky like a great sheet of burnished old copper. It was not observed that three white faces peered warily out of the shadow, behind as many opened windows; nor could it easily be seen that the figure in blue, sitting, knees drawn up, on the deck house just behind the laopan who mercilessly urged on the sweat-shining oarsmen, was none other than the redoubtable Tom Sung.

CHAPTER VIII – ABOARD THE YELLOW JUNK

IN making their escape from the steamer, Tex Connor and the Manila Kid seized one of the small boats, manning, one at either end, the tackle-falls. Connor was quick, rough, profane. The Kid, breathless with excitement, hesitant, glancing back over the rail for a thinly girlish face that did not, then, appear, worked with ten thumbs at the ropes. Connor’s end, the boat, fell first, a short way, nearly pitching him out. He cursed this futile man, his jackal, roundly; then clung to the tackle as the stern fell… The Kid moaned with pain as the slipping hemp burned the skin off his fingers, but held it just short of disaster.

Hot red flames licked out overhead as the boat jerkily dropped. The women were screaming up there. A white man, the second mate, leaned over, swearing vigorously at them. They passed an open freight gangway, where bodies lay.

“Ready, now!” cried Connor. “Let go with me!”

“Wait a minute, can’t you?” whined the Kid. He was peering into the dark interior of the steamer; grasping a moment more; wrapping a handkerchief about his left hand. “My God! Can’t a fellow tie up his hand.”

A thin blue figure appeared, stepped lightly over into the boat and dropped on a middle thwart.

“Dixie!” cried the Kid in falsetto.

She wore a cap, and carried an oddly lady-like shopping bag.

“Where’d you come from?” growled Connor.

“I saw you start,” said the girl casually. “Come on – let’s get away.”

Connor stared at her; then turned back to his work. The boat struck the water and drifted rapidly away down-stream. Connor, roaring angrily at the Kid, got out an oar.

“What are you doing?” asked Miss Carmichael very quietly.

“Going ashore?” said Connor.

“Oh, come, Tex!” said she. “Use your head.”

He looked sharply, inquiringly, doubtingly at her.

“You two better row straight down-stream as hard as you can,” she added. “You can bet Tom Sung and that gang aren’t going to show themselves at Kiu Kiang. They’ve stopped somewhere below here.”

The Kid, who was nursing his hand, looked up; wrinkled his low forehead that was hatless, and then softly whistled. Connor made no remark, but continued studying the girl with his one eye. Finally, with an effort at reasserting his authority, he growled:

“Take an oar, Jim!”

“But my hands! My God, that rope took all the – ”

“Do you expect me to do the rowing, Jim?” said Miss Carmichael.

The Kid yielded then. The girl settled herself comfortably in the stem, looking back at the fire. Soon they were out of the circle of light.

Suddenly Connor drew in his oar; stowed it away.

“Dixie,” he remarked. “You’ve made up your mind to go through with this business, eh?”

“Certainly,” she replied.

“You’ll have to come across if you want my help. I won’t go it blind.”

Miss Carmichael glanced back at the red glow in the sky, then out toward the slightly paling East.

“I’ll tell you by sunrise,” she said. “The thing won’t keep much longer than that, anyhow. It’ll have to be fairly quick work.”

“All right,” said Connor. “That’s an agreement. Now I’m going to take a nap. This current’s taking us down fast enough. When you sight Tom’s outfit, wake me up.” With which he curled up in the bow, and soon was snoring.

The Kid stowed his own oar, and crept to the girl’s side.

“Careful!” she whispered. “If he should wake up…” She extricated herself from an encircling arm. “Jim – sit still now! – It’s time you and I had an understanding. I need you, and I’m going to use you. I don’t propose to have you all steamed up, either. You’ll need all the nerve you’ve got. Perhaps more. I’m not at all sure that you’re big enough for what you’ve got to do. That’s the difficulty.”

“You promised, Dixie.” He was still absurdly breathless. “You said it was a trade – if I’d stick to you, you’d stick to me!”

“Certainly. But it’s during the next eight or ten hours that you’re going to find out what sticking to me, means. You can have me, all right, Jim, but you’ve got to earn me.”

“I guess I’ll earn you, all right.”

“I wonder if you have the courage.”

“By God, for you, Dixie – ”

Her hand fell lightly on his; and her voice, very small and calm, broke in with: “Supposing I told you to kill a man. Would you do it?”

She heard, felt, his breath stop. Then he whispered, with one swift glance at the sleeping Connor: “If I say yes, Dixie, will you kiss me? Right now?”

She pressed her lips slightly; then replied: “No. Not yet. And you needn’t kill anybody until I tell you to.”

“Is it – is it” – his whisper was huskier – “is it – him, Dixie?” He was staring with less certainty now, at Connor.

“No” – said she slowly – “nobody in particular. But anything may happen to-night, Jim. And we can’t falter. Not now.”

She let him press her hand during a brief moment; then made him resume his seat. And from behind lowered lids she watched him.

Once he came back, to ask hoarsely: “You said he was rough with you, Dix. Did he – did you and he – my God, if I thought that Tex had – ”

She caught his shoulder and placed a hand over his mouth: held him thus while she said: “If he catches you back here, Jim, he’ll kill you. No fear! Now you go back there and show me that you can play cards. You’re sitting in the biggest game of your life. Jim Watson.”

He crept back; puzzled, something hurt. There was a sting in her voice. Could it be that the girlish Dixie was as cold-blooded as that? Treating him like a child! Hadn’t she any feelings? The question came around and around in his muddy brain, confused with frantic uprushes of jealousy against the big man who slept and snored in the bow… hadn’t she any feelings?.. She was excitingly desirable.

Just as a conquest, now; something to brag about.

It was Dixie who sighted the soldiers, sitting in heated argument on the bank not a hundred yards below a big junk that lay moored to stakes in an eddy. She called sharply to Connor; they pulled straight in beside the other two boats.

Tom Sung came to the water’s edge, a rifle (with set bayonet) in his hand. Connor stepped out, holding the boat. The Kid, with a furtive, glance at the big yellow fighter, and the abruptly silent shadowy group on the bank, cautiously got out an automatic pistol and held it beside him on the thwart.

Dixie said sharply, for Connor’s ears: “Put up that gun, Jim!”

The Kid obeyed.

She spoke then to Connor direct.

“Tell your man we want that junk,” she said. “Get out these other boats and take it, quick. Then we’ll start back up-stream.”

For a moment Connor was nonplussed. The girl’s assumption of authority was complete. Even the slow-thinking Tom Sung felt her presence and turned abruptly from himself toward her.

But, though angered, Connor controlled himself. She meant, after all, business. Dixit wasn’t a girl to make careless mistakes. She knew, none better, what any success, little or big, might be worth in risks run. So, speaking sharply, he gave his orders to Tom.

Quietly the twenty or more outlaw soldiers came down to the boats and pushed off. Rowing and paddling they crept up on the junk. A drowsy watchman peeped over at the rail, forward.

Then they were alongside. Catching at the mooring poles, the soldiers stepped out on the wide sponson that curved down, amidships, nearly to the water-line. Quickly, rifles slung on backs but revolvers at their girdles and knives in their teeth, they went up the ropes hand over hand, their bare feet dinging monkeylike to the smooth side.

There were cries aboard now, and a confusion of running feet. The first soldier to get a leg over the rail came tumbling back with a split skull, bounding off the sponson into the water and sinking as he drifted away.

Connor and the Kid caught together at the sponson. Connor stepped out; and calling on a belated soldier to give him a back, climbed laboriously, puffing but determined, up over the rail, pausing at the top only to call back for the Kid to follow.

But that worthy hesitated, crouching, clutching at the boat painter. “I’ve got to hold the boat here!” he shouted back; but Connor had disappeared.

There was much noise up there now – shouts, groans, appalling screeches, shots, and that insistent pattering of feet.

Dixie, watching critically the crouching figure on the sponson – for the Kid was shivering and making little sounds, obviously caught in the acute physical distress into which extreme sudden fear will at times plunge a man – called abruptly: “Jim – look up!”

A nearly naked Chinese was lowering himself in a deliberate gingerly manner down a moving rope nearly overhead.

“Kill him, Jim!” Dixie added.

Singling out her clear voice from the tumult, the yellow man looked fearfully down.

The Kid, at the same moment, looked up; then, fumbling in a curiously absent way for his pistol, glanced back at Dixie.

“I’ll hold the boat,” said she. “Go on – kill him!” She sat quietly, one thin arm reached out to the nearest mooring pole, looking steadily up.

The Kid, nerving himself, suddenly burst into a storm of wild oaths and shot three times into the body above him. At the first shot the mar. slipped down a little way.

“Push him away!” Dixie cried sharply. “I don’t want him falling into the boat!”

He was shooting again; and then with an effort diverted the falling body.

Dixie got up, and stood steadying herself in the gently rocking boat; and the Kid – quit; out of breath now, and muttering, as he fondled the hot pistol, “Well, I did it, didn’t I? I did what you said!” – found in her eyes, shining through the dusk of early dawn, a bright white light that was, to him, disconcerting and yet profoundly thrilling. He shivered again as he felt the spell of her strange genius. What a woman, he was thinking again, but wildly, madly, now, to conquer.

And she was saying, “I guess your nerve’s all right.”

Other shining yellow bodies were tumbling over the side and floating away.

“Help me up there, Jim!” she commanded. “Never mind tying the boat – let it go! It’s only a giveaway. Quick – give me a hand!”

She was beside him on the sponson. He clasped her in his arms; but before he could kiss her she slapped him sharply. “Keep your head!” she commanded. “Put me up there!”

He lifted her high; until she could kneel, then stand, on his shoulder. She went over the rail as lightly as a boy. She found the soldiers in small groups cornering one or another of the crew, torturing and hacking at them with bayonets and knives, and during a brief moment looked on with a curious keen interest. The master, or laopan, crouched, whimpering, on the poop… She saw Connor standing by the mast, just above the well, amidships and forward, where were huddled the survivors among the crew (their number surprisingly large); Connor was panting, revolver in hand, and scowling about him.

Dixie stepped to his side.

“You’ve got to save enough of this crew to work the boat up the river, Tex,” she remarked.

“I’m saving enough of ‘em,” he replied gruffly. “We’ve only killed a dozen or so. There was more’n a hundred.”

The heavily evil-looking Tom Sung reluctantly detached himself from one of the groups and came over, wiping his bayonet casually on his sleeve. Him Connor roughly ordered to gather his men together and make ready to get under way. To the Kid, who came awkwardly over the rail just then, Connor gave merely a glance. Then to Dixie, he said:

“Come up here!”

He led the way up the steps with the carven hand rail to the poop; gave the laopan a careless kick; stepped around the steersman’s covered pit and out astern on the high projecting gallery.

“Now,” he said, fixing his one eye on Her, “where’s this place?”

She turned away to the pots of flowers that stood closely spaced just within the elaborate woodwork of the railing. There were chrysanthemums, white, yellow and deep Indian red; highly cultivated double dahlias; red lotus blossoms; and tuberoses that filled the fresh morning air with their heavy perfume. “Well?” Connor added explosively.

“I said I’d tell you by sunrise, Tex,” she said, coolly pleasant; and hummed, very softly, a music-hall tune, bending over a spreading lotus blossom with every appearance of ingenuous girlish interest. After a moment, she went on, “The thing now is to get this junk up the river as fast as it will go.”

“Where to?” He was controlling his voice, but his face, usually expressionless, was brutally clouded…"Push me just a little farther, Dix, and you’ll go overboard. And there won’t be any flowers at the funeral. By God, I’m not sure I wouldn’t enjoy it. You got me into this business! Now if you – ”

“Better control yourself, Tex,” said she; straightening up before him. “I may have got you in, but it’s a real job now. You’ve got to go through. And you’re going to need me. The place is a few miles this side of a town called Huang Chau, on the north hank.”

“Beyond Hankow?”

“No, below. It’s only a matter of hours getting up there, if you’ll just get this junk started.”

“How’ll we know it when we get there?”

“All we’ve got to do is ask a native, anywhere along the bank, where Kang Yu lives – his old home.”

“Who’s he?”

“The viceroy of Nanking. Why don’t you use that eye of yours once in a while, Tex – look around you a little?”

Slowly his mind, so quick at the vicious games of his own race, picked up and related the facts. His face relaxed, as he thought, into the familiar wooden expression.

“You’re sure the stones are there?” he asked, quietly now.

She nodded; hummed again; caressed the flowers.

“All right, Dix,” he said then, as he turned to go forward, “that sounds square enough. I guess I can handle it all right. And I’ll see that you get your share all hunky dory.”

“What are you figuring my share to be?” she asked, glancing casually up from a lotus blossom.

“Oh,” he cried without hesitation, almost playfully, “you and I aren’t going to have any trouble about that.”

He went then; and she lingered among the flowers.

From beyond the long deck house came shouts and wailing. The great sweeps were got overside. The mooring poles were hoisted out and lashed along the sponsons. The clumsy craft swung out into the river and moved slowly forward.