TheManchesterswung into the Rangoon River some twenty hours late. Trent, who had risen early, saw the dome of the Shwe Dagon in the dawn, like a rippling flame against the purple haze. Before the ship dropped anchor, he sought the captain.
"I've decided not to press charges against the fellow confined below," he announced. "Let him go—but not until a half hour after we come to anchor."
The captain, his eyes following Trent's receding shoulders, reflected that he'd see the blighter in blazing hades before he'd let him off so easily. But, not being clairvoyant, he could not know that Trent had a few minutes before issued certain specific instructions to Tambusami.
Later, after Trent had concluded with the tiresome customs details, he saw Dana Charteris. She was preparing to go ashore. She wore the black hat with the sheaf of cornflowers and wheat about the crown, and her face, shadowed by the wide brim, had the pallor of ivory.
"I suppose I ought to say something," he began, halting in front of her, "but I don't know whether I want to ask your forgiveness for what occurred last night."
It was a strained moment, for both were painfully conscious. She averted her face.
"Perhaps," she suggested, "it would be better to say—nothing."
Then she looked at him; smiled; extended her hand.
Not until she was gone, a creature of white and russet-gold in the sunshine, did he remember that he did not know her address. This realization brought a new and enveloping sense of isolation.... Interlude! And this was the end—andante dolento!
Sunset, like the wings of a giant golden moth, quivered in the sky and beat gently against the city, stirring from the earth a film of dust that, illuminated by the lingering glow, hung in the air like yellow pollen. Gold was the sovereign tone of every quarter. In the Shwe Dagon numerous Buddhas smiled at the vain splendor of goldleaf and gold-fretted spires; Victoria Lake, on whose banks social Rangoon had gathered to cool after a stifling day, lay like a gold-chased platter; along the riverfront, dull brown water, shot with glinting ripples, swirled and eddied beneath quayside godowns, and in the adjacent bazaars a concourse of native life moved against a background of gold-lettered signs and gilt-painted shops.
This golden dust-haze enveloped the bungalow in Prome Road where Dana Charteris was packing a suitcase; floated through the window of a house near the waterfront where Hsien Sgam sat talking to another Oriental; irradiated the interior of the tramcar that carried Tambusami toward the commercial town; and glowed in a luminous cloud about a veranda of the Strand Hotel where Trent, lounging in a wicker chair, engaged in an occupation that might have cast some slight reflection upon the morale of the British Army.
Immediately after reaching the hotel from the steamer he had inquired about the train schedule, and was informed that to make the best connection at Mandalay for Myitkyina he should leave Rangoon on the noon train, reaching Mandalay at nightfall. From there, he was told, Myitkyina was a matter of twenty-four hours. Trent decided to remain in Rangoon until the next day; for he intended to explore the mysteries of the House of the Golden Joss. Having settled the time for his departure, he gave himself over to an inspection of the city. After tiffin he visited the bazaars, purchased a small leather-bound volume by Shway Yoë at a shop in Merchant Street, and now sat on the veranda of the Strand, waiting for Tambusami, whom he had not seen since he came ashore.
It was growing too dark to read, and he slipped the book into a pocket of his silk suit, transferring his attention to the variety of head-dresses that passed in the roadway. Pith helmets, felt Bangkok hats, Chinese skull-caps, loosely-knotted Burmese scarfs, and turbans of all sizes.... Darkness fell and street-lamps glowed into being before he abandoned his watch and went to dinner.
After the meal he returned to the veranda—and met a smiling, bespectacled Tambusami in the doorway.
"Burra salaam, O Presence!" was the native's greeting. "Was the Presence beginning to believe I had been swallowed up by this strange city?"
Trent drew him into one corner and sat down.
"Well?"—as he lighted his pipe.
Tambusami, after a wary look about him, made a gesture.
"I did as you directed, Presence," he began. "I waited until that filthy Mohammedan louse left the ship, and followed. Louse indeed, for he went to a place of stinks that would poison other than vermin! Fish and onions, Presence! He put such corruption into his belly! From there he walked about several streets that are as filthy as that stink-hole of a restaurant, then took a tramcar. He sat in front, I in the rear.
"At the pagoda, the great pagoda"—meaning, Trent knew, the Shwe Dagon—"he got off and defiled it with his presence. He went up to the top, where there is a great bell, Presence, and many images of the Lord Gaudama. Even the dogs in the stalls snarled at him! After he had tainted the upper platform with his presence, he returned to the bazaars below. There at the foot of the steps he waited, while I hid in the shadows above. Finally the one for whom he waited came—a Memsahib."
Trent's lips pressed into a thin line.
"A Memsahib," Tambusami went on. "She wore a veil and I could not see her face. She was dressed in white."
"Did you notice the color of her hair?" Trent cut in.
"No, Presence; the veil was heavy. But I saw a bracelet—oh, a very beautiful bracelet! It was gold and had a cobra upon it—a king-cobra, with hood lifted!"
If this announcement was startling to Trent, he succeeded quite well in hiding it. He smoked on in silence.
"I could not hear what they said," continued the native. "They left almost immediately. She had a gharry waiting in the road. I did not follow long. Am I a dog that I should run behind until my tongue drips and I drop dead of heat? When they disappeared, I got on a tramcar. Now I am here!"
Trent looked at him closely. "You heard the Memsahib's voice?"
"Yes, Presence, but not—"
"It wasn't familiar?"
"Nay!"
Trent's fingers drummed on the arm of his chair.
"You should have followed," was his comment, after a moment. "Since you didn't, the only thing for you to do is to return to the restaurant. He may go back to-night."
Tambusami ceased smiling. "That stink-hole of fish and onions!" he exclaimed indignantly; then: "Very well—I am a faithful servant of the Presence!"
Whereupon he salaamed and departed, quickly losing himself among the many turbans in the street.
Trent continued to drum on the arm of his chair. The woman of the cobra-bracelet! And in Rangoon! That meant she was a passenger on theManchester. But no, not necessarily. Damn the illusiveness of her! Who was she, anyway? Sarojini Nanjee? In that event it was likely Tambusami would have recognized her. Perhaps he did, was his next and disconcerting thought; perhaps the affair on shipboard was a hoax, a foil for something deeper; perhaps Tambusami knew this and his story of the meeting at the pagoda was false. It was queer, he admitted, that Tambusami didn't hear anything that passed between the two.... But at least, he told himself, he was free of his perpetual shadow for several hours; he had not despatched Tambusami to the restaurant because he believed Guru Singh would return (if he had ever been there), but because he did not wish his own actions under surveillance that evening.
Still puzzling over Tambusami's report, he left the hotel. An involuntary glance behind showed him no familiar face, and he hailed a cab. (When the temperature is at ninety degrees one does not walk for pleasure.) Thegharry-wallahknew no English—which was not unusual—and to make himself understood Trent had to solicit the aid of a Sikh policeman.
Hsien Sgam was the pivot of his thoughts as he rolled northward along Strand Road. His interest in the invited interview was almost wholly personal, for he felt that the Mongol's "revolution" was more a matter of vain dreaming than reality. Such a movement, unless backed by some power, could hardly be regarded as formidable. Yet the rebellion in South China in nineteen-eleven, which brought about the presidency of Yuan Shih-Kai, must have seemed puny in its first stages. Although insurrection in Mongolia against China would scarcely affect the interests of his Government, it was at least worthy of investigation. There was, as always, the possibility of infection—for the smell of powder, especially in Eastern lands, is dangerous. It might spread into Szechuan and Yunnan (there were already ugly symptoms along the banks of Mother Yangtze) or into Tibet, thus bringing it to the back door of Burma. And that "back door," he knew, was no small consideration. Since the occupation of Hkamti Long, the Kachin tribes of the Burmese hinterland needed but slight pretext to inaugurate trouble. True, they could be easily put down—"easily," he reflected grimly, meaning troops; death for hundreds in fever-haunted swamps and in jungles where lurked innumerable dangers. That was "black" country, up there between India, Tibet and China; wild people in a wild setting—dwarf Nungs, Black Marus and Lisus. Yes, they could be quelled, these primitive people, for a price. All of which, he concluded, was pure romancing.
He was in a street that ran parallel with the river, a highway where Burmans, Chinese, Hindus, Madrasees, Tamils, Cingaleese and Chittagonians mingled in a colorful, reeking democracy unknown to caste-bound Indian cities. On one side, beyond quays and warehouses, was the river, its dim expanse flecked with lamps on sampans, junks and lighters, here and there the white silhouette of an ocean-going vessel blotting the gloom; on the other, groups of colors that, like parrots, would seem gaudy and flamboyant in other than their natural setting shifted upon a background of low, swarth buildings and shops decorated with imitation lacquer and goldleaf.
Here was Burma, sleepy gilded Burma, with its quaint kyoungs and pagodas, its air of vain decay. A siren of the East whose charms are fast being supplanted by the craft of her less attractive, but more industrious, sisters. They laughed and smoked, these light-hearted Burmans, while Chinos and Hindus moved with stealthy intent among them—grim, silent fellows, as quick in commerce as the Burmans are lazy and indolent. This was not the quiet of India or China, a boding hush, but an atmosphere of somnolence and perfect content.
Thus Trent was musing when he came at length to the House of the Golden Joss. It was a yellow brick building in a flagged enclosure, its upcurling eaves and series of roofs, to Trent, strikingly like the fantastic headgear of a lemon-faced mandarin who looked out with satisfaction upon the marine highway by which the merchandise of his sons floated into port. Curious eyes followed the Englishman as he paid thegharry-wallahand moved up the low stair to the entrance. There, after a pause, he passed between twin stone dragons; passed from the twentieth century, so it seemed, into a perished dynasty.
He found himself in a vast court where the smoke from joss-sticks hung in clearly defined layers upon the atmosphere. The walls were lacquered with red and gold; and black-enameled pillars, inscribed with ideographs, were joined to the beams by filagree dragons. Orange-colored scrolls, red and gold paper-prayers and blue pottery reflected bizarre splashes upon glazed floors. The draperies were crimson; great red lanterns, hanging from the ceiling like captive moons, added to the scarlet effect. Worshippers of all races and colors knelt before the altar and numerous small shrines, and the murmur of many voices in twice as many tongues hummed in the great red temple.
Trent's interest was instantly claimed by the blue pottery—tall vases, thin of neck and bellying out as they curved toward rounded bases and black pedestals. Red walls reflected upon their shiny surfaces. These vases were relics of China's Imperialists, Trent knew, brought from Honan or Chili—and his collector's soul flamed. Nor did he fail to observe the porcelain dragons or the intricate filigree work that adorned the beams. From these treasures he tore himself and gave his attention to the people. Mongoloid features, Aryan and Malay. No familiar face among them.
He pursued a corridor that led from the main court and completely circled the building—a dim passageway with many curtained recesses off from it. At one corner was a restaurant. He could imagine from the smells the sort of food served within, and he hurried on, returning to the temple where incense banished the less enticing odors.
At a light touch on his arm he turned. A gray-clad priest stood at his side—an emaciated Buddhist.
"Your name is Tavernake,thakin?" he asked in English; then, as Trent nodded, added: "Come with me."
Trent was led back along the dim corridor, past the restaurant with its pungent smells, to a curtained room in the rear. It was evidently a bedroom, for there was the customarycharpoy, or bed. Its walls were vermilion; vermilion portières hung in the doorway, and a heavy vermilion curtain defied any air to enter through the one window. It was close, stifling. The lantern swinging from the ceiling seemed a fiery ball that radiated heat.
"His Excellency Hsien Sgam will be here presently," announced the monk; and Trent did not fail to notice the title. "He begs you to accept the humble comforts of our hospitality until he arrives."
Trent's eyes followed the priest. As the vermilion portières fell together behind him, rippling gently, like red heat-waves, the last draught of air seemed banished; the room became oppressive, as though the lid of hades had been shut, and the odors from the nearby restaurant did not improve the atmosphere.
Trent dropped on the edge of thecharpoy, fanning himself with his hat and inspecting the room with mild curiosity. He leaned over and drew aside the window-curtain. A warm current of air breathed upon his face. Beyond the rectangle was darkness—the back of the flagged enclosure, he surmised. A faint drone of voices was borne through the quiet—worshippers in the temple-court. Footsteps padded softly in the corridor; drew nearer; passed.... Five minutes....
Why the devil was Hsien Sgam keeping him waiting, and in this infernally hot room, he wondered?
Growing impatient, he rose and paced the floor, not ceasing to fan himself. Sweat streamed into his eyes, rolled down his body and moistened his undergarments. His scalp burned and needled with heat. After a moment he resumed his seat, staring at the motionless vermilion portières. Still the hum of voices from the temple; it went on with maddening persistence.
"Good God!" he thought, as he mopped his face. "Such heat!"
He glanced at his wrist-watch. He had been waiting ten minutes. Confound Hsien Sgam and his revolution!
Suddenly his eyes were invaded by an alert gleam. That was the only change in his expression. He let his gaze rove about the room and continued the restless fanning. But there was something in his attitude, in the poise of his head, that likened him to a stag suddenly aware of an alien presence.
He had seen the vermilion portières move—very slightly.
Casually, he lowered his eyes to the bottom of the curtain. Two inches of gloom separated the hem from the floor, but that was sufficient to show him the toes of a pair of shoes. As he looked, they drew back—but not too far for him to still see them.
He continued to fan himself. Perspiration ran into his eyes and stung them, and he wiped away the moisture with a damp handkerchief. The heat seemed to press down, like a burning cushion, and quench his breath.
The pair of shoes moved closer. Another ripple of the curtains. Then, above the murmur from the temple, he heard a sound in the corridor—athwack. Came a quick gasp, a low, sobbing intake of breath.
Trent got to his feet, swiftly. As he stood erect, the portières parted suddenly and a body slued into the room. It swung about drunkenly; went to its knees; stretched upon the floor. A revolver clattered beside it. Trent barely had time to see that the body was that of a gray-robed man—a priest, who had fallen face downward and lay still, with an ugly blotch between his shoulders—before another figure slipped through the division of the curtains and thrust forward the muzzle of a revolver.
Trent halted. A flicker of recollection crossed his brain. The man who stood outlined against the vermilion hangings was a native clad in dirty garments; his turban was soiled, his feet bare. As Trent saw the scar running across one cheek and the drooping eyelid, he recognized the snake-charmer who crossed the Bay in the steerage of theManchester.
The fellow grinned impudently, and the expression was reminiscent of another smile.
"Turn about!" he ordered softly, in English—excellent English for a street juggler, as Trent did not fail to notice. "Don't say a word; don't make a sound!"
Trent's eyes dropped to the body; lifted questioningly.
Again the snake-charmer grinned—that impudent, strangely reminiscent expression.
"Never mind that now!" he said, and his voice, too, slow and quiet, seemed vaguely familiar. "If you want to get out of this place whole, do as I say!"
Trent turned, facing the window. (And the native did not see the smile that traced itself upon his face.) Instantly the Englishman felt a pressure between his shoulders.
"Now, drop out of the window!" came the whispered command from behind.
Trent moved to the window and pulled the curtain aside. As he swung over the sill he caught a glimpse of the juggler's grinning face. The sash was not more than four feet from the ground, and he discovered that he was behind the joss-house, in the shadow of a lofty wall. Above were stars; at one side, further along the wall, a gateway where the glow from a lighted street fell within.
"Walk to the gate," was the native's quiet order, as he lowered himself from the window. "Hail a carriage and get in. I'll be directly behind you. Don't look around or say a word; if you do...."
Trent obeyed. He moved slowly, almost carelessly, through the gate and into the street, where a thin stream of Burmans and Chinese flowed toward the joss-house.
It was half a square before he saw a cab; then, in a matter-of-fact way, he motioned to thewallah. As the gharry drew up, the slow, familiar voice at his side spoke to the driver—in Burmese, Trent imagined.
The Englishman stepped into the conveyance, showing no surprise when the juggler got in and sank upon the seat beside him. Nor did he look in the least amazed, as he should have done, when the native's drooping eyelid lifted and winked at him in an outrageously familiar manner. He only smiled—a smile that grew as he commented:
"You're a downy bird, Kerth."
Which was not indiscreet, for one may safely assume, in Rangoon, that hisgharry-wallahcannot understand him when he speaks English.
"I've instructed thewallahto drive to your hotel by a longer route," Euan Kerth drawled, and Trent wondered how he was ever baffled by such a simple make-up; it was the drooping eyelid, he decided, and the absence of the waxed mustache.
"I want time to talk," Kerth explained. "Also, I'll take this opportunity to return a piece of your property."
One slender hand emerged from under his clothing and extended an object that gleamed softly in the semi-dark, an object that caused the blood to leap into Trent's temples and throb there for a moment of sheer excitement.
For it was the silver-chased piece of coral that had twice been stolen from him.
"Too, I want to tell you," Kerth went on, "that your pretty cobra friend lied to you."
"Sarojini?"
Kerth nodded. "Most gloriously," he emphasized. "Look inside the locket—or whatever it is—and you'll see."
Again Trent felt the blood in his temples. But his hand was calm as he pressed a fingernail under the rim and opened the pendant. He bent low; peered intently. He made no exclamation as he saw the name that was engraved within—but his breathing quickened. He snapped the oval shut and sat with it gripped in his hand. The blood was still beating in his temples.
"As I told you," resumed Kerth, "Gilbert Leroux, the name that's written there, was Chavigny's last alias. Therefore, when Sarojini said he had nothing to do with the Order, she lied. And if she lied once, she's likely to do it again. Fact is, I don't trust her. I have a reason to believe she isn't playing the game just right."
"Yes?" Trent encouraged, while the name in the pendant sang itself in his ears with the roll of the carriage wheels.
"I'll have to be rather personal," was the slow statement; "embarrassingly so, I fear. Nevertheless, it's better that you know I know. Before I left Benares I sent a telegram to a friend, the Commissioner at Jehelumpore—you see, I knew you were stationed there at one time—asking if he knew whether—whether you and Sarojini Nanjee—well—"
He paused. Trent, smiling to himself, said: "Go on."
"When I reached Calcutta I received a letter from him by special post," Kerth continued. "He told me the whole story.... That's all. And for that reason—and because she lied about Chavigny—I believe you should be wary of her. Balked affection is an unruly mount to straddle, and when a woman plans to make a fool of a man because he doesn't pay her any attention, and the man by his wits turns the affair so thatsheis the fool—well, I'll say only that she's likely to cause trouble, especially if she has a Rajput strain in her blood."
Quiet followed. They rolled on toward the hotel. Trent was the first to speak.
"Just how did you do this?"—with a gesture that conveyed more than the speech.
In the semi-dark, unobserved, Kerth smiled.
"Oh, it was easy enough," he drawled. "I determined to have a look at the instructions you received at Sarojini Nanjee's house, there in Benares. I didn't quite fancy the way she gave in to your request to take me along. When we returned to the hotel, I left you for a few minutes, if you recall. During that time I filled an envelope with blank paper, then went to your room and while we were talking, under the pretense of getting a match from your tunic, I exchanged envelopes."
"And you returned it that night?" Trent put in, with a smile.
"Yes, I was your nocturnal visitor. I left on an express for Calcutta that night. When I got there I haunted the environs of the old mandarin's establishment. The night you called I hid in the court—back of the house and just behind the room where you two were talking.... Oh, it was easy enough," he repeated.
"What about this?" Trent inquired, indicating the pendant.
"I intended to take a look through your cabin, on general principles, the first night out—and I happened along just as your servant and that other fellow staged their shindy outside your state-room. When you went on deck, I seized the opportunity. I found the pendant under the pillow and took it because I wanted to study the design—and—well, for other reasons, too. I didn't discover the Chavigny alias until later."
"I had the captain search the steerage passengers for it," Trent said.
Kerth laughed. "I know you did—and I caused an inoffensive, fangless cobra to go to his Nirvana by hiding the thing in his gullet. I would have spoken to you on shipboard, but I was afraid of hidden eyes."
That explained the theft of the pendant on theManchester(thus Trent to himself), but who took it the first time, in Benares? Kerth was evidently ignorant of that. Guru Singh was the key to the riddle, and he silently cursed himself for having released him.
"What did you learn about the design?" he pressed on.
"A little," Kerth returned carelessly. "I spent this afternoon at the Bernard Library looking up all sorts of deities. The one on the piece of coral is Janesseron, the Three-eyed God of Thunder—aTibetangod." Then, after a pause: "There may be some significance in the fact that the symbol of the Order is a Tibetan deity, and then, there may not. I've formed a theory, and unless I'm greatly mistaken, you and I have a neat little sprint before we reach the so-called City of the Falcon. And if this city is where I believe it is, why, we.... But I'm anticipating. Anyway, I haven't the time to pawn off my theories upon you. I simply wished to let you know I wasn't in Bombay, and to return the piece of coral."
Another pause before he ventured:
"I suppose you're not at liberty to tell me how you came into possession of that?"—with a motion of his slim hand toward the pendant.
Trent considered, then replied, "Why, yes." And he told of finding Manlove in the ruined temple at Gaya. When he had finished, Kerth whistled softly.
"So!" he commented. "Chavigny at Gaya—but wait! When did I track him to the nativeseraiin Delhi?" He was silent for a moment. "It was Friday," he resumed, "no, Saturday—I remember now. And what day was Captain Manlove murdered?... Monday—the twentieth? You see, then, that Chavigny would have had time to reach Gaya; but how in flaming Tophet did he get out of Delhi? You remember I told you I found blood-stains in his room at theserai.... Hmm. This is a complication. D'ye suppose Chavigny made a mistake—thought Manlove you? Yet why the deuce should he want to put you out of the way?"
A lengthy space of silence followed. Kerth took up the conversation.
"I haven't the slightest idea why you went to that joss-house to-night; however, I'm glad I followed and"—he smiled—"saved one of the eyes of the empire."
"And I'm rather glad you followed, too"—this from Trent drily. "I sha'n't forget. I went there to meet a...." Followed a short description of Hsien Sgam, the Mongol, and an explanation of Trent's purpose at the House of the Golden Joss. Again, as he finished, Kerth whistled.
"Complication upon complication! D 'ye suppose he's one of the Order? I remember seeing him on the boat. What's his object in attempting to murder you? It's obvious that that was his purpose."
"I can't somehow adjust him with the Order," returned Trent. "He seems above that. He's capable of villainy all right—rather exquisite villainy, I imagine—but I can't associate him with thievery and stolen jewels.... Did you see the face of the fellow who tried to kill me?"
Kerth nodded. "It was the priest who took you to that room. Oh, he was shrewd—or rather, the one who directed him! He had a maxim silencer on the revolver; and if I had been two seconds later, you would have had a steel morsel lodged somewhere between your chest and stomach. I didn't dare waste time to explain there; I was afraid there might be others, and two white men in a heathen prayer-house would have as much chance as a pair of bats in hades!" Kerth glanced ahead. "We'll be at your hotel in a few minutes," he announced, "and your shadow might be there, so I think I'll make my exit now. I'm leaving Rangoon to-morrow noon, as I daresay you are, too. I'll manage somehow to see you at Myitkyina."
He thrust one foot out of the gharry, upon the step, and stood there a moment, the reflection from passing lamps upon his stained features. He was smiling his satanic smile—a rather impudent, careless expression.
"I think I shall pay another visit to the House of the Golden Joss," he said. "What you have told me of this Hsien Sgam interests me in him. Good luck, major!"
With a wave of his hand he swung down and disappeared in the street.
When Trent reached the hotel he found Tambusami waiting, with no news of Guru Singh, and the Englishman dismissed the native and went to his room.
As he undressed, the coral pendant lay upon the table before his eyes and he stared at it fascinatedly—stared until the coral blended in with the silver and met his gaze like a monstrous blood-shot orb.... It was hard to believe that Chavigny was at Gaya, that it was the Frenchman who murdered Manlove. Chavigny—Gilbert Leroux. What reason had he to kill Manlove, unless, as he theorized before, the guilty one had been discovered at the bungalow by his victim and in the ensuing struggle the latter was stabbed? Or, as Kerth suggested, he might have mistaken Manlove for Trent, although he could think of no reason why Chavigny should desire his death. And there was Chatterjee—Chatterjee, who died with his secrets.... Chavigny at Gaya! It was incredible. Of course the piece of coral might have been left as false evidence, a blind. But who, other than a member of the Order of the Falcon, would possess the ornament, and would a member of that mysterious band have left the symbol to be found by the police?
Provided Chavigny was the murderer, would it not be natural for him to take steps to recover the pendant, once he discovered its loss? Perhaps it was he who stole it in Benares. But that did not seem likely, in the light of Guru Singh's actions. For why should Chavigny wish to return the oval to him? If....
Then Trent had an inspiration. Was the attempt to kill him at the House of the Golden Joss the work of Chavigny? But what of the Buddhist priest? Chavigny might have bought him; paid him to kill Trent. To go further, it was possible that Chavigny was on theManchester. Chavigny, an illusive personality, ever at his heels, like his own shadow! There was something intriguing in the thought. And it was plausible—plausible, too, that Chavigny, the notorious Chavigny, was the Falcon, the head of that nebulous order.
Theories, Trent concluded—only theories. He locked the pendant in his trunk and switched off the light.
As he lay in darkness, while lizards chirruped on the floor and the ceiling, a sense of cavernous aloneness enveloped him. It thronged with poignant thoughts. Manlove.... It seemed an age since he stood in the bungalow at Gaya that last morning. So much had happened since then—much to distract. Yet always, niched away in the subconscious, was the hurt, wearing deeper with a bruising force. Trent's nature was sterile for the average seeds of intimate kinships, but now and then—not more than half a dozen times in his life—one fell upon fertile soil. There was something fresh and strong in his association with Manlove. (An essence thrice sweet in the memory.) Their personalities seemed to have entered into a mystic communion of comradeship—a bond not of words nor demonstrations, but feeling. That was why he felt so keenly the bruise of it.
Gone, too, was the woman who had materialized from his world-scroll into intimate palpability, bringing the rich gift of her presence—and leaving the bitter-sweet pangs of her departure. He would find her again, for she had fixed herself in the inner-penetralia of his being. But the period of waiting!... Waiting—love's Gethsemane since the first simian creatures battled in the wildernesses of a still-hot planet.
As he lay there, reflecting upon these things, he experienced an ache, a sensation of isolation, that was reminiscent of his boyhood—of a night when a shadowy being of antiseptics and sick-room odors roused him from sleep with the announcement that the man who had fathered him into existence was no longer in the house.
It dulled only when a sleepy intoxication came over him, and as he surrendered to it he visualized, in a dim, hazy way, a falcon, and it lay in a welter of blood.
At noon the next day Trent drove to the station where Tambusami, having attended to his luggage, was waiting. The Englishman looked for Kerth among the travelers on the platform, but saw no one who even resembled him. However, he reflected as the train pulled out, Kerth might have changed his identity and passed within a foot of him without his knowledge!
When Pegu lay behind, he shifted his attention from the "Rangoon Gazette" to the endless panorama of paddy fields and scrub jungle. Yet he could not altogether divert himself. Invariably the landscape faded, to be replaced by the recollection of some recent scene: the court of the joss-house; the ride along Strand Road with Euan Kerth. But more frequently his mind was possessed with an image of starry luster and russet hair. The memory of Dana Charteris occurred suddenly, unexpectedly, in the very midst of other thoughts. She seemed a central force about which musings, retrospections and quandaries revolved. He found himself separating from their short association certain incidents and looking back upon them as through stained glass. He pictured her under the black and gilt scroll in the Chinese quarter; in the dusk of the Bengali theater; in the bow of theManchester, beneath the sprinkled flame of tropic stars. These portraits arranged themselves in a mosaic—an exquisite inlay of romance. Romance. He clung to the word. "The doctrine of Romance and Adventure—" She had said that "... in mellower years, to close your eyes and dream of wandering in the 'Caves of Kor' or the time you spent on a pirate island." She had the spirit of youth eternal—youth with its orient mirages. He was having the Great Adventure now. Soon it would be over. And then? Back to the old routine—medicines and sun-scorched villages. (The thought was new, strange. Had he ever been a doctor? It seemed so long ago!) But in the years to come, at night, over his pipe, he could dream of it all. The memory of things—that was life's recompense for taking them away.
Shortly after seven o'clock he arrived in Mandalay. As he left his carriage, he saw a familiar figure—Kerth, scar, drooping eyelid and all; saw him again, an hour and a half later, when he boarded the Myitkyina train.
A perceptible coolness invaded the carriage that night, and when Trent awakened in the morning he looked out upon jade-green hills. The scenery, as well as the people who stood on the railway platforms, had changed. Great fern trees and immense clumps of bamboo grew on the hillsides.
Evening was pouring its dusky glamour over the world, and the far, misty ranges of the China frontier had purpled when Trent left the train at Myitkyina, the terminus of the Burma Railway. He caught a glimpse of Kerth hurrying away in the twilight as he despatched Tambusami to the P. W. D. Inspection Bungalow to see if quarters were available there; and, after numerous inquiries, took himself into the bazaar, to the shop of Da-yak, the Tibetan.
The latter proved to be a languid person with a bluelungyitwisted about his hips. He inspected Trent with narrow, inky-black eyes, and led him into a back-room that stank of the hundred nameless odors of the bazaar. There he glanced lazily, indifferently, at the coral symbol that the Englishman showed him.
"We expected you yesterday,Tajen," he announced indolently, in atrocious English; and Trent wondered who the "we" included. "I am instructed to tell you to go to the Inspection Bungalow and wait. I will call for you later in the evening; in an hour, perhaps."
Which concluded the interview.
Trent decided immediately that Da-yak, the Tibetan, was of no consequence, merely a mouthpiece.
He returned to the station, where he had arranged to meet Tambusami. There he waited for at least fifteen minutes. The native was in a high state of excitement when he finally arrived.
"Guru Singh is here, O Presence!" he reported. "I saw him down by the river. He was in a boat, going upstream. I cried out to him and called him a liar and a thief, and he told me I was a bastard! The swine! He knew well I could not get my hands on him!"
"And you let him get away?" Trent demanded.
"What could I do, Presence? There was a Gurkha nearby, but I knew the Presence did not want the police to interfere with his business. Think you I would have let him go after he called methat, could I have prevented it?"
Trent wasn't so sure; but he only said:
"Very well. What about quarters?"
"All is arranged at the bungalow, Presence."
Thinking of what Tambusami had told him, Trent left the station, the native at his heels. He wondered. Did Guru Singh's presence mean that the woman of the cobra-bracelet was in Myitkyina?
Just about the time Trent reached the P. W. D. Bungalow, a street-juggler with a scar across one cheek and a drooping eyelid made his way through the main road of the bazaar. His good eye was very active—as was the other, for that matter, although less visible to passers-by—and he swung along with his head cocked at a rakish angle, pack slung over his shoulder, flashing smiles at the copper-skinned Kachin and Maru girls.
Singling out a shop where boiled frogs, sweetmeats and confectionery were displayed to the mercy of insects, he approached, and, after purchasing a delectable morsel cooked inghee(which he deposited in his pocket instead of his stomach), he announced to the spare Burman who lounged in the doorway:
"I go to Bhamo to-morrow, O vender of sweets, and I must take my brother a present. Canst thou suggest what it shall be?" Then, before the other could answer, he went on: "I might buy an umbrella—or, better still, a turban-cloth."
The Burman came out of his lassitude enough to say that he sold very beautiful turban-cloth, and much cheaper than any other merchant in the bazaar.
"I want a nice one," he of the drooping eyelid asserted; "a white one, spotted like a cheetah, or perhaps yellow."
The shopkeeper had none such as he described, he said, but he had some fine cloth of red hue that came from a shop in Sule Pagoda Street, in distant Rangoon.
"Ah!" exclaimed the juggler. "I have been to Rangoon. It is a great city. Let me see the cloth of red."
In the course of bargaining, he said:
"Tell me, O wise one, is there in the bazaar a merchant who bears the name of Da-yak?"
The Burman grunted that there was and waved his hand toward a lighted doorway not far away. "There!"
"Ah!" exclaimed the juggler again. And he added, by way of explanation, that at Waingmaw, whence he had come, a friend warned him against buying at the shop of Da-yak, who was a cheat.
"All Tibetans are cheats," was the Burman's comment.
"Has he been here long, robbing you of your trade?" the juggler pursued.
"Oh, not very long," was the languid answer; "since about the time of the casting of the bell in the pagoda last year. But his shop is not half so nice as mine. He is a dirty wild-man." Then: "Didst thou say, O traveller, that thou wouldst take the turban cloth for six rupees and two annas?"
"Nay, I am a poor man. For five rupees, O generous one."
At length the turban-cloth was purchased, for five rupees, and the juggler moved on. In front of the shop of Da-yak he paused, looked about tentatively, then strode to a spot just outside the door. There he unslung his pack. From a basket he produced a brass pot with a thin neck. Squatting, back to the wall, he brought forth a flute and began to play.
At first the music attracted only children. But before many minutes girls and men joined the circle about the juggler, and, as the group enlarged, a sinuous black body rose from the brass pot; rose and dropped back, like a geyser; rose again and slithered to the ground where it curled its tail into an O, and, with head lifted, lolled to the delirious piping.
"A-ie!" sighed the onlookers with approval—and drew back a step.
Presently a head was thrust out of the doorway of Da-yak's shop—as the juggler did not fail to observe—and, following the head, its owner. He squatted and indifferently watched the proceedings.
After the cobra had danced, the juggler performed many feats of magic, to the delight of the simple hill-people. When his repertory was exhausted, the audience moved on and he found himself alone with the squatting Tibetan merchant.
"I am a stranger here, O brother," announced the juggler, pouring the coins from his bowl into his hands and shifting them from one palm to the other with a musicalclink-clink. "Canst thou tell me where I will find a bed for to-night?"
In the dim light the juggler studied Da-yak's features—thin lips, high, thin cheeks, and mere slits for eyes.
"Thou canst find a bed of grass under any tree," was his reply, covertly watching the coins.
"Nay! Am I an animal that I should lie upon the ground when I sleep? Hast thou no room? I am a story-teller and for a bed I will tell thee a tale that thou hast never heard before!"
"Nay, juggler, I have no time for stories."
"Then thy children?"
"I have none."
"Perhaps thy wife?"
"Nor have I a wife, either."
The juggler grunted. "Art thou a celibate that thou hast no wife?" He leaned closer, peering into the Tibetan's face. "Indeed, O merchant, thy face is like that of a lama I knew in Simla!"
Da-yak's slitty little eyes opened wider, showing small, bleary pupils.
"What is it to thee, O scarred one, if I have a wife or not?"
To himself the juggler admitted that it meant more than a little, but to the Tibetan he said: "Scarred indeed, and afflicted of an eye! Seest thou this?"—touching the scar. "It is a mark left by a Dugpa's knife—in Tibet. I was headman for a Burra Sahib who traveled from Sikkhim, which is a far country which thou hast never heard of, to the holy city of Lhassa. From thence we went down, across many mountains, into Hkamti Long and the Kachin country. At Fort Hertz we followed the mule-road. That was many years ago."
"Thou dost lie," accused Da-yak. "No white man has ever crossed from Tibet into the country of the Hkamtis. There is no road there—"
"Then whereisthe road, indeed, if thou dost know?" interrupted the juggler.
"Did I say there was a road?" flared the Tibetan. "There is none."
"Thereisa road, if a road it can be called! For did not I travel it? By the Four Truths of Gaudama Siddartha, it is thou who dost lie!"
Da-yak's eyes burned with anger. "Why dost thou swear by the Lord Gaudama?"
Inwardly, the juggler smiled. "Why do rivers run down to the sea, thou dolt?" he asked—and made a mystic sign, a sign that is known to few.
Da-yak's eyes were no longer burning. But his inky-black pupils moved nervously under the lids.
"Thou dost make strange signs, O evil eye," he muttered. "How do I know that thou hast not summonedNatsto beset my shop and drive away those who might buy?" He rose. "Go find a bed in the stink where thou dost belong!"
The juggler, too, rose. He spat contemptuously.
"Kala Nag!" he hissed; which means, "black snake."
And, picking up his pack, he swaggered off—while Da-yak, with an uneasy glance over his shoulder, entered his shop. However, the juggler did not go far. In the darkness of a nearby alley, from which point he could observe anyone going in or out of Da-yak's house, he sat down to wait. But not for long. Scarcely had five minutes passed before the Tibetan emerged from the shop and, like a shadowy cinema-figure, hurried off in the gloom.
The juggler got up. He smiled—for, figuratively speaking, he possessed a key to certain locked doors.
Trent was on the veranda, smoking, when Da-yak presented himself at the Inspection Bungalow, and without a word he rose and accompanied the Tibetan.
"We go to the river,Tajen," the native informed him briefly.
A walk past lighted bungalows and well-kept compounds brought them to the river—the mighty Irrawaddi, flowing down from mountain heights, past dead kingdoms and into tropical seas. A slim saber of a moon was swinging up over the hills as they came within sight of the stream. It showered the water with a wealth of silver coins that collected into a band, and, shimmering and coruscating, stretched from the remote shore to the sharply etched Kachin rafts and country-boats beneath the Myitkyina bank.
Into one of the smaller boats Da-yak led Trent. Two boatmen, both in turban, jacket andlungyi, stepped lazily into the craft, and one shoved off while the other crawled forward and plied his paddle, guiding the boat into midstream and turning its prow with the current. The smell of the jungle, warm, fragrant odors, hung in the air, and the rhythmic dip of the paddle, with the sucking sounds produced by the water as it slapped the sides, only italicized the silence.
Trent, lounging among cushions amidships, let his eyes follow Da-yak, who moved forward and took the paddle from the boatman. The latter, with a murmured word, rose and crawled toward Trent.
"I would sit beside you, Sahib," he announced in a soft voice.
Trent stared—and the boatman laughed, a sweet laugh that rippled low in the throat; laughed, and sank upon the pillows beside the man whose breathing had grown a trifle faster as he inhaled the perfume of sandalwood.
"You are surprised?" asked Sarojini Nanjee, quite pleased with the effect of her sudden appearance.
He smiled. "You are clever."
The woman clasped her hands behind her head and regarded him. The night made secret certain of her features, for whereas the moon shone full upon her face, softening the contours, her eyes were hid in dim mystery. Thus, when she looked at him, (as she was doing every second) he could not see her eyes. Which seemed to please her, for she lay back upon the cushions, smiling, an insolently boyish figure.
"Did not you find Tambusami an excellent bearer?" was her next query—and he imagined her eyes were mocking him.
"Quite"—rather drily.
"Yet he cannot equal your Rawul Din," she went on. "He is a perfect example of careful tutoring."
She leaned closer, so close that the warmth of her breath was on his lips, and her eyes, like black opals, burned near to his.
"I wonder, man of wits, how many bearers would think to do what your Rawul Din did, that night at my house?" Then she laughed and drew away; and the musical peals were reminiscent of shattered crystals. "Ishouldbe angry—for why did you spy upon me?"
"I don't understand"—this from him.
"No?"—with irony. "Am I so dull that I do not understand when I find a pool of wine under a divan? Oh, he was clever, very clever; but I was more clever!"
Trent wondered how much she knew. He felt sure she could not have guessed the truth, for the discovery that Delhi was keeping a finger on her would undoubtedly have angered her.
"Surely you would like to know how I came here," she announced. "Why not inquire?"
"I was instructed to ask no questions," he reminded.
She nodded that queer little nod of hers.
"You obey well—when you wish to. But we have no time now to talk of the past; suffice to say I come and go like the wind, when and where I will, and depending upon no man."
She settled deeper among the cushions and watched him—watched him half-humorously, as though he belonged to her and she was undecided what to do with him next. He realized she was waiting for him to speak, that she wanted to find out what he had learned since their meeting at Benares. Therefore he resolved to keep silent, not that what he knew was of any significance, but because uncertainty on her part was his best weapon. So he drew into his shell and waited. When she could no longer endure it, she said:
"Now that you are here, have you no thought of what you are to do?"
"There's a platitude about anticipation," was his reply. "Preconceived ideas never are correct."
"You, of course, suspected Myitkyina was not the end of your journey?"
"Then it isn't?"
He could not see her eyes, but he knew she was looking at him closely.
"Did not his Excellency Li Kwai Kung speak of certain terraces, each a step toward enlightenment?"
He nodded. "Is the City of the Falcon the next?"
"Ultimately," she modified.
"When do I start—or dowe?"
She shook her head. "Youstart to-morrow." Then, following a pause: "Previous to this you have been under my direct observation and protection." That made him smile to himself. "I can no longer do that. Certain threads will be placed in your hands and you will be left to untangle them. And it will not be easy. That is why I chose you."
The boatman had ceased paddling, and they drifted with the current in silence that was like a presence. Now and then a gibbon called from the bank; frequently fish leaped above the water, breaking the moon's path into silver fragments.
"Oh, it is far from easy!" she continued. "You will pass through a stretch of country where no Englishman has been. There will be discomforts—yes, dangers. The jungle knows how to torment white men. Death in a hundred guises waits for the unwary; death in the poison swamps, in the bush; death everywhere!" She straightened up, and her hand closed over his. "There will be times when you will curse me for having sent you! Yet in the end there is reward! Glory! Honor! Your name will sweep from one end of the empire to the other!" Then she drew a sharp breath, for she divined what was in his mind. "You believe I lie? But I speak the truth, before all the gods! Yonder"—with a wave of her hand—"beyond the moon, it lies, this city where the Falcon nests with the treasures of Ind!"
"You mean the jewels passed through Myitkyina?" he questioned, trying to speak casually, as though it were a spontaneous query rather than a studied interrogation.
"Ah! Did I say so?" she fenced. "Nay! I will not answer that! Perhaps they did; perhaps they did not." (Trent was more inclined to believe the latter.) "However, they are there, beyond the moon, and every one shall be returned, down to the smallest pearl!"
It sounded rather preposterous to him. How could this thing be accomplished by two people? Was she playing with him? She'd hardly dare. She might risk it, were he alone, but with the Government of India behind him a false move on her part would be her own defeat. Yet he could not disassociate her from some hidden, not altogether pleasant, purpose.
"Aye!" she resumed. "You and I"—and her fingers tightened about his hand—"shall do what the Secret Service could never do! We shall go where they could never go! We shall understand things that they could never understand! We are blessed of the gods, you and I! We shall pluck the Falcon's pinions; rob his nest. And, oh, it will be a great jest, a very great jest! If you only knew, you would laugh with me! But not yet. It would spoil the secret to tell it now."
"Yet you can tell me now," he suggested, "how far this Falcon's nest is?"
She inclined her head. "Yes, I can tell you that now." And her answer was as fantastic as the city itself: "It is nearly eight hundred miles."
Inwardly, he started. A moment passed before he spoke.
"Nearly eight hundred miles," he repeated, picturing as accurately as possible a map. "Traveling west of Myitkyina that would take us beyond the Brahmaputra; east, into China—about upper Yunnan or Kweichow; and north—well, the Tibetanborderis three hundred miles from Myitkyina. Which is it: north, east or west?"
"Which seems the most likely? In which of the three regions would the Falcon's nest be in less danger of discovery by blundering British agents?"
He had guessed, but he did not wish to commit himself. He deliberately chose—
"Beyond the Brahmaputra?"
She laughed. "You are no fool. The moment I said nearly eight hundred miles you knew I meant Tibet."
He considered for some time. Then: "That's impossible." Subconsciously, he was thinking of the coral pendant.... Janesseron, a Tibetan god. Nor had he forgotten what Kerth told him in Rangoon.
"What is impossible?"
"Tibet."
She chose to smile at that. Apparently she enjoyed the astonishment that he made no effort to conceal.
"There is a way and a means for everything! Whither goes the elephant when his time is come? Does man know?" She shrugged. "Oh, it is a strange planet, this!"
She drew something white from beneath her jacket—something that crackled as she unfolded it and spread it upon her knees. The moonlight showed him the faint tracery of a map.
"Bend closer," she directed. "See, here is Myitkyina"—her finger rested on a tiny dot. "Above is the confluence of the Irrawaddi. The Mali-hka flows northeast, the 'Nmai-hka northwest. You will follow a route in the triangular space between the two rivers, in a territory where Government surveyors have never been. At the edge of the Duleng country you cross the 'Nmai-hka and go eastward to a town across the Chinese border, in Yunnan. It is called Tali-fang, and is under the administration of a military governor, theTchentai. Just beyond Tali-fang is the Yolon-noi Pass into Tibet. And there"—she touched a blank space in Tibet, in the northwest corner of Kham—"is the City of the Falcon. Its name is Shingtse-lunpo."
That conveyed nothing to Trent. But its situation did. In Tibet, between the sources of the Brahmaputra and the Mekong! It was as incredible as if she had informed him he was to go to the moon. Her figure of speech was not amiss—"Beyond the moon." That territory was as nebulous as the regions of the moon, as weirdly unreal. It was the country toward which Mohut, the explorer, had striven, which Prince Henri d'Orleans had skirted.
"From Myitkyina," he heard Sarojini Nanjee saying, "to Tali-fang, you will be guided by a Lisu; there will be porters, of course. At Tali-fang you must call at theYamenof theTchentai, who will furnish fresh mules and supplies. There you will also exchange your porters and guide for Tibetan caravaneers. A passport is necessary to enter Shingtse-lunpo, but that will be provided. Once inside, you will be upon your own resources."
"As whom does the Falcon know me?" he inserted.
"I am coming to that. He knows you as Tavernake, the jeweler—a childhood friend of mine. The work he expects you to do is to oversee the cutting and resetting of the jewels—a work that you will never do. He will no doubt see you before I do, so guard your tongue. Trust no one unless he comes in my name and has proof."
"Then I shall see you there?"
A nod. "I start to-night, as I must reach Shingtse-lunpo in advance of you. Oh, as I said, I come and go as the wind, when and where I will, and depending upon no man! But I do not go as Sarojini Nanjee.... Just before you reach Tali-fang—it will not be necessary until then—Masein, your Lisu guide, will help you effect a transformation from a white man to a Hindu merchant from Mandalay. White skins are not popular in that region. You speak Hindustani as well as some Hindus, better than others. Avoid the natives as much as possible, for they are not over-fond of any one who is not of their race. If asked whither you go, say to a holy city in Tibet."
Silence settled for a moment after that. They were more than a mile from Myitkyina, and the silver coins still glittered and danced in midstream.
"D'you think," he began at length, "if the Government knew I was going into Tibet, it would approve?"
She shrugged. "Why not? It was understood at Delhi that you were to do as I directed; go wherever I willed."
"Suppose—" But he halted.
"Yes?"
"Suppose I am killed in Tibet?"
"But you will not be."
"You said there would be dangers."
"Yes—but you are a resourceful man."
"Frequently resourceful men are killed. Let us suppose I were murdered in Tibet—by robbers, we'll say. It would place my Government in an awkward position. Could Tibet explain satisfactorily; or would there be a British expedition, resulting in death for hundreds, because of one indiscreet Englishman?"
"Is it indiscreet," she countered, "to recover the jewels?"
He appeared to be considering that. Finally:
"If it were made known that the gems are there, the Government could demand action from the ruling powers of Tibet—or send an expedition."
She laughed. "Do you call that logic? And answer me, impossible one, whoarethe 'ruling powers' of Tibet, as you choose to call them? The Dalai Lama? Or the British Raj? Answer me that! And as for the expedition:weare the expedition. In this case the wits of two are worth more than a hundred Lee-Metfords. Guile! Guile is the stronger weapon—and it does not attract so much attention as guns!"
Again silence. They were still drifting with the current. Behind, in the moon's path, was a tiny blotch—another boat. He watched it curiously. Seeing his inquisitive look, the woman spoke.
"No doubt it is Tambusami with your luggage; I instructed him to fetch it from the Inspection Bungalow and follow. Yonder," she explained, with a gesture downstream, "is your camp. There you will remain until dawn. I shall accompany you to the camp, as I have further instructions to give your guide."
Questions bred in Trent's brain and clamored for utterance, but he pressed them back. For her to know he was anxious was the surest way to learn nothing. Therefore he held his tongue, reflecting upon what she had told him.
He was suspicious of her promises. She was not a type to volunteer service to a government without some personal motive. And of her motives he was doubtful. There was a scheme of her own interrelated and under the surface. Too, he felt that by this latest move, in having his luggage brought from the Inspection Bungalow, she had thrown Kerth off the trail.
He extracted cigarettes from his pocket, for he felt that a smoke would clarify his thoughts; passed the case to her. She took one with languorous grace and bent nearer for him to light it. As the match flared, he saw her eyes, again like black opals, close to his. But he learned no secrets from them; they were as baffling, as crowded with mysteries, as the black jungles ahead of him.
"There is much more to be explained," she said, tilting her head and expelling smoke from her nostrils; "certain things to be ignorant of which would surely lead to trouble...."
As they drifted on she talked, cigarette in one hand, the other resting upon the map. Before long Da-yak plied his paddle, sending little ripples over the stars that lay reflected like silver pebbles in the river. The moon rode high above the hills, a phantom dugout, and the collar of silver coins spread in extravagant display. The boatman in the rear crooned a song of ancient Hkamti—of a Sawbwa who loved a Maru maiden and forsook his kingdom for the dark-eyed daughter of delight. And Trent, listening, felt himself drawn back to the night when he stood in the bow of theManchester, in the realm of the stars, and Romance whispered an old, old tale.
The spell did not leave until the boat grated upon a sandbank, close to a dark tangle of forest, and Da-yak sprang out. Then Sarojini Nanjee put away the map, rose and took Trent's hand.
"Your camp is only a short distance beyond the trees," she told him.
As he stepped out of the boat Da-yak made a sound like a night-bird, and a moment later there came an answering cry from the dark thicket.
When the juggler—he of the scar and the drooping eyelid—left the alley in the bazaar, it was to follow Da-yak. At the P. W. D. Bungalow he saw a sahib join the Tibetan—which was what he expected. From there he tracked them to the river, and stood upon the high bank watching as they cast off and glided downstream.
When they were well under way he sauntered down to the huddle of boats, and, choosing one, dropped his pack in the bow and kicked the Kachin who lay sleeping in the bottom.
"Wake up, lazy one; I would go to Waingmaw."
The boatman, thus awakened, looked up with unconcealed hostility. Seeing a native, and a ragged one at that, he let go a stream of oaths that, fortunately for him, were not understood by the juggler. However, the latter imagined from the tone in which the words were delivered that he was being neither praised nor glorified.
"This for thy trouble, O boatman," said the juggler, choosing to ignore the oaths and thrusting a banknote within view of the Kachin's eyes.
The boatman, not entirely appeased yet too avaricious to allow a mere insult to stand between him and the banknote, pushed off, and the juggler seated himself in the stern, both to steer and to watch the craft ahead.
"Do not gain on yonder boat," he instructed when they were in midstream, "nor lose. If thou hast a conscience that thou canst smother, then this night will indeed be profitable for thee, Kachin."
The juggler said this knowing well that his every word would be repeated to all the boatmen in Myitkyina, and that, after traveling through devious channels, they would reach the bazaar, greatly magnified en route. For what purpose a juggler with a drooping eyelid had followed a boat down the river could only be surmised—but bazaars surmise much.
"Know you those who are in that boat?" he continued, baiting gossip.
The Kachin grunted—which was intended as a negative answer.
"The boatmen are no friends of thine?"
Another grunt. "The boat belongs to Kin Lo," the Kachin volunteered, chewing on an opium pellet. "But some stranger hired it for the night." And he added, by way of personal suggestion, "They paid well."
This information pleased the juggler, for he smiled and drew out a cheroot and lighted it.
"Aye!" he growled. "They paid well, did they? Well, why should they not? Robbers! Sons of swine! Listen, Kachin—in yonder boat is my enemy. From Mandalay I have followed him, and ere the moon sinks I shall avenge the wrongs he committed against my house!"
"A-a-ah!" sympathized the Kachin, forgetting the rude awakening—they are as eager for scandal, these wild men of the hills, as the most polished Englishman who sits beneath a punkah in Rangoon Cantonment.
Whereupon the juggler recited a tale of imaginary woes and wrongs that did justice to his alleged art of story-telling. Myitkyina's lights had long dropped away behind when the juggler saw the leading boat turn, cross the path of moonlight and glide shoreward.
"Ah!" he muttered. "See, Kachin, he thinks to elude me, the swine!"
A glance behind showed him another craft—a mere speck on the expanse of the river. For a moment he was undecided what to do, then, with an exclamation of satisfaction, he stripped himself but for a perineal band.
"Listen well, Kachin," he admonished, creeping forward. "It is not wise for my enemy to see me coming ashore; therefore I shall swim, like a crocodile. Turn back to Myitkyina. There hurry to the bungalow of Colonel Warburton Sahib—you know where it is? Tell him he is wanted at the landing immediately. He will go."
"But my money," objected the Kachin. "How do I know you will come back?"
"Dost thou not see, O fool, that I have left my clothes and my pack? Will not I return for them?"
The boatman was not positive of that.
"Well, then, I will give you half now," compromised the juggler, taking a wallet from the inside pocket of his discarded jacket. The Kachin watched with crafty eyes to see if the wallet would be returned to the pocket, but the juggler thrust it carefully under his turban.
"Lend me thydah," he directed. "And do as I said. Thou shalt be well rewarded for thy trouble."
With the knife gripped between his teeth, he slipped over the side into the current. He made no sound as he swam away from the boat; only his moving head and the ripples in his wake told of swift, underwater strokes.
The river was cool—old wine to the muscles—and he made for the bank several hundred feet above the white stretch of sand where the other craft had landed. Not until he was very close to the shore could he touch bottom. There he halted, head above the surface, eyes straining to penetrate the gloom further along. He could make out the faint blur of the boat and a single figure huddled in the stern. A look toward midstream showed him his craft fast being absorbed by the darkness. Behind it, coming from Myitkyina, was another boat.
He waited for events to mature. When the latter craft, which he could see contained two forms, came abreast of him, midstream, it turned shoreward and a few minutes later touched the sandbank near the boat that he had followed. He could dimly make out the two forms as they carried several bulky objects ashore and vanished in the jungle—leaving the solitary figure huddled in the rear of one of the boats.
The juggler smiled to himself and struck out, swimming easily with the current. Less than twenty yards from the boat he submerged, propelling himself forward until yellow sparks reeled before him; then he buoyed himself up.
The two country-boats loomed close by. His heart beat a tattoo against his breast as he waited, feet upon the pebbly bottom, to see if his approach had been heard. Apparently it had not, for the man—a native boatman from his appearance—lounged in the rear seat, his body slouched forward.
After a brief hesitation the juggler (his eyelid no longer drooping) took thedahfrom between his teeth and moved slowly, cautiously to the rear of the boat. It was shallower there; the water barely reached his arm-pits and his chin was level with the back of the craft. The man had not stirred; he was evidently asleep, the juggler thought. The forest that met the sandbank was silent but for the whirr of cicadas.
For a full moment the juggler stood motionless. When he moved it was quickly—and before the native had time to realize what had occurred, he was seized and jerked backward over the stern. If he cried out, the water smothered the sound. But what he failed to do in noise, he made up for in activity. He squirmed and wriggled, his legs and arms thrashing about in vain effort to wrest himself from the grasp of his sudden assailant. But the juggler had the advantage of surprise—and a firm hold on the native's neck—and he brought the hilt of thedahdown upon the latter's skull. The native relaxed—sank with a gurgle.... The juggler lifted him. Assured that he was only unconscious, he dragged him to the sandbank, and there, breathing heavily, sank on his knees.
The native, like the juggler, had a beardless face and was naked but for loincloth and turban. The latter was small, a mere rag twisted around his head. Therefore, the juggler told himself with the darkness as his ally he might easily pass for the other—for a short while at least. And the defeat of empire has been accomplished in less than an hour.
He quickly stripped the man, then cut his own turban into strips and gagged and bound the unconscious one. When this was done, he caught the fellow under the arms and dragged him several yards down the bank. There, carefully selecting a spot in the undergrowth where he was not likely to be soon found, he hid him. Retracing his steps to the boat, he sat down in the stern to wait.
Indeed, he reflected, his kismet looked upon him with favor.