YELLOW 
 MEN 
 
 CtfJO 
 
 OLD 
 
 OUVERNCUR
 
 3 1822 01137 8155 
 
 I II II I II II " v - PS 
 
 I II II * / 
 
 7 QH CC ^ --V . 

 
 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD
 
 YELLOW MEN AND 
 GOLD 
 
 BY 
 
 GOUVERNEUR MORRIS 
 
 Author of " The Voice in the Rice" 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 
 1921
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1910, BY 
 THE RIDGWAY COMPANY 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1911, By 
 DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
 
 To 
 JOHN O HARA COSGRAVE 
 
 MY DEAR COSGRAVE : 
 
 Far be it from me to accuse you of having written 
 "Yellow Men and Gold," but if it had not been for 
 you, the yarn might never have got into print. To 
 your long memory and to your taste for adventure 
 must some of the bloodshed in this volume be laid. 
 It was your patience and judgment that gave Frank 
 Norris s " Moran of the Lady Letty " to an admiring 
 world, and now, as the saying is, you must " pay for 
 your fun." 
 
 Norris Morris. Oh, what a falling off is there, 
 my countrymen ! 
 
 Sir, you have been a good friend to me a wise 
 friend, a generous friend, an engaging friend. I owe 
 you a wing of my house, and there s a room of this 
 (with bath and sun, and a magnolia tree brushing the 
 window) which I propose to pay back whenever you 
 care to take it for yours. 
 
 My gratitude and admiration do not sufficiently 
 show in the quality of this book. Do not look for 
 fruit among the leaves. Believe only that the dedi 
 cating heart is sound. 
 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 GOUVERNEUR MORRIS. 
 AIKEN, S. C., Dec. 9, 1910.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I How SUCCESS RUINED ME .... 1 1 
 
 II THE MURDER IN THE GULLY ... 19 
 
 III THE SPOTTED STONE 26 
 
 IV THE CREW-MAN S WALLET .... 34 
 V THE OWNERS OF THE CALLIOPE . . 41 
 
 VI I "Do" THE TOWN 52 
 
 VII BESSIE 59 
 
 VIII LICHEE 67 
 
 * IX BESSIE S STORY 73 
 
 X Two SIDES OF A RESCUE .... 86 
 
 XI MRS. CUNNINGHAM 94 
 
 XII MAGELLAN AT LAST 108 
 
 XIII CHANG GEOLOGISES 115 
 
 XIV JERRY TOP 122 
 
 XV SOME OF Us Go TREASURE HUNTING 128 
 
 XVI THE AMBUSH 133 
 
 XVII A REPRISAI 140 
 
 XVIII I RETURN TO THE SHANTUNG. . . 147
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XIX AN EXCHANGE 156 
 
 XX GUIDING THE ENEMY 167 
 
 XXI A RACE 175 
 
 XXII A RESCUE 180 
 
 XXIII THE WHITE FLAG AGAIN . ... 187 
 
 XXIV TERMS 195 
 
 XXV CARMEN GIVES ADVICE . . . . 210 
 
 XXVI AT SEA AGAIN 219 
 
 XXVII DON PHILLIP EMANUEL ESQUADA 224 
 
 XXVIII WAITING 233 
 
 XXIX SPIRITS OF LAVENDER 238
 
 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD
 
 CHAPTER 
 ONE 
 
 HOW SUCCESS 
 RUINED ME 
 
 As a schooner among the South Islands, heel 
 ing to the honest Trade, skims unaffectedly 
 from port to port, asking but small room of the 
 sea and intent only upon her narrow destiny 
 and little interests; so, I know well, ought a 
 narrative of adventure, treasure-seeking and 
 violent meetings of men, to start, to proceed 
 and to end. Yet from the very veraciousness 
 of those events about to be related, it seems 
 necessary to begin cumbersomely; as if the 
 vessel to manoeuvre were a three-decker, the 
 wind baffling and the channel, between harbor 
 and open sea, tortuous and involved. And 
 there will not be any plain sailing until well 
 after the murder in the gully and the exami 
 nation of the crew-man s wallet. 
 
 I had determined while still in those gawky 
 teens, from which so far as concerns locomo 
 tion I shall never emerge, to be an author. And 
 I wrote from that period until my thirtieth 
 year with assiduous patience and distinguished 
 unsuccess. I saw the closest friends of my
 
 12 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 youth crawling but always upward upon 
 the muddy slopes of banking and brokerage; 
 coming into dazzling legacies, marrying wealth 
 ily, and steadily thickening about the waist. 
 But for me those fifteen years had been devil 
 ish lean, and hard to bear: hardest to bear 
 were the successes of others who wrote even 
 worse than I; and I have thought (oh, in bit 
 terness if you like, and in envy) that to be a 
 successful author it is necessary only to be 
 heavy, involved, filled to the brim with misin 
 formation, pompous and prudishly afraid of 
 naked words. 
 
 I had private means (the meanest kind) until 
 I was twenty-seven; then, luckily, pigs of 
 mine that went to market were bought by 
 the butcher, slaughtered, gutted, debristled, 
 adorned with greens and offered as honest 
 pork to the very hungry. As the difficulties 
 of raising pigs grew, so did the market for 
 them, and the butchers paid generously enough. 
 And I skimped from the first of one month to 
 the first of the next. But to have laboured with 
 courage and devotion for fifteen years, to have 
 remained in love during that whole period with 
 all of life and with one girl, and at the end of 
 it to be still skimping, must furnish the stoutest 
 stomach with the food of discouragement.
 
 13 
 
 During my thirtieth year, and not many 
 months after a first real success with the 
 public, I allowed hope to die out in my breast 
 for a little interval; and love, which is the 
 same thing. I said good-by to my first mem 
 ory of her, and to my last; to that mischie 
 vous rolling ball of femininity in a blue and 
 white blanket coat, burbling and prattling, that 
 I had toted, closely hugged, in my thin boy 
 arms; to that later picture of her, wonder 
 fully slender, in frosty white, with a great 
 black hat, and innumerable little terriers that 
 dogged her steps across a lawn set with dande 
 lions (as the heavens with stars) and looked 
 up into her face. She had in one hand a pair 
 of pruning-shears, for we had said good-by, 
 and it was in her mind to comfort me \vith 
 a rose. 
 
 As my train crawled and halted and halted 
 and crawled through the snow-sheds into Cali 
 fornia, the magazine containing my two-page 
 " Tale of a Lady s Hat " was put on sale, and 
 I had not been a month in San Francisco with 
 out learning that on the whole the world 
 was the merrier for the trifle, and that, in 
 the telling American, I had " made a hit." 
 
 Believing upon this earnest that I could 
 henceforth and forever face a greater em-
 
 14 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 barrassment of bills, I went to housekeeping 
 in the little village of San Mateo. There was 
 for house a one-story bungalo\v that seemed 
 to have been built, walls, roof and chimney, 
 of cloth-of-gold roses and that stood in a 
 seven-eighths acre of almonds and English 
 walnuts planted in alternation. The tiny estate 
 was bounded on the north, or roadside, by 
 scarlet passion vines and sweet-peas, on the 
 east (toward the village) by a hedge of helio 
 trope eight feet high, on the west by honey 
 suckle that concealed all but the white-roses 
 roof of Mr. Carrol s house, and on the south 
 by an abrupt, dry and stonily lined gully that 
 had once been the San Mateo River, now 
 dammed many miles above to be a reservoir. 
 To the farther side of the gully came a great 
 screen of bay trees, live-oak, buckeyes and 
 underwood a boundary of the great Bird 
 ranch, and containing in its immediate midst 
 the hallowed and periwinkled ground where, 
 as the monument solemnly testifies, rested from 
 
 1852-1867 
 The Body of the First Bird 
 
 (under which the species had been designated 
 by the pencil of some Iconoclast as the 
 "Dodo"), and where continues to rest, dur-
 
 HOW SUCCESS RUINED ME 15 
 
 ing the heat of the day, a vast flock of tame 
 quail. 
 
 My cook, housemaid, butler, chambermaid, 
 gardener and occasional adversary at a quiet 
 game of cards was a Chinaman named Fong, 
 who washed himself all over with soap four 
 times a day, owned seventeen tooth-brushes, 
 and smoked opium every afternoon from five- 
 thirty to six-fifteen. He was a practical, sav 
 ing man, and with my own eyes I have seen 
 quail, of the Bird s tame flock, cross the gully, 
 intent upon a trail of wheat, hop solemnly up 
 the steps into our very kitchen, and emerge 
 no more. 
 
 My life, for some months wonderfully happy 
 and hopeful, consisted of hard work from nine 
 till one, leisurely walks back into the hills, 
 and an occasional julep with my neighbour Mr. 
 Carrol. But when I had begun once more to 
 send work to the magazines, sure now, after 
 a little success, of a ready market, life began 
 once more to be complicated. For, far from 
 finding a ready market, I found that such a 
 market as I had had was gone struck from 
 the map. One and all the manuscripts came 
 back, and one and all the editors wrote to 
 the effect that the stories were very well 
 capital, indeed but that having set a cer-
 
 tain standard by the " Tale of a Lady s 
 Hat " I must live up to it. " Readers all over 
 the country," wrote one editor, " are infatu 
 ated by that blissful little story, ourselves have 
 laughed over it till we cried, and cried till we 
 laughed. They want more just like that, 
 and you can give them more if you only 
 will." 
 
 At first such letters made me furious; for 
 I neither could write another tale like that 
 of the " Lady s Hat," nor wished to. But 
 when I realised finally that my wares were 
 become absolutely unsalable, though of better 
 quality, I think, than many which I had man 
 aged to sell before, helpless fury yielded by 
 inehes to an empty feeling of despair. Here 
 was I, no longer a beginner, but a man of let 
 ters, who had at least had his success, and who, 
 instead of being assembled and set up thereby, 
 had been broken and cast aside. 
 
 A time came, and with swift strides, when 
 I was unable to pay my bills. And there is, 
 I think, no mental torture so cruel as that 
 even to the half-wav honest. Nor could I 
 
 wf 
 
 think (and I had, I thank God, the courage to 
 try) of any other business upon which I could 
 embark and make a living. I was over six 
 feet high, but without an ounce of strength,
 
 HOW SUCCESS RUINED ME 17 
 
 thin as a rail and grotesquely awkward; pro 
 digiously wanting in mathematics and all the 
 other branches of common sense. I had 
 worked, and failed ; I had loved, and lost ; and 
 still I had the vain wish to hold up my head 
 in the world, while I should remain in it, and 
 to pay my bills. It \vas evident that I must 
 face my creditors one at a time, and humble 
 myself with explanations and promises, and 
 upon that thought I lay awake for whole nights 
 and writhed. It was also evident that common 
 honesty demanded that I turn such talents as 
 I possessed prostitute, and write tales as nearly 
 like that of the " Lady s Hat " as despair and 
 necessity could manage. Once a sharp stickler 
 for the proprieties, I have never, since those 
 hard days, sat in thoughtless judgment upon 
 women who walk the streets. 
 
 Yet I was in worse plight than I knew, for 
 having decided, and taken comfort from the 
 decision, that if my talent must play the light 
 woman it should be cheerfully, I visited an 
 oculist in the city to be refitted with working 
 glasses, and learned, out of an absolutely 
 clear sky in that direction, that if I did not 
 leave books, writing and indoor confinement 
 very strictly alone for a year or more, I might 
 go blind.
 
 18 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 I staggered out of that devil s office with 
 hope dead in me, and love; and alive only a 
 kind of wild hatred of God and man, and the 
 most unmanly and childish self-pity and de 
 spair. I think I was the most self-centred 
 wreck that ever went from San Francisco to 
 San Mateo (and there must have been many 
 after the great earthquake). I think I could 
 have trampled upon a sick child if one had 
 thwarted me. But I hope not. 
 
 I did not at once enter the bungalow, fear 
 ing to face the light, or to see myself in a 
 mirror, but shambled aimlessly among the wal 
 nut and almond trees, until finally I stood upon 
 the edge of the gully, with half a thought to 
 cast myself head-first upon the stones at the 
 bottom. Had the height been sixty feet and 
 sure death, I would have done so. But it was 
 a scant thirty tempting but uncertain. And 
 I fancied myself half-dead only, among the 
 stones, a moaning failure in suicide as in life. 
 It is not sure if I moaned aloud or not ; but it 
 is sure that something did moan at the bottom 
 of the gully; and I started back in a terror the 
 more unreasonable if you consider that I was 
 in the very midst of hobnobbing with self- 
 slaughter.
 
 CHAPTER 
 TWO 
 
 THE MURDER 
 
 IN 
 THE GULLY 
 
 THE silhouette of Fong upon the drawn shade 
 of the kitchen window (in the very act of 
 brushing his teeth) was like a reinforce 
 ment. I shouted loudly for him; then sat 
 down on the edge of the gully, slung my legs 
 over and slipped and scrambled to the bottom. 
 It was too dark down there for definite per 
 ceptions; and as the moaning had ceased, I 
 stood still and at a loss. Nor was it until the 
 light of Pong s lantern shone suddenly into 
 the place that I found my very next step must 
 have been upon the body of a man. 
 
 The heart in the body was beating; but 
 when Fong had descended and brought the 
 lantern close, dreadful stabs were disclosed 
 in its stomach and chest, and the stones 
 among which it lay were amuck with blood. 
 I was not experienced in these realities, but 
 I perceived the approach of death as distinctly 
 as that of an embodied person. 
 
 " Fong," I said excitedly, " go back home
 
 20 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 quick-step and telephone doctor and police 
 man!" 
 
 Fong touched, with a finger like the stem 
 of a much smoked clay pipe, a pocket that 
 had been turned inside out. 
 
 " Dam much rob ! " he said and, turning, 
 made the precipitous ascent with astonishing 
 alacrity. 
 
 Even while attempting to plug with my 
 handkerchief what seemed the deepest and 
 bloodiest stab, I saw that every one of the 
 man s pockets had been turned inside out, 
 and the tail of my eye caught the face of 
 a gold repeater lying between the stones, and, 
 nearer the body, that of Washington from the 
 midst of a greenback. Even in those confused 
 seconds it struck me as odd that these things 
 should have been left behind, if the crime, as 
 the inside-out pockets suggested, had robbery 
 for its motive. I had packed the half of my 
 handkerchief into the wound, with my fore 
 finger, as you pack tobacco into a pipe, when 
 suddenly the man s eyes came open and he said 
 in a wild voice: 
 
 Take it easy, boys they ve cracked ! " 
 
 And he struggled to raise himself. 
 
 It will show the state of mind that I was in 
 to record that I asked him if he was hurt.
 
 THE MURDER IN THE GULLY 21 
 
 But the idiotic query seemed to steady him, 
 and slowly and painfully he brought his eyes 
 to a focus, until they rested on my face. 
 
 " Don t know you," he said quietly. . . . 
 "Thanks" . . . 
 
 I bent close to him and said as clearly as I 
 could : 
 
 "Who did it?" 
 
 "Oh, hell!" he said; but in the merest 
 whisper. " Cut it out. They got me ... 
 it s up the gully under a spotted stone . . . 
 it s yours, my friend, don t know your name. 
 . . . Don t let them get it. ... Burn all pa 
 pers in the wallet except it " With that 
 the reason went clean out of his eyes, and he 
 rose, easily and lightly, to a sitting position, 
 and turning his head as if he saw some one, 
 spoke in the most sarcastic, wearied drawl : 
 
 " Harvey," he said, " you are n t supposed 
 to be helping yourself to ice-cream . . . you 
 are supposed to be rowing number three in the 
 Yale boat "... and then, but in far crisper 
 tones, a note of deep regret in them : Just as 
 you say, Mr. Cook " His eyes closed and 
 his head rolled over on his breast, but to be 
 raised once more with a kind of splendid bold 
 alertness. 
 
 " Give way ! " he cried in a great voice, and
 
 22 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 toppling gently over on his side, his soul slipped 
 from him and was soon, perhaps, in old 
 Charon s boat pulling out from the Stygian 
 shore. 
 
 While I waited with the dead man, my 
 neighbour, Mr. Carrol, attracted doubtless by 
 that great shout of " Give way," came to the 
 edge of the gully. 
 
 That you, Parrish ? " he said. 
 
 " Come down," I said. There s been a 
 murder." 
 
 Carrol, a thick-set, fattish great man, de 
 scended with difficulty and sharp breathing. 
 
 "That s hell, isn t it?" he said. 
 
 " For some person or persons yes," I said. 
 
 Was he dead when you got to him ? " 
 
 " Not quite," I said. " He lived, perhaps, 
 four minutes after I found him." 
 
 "Stuck him in the stomach, didn t they?" 
 said Carrol. "My!" 
 
 He knelt by the corpse and felt of the upper 
 arms, thighs and calves. 
 
 " Lusty brute, was n t he ? " 
 
 "He wasn t a brute," I said; "he was a 
 gentleman and he rowed in the Yale boat - 
 when Bob Cook was coach. He said as 
 much - 
 
 "Said?" exclaimed Carrol, his eyes round
 
 THE MURDER IN THE GULLY 23 
 
 with astonishment. Did he say who did 
 it?" He snapped the question at me like a 
 whip. But I interpreted his tone as that 
 natural to a good citizen upon an occasion of 
 crime. 
 
 " No," I said. 
 
 Carrol passed the back of his hand across 
 his forehead. 
 
 "Too bad! "he said mildly. 
 
 " Yes," I said, " too damned bad! " 
 
 "Did he talk sense?" asked my neighbour 
 suddenly. " Or rave? " 
 
 :< Why," said I, " some of it sounded like 
 sense, but it was n t about sensible things." 
 
 " No dying messages, I suppose ? Just what 
 did he say ? " 
 
 " Nothing important, I fancy," said I. 
 " Something about thanking me for trying to 
 help him." 
 
 " Dying men," said Carrol, " sometimes 
 say very interesting things especially those 
 that have lived rough as this poor cuss has 
 seems to have," he corrected himself. 
 
 And I thought to myself that what the dying 
 crew-man had said about the wallet under the 
 spotted stone was extremely interesting, and 
 much too interesting to be divulged to the first 
 questioner. Indeed the secret, if it was a se-
 
 24 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 cret, or anything but raving, had been given to 
 me for my very own, as God could witness, and 
 if it was worth giving it was possibly worth 
 keeping. So much I perceived logically in my 
 unstrung and nervous state of mind. 
 
 " At first glance," Carrol broke in upon my 
 reflections, " it looks like ordinary robbery 
 but see that watch and that greenback. It 
 looks as if something particular had been 
 wanted does n t it ? " 
 
 " Just what I think," said I. 
 
 " I wonder what? " Carrol mused. 
 
 I thought that I could have given Carrol 
 information on the point. I was mistaken. 
 For at that very moment Carrol knew more 
 about the contents of the crew-man s wal 
 let than I did. But what he did know, 
 much as that was, was not sufficient for his 
 purposes. He sighed, and looked for a long 
 time into the dead man s face. 
 
 " How unnecessary," he said presently, 
 " how damned unnecessary! " 
 
 By some unaccountable freak of rigor mor 
 tis the crew-man s eyes suddenly opened as if 
 worked by springs, and Carrol jerked himself 
 backward as if he had been struck at. 
 
 Talking seemed more comfortable than si 
 lence in the presence of the staring eyes, and I
 
 THE MURDER IN THE GULLY 25 
 
 said, trying to pitch my voice in its natural 
 key: 
 
 " Lucky this is n t the Middle Ages, Carrol. 
 You know they believed that a corpse bled in 
 the presence of its murderer, and opened its 
 eyes, and went through all sorts of dumb- 
 crambo accusations." 
 
 " I never heard of the eye part," said Carrol, 
 and he drew a deep breath. 
 
 " Yes," I said. " But just before the eyes 
 opened a lot of blood welled suddenly out of 
 one of those cuts. It nearly gave me a fit 
 I thought for a second it was something alive. 
 It looked like a mouse coming out of its hole." 
 
 "Don t say that sort of thing!" said Car 
 rol. " I m feeling pretty sick as it is. I want 
 to scream and run away." A great spasm 
 went through him from head to foot. And 
 he tore his hat from his head and covered the 
 dead man s face.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 THE SPOTTED STONE 
 
 THE early morning saw me, so recently a 
 candidate for suicide, striking up the dry bed 
 of the San Mateo River from the spot where 
 the murder had been done; my eyes peeled, 
 as the saying is, for spotted stones; and hope 
 once more alive in my breast. Indeed, I had 
 withdrawn so far from absolute despair as to 
 be in a whirlwind of school-boy spirits. My 
 imagination had been wildly at work during 
 the night upon the wallet and its contents. 
 
 " Burn all the papers but It" the crew-man 
 had said. 
 
 " It," then, if actual money, might be a bill 
 of large denomination ; but with that the imag 
 ination would not rest. A valuable patent had 
 suggested itself, or a valuable principle to be 
 patented; the location of a rich gold mine, or 
 a coal mine. Something, anyhow, that was 
 worth doing murder for. On the other hand, 
 for a dampener, the reason that suffices one 
 murderer is not sufficient to the next. Some 
 men will kill for a few dirty dollars ; some only
 
 THE SPOTTED STONE 27 
 
 for many bright thousands; and some again 
 if merely to put the final quietus upon the 
 tongue of a nagging wife. I tried to hold my 
 desires in check, and kept reiterating, " A 
 couple of thousand will help just a couple 
 of thousand." But they would not be so 
 snubbed and, together with that ray of hope 
 that had been rekindled in my breast, were 
 ever dancing like mad among the millions. 
 
 The ancient river-bed was thickly laid with 
 stones and contained more than one that was 
 spotted. Indeed, had every spotted stone that 
 I turned over concealed a dollar bill, I must 
 soon have lost interest in the crew-man s wal 
 let. I had, I think, pictured the particular stone 
 wanted as greenish black, very thickly and 
 regularly overlaid with white polka-dots, and 
 flattish ; yet it might be a white stone, spotted 
 with black; or it might be shaped like a 
 boulder or a pyramid. Whatever its shape, 
 size or appearance, however, I was determined 
 to find it, following the river-bed, if necessary, 
 all the stumbly miles to the reservoir and back. 
 But it was aching, hard work, and I was very 
 sharp with Providence for having supplied me 
 with so weak and awkward a frame and with 
 so cowardly a pair of lungs. The more so that 
 there was nothing wrong with them but a
 
 28 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 chronic aversion to doing their work cheer 
 fully in the world. I could not dog-trot it for 
 a city block without their losing all ambition 
 and flying into a passion of protest. Indeed, 
 coming suddenly upon a hundredweight stone, 
 yellowish and darkly spotted like the hide of a 
 leopard, I was obliged to put off the moment 
 of turning it; and, instead, sat upon it, for 
 it looked a soft comfortable stone, and rested. 
 
 The banks of the gully were at this point 
 of a negligible height and clothed with a dense 
 but not tall vegetation of scrubby buckeyes, 
 nightshade and riotous wild-grape vines; and 
 a little above where I sat, and a little below, the 
 gully itself turned off sharply; so that I occu 
 pied, as it were, the centre of a stony open 
 space in the midst of a forest. 
 
 Now this same weakness of limb and lung 
 which so handicapped my quest was to prove 
 instrumental in its safe accomplishment; for 
 had I turned over the stone upon which I sat 
 when I wished to, instead of waiting till I 
 could, I must have been discovered in the 
 very act by my neighbour, Mr. Carrol, who 
 came now suddenly into view around the 
 upper bend, at a very slow pace, his small 
 bright eyes ranging penetratingly among the 
 stones.
 
 THE SPOTTED STONE 29 
 
 " Hallo! " said I, when he had drawn near. 
 He started violently, as indeed the most 
 innocent person might have done under the 
 circumstances, and made the familiar gesture 
 of passing his hand across his forehead with 
 out actually touching it. But he pulled him 
 self together almost at once, and seating him 
 self near me, "Hot, isn t it?" he said, and 
 flung off his hat and ran his fingers through 
 his hair. 
 
 " Scientific people," said he, " believe that 
 somewhere on this peninsula there is a vein of 
 coal. I sometimes take a day off and go bota- 
 nising after it." 
 
 " It s like me," said I ; " I have been geol 
 ogising for wild flowers. And I m quite 
 blown, thank you." 
 
 " By the way," he said, " I m expecting 
 some odd characters to lunch; would you 
 care to look them over, with your constant 
 view to fiction? 
 
 " I d like to look in after lunch," I said. 
 " What are they anarchists like last time? " 
 
 Carrol grinned. 
 
 " I do have the damnedest friends, don t I ? " 
 said he. " No, these are three young bummers, 
 and one of them Lynch has got hold of a 
 schooner, for a bad debt; the other two have
 
 30 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 chipped in a little money, and they ve made up 
 their minds to cruise the Gulf of California 
 for ambergris and pearls." He shot a quick 
 glance at me. Fancy," he said, " they ve 
 got a diving-suit! " 
 
 " Have they?" said I innocently. He had 
 taken a shot at me, I learned later, but had 
 missed the mark, easy though it was. 
 
 " The funniest part," he went on, " is this. 
 I m going with them." 
 
 You don t mean it!" I exclaimed, for I 
 had regarded Carrol as a sensible matter-of- 
 fact man, above any childish impulse. 
 
 " Why," said he, with a frankness that was 
 attractive in him, " I m so dead broke I can t 
 see straight, and I m so fat I can t walk 
 straight, and I m so down on my luck that 
 I can t think straight." 
 
 : I have always pictured you," said I, " on 
 the very verge itself of prosperity." 
 
 " I am," he said, " always all that and never 
 anything more. Of course I don t believe in 
 the pearl and ambergris part of the trip, any 
 more than I believe that a beautiful woman," 
 he smiled ruefully, " could learn to love me 
 for my shape alone; but I do believe that sea 
 food and sea air and especially sea work would 
 make a new man of me a slim godlike man."
 
 THE SPOTTED STONE 31 
 
 " Like me," said I, " with chuckle knees and 
 a backache and a pair of bellows that can just 
 put a candle out at the fifth blow." 
 
 :< Besides," said Carrol, " I owe a lot of 
 dirty little bills, and they fidget me. You 11 
 look in after lunch, then?" 
 
 I nodded, and he rose. 
 
 " Are you going any farther ? " he asked. 
 
 " I think yes," said I. "Why?" 
 
 Why," said he, " I seem to have lost my 
 wallet. It s too much bother, and I have n t 
 time to go back and look for it, on the chance. 
 Still I want it, for old sake s sake." 
 
 " What sort of a wallet is it? " I asked. 
 
 " My dear man," said Carrol, " you speak 
 as if you expected to find fifty wallets. But 
 mine is to be recognised by the fact that it 
 contains absolutely no money and a few 
 letters that you may read if you wish, but 
 which will make you think the worse of me. 
 They are from a beautiful woman," he ex 
 plained, " who loves me when I have money." 
 
 Then with a cheerful " So long! " he waved 
 a pudgy hand and was soon out of sight around 
 the lower bend. 
 
 I was now rested, and rose to the work of 
 turning over the stone upon which I had been 
 sitting. By good fortune, for my strength
 
 32 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 was not up to the task, it was not deeply bedded 
 and had a convenient ledge for the hands to 
 grip; and at the very first tug it came half 
 over and I let go, with a startled gasp, and 
 it dropped back into place. 
 
 The finding of a snake so close to my hand 
 would have produced an effect upon me very 
 similar to that caused by an actual sight of 
 that which I sought. And for some moments 
 I could not make the further effort necessary 
 to gain possession of the crew-man s wallet, 
 but stood aloof from the stone, wholly out of 
 breath, and with a wildly beating heart. 
 
 Then once more I bent to it, and this time 
 turned it over and saw the wallet, released 
 from pressure, expand like a live thing that 
 draws a deep breath. 
 
 I noted only that it was of pigskin, darkly 
 stained by age and sweat; and then, you will 
 guess, I lost no time in going through its 
 contents ! 
 
 But you have guessed wrong; for with the 
 issue in my very hands, I had not at that mo 
 ment the heart to face it. My highest hopes 
 seemed to crowd about and implore me to wait. 
 Thus when at Christmas-time a boy receives 
 an envelope directed in the writing of his rich 
 uncle, he does not at once open it, but exults
 
 THE SPOTTED STONE 33 
 
 awhile with the hope that the check it con 
 tains will be double that of the year before, 
 so, instead of going through with the business 
 then and there, I slipped the wallet into my 
 inside pocket and buttoned my jacket over that 
 which, in moments of supreme excitement, I 
 am pleased to call my chest.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 THE CREW-MAN S WALLET 
 
 I TOOK out the wallet in my bedroom, having 
 bolted the door, and shook the contents of its 
 various pockets upon the bed. The inventory 
 follows : 
 
 1. A part of an envelope, unaddressed and scrawled 
 over with telephone numbers ; 
 
 2. A whole envelope, blank, but not very clean ; 
 
 3. An elastic band ; 
 
 4. A much soiled square of chewing-gum, make 
 and flavour unknown ; 
 
 5. A fish-hook, with the point broken off; 
 
 6. A copy of amatory Spanish verses in a swift 
 female hand; 
 
 7. A French two-franc piece; 
 
 8. A slip of paper, with a design in pencil, neatly 
 executed for an elaborate, but undecipherable, mono 
 gram; 
 
 9. An old joke cut out of a newspaper, and 
 
 10. and last, the half of a dime, cut clean off as by 
 a pair of shears. 
 
 You will imagine that I made sure to have 
 overlooked nothing before I flung the wallet
 
 THE CREW-MAN S WALLET 35 
 
 disgustedly on the floor and gave way to a 
 fit of contemptuous laughter. I had, indeed, 
 builded my hopes very high, and to have their 
 fanciful structure fall so grotesquely flat was 
 nothing less than sickening. Yet, unwilling to 
 accept defeat, I once more went through the 
 wallet, turning its pockets literally inside out 
 and poking my long fingers into the crevices 
 and along the seams. So violent and angry 
 was the search that I tore the rotten leather in 
 places, and it was from between the edges of 
 such a tear that I perceived suddenly a portion 
 of paper surface criss-crossed with the mi 
 nutest of writing in the blackest of ink. Nor 
 could I doubt that I had uncovered, by an 
 eleventh-hour accident, that mysterious " It " 
 which had cost the crew-man his life. 
 
 The paper, on being extricated, proved a 
 rectangular slip of a thin and shiny manu 
 facture, six inches long by five inches wide. 
 It had been folded lengthwise once; the 
 double leather between two of the compart 
 ments of the wallet had been ripped along the 
 seam to receive it and resewed with perfect 
 fidelity to the original thread and to the needle- 
 holes. As for the writing, with which both 
 sides of the paper were closely crossed, it 
 was miraculously even, and so fine as to re-
 
 36 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 quire for decipherment a reading-glass; and 
 one far stronger than I possessed would have 
 made the task far easier. 
 
 One whole side of the sheet, and all but a 
 few lines of the other, was covered by an in 
 ventory list of articles of value; with the 
 following note at the beginning: 
 
 Translation of original inventory, now in the Royal 
 Library, Madrid, of articles of gold, silver, etc., con 
 signed by Pizarro, from Peru, in the galleon Espiritu 
 Santo, to the King of Spain. 
 
 The inventory as a whole read like some 
 wild fiction, but I have not here the space to 
 set it all down. Here are a few items, chosen 
 at random: 
 
 3. Small box of emeralds, carved in imitation of 
 roses ; 
 
 7. A palace wainscoting of gold, laid upon wood ; 
 
 8. A mortar and pestle of gold ; 
 
 18. A little tree of gold hung with jewelled fruits ; 
 23. A gold door, cunningly carved with bestial 
 scenes ; 
 
 29. Two Peruvian princesses, fifteen years of age; 
 
 30. Six great chests, containing their raiment and 
 jewels; 
 
 33. An Inca s head in a cask of spirits ; 
 
 37. Eight thousand pound of gold, cast into ingots;
 
 THE CREW-MAN S WALLET 37 
 
 38. Eight thousand pounds of silver, cast into 
 ingots ; 
 
 50. One great chest, containing divers golden vessels, 
 ewers and services. 
 
 And at the very end of the long inventory 
 was the following priceless information: 
 
 The Espiritu Santo was lost in shoal water off a vol 
 canic rock or islet that lies in latitude longitude . 
 
 Fragments of the vessel may be discerned by the use 
 of a marine-glass, in the midst of the cove at the North 
 west corner of the islet, and much of the treasure might 
 be recovered by the use of a diving-suit and a little 
 patience. Written this day of - in the 
 
 prison of Sing Sing for my only friend in this world, 
 Roy Cunningham. If my memory has played tricks 
 with me, Roy, it is only to the extent of an item or two 
 in the inventory. The latitude and longitude is O. K. 
 Pray for my horned soul, and God bless you! This 
 time to-morrow I shall be where ? And you, per 
 haps, on your way to the Straits of Magellan. 1 
 
 I think a man s imagination must be a 
 spiritless nag not to be set galloping by such 
 a spur. Mine, I know, went a-flying to the 
 
 1 The treasure route from Peru to Spain was by 
 way of Panama in Pizarro s day. But the case of the 
 Espiritu Santo goes to show that there must have been 
 some knowledge of Magellan s Strait, prior to Ma 
 gellan s discovery. J. P.
 
 38 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 closing scenes of the great Inca s life (and 
 very white they looked against their black and 
 amber background of Spanish lies and treach 
 ery). I saw as in a stage drop the bearded 
 Spanish men staggering up the galleon s gang 
 ways under the chests of ingots and gems ; 
 the cask with the Inca s head, lightly handled, 
 like a sample of the new country s pickles for 
 the Sovereign. The golden door with its 
 bestial carvings; that exquisite little tree of 
 gold with its jewelled fruits ; and those jewelled 
 fruits the little brown princesses, ripe for the 
 plucking, with their round eyes full of wonder ; 
 and I sailed with the labouring galleon in the 
 heel of the trades, with the unknown seas 
 upon the one hand and the unknown mountains 
 upon the other; and sailed from under the 
 bright skies into a moaning, gray, dripping 
 region; and saw the waves broken and sub 
 dued among the monstrous seaweeds of Ma 
 gellan; and the ravines filled with dark and 
 sombre forests; and for a moment, cleared of 
 mist and fog, the eternal snows low upon the 
 mountains ; and saw the gull and the albatross 
 loafing into the storm blast; and heard the 
 thunder of breakers ; and felt in my very soul 
 that earthquake sickening shock when the gal 
 leon struck ; and felt her sink beneath my feet,
 
 THE CREW-MAN S WALLET 39 
 
 and go down, with her colossal treasure, and the 
 princesses, locked, perhaps, in each other s 
 arms, poor kids, and with the whole of her 
 hell-bound crew. 
 
 No, not the whole of it ; for there must have 
 been one at the least to escape with the bear 
 ings of where the tall galleon lay. And I fol 
 lowed him more vaguely, and pictured him 
 suddenly struck dead for his secret, as the 
 crew-man had been struck in the gully. And 
 I came swiftly down the hundreds of years with 
 the secret, and the intriguings for it, and the 
 bloody murders and the wild passions that it 
 must have loosed came down, indeed, to the 
 reality of the little bedroom in which I was 
 pacing like a wild animal ; and there my imagi 
 nation stuck fast. For I could no more think 
 out a logical way to lift the treasure from that 
 far-away floor of the sea than I could fly. 
 Who could capitalise the weak-bodied, spirit 
 less author or trust him to raise from the deep 
 that treasure which had defied the men of 
 action these many hundred years? 
 
 I soon saw that I was in no condition at that 
 time to focus upon rational issues ; so I slipped 
 the crew-man s legacy beneath the carpet; 
 burned as directed such papers as the wallet 
 contained, and the wallet itself; bathed my
 
 40 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 flushed face again and again with cold water; 
 had a snack of lunch (it was now half-past 
 two o clock) and started over to Mr. Carrol s 
 house, to hear the talk and make the acquain 
 tance of his adventurous friends.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 THE OWNERS OF THE CALLIOPE 
 
 As I turned the corner of his house I met 
 Carrol stepping off the bowery porch, his 
 arms filled with bottles of beer, and his face 
 flushed. 
 
 " Parrish," said he, " we re out under the 
 big buckeye celebrating. Take some of these, 
 there s a dear man ! . . . Since I saw you - 
 I relieved him of a portion of the bottles, and 
 we proceeded toward the great buckeye from 
 the other side of which came the sound of glee 
 ful chuckles. " Since I saw you," Carrol re 
 peated, "I have sold the old homestead; a 
 man and his wife, lungers, I fancy, dropped 
 in out of the golden East - - Noo Yok they 
 said, I fancy it is in Persia and took one 
 good look at Fat Carrol s house and lot and 
 bought them out of hand. Hence the celebra 
 tion. It s the smooth moneys that are to be 
 paid over in the morning that have made Fat 
 Carrol so happy and free from care. Gentle 
 men "as we rounded the sweeping branches 
 of the buckeye and came upon a group com-
 
 42 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 posed of three live civilians and some twenty 
 or thirty dead soldiers, as the saying is 
 " let me present Mr. Parrish not Max, the 
 pictator but James, the merry-companion 
 author of the Tale of a Lady s Hat/ Mr. 
 Parrish, Mr. Joseph Lynch, commonly known 
 as * Nine Points of the Law or Ten Pins 
 for short. Mr. Paul Granger Craven, the well- 
 known amateur pugilist, and Mr. Willing 
 Todd, the pet of the natatorium and the Co 
 lumbus of the Poodle Dog and the Barbary 
 Coast." 
 
 The gentlemen were all in the thirties, I 
 guessed, with the exception of Carrol, who 
 had the look of a youthful fifty; and I have 
 never sat down to beer with a more cheerful 
 and debonair quartet. They were vulgarians, 
 if you like, the type that shaves the back of the 
 neck and selects in conversation, when there 
 are many names for a spade, that which is the 
 least agreeable to the ear, though often the 
 most connotative to the mind. They had a 
 kind of clannish humour, as if they had spent 
 much of their lives in various unities of inter 
 est; and I could not but admire, and indeed 
 envy, the elation of spirits into which the ap 
 proaching project of their adventure threw 
 them. Yet I detected, too, beneath their habit
 
 THE OWNERS OF THE CALLIOPE 43 
 
 of turning the issue, whatever its nature, into 
 a joke, a kind of underlying vein of stubborn 
 determination, a kind of ready-at-need quality 
 that led me to think them the very types of 
 man best suited to a catch-as-catch-can enter 
 prise. And I thought them honest as men go, 
 with a distinct preference for giving the odds 
 and seeing fair play. And this in spite of the 
 fact that for the more exquisite relations in 
 nature they had no more regard or respect 
 than so many dogs. They had planned, for 
 instance, casually and as a matter of course, 
 to take a couple of women upon the cruise; 
 and, listening to the argument upon which the 
 plan was abandoned, I heard many shrewd 
 phrases of expediency, but not so much as 
 one word against the morals of the thing. 
 
 " We 11 just have to grin and bear the 
 times when they would n t have been in the 
 way," exclaimed Mr. Willing Todd, and he 
 tilted the tag-ends of a beer bottle into his 
 mouth. 
 
 " And when we get back," Craven mollified 
 himself for the disappointment which the de 
 cision had cost him, " with pearls and amber 
 gris and shark-fins, you 11 hear the breakers 
 roar along the Barbary Coast ! " 
 
 They made so light of the serious sides of
 
 44 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 the adventure, and so sure of its nebulous 
 sides, that from the first I saw myself sailing 
 with them in spirit; and, in spite of that al- 
 locative document hidden beneath the carpet 
 in my bedroom, the approximateness of their 
 quest the schooner provisioned in the har 
 bour, and manned; Carrol s bills about to be 
 paid; indeed, the fact of the thing made me 
 lose sight for the time being of the more allur 
 ing, if remote, aspects of my own undigested 
 adventure. Indeed, I was thrown into such 
 an envy and restlessness by their tale that 
 twice I was on the point of saying, " Come, 
 gentlemen, make me a partner with you, and 
 we shall sail not for the Gulf of California 
 but for the Straits of Magellan, and I shall 
 tell you why ! " 
 
 And I fancied excusing myself, and reap 
 pearing with the memorandum of treasure, 
 and flinging it like a bomb-shell into their 
 midst. It must be that my face had upon it an 
 envious and excited expression; for Carrol, 
 who, I noticed, attended with the most flat 
 tering attention whenever I spoke, suddenly 
 clapped his hand heartily upon my knee. And, 
 
 " Parrish," said he, " chuck your troubles 
 and come along! " 
 
 His voice had in it a kind and friendly ring.
 
 THE OWNERS OF THE CALLIOPE 45 
 
 " Oh, I could n t," I said quickly and a little 
 nervously. " I could n t very well run away, 
 owing money right and left." 
 
 " Now look here," he said, " we need another 
 man." 
 
 " But not me," said I. " I can t contribute 
 anything; and I m abjectly useless." 
 
 " If I said, then," said Carrol, " that dur 
 ing our little talks across the fence and 
 our little visits and all, I had grown 
 fond of you, Parrish, you would n t believe 
 me?" 
 
 I cannot deny that I was flattered and 
 moved. 
 
 " Look here," he said, " take a bit of a 
 walk." 
 
 We rose, and he thrust his arm through 
 mine and led me away. The others, it seemed 
 to me, had exchanged glances; but I laid it to 
 their wish to express that Carrol had drunk 
 too much beer. 
 
 " Now, Jim," said Carrol, " let me say first 
 that your face is an open book and that I can 
 read what s passing in your mind when it 
 is n t above my level. If you can deny that 
 you re in deep trouble and at your wit s end, 
 you re a damned liar " He pressed my 
 arm affectionately.
 
 46 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " Well, then I am," I blurted out. " I can t 
 sell my stuff, I owe money, and the doctor says 
 I must live in the open air away from books 
 or take my chances of going blind." 
 
 We walked a little farther without saying a 
 word; yet Carrol kept talking to me by that 
 firm pressure on the arm. 
 
 " Well," he said, after a while, " what s the 
 matter with the cruise of the Calliope for 
 open air? " 
 
 ;< Even if I could pay my bills and go," said 
 I, " I d be a burden." 
 
 " Not you, Jim," said Carrol. And after 
 another pause, " What do you owe? " he asked. 
 And I told him. He swore profanely. 
 
 " Good God! " he said, " you ve looked the 
 liabilities of a Trust Co., while you ve only 
 incurred those of an apple woman. My dear 
 dear boy, say you 11 come, and out of the 
 money I m to be paid to-morrow I 11 -fix you 
 up." 
 
 "You will?" I said. 
 
 " Sure," said he. 
 
 " Carrol," I said, greatly moved, " it s won 
 derful to find such kindness among strangers, 
 in a far place. But the kindness sha n t be all 
 on one side. Your cruise is the chanciest kind 
 of a thing isn t it? What if I can lay a 
 better course for you all; what if I can tell
 
 THE OWNERS OF THE CALLIOPE 47 
 
 you where a Spanish treasure ship lies in shoal 
 water - 
 
 I ought then and there to have realised my 
 folly, for Carrol drew such a breath as a man 
 draws on reaching the surface of the water 
 after being half buried in the depths. But he 
 had himself so quickly in hand again that 1 
 suspected nothing. 
 
 " You have n t drunk too much, have you? " 
 he said humorously. 
 
 " You remember," I said, " you asked me 
 what the murdered man said before he died? 
 Well, I did n t tell you. Can you guess why 
 he was murdered ? " 
 
 " Who I ? " Carrol seemed startled, and 
 I laughed. 
 
 " He was murdered for the secret of the 
 treasure ship; but he had hidden it. And I 
 found it." 
 
 " Now calm down," said Carrol, " and 
 switch to simple language." 
 
 " Come into my house," I said, " and we 11 
 let the facts do the talking." 
 
 While Carrol was going over the crew-man s 
 legacy through my reading-glass, he got redder 
 and redder in the face. He looked giddy, and 
 again and again passed a hand across his fore 
 head. Yet his only comment from start to
 
 48 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 finish was a kind of shocked reiteration of the 
 phrase " Just x-cuse me Just x-cuse me ! " 
 
 But, having finished, he rose, and banged 
 his fist upon the table. 
 
 " My God! " he said, " my God! " 
 
 " Do you think," I ventured, " that maybe 
 there s nothing in it? " 
 
 Think, Lucky Penny, old boy think 
 no I don t I can t! But I 11 tell you one 
 thing. Whoever did one murder for that, 
 would do another quick as winking! " 
 
 " Good God! " I said, " I had n t thought of 
 that! But no one knows I have it but you, 
 Carrol." 
 
 " How do you know nobody knows ? 
 Don t you suppose they know you were the 
 first man to be on the scene? The papers had 
 it don t you suppose you ve been watched 
 and marked ever since ? My God, Jim, you ve 
 got a nerve ! " 
 
 He picked up a savage-looking kris that I 
 used for opening letters, and fell to testing the 
 point with his thumb; but his thought seemed 
 far from the business. 
 
 There s nothing to prevent one of them 
 walking into this bungalow to-night and stick 
 ing that into you, my boy ! " And he flung the 
 ugly thing sharply back among the litter on
 
 THE OWNERS OF THE CALLIOPE 49 
 
 the table. I noticed that he was very white; 
 and I thought the pallor flattering, as showing 
 the sharpness with which my possible danger 
 affected him. 
 
 " Now," said he, " you put together what 
 things you can carry in a couple of suitcases, 
 and you go straight up to Frisco, take Fong to 
 help you, and you go to the Palace, and you 
 keep in the palm-room where there is always 
 a crowd; until I come! Don t have anything 
 to do with any one you don t know." 
 
 " And how about my affairs in this town? " 
 I said. 
 
 " Get your bills together," said he, " and 
 leave them with me." 
 
 Being orderly by habit, I had them ready in 
 a neat packet, which Carrol thrust, with a nod, 
 into his pocket. 
 
 " But do you really think I m in danger ? " 
 I asked. 
 
 " Jim," he said earnestly, " you bet! When 
 a man s got the wealth of Ormus and of Ind 
 in his clothes he s in danger, and you may 
 take pen and ink and write it down." 
 
 I glanced involuntarily into the corners 
 and out of the windows of the peaceful and 
 familiar room. 
 
 " Was that poor cuss in the gully ever in
 
 50 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 danger, Jim ? " said Carrol. " I ask you. 
 Now do as I say ! " 
 
 " Indeed I will," said I, with a kind of cow 
 ard eagerness. " But I m glad you re in the 
 know, Carrol, because I m an innocent, and it 
 never would have entered my head that any 
 one but the butcher or the baker had it in for 
 me." 
 
 Jim," said Carrol, " we 11 come for you 
 about seven-thirty, in the palm-room, mind; 
 and we 11 make a body-guard until we get you 
 safe aboard the Calliope." He turned to go, 
 but returned upon a thought. 
 
 " Look," said he, " Will I tell the boys now, 
 or later when we re all aboard ? It s for you 
 to say." 
 
 " Oh," said I, " later, when we re under 
 way don t you think and surprise them, 
 good!" 
 
 You bet," said Carrol, and he smiled 
 broadly. But what a child you are." 
 
 Again he turned to go, and once more came 
 back. 
 
 " We ve got to keep pretty well together," 
 he said, " but I m afraid the boys are for mak 
 ing a night of it liquor and ladies, and all 
 that you see it s their last night ashore, 
 and you see
 
 THE OWNERS OE THE CALLIOPE 51 
 
 " I don t judge for others," I said. " But 
 that s reason enough for not telling them 
 till later." 
 
 "Right," said Carrol, "and you and I ll 
 eschew the bottle and keep the bunch in hand 
 if we can." 
 
 He left me, and I went at my work of se 
 lection and packing with an ardour not dimin 
 ished by the thought that those who had not 
 stopped at one murder would not balk at 
 another. But it heartened me some to hear, 
 now and again, through the open window 7 the 
 bursts of laughter from the jolly companions 
 under the buckeye tree. Indeed, one burst of 
 it, not long after Carrol must have rejoined 
 them, was so heartfelt and contagious that in 
 the midst of folding a blue flannel shirt I burst 
 out laughing myself. 
 
 But if I had known what the joke was, at 
 which I laughed with so much enjoyment, the 
 hour of seven-thirty would not have seen me 
 impatiently waiting in the palm-room of the 
 Palace Hotel for the appearance of Carrol 
 and the joint-owners of the Calliope.
 
 CHAPTER 
 SIX 
 
 I "DO" 
 THE TOWN 
 
 ALL cities are cities of dreadful night. Yet 
 if palms were awarded for being dreadful, I 
 think the first would be flung at the feet of 
 San Francisco. I had often delighted to deal 
 firmly in fiction with what I fancied to be the 
 darker sides of life. And I had hung a little 
 upon the outskirts of vice, dined in its least 
 notorious restaurants or drunk my cocktail 
 across its outer bars. But of wickedness, of 
 which I had thought myself not the least pierc 
 ing observer, I knew until the later hours of 
 that night, nothing. And, oh, the faces and 
 the jargon and the dark places and the thirsts 
 and the lechery that I saw that night as in a 
 hideous revelation a crowd of half living, 
 half putrid maggots feeding like mad things 
 upon the very guts of the city! Vice I saw 
 without the gilding; and learned the abyss 
 between what is not respectable and what is 
 lost. 
 
 Nor was I happy in thinking that my com 
 panions for the voyage should have thought
 
 I "DO" THE TOWN 53 
 
 that the scenes through which they passed 
 me would oh, not please me, perhaps, 
 but appeal strongly to my sense of the 
 picturesque. 
 
 " Let s have a look at Sky s," one would say. 
 " Parrish ought to see that." Or " Let s show 
 him the Sink," or the like. To my shame be it 
 said that I had not the face to say that I was 
 displeased and unhappy. And, sick at heart, 
 I suffered myself to be led from one abomina 
 tion to the next. You will hear it said that 
 such an experience has it value. But I think 
 not. I should like to see at once very much 
 less reticence in the world and very much 
 more. 
 
 As we " did " the town ripe for damna 
 tion my three younger showmen became 
 gradually drunk. And I myself, to keep up 
 heart, had taken more than I was accustomed 
 to or could well " carry," as the saying is. 
 Indeed, I recollect being pulled away from a 
 haggish young woman whom I had suddenly 
 accosted at the corner of a street and was ex 
 horting to lead a better life. And I was very 
 sharp with Carrol for interfering with my ef 
 forts to do a little good in the world, and would 
 have broken from him and gone back to renew 
 the sermon had I not heard the woman calling
 
 54 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 upon Carrol to " hide that long- 
 legged spider or she d cut its heart out." 
 
 " Come along, Jim," said Carrol, " you re 
 drunk." 
 
 " I m not," said I, " not in the least. I was 
 never more rational in my life. You can start 
 any argument you like and see if I m not, to 
 prove it." 
 
 " I don t give a whoop if you are or not," 
 said Carrol. 
 
 I tried to answer him, but gave it up owing 
 to a sudden and wearisome thickening among 
 my vocal cords. And I fell to counting just 
 how many drinks I had had, and then was 
 startled to think that so very few should have 
 had so grave an effect upon me; for, in addi 
 tion to the thickening sensation among the 
 vocal cords, my feet had become terribly heavy, 
 and my limbs as if made of fluids. " Surely," 
 I thought, " six or more drinks of whiskey 
 could n t do it! " And I wanted to ask Carrol s 
 opinion, and could not. I came to a dead halt, 
 with Lynch laughing and holding me by one 
 arm, and Carrol, with a kind of expectant ex 
 pression, holding me by the other. Craven and 
 Todd faced me, flushed and wild-eyed. 
 
 " Well," said Carrol gently, " let s put him 
 aboard."
 
 I "DO" THE TOWN 55 
 
 I tried to say that I thought the last drink 
 must have been drugged, was conscious of a 
 frightful wild beating of my heart, as of a 
 caged bird struggling to escape ; I felt a hand 
 slide into the breast of my jacket, and knew no 
 more. 
 
 I must have been senseless as a bale of goods 
 for a long time ; and must have slept naturally 
 for many hours after the effects of the sopo 
 rific drug had passed off; for I woke, rather 
 than came to, feeling less wretched than may 
 be supposed, and clear in mind. Yet not so 
 clear as I thought; for I imagined myself 
 to be lying in the open air upon a sidewalk; 
 and for a long time neither the complete dark 
 ness nor the occasional strong lifting under 
 me and falling away of the pavement seemed 
 unaccountable. Nor did I realise for a long 
 time that the hot, close air could not by any 
 magic be related to the inspiring draft of a 
 San Francisco street at night. 
 
 But at last it became evident to a jaded 
 and illogical understanding that I was shut 
 up somewhere, in an unventilated place that 
 rose and fell quietly, as the breast rises and 
 falls in deep breathing; and upon that realisa 
 tion came rapidly other evidences smells of
 
 56 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 bilge-water, of caulking and marine stores 
 that I was upon a ship at sea. 
 
 The adventure, then, had begun. The Calli 
 ope was southing; I had been put aboard in 
 a senseless, drunken condition, and now Carrol 
 and the others would be laughing at me to my 
 face. I had wakened with the suspicion that 
 Carrol himself had done the drugging, and that 
 it was his hand that had slipped inside my 
 jacket and relieved me of the crew-man s 
 legacy. But I thought now that the drugging 
 must be attributed to my own weak head, and 
 the picking of my pocket to Carrol s natural 
 wish to see the document in more responsible 
 keeping. Yet my friends, too drunk them 
 selves, perhaps, had not stowed me comfort 
 ably; or if they had laid me in a bunk, I had 
 tumbled out of it. While I lay thus, desul 
 torily ruminating, there opened suddenly, half 
 a dozen feet above my head, a hatchway, and I 
 saw bent over the brightly illumined square a 
 yellow Chinaman, naked to the waist. I lay 
 blinking at him. 
 
 For two seconds, perhaps, the Chinaman 
 did not move a muscle. Then suddenly he 
 whipped out a bright long knife from some 
 where, caught it horizontally between his teeth 
 and, before I could move hand or foot in self-
 
 I "DO" THE TOWN 57 
 
 defence, had dropped through the hatch and 
 was kneeling heavily upon me. Yet murder 
 ously as he had come to me, he did not offer 
 to strike. He seemed, indeed, relieved to find 
 so unresisting an object to his prowess, and 
 presently, lifting his face skyward, commenced 
 to shout in a kind of shrill, high sing-songing. 
 Other yellow^ faces appeared soon in the hatch 
 way, and the light was practically shut off by 
 the massing. 
 
 There was a great interchange of swift jab- 
 bery; and then the Chinaman that knelt upon 
 me rose and motioned me to rise also. Seeing 
 me to be scarce able to stand alone, yellow 
 hands reached downward and helped me 
 through the hatch. And I found myself in a 
 kind of ship s forecastle, the centre of a group 
 of a dozen Chinamen, half naked and barefoot. 
 I say a kind of forecastle, for though the place 
 occupied the usual wedge-shaped space in the 
 vessel s bows, and was lined with tiers of bunks, 
 it had about it a garish and Oriental look ; for 
 the curtains to the bunks were of showy, if 
 coarse, embroidery; a big, brass, squatting 
 god glowed between the butts in the bow, and 
 the deck-beams and planking were one strug 
 gling mass of dragons; an inimitable compo 
 sition, in Chinese-blue, scarlet and orange.
 
 58 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Also there was an effect about the place of 
 fluttering papers; and I learned afterward 
 that these were prayers, mucilaged wherever 
 piety could find a place for them. And for 
 the rest, that forecastle smelt as no white 
 man s forecastle smells; here was no odour of 
 mildew and sour sw r eat, but a clean pungent 
 odour, a hint of incense, or joss-sticks, perhaps, 
 a hint of camphor and pepper. 
 
 From the forecastle I was helped to the 
 ship s deck; and there, what with the bright 
 ness of the sun, the overpowering freshness 
 of the sea air and the emptiness of my stomach, 
 for all the world like a young lady whose stays 
 are drawn too tight, I fainted dead away.
 
 CHAPTER 
 SEVEN 
 
 I CAME to, lying upon a doubled quilt, in the 
 shadow cast by the mainsail and faced so that 
 I could see far off the purple hills of California 
 sliding astern. The same Chinaman that had 
 drawn the knife was sitting on his heels beside 
 the quilt and offering me, in a blue and white 
 bowl, a fluid mixture of water and soft boiled 
 rice. How good it tasted ! Or rather felt, for 
 my insides burned like the pipes in a boiler. 
 Nor could I take my lips from the bowl to ask 
 where Carrol was until I had gulped the half 
 of its contents. 
 
 " Callol," said the Chinaman, with an amused 
 and tolerant smile, " no sabe Callol Bessie 
 come soon him very fine talkee womans." 
 
 "Bessie?" I said idiotically. "What 
 Bessie?" 
 
 ; Him come now," said the Chinaman. He 
 scrambled to his feet, and with a sudden nod 
 ding smile and open-hand gesture, indicated 
 me to some one and, turning, went softly 
 forward.
 
 60 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " Well of all the skinnics ! " said a woman s 
 voice, and I tried to rise. But was pushed 
 down again by the shoulder. 
 
 " Take it easy," she said, and came around 
 where I could see her and seated herself in a 
 matter-of-fact way on the quilts at my feet. 
 
 She was no beauty (though young) and in 
 clined to be overweight. But there was a 
 certain comeliness about her, of colouring and 
 of fine black eyes that twinkled amazingly. 
 Her hair hung in two very thick but not very 
 long braids, and was coarse but of a lovely 
 brown colour, with lighter streaks due to sun 
 burn, and very shiny; her face was broadish, 
 the features inclined to be thick; but she had 
 an expression of well-being and joviality that 
 were mighty pleasant to the eye. For costume 
 she had a blue serge skirt spotted by sea-water, 
 a kind of dressing-jacket of Chinese cut and 
 material; and little else I fancy; certainly 
 neither shoes nor stockings. 
 
 " I m Bessie," she said, " that s all. Who 
 are you ? " 
 
 " My name is Parrish," I said, " and I m 
 part owner of the Calliope." 
 
 " What s that? " said Bessie. 
 
 " Why," said I, " is n t this the Calliope?" 
 
 "This?" she exclaimed. "This schooner?
 
 BESSIE 61 
 
 Not on your life. This jolly boat is the Shan- 
 tung. And your hall-marks say stowaway 
 plain as day. And the Shantung Company 
 would like to know how you came to be in 
 the forward storeroom ? " 
 
 " As to that," I said, though very much 
 bewildered, " I was put. Are there no white 
 men on this ship ? " 
 
 " Not a one but you," said she. 
 
 " Then," said I, " I was drugged and robbed 
 and shunted off where I could do no harm and 
 tell no tales." Indignation rose and I found 
 the strength to sit up; and I plunged into my 
 bad-luck story at a speed that produced upon 
 Bessie a look of complete bewilderment. 
 
 She interrupted good-naturedly. 
 
 " I 11 tell you," she said, " just where you 
 are. And you can dope out how you got here. 
 The Shantung belongs to those who work her 
 just thirteen of em, and she sailed yester 
 day morning in hardware for Peru to trade 
 in miscellanies. Now what s that to you? " 
 
 "Yesterday morning!" I cried. "Have I 
 been in that hole all that time? No wonder 
 I m done up." 
 
 "It s wonderful it didn t kill you," said 
 she. 
 
 " As," said I, " it was probably meant to,"
 
 62 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 And again I began my story, but with more 
 clarity and less speed. And, though intend 
 ing to reserve the parts that concerned the 
 lost galleon, I had soon told Bessie the whole 
 of it. 
 
 " But," she said, when I had done, " if there 
 was all that treasure, and you told them where 
 it was, why would n t they take you along and 
 let you share? " 
 
 " That s what I don t get," said I. " There 
 seems to be millions of treasure, and there were 
 only five of us; and it was I that found out 
 where the stuff w r as." 
 
 :c Well," said Bessie, " some men are so 
 mean you can t understand it at all." 
 
 " I would n t wonder," I said, " if it was n t 
 so much meanness as just plain thinking I d 
 all the time be in the way. And I dare say 
 that s right. You see I m not up to much 
 hard work, and I m not very practical." 
 
 " And I don t see why they put you on board 
 the Shantung. It was a dead easy thing to do, 
 because we all were ashore at a wedding in 
 Chinatown, and perhaps that s the reason. It 
 would have been a cinch to knock you on the 
 head and stuff you into a manhole, or to just 
 drop you overboard and whack you once with 
 
 an oar."
 
 BESSIE 63 
 
 They were all pretty drunk," I said; "at 
 least I think so, and maybe they did n t quite 
 know what to do with me; and maybe they 
 thought they were perpetrating a joke." I 
 smiled dismally, but Bessie shook her head. 
 
 They hoped you d smother yourself in the 
 storeroom," she said. Don t see why you 
 did n t ; and they thought maybe your death 
 would be fixed on us. And that s one for your 
 fat Carrol. But say, what about this treasure ? 
 That all sounds like gibberish." 
 
 I had to go pretty deeply into early Spanish 
 explorations and the conquest of Peru before 
 she understood; and then she said: 
 
 Well, if your address was bona fide, you Ve 
 played in dirty hard luck to lose it. But I don t 
 see what you can do about it." 
 
 " Oh," said I, " the paper itself does n t 
 matter, Miss Bessie." 
 
 " Guess you d better say Mrs. Bessie," said 
 she. 
 
 " Beg pardon," I said, " I will. I Ve got the 
 paper pretty well by heart. Indeed, I don t do 
 anything well except remember things." 
 
 "You remember the bearings?" she asked, 
 and I repeated them for her. 
 
 "About where is that on the map?" she 
 said.
 
 64 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " Why," said I, " I did n t look at it, but it s 
 not far from the Straits of Magellan; maybe 
 in the Straits themselves, but south of them, 
 I think; off Terra del Fuego, I think." 
 
 " Do you believe in it? " she asked. " In the 
 treasure, I mean ? " 
 
 " Mrs. Bessie," I said, " the crew-man be 
 lieved in it ; his murderers believed in it ; Car 
 rol and his gang believed in it; and, as I feel 
 like a played out dish-rag, there s not much to 
 prevent me believing in it." 
 
 She thought a while. 
 
 " Nor me," she said finally, and looked land 
 ward for some moments, fro\vning thought 
 fully and pursing her lips. Presently her brow 
 smoothed and she turned once more to me. 
 
 If you," said she, " were willing to go 
 shares, share and share alike, I might get the 
 company to take the matter up. If we make 
 a good dicker in Peru, and are feeling pretty 
 flush, it might just appeal to the company to 
 take a chance, and again it might not." 
 
 You mean the Shantung Co. ? " I asked. 
 This ship, in other words ? " 
 
 " Yes," she said, " and the kid, and me." 
 
 "Do you belong to the company?" I 
 asked. 
 
 " Why, yes, I do," she said.
 
 BESSIE 65 
 
 "And the kid? "I asked. 
 
 That s Lichee," said she, and she smiled 
 at the thought of him. " He s not awake yet, 
 the lazy little beggar. But when he is awake 
 Mr. Parrish, did n t you say? he 11 be 
 good company for you." She leaned toward 
 me confidentially. " He s a child, too! " And 
 then for the first time I heard her laugh. It 
 was not the ha-ha-ha of civilisation, but the 
 great haw-haw-haw chest tones of the African 
 savage a laugh at once strong music and the 
 epitome of humour. The tears of laughter 
 rolled from her eyes; and I caught a glimpse 
 of more than one Chinaman looking suddenly 
 up from his work and smiling broadly toward 
 the burst of merriment. 
 
 After a while she stopped laughing and 
 rose to her feet. 
 
 " Now for business," she said. " Do I lay 
 the matter before the company or don t I? 
 It s your secret." 
 
 " No," said I, " it became yours, too, when 
 you laughed like that." 
 
 "Good!" she said, and flushed up redly 
 under her clear tan. " But you won t find them 
 coming to any decision right off. There s no 
 man in this world so quick to decide as a China 
 man if he s only got a second to make up his
 
 66 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 mind; and there s no man so slow, if he s got 
 weeks and weeks. Anyhow 7 ," she went on, 
 " you 11 be parlour-boarder; and I m hanged if 
 we don t put a little flesh on your bones. There 
 is n t a better trainer in God s world than I am. 
 I had a husband," she said, with a sudden 
 twitching of the eyelids, " who was a crank on 
 health Sleep," she said, " is the most im 
 portant thing; so roll over, and when you 
 wake up I 11 see that you do the next most 
 important thing next." 
 
 And I rolled over as I had been commanded, 
 and fell upon the instant into a quiet deep-sea 
 sleep.
 
 CHAPTER ^^BK^^M LICHEE 
 EIGHT 
 
 MY eyes were no sooner wide open than Bessie 
 came up to me, smiling as upon a child, and, 
 " Now, sir," she said, " stand up! " 
 
 So I stood up, very weakly, and said that I 
 was waiting for orders. 
 
 " Well," she said, " draw a deep breath 
 try to burst yourself that s the way 
 and now hold it, as long as you can there, 
 that 11 do ; and now let it out, as slow 
 as you can. It s to give you the right 
 kind of an appetite and everything," she 
 said. 
 
 ;( It makes me dizzy," I said. 
 
 " Never mind that," said she ; " do you see 
 how it s done ? " 
 
 " Yes," I said. 
 
 " Then," said she. " I m going below; and 
 you 11 go on breathing as I ve showed you till 
 you get your clothes off, and then you 11 go and 
 stand in the lea-scuppers, and the boys will look
 
 68 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 after you. Now," she said, " don t look obsti 
 nate. It s for your own good pah no 
 wonder you re sickly ! " She turned away im 
 patiently, and when she had disappeared I 
 began, not, however, without hesitation, com 
 punction and a feeling that I was playing the 
 fool, to breath as she had directed and to strip 
 off my much-creased and bedraggled clothes. 
 And presently, shivering in the wind, naked as 
 Adam and frightfully ashamed of my thinness, 
 I advanced trepidantly upon three Chinamen, 
 who, smiling broadly, appeared to be awaiting 
 me in the lea-scuppers. These three, suddenly 
 and without warning but with loud grunts and 
 exclamations, seized me and commenced to 
 brush me strongly with dry, bristly brushes. 
 They went over me from head to foot with a 
 kind of good-humoured fury until from cold I 
 passed to warm, from warm to fever; and 
 then, just as I thought the intention was to 
 skin me alive, the brushing ceased, the three 
 sprang aside, and I received full upon the 
 back a bucket of ice-cold water thrown with 
 violence. 
 
 With a cry between pain, fear and rage, I 
 turned, only to receive a second bucket in the 
 open mouth. Turn and start and twist as I 
 would, there was nothing for me but laughter
 
 LICHEE 69 
 
 and water, and behold, at the very moment when 
 I felt about to die, I began to enjoy myself! 
 And when that sudden and violent bathing was 
 at an end and I stood, streaming sea-water and 
 glowing like a new-cast statue, I felt in my 
 whole being an exhilaration and freedom from 
 care that were wonderful. 
 
 But now they came at me with great hand- 
 fuls of cotton waste, such as is used for clean 
 ing brass, and scrubbed me dry; and then 
 one flung me a kind of pajama suit of thin 
 white cotton; and, being clothed in this, 
 another brought a razor and fresh water and 
 soap and shaved me delicately and quickly. 
 And then they made me drink down a great 
 bowl of water and went about their business 
 smiling. 
 
 Bessie now came out of the cabin leading 
 by the hand a little boy. He was dressed in 
 amazing contrast to the Chinamen and to 
 Bessie herself. Indeed, he looked like a mini 
 ature viceroy, or princeling, just out of the 
 band-box; from the little skull-cap of brocade 
 with its jade button, to the snow-white socks 
 (or rather mittens, for the big toe had a com 
 partment to itself) he was the pink, I am sure, 
 of Chinese fashion, and the mould of form. He 
 was in a bright sky-blue silk jacket, with white
 
 70 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 silk bands to the wide sleeves and white cording 
 low around the throat. 
 
 This celestial little garment had been em 
 broidered by witchcraft with butterflies in 
 wonderful soft tints and shades, and birds and 
 flower-pots with flowers growing out of them ; 
 and green puppy-dogs with round popping eyes ; 
 and little high-arched bridges that crossed 
 streams and led to pagodas and temples ; and 
 a thousand and one devices, exquisite in them 
 selves and forming as a whole an effect of 
 magical jewelling. Trousers of a clear, bright 
 green silk, wrapped at the ankles and thrust 
 into the aforementioned white socks, completed 
 the costume ; or rather it was completed by the 
 child himself. There was a gravity upon his 
 jolly round face, and a majesty may I say 
 so ? to his grave, toddling sea-waddle that 
 were the very essence of the picture. He was 
 like a Chinese advertisement of a health food, 
 and as he came toward me, one hand in Bessie s 
 and one resting gravely upon his portly little 
 " turn," famished as I was, I could have cried 
 aloud for joy. 
 
 Chinese he seemed from head to toe, but 
 when, after looking gravely in my face for 
 some moments, his sloe eyes closed suddenly 
 and he put back his head and laughed a treble
 
 LICHEE 71 
 
 ghost of that haw-haw-haw of Bessie s, I knew 
 that he belonged to no country, and to no race 
 of men. 
 
 Bessie looked me gravely in the eyes. 
 
 " Saves a world of explanation," she said, 
 "doesn t it that laugh? Stop laughing, 
 Lichee, you little monkey ! " 
 
 Lichee broke short off. 
 
 Time Melican man eat," said he. 
 
 " Lichee," said I, " you are delightful in 
 conversation." 
 
 Yes," said Bessie, " you re to have food 
 now, on two conditions." 
 
 " A thousand! " I cried eagerly. 
 
 " First," said Bessie, " you ve got to say 
 you liked your bath we heard him yell, 
 did n t we, Lichee ? and second, you 11 chew 
 every mouthful you eat forty times." 
 
 "But why?" said I. "Is it a religious 
 rite?" 
 
 " No," said Bessie quietly, " it s to make a 
 man of you and when you re that you can 
 talk about religion. It sickens me to think how 
 you ve neglected yourself. Bright enough 
 you are, too, by the shape of your head, to 
 know better ! I d rather see a good solid bar 
 room drunk than a library skeleton. Come 
 now, shake hands, and forget it ! "
 
 72 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 She smiled very winningly and we shook 
 hands. 
 
 " Melican man eat now? " said Lichee. 
 
 " Oh, my friend, my friend ! " I cried. And 
 had he been my ow r n I could not at that fam 
 ished moment have loved him more.
 
 CHAPTER 
 NINE 
 
 Chang 
 
 BESSIE S 
 STORY 
 
 I WAS soon enthusiastically taken up with 
 physical training. From the very first the 
 brushings, and the violent baths, the light diet, 
 much chewed, the frequent great drafts of 
 water, and the strong sea air had stirred within 
 me and were bringing to liveliness the germs 
 of health and well-being. 
 
 But you will not suppose that the experi 
 ence with Carrol and his friends was ever long 
 out of mind; nor that I awaited with anything 
 but impatience the decision of the Shantung 
 Company upon the affair of the treasure. 
 They regarded me, after Bessie had told 
 them of it, with an open interest and perhaps 
 a tinge more of zeal in attending to my needs 
 and comforts; and they made me feel that I 
 was no waif upon their charity, but one who 
 paid, or at least made creditable promises of 
 payment for what he got. 
 
 But not a word of pro and con upon the ad 
 venture itself was to be heard from one of 
 them, nor do I think that they discussed the
 
 74 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 matter among themselves. I was suffered to 
 come and go as I pleased ; and was encouraged 
 to take a light share in such work as swabbing 
 down the decks, and even learned to stand a 
 trick at the wheel. Nor was I allowed to stand 
 aside when it came to amusements. 
 
 They look up to you," said Bessie to me 
 once, " because you are an author ; writing 
 is sacred to the Chinese, pretty near; or at 
 least it s the very tip-top thing in good man 
 ners ; and these boys are n t the Canton coolie 
 type anyway ; they re North Chinamen, well 
 educated some of them ; and they Ve a pretty 
 snug inkling of what s what. 
 
 They re certainly different from the China 
 men I Ve seen in America," I said, " taller and 
 thicker-necked. They don t look so much like 
 delicate birds. And I Ve never been kinder 
 used by any one but that, of course, is owing 
 to you." 
 
 :t We were slipping along upon a brisk beam 
 wind, with a pleasant bubble of water under 
 the bows and under the leeward rail, while the 
 foam whirled and sudded in our wake. Lichee 
 was in the galley composing sweetmeats with 
 a little help from the cook; Wong was at the 
 wheel, steering with two fingers; Chang and 
 Jili were stripping the morning s wash from
 
 BESSIE S STORY 75 
 
 the windward rigging; and there was a pair 
 of checker players in the shadow of the fore 
 sail. But otherwise we had the deck pretty 
 well to ourselves. 
 
 "Mrs. Bessie," I said, "just what is the 
 Shantung Company? " 
 
 " Do you notice," said she, " that they re 
 all about the same age? Well, they were all 
 students together in some Chinese college 
 and they had advanced views about politics, 
 and China began to get unpleasant for them. 
 So they clubbed together and bought this 
 schooner of a sealer that had to go to jail; 
 and she s been home and country to them ever 
 since. They swore an oath of partnership 
 to stick together, sink or swim, and to share 
 and share alike good luck, bad luck, and 
 the whole hog." 
 
 "And you, Mrs. Bessie?" I said, after a 
 pause. 
 
 " You ve looked that question more than 
 once," said she, " and you ve thought this and 
 you ve thought that, till you don t know where 
 I stand on the ladder that has its head at 
 heaven s gate and its feet in hellmuck. . . . 
 Chang s father willed me an interest in the 
 Company and other interests that were nabbed 
 when he died. He was a good man by his
 
 7 6 
 
 lights ; all white under the yellow. ... I know 
 what they think in Christian countries about 
 white girls that marry Chinks ; but I ve a 
 bit boy that looks up to me and honours me, and 
 twelve good men and true " 
 
 " Thirteen," I corrected. " Not that I want 
 to boast." 
 
 She gave me a grateful look. 
 
 " Mrs. Bessie," I said, " I m curious as any 
 woman. But I m no cat. I d dearly love to 
 have the whole story. Am I going to? " 
 
 " It s long," she said doubtfully. " And it s 
 some tough." 
 
 " And take my word for it," said I, " that 
 somewhere there s a lot that s fine in it." 
 
 " I married," she said, " when I was seven 
 teen. He was all kinds of a man, Willy was; 
 ten years older than me; and gentle as they 
 make em, and white clean through. He was 
 a born athlete, and a made one " She smiled : 
 " That s how I come to be such a trainer. At 
 first \ve lived in Frisco, and saved a little 
 money. Then Willy thought he saw a chance 
 to make money in Shanghai he was a kind 
 of small contractor and there was a boom in 
 building. We went out that was seven 
 years ago and Willy d no sooner got there 
 than he bid for a contract to put up a house in
 
 BESSIE S STORY 77 
 
 the English section just a little two-story 
 house, but with a good profit in it. 
 
 ; We kept house in two rooms just on the 
 edge of the Chinese quarter, and I was happy 
 all day long, even when Willy was away look 
 ing after his contract. I guess a woman s hap 
 piest when she s seeing one man, or looking 
 forward to seeing him, and knows he 11 come 
 to her sober and gentle and loving. 
 
 1 There was only one thing we wanted, and 
 that was a kid; but there was nothing doing. 
 Willy got mixed up in local athletics, and boxed 
 and swam races and played ball when he had 
 the chance. And sometimes we d hire a couple 
 of ponies we could n t either of us ride to 
 save our necks and go rides in the country. 
 One day Willy got off at a piece of old wall 
 to see how it was put together. He said it was 
 curious construction, that was his word. And 
 I told him not to go near the old thing, because 
 it would fall on him. But he smiled and went 
 up close to the wall and poked it and looked it 
 over and got out his note-book to make a sketch 
 and then I saw the thing totter and I 
 screamed; and Willy jumped, but not quick 
 enough. He was pinned by the legs, and 
 by the time I got to him he had fainted 
 dead away. I got some Chinamen that
 
 78 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 were working in a field to help me, and we 
 got the stones off his legs, and they got a 
 couple of poles and made a kind of litter and 
 carried him back to the city. Once Willy 
 opened his eyes, and said curious construc 
 tion/ But the rest of the time he was 
 unconscious. 
 
 " I gave those Chinamen all the money I 
 had, because they d acted so white, and had in 
 the best doctor in Shanghai to look at Willy. 
 He looked and went away and came again 
 with another doctor and a nurse, and they 
 cut one of Willy s legs off at the ankle and the 
 other above the knee . . . but he did n t get 
 well. He just seemed to live, and that was all. 
 They said his back was hurt, and his insides, 
 they thought, but were n t sure. Willy s con 
 tract went to pot, and the money mixed up in it. 
 
 I saw the consul, and told him we were 
 stone broke, and he said he d do what he could. 
 It was n t much. He said he d have Willy put 
 in a free hospital, and get me a job as chamber 
 maid in an English family he knew, or buy 
 me a steerage passage home, whatever I chose. 
 But I could n t keep Willy on chambermaid 
 wages, and I would n t leave him, and I told 
 the consul so. He kind of hemmed and hawed 
 and looked around to see if any one was listen-
 
 BESSIE S STORY 79 
 
 ing-, and then he says : Look here/ he says, 
 what if I were to pay you eight dollars gold 
 a week? Well, says I, what if you were? 
 Before he got more than six words out of his 
 mouth I grabbed the heavy ruler that was on 
 his desk and brought it down on his white head. 
 And the last I saw of him he was face down 
 among his papers, bleeding like a stuck pig. 
 
 "He didn t prosecute in the courts; but 
 he prosecuted behind my back gave me a 
 bad name and said I d made certain proposi 
 tions to him that had shamed his white hairs. 
 And he took care that nobody should help me 
 or employ me. And a day or so later the 
 tradesmen I guess he set em on began to 
 want their money and I did n t know where to 
 turn. 
 
 "Well, one morning an old Chinaman come 
 to see me. He was old as the hills, and the 
 brocades on him were worth a thousand dol 
 lars gold if they were worth a cent. He had 
 two servants, one to carry his fan and purse and 
 umbrella, and one to roll cigarettes for him ; he 
 smoked em as fast as they could be rolled. He 
 was a wonderful looking old guy; he had 
 black-rimmed specs three inches across and 
 perfectly round, and there wasn t a level patch 
 of skin on his face it was just ten hundred
 
 So YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 million little wrinkles. He talked good English 
 - the best I ever heard a Chinaman talk. He 
 began by saying that he was seventy years 
 old and that I must n t be angry with him at 
 anything he said. 
 
 " He said he d heard about me and all my 
 troubles and how my own people would n t 
 help me; and that he himself, being a sport 
 ing man, had come to make me a proposition. 
 He said he d pay me fifteen dollars gold a 
 week no writing, just his word and mine 
 as long as Willy lived. He said he d seen the 
 doctor, and the doctor said Willy might live, 
 and might not. If Willy lived a year the con 
 tract ended, with good wishes on both sides. 
 But if Willy died, I was to become the prop 
 erty of the old Chinaman. He said his chief 
 business was buying pretty girls and placing 
 them, he called it. I said, * What if you die? 
 and he said the bank would go on paying the 
 money just the same, for a year, but that I 
 would n t be bound to anything. Well I thought 
 it over. It sure was a sporting" proposition on 
 the old Chinaman s part, and I was just as 
 sure that Willy would live! And if he did n t 
 why, it did n t seem to matter what happened 
 to me. 
 
 " Every week the money come in regular
 
 BESSIE S STORY 81 
 
 by messenger from a Chinese bank; and once 
 in a while Hoang Lo, which was the old fel 
 low s name, sent me a basket of fresh eggs 
 with his compliments, and called once to say 
 that he only sent me eggs because if he sent 
 anything else I d be afraid he d put poison 
 in it for Willy. 
 
 " It was having broken his contract that 
 killed Willy as much as anything. He was 
 that honest, sir, and open; he just couldn t 
 bear it. But he lived long after the doctor said 
 he would. It seemed as if he knew that he had 
 to live a year to make things come out right 
 for me. But of course he did n t know. 
 
 ;< When the leventh month was under way 
 I began to see a good deal of Hoang Lo. He 
 came pretty nearly every day, and he was that 
 kind and generous that I got to think a lot 
 of him. That s funny, Mr. Parrish. He was 
 planning to set me well along the downward 
 path, and yet I got to like him and look for 
 ward to his visits and his talk. He was wise. 
 And he saw how I felt about Willy that 
 nothing else mattered, and he got fond of me. 
 
 " Two days before the year was up, Willy 
 began to sink. He roused up enough to say 
 good-by and to give me a lot of advice about 
 what to do when he was n t there any longer
 
 82 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 to look after me ! And I said yes to everything, 
 and promised everything he asked, if only to 
 make his mind easy about me. About sundown 
 that night he got unconscious, and though he 
 did n t die just then, he never spoke again. 
 
 " When Hoang Lo learned that poor Willy 
 was sinking, he came round at once. And 
 he had a smile on him that was n t Now I ve 
 got you or I told you so or You lose, I win 
 or anything like that. It was the smile old 
 friends put on when they re sorry, too. He 
 said that he would bring a Chinese doctor, who 
 had studied in Germany, to see Willy, if I d 
 only believe that it was n t just a scheme to 
 put the finishing touches to Willy before the 
 year was up. I trusted the old man and it 
 pleased him. 
 
 ;< When the Chinese doctor saw Willy and 
 took his pulse he just shook his head. He said 
 Willy couldn t get well; there was no use 
 bothering. He said, though, when Hoang Lo 
 asked, that oxygen and electricity might keep 
 life flickering on for a day or two. And then 
 what does the old Hoang Lo do but give orders 
 to have Willy kept alive as long as possible and 
 not to spare any expense! So the Chinese 
 doctor he sent for oxygen and things and his 
 slippers, and stayed by Willy till the end. . . .
 
 BESSIE S STORY 83 
 
 And the end came six hours after the year 
 was up. 
 
 " I d dried all my tears out weeks before. I 
 
 */ 
 
 was that tired with watching and grieving 
 I just collapsed. 
 
 " Hoang Lo made all the arrangements for 
 burying Willy, and paid for them. Then he 
 waited till I was able to talk. And then he 
 said he knew I d have kept my contract if 
 Willy had n t lived, and that he always was 
 at the service of honourable persons. What 
 was I going to do now ? I said It was through 
 you he lived out the year. God bless you, 
 Hoang Lo, you did what you could for us; 
 you re dead white. The letter of the con 
 tract s broken, I know. But it s a quibble of 
 your making. 
 
 " He just smiled. He said that long since 
 he d made up his mind that I was n t any com 
 mon trash to be sold for so much gold. He 
 said I was a pearl, not a woman. And first 
 thing I knew, the old fellow had proposed 
 matrimony as honourable as a Chinese can. 
 Maybe if I d been myself I d have turned him 
 down, but I was sick with watching and wait 
 ing and I was sick with fever, too, though I 
 did n t know it at the time. And I suppose it 
 came to me that marrying a Chinaman old
 
 84 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 enough to be my grandfather was n t like 
 marrying a young one. The last I remember 
 till I came to my senses weeks later in Hoang 
 Lo s house and he had tan-bark spread in the 
 street to stop the noise was dropping at his 
 feet and crying against his knees, and his hand 
 patting my shoulder." 
 
 The honest tears streamed down Bessie s 
 face, and for some minutes she could not go on. 
 
 " Well," she said, " Lichee came and old 
 Hoang Lo died, and left a big property to 
 Chang and the kid and me; but the viceroy 
 kicked up a political mess and robbed right 
 and left, until we had nothing to fall back on 
 but the Shantung shares. 
 
 " Now you ve heard the whole of my hard- 
 luck story. And whether I acted right or 
 wrong does n t matter a hang. But I do know 
 that having made my bargain, it was right for 
 me to stick to it and try to be cheerful in 
 it and now the boys are happier and more 
 content for my presence on this ship, and 
 kinder. Do I look after them all, the best I 
 can, and nurse them when they re sick and 
 laugh them out of the sulks and keep them 
 away from drugs or don t I ? As God s 
 good, Jim Parrish, I think I Ve done as well 
 by my circumstances as many a luckier woman
 
 BESSIE S STORY 85 
 
 has done by hers! What the people who sit 
 up to judge forget is just this : that God s 
 so bright he can shine light down into the 
 blackest hole ! And it s not Tom, Dick or 
 Harry that can stop him, Mr. Parrish, and 
 you can put that in your pipe and smoke it." 
 
 She had become very vehement, and her 
 eyes shone with a splendid valorous look, and 
 dared me, as it were, to contradict her. But 
 nothing was further from my mind ; I had for 
 her at that moment but one feeling, and that 
 was unshakeable admiration. For it seemed 
 to me that the outcast shone very brightly out 
 of the darkness into which she had been thrust.
 
 CHAPTER 
 TEN 
 
 TWO SIDES 
 
 OF 
 A RESCUE 
 
 HAD Lichee been wholly white he must have 
 been outrageously spoiled; but the thou 
 sands of generations of courteous and polite 
 children that lay behind him on the one side 
 were not easily to be shunted off. I may say, 
 I think, for a Chinese child he was spoiled; 
 but as white children go, he was an angel. Al 
 ways there was to be found one of the Shan 
 tung Company in a playful mood, ready to 
 carve potatoes into dragons ; to make and fly a 
 kite off the stern; to ride him pick-a-back, or 
 to roll and wrestle with him upon the deck. 
 Or he might, if he liked, go aloft in a wicker 
 basket for all the world like a bright little, fat 
 little bird in a cage. 
 
 In a world where his word was law, Lichee 
 never sulked; and, in a position to command, 
 had his way most often either by circuitous 
 intriguings or by the most direct, frank and 
 engaging begging. The bowels of those yellow 
 men yearned over the child; and I must be 
 lieve that the parts of him that were Bessie
 
 TWO SIDES OF A RESCUE 87 
 
 the rollicking, infectious laugh, the sudden 
 \\istfulness, the sturdy fearlessness, had drawn 
 them a little from their own civilisation toward 
 ours. There was many a burst of gaiety aboard 
 the Shantung, many a kind and thoughtful 
 deed, many a well engineered surprise party 
 with the giving of pleasure for its object, and 
 many a merry joke was passed for the sake of 
 joking. I have seen better moralists who were 
 less kind ; richer men who were less generous ; 
 ministers of the gospel who, take them for all 
 in all, have seemed to me less Christian. And 
 I am quite sure that I have never been thrown 
 among men who were so clean; so zealous to 
 tub; so indefatigable with the toothbrush. 
 As for little Lichee, when he was not dressed 
 like a fairy-story he was naked as a cherub, 
 now snowy with lather and now streaming 
 with rinsings. 
 
 For my part I began, as Bessie said, " to 
 flesh up," to develop a latent, distinct, if awk 
 ward, celerity, and to grow strong in the 
 muscles. If only for that I blessed the woman; 
 but I had stronger reasons to bless her for 
 a newer, franker, honester outlook upon life; 
 for a strengthening of heart and moral cour 
 age. Indeed, as the saying is, I was by way 
 of becoming a new man; the air looked no
 
 88 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 longer like torn and dirty lace to tired eyes; 
 the sea-water washed the tired lines out of my 
 face ; and the strong fresh wind from the west 
 blew colour into my cheeks. I learned to wrestle 
 a little; to get a little way up a swinging 
 rope; and to balance a broom upon my chin 
 (a fine exercise, by the way, in a rolling sea). 
 
 To keep the mind on edge, I began to pick 
 at Chinese, and, thanks to a prodigious power 
 for remembering, was soon on terms of 
 equality with Lichee. Beyond that, how 
 ever, I discovered the road into the celestial 
 tongue to be thorny, steep and abounding in 
 blind alleys. But the formidable efforts that 
 I made got me into better liking and put 
 me upon terms of real friendliness with my 
 teachers. English, though, remained the chief 
 medium of intercourse, for, as Jili courteously 
 remarked, You think Chinaman no good 
 Melican talkee; me think you hellee dam bad 
 Chinaman talkee." 
 
 It was not till we were off the Isthmus, 
 stewing in a kind of unexpected doldrums, that 
 the Shantung Company called a meeting to 
 which I was not invited and at which, so Bessie 
 hinted to me as she went forward with the 
 others, the matter of the treasure was to be 
 seriously considered. I was sent for after about
 
 TWO SIDES OF A RESCUE 89 
 
 an hour and asked to repeat as much of the 
 famous paper as I could remember, the items 
 of treasure and as much as possible of the 
 note at the end. 
 
 After the naming of each item and I had 
 the most of them pretty pat Bessie trans 
 lated into Chinese, but none of the men inter 
 rupted or commented in any way. 
 
 When I had finished with the items and with 
 the note at the end I was asked for my own 
 personal beliefs in the matter; heard without 
 comment, and sent aft. I had more the feel 
 ings of one whose veracity is at stake than of 
 one whose personal fortunes hang upon a hair. 
 
 Yet anxiety upon the latter point kept me 
 moving impelled me to affect a calmness 
 that I was far from enjoying; to examine 
 with sudden interest the spokes of the wheel; 
 to test with a finger-nail the rigidity of the 
 sun-softened pitch between the deck planks; 
 and to scan from time to time the westward 
 weather for signs of a returning wind. 
 
 To say that the Shantung was without mo 
 tion and the sea smooth as a lake would not 
 be strictly true ; yet what way she had was by 
 the stern, and so broad, so roundly moulded and 
 slow going were the ocean swells that you could 
 not have said to the moment when the schooner
 
 90 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 finished riding and began to fall. The damp, 
 scorching atmosphere was unsealike, and sug 
 gested (though there was nowhere to be 
 seen any thickening along the eastern horizon 
 that might have been land) the proximity of 
 Panama with its hammering sun and its tumul 
 tuous vegetation. Twice in New York City 
 I have felt a similar wet, burning heat; once 
 in the hot room of a Turkish bath, and once as 
 a little child in Trinity church of an Easter 
 morning. Upon that latter occasion, moistly 
 clasping a little palm branch, I had fainted 
 aw r ay, to my father s intense mortification. 
 And now, looking over the stern and seeing 
 an actual palm branch floating in the water, 
 the whole scene was recalled to me with the 
 vividness of a view thrown suddenly upon a 
 blank sheet by a stereopticon. 
 
 I remembered, too, with a certain dismal- 
 ness, how my father, from the vivid heights of 
 a health that was almost gross, had used to 
 cut at my puniness with his sharp, ever-ready 
 tongue. Yet here was I, whom the doctor had 
 so often given up, a picture of so much health 
 as is consistent with leanness; and there, in 
 old Trinity graveyard, dead before the prime 
 of life, lay the corpse of my father, who had 
 thought to bow the whole world by sheer
 
 TWO SIDES OF A RESCUE 91 
 
 strength of mind and body, and to live a hun 
 dred years. I remember he used to plant acorns 
 that his old age might be solaced with the ma 
 jesty of oaks; and yet at this writing the 
 tallest of those trees is no higher than the 
 grave is deep. 
 
 The Shantung, impelled by a deeper current, 
 perhaps, leisurely overhauled the palm branch 
 as it passed slowly forward, almost grazing her 
 side. The thing itself must have seemed de 
 sirable to Lichee, and its proximity an irre 
 sistible temptation. The bright flashing of the 
 child s gay jacket, seen with the tail of an eye,, 
 had broken my revery; I looked up in time to 
 see him jab cumbersomely at the branch with an 
 unwieldly boat-hook and, his round face ex 
 pressing solemn surprise rather than fear, 
 topple slowly over the low rail into the sea. 
 
 I ran for the spot, with no very definite idea 
 what I should do when I got there; stubbed 
 one naked foot cruelly against a ring bolt, and, 
 by a dive as clean as it was unpremeditated, 
 entered the water almost on top of the strug 
 gling child. My left hand, indeed, must have 
 passed under his jacket, or become entangled 
 with him in some way ; anyhow I dragged him 
 under with me, and our reappearance together 
 had all the hall-marks of a bona fide rescue.
 
 92 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Yet all was not well. The child was un 
 conscious; we were a dozen feet from the 
 schooner s side; my left arm, wrenched back 
 ward against the impetus of the dive by the 
 resistance of Lichee s stationary weight, was 
 useless; indeed, half full of sea-water and con 
 sternation, I must, if left to myself, have gone 
 down with the boy. Yet help was near; for 
 my sound arm in its thrashing fell sud 
 denly with jarring violence upon the boat-hook, 
 and that straw s worth of additional buoy 
 ancy preserved us. A second more and the 
 half of the Company were around us, swim 
 ming like yellow-faced seals and completing the 
 work of rescue \vhich I had accidentally begun. 
 
 The incident, and the praise with which I 
 was overwhelmed, were the more distasteful 
 from the fact that, if I had not tripped, I might 
 have reached Lichee from the schooner s deck, 
 and rescued him neatly, without so much as 
 wetting my shirtsleeves. I tried religiously to 
 defend myself from praise; explained the 
 whole affair to Bessie again and again at the 
 top of my voice, but all to no purpose. I could 
 no more have persuaded those grateful hearts 
 that I was not the saver and restorer to them 
 of their mascot than that I was the Emperor of 
 China in disguise. Added to their gratitude
 
 TWO SIDES OF A RESCUE 93 
 
 was admiration for the presence of mind that 
 in the midst of peril, in the very jaws, as it were, 
 of sharks and sea-devils, had not omitted to 
 rescue so insignificant an object as a boat-hook. 
 
 But the true importance of the incident to 
 this narrative is that it served to make up the 
 Shantung Company s mind about the treasure. 
 As a mere favour, Bessie said, they would now 
 have gone for me through a thousand thousand 
 hells. 
 
 As for Lichee, he was not long coming to, 
 and having thrown up the sea-water which 
 he had swallowed, signified that if he might 
 become the undivided possessor of a clasp- 
 knife such as grown men use, he would think 
 favorably of continuing to exist. Otherwise, 
 we might as well look forward to the worst.
 
 CHAPTER 
 ELEVEN 
 
 MRS. 
 CUNNINGHAM 
 
 IN the thought that having voted for treasure- 
 hunting the Shantung Company would make 
 quick work of their business in Lima I was 
 mistaken. And when, in my impatience, I com 
 plained to Bessie that we were wasting some 
 precious time, she begged to differ, and soon 
 had me in agreement with her. 
 
 ;< If you think the boys are loitering," she 
 said, " let me tell you what Chang says. He 
 says he knows the Calliope, of old, for a rotten, 
 slow-going tub. If she has got a start of us, 
 by this time, and if she does get to the place 
 ahead of us, who cares? Will they get that 
 stuff out of the mud under one month two 
 months? I ask you. And every two-bit piece 
 that they do get up, before we blow in, is just 
 so much in our pockets for the trouble of 
 taking it." 
 
 :< Why, Bessie," said I, " would n t they have 
 something to say about that? My idea was 
 to get there before them and lift the stuff and 
 vanish leaving a few good guesses behind."
 
 MRS. CUNNINGHAM 95 
 
 That was your idea, was it ? " she said with 
 some asperity. Well, the sooner you forget 
 it the better. There is just one chance in a mil 
 lion of getting through the business without a 
 fight. That s reason one for delay ; Chang s 
 trying to get hold of a second-hand Maxim 
 and some Winchesters we ve only a couple 
 aboard. Reason two : we re fitted for the 
 tropics, or Frisco at the worst. Nice you d 
 look in those cotton pajamas sitting on an ice 
 berg ! We ve got to have warm clothes ; and 
 Chang s going to put a stove in the cabin and 
 one in the forecastle. Reason three : who s 
 going to do the diving, and how s it going to 
 be done? If Chang can hire it done, you bet 
 he 11 hide it; if he can t he s got to get hold 
 of a diving-suit two of them in case one 
 breaks and do the trick himself. Reason 
 four : he s going to make the best dicker he 
 can on the present job, in case the lost galley- 
 west does n t turn up. If that is n t sense, 
 Jim, prove it! And if you don t, why put it in 
 your pipe and smoke it ! " 
 
 " Thanks," I said, " I 11 smoke," 
 
 " Good," said Bessie. Then climb into your 
 
 shore togs and show me the town will you ? 
 
 I m kind of bashful about leaving the ship; 
 
 and but maybe you d rather not be seen walk-
 
 96 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 ing with me. Tell me the truth, Jim ; I won t 
 mind much." 
 
 "Bessie!" I cried indignantly, and hurried 
 off to change my clothes. And when we got 
 ashore indeed Bessie had made herself very 
 trig and smart for the occasion we walked 
 up from the wharves and promenaded the more 
 fashionable streets, looking the parts of very 
 usual travellers. Only somehow it seemed to 
 me that Bessie was prettier than the run of 
 white women in outlandish places, as I was 
 surely taller and thinner than the average man. 
 She had, too, an eye for colour, humour and ob 
 servation that w 7 ould have done credit to a 
 Davis or a Steevens; and I found myself see 
 ing a thousand things that I must else have 
 missed, and livening the hours of the Spanish 
 siesta with joyous laughter. It was by no 
 means my first trip ashore; for three weeks 
 had passed since we anchored off the Peruvian 
 capital; but it was the one that I shall best 
 remember. 
 
 I had long since become accustomed to Bes 
 sie s careless and rough habit of speech; no 
 longer sat in judgment upon her Chinese mar 
 riage ; and thought her, as indeed she was, the 
 very best friend I had in the world. She was 
 the most sympathetic listener, the sanest, kind-
 
 MRS. CUNNINGHAM 97 
 
 est adviser, the merriest companion, the most 
 devoted mother, and the most distinguished 
 example of making the best of things that ever 
 I saw. A man could not have sailed long 
 aboard the Shantung without making a confi 
 dant of Bessie. She would have your dearest 
 secrets out of you in no time, and make them 
 her own. Had I been a murderer, I must have 
 told Bessie upon some night of stars; and the 
 girl into whose face the little terriers looked 
 was a piece of ancient history to her, yet one 
 upon which she loved to harp. I had told her 
 in the beginning that that jig was up, but she 
 would have none of it ; I was to go back to my 
 own place, rich and strong, and to make the 
 running with a high hand; yes, and at the 
 wedding breakfast I should receive a telegram 
 or a cable, unsigned, with the words, " I told 
 you so." 
 
 " Now who told me so ? you 11 say," said 
 Bessie, " who was it, now? And you ll 
 put your mind to raking in the ashes of 
 all you ve ever done and been and known, 
 and maybe you 11 remember after a while 
 and say : That was that woman on the 
 Shantung. 
 
 " Yes," I said, " Bessie, I 11 probably forget 
 you quicker than any one I ve ever known.
 
 98 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 There s nothing about you to impress a man, 
 unless it s your general unkindness and bad 
 temper ! " 
 
 " I wonder," said Bessie, much mollified, " if 
 you and she 11 ever talk about me." 
 
 " If she and I ever talk together again in 
 this world, Bessie," I said, " you 11 be in it." 
 
 : Would n t mentioning me," said Bessie, 
 " be oh, like saying things that can t be said 
 to young girls ? Better cut me out, Jim, when 
 you leave us." 
 
 " When I leave you, Bessie? " said I. " And 
 I m not sure that the Shantung Company will 
 ever see the last of me. When have I ever 
 been so \vell or so happy or so kindly 
 treated? -Never, and never shall be again. 
 If," said I jocosely, " you were a smoker, 
 Bessie, I should tell you what to put in your 
 pipe." 
 
 Lima is a quiet place in the heat of the day. 
 And the streets which had shown a certain 
 activity when we came ashore, had become 
 gradually deserted. Even our shadows hid 
 themselves, as Bessie remarked. You could 
 look the length of a street and see nothing 
 living, unless a scavenging rat or so attracted 
 by the security of the blazing stillness, and 
 although shops remained open, it was no un-
 
 MRS. CUNNINGHAM 99 
 
 common thing to see the proprietor, through 
 the dirt and fly specks of the windows, sound 
 asleep in an easy-chair. 
 
 In the midst of this silence then, broken only 
 by the sound of our own footsteps, Bessie spoke 
 so suddenly as to startle me. 
 
 Jim," said she, " there s that woman 
 again." 
 
 " Is it? " said I, " your eyes are sharper than 
 mine where? " 
 
 " She s pulled her head in now," said Bessie. 
 " She s in the one two in the ninth 
 doorway on the right." 
 
 Even as Bessie spoke the woman put her 
 head out, looked our way, appeared to hesitate, 
 and once more drew back. 
 
 " Right about face," said Bessie, " we 11 see 
 if it s accident, or if she s really following us." 
 
 So we faced about, turned the first corner, 
 and there waited. Presently we heard swift 
 steps and a moment later the woman herself 
 turned the corner, and stood as if petrified at 
 finding herself trapped. 
 
 "Well," said Bessie, "what is it? You ve 
 been following us all morning. If it s just bad 
 manners, cut it out; if you really want some 
 thing, why speak your piece! " 
 
 The woman drew a long breath. She was no
 
 ioo YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 longer young nor pretty; but she had great 
 stag eyes and wonderful white teeth. 
 
 :< I ask pard-on," she said in timid, faltering 
 and very pretty Spanish English. 
 
 " And that s granted," said Bessie. 
 
 " I want for to ask," said the woman, " are 
 you of the Unie-ed State?" 
 
 " Sure pop," said Bessie, " and then some. 
 Why?" 
 
 " Always," said the woman, " if I see people 
 of your con-tree, I have to ask them if they 
 have seen my frien up there. I have write, 
 and write an get no letter back." 
 
 On Bessie s lips I distinctly saw the word, 
 " Nutty ! " form, but she did not utter it. I 
 put in quickly and as kindly as I could speak : 
 
 1 What s your friend s name ? Perhaps I 
 do know of her, or of him." 
 
 And the name she gave almost knocked me 
 silly. It was Roy Cunningham. 
 
 " The crew-man ! " exclaimed Bessie. 
 
 "Wot you say?" 
 
 " She says why yes we that is I, know 
 a Roy Cunningham knew such a man." 
 
 " Know knew ! " her voice grew suddenly 
 shrill and tense. You know him? 
 
 " I knew him," I said. 
 
 She did n t say " Then he is dead." She
 
 MRS. CUNNINGHAM 101 
 
 seemed to see straight through me and beyond 
 me, and she said: 
 
 Then he is murder ! " And she followed 
 the one second-sight blow with another. " Car 
 rol It was Carrol keel him ! " 
 
 She swayed dizzily, and I caught her. In a 
 moment the faintness had passed. 
 
 We can t talk here." said Bessie. 
 "Where?" 
 
 " I am Mrs. Cunningham," said the woman, 
 " you come with me." 
 
 She hurried us through a network of side 
 streets, and led us, finally, into a little wine 
 shop, cool and pleasantly greenish after the 
 white glare of the streets. " Here," said the 
 woman, " I treat you with chocolate, and we 
 shall talk. That is our table you jus wait, 
 and I give the order." 
 
 Bessie and I seated ourselves at a round 
 iron table, painted white and much scratched 
 with names, initials and knife-point draw 
 ings. 
 
 "Bessie!" I cried in sudden excitement, 
 and I pointed to a name, very neatly executed. 
 
 " Espiritu Santo, " said she; " the name of 
 the galleywest! " 
 
 " And look here," said I, making a fresh 
 discovery, " Roy Cunningham!
 
 102 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " And here s his name again," said Bessie, 
 " in a heart with another name Carmen - 
 
 " Yes," said I, " and here are his initials and 
 a picture of something I can t make out 
 what, can you? " 
 
 " Why," said Bessie, " it s a diver s helmet, 
 isn t it?" 
 
 "Either that," said I, " or a skull. His 
 writing is better than his drawing. He must 
 have sat often at this table, Bessie, with his 
 girl and his dream." 
 
 In the act of crossing one leg over the other 
 my knee struck a hard knot under the table; 
 upon investigation it came off in my hand, and 
 proved to be a lump of hardened chewing-gum, 
 and imbedded in the surface that had been flat 
 tened against the table was a paper, folded many 
 times. We unfolded it, and read in English : 
 
 I get your word and hide; but Carrol get me. He 
 break my finger to make me tell one after the other 
 but I not tell. And I not believe he think I know. He 
 gone north after you. Something tell me you come 
 back, and we sail once more and find that gold where 
 we leave him. Carrol have me put in prison. I am 
 just out. Some of my finger not bend, and are all grow 
 crooked; but you not mind, my dear, not you? I 
 have our baby in prison, but he is dead when he come. 
 I think it is because Carrol hurt me so, and trample 
 on me to make me tell. I love you forever. C .
 
 MRS. CUNNINGHAM 103 
 
 "My God!" said Bessie. 
 
 A shadow fell between us, and we looked up 
 into the face of the woman. She reached a 
 small distorted hand toward the paper. 
 
 " Carmen! " I exclaimed. 
 Yes," she said, " please give me thata 
 letter. That not mean for you." 
 
 Was it meant for Roy Cunningham?" I 
 asked. 
 
 She scrutinised me for some time with her 
 great stag eyes. 
 
 "What of it?" she said. 
 
 I rose and offered her a chair. 
 
 " Please sit down and I will tell you what 
 I know about him." 
 
 She sat down, all of a huddle, so to speak. 
 
 " Did Carrol kill him? " she asked presently 
 in a quiet voice. 
 
 And I told her from the beginning all that 
 I knew of the man guessed to have been Cun 
 ningham; of his murder; of his eyes and 
 wounds opening at the approach of Carrol; 
 and of those subsequent events that accounted 
 for our meeting with her in the restaurant. 
 
 " Thata Roy," she said, " and Carrol kill 
 him!" 
 
 And that was all she said for a time. Then, 
 speaking very gently :
 
 104 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " I know you not friends with Carrol," she 
 said. " I watch you from the door ; and I see 
 how them name on thata table estonishe you. 
 Roy love to carve with his knife. And so 
 you going after Carrol and thata treasure? 
 I not care about thata treasure that is 
 for you - But I like oh, that only jus and 
 fair that Carrol belong to me. 
 
 Her voice, tired and gentle, did not instil the 
 last phrase with any particular meaning. 
 
 Why? " said Bessie. Why do you want 
 Carrol?" 
 
 " Why," said the woman, " he not done you 
 no harm but you think what he do to me. 
 And then ask me why I want of him for? " 
 
 She laid her two little hands, palm down, on 
 the table so that we should see into what dis 
 tortion and rigidity the bones broken by Car 
 rol had set. They must have been once very 
 pretty, clever little hands. But now, uncomba- 
 tive as I am by nature, the sight of them was 
 like that of a red cloth to a bull. And I felt 
 myself trembling from head to foot with the 
 lust to hunt Carrol down and kill him. 
 
 " Those," said she, " were my hands. They 
 used to make the fine lace. Cunningham he 
 my hosband, as thees ring, that I not get off 
 now if I want, show. . . . You listen "a
 
 MRS. CUNNINGHAM 105 
 
 certain vigour animated her gentle voice. " Roy 
 and I pass our honeymoon in one litter bit sloop 
 lookin for thata treasure, jus we two of us. 
 It not so easy for to find; and when we find 
 him, we cannot get him up. We not expect 
 do that. We are prospective, what you call 
 him? and if we find there some treasure we are 
 go to form the company, with Roy for leader, 
 and go back to them place with divers and all. 
 Roy dive down just as he is half a dozen time; 
 but the water is too col and deep, and we 
 learn more with that sea-glass. 
 
 The treasure-ship she have struck on a 
 reef of rock and go down into a kind of bowl 
 on the other side; that bowl is almos clean 
 rock, no mud, no sand to bury those things 
 just enough to help hoi them; and with that 
 glass you can see ches s, and timbers, and 
 casks, all atangled, and bone and skulls, and 
 fishes dartin amongs them and that bowl 
 have high side so that those things have not 
 been wash out of it, or mos of them. If it has 
 not been for those network of timbers, Roy 
 can have get much more; he only get two 
 little bar of gold; and I not let him go down 
 there any more; it is terrible to be all alone 
 in that sloop while he dive ; I cannot stand the 
 terror of him.
 
 106 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Then we come back here ; and met Carrol 
 that Roy have known beforehan . And he think 
 Carrol was an honest man; and he tell him 
 about that treasure, and the company is form. 
 But the agreement say that Roy is to have 
 three-fourth of that treasure; and although 
 Carrol agree and say that was fair, he make 
 up his mind, as these hand show, to get the all 
 of it, or the mos , for himself. 
 
 There not time now to tell how he try to 
 murder Roy then, and get that paper, and how 
 he raise those authorities agains Roy. and 
 Roy have to escape out of this country. And 
 Carrol follow him, after he is giving up try 
 to make me tell. No time and no use. But 
 listen: I not want that treasure; I only want 
 Carrol. But I am of use to you: I show you 
 the very place; and that not so easy to fin ; 
 because there are days and days when it was 
 too rough to use the glass; and you have 
 search for weeks within a hondred feet of 
 thata place, and not find him it look easy ; 
 off the northwest corner of the islet in shallow 
 water ; but that not easy. It take Roy and me 
 one month to find him - 
 
 Bessie reached out and drew both the dis 
 torted little hands into one of hers, and fell 
 to patting them with the other.
 
 MRS. CUNNINGHAM 107 
 
 " Don t get excited, you poor little thing," she 
 said, " and get to thinking we don t under 
 stand. Of course you want to go with us, and 
 see Carrol s finish ; and by the everlasting, you 
 shall!" 
 
 Mrs. Cunningham s great eyes filled slowly 
 with tears, and suddenly overflowed. 
 
 " If you re going to cry," said Bessie, " you 
 can t go." And her own eyes filled and ran 
 over; I think it was those poor little hands 
 that did it. " And and you can p-put that 
 in your pipe, and smoke it ! " 
 
 The women dried their eyes presently, and 
 left the restaurant, walking hand in hand like 
 two little children. And I followed them with 
 feelings that I presume to be akin to those of 
 an agitated parent.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 MAGELLAN AT LAST 
 
 ALTHOUGH we proceeded down the coast in a 
 leisurely manner, anchoring sometimes for a 
 day or two in the chief harbours, a spirit of 
 excitement began gradually to pervade our 
 whole ship s company; until finally Chang, dis 
 appointed from port to port in his efforts to 
 secure a Maxim, and an experienced diver to 
 go down in the suits bought in Lima, laid the 
 Shantung s course for the western opening of 
 Magellan s Strait. 
 
 The bright weather of the tropics went a 
 little farther with us ; as in the country a hos 
 pitable host sees his departing guests along the 
 road and stands at last waving and smiling 
 until they are hidden beyond the turn. For an 
 hour or two one day we could look back into 
 bright blue Summer; while ahead mists were 
 gathering, and the sea was a cold gray, and 
 the sky. There was an end to happy-go-lucky 
 sailing; and I began at last to appreciate the 
 zeal and devotion of Chinamen to a cause; 
 their delight in what is certain, and their con-
 
 tempt for chance. There seemed to be always 
 some one aloft searching with microscope eyes 
 for flaws in the rigging, greasing blocks and 
 trying ringbolts ; piece by piece the spare can 
 vas was overhauled; the mast-stays, and in 
 deed, any main reliance or trifle that might be 
 expected to play traitor and deliver us to the 
 gales. Nor was the general welfare left to the 
 individual when it could be helped ; no one went 
 long in wet clothes, whiskey appeared from 
 somewhere on that abstemious ship and was 
 served three times a day like a tonic; the 
 kettle boiled on the galley stove and each man 
 made tea when he liked. 
 
 The weather along that last stretch of conti 
 nent was neither so cold as I had expected nor 
 so violent. The thermometer ranged in the 
 middle forties; the wind from half to three 
 parts of a gale; and of the infinitude of low- 
 hanging gray clouds that swept over us, the 
 one burst and the next passed without burst 
 ing. It did not rain all day; but some days it 
 rained a hundred times; and if at times the 
 clouds opened and showed a watery sun, it was 
 seldom at high noon or apt for the navigator. 
 
 Yet of all the matters, great or minute, with 
 which Chang was busied day and night (al 
 most), those affecting the navigation of the
 
 i io YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Shantung appeared to give him the least 
 anxiety. He was, with his charts and com 
 passes and parallel rulers, his brushes, and 
 cakes of India ink, and, most important of all, 
 the wired frame with its movable beads upon 
 which he could perform any miracle known to 
 mathematics, the plus past master of dead- 
 reckoning. He moved among those unknown 
 seas and currents as certainly, as carelessly, you 
 might say, as a librarian among his books ; and 
 only at those rare times when he could prove 
 himself right to an inch by an observation did 
 he display the ghost of an emotion. Then the 
 fires in his black sloe eyes would liven for half 
 a minute and play ; or he might have been seen 
 to catch Lichee by the foot and toss him for a 
 double somersault, catching him amid the swing 
 and toss of the ship w 7 ith the gentleness of a 
 woman and the certainty of fate. 
 
 But there was no time now for games and 
 loafings and amusements. The Shantung, if 
 never in actual jeopardy, was in the midst of 
 perils and encountered many a chance of mis 
 chance; and the characters of the men that 
 sailed her for all that \vas in them began to 
 be revealed. Hitherto, except that Chang was 
 the captain, and Jili the jester, if I may say so, 
 I had seen little real difference between them.
 
 MAGELLAN AT LAST m 
 
 For weeks I had even thought them to look 
 very much alike; but now it seemed that Jili 
 was a nervous, anxious man, ready enough to 
 do his duty, and manly enough for that matter, 
 but prone to look with pessimism upon any un 
 expected opposition of the elements; always 
 the first of the watch to be on deck, but not, 
 I thought, so much from extra vigilance as 
 from the inability to sleep soundly. And he 
 who had always been the first to see or to perpe 
 trate a pleasantry now wore the mask of a 
 dismal and narrow spirit. 
 
 But Chang, in bright weather docile, I had 
 sometimes thought, to the point of weakness, 
 never forward in talk, but one who sits back 
 and, yes, giggles, appeared now in a wonderful 
 change of colour. Into his voice, higher and 
 more womanish than is common even among 
 Chinamen, there came now the sharp and jar 
 ring note of command ; and you sprang to obey, 
 moved by the whole strength of your legs plus 
 the impulse of his voice. The company met no 
 more in council to vote upon this measure or 
 that; for decision came from Chang, as light 
 ning from a storm-cloud, and as overwhelm 
 ingly struck. I looked upon him no more as on 
 a man of a particular race; but as upon the 
 universal man, born prepared ; he was the sea-
 
 ii2 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 man incarnate; the genius of navigation; a 
 figure at once inspiring and formidable. So 
 Columbus may have borne himself, or the in 
 domitable Magellan himself among those very 
 seas. 
 
 We knew one morning that in the afternoon 
 we might expect to enter the famous strait, 
 and I cast many an excited look into the gray, 
 streaming weather for the exalted mountains 
 that I believed to guard the entrance. Yet so 
 thick was the weather that I despaired of catch 
 ing more than a glimpse of that dramatic 
 portal. 
 
 As we drew into the coast the wind became 
 a monster to be reckoned with; baffled, I sup 
 pose, by the opposition of the southwest Andes, 
 it blew now from the west and now from the 
 east and now in ferocious circles. Once we 
 jibed with a violence that I thought must have 
 torn our masts out of us; and once the Shan 
 tung ran her bows under solid green water, 
 and it seemed for a moment as if she must go 
 to the bottom of the sea as a toboggan to the 
 bottom of an iced slide. Sleet rather than rain 
 bit the face and blinded the eyes; the rigging 
 gave out sounds as of sudden loud singing, and 
 the wind roared like a bull in the hollow of the 
 ear.
 
 MAGELLAN AT LAST 113 
 
 It was about noon that Jili, who was at 
 the wheel, gave a loud cry and jammed us 
 suddenly into the eye of the wind, to hang a 
 minute, and fill once more and almost as 
 suddenly upon the starboard tack. 
 
 That he alone had seen the little sloop that 
 now passed along our lee rail, almost colliding 
 with us, must be attributed to the fact that all 
 eyes were after mountain-tops rather than sea- 
 levels. But it was lucky for all concerned that 
 Jili had seen her in time to luff. 
 
 She was almost thirty feet on the water 
 line; a fat, white, high-bowed little craft that, 
 looking as if she was built of odds and ends 
 of wrecks, behaved like a witch and tore over 
 the great seas, under a mainsail reefed to the 
 size of a bed-spread, like a dolphin. Her 
 course was the same as ours; and before we 
 had outfooted her I read the name Sting-ray 
 upon her stern board, in great scrawly letters 
 as if painted by an amateur of shipbuilding. 
 She showed but one man ; a middle-aged white 
 man with a black beard tucked into the collar 
 of his oilskin. He sailed his little ship by a 
 ramshackle looking tiller, had a great black 
 drooping pipe in his mouth, and as he came 
 parallel with our stern he turned to us a mild, 
 blue, interested pair of eyes and, freeing one
 
 ii4 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 hand, waved to Jili and smiled on either side 
 of the pipe-stem, as much as to thank that 
 paper-pale celestial for the timely and un 
 speakably necessary luff. 
 
 But it was Chang that had the most, inter 
 est in the stranger ; and he never took his eyes 
 off that brave little ship until she had disap 
 peared in the smother astern. Then, without 
 a word, he turned, and himself relieved Jili at 
 the wheel. 
 
 An hour later, trumpeting my hands, for 
 the storm and the rain were making a deafen 
 ing racket, I ventured to ask him a question. 
 
 " How near now? " I cried. 
 
 For answer he took an instantaneous hand 
 from the wheel and pointed over his shoulder. 
 
 We had indeed passed the portals of the 
 perilous strait without seeing them; but, 
 suddenly, far to starboard, a cloud tore 
 apart vertically like a sheet of paper, and in 
 the swirling rift I saw, for one instant of 
 time, a jagged peak white with eternal snow 7 .
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 CHANG GEOLOGISES 
 
 THE weather, gray, wet and cold, with high 
 winds and sleet flurries, held up for one piping 
 hot day of unimaginable calm and beauty. 
 From dawn till dark we passed slowly on 
 ward between the mountains, their heads daz 
 zling with the low-drawn snow; their feet 
 quietly washed by waters of an equatorial blue ; 
 the valleys between them and their steep slopes 
 clothed with sombre forests. In one place a 
 glacier of a bright tint of blue came nearly to 
 the water s edge, and as we passed, a moun 
 tainous fragment broke from it and fell roar 
 ing. So great was the displacement that the 
 waters rushed from it like a tidal wave and 
 we were treated for some minutes to a nasty, 
 chopping sea. 
 
 All that bright hot day we sailed among 
 fragments of ice; among half-submerged 
 rocks from which the dark sea-weeds streamed 
 for hundreds of feet around; rising and fall 
 ing with the undulations of the sea, like the 
 hair of a swimmer s head. And in those cold
 
 n6 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 deep waters there was abundance of life as 
 in a tropical forest. Whales and dolphins and 
 seals swarmed; shoals of little fishes passed 
 just beneath the surface, like reflections of 
 silver-lined clouds; vast rocks there were, 
 white with sea-gulls, and even the albatross 
 was no rare sight. 
 
 That night the sun went stormily down, 
 his face sullen and crimson, like an angry per 
 son s; and we did not see him again for many 
 days. The wind blew up a deluge of sleet and 
 rain; clouds obliterated the mountains; the 
 barometer went down like the sand in an hour 
 glass; and by midnight we called the women 
 and Lichee, to have them prepared, in case 
 of necessity, for the worst. But we passed 
 through the danger of that night and two 
 nights more, and then, even as we had entered 
 the strait, in the same blither of sleet and mist 
 and strong running seas, we left it and were 
 in the Atlantic at last. Then we laid our course 
 once more south, made the Harbour of Good 
 Success at the entrance of the famous Beagle 
 Channel and, having reached the threshold of 
 our adventure, came to anchor for an earned 
 and necessary rest. 
 
 Chang, upon whom the anxieties of the last 
 perilous weeks had fallen, who had guessed, felt,
 
 CHANG GEOLOGISES 117 
 
 divined a way, when for the most part there 
 had been nothing to guide him, offered prayers 
 of thanksgiving to the strange brass god in 
 the forecastle going down alone and remain 
 ing for two hours; he then smoked opium; 
 prepared for him and urged upon him by Bes 
 sie; and lay down, an ugly open knife beside 
 him which he swore to use upon the first man 
 that disturbed his sleep, and slept for eighteen 
 hours. 
 
 Meanwhile the wind abated, the rain stopped 
 falling, and the weather cleared to a light sun 
 less gray. Chang awoke, we weighed anchor, 
 and sailed into Beagle Channel. The next day 
 we proceeded under shortened sail, with a 
 sharp lookout for signs of the Calliope. We 
 might stumble upon her around any headland, 
 and we chose, if possible, in the succinct Ameri 
 can, " to see her first." 
 
 About noon the lookout thought he saw far 
 ahead a schooner under full sail; but Carmen, 
 looking long through telescoped hands, became 
 very much agitated, and said that it was no 
 ship but a vast discoloration upon the face of 
 a headland; that she knew it well, now that 
 she saw it, and that in the bay beyond that 
 headland we should find the islet that we had 
 come so far to seek.
 
 iiS YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 As we drew upon the headland, excitement 
 moved among us like some invisible agitator, 
 whose oratory affects different persons in dif 
 ferent ways. Chang became terse and morose ; 
 Wong displayed a shining face of greed; Jili 
 talked and clattered incessantly like a child s 
 rattle; Bessie had the crimson cheeks and the 
 vivacious, dancing eyes of a girl at the threshold 
 of her first ball; Lichee, perceiving oppor 
 tunity, snatched it by the hair and dragged 
 it with him into the deserted galley, picked 
 the lock of the jam-locker, and was the first of 
 our company to feel that he had not voyaged 
 in vain. 
 
 Carmen, alone, in whom that familiar head 
 land, recalling her lover and her honeymoon, 
 must have stirred the ashes of past joys and 
 suffering into flame, fell into her ordinary calm 
 demeanour. 
 
 " Soon now," she said, " we shall eround 
 into that bay and see that rock standing in the 
 middle." 
 
 Yet we passed the great headland with its 
 nature-faked schooner and found, it is true, 
 an indentation like a narrow fiord that 
 wound off into the cliffs, but no bay; and a 
 smaller headland; only to find beyond that a 
 third.
 
 CHANG GEOLOGISES 119 
 
 " I think after that one," said Carmen. But 
 a fourth confronted us, and then a fifth. 
 
 * But it was here right here. ... It was 
 right here," she kept saying. " I remember 
 that fine clear day; and that schooner. . . . 
 And she became confused like a truthful per 
 son suspected of lying. Chang and his mathe 
 matics bore her out ; but neither deep indented 
 bay nor rocky islet appeared. Those minutes, 
 in which what we had sought so far seemed 
 not to be, were terribly trying. We spoke in 
 whispers, as if afraid of waking some one, and 
 were pale, one and all of us. 
 
 Where so many eyes, hopes and conjectures 
 were straining forward, Chang alone appeared 
 to be studying the nearby cliffs and steeps them 
 selves, even applying a telescope to the work. 
 He passed an hour thus, interested apparently; 
 perplexed; but undiscouraged. Then, shut 
 ting the telescope, he went forward and was 
 no sooner watchfully ensconced in the bows 
 than we opened the mouth of just such a fiord 
 as that beyond the first headland. Then was 
 Chang a man transformed; his grave face 
 wrinkled with smiles and he came bounding 
 aft to the wheel, laughing shrilly. He headed 
 the Shantung straight for the mouth of the 
 fiord and, a quarter of an hour later, hav-
 
 120 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 ing discovered a suitable anchorage, himself 
 wreathed in smiles, put her into the wind and 
 gave the order to anchor. 
 
 I thought that the tempestuous and nerve- 
 racking passage of Magellan had unhinged 
 the man s mind; but not at all. He sent for 
 his paint-brush, his cake of ink and a sheet of 
 paper. Spreading the latter upon the deck, 
 he knelt by it, and in a ring of completely 
 puzzled faces, began to draw. 
 
 The first picture was something like this 
 (only beautifully drawn), and when it was 
 finished he explained. And in English that 
 all might understand. 
 
 Touching with his finger the point that I 
 have marked A, he said : " That white schooner 
 ship on rock; all same now." Then running 
 his finger along the dotted line B C, " Him 
 old time bay," he said; and, " him," here his 
 finger moved to X " him lilly lock. Chang 
 think lilly lock one time top side fire mountain ; 
 Chang think earthquake come along and lift
 
 CHANG GEOLOGISES 121 
 
 lilly lock out of bay." He drew a second 
 picture. 
 
 Then, his finger back at X, " Lilly lock," he 
 said, " now big lock; fill um old time bay full; 
 not all full, leave lilly bit." And he moved his 
 fingers along the Channel B C ; and then, point 
 ing to D, " Chang think Shantung stop here; 
 here now - Here he sprang to his feet, 
 and with sharp, quick gestures : " Chang 
 think," he cried, " no dive down for gold; think 
 climb up, and find him top side lilly lock ; Chang 
 look, and think old time lilly lock new time big 
 lock ; and Chang think him land now and look 
 lilly more." 
 
 "What makes think new land, Chang?" I 
 said. 
 
 For answer he pointed into the air, and said : 
 " See um old rotten whale, topside lilly cliff, 
 all same sea- weed; Chang think earthquake 
 raise um lilly lock; raise um bottom, raise um 
 hell. Chang look and see lilly tlee (tree) all 
 same size Lichee; all tlee lilly tlee; no see big 
 tlee; Chang think land new, all same baby."
 
 CHAPTER 
 FOURTEEN 
 
 OPPOSITE the schooner, although the water in 
 the fiord was smooth as a ribbon, it appeared 
 impracticable to land or make an ascent ; nor 
 could we sail any farther owing to the dead 
 calm that prevailed. But it was necessary to 
 investigate Chang s theory of the former islet s 
 having risen; and to find out whether Carrol 
 and the Calliope were in the vicinity. So we 
 got one of the boats overboard, and four of 
 us embarked : Chang and I to go ashore at the 
 first favourable place and explore the land; 
 Wong and A Fing to proceed cautiously along 
 the fiord, returning for us about sundown. 
 
 I was still wondering why Chang had selected 
 me to be his companion, when he gave an order 
 and the boat was turned at right angles to her 
 course and run head on for a shelving pocket 
 of sand. From this point a wide fissure in the 
 rocks ran backward and upward and appeared 
 to lead easily and directly to the higher levels 
 which we were desirous of gaining. And 
 such, indeed, proved the case; and the ascent,
 
 JERRY TOP 123 
 
 even Lo a man encumbered with a heavy Win 
 chester, was by no means difficult. At an ele 
 vation of, perhaps, a hundred and fifty feet we 
 came out of the fissure upon a great space of 
 rock and sand whose general level was broken 
 by ridges and fissures. 
 
 That the formation had not been long out 
 of water must have been evident to a child; 
 mingled with almost any handful of sand were 
 to be found pieces of fish-bone, and whole and 
 fragmentary shells, the colours still bright and 
 fresh upon them; the profusion of little beech 
 trees two and three feet high, and no higher, 
 was significant a clean-picked skeleton of a 
 seal or sea-lion disordered by the thrusting 
 stem of a beech; these and a thousand other 
 evidences went far to proving Chang s theory. 
 
 Levelish as the plateau was in general effect, 
 and far as the eye carried, yet a thousand men 
 might have been concealed within a stone s 
 throw of us; and for this reason we kept as 
 much to the hollows and below the surface, 
 so to speak, as possible. In the midst, but far 
 off, the plateau rose to a kind of truncated cone; 
 and that, as the highest point visible, we con 
 ceived might be the old time islet itself ; indeed, 
 a sharp discoloration, extending horizontally 
 and bisecting the cone s altitude, had even at
 
 124 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 that distance the look of an old high-water 
 mark; and so sure was Chang that he elected 
 to proceed no farther toward it at that time, 
 but to strike across, at right angles, to the fiord 
 and follow its windings from above. My im 
 pulse (and mine are seldom wise) was to hasten 
 to the cone, prove it the ancient islet, find the 
 cove where the galleon had sunk and fill my 
 pockets with treasure. But Chang, uniting 
 as he did the boldness of a fanatic with the cau 
 tion of a Hebrew, preferred first to locate 
 Carrol and the Calliope. 
 
 Why I clung to the idea that we had nothing 
 to fear from Carrol and his gang I do not 
 know. Our own perilous voyage, perhaps, had 
 to do with this, and the desolateness of the 
 region in which we found ourselves. Because 
 I saw no sign of man, I was ready to believe 
 that none was to be seen, and yet at the very 
 moment that I was imparting these unreason 
 able thoughts to the patient Chang there was 
 a man within a dozen feet of us. And, as we 
 learned afterward, he had never been much 
 farther off during the whole of our exploration. 
 
 To reveal himself he chose a strategical op 
 portunity, with a way of retreat in reserve. 
 We were passing between two great rocks ; he 
 had climbed to the top of that on the right hand
 
 JERRY TOP 125 
 
 and was watching us, torn between timidity and 
 loneliness. A pebble fell at my feet ; I looked 
 up and saw a copper-brown face that my as 
 tonished glance seemed to split into an im 
 measurable grin and to set bobbing up and 
 down. I caught Chang by the arm, and he, 
 too, looked up into that idiotically good-natured 
 face. Black hairs, thick as wool, matted the 
 individual s head; and black hairs, rare as in 
 leprosy, stuck ridiculously from his chin. And 
 he smiled and he bobbed and he bobbed and he 
 smiled. 
 
 " Good afternoon," I said, and was aston 
 ished to be answered in English. 
 
 " Me well, thank you ; me hope you very 
 well." 
 
 " Who are you ? " I asked. 
 
 " You not shoot, me come down and tell." 
 He seemed to wait my answer nervously. 
 Chang took the rifle out of my hands and laid 
 it aside, together with his own. Then the grin 
 ning savage came out entire upon the top of the 
 rock, and leaped down. He was a little, knotted, 
 bow-legged man and, unless you count a with 
 ered looking twig with a few yellow leaves 
 that he carried in one hand, absolutely naked. 
 Now it must be remembered that although I 
 had begun the conversation, it was to Chang
 
 126 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 as to the man of importance that the savage 
 at once proceeded to address himself. 
 
 Well, there followed so comic a conversation 
 in broken English that politeness alone kept me 
 from splitting apart with laughter; but the 
 subject of their discourse became presently 
 serious enough to have sobered the most un 
 redeemed buffoon. 
 
 The savage s English name was Jerry Top. 
 He had sailed five years before the mast on a 
 Yankee whaler, and hence his English and his 
 civilisation. Then, it seems, he had been 
 beaten, unjustly, had leaped overboard in a 
 snow-storm, and now behold him here. Oh yes, 
 thank you, he lived very well. But he was 
 very lonely. He had been a ladies man in his 
 day; a family man; indeed a man of many 
 families. He wished very much to sail before 
 the mast once more. God knows he was tired 
 of living alone. Would we take him with us? 
 
 There were some men and here his infor 
 mation became startling over there. They 
 had come in a schooner; and they kept put 
 ting different ones of them in a curious suit of 
 clothes and dropping them overboard at the 
 end of a rope. He did not know why. It was 
 funny to see; but even he had tired of it, 
 watching them from the cliff. He had ap-
 
 JERRY TOP 127 
 
 preached them, and they were very bad men. 
 They were not jolly; they never laughed. 
 They were very bad. They had given him a - 
 good beating. But we were different; we 
 looked like very jolly men. Had we any ladies 
 aboard ? He would be glad to see a lady - 
 just to see one. He was terribly lonely. He 
 became embarrassed and attempted to shield his 
 countenance behind the twig which he carried. 
 
 Chang reached forward suddenly and took 
 the twig out of the man s hand. He examined 
 it a moment, and then passed it to me, his nar 
 row slant eyes round with astonishment. And 
 with reason, for the thing was no part of a 
 vegetable growth, but a much battered speci 
 men of wonderfully wrought and hammered 
 gold. Chang turned to Jerry Top and smiled. 
 
 " You tell where find um," he said, " Chang 
 take you way on ship; kind all same brother. 
 Where you find um? 
 
 Jerry Top turned and started off at full 
 speed; but Chang overtook him. 
 
 " To-mollow," he said, " Go back ship now. 
 Chang think lilly."
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 SOME OF US GO TREASURE HUNTING 
 
 WE had not to wait te"n minutes at the landing 
 place for the return of Wong and Ah King. 
 These at first were very big \vith news; but 
 collapsed like balloons on learning that we, too, 
 knew that the Calliope was somewhere along 
 the fiord; we laughed, though, with a com 
 mon impulse, to think of Carrol and his gang 
 so absurdly employed in diving. Jerry Top 
 laughed too, very heartily, but he could not 
 have explained why. 
 
 It was evident that Carrol had not guessed 
 at the change of topography which the region 
 had so recently undergone; and Chang him 
 self must have been longer in finding it out 
 if he had not had Carmen and her clear mem 
 ory aboard the Shantung to spur his ingenuity. 
 We congratulated ourselves heartily upon the 
 situation; and it was odds but that we could 
 lift the bulk of the treasure, and get away 
 with it, while Carrol continued to explore the 
 bottom of the fiord. He might, I told myself, 
 so employ himself for the rest of the time for
 
 SOME GO TREASURE HUNTING 129 
 
 all I cared. And the general wish was to leave 
 him severely alone, rascal and murderer though 
 he was. 
 
 Carmen, however, wished in the frank Span 
 ish manner to be less subtly revenged, and made 
 no bones about saying so. And she took no 
 part in our premature rejoicings, but looked 
 on us coldly as on people who had cheated her, 
 treating no one to a smile but Jerry Top. He, 
 indeed, was deserving of smiles ; for no sooner 
 had he set foot upon the schooner than he 
 became the incarnation of childish joy let loose. 
 We had great ado to catch him, and clothe him 
 decently; he ran hither and thither like a mon 
 goose, poking his nose into the cabin, into the 
 forecastle, flashing brownly aloft, sliding with 
 furious speed down the jibstay; giggling, leap 
 ing and cracking his heels together, and snap 
 ping his fingers ; and firing off broadside after 
 broadside of his ridiculous and profane Eng 
 lish. And when we waked him the next morning 
 at dawn, and told him that he must act as guide 
 to the place where he had found the golden 
 twig, he flew into a childish passion of reluc 
 tance at the idea of quitting the ship. 
 
 As we presumed on many loads of treasure 
 in the course of the next few days, it seemed 
 best to move the Shantung until she lay opposite
 
 130 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 the little beach where Chang and I had landed ; 
 but as there was not a breath of wind we were 
 obliged to take to the boats, and tow her. And 
 a slow, dismal process it was. But all things 
 have an end, and at last she was snugly 
 anchored in the new berth, perhaps a hundred 
 fathoms from the landing place. We cut a 
 pack of cards to see who should go treasure 
 hunting, and who should stay at home and keep 
 ship. Of the latter were Bessie and Car 
 men, willy nilly; and after the first round of 
 cutting, it appeared that Jili, much to his 
 disappointment, must also remain. Another 
 round disposed of Wong, and still another of 
 Ah Fing. Chinamen are proverbially great 
 gamblers; and the excitement displayed upon 
 the present occasion was no exception to the 
 rule. You might have thought that the treas 
 ure itself was to belong to those who went 
 ashore, instead of the more arduous task of 
 hunting for it. Yet had we but known it, we 
 were playing for higher stakes than gold and 
 gems, and, with the exception of Jerry Top 
 and myself, those who stayed aboard the 
 Shantung were, for a time, the lucky ones. 
 
 The shore party, led ex-officio by Chang, 
 consisted of Jerry Top (once more allowed the 
 privilege of nakedness), Wu Lo, San Lo, Ho-
 
 SOME GO TREASURE HUNTING 131 
 
 ang, Man Lo, myself; and at the last moment 
 that little beggar, Lichee, slipped into the boat, 
 and resisted ejection so firmly and plaintively 
 that Chang, usually firm and decided, could not 
 make up his mind to disappoint him. The 
 chords of discipline were relaxed, and Chang 
 complained sheepishly that he would, if neces 
 sary, carry the child upon his shoulders; the 
 ways of children were mysterious; it might 
 be that Lichee would be the grain thrown into 
 the scale of chance that would bring us luck. 
 He ordered Wu Lo and Hoang to give way, 
 and presently we had landed and hauled out 
 the boat on the beach. With the exception of 
 Jerry Top who carried two spades and was 
 very sulky at finding himself once more ashore, 
 each man toted a Winchester and an empty 
 breadsack; and Hoang, a wonderfully powerful 
 fellow, had in addition a pickaxe and a package 
 containing food. By a common impulse, we 
 turned before commencing the ascent of the 
 fissure and waved to our friends aboard the 
 Shantung; and Bessie flung us a frank shower 
 of kisses (I believe I was included) and snatch 
 ing up a megaphone, called in her large, hu 
 mourous voice: 
 
 " Don t come back, Jim, without my tarara." 
 Then we turned and began to ascend. It
 
 132 
 
 was an easy climb for grown men, but very try 
 ing, I expect, to the short, dimpled legs of 
 Lichee. And it was delicious to observe the 
 manifest determination of the child not to 
 abuse his privileges by making a nuisance of 
 himself. He fell repeatedly, but treated such 
 mischances with the quiet contempt which they 
 deserved, and made up for them by redoubled 
 efforts. He must have been on the point of 
 bursting when at last we reached the plateau, 
 and the going made less savage assaults upon 
 the heart and lungs.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THE AMBUSH 
 
 JERRY TOP was for making by the shortest line 
 for the truncated cone that Chang and I had 
 decided to be the old time islet. But Chang, 
 the ultimate destination being once indicated, 
 himself assumed the part of guide, choosing a 
 route which, if at times anything but direct, 
 kept our heads below the general level and our 
 feet upon substances that left no mark. It 
 would not do, he said, for Carrol or one of his 
 men to come by chance upon a broad trail, and 
 follow it to where the treasure lay. There must 
 be no trace of our comings or goings, else the 
 business upon which we were engaged must be 
 discovered. Not to hurry breathlessly forward 
 rent the heart ; but no one except the irrepres 
 sible Top thought for one moment of going 
 against Chang. 
 
 Once we heard a shot from far off to the 
 left in the general direction of the Calliope, and 
 we could see the thin smoke of a fire towering 
 to the sky; and once a flock of crows flew sud 
 denly upward from a distant hollow, cawing
 
 134 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 angrily as if they had been disturbed in the 
 midst of a feast; but of other disquieting signs 
 we had none. Nor had we need of exterior ex 
 citement, for that furnished by the quest on 
 which we were engaged, and every man s in 
 ward anticipations sufficed. I may liken my 
 feelings to those of a nervous bridegroom on 
 his way to church, sure that he is late and be 
 lieving every watch to be a liar. 
 
 About nine o clock we were in the shadow 
 of the cone, and twenty minutes later we were 
 looking down into a kind of a bowl, the bottom 
 choked with sand and little beech trees. The 
 bowl had the exact bearing to the cone that the 
 submarine berth of the Espiritu Santo had had 
 to the rocky islet off which she went down, and 
 it was with a kind of galvanic spasm of ex 
 citement, and (I think) dread, that I leaped 
 into the place, and plunged my hand into the 
 sand as if each grain of it must prove a gold 
 coin. A sharp exclamation from Hoang 
 brought me to my feet. He had found, not 
 a bar of gold, but a black and rotted frag 
 ment of timber. It went rapidly from hand to 
 hand, and we ejaculated and exclaimed; and 
 swore that it w^as a part of a ship. But if we 
 had expected (and I for one had) to find all 
 manner of precious things laid out as on a shelf
 
 THE AMBUSH 135 
 
 in Tiffany s we were doomed to disappoint 
 ment. If the treasure was anywhere in that 
 bowl of rock, it was beneath the accumulation 
 of sand and beech leaves that choked the place, 
 and we must dig. But where to begin? Even 
 Chang was at a loss; he looked across the 
 place, and around it, and up and down it, and 
 rested his chin upon the heel of his hand, 
 and frowned; then, quite suddenly, and with 
 out any change of expression, as one of those 
 persons gifted with the ability to find four- 
 leaved clovers stoops and picks one surely from 
 a clump where all the others have but three, 
 so Chang stooped, and picked from the sand 
 between his feet a raw green emerald as big 
 as a California cherry. He held it between his 
 thumb and forefinger and turned it slowly 
 this way and that for all to see. Then, point 
 ing between his feet: 
 
 " Chang think, dig here," said he, and 
 stepped back. 
 
 At Hoang s second powerful thrust, the edge 
 of his spade struck with a kind of chug into 
 something solid. He paused, grinned from 
 ear to ear, and, as an actor sure of his effect: 
 
 " Him feel like gold," said he, and with a 
 quick, deep scoop he brought up, upon the broad 
 of the spade, a chunky ingot of the virgin metal.
 
 136 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Then, indeed, the digging became fast and 
 furious, with the two spades, the pick and bare 
 hands; even Jerry Top caught the excitement, 
 and began to dig like a dog, stooping and send 
 ing a shower of sand backward between his 
 legs. As luck would have it, we had lighted 
 first of all on the ingots, long since burst from 
 their chests and scattered, and to be found now 
 in twos and threes and now singly; and often 
 for long periods of furious digging not at all. 
 We dug as men eat who have a train to catch ; 
 I have never seen men in such a passion of 
 hurry; nor do I exclude myself. I dug myself 
 to the verge of exhaustion, and kept on dig 
 ging. I was dimly aware that it had come 
 on to rain; that it was pouring; that I had a 
 great to-do keeping my own private excavation 
 from filling, and could make but precious little 
 progress downward or laterally; and still I 
 dug, bare handed, with torn nails and bleeding 
 knuckles. 
 
 We dug without rest, one and all of us, not 
 excepting Lichee, from half past nine until one 
 o clock. Then the pouring rain became a veri 
 table deluge, and upon the sharp and thrice 
 repeated command of Ghang we stopped re 
 luctantly. 
 
 The gold was parcelled out, and loaded into
 
 THE AMBUSH 137 
 
 the strong bread bags ; even Lichee was given 
 an ingot, and leaving the spades and the pick, 
 we began to climb out of the bowl. I remem 
 ber laughing, aching as I was with fatigue, to 
 think how easy it had been to reach the place, 
 poor ; how arduous it was to leave it, rich. 
 
 Owing to the inclemency of the weather, we 
 began the return journey with less caution ; as 
 sured that none would be abroad to spy upon 
 us, and that the rain would soon obliterate all 
 tracks. Chang in the lead moved very swiftly, 
 and it was only by the most strenuous and 
 courageous exertion that for a time I kept 
 his pace. Then I began to lag behind, and 
 Lichee, glad of an excuse to ease his fat little 
 pins, lagged with me. What with the digging, 
 and the excitement, and the gold I carried and 
 the rifle, I was near dead, and soon came to the 
 conclusion that I must lighten my burden or 
 incontinently collapse. As the rifle seemed 
 of no particular use, I laid it aside together 
 with my cartridge belt in the cleft of a great 
 split rock, whence I should have no difficulty 
 in recovering it next day; and once more 
 dragged myself onward. 
 
 After many ages of time, I saw that Chang, 
 now far ahead, had reached the upper end of 
 the fissure that marked the termination of the
 
 138 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 journey; and as the rain had now settled into 
 a light drizzle, I made up my mind that I would 
 sit down if only for a moment, and rest. 
 
 " Lichee," I said, " Melican man no can do; 
 sit down or bust." 
 
 So I sank upon a rock with a groan of relief, 
 and Lichee, his lips scornfully curling, stood 
 waiting until I should be ready to go on. 
 
 I watched Chang and the others disappear 
 one by one into the fissure; Hoang, the last 
 to go down, turning at the last moment and 
 beckoning impatiently to me to follow. And 
 I had at last risen to do so when I saw a bulky 
 bearded man (and even at that distance I knew 
 him for Carrol despite the beard) rise from be 
 hind a rock, step to the brink of the fissure, and 
 lean cautiously forward until he could look 
 down into it. Then, freeing one hand from the 
 rifle that he carried, he made a gesture of 
 beckoning, and seven more men emerged from 
 their hiding place, and joined him. A moment 
 the eight stood, looking down upon the heads 
 of Chang and the others, surmising, perhaps, 
 the contents of those obviously ponderous bread 
 bags. Then, and the thing was so sudden that 
 I had not even the time to shout a warning, 
 the eight, as one man, put their rifles to their 
 shoulders, depressed the muzzles to the per-
 
 THE AMBUSH 139 
 
 pendicular, and fired a broken murderous vol 
 ley. One harsh, sharp cry as of a man in his 
 mortal agony came from the fatal depth of 
 the fissure, and no more. 
 
 And I, seized by an accursed, unmanly, 
 damned panic, slipped from my load of gold, 
 caught Lichee by the hand, and fled away in 
 land, with a power and burst of speed that were 
 almost demoniac.
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 A REPRISAL 
 
 THE flight, begun in a very mania of fear, was 
 without goal or logic. But as I ran, some 
 times jerking Lichee completely off his feet, 
 the tragedy, whose inside workings I had been 
 a witness to, hung before me like a painting. 
 I saw those poor Chinamen who had been my 
 friends and comrades huddled shockingly in 
 unprovoked death, face down, face up, among 
 the rocks. I saw the murderers descend warily 
 to put the finishing touches upon the crime; 
 to put the knife into that body which still con 
 tained, perhaps, the breath of life; and to rob 
 the dead men of their gold. 
 
 I do not know at what point in my flight 
 grief got the better of fear ; at what point grief 
 yielded to shame. I know that I ran slower 
 and slower, muttering and talking to myself; 
 and that gradually a passion of anger rose 
 strongly from some unknown hollow of my na 
 ture, as a full river and flooded me. Then, 
 as suddenly as I had begun flight, I broke it 
 off; stopped short, and faced about. My im-
 
 A REPRISAL 141 
 
 pulse to go back was almost as strong as that 
 which had brought me where I stood. But the 
 folly of so doing beat me to a standstill with 
 swift, sharp strokes. I had the courage to go 
 back, plenty of it, and to sell my life as dearly 
 as possible but to what end? I was un 
 armed, and a long way from where I had left 
 my rifle and cartridge belt. If I went back it 
 must be to strike some terrible blow. Armed 
 and from above I might massacre the enemy 
 as they had massacred us; but even now they 
 must have finished their work in the fissure, and 
 were probably climbing out with the gold. 
 There was no longer time to take them at that 
 particular disadvantage. How else could I 
 strike them? What would be their next step? 
 Why, back to their own schooner, of course, 
 to put the gold aboard. There were eight of 
 them, but the gold was heavy. Neither would 
 they feel any need to hurry. Even if they knew 
 that I had been of the shore party, they would 
 not disturb themselves with the thought of any 
 thing that I might do. It was that - - the con 
 tempt in which I believed myself to be held 
 that finally goaded me into action; which, in 
 the event of there being no more than eight 
 all told in Carrol s party, would be as easy of 
 accomplishment as rolling off a log. Roughly,
 
 142 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 my plan was to get to the Calliope before Car 
 rol and his men; and if, as I expected, she 
 proved to be unguarded, to board her in one 
 of Carrol s boats, set her on fire, and return 
 in the same boat to the Shantung. That stroke, 
 I thought, would put the enemy at the mercy of 
 those of us who survived. But I could not 
 risk Lichee in any such desperate business, 
 and for a few moments more I hesitated. 
 Then, knowing the child s natural qualities of 
 patience and obedience, I appealed to them. 
 
 " Lichee," I said, " you sit here, no matter 
 how long. Maybe Melican man come back; 
 maybe Jili come; maybe Bessie. You give 
 word Melican man you not move till some one 
 come? " 
 
 Lichee seated himself stolidly, but with a 
 wondering look in his eyes. 
 
 " Allight," he said. 
 
 I bent over on the impulse, and kissed his 
 forehead. 
 
 " God keep you, little Lichee," I said, " and 
 grow you into a fine strong man." 
 
 Then I turned and hurried off upon my 
 errand. I knew about where the Calliope must 
 be anchored; and made for that point as fast 
 as the precaution of keeping below the sky line 
 would permit. I kept a pretty good lookout for
 
 A REPRISAL 143 
 
 Carrol s party, halting from time to time, and 
 poking my head over some easily accessible ele 
 vation, but saw nothing of them, or theirs ; un 
 til, after some twenty minutes of going, I came 
 to the beginning of a long sweeping downward 
 slope, and saw at the foot of it the waters of 
 the fiord, and the Calliope at anchor. Two of 
 her boats were drawn up on the shore, and a 
 third floated under the stern ; but there was no 
 sign of a guard, nor of Carrol s returning. 
 There might, of course, be some one below 
 decks on the schooner herself; but that, as well 
 as the open nature of the slope down which I 
 must descend, were chances that had to be 
 taken. And as the deed might hang on the 
 turn of a moment, I flung further discretion 
 to the winds and raced down the long incline. 
 The larger of the two boats had been 
 drawn beyond high water mark and lay, bot 
 tom up, as if under repair. There were 
 plenty of sizable stones strewn about, and 
 with the help of these I had in a few minutes 
 reduced her to kindling wood. Sure now 
 that no one was aboard the Calliope, else the 
 smashing of the one boat must have been 
 heard, I managed, thanks to the strength left 
 me by anger and excitement, to launch the 
 other, put a couple of great stones aboard,
 
 144 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 and after an awkward interval of rowing to 
 lay her alongside the Calliope. 
 
 I opened the schooner s three hatches to 
 give my fire a proper draft, and went below 
 to find inflammable materials. Her hold sup 
 plied these: a barrel of tar and a great heap 
 of straw jackets off \vine bottles. I broached 
 the tar barrel until I had a great black, sticky 
 pool of the stuff; to this I laid a thick train, 
 or fuse, of the straw jackets, and then, at the 
 very moment of accomplishment, was baulked 
 by the discovery that I had no match. 
 
 All amuck with a sudden cold s\veat, I tore 
 on deck and aft to the cabin. Here \vas a 
 narrow table covered with oil cloth, and set 
 for eight; a dish of maggoty biscuits; a plat 
 ter with traces of gravy upon it; a half dozen 
 bottles of red wine with the drawn corks re 
 placed in their necks; yellow and filthy butts 
 of cigarettes; and in the seat of a camp-stool 
 (I have often \vondered how it came there) 
 a half spilled box of safety matches. 
 
 I came out of the cabin, and after one 
 good look at the shore, \vhich revealed no 
 sign of life, once more descended to the hold, 
 and set fire to my straw fuse ; tended the stuff 
 until it was burning fiercely toward the spilled 
 tar; and then bethought me of a retreat. So
 
 A REPRISAL 145 
 
 quick was the fire that smoke accompanied me 
 to the deck. Landward all was as before, and 
 having leaped into the boat in which I had 
 come, and headed her round under the doomed 
 Calliope s stern and split the other boat by 
 means of the stones which I had brought, I 
 pushed off, seated myself at the oars, and began 
 to row down the fiord in the direction of the 
 Shantung. 
 
 By now the black smoke was pouring from 
 all three of the Calliope s hatches ; and I could 
 hear a loud roaring, like that of far off surf. 
 Then the depths of those black smoke clouds 
 began to glow; and were presently shot with 
 tongues of furious red flame. Somehow the 
 conflagration that I had caused made me feel 
 very small and insignificant; the mountains 
 beyond, with their vast, white, peaceful man 
 tles of snow ; the wide, black quiet of the fiord ; 
 the immensity and the awful gravity of nature 
 in those regions. 
 
 I steered, by the burning schooner, without 
 troubling to turn my head; and, owing more 
 to the tide which was setting out than to my 
 own exertions, made a satisfactory progress. 
 I was thinking, I remember well, that the 
 burning of the schooner was now a glorious 
 thing to see; that I, an atom, had struck a
 
 146 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 formidable blow; that Carrol and his fellow 
 murderers must soon put in an appearance. I 
 wondered if they would follow my retreat and 
 pot me at long range from the island cliffs. 
 
 Then the progress of my boat stopped sud 
 denly with a kind of soft, jerky jar, and a 
 voice through which there ran the most 
 hideous and shocking calm of repressed fury 
 and cruelty pierced into my brain like a knife. 
 
 " Good evening, Jim! "
 
 CHAPTER I m I l RETURN 
 
 ^^_ TO THE 
 
 TEEN I * Ji SHANTUNG 
 
 WHY it had not occurred to me that Carrol 
 might possibly elect to run the Shantung s 
 fire and return to the Calliope by water, in the 
 very boat which had been waiting to ferry 
 us and the treasure to the Shantung, I shall 
 never know. I had counted absolutely on his 
 returning by land ; and what with the burning 
 schooner to rivet my attention, and an occa 
 sional examination of the shore, had not once 
 turned my head to see where I was going. 
 And now, blithering idiot that I was, I had 
 rowed straight into my enemies boat. Indeed, 
 Craven, crouching in her bows, had but to 
 reach out his hand, take my boat by the stern 
 and make her captive. And this it was that 
 made the effect of that soft, giving jar that I 
 had felt. 
 
 In that moment of horror it is impossible 
 that I should have noticed how overladen was 
 the enemies boat with men and treasure, and 
 how it was only by the nicest trimming that 
 she was kept from taking in water over one 
 gunnel or the other. But it was to this fact
 
 148 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 that I owed the deliberation and care which 
 Craven was obliged to exercise in securing first 
 my boat, and then me. The furious faces of 
 the men in the deep-laden boat, crimson with 
 the reflection of the burning Calliope, were 
 like the faces of so many devils in a pantomime. 
 For a moment I was paralysed, as if I had been 
 hit across the spine, and sat looking over my 
 shoulder into the wicked, red faces and ready, 
 waiting hands toward which Craven was 
 stealthily drawing me. Then, as a rat, tor 
 mented and frightened beyond endurance, 
 turns upon a dog, I leaped to my feet, snatched 
 an oar from the oarlock, and struck a shocking 
 blow at Craven s face. 
 
 Unprepared as he was for a show of fight, 
 he lurched heavily to one side and escaped 
 the brunt of the blow; but in so doing de 
 stroyed the nice balance by which his boat was 
 kept afloat and the water rushed strongly over 
 her starboard gunnel. Two men rose to their 
 feet and leapt frantically in opposite direc 
 tions; and where a moment before there had 
 been a boat filled with cruel resource and pur 
 pose, there was now but black, ice-cold water 
 and panic-stricken men swimming desperately 
 for their lives. 
 
 A fat hand with a diamond ring on the little
 
 149 
 
 finger (and I recognised it for Carrol s) seized 
 the gunnel of my boat; I smashed it furiously 
 with the oar; it disappeared. Then I began 
 to paddle desperately, first on one side, then 
 on the other, to free myself from any further 
 menace of that kind. But there was no need; 
 my enemies, half paralysed by the cold and their 
 heavy clothes, were making for the shore, with 
 one exception. That was Craven. The blow 
 that had missed his face had fallen heavily upon 
 his forearm ; he must have been an indifferent 
 swimmer at best, and it was evident that with 
 out help he must drown. 
 
 Despairing of reaching the shore, he turned 
 and swam toward me, with the most pitiful 
 cries and entreaties. But I backed warily away 
 from him. 
 
 " For God s sake, help me, Parrish ! " he 
 said. 
 
 " No," said I, " not for billions. If you are 
 drowning, I m glad of it. The sooner the 
 better. The world will be quit of a dirty 
 coward " 
 
 " Parrish," he said, " don t let me " water 
 entered his open mouth; he strove to spit it 
 out, became confused, and sank. A moment 
 later his head emerged once more, the eyes roll 
 ing horribly. I could not stand this.
 
 ISO YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " Hold on tight/ I said, " I ra corning." 
 
 But that attempt at mercy came near to 
 being my last. For, whether the man was 
 crazed by peril or malevolent to the last, he 
 seized the gunnel of my boat in both hands, 
 and struggled, it seemed to me, less to climb in 
 than to overturn her. 
 
 " Look out, you 11 upset her," I cried. 
 
 He only redoubled his efforts to do so. I 
 rammed the oar frantically into his face, and 
 saw him no more. 
 
 Had I been left with the heart to do so, I 
 might have paddled after the enemy, and (as 
 a cruiser with a fleet of merchantmen) dealt 
 with them one by one. That I ought to have 
 done so I do not for one moment doubt; I 
 thought of doing so, and I could not. I paddled 
 a stroke or two toward the nearest swimmer, 
 and the oar became heavy in my hand, like the 
 trunk of a tree; I swayed dizzily. Then sud 
 denly that man who was third in the race, 
 without a cry or any sudden convulsion, quietly 
 sank. 
 
 I sat down, all dazed and sick, and while my 
 boat drifted slowly down the fiord, watched as 
 in a trance the leading swimmer, which was 
 Carrol, reach the shore, and draw himself 
 slowly out of water. Thanks to his thick de-
 
 I RETURN TO THE SHANTUNG 151 
 
 posit of adipose, and his strength of a brute he 
 had not only distanced his companions by 
 twenty yards, but had taken his rifle safe out of 
 the catastrophe. Perceiving this I came to my 
 senses, seized the oars once more, and rowed 
 for dear life. There w r as a point of a rock, 
 high and rounded, beyond which I should be 
 in safety; but it was evident that before reach 
 ing it I must stand the hazard of half a dozen 
 shots. 
 
 Carrol must have been either an indifferent 
 marksman, or so breathed by exertion that he 
 could not hold his rifle steadily, for the first 
 bullet flew wide ; and rather than risk a second 
 I jumped deliberately overboard, on the opposite 
 side of the boat from Carrol, and clinging to 
 her with one hand, kicking with my feet, and, 
 borne by the tide, was soon in safety; and 
 scrambling back into the boat (a gruelling bit 
 of work) once more manned the oars, and 
 half an hour later (it was falling very dark), 
 exhausted and cold almost to the point of in 
 sanity, I heard Bessie s voice hailing me from 
 the Shantung, and a few minutes later was 
 alongside. 
 
 " Where s Lichee? " she said sharply. 
 
 " I had to leave him, Bessie," I said, " but 
 he s in a safe place. And he promised to wait
 
 152 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 till some one came for him. You ve got to 
 give me food and a drink, and then I m ready." 
 Thank God, the kid s safe," said she, and 
 burst into tears. 
 
 There was an atmosphere of deep gloom 
 aboard the Shantung and an ominous quiet. 
 My story of burning the Calliope was received 
 with a certain grim satisfaction; but it was 
 easy to see that it was the intention to exact a 
 far more terrible vengeance than that for the 
 massacre in the fissure. 
 
 Jerry Top was the only survivor. The sight 
 of the Shantung had preserved him. For so 
 eager was he to be once more comfortably 
 aboard and in full enjoyment of ship life, that 
 the very moment before the fatal volley had 
 been fired he had broken into a run, thus, by 
 a strange fatality, dodging whatever bullets 
 had been intended for him. Panic stricken, 
 he had dropped his load of treasure, redoubled 
 his pace, leapt into the water, and amphibious 
 by nature and only emerging now and then 
 for breath, had made his escape. But Chang, 
 Hoang, Wu Lo, San Lo, Man Lo; those old 
 friends and tried comrades,, would not speak 
 to us any more. Their bodies had been 
 brought off; and Bessie drew me into the 
 cabin where they had been laid side by side
 
 I RETURN TO THE SHANTUNG 153 
 
 as befitted brothers, and under one covering. 
 I shall never forget the sight of those five 
 yellow faces ; very grave in death, but peaceful 
 and mystic. I stood with Bessie for some time 
 looking at them, and talking quietly about 
 them; recalling acts of kindness and thought- 
 fulness; praising Chang s sea-genius to his 
 dead face ; and Hoang s bountiful strength and 
 good nature, to his. 
 
 " Now," said Bessie, " you must go after the 
 boy, Jim." 
 
 The hot tears were pouring down her cheeks, 
 and down mine, too. I patted her clumsily on 
 the shoulder and we went out of the cabin. 
 
 " One thing I don t understand, Bessie," I 
 said, " why you let Carrol get away in the boat 
 right under your noses." 
 
 " Why," she cried, " it was so damned sud 
 den, Jim! We were eating dinner, and won 
 dering when you d all be coming back; and 
 nobody s rifle was handy or loaded. We 
 were n t expecting anything. And then we 
 heard the shots and ran on deck, and could n t 
 make out what had happened. And we stood 
 round like a lot of dummies, jabbering and 
 guessing then they came with a rush, and 
 were in the boat, and getting away, before you 
 could say Jack Robinson; and Jerry Top was
 
 154 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 half way out to us before we could get our 
 guns and begin to shoot; and they shot back; 
 and I guess there was n t much damage done 
 on one side or the other; then they got round 
 a corner pretty damned quick, too, and 
 that was the end of that . . . Hello, what was 
 that?" 
 
 We stood listening with bated breath. 
 
 " Ship a hoy ! " The sound came faintly 
 from somewhere high up, or so it seemed. 
 
 " Some one s hailing us from the cliff," 
 Bessie said. We joined the others who were 
 gathered amidships, their faces turned toward 
 the sound. Presently the hail was repeated. 
 
 That s Carrol," I said. Jili exclaimed 
 savagely. 
 
 " Are you d-e-e-e-af ? " came the voice. 
 
 Bessie called, " Hello there ! " at the top of 
 her voice and then, through the megaphone 
 that I handed her, " what do you want?" 
 
 And the voice came back with a kind of sus 
 tained, intoned effect. 
 
 " Got a little stra-a-nger here." 
 
 "My God! "I cried, " Lichee - 
 
 Jili turned sharply upon me, but I could not 
 see his face for the darkness. 
 
 " He s in good ha-ands," came the voice 
 again, " don t worry."
 
 I RETURN TO THE SHANTUNG 155 
 
 "Shall I send a boat ashore for him?" 
 Bessie called, and her voice shook. 
 
 This brought laughter out of the night, and 
 then : 
 
 Think it over till mo-orning." 
 
 " Lichee! " Bessie cried. 
 
 It seemed to some of us that we heard one 
 piping note of the child s voice that was cut 
 short as by a hand clapped upon his mouth. 
 
 We 11 ta-alk in the mo-orning," came the 
 voice. I snatched the megaphone from Bessie s 
 nervous hand. 
 
 " Carrol," I cried, " you 11 not hurt the 
 child." The answer came, very drawn out, and 
 quieter." 
 
 " Not till we Ve ha-ad our ta-alk." 
 
 And though I called to him again and again, 
 he wasted no more words upon us that night. 
 Nor did sleep waste her favours upon us; the 
 rain came down in torrents, and there was 
 much far off thundering. Carmen, Jerry Top 
 and I kept dismal company in the galley; now 
 renewing the fire; now talking a little; now 
 nodding and dozing. In the cabin Bessie kept 
 watch with the dead, while in the forecastle 
 the Chinamen burned joss-sticks and prayed to 
 the god of little children, all through the night.
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 AN EXCHANGE 
 
 THERE was never a more gray and sodden day 
 break; even the lively red of Jerry Top s skin, 
 like the coals in the galley fire, had an ashen 
 look. The piercing dampness and the unprece 
 dented exertions, exposure and immersion of 
 the day before had tied my muscles into rheu 
 matic knots. I had caught a heavy cold, and my 
 nose from being constantly blown was now sore 
 to the touch. Of us three Carmen appeared to 
 have come through that troubled night best; 
 she sat erect upon a camp-stool, staring straight 
 before her, her hands folded in her lap, her 
 great, black stag eyes steady, brilliant and 
 unwinking. I rose, very painfully, and one of 
 my knees cracking like a pistol shot, she turned 
 her eyes and smiled. 
 
 "Carmen," I said, "once and for all I m 
 on your side now. I want to see that man 
 Carrol die very slowly." 
 
 She nodded, and raising her eyebrows, 
 
 "Tea? "she said. 
 
 The word brought Jerry Top to life, so to
 
 AN EXCHANGE 157 
 
 speak. He bounded to his feet, and had the 
 kettle filled in no time ; and I fed the fire with 
 fresh coal and a few teaspoonfuls of kerosene. 
 Presently the fragrant smell of tea filled the 
 galley, and escaping thence, like a rumour, 
 reached Bessie in the cabin, and the Chinamen 
 in the forecastle. Bessie was the first to join 
 us, white and heavy-eyed; but, as always, 
 energetic and efficient. And she spoke cheer 
 fully, and tried to make us believe she was 
 hungry ; when, poor anxious mother, she could 
 not even choke down a cup of tea. Then came 
 Jili and the others, haggard from the night of 
 prayer, and half asphyxiated by the fumes of 
 the joss-sticks. They had no word of greet 
 ing for any one ; but now and then one or other 
 of them rolled upon me a baleful and malev 
 olent eye; as if I alone had been to blame for 
 our misfortunes. And I tell you it was mighty 
 hard to bear after the long weeks of friendship 
 and good fellowship. I had come to think that 
 they liked me for myself; but it was plain 
 enough now that I was no more to them than 
 a shaving of wood. If Lichee s mother for 
 gave me for leaving the boy alone on the island, 
 why not these men, no one of whom was re 
 lated to him? The burning of the Calliope, 
 and the drowning of two of our enemies, did
 
 158 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 not seem to count a whit in my favour; and 
 what with that, the suffocating cold in my 
 head, and my aching bones, I think the dawn 
 discovered on the whole of God s earth no man 
 so wretched as I. 
 
 About eight o clock Carrol hailed us from 
 the landing place, and waving a white hand 
 kerchief at the end of a stick, asked us to send 
 a boat ashore to bring him off to the schooner. 
 Jili went alone; but on the chance of some 
 further treachery, Ah Fing, who was the best 
 shot among us, lay down against the bulwarks 
 and steadily held a cocked rifle sighted on Car 
 rol s bulky person. But Carrol was by way 
 of playing fair for once, and stepping nimbly 
 aboard the boat which Jili backed ashore to re 
 ceive him, was soon alongside, much dismantled 
 by a night of exposure, but calm, nonchalant 
 and even tempered. As he came aboard he 
 apologised to Bessie for his appearance ; and it 
 was only at recognising Carmen that he sho\ved 
 a sign of uneasiness. He bowed to her, but she 
 looked steadily through him, as it were, and 
 beyond; turned presently on her heel, and went 
 back into the galley. 
 
 " Jim," said Carrol easily, " who does the 
 talking for this crowd?" 
 
 " I guess," said Bessie, " that anything
 
 AN EXCHANGE 159 
 
 you Ve got to say will be attended to, some 
 how. So fire away." 
 
 "Are you the mistress of this ship?" said 
 Carrol, without, I think, meaning to play on 
 words; but Bessie flushed angrily. 
 
 " If you ve come to make a deal," she said, 
 " stick to business." 
 
 " Oh," said Carrol, " I beg your pardon. 
 Now how about a fire? Couldn t we talk 
 better over a fire? " 
 
 " I guess we can talk here," said Bessie. 
 
 Just as you say," said Carrol, and he looked 
 very much disappointed, for he was soaking 
 wet, and blue with the cold. 
 
 First," said Bessie, " is the boy alive, and 
 unhurt ? 
 
 " He s cold and wet, like the rest of us," 
 said Carrol, " but he has n t been hurt yet." 
 
 " Come to the point, Carrol," I broke in, 
 " we don t stand for threats in this crowd." 
 
 " Oh, yes, the point," said he, as if he had 
 forgotten that he had come with any particular 
 intention. " The point is we ve no immediate use 
 for the child ; he knows where the treasure is, of 
 course ; but as he does n t understand a word of 
 English . . . What are you smiling at, Jim ? " 
 
 " I was smiling," I said quickly, " to think 
 of your trvino- to talk Chinese."
 
 " Well, smile," said he. " I tried all right; 
 Chinese, English and gesticulation. But the 
 boy s only a baby after all and a thicker 
 baby I never tried to enlighten. Now," said he, 
 turning directly to Bessie, " we have n t hurt a 
 hair of the child s head; and we propose to 
 give him back to you safe and sound. Our 
 differences, after all, are grown-up differences, 
 and there s no use dragging a baby into 
 them." 
 
 " Well," said Bessie, " you return the boy ; 
 and what must we do? : 
 
 You," said Carrol, " must give us a grown 
 man in exchange." 
 
 :< Would a woman do? " said Bessie quickly. 
 
 " You bet ! " said Carrol, his eyes shining. 
 
 " Then that s settled," said Bessie, " I go." 
 
 " Very well," said Carrol, " it s a bargain." 
 
 Bessie turned and made a step toward the 
 boat ; but, Jili slipped in front of her, ordered 
 her back with a savage gesture, and poured out 
 a sudden shrill torrent of Chinese. 
 
 " Right O," said Bessie, and she turned to 
 Carrol. " Jili says," said she, " that you 
 would n t keep your word if I did go. And 
 I think he s right. How about it? " 
 
 Carrol shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " You ve got to trust somebody," he said.
 
 AN EXCHANGE 161 
 
 "Yes, Carrol," said I, "but I don t believe 
 the Lord God himself could give any reason 
 why that somebody should be you." 
 
 " Perhaps you re right," he said cheerfully, 
 " and that being the case, why I 11 have to trust 
 you. Give me your word, Jim, that if I bring 
 the boy aboard, you 11 turn the woman over 
 to me, and let us depart in peace, as the saying- 
 is." But Jili interrupted again, and with much 
 finality. 
 
 Bessie not go anyhow," he said, and drew 
 back as if that was the end of that. 
 
 " Well then," said Carrol, " who will? " 
 
 " What will happen," Bessie asked, " if no 
 one goes ? " 
 
 Why," said Carrol, " as far as I m con 
 cerned, nothing. But there s Todd to be reck 
 oned with, and one or two others that are n t 
 as fond of little half-breed children as I am. 
 They re quite a little put out by the way things 
 have gone, and if they can t trade the boy for 
 somebody more useful, why they re bound to 
 have their fun with the boy. I dare say 
 they d be willing, and even apt, to carry their 
 fun somewhere where you could hear it 
 going on . . . 
 
 Jili cut him short. 
 
 " Fetch boy, Jili go."
 
 162 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " Why you? " said Bessie. 
 
 There came a strange, tender look into the 
 black sloe eyes, and a blush, I will swear, into 
 the yellow r cheeks. 
 
 I think that no woman has ever received a 
 declaration under stranger circumstances. And 
 her reception of it was characteristic and frank. 
 
 " It won t do, Jili," she said, " but thank you, 
 and God bless you ! " 
 
 " Jili," said he, quietly, " die for lilly boy, all 
 same glad ! " 
 
 " Can t you cut some of this palaver out? " 
 said Carrol brutally. " I m half perished. I 
 don t care who goes; decide for yourselves; 
 only it s got to be some one who knows where 
 the treasure is." 
 
 Then," said I, and I am afraid my voice 
 faltered, " Jili won t do. It s up to me." 
 
 " Come, now," said Carrol, " decide some 
 thing quick." 
 
 " What s the use of your knowing where the 
 stuff is? You can t get away with it." 
 
 " Oh," said Carrol easily, " we 11 take Jim 
 here as a hostage, keep him safe, and in return 
 \ve 11 just ask you to give us and the treasure 
 a lift to the nearest port. You all like Jim, 
 don t you? " 
 
 " You bet we do," cried Bessie, in her big
 
 AN EXCHANGE 163 
 
 hearted voice, I think to warm my heart and 
 give me courage. " And I 11 tell you this," 
 said she, " Mister Carrol, if you hurt a hair 
 of his head that is if he does go with you 
 somehow or other I 11 hunt you down, and get 
 you in my power, and give you the finest work 
 ing idea of hell that any man ever had this side 
 of there. And you can put that in your pipe, 
 and smoke it." 
 
 All her colour came back for the moment, 
 and her eyes flashed splendidly. 
 
 " Then Jim goes," said Carrol. 
 
 " I suppose so," said I, in a miserable, small 
 voice. 
 
 " And you give me your word that when I 
 bring the boy off safe and sound you 11 go with 
 me?" 
 
 There was a moment of silence. 
 
 " Jim," said Bessie, " if you don t feel free 
 to do it, don t." 
 
 " Free ? " said I. " I admit the thought of 
 it makes me sick . . . I turned quickly 
 to Carrol, lest my half-hearted resolution fail 
 me completely. 
 
 " I give you my word," I said hastily. 
 
 A hand clasped me strongly on the shoulder. 
 I turned and saw Jili s face illuminated as from 
 within.
 
 164 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Jili not forget," said he, " not never." He 
 turned and motioned Carrol into the boat. 
 
 " When shall we expect you back, Carrol? " 
 I asked. 
 
 " In about an hour," said he, and went over 
 the side. 
 
 " Now then, Jim, said Bessie, " you go into 
 the forecastle with the boys, and they ll rub 
 your stiff joints, and freshen you up. And, 
 mind you, you don t run any danger with Car 
 rol. Your life s pretty near as useful to them 
 as it is to you." 
 
 " But, Bessie," I said, " they 11 want me to 
 show them where the treasure is ; and I m in 
 duty bound not to tell them ; and then they 11 
 try to make me. It s that that gives me the 
 shakes to think of if I thought they d just 
 knock me on the head and be done with it, all 
 right ; but I Ve got to try to stand up to them 
 like a white man, and a gentleman, and I m not 
 very good at at pain, Bessie." 
 
 " You damned long-legged Pin-head," said 
 she, and her voice which she strove to make 
 jovial and bold was very tremulous and moved. 
 " Why in hell should n t you tell them where the 
 treasure is ? At least have the sense and kind 
 ness to save us the trouble of sifting it all out 
 of the sand."
 
 AN EXCHANGE 165 
 
 You think it s no harm to tell them?" I 
 cried eagerly. 
 
 " It s the only thing to do," said she posi 
 tively. 
 
 The anticipation of immediate torture being 
 done away with raised my spirits like wine; 
 and an hour of rubbing, with whiskey, kneading 
 and pommelling, enabled me to greet the safe 
 return of Lichee with real joy. 
 
 Not one word had the child spoken to his 
 captors during the whole of his captivity; but, 
 his shrewd intellect masked by a blank and stu 
 pid expression, he had, it appears, after his first 
 fright and surprise, even laughed at them in his 
 sleeve. Wet, bedraggled, chilled to the bone, 
 but calm and unperturbed, he came over the 
 side, and ran with little solemn steps to Bessie, 
 buried his face against her dress, and then, and 
 then only, his pent-up feelings found their nat 
 ural expression in a burst of weeping, of which 
 he was afterward terribly ashamed. 
 
 In answer to Carrol s impatient " Are you 
 coming, Jim, or not ? " I slid over the side into 
 the bow of the boat. Jili shoved off and headed 
 her slowly for the shore. 
 
 Then Lichee, his face all teary still, but 
 wreathed in smiles, ran to the bulwarks. 
 
 " Hey man! "he called.
 
 166 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Carrol turned his face and looked sourly at 
 the boy. 
 
 " Me peak English," cried Lichee, " all same 
 Melican man ! " And he stuck out his red 
 tongue at Carrol, and jumped up and down 
 with uncontrollable satisfaction.
 
 CHAPTER 
 TWENTY 
 
 GUIDING 
 THE ENEMY 
 
 WELL," said Carrol, " that s one or two or 
 several on me ! " 
 
 And several times during the short row he 
 came out with a tickled chuckle. But I was too 
 wretched and afraid to see any humour in any 
 thing; and, furthermore, the whole of my 
 faculties were concentrated in an effort to 
 understand what Jili was saying to me be 
 tween strokes. He spoke in Chinese, very 
 slowly, using very simple words, and I gath 
 ered at last that he was tempting me to break 
 faith with Carrol. The matter, according to 
 Jili, was of simple accomplishment: we must, 
 on reaching shallow water, rise suddenly 
 against Carrol; kill him (Jili would attend to 
 that with his knife) ; and retreat covered by 
 the Shantung s rifles. But when I answered 
 that I had given my word, and would not break 
 it, I was rewarded by the ringing note of ad 
 miration that came into his voice; and he 
 praised me over his shoulder; and said that I 
 was honest as a Chinaman. Then he gave me
 
 168 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 a piece of advice: if I found myself in iminent 
 danger, I must throw false pride to the winds 
 and scream at the top of my lungs ; and when 
 I seemed most deserted and alone, I must be 
 lieve that help was somewhere near at hand. 
 Also, if I had a chance to run for it, I should 
 find the boat waiting near the landing. All 
 that mere man could do for me, in short, Jili 
 proposed to do. Rather than lose me, he said, 
 he would return to China and desecrate the 
 graves of his ancestors. And at parting he 
 shook hands with me; but not with the cold, 
 limp handshake that is characteristic of China 
 men; he gripped my fingers so that I felt his 
 friendship run like an electric message up my 
 arm, and into my faint heart. 
 
 " Well, Jim," said Carrol, " let s be moving. 
 The boys are waiting up top, and they 11 be 
 glad to see you you re almost the only thing 
 so far that has come our way. Todd % s still 
 with us you remember Todd a bright little 
 feller?" 
 
 :< I remember him very well," I said. 
 
 But the steep incline of the fissure made con 
 versation difficult; and here and there traces 
 of blood not entirely dissolved by the rain 
 acted on my hearing like plugs of cotton. It 
 was a positive relief to exchange the dark sug-
 
 GUIDING THE ENEMY 169 
 
 gestion of the place for the cold windy heights 
 and the suddenly met members of Carrol s party. 
 They were waiting for us near the fissure s 
 upper end; and Todd, stepping quickly from 
 them with a natural and hearty " How are you, 
 Parrish," offered me his hand. And so strong 
 is the habit of certain practised conventions, 
 I took it, bloody murderer s though it was. 
 
 I was in a shocking, quaking state of uneasi 
 ness to be there alone among the enemy, cut 
 off from my friends, and with no earnest 
 that I should live to tell the tale. Else I must 
 have been positively amused at the droll, be 
 draggled figure cut by that conscienceless gang. 
 Their dry clothes had mingled their smoke 
 with that of the Calliope; the clothes they had 
 on were still wringing wet from the night of 
 rain and grotesquely shrunken ; nor could these 
 miserable adventurers have counted one white 
 nose among them; coughing, snuffling, hawk 
 ing, and spitting great gobs of phlegm, wiping 
 their sore and fiery noses on their soaked hand 
 kerchiefs or wet rasping coat-sleeves, greed 
 alone kept them yet awhile on their feet; and 
 their rough beards, the accumulation of dirt in 
 the corners of their eyes, their split disgusting 
 finger-nails were in astonishing contrast to the 
 clean shaven, sprucely groomed Chinamen I
 
 1 70 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 had left behind. I noted too, and with lively 
 satisfaction, that but two rifles had survived 
 the upset in the fiord ; and these looked for all 
 the world as if red rust had gone into their 
 original assemblage instead of gun metal. 
 How I wished that my friends might suddenly 
 appear, out of God knows where, fall upon 
 that dejected and almost defenceless group and 
 deliver me ! 
 
 :< Well," said Carrol, as if divining my 
 thoughts, " w r e re richer than we look; and 
 Jim, it s up to you to prove it." 
 
 " In what way?" I asked. 
 
 " Now," said he, " I always found you rea 
 sonable ; and I hope for your own good you 11 
 be reasonable now." 
 
 In spite of the man s wretched physical 
 state, he chose to talk in bantering circles round 
 and about the point. 
 
 " Now," he said, " that you and Todd and I 
 are together again poor Craven was so 
 glad to get a glimpse of you the other day after 
 all these months, but the joy was of a kind that 
 did n t last now, as I say, that we re to 
 gether again I hope from the bottom of my soul 
 that nothing disagreeable is going to hap 
 pen " 
 
 " Ah, cut it out ! " exclaimed one of the
 
 GUIDING THE ENEMY 171 
 
 men, and went directly into a paroxysm of 
 sneezing. 
 
 :< Blake," said Carrol, and he thumped the 
 fellow on the back, " see what comes of inter 
 rupting! " 
 
 " I m sure," said Todd quietly, " that Par- 
 rish is n t going to put us to any trouble." 
 
 ;< Parrish," said Carrol, " is too well ac 
 quainted with the rudiments of the English lan 
 guage not to know how easily a man may be 
 taught to speak it. How about it, Jim? " 
 
 (< I think, Carrol," said I, " that you want 
 me to show you where the treasure is, and that 
 you are threatening to hurt me if I won t. Is 
 that it?" 
 
 "Bright boy!" exclaimed Carrol. 
 
 " Well," said I, " I m quite ready to show 
 you where we got the gold that you took from 
 us, and subsequently lost. If there s any more 
 where that came from, why I suppose you can 
 get it out as well as another." 
 
 " By the way," said Todd, " was that mule 
 gang that we interrupted yesterday the first 
 from the mines ? " 
 
 Carrol reached into his pocket, and pre 
 sently brought out the famous document that 
 he had stolen from me in San Francisco. 
 
 " Now, Jim," said he, " go over this and pick
 
 172 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 off the items that are already aboard the Chin 
 ese ship so s to give us an idea of what s 
 left to look for." 
 
 " It s all to look for," I said, " so far as I 
 know. What you lost in the fiord was all that 
 we had lifted/ And I made to return the paper. 
 
 " Keep it," said he, and with a kind of snort 
 ing laugh, " I can trust you with it now that 
 you re sober. And now lead off, and show us 
 where the stuff is." 
 
 I thrust the paper into my pocket, turned 
 without a word and walked straight for the 
 truncated cone in the midst of the islet. Where 
 it was possible Carrol and Todd kept abreast 
 of me, and the rest tailed along behind; last 
 of all came Blake, whose cold was so heavy as 
 to suggest incipient pneumonia. Carrol carried 
 one of the rifles; a sour, oldish man, whose 
 name I afterward learned was Kelsey, should 
 ered the other, grumbling with its weight, 
 now stopping to endure a paroxysm of cough 
 ing, and now swearing in a hoarse, whining 
 voice that was in ludicrous contrast to the 
 shocking and filthy words. 
 
 Two things occupied my mind : to ascertain 
 if possible and mark down the exact place 
 where I had left my Winchester and my car 
 tridge belt; and the other matter was the
 
 GUIDING THE ENEMY 173 
 
 weather. As a farmer during a stubborn 
 drought I prayed fervently for rain. A little 
 more exposure, I thought, and some of these 
 sweet creatures will not live to tell about it. 
 But the gray of the sky was growing thinner 
 constantly and brighter; and north, towards 
 Magellan, the snow capped mountains glared 
 here and there with sudden and shifting visita 
 tions of the sun. The wind, too, had a brisk 
 dry quality, and in my joints I felt that it was 
 going to clear. As for the rifle, now I thought 
 I had the place, now not. But recognising of a 
 sudden the hollow where I had left Lichee, I 
 was able almost at once to lay my eye on the 
 top of the split rock, between whose halves I 
 had laid the thing; and you may be sure that 
 I looked backward from time to time to mark 
 it indelibly on my mind. The last look I took 
 was from the shadow of the cone, and I saw 
 the extreme tip of my landmark, no bigger 
 than a bead, black, with one sharp point of 
 white, and shining with wet. 
 
 If my chance came it would not be upon 
 direction that I should go wrong; for I could 
 now, I told myself joyfully, go as straight to 
 a weapon as that weapon s bullet could be sent 
 back among those who might pursue. 
 
 "Carrol," said I and he looked at me
 
 174 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 shrewdly, for I was speaking for the first time 
 that day in a natural voice " I ve been won 
 dering how you happened to find Lichee 
 that s the boy I left him well hidden; and 
 he promised to stay hidden." 
 
 Then he broke his promise, Jim," said Car 
 rol ; " he climbed a rock to have a look around, 
 and Blake saw him, and the bunch of us ran 
 him down. It was no cinch; the little devil 
 ran like all possessed ; and finally hid in a place 
 not big enough to hold a rat ; and it was pretty 
 dark by then; and he pretty damned near got 
 off . . . How much farther have we to go? " 
 
 " About fifty feet," said I. 
 
 Boys," Carrol turned and called, " hurry 
 up! We re there !" 
 
 Even Blake, sick as he was, made shift to 
 break into a stumbling run ; and almost as one 
 man we arrived on the rim of the treasure bowl, 
 and stood looking down.
 
 CHAPTER 
 TWENTY- 
 ONE 
 
 A RACE 
 
 THE excavations that we had made to get out 
 the bar of gold were washed half full of sand; 
 but were still amazing cavities considering 
 with what few implements and in how short a 
 time they had been dug. Carrol stood for a 
 moment looking down; then jumped, landing 
 with incredible lightness for a man of his bulk; 
 dropped his rifle, snatched up one of the spades 
 that we had left for our own future use, and 
 began to dig. The rim of the bowl was fifteen 
 feet, perhaps, higher than the level of the sand 
 and beech bushes within; the sides were steep 
 and smooth, with traces of horizontal grooves 
 as if the hollow had been ground out of the vir 
 gin rock; it was, in short, an easy place to 
 enter, and by no means so easy to leave, the 
 smooth slopes offering but few foot-holds or 
 hand-holds. Blake, who was the next to jump, 
 must have twisted an ankle in landing, for he 
 fell all of a heap, then sat up, nursed his one 
 foot with both hands, and cursed frightfully. 
 Kelsey, Todd and the others jumped as if from
 
 176 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 one set of springs; and had no sooner re 
 covered balance than they fell like dogs upon 
 the remaining spade, struggling for its posses 
 sion, wrangling and cursing each other. I have 
 never seen men so earnest to do a piece of dig 
 ging; and remarked to myself that an equal 
 and previous zeal for hard work might have 
 kept any one of them from becoming a rascal. 
 At this juncture Carrol, shouting aloud, 
 dropped his spade, and dug some object free 
 with his hands. I could not see what it was. 
 The others, including Blake, who hopped on 
 his sound foot, were about him in an instant 
 like a swarm of wasps. Their hoarse and thick 
 voices became clear with the tonic of wild ex 
 citement ; and they clapped one another on the 
 back, and poured forth torrents of happy abuse. 
 Then just such a frenzy of digging as had come 
 over the Shantung party the day before seized 
 them; Carrol with one spade, Kelsey with the 
 other, a third, whose name, if I had caught it 
 correctly, was Brandreth, with the pick, and 
 Blake, Todd and the other with their hands. 
 As for me, I stood forgotten upon the rim of 
 the bowl. So far as the diggers were concerned 
 I did not exist; nor did I (so heartily did I 
 participate in the excitement of the digging) 
 for a minute or two remember myself. I came
 
 A RACE 177 
 
 to with a start. Here was a golden opportunity 
 such as I had been praying for; there would 
 never come a better. With good luck I might 
 run a mile, or even walk one, before I was 
 missed; with the worst luck in the world I 
 could put a hundred yards between me and 
 pursuit. A bullet might overtake me, but the 
 bullet that ended me would also end their 
 chance of securing a passage on the Shantung; 
 therefore they would be in nc hurry to shoot, 
 unless carried away by unthinking passion. 
 I gave one last look at the bent, labouring 
 backs in the bowl, took one cautious step back 
 ward, a second, a third, then turned, walked 
 rapidly for twenty feet, and, my heart thump 
 ing furiously, broke into a run. The relief to 
 my pent-up feelings afforded by doing some 
 thing with all my might and main was in 
 credible. So the surgeon s knife relieves the 
 fever and agony of an abscess. My heart beat 
 more quietly; I breathed more easily; and I 
 am prepared to swear that I even saw a certain 
 humour in the situation. But it was a short 
 lived glimpse, A furious shout to stop went 
 through me like a bullet ; then a flesh and blood 
 bullet, or rather one of lead and lubricator, 
 sang a wicked note in my ear. I looked back. 
 Blake was hobbling after me, a rifle smoking
 
 178 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 in his hands; the head and shoulders of 
 Todd were emerging from the bowl, accom 
 panied by a humming sound of shouts and 
 curses. 
 
 I leaped into a hollow, and ran on; but the 
 farther end of the hollow sloped gently back to 
 the general level, and I must expose myself to 
 another shot. Yet none was fired, and I looked 
 back once more an idiotic manoeuvre which 
 cost me a heavy fall. Still I gathered that 
 Todd, having snatched Blake s rifle in passing, 
 was attempting to run me down, and take me 
 alive. And even in the brief glimpse that I had 
 of his little lithe form running over the rocks 
 like a mountain goat, I saw that his speed to 
 mine was as that of a race horse to a donkey. 
 But I had a long start ; so long as he continued 
 to gain he would not shoot; and if I could 
 reach my rifle and cartridges, he would live 
 just long enough to repent having chased me. 
 All this in scrambling up from my fall, and 
 taking once more to my heels. And I ran on, 
 as fast as I could work my legs, and as straight 
 for that greatly needed rifle as I could steer. 
 The hardest part was to keep from looking 
 back; but the last folly of that kind had taught 
 me a lesson that was not to be forgotten. T 
 would get to my rifle as fast as I could; that
 
 A RACE 179 
 
 was all that concerned me. If I got to it in 
 time well and good; if not ! 
 
 Soon I began to hear the light fall of Todd s 
 feet; and presently he shouted to me to stop 
 or he would blow my head off. But judging his 
 distance by the sound I believed that there was 
 still a chance. It was only a little further to 
 the split rock; and Todd s nearness encouraged 
 me to renewed exertions; to that labouring 
 spurt that has won many a race at the tape 
 itself. Yet had the luck been against me I 
 must have been caught. I had been handi 
 capped by one tumble; now the fates evened 
 matters by tripping Todd. I heard the sharp 
 clatter that his rifle made upon the rock ; heard 
 the man grunt ; and twenty steps later I plunged 
 into a hollow, turned the corner of the split 
 rock and saw my rifle lying before me like a 
 streak of rust. To snatch a couple of car 
 tridges from the belt, and to shove the nose 
 of one into the breech of the magazine was the 
 work of an instant. But there the work came 
 to an untimely end, for the calibre of the car 
 tridge was greater than that of the rifle.
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 A RESCUE 
 
 THE day before when we started back with 
 the gold, in the attendant excitement, con 
 fusion and downpour of rain, I must have 
 picked up a cartridge belt belonging to some 
 one else. But however the mistake had come 
 about, come about it had; and I must pay the 
 forfeit. Yet as Todd came suddenly upon me 
 around the corner of the rock, I had the sense 
 to point the empty weapon at his heart and, like 
 a gentleman of the road, to call upon him to 
 hold up his hands. 
 
 The effect upon Todd of finding me armed 
 was grotesque; his jaw dropped; his eyes 
 bulged; and he went very white; then his 
 knees buckled, and he sat down all of a heap. 
 To a man of very little courage the sight of the 
 white feather displayed by an adversary is the 
 surest and strongest impulse to daring. And a 
 torrent of taunting phrases rushed to my lips 
 only to fall for \vant of the breath to deliver 
 them. Indeed I \vas so winded that now and 
 then I saw showers of stars where Todd s face
 
 A RESCUE 181 
 
 ought to have been; and the muzzle of my 
 rifle jerked and circled here and there. A full 
 minute must have passed thus. 
 
 Then " Stand up," I commanded breath 
 lessly. 
 
 Todd hesitated. He was calmer already, 
 and the colour was flickering back into his 
 cheeks. Then slowly, his eye never leaving 
 mine, he rose to his feet. 
 
 f Drop that gun," I said. But his answer 
 to this was as unexpected as it was alarming. 
 For instead of dropping the rifle he raised it 
 suddenly to his shoulder, cocking it as he did 
 so, and pointed it between my eyes. 
 
 " No," he said, " you drop yours! " In my 
 turn now there was hesitation. 
 
 " Parrish," said he, " your rifle is n t cocked. 
 That was a sad oversight on your part, my 
 boy. So put it down now and come along . . . 
 My God though," he went on, " you had me 
 scared ! But when I saw that you d forgotten 
 to cock the thing probably didn t know how 
 - I felt better. Whew ! Have you many more 
 surprises up your sleeve? First you burn the 
 Calliope; then you spill us overboard; then 
 you find a rifle growing on a bush ! . . . What 
 a fellow you are ! . . . It s a shame you 
 didn t come with us in the first place, stead
 
 182 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 of giving us the slip in Frisco, and running 
 off with a lot of Chinamen. Why, if you d 
 stuck to us we d been half way home now, 
 treasure and all." 
 
 " So I gave you the slip, did I ? " said I. 
 
 You bet! " said he, and burst out laughing 
 in my face. 
 
 " I often wonder," I said, " why you men 
 were n t willing to let me go along with you, 
 and share with you ; God knows there s enough 
 profit for all, if the invoice is anywhere near 
 correct. Why were n t you willing? " 
 
 " Oh," said he easily, " it was for several 
 reasons. You were n t our kind ; we thought 
 you d be so much dead weight ; and I don t 
 know what all. But we had one damned 
 sensible reason we were afraid of of 
 catching your trouble." 
 
 " My trouble ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 " Yes your lungs," he said. " We did n t 
 like the notion of getting mixed up with your 
 knife and fork, for instance, or drinking out 
 of a glass that you had used; so it was voted 
 wisest for the welfare of the many to sail 
 without the one." 
 
 " I see," said I, and with great indignation 
 and resentment. " And I never had a trace 
 of consumption in my life!"
 
 A RESCUE 183 
 
 " Well," said he, " judging from recent 
 events, I believe you. However if you ve 
 got your wind, I ve got mine. Let s get a move 
 on. Pass me that rifle, butt first. We need 
 an extra rifle. No. You can carry the car- 
 triges. They re heavy, I know, but in your 
 hands I believe quite harmless." 
 
 I reached out my hand toward the rifle, 
 and at that instant became aware of a figure 
 that appeared like a ghost from heaven knows 
 where, and was creeping upon Todd from be 
 hind. It was Jili, and my sudden look of ex 
 citement nearly betrayed him; but not quite; 
 for Todd, in the very act of turning alertly, was 
 caught across the throat by a skinny yellow 
 arm that sank into the soft of it like a rope; his 
 cry was strangled ere it could be born; and 
 it was from me that a cry of horror and fear 
 was torn. 
 
 In the shock of the surprise, Todd s rifle 
 had fallen from his hands; and now struggle, 
 writhe and twist as he would, his fate was 
 upon him. The strong hand of Jili s left arm 
 never relaxed, and his right hand, holding a 
 knife curved like a hook, now crept around 
 Todd s body and although Todd seized its 
 wrist with both hands, he could not arrest its 
 progress; just by Todd s left hip bone the
 
 184 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Chinaman, with a sharp cunning jab, hooked 
 the knife into the living flesh; worked it 
 to the hilt; and then, sawing, jerking and 
 dragging, began to rip his victim open. 
 
 Most horrible of all were Todd s efforts to 
 arrest the work of the Chinaman s inexorable 
 hand; for his jerking and tugging against that 
 slim steel-strong yellow wrist had a look of 
 aiding rather than hindering the ghastly work 
 upon which it was engaged. No sound came 
 from Todd, but a kind of whistling of the 
 breath in his nostrils, and the sounds of his 
 stubborn and reluctant flesh parting with rasp 
 after rasp before the drag and jerk of the 
 knife. Once the point of the knife screaked 
 shrilly upon a bone. 
 
 By then I had closed with that awful group 
 of murder, and was doing my best to pry off 
 the Chinaman s hand. As well have grappled 
 with the piston rod of a locomotive; the work 
 went on to its appointed end. Then Jili re 
 leased his hold, and Todd, wide open from left 
 hip bone to right ribs, sank at our feet; quiv 
 ered, choked, moaned and died. 
 
 Jili was breathless, but smiling. 
 
 " Jili think Chang larf lilly now all same 
 dead," said he. " Jili think open belly good 
 way; not too dam quick; not too dam slow.
 
 A RESCUE 185 
 
 Jili think time go back schooner; them mans 
 hurt you? By and by Jili catch um other one; 
 now go back schooner, and grind knife." 
 
 He examined with much concern a deep nick 
 in the blade, thrust the bloody thing into its 
 sheath, caught up the rifles; and then, one 
 arm about my waist for I was near fainting, 
 walked me slowly through hollows and gullies 
 to the head of the fissure; stopping now and 
 then to poke his head above the general level 
 and make sure that we were not pursued; but 
 no one actually seemed to have followed us, 
 although Carrol could be seen half way up the 
 side of the truncated cone, trying apparently 
 to find out what had become of Todd and me. 
 
 By the time we reached the boat I had re 
 covered from my f aintness ; but it was with the 
 utmost repugnance only that I could bring my 
 self to look at Jili; though his deed had saved 
 me, perhaps, from an ultimate fate more cruel 
 than that which had been visited upon the 
 wretched Todd. And now with the perspective 
 of time, that dreadful act of vivisection, awful 
 as it was to witness, seems to have been about 
 the compromise between sudden death and tor 
 ture that such men as Todd deserve. Surely 
 it was in no way so great a crime as the unpro 
 voked murder of Chang and Hoang and the
 
 i86 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 others had been. Then, too. it seems that not 
 merely the cruel passion of revenge impelled 
 Jili to the atrocity. Rather, and Bessie ex 
 plained it so to me, he wished by one terrible 
 example to fill the hearts of our enemies with 
 consternation and cold fear. To have found 
 Todd conventionally dead would have served 
 only to inflame them further against us; but 
 to find him as he was, must, and I agreed with 
 Bessie, serve them as an awful warning. 
 
 We had now but five men and one rifle to 
 deal with; five men without shelter; with no 
 food except such sea-birds (and these were 
 plentiful enough) as they could kill; and no 
 means of kindling a fire, for there was no fuel 
 upon the island. Jili was for going ashore 
 and hunting them down like so many sheep, 
 and potting them one by one until we had ac 
 counted for the lot. But the rest of us would 
 not hear of it; the enemy had still one rifle, 
 and that was just one too many. Better go 
 for a short cruise, or merely stay where we 
 were, and let the cold and the rain hunt down 
 the men upon the island, and dispose of them 
 one by one.
 
 CHAPTER 
 TWENTY- 
 THREE 
 
 THE 
 
 WHITE FLAG 
 AGAIN 
 
 IN the hold of the Shantung, each in its red 
 wood packing case, were twelve coffins of 
 American manufacture, already engraved with 
 the names of those who were some time or other 
 expected to occupy them. Your Chinaman 
 cannot bear the thought of being buried at sea 
 or, permanently, in a foreign land; and, in 
 deed, to be sure of resting one day in Chinese 
 soil he would cheerfully curtail the full measure 
 of his days. These coffins for which there were 
 now occupants were hoisted to the deck, and 
 the afternoon was passed in soldering their 
 leaden linings hermetically over our dead, 
 screwing down the lids, and slipping the cof 
 fins once more into the packing cases. The 
 Shantung s cabin was then once more made to 
 serve as a receiving vault, and the coffins 
 ranged lengthwise along the wall; the centre 
 of the cabin being kept open as usual for meals, 
 games of cards, navigation and all its thousand 
 and one other uses. While we were carrying
 
 1 88 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Chang s coffin into the cabin two shots were 
 fired at us from the island; one splintered di 
 agonally into the deck, and one flew wide. So, 
 having stored the bodies, we got up the Shan- 
 tuny s anchor and moved her, perhaps a quar 
 ter of a mile, or as far as the width of the fiord 
 would permit, further out from the landing; 
 and also erected a flimsy screen of canvas that 
 could be shifted from side to side, according 
 to how the ship lay on the rising or falling tide, 
 and behind which \ve could move about unseen. 
 The screen, of course, offered no obstacle to a 
 bullet; but we agreed that men with a limited 
 supply of ammunition would not waste it- on a 
 wall of canvas, in the wild hope of hitting some 
 one who might be at a particular point behind 
 it. Furthermore the added distance between 
 us and the shore precluded the idea of any des 
 perate man swimming off to us in the night. 
 Only Jerry Top, a native of the region, and 
 who could bask naked in the midst of a drizzle 
 with the mercury at 45, for all the world like 
 a lizard in the sun, could have accomplished 
 so tremendous a feat of natation. Had it not 
 been for the desperate men ashore, of whom 
 he stood in mortal terror, he w r ould, I think, 
 have tried it at this time. For the man s likes 
 and dislikes had already turned topsy turvy.
 
 THE WHITE FLAG AGAIN 189 
 
 He was now as sick of ship life as formerly he 
 had been of that on shore. And he babbled 
 continually and very lovingly of terra firma, 
 of moist hollows among the wet rocks, of raw 
 sea-gulls, of occasional feasts upon the putrid 
 blubber of stranded whale. He told us that 
 he had a ton or more of whale buried on the 
 island; and that if he could not come at it soon 
 he feared that it would pass its prime. The 
 clothes, too, that he was made to wear aboard 
 ship fretted him cruelly. He was as sorry 
 to. remain aboard as he had been rejoiced to 
 come. 
 
 Early the next morning Carrol presented 
 himself on the landing, bearing a white flag; 
 and after a somewhat heated discussion be 
 tween Jili and Ah Fing, was brought off in the 
 boat. He carried himself with commendable 
 bravado; but it was evident that hunger 
 pricked him, and that he was really sick with 
 the cold in his head. 
 
 " Jim," said he to me, " that was an awful 
 thing you did to Todd." 
 
 " Don t give me the credit of it," said I, 
 "though I dare say it was no more than he 
 deserved." 
 
 " So it was n t you," he said, " well, I m 
 glad ; it was n t nice to think that a white man
 
 190 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 had done it. I suppose you 11 be surprised to 
 hear that I ve come on an errand of mercy 
 . . . Ah! Good morning, Lichee . . . 
 
 " Morning," said Lichee, and grinned. 
 
 :< It s about Blake," said Carrol, and he 
 seated himself heavily on the deck and leaned 
 against the mainmast. " Excuse me but," 
 and he smiled ruefully, " I ve been up all night 
 with him; but we can t do anything for him. 
 I Ve come to ask you in common charity to 
 take him aboard. You ve got medicines, 
 have n t you, and whiskey ? He d have a 
 chance here." 
 
 " What ails the man," said Bessie, " that 
 should not ail him? " 
 
 " I suppose it s pneumonia," said Carrol. 
 " It began with a heavy cold, and now he s 
 delirious, and burning up with fever." 
 
 Bessie pointed to the closed door of the cabin. 
 
 " In there, Mister Carrol," she said, " are 
 five dead men who were kinder to me than 
 brothers. Now you ask me to take one of the 
 men that murdered them aboard the ship, and 
 nurse him back to health and strength ? I 11 tell 
 you what we 11 do for you, Mister Carrol. 
 We 11 take him aboard and we 11 nurse him. 
 If he dies well and good; if he does n t die 
 if he recovers well then, just as soon as
 
 THE WHITE FLAG AGAIN 191 
 
 he s well enough and strong enough to under 
 stand what s happening, we ll hang him as 
 high as he can be hoisted on the end of a 
 rope. And you can put that in your pipe and 
 smoke it ! " 
 
 " Jim," said Carrol, " have you no influence 
 among these heathen ? " 
 
 " Not enough," said I, " to turn their human 
 nature upside down, any more than my own. 
 Those dead men in there were like brothers to 
 me, Carrol. And I can find it in my heart 
 to think of this Blake s plight with positive 
 satisfaction, God forgive me." 
 
 " It s a hard world," said Carrol, " and 
 Blake s blood is on your head, Jim, not mine." 
 
 " I guess there s damned little room left on 
 your head for everybody else s blood, Mister 
 Carrol," said Bessie tartly, " and now if you ve 
 said your say, I guess you d better be moving." 
 
 He rose to his feet, staggering a little, but 
 with a show of temper. 
 
 "All right!" he said, "all right! But 
 answer me this where do you all come in? 
 Here you are, to be sure, and very snug to be 
 sure but the treasure s with us ; and you re 
 no nearer to it than you were before you ever 
 heard of it. So if at any time you have any 
 reasonable overtures just let us know."
 
 192 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " Carrol," said I, " we have discussed that 
 subject already among ourselves under two 
 heads. It \vas first proposed to go ashore and 
 hunt you people down like so many quail, from 
 rock to rock, from gully to gully, from your 
 first hiding place to your last, and there ex 
 terminate you. But the vote went against 
 that plan. And the present idea is to leave 
 you severely alone." 
 
 Carrol laughed sneeringly. 
 
 " You d better ! " said he. 
 
 To leave you severely alone," I went on, 
 " until one by one you have gone where Blake 
 is going, and by the same road. How long can 
 you people hold on to your miserable lives 
 on that barren rock? Will the green beech 
 stems burn, even supposing that there is a dry 
 match left among you? How long can you 
 eat raw gull? If the rain holds off you will 
 die of thirst; and if the rain falls and in 
 deed I felt a drop not a minute ago you are 
 as well able to stand showers of corrosive 
 sublimate." 
 
 He compressed his lips tightly, but still 
 sneering. 
 
 " Jim," said he, " I don t know a bolder 
 talker than yourself when you Ve got your 
 friends to back you. But yesterday when you
 
 THE WHITE FLAG AGAIN 193 
 
 were visiting us, you kept a civiler and less 
 bloodthirsty tongue in your head ! " 
 
 I crimsoned to my eyes with shame; for 
 what the man said was perfectly true. 
 
 " But for me," said he, " it s different. And 
 among friends or enemies you 11 find me the 
 same. When I tell you to your faces " his 
 face becomes gradually frenzied with rage 
 " that I am going to cut the heart out of every 
 mother s son of you, I mean it. And as 
 for the mother s daughters among you ask 
 that Spanish prostitute there what I did to 
 her ... " 
 
 " Mister Carrol," said Bessie quietly, 
 " among Chinamen a white flag protects its 
 bearer as surely as an army. But the amount 
 of honour that an outcast woman can claim is 
 so small and valueless to her, that if you don t 
 get out of this ship in about three shakes of a 
 lamb s tail I ll fix you. And I ll fix you 
 good ..." 
 
 Her temper had risen, and she glared into 
 the man s face, and walked slowly towards him, 
 her arms akimbo, and her chin thrust sharply 
 forward and up. Carrol clenched his right 
 hand. He was brave, and no mistake. For he 
 must have known that he had but to strike 
 the woman to be literally torn to pieces the
 
 194 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 next instant and I think he meant to strike 
 her. Jili s crooked knife was already flashing 
 in his hand, clean once more and sharp. I 
 sprang between Bessie and Carrol. 
 
 " Carrol," said I, " certain things have been 
 said to you that you may as well put in your 
 pipe and smoke. My God, man, think of 
 Todd!" 
 
 He must have done so, for his face changed 
 on the instant from crimson to ash. And, 
 
 " I guess you re right, Jim," he said mildly. 
 
 A moment more and he had gone over the 
 side, and was being ferried ashore.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 TERMS 
 
 WELL, as the saying is, we sat down to wait, 
 and felt pretty sure of our affair, Before 
 Carrol had stepped from the boat to the landing 
 the rain was once more descending in torrents. 
 You may lay it against me that I was not un 
 duly moved with the thought of human beings 
 succumbing inevitably to exposure, and so near 
 at hand. But I was not. The island and its 
 transient inhabitants seemed very far off. 
 Do you, for instance, when you read of a ter 
 rible famine in distant India really take the 
 matter to heart? I think not; for it is only a 
 rare, and a very morbid, imagination that can 
 picture sufferings beyond the seas with suffi 
 cient vividness to be troubled by them. Can 
 you not pass a city hospital with laughter and 
 jest? Are you in the least affected, though 
 you fling them a thought, perhaps, by the suf 
 ferings that are going on within? You do 
 not hear the screams, nor smell the ether, nor 
 feel the passing of souls. If all the world s 
 death-beds and tortures came near enough,
 
 196 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 you yourself would die of pain. But a brick 
 wall, the roof of a house, the width of a street, 
 keep you in blissful ignorance. How much 
 more, then, the width of a fiord, and the rocky 
 heights of an island. It was harder to sit down 
 among our own dead in the cabin, to eat a meal, 
 than to think of Blake in his last throes. And 
 after a meal or two that feeling of wretched 
 discomfort passed, and I grew used to lean 
 ing against Chang s coffin and watching a deal 
 of fan-tan eat up my resources. Have I said 
 that I was made to gamble furiously aboard the 
 Shantung? Alas it is so! And having not 
 a penny of my own in the world I was a con 
 stant recipient of forced loans. Our stakes, 
 it is true, were wondrous small; but the ex 
 citement was as great as among men playing 
 for thousands. At checkers and backgammon 
 I could hold my own; and I was beginning to 
 see the inner workings of fan-tan ; chess, how 
 ever, was not a contest but a series of presents 
 from me to the adversary; though I once 
 pushed Lichee very close for a rubber. Bessie 
 played cards with astonishing good luck, and 
 very little skill; Carmen played well and un 
 luckily; but the only heavy winners among us 
 were poor Chang, who was dead, and Lichee. 
 The child played with real genius; and it was
 
 TERMS 197 
 
 a great feather in the cap of any one who could 
 worst him. He knew every card in the pack; 
 at whist he seemed to know by intuition, after 
 a lead or two, exactly what hands were held 
 by the various players. The meanings and 
 values of cards and their combinations were 
 far easier to him than his own baby talk, Eng 
 lish or Chinese. Neither did he win with the 
 unnecessary vivacity, or lose with the dismal- 
 ness of your amateur. Give the child a pack of 
 cards and he was a Jack Hamlin. Sometimes 
 for sport, and without stakes, he would play me 
 a game of piquet, announcing beforehand that 
 he intended to cheat; but, watch as I might, I 
 could never catch him at it ; and he would put 
 back his round little face and half close his 
 black sloe eyes, and roar at my ignorance and 
 stupidity. 
 
 For two days and nights it rained and sleeted, 
 and the wind howled. And we passed the time 
 with games and cards and conversation. We 
 even had a great candy pull, got up by Carmen 
 for Lichee s benefit ; and made a great mess in 
 the galley boiling down molasses and pulling it 
 till it was white, sprinkling our hands with flour 
 so that the sticky mass should not adhere. And 
 all this merry making was to pass the time that 
 our enemies should take in dying.
 
 198 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 Well, now that it s all over, that is, perhaps, 
 a horrible thought. But even if we had sat in 
 solemn rows twiddling our thumbs, it would 
 not have helped in any way. And as a matter 
 of fact while we were trying to amuse time 
 away none of our enemies died but Blake ; and 
 his death had come upon him while Carrol was 
 being ferried to the shore. 
 
 The morning of the third day broke over 
 cast but rainless. During the night Jerry Top 
 had left us, being sick to death of schooner life. 
 But whether he swam off to the island, or to 
 the mainland, we never knew. Probably it was 
 to the latter, since it was nearer, and not popu 
 lated by people likely to do him harm. He left 
 the clothes with which we had supplied him 
 lying on the deck, and departed the Shan 
 tung almost as naked as he had come to her. 
 But not quite. For we found that he had 
 taken one hair brush belonging to Bessie, 
 Lichee s clasp knife, and a jar of strawberry 
 jam. For my part I wish him well and hope 
 that whenever he tires of shore life he will spy 
 a vessel in the offing, and vice-versa. 
 
 About nine o clock of the third day Carrol, 
 once more waving the white flag, was seen on 
 the landing, and on the brink of the cliffs far 
 above him we perceived the rest of the gang,
 
 TERMS 199 
 
 Kelsey, Brandreth and another whose name 
 turned out to be Swigot. These three sat upon 
 the edge of the cliff, at a point where it was 
 more than perpendicular, and (their legs hang 
 ing into space) resembled three small boys on a 
 very high wall. And it seemed to me that in 
 thus disregarding the perilous altitude they 
 showed something of the desperation to which 
 they must have been brought by the cold and 
 the rain. But we kept Carrol a long time wait 
 ing, and decided at last to bring him off to the 
 schooner only because \ve had been pent up so 
 long that we were eager for diversion even 
 of a disagreeable nature. Furthermore we 
 thought that by a close look at Carrol, we 
 could estimate how long the business of wait 
 ing might be expected to endure. 
 
 But it was evident at first glance that Car 
 rol s deposits of adipose were serving him in 
 good stead ; they formed a kind of granary of 
 reserved strength and nutrition upon which he 
 could draw. White he was very; thinner; 
 and had a grave, drawn look; but his eye 
 sparkled with intelligence and determination; 
 and whatever his inmost estimate of the situa 
 tion, he had neither the expression nor the 
 bearing of a beaten man. He chose to present 
 himself as the herald of the stronger party,
 
 200 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 as indeed, he was in one way ; for the treasure, 
 now as always the real sinews of war, remained 
 for the present on his side of the quarrel; and 
 he chose to be sharp with us for having kept 
 him waiting. 
 
 " If you had n t sent for me when you did," 
 said he arrogantly, " I would have refused to 
 treat with you at all." 
 
 "Treat with us?" said Bessie. 
 
 "And why not?" said he. "I am at this 
 moment more times a millionaire in terms of 
 bullion than any man in the world. I am in a 
 position to treat with an emperor, let alone 
 with a scrubby ship s company whose only 
 assets are a couple of stoves and a cock- 
 roachy schooner. Now then, I am prepared 
 to offer you a handsome sum to land me and 
 my friends safely in Rio, and in addition a 
 handsome bonus for handling the treasure. I 
 am authorised to offer virgin gold to the amount 
 of fifty thousand dollars." 
 
 " And suppose," said I, " that we refuse this 
 munificent offer; row quickly ashore and take 
 possession of this treasure which by every 
 ethical right belongs to us, and sail away, leav 
 ing you and your friends to think the matter 
 over?" 
 
 " Jim," said he, " if you d acted on that
 
 TERMS 201 
 
 idea a few days ago, instead of sitting down 
 to starve us out, I won t deny that you could 
 have worked it; since you outnumber us two 
 to one, and have plenty of weapons. But you 
 preferred apparently not to face any active 
 or dangerous issue, and now, few and weak 
 though we are, the game s in our hands. 
 Don t think we spent the opportunity you gave 
 us twiddling our thumbs. No sir ! We worked 
 like mules, and bit by bit we dug out every 
 sliver of the treasure, and most of the gems, I 
 guess, and we transplanted em, digging by 
 day and carrying by night, until the whole 
 mass of it lies on the cliff yonder, where the 
 boys are sitting and dangling their legs." 
 
 " Thank you kindly," said I, " for your 
 trouble. And it seems to me you ve only 
 saved us much time and labour." 
 
 But he shook his head gently and smiled 
 pityingly in my face. 
 
 " The advantages of our position," he said 
 softly, " would be obvious to any one but a 
 nincompoop." 
 
 " Doubtless," I said, " but you will certainly 
 have to explain them to me." 
 
 " Why, Jim," said he, " we four survivors 
 of the late Calliope are in desperate straits, I 
 admit that: we re half starved; we re chilled
 
 202 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 to the bone ; but though we Ve kept going on 
 nerve and excitement we can t keep it up for 
 ever, nor indeed for very long. Perhaps you 
 think \ve re good tempered about the way 
 things have gone against us from the start? 
 Perhaps you think we re grinning and bearing 
 our misfortunes like the good Christians that 
 we are n t ? No, we re feeling pretty savage 
 and resentful, if you want the truth. If we Ve 
 got to perish miserably on that damned rock, 
 well and good ; but our last death rattle is n t 
 going to enrich anybody; because we intend, if 
 you people won t listen to reason, to throw every 
 grain of the treasure from the cliff into the 
 fiord. And the waters there, as I know that 
 have sounded them, are a hundred fathoms 
 deep . . . Now maybe you ve got a healthier 
 view of the situation." 
 
 I must admit that the new turn in the affair 
 threw us into a very considerable consterna 
 tion. The Chinamen burst into full council, 
 all talking at once and at the top of their 
 lungs; and Bessie, too, mingled with them, 
 haranguing, almost shouting, and stamping 
 her feet. 
 
 " What are they saying, Jim," asked Carrol. 
 
 " I wish I knew," said I. " But whatever it 
 is they 11 come to a decision pretty quick."
 
 TERMS 203 
 
 The hubbub ceased as suddenly as it had 
 begun, and Bessie came forward as spokesman. 
 
 We want to know, Mister Carrol/ said 
 she, " about how much you think the stuff 
 foots up to? " 
 
 We ve no scales on the island," said he, 
 " so it s impossible to make any kind of an 
 estimate; especially of the gems. But there s 
 enough to make me and my friends feel pretty 
 wealthy." 
 
 "Well," said Bessie, "our feeling is this: 
 We feel that your offer of fifty thousand dol 
 lars is mighty generous; and we don t want 
 to be outdone. So we make you just the same 
 offer; fifty thousand dollars to be divided 
 among the four of you, and a safe passage to 
 Rio." 
 
 "What!" exclaimed Carrol, "why the 
 stuff s worth millions and millions, and you 
 offer us fifty thousand dollars worth when 
 the whole of it s ours ours! That for your 
 offer ! " he cried, and he spat upon the deck. 
 
 " Mister Carrol," said Bessie, " we re as 
 able to pay for our fancies as you are. You 
 may take this offer or leave it. And you Ve 
 got five minutes to make up your mind. Take 
 it, and we 11 keep our end of the contract faith 
 fully ; leave it, and by the living God, five min-
 
 204 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 utes from now the boys go ashore and hunt 
 down those friends of yours from their perch. 
 If they chuck the treasure overboard, well and 
 good, they ve got sand. But I think Mister 
 Carrol they 11 run like whipped sheep ! Jili 
 Ho Lee get your guns out, boys, and get a 
 bead on those black birds on the cliff yonder ! " 
 
 The Chinamen sprang to the work, and 
 poking their rifles here arid there through 
 the canvas screen that had been rigged to keep 
 our actions hidden, prepared to make it hot 
 for the men on the cliff, who, in utter igno 
 rance of what was brewing, continued to kick 
 their legs idly in space. 
 
 Carrol sprang to his feet livid. 
 
 " Is this how you respect a flag of truce," 
 he cried. " My God strike me dead ! There s 
 no decency left among men." 
 
 " Mister Carrol," cried Bessie, " the flag 
 affects only you. Nobody s raising a hand 
 against you! As for those skunks up yonder 
 there s nothing to protect them except the 
 long range four five six hundred yards 
 / call it and that won t cover them long." 
 
 " It s murder ! " Carrol screamed this at 
 the top of his voice, hoping, I think, to warn 
 his friends; but if his cry did reach them it 
 passed unheeded.
 
 TERMS 205 
 
 " Try that again," said Bessie, " and we 11 
 call the truce off and you ll last about five 
 seconds . . . now then, my buck, take our 
 proposition or leave it." 
 
 But I can t," said Carrol resolutely, " with 
 out consulting with my friends, I m only one 
 vote among four." 
 
 " Oh well," said Bessie, " if that s all the 
 influence you Ve got up yonder, and you the 
 boss, the fount of wisdom, I guess we better 
 open fire and have done with the business." 
 She turned to the Chinamen. 
 
 "Jili," she said- 
 
 " Hold on ! " said Carrol. " You guarantee 
 us fifty thousand and a safe passage to Rio? " 
 
 " Fifty thousand," said Bessie. " and a safe 
 passage unless you try any dirty work!" 
 
 Carrol s face was a study. Resolute villain, 
 I think he was capable of flinging the offer in 
 our faces and dying a martyr to his own stub 
 bornness. But it must be that at this moment 
 the inklings of some future desperate plan 
 came to him ; for suddenly, and with consider 
 able meekness, " I accept," said he, " for myself 
 and for my friends." 
 
 "Well and good!" said Bessie. 
 
 "And now," said he, "put me ashore, and 
 I 11 tell the boys."
 
 206 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 For answer Bessie fetched the megaphone 
 and thrust it into his hands. 
 
 [< From the moment you accepted the propo 
 sition," said she, " we re responsible for your 
 safe passage to Rio, and we ? re not going to let 
 you run the risk of going ashore. Now then, 
 phone those men that you ve made a satisfac 
 tory arrangement you need n t state the terms 
 
 or you might get yourself permaturely dis 
 liked. Tell them to come at once to the land 
 ing, and we 11 send for them. And by the 
 way, they ve got a rifle. Tell them to throw 
 that into the fiord so that I can see them 
 do it." 
 
 Carrol rolled a wicked and baleful eye; but 
 he put the megaphone presently to his mouth, 
 and gave his comrades their directions. For a 
 few moments they appeared to consult; then 
 
 Kelsey, it was, rose to his feet, raised the 
 rifle high above his head, held it thus in full 
 view for a second or two, and flung it from 
 him. It seemed a long time falling, turned 
 over slowly, and entered the water without a 
 sound or splash that could be detected from the 
 schooner. The three men then turned and dis 
 appeared, making for the head of the fissure 
 that conducted to the landing. 
 
 " Well/ said Carrol, shrugging his broad,
 
 TERMS 207 
 
 fat shoulders, " that s over. Now for God s 
 sake give me something to eat and a drink, and 
 let me dry out at the stove." 
 
 " Jili," said Bessie, " look after Mr. Carrol." 
 
 The way in which Jili did this must have as 
 tonished that desperate adventurer. Jili drove 
 into the man s brawny legs and jerked them 
 from under him, and pitched him heavily upon 
 the deck. Then, falling upon him with ropes, 
 Ah Fing and Ho Lee had in a moment so 
 bound him that he could move no more than 
 his fingers and toes. 
 
 " Look in his hip pocket," said Bessie. " I 
 thought so! A sawed off Colt. Take the car 
 tridges out of it, and give it to Lichee to play 
 with. Take that knife, too, that he wears in 
 his belt; he sports that so open that I guess 
 he s got another hidden. Find it." 
 
 It was as Bessie said. The man had a 
 second knife in reserve. And his face became 
 apoplectic with fury when this last resource 
 was taken from him. Foam appeared on his 
 lips and, rolling his head until he could see 
 Bessie, "Damn your soul to hell!" he cried, 
 " you blank, you blank, you blank ! " 
 
 " Jili, said Bessie, " if that sewer of a 
 mouth starts to run again, get your sail- 
 needle and take a couple of stitches in it."
 
 208 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " Carrol," I said, " I Ve enough humanity 
 in me to advise you to be careful. You Ve 
 spoken as a man has no right to speak to a 
 woman were she Satan s mother. Try it 
 again, and your lips will be sewed together 
 like the lips of a wound; the stitches to be 
 taken out at meal time. Behave yourself, and 
 you will be treated reasonably well." 
 
 He made no answer at all; and presently 
 was carried into the galley, placed near the 
 stove to dry, and fed by hand like a baby. 
 
 Not long afterward Kelsey, Brandreth and 
 Swigot came over the side; and three more 
 forlorn, meek, spiritless sheep I have never 
 had the pleasure to see. And they took to the 
 idea of being bound with ropes as peacefully 
 as tired men take to soft beds at the close of 
 the long day. 
 
 Two small penknives, one vicious clasp 
 knife and a revolver whose mainspring turned 
 out to be broken, were found about them ; 
 and in Kelsey s watch pocket a small bottle 
 labelled Spirits of Lavender. Bessie was about 
 to heave this overboard, but Carmen begged 
 for it, saying that it was a well-known and 
 harmless remedy for insomnia, and that she 
 stood in great need of something of the kind. 
 I think she spoke in good faith.
 
 TERMS 209 
 
 " But," said Bessie, " how do you know it s 
 what the label says ? " 
 
 Carmen uncorked the bottle and sniffed at 
 the contents. Then smiled suddenly into one 
 of her rare and animated smiles. 
 
 " You tell by thata smell," said she. And 
 she recorked the bottle and thrust it into her 
 bosom. " It s my hands," she said, nodding 
 brightly, " they keepa me awake. They have 
 a what you call him ? " 
 
 "Rheumatism?" I suggested, and she 
 nodded. 
 
 " It s this cold, damp climate," I said, " you 
 poor soul." 
 
 " Yes," she said, " here it is too fraish for 
 my poor bone."
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 CARMEN GIVES ADVICE 
 
 How often during the next days of appalling 
 labour for all hands did I envy Carrol, Kelsey, 
 Brandreth and Swigot, in comfortable bon 
 dage, each with a pillow to his head, reclining 
 in the warm galley and resting from wicked 
 ness! Standing and contemplating the great 
 mass of treasure on the cliff for the first time 
 was, I think, the most delightful and thrilling 
 occupation upon which I was ever engaged; 
 and I could have spent a month turning over 
 the pieces, admiring this admirable golden 
 bowl, battered as it was; or piecing to 
 gether the ancient Peruvian wainscotting, and 
 laying it in order (like the parts of a picture 
 puzzle) upon some level space of sand; or I 
 could have looked by the hour into the heart of 
 one ice green emerald, and by the hour into the 
 heart of the next. Or I could turn away from 
 the glistening, tarnished heap, losing my vision 
 in the distances of the snow-capped mountains 
 and flying hand in hand with the imagination
 
 CARMEN GIVES ADVICE 211 
 
 to the active centres of civilisation; there to 
 see myself play the nabob, the philanthropist, 
 the friend of the poor; my yacht should be 
 white and tall upon the blue waters of Long 
 Island sound; my house should stand where- 
 ever skies are bluest, and nature is most grate 
 ful to the helping hand. I imagined in terms 
 of hundred acre lawns and marble stables. Or 
 better, and less personally, I dreamed that I 
 should do something noble with my money, 
 of great good to the many, enduring and free 
 from taint; though just what that should be 
 I was admittedly unable to specify. In short, 
 like every other natural man in this world, I 
 wanted the pleasure and the ease and the pic- 
 turesqueness of great wealth, without any of 
 the labour. I wanted to sit upon the cliff and 
 play with the museum pieces of the treasure, 
 and guess the value they would bring in the 
 market. But after one hour of it exactly, I 
 did not want to be one of the pack mules that 
 must carry the stuff like so much coal, and help 
 store it aboard the Shantung. Do you know 
 that sixty pounds of gold is no easier to carry 
 than sixty pounds of offal, and is heavier upon 
 the shoulders of a man than the whole of his 
 sins? But such is the fact. And when you 
 get under your load for the twentieth time in
 
 212 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 one day, and the straps of your panier settle 
 themselves into the raw furrows on your shoul 
 ders, and when after a heavy stumble the sixty 
 pounds hits you a concentrated jarring bump 
 upon the spine, then, indeed, you begin to un 
 derstand the woes of the rich. And the woes 
 of the rich are just as woful as the woes of 
 the man who dynamites them. And this, hav 
 ing moved upon my own shoulders about a ton 
 of bullion in two days time, I myself am pre 
 pared to certify, laying, if requested, my right 
 hand truthfully upon The Book. 
 
 When at last it came to moving the silver 
 and this was of problematical value owing to 
 the depths to which it was bitten by tarnish 
 and destroyed, I struck work. Cold as was 
 the wind and the drizzle, I stripped off my 
 coat and shirt, and instructed Jili (who, ever 
 since I had gone as an exchange for Lichee, 
 had been very tender w r ith me and thoughtful 
 of my comfort) as a committee of one to ex 
 amine my shoulders. He reported them unfit 
 for work, and though at a pinch I might have 
 carried one more load (consisting of nothing 
 less valuable than Koh-i-nurs I w r as invalided 
 to do guard duty over our four precious rascals 
 in the galley. Hitherto I had only taken my 
 turn at this; but for the whole of the last day
 
 CARMEN GIVES ADVICE 213 
 
 during which we lay anchored in the fiord, I 
 kept the necessary eye on them, and played the 
 bugbear generally. 
 
 The four, now well-fed and warmed, began 
 to take life very easily, and to joke with their 
 jailors; but that the least opportunity would 
 fill them once more with the old Nick was not 
 to be doubted. During that last day, for in 
 stance, Carrol proposed, if I would set them 
 free and arm them, to make me sole master 
 of three parts of the treasure. To murder the 
 Chinamen was the merest detail of the plan; 
 and, although he opened the matter jocosely, 
 I could see that he was not altogether sure as 
 to whether I was to be tempted or not. Having 
 heard him out to the end, however, I laughed 
 in his face, and he laughed back. 
 
 " You treated me so faithfully and honour 
 ably in Frisco," said I, " that I feel sure you 
 would do the same now if I set you free. All 
 you have to do is to give your word, to be be 
 lieved by any one aboard this ship. Why, man, 
 I don t believe, I honestly don t, that you ever 
 so much as kept a promise given by yourself 
 to yourself. Suppose that yours had been the 
 successful party, how many of them would 
 you have allowed to survive to tell the tale? 
 And I 11 give you others a piece of mighty good
 
 214 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 advice. It s this when you go ashore at 
 Rio with your share of the fifty thousand that s 
 to be handed over to you, keep an eye on Carrol 
 here. He 11 want the whole of it, and he 11 
 get it if you don t watch out." 
 
 " Parrish don t think much of you, do e? " 
 said Kelsey. " And I dunno s I blame im." 
 
 " It s a long rolling road to Rio," said Bran- 
 dreth cheerfully, " and between here and there 
 the ocean s deep, and maybe we 11 all roll on 
 the bottom together." 
 
 " I dreamt last night," said Swigot, " that 
 the damned ship blew up, and while I was in 
 the air the ropes that bound me bursts asunder, 
 and I fell flop into the water, and was just 
 striking out for shore when I gets all tangled 
 up in the Chinks pig-tails and is dragged 
 under." 
 
 " On the level, Jim," said Carrol, " what do 
 you think the treasure s worth ? " 
 
 " Well," said I, " I toted the smallest share 
 of anybody from the cliff to the boat. And I 
 calculated roughly that that share was about 
 twenty-eight hundred pounds gold that s 
 more than a million dollars, just what I carried 
 alone. Some of the boys made as many trips 
 as I did and carried about a hundred pounds 
 each time to my sixty. Then there are the
 
 CARMEN GIVES ADVICE 215 
 
 emeralds and things, and the good Lord only 
 knows what they re worth!" 
 
 ; When I was in the land of the free," said 
 Kelsey pathetically, " emeralds was high." 
 
 And thus we argued the matter, and esti 
 mated. Just as in a cafe four men may sit 
 about a table and guess by the hour as to 
 the fortune of Mr. Vanderbilt or Mr. Rocke 
 feller; starting upon guessed premises, and ar 
 riving, of course, nowhere. It was wonderful 
 to see how cheerful a topic to these four men 
 was that of the millions that they had all but 
 secured for themselves. So every family loves 
 to dwell upon the gold mine that should have 
 made it rich ; or upon the timber lands sold at 
 the wrong time, by the unprophetic grand 
 father. And so, I fancy, the civilised world 
 over, the most toothsome of all gossip where 
 men are met together is that of unboundable 
 wealth. And if it were not for heavy gold, 
 light women, and fast horses, civilised man 
 would soon lose the use of his tongue. 
 
 A figure blocked the galley door, and a 
 shadow fell among us conversing. Carmen 
 was on her rounds. Fifty times a day she 
 would thus steal silently upon the prisoners, 
 stand a while in the frame of the door, look 
 her fill upon Carrol in his fallen fortunes, and
 
 216 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 steal as quietly away. But on this occasion 
 she spoke. 
 
 " It is better," she said, " that fat man be 
 killed before he do mischief. You think he 
 mind them rope? Not so much." And she 
 snapped her distorted little fingers. " You 
 keep faith with heem, but nobody keep faith 
 with me. When I say I come along, and not 
 want any gol you promise me that man for 
 myself. Now you not give heem me. But I 
 tell you I creep in here some fine night, when 
 nobody on the look, and then I have my little 
 fling with heem." 
 
 She gazed for a long time into Carrol s face, 
 and he went white under the stare of her great 
 accusing stag eyes. 
 
 " If I not kill heem," she said, " that ver 
 bad. When he break loose, and cut your heart 
 out, you not like hear me say, I tole you so. 
 That man poison, just lak snake. He wear 
 thata rope cause it suit heem; but he not 
 have to." 
 
 She turned and went as suddenly and as 
 silently as she had come; but her words had 
 blunted the edge of cheerful conversation. 
 And Carrol in particular was badly scared by 
 them. 
 
 " I tell you," he said, " I don t like it. I
 
 CARMEN GIVES ADVICE 217 
 
 was promised a safe passage to Rio, and I 
 submitted to be bound. I demand either that 
 these ropes come off, or that I be guarded night 
 and day. I tell you it gives me the chills to 
 think of that revengeful slut creeping in here 
 some night and cutting my throat." 
 
 You may be quite sure," said I, " that 
 anything of that kind will be prevented." 
 
 " Quite sure s not sure enough," said he. 
 
 ; Well," said I, it s the nearest sure you 
 can be in this world." 
 
 " And to think," said he, in the tone of one 
 who has missed the short end of a hundred 
 to one shot at the races, " that I could have 
 killed her, one time in Lima, just as well as 
 not, could have had the business hushed up, 
 and never need have had this hanging over me. 
 I tell you it s damned unpleasant, not to put 
 it stronger." 
 
 The next day dawned with watery sun 
 shine and capricious breezes. We got up the 
 Shantung s anchor, and stood down the fiord 
 for the more open stretches of Beagle Channel, 
 and about ten o clock had left the scenes of 
 our desperate adventures behind. Looking 
 astern the great white blotches of the head 
 land dwindled, and ran together until they re 
 sembled once more a saucy schooner under
 
 218 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 full sail; and dwindled and shrank to a spot, 
 to a pinhead, and vanished at last from our 
 eyes forever. 
 
 Of the various emotions displayed at this 
 time Bessie s was the most odd. For she was 
 moved suddenly to tears, and clasped Lichee 
 to her heart, and fondled him, and finally 
 pushed him away from her, and ran into the 
 cabin, and sat for many hours among the 
 coffins of the dead.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 AT SEA AGAIN 
 
 To run out of Beagle Channel, turn the corner, 
 so to speak, and follow up the eastern coast of 
 South America, embraced but the first princi 
 ples of navigation; eliminating a perilous re- 
 passage of Magellan, or the dangerous gales 
 and seas of Cape Horn. We were now so rich 
 that it mattered little in what port of the civil 
 ised world we should first anchor; let it be 
 only the nearest and easiest to reach, and one 
 from which trustworthy steamers sailed, or 
 trains ran. But the troubles which such a 
 course promised to prevent were inflicted 
 upon us in other ways. Our venture was pre 
 destined to trouble; where navigation should 
 have been easy it was made difficult by fog. 
 And in comparison to Chang, Jili was no great 
 sailor; instead of incurring dangers on the 
 side of boldness, he incurred them by caution 
 and procrastination. And instead of feeling 
 his way northward through the fog, he stood 
 day after day straight out to sea; we weath 
 ered a very wicked fifty-hour gale that never 
 so much as lifted a corner of the fog; we came
 
 220 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 within an ace of running down an uncharted 
 island; and we sprang a leak forward, which, 
 though not an actual menace, obliged us to 
 keep the pumps pretty active. And when at 
 last fine blue sea-weather put in a tardy appear 
 ance, and our minds were at rest as to the 
 ship s position, Nature, not yet ready to let us 
 go scot free, visited us with the scurvy. Labour 
 that was almost unendurable, and long con 
 tinuance in a narrow, salty and not particularly 
 nutritious diet, had its usual results; especially 
 the labour. For those who had worked the 
 hardest were the first to fall sick; while those 
 who had not worked at all escaped. The pas 
 sengers or prisoners continued in excellent 
 health and spirits, with the exception of 
 Carrol; and whatever it was that ailed him 
 it was not the scurvy; he seemed to suffer 
 more from general langour and loss of appe 
 tite than from anything specific; and com 
 plained that his whole skeleton was outlined 
 in aches. The women had no touch of the 
 scurvy, nor had Lichee; and my own case of 
 it was more in the nature of a threat than a 
 development. But the Chinamen, for what 
 reason I do not know, unless it was that they 
 had endured such cruel labours, displayed no 
 power whatever to resist the disease. Irregu-
 
 AT SEA AGAIN 221 
 
 lar red blotches splotched their emaciated yel 
 low faces; their bones ached, their gums bled; 
 depression, exhaustion and a disgust of them 
 selves marked them. They were paying an 
 awful price for riches. It seemed positively 
 wicked not to put the well men to work; but 
 it was a risk that we dared not run; for the 
 Chinamen, though they continued dejectedly 
 to sail the Shantung, were in no condition, 
 immensely superior though they were numeri 
 cally, to handle a spirited mutiny with any 
 certainty. So obvious was this that Kelsey, 
 Brandreth and Swigot begged like so many 
 children to be freed from their bonds and put 
 to work. A dozen times a day they volun 
 teered for work, their eyes gleaming and glis 
 tening; but when denied, it was really comical 
 to see how ill they bore the disappointment. 
 
 One thing was certain. We must crack on 
 all sail and make for the nearest fresh vege 
 tables. And to that intent we hauled our 
 wind and steered for Port Pazoo in the Gulf 
 of San Matias. None of us had ever heard of 
 the place ; it was not sure we should find there 
 what we sought ; and, as the saying is, we were 
 merely taking a chance on it. It was the near 
 est named settlement that our chart gave, and 
 the wind blowing strongly, and with every ap-
 
 222 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 pearance of steadiness from the southeast, had 
 not a little to do with the decision. 
 
 Shortly after we had made our landfall, 
 Ah King died, and was sealed in his coffin, and 
 laid by the side of his friends and comrades 
 who had gone before. But in spite of this sad 
 ending to a cheerful, useful and laborious 
 life, the effect of sighting land could not but 
 cheer us to the marrow. It looked a green, 
 fertile country; and it served like some potent 
 drug to arrest the course of the scurvy. Else 
 must Ah King s death have been followed by 
 others ; for very sick men are often like sheep 
 about dying. Together they hold out for 
 awhile; then one takes the plunge and the 
 others make haste to follow. 
 
 Of all our ship s company Carrol alone was 
 not cheered and revivified by the sight of 
 land; for two days he had refused food; and 
 he had all the appearance of a very sick man. 
 Perhaps he realised that any desperate plan 
 he may have formed of rising and taking the 
 schooner at sea was over and that his game 
 was up. He spoke, if at all, very quietly and 
 soberly; he seemed to think there was a pos 
 sibility of his dying; and he was so meek as 
 to express regret for the life he had led and the 
 deeds he had done. // he died, he said, he
 
 AT SEA AGAIN 223 
 
 wished his share of the fifty thousand to go to 
 a charity which he named in Los Angeles; a 
 charity, he said, that his own mother, rest her 
 soul! had founded. I think that in all the 
 seven seas you could not have lighted on a more 
 Christian spoken man. In the expression of 
 his face, calm, gentle and tolerant and in the 
 quiet, colourless words of his mouth, with the 
 occasional quaint sanctimonious turns, he was 
 the most vivid illustration, nay illumination, of 
 that ancient saw : 
 
 " When the devil is sick 
 The devil a saint would be ; 
 When the devil is well 
 The devil a saint is he." 
 
 A pleasant human note, coming as it did 
 from so evil a man, was the pathetic concern 
 exhibited by Kelsey for his fallen leader; and 
 Brandreth and Swigot seemed to have a real 
 tenderness and affection for him. Yet God 
 alone knows what he may ever have done to 
 deserve it at their hands or another s. 
 
 We came at last to anchor off the umbra 
 geous, little red-roofed settlement called Port 
 Pazoo, and learned within the next twenty 
 minutes in the person of Don Phillip Emanuel 
 Esquada, that the diminutive place maintained 
 a customs and a quarantine.
 
 CHAPTER 
 TWENTY- 
 SEVEN 
 
 DON PHILLIP 
 EMANUEL 
 ESQUADA 
 
 THERE was nothing Spanish about the little 
 man but his name. For he was a Vermonter 
 by birth as he made haste to explain; and a 
 dentist by education. He had taken a Spanish 
 name the quicker to advance politically; and 
 had assumed all the prerogatives of a bona fide 
 physician, a profession more lucrative in Port 
 Pazoo than dentistry. The little creature had 
 bright eyes, a dancing step and a prodigious 
 moustache. He was a veritable wind-bag for 
 loquacity; and yet a man that rang kind and 
 honest; especially, I think, to so poor a judge 
 of physiognomy as myself. 
 
 " You ve got sick aboard? " said he, in his 
 quick chirping voice of a dickie bird. " What 
 ails them scurvy? / see; dose em all 
 round, and send you out a boat-load of salad. 
 Any other sick? One case. Don t know what 
 it is eh? Mysterious / see. I ll have a 
 look at him." 
 
 " We re obliged to keep him in confinement, 
 doctor," said I.
 
 PHILLIP EMANUEL ESQUADA 225 
 
 " Mutinous something of that sort ? " 
 he interrupted. " 7 see ... " 
 
 Well not that exactly," and I was for giv 
 ing a certain truthful, if not complete, account 
 of the situation, but Don Phillip had not been 
 born with the faculty of listening at least 
 to me. 
 
 " / see / see," he said. " Now where is 
 he? ... pretty woman that . . . your wife? 
 . . . mistress? . . . 
 
 " No," I shouted, " nothing of the kind! " 
 
 " / see 7 see," he said, " pretty plump 
 affectionate good-natured big eyes. Now 
 about this mutineer ... In the galley eh? 
 . . . Have the goodness to point him out." 
 
 Carrol had rolled over on his face and was 
 moaning and breathing very heavily. 
 
 " Looks like stomach-ache roll over, my 
 man glary eyes just put out your tongue 
 phew ! White as chalk pulse hum 
 hum regular enough at the moment but 
 weak very weak. How long have you been 
 feeling bad . . . Any fever that s bad . . . 
 ever been like this before . . . plenty of fat 
 left . . . damned if I know what s the matter 
 with you, my man." 
 
 " Water ! " moaned Carrol. 
 
 " I stepped out of the galley to fetch him a
 
 226 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 dipper full and when I returned the doctor 
 was kneeling beside him, and pressing his ear 
 to him here and there as if to listen to the 
 workings of his heart and lungs. But in those 
 few 7 moments a change had come over both 
 Carrol and the doctor. The doctor s loquacity 
 had left him; and Carrol had in each cheek a 
 spot of colour. 
 
 " Here s the water," said I. " and by the 
 Lord Harry, doctor, your man looks better 
 already." 
 
 "Better!" said the doctor, "not much - 
 he s not better. Look here . . ." He rose 
 from his knees and whispered in my ear: 
 
 " It s incipient yellow fever, I m afraid." 
 The little man s voice shook. " It has n t 
 reached the virulent contagious stage but it s 
 on the verge. Did you see his tongue? Now 
 you must see what arrangements can be made 
 to quarantine him from the others." 
 
 " We must put him ashore." I said. 
 
 " Not much, you must n t," said he. " What 
 do we keep a quarantine for? " 
 
 But," said I, " I have never heard of yellow 
 fever coming on this way and hanging off 
 so long. Why the man s been complaining for 
 weeks." 
 
 " There are twenty forms of yellow fever,"
 
 PHILLIP EMANUEL ESQUADA 227 
 
 said the doctor. This is one of them . . . And 
 by the way, if you 11 muster the crew, I 11 - 
 He seemed unaccountably agitated, and I at 
 tributed this to his personal fear of taking the 
 fever from Carrol. " I 11," he said, " I 11 dose 
 them all around. Tell them to go into 
 the forecastle and lie down in their bunks ; I ve 
 some strong specific here, and it s best to rest 
 after taking it." 
 
 It was n t very difficult to persuade the 
 Chinamen to lie down; they were very tired, 
 poor fellows, sick and listless. Jili especially 
 looked to be at death s door. They drank a 
 tumbler apiece of the medicine the doctor had 
 mixed for them; made no complaint of its 
 taste, which he said they would find bitter and 
 disagreeable; and one and all turned their 
 faces to the wall and lay like dead men. 
 
 " Now boys," said the doctor, " that medi 
 cine will begin to burn presently but don t 
 mind that only shows it s working . . . 
 Now, Mr. Parrish, I Ve mixed a glass for 
 you, too." 
 
 " No, no," I said, " a little fresh salad will 
 fix me. There s not anything really the matter 
 with me." 
 
 Jili turnecl his face toward us, attempted to 
 smile and rubbing his abdomen with one hand,
 
 Him burn all same fire," he said. 
 
 " That s right that s right," said the 
 doctor. The more it burns now the quicker 
 it will stop burning." He seemed unduly agi 
 tated and in a great hurry to get on deck into 
 the open air. 
 
 " It s too close for me," he said, " down 
 here." 
 
 I followed him up the ladder. Bessie, 
 holding Lichee by one hand, was waiting 
 for us. 
 
 " Have you given them some medicine, 
 doctor ? " she asked. 
 
 Yes yes," he said hastily, " but I must 
 ask you to make that child scarce. You Ve a 
 case of yellow fever aboard the man Carrol 
 better go into the cabin until we Ve made 
 arrangements for disinfection, and so forth. 
 Excuse me, Mr. Parrish, I must send my boat 
 ashore for a supply of vegetables." 
 
 He gave an order to the men w r ho had rowed 
 him out, and they cast loose and pushed away 
 toward the landing. 
 
 " Now then," said the doctor, " I 11 have 
 another look at Carrol." 
 
 This time I did not accompany him into the 
 galley, but stood idly looking at the distant 
 town, longing to stroll about its shady streets,
 
 PHILLIP EMANUEL ESQUADA 229 
 
 and to eat myself sick with its fresh fruits. 
 Presently I heard what sounded like a groan. 
 I turned, and saw the face of Jili half out of 
 the forecastle hatchway. His chin was turned 
 forward and up; and his eyes were frightfully 
 rolling; a steady humming sound of moaning 
 and groaning seemed to pass him, coming from 
 the forecastle, and spreading into the open air. 
 Jili s thin hands clutched the edge of the 
 hatchway, and he seemed to be making semi 
 conscious efforts to drag himself upon the 
 deck. Then, as I looked, his head rolled 
 further and further back, his hands relaxed 
 their hold, and he fell suddenly out of sight. 
 
 I sprang into the galley to call the doctor. 
 But before I could speak his name I was 
 thrown violently to the floor, beaten about the 
 head, and bound hand and foot, and chucked 
 into a corner. 
 
 Carrol stood over me, smiling. 
 
 "Wonderful man, the doctor," he said. 
 " Cures me, puts the Chinks out of their pain, 
 and now look at him ! " I heard the sounds 
 that accompany sea-sickness, and turning my 
 head saw the little doctor bending over double 
 and convulsed by nausea. 
 
 " Luckily," said Carrol, " he kept his nerve 
 until he d done the trick . . . Brandreth, go
 
 230 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 and batten down the forecastle hatch; the 
 Chinks ought to be quiet enough by now, but 
 you never can tell. Swigot, you and Kelsey 
 take some of these rope ends and make the 
 women fast. As for me . . . my God I eat 
 . . . Jim Jim," he said, " it takes a nerve 
 to starve yourself sick . . . He burst out 
 laughing. " And you thought I had the yellow 
 fever, did you? . . . Buck up there, doctor. 
 You played your part to perfection. I give you 
 a mark of ten, as the boys say." 
 
 All this while he was ransacking the galley 
 for food, and cramming such as he found into 
 his ravenous mouth. 
 
 " And so, Jim," said he, " you would n t take 
 your medicine like a man? You were so 
 damned fond of those yellow friends of yours 
 that I thought you d like to go with them 
 wherever they Ve gone." 
 
 " Was it poison you gave them? " I faltered. 
 
 " Was it poison ! " and he slapped his 
 thighs as if an excellent joke had been passed 
 " and what would we give them soothing 
 syrup? " 
 
 " God," I moaned, and then I am afraid I 
 cried a little, what between horror and fear. 
 For I could not but think that my own end was 
 near at hand. And almost I wished that
 
 PHILLIP EMANUEL ESQUADA 231 
 
 I had drunk of the poison lest a worse fate 
 befall. 
 
 Presently Kelsey poked his head in at the 
 door. 
 
 (< Kelsey, sir," said he, " to report that the 
 ladies has been secured." 
 
 " Ah," said Carrol, " and they sent me their 
 love, I calculate." 
 
 "Well not Bess, sir," said Kelsey. "But 
 little Spanish, she said to say as how she was 
 always all yours." 
 
 Well," said Carrol, " since all s ship 
 shape, I guess we better get up the hook and 
 make sail. Cheer up, doctor there s a million 
 of gold belonging to you on this ship, and that 
 ought to be heavy enough to keep food on your 
 stomach. Jim - he turned at the door, 
 " don t look so silly you 11 be well treated - 
 you 11 even have those ropes taken off when 
 we are out of sight of land." 
 
 An hour later the Shantung was standing 
 once more for open sea. Carrol came into the 
 galley and cut the ropes which bound me. 
 
 " You re wanted on deck," said he. 
 
 "Why?" said I. 
 
 " To help throw the dead overboard," said 
 he. " The forecastle s all cluttered up with 
 them, and so s the cabin."
 
 232 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 "Bessie!" I half asked. 
 
 " Still showing fight," said he. " My God, 
 man, you re not in love with the woman, are 
 you? Because if you are well, damned if 
 I don t begin to feel sorry for you." 
 
 "When are you going to finish with me?" 
 I asked. 
 
 Why, this is my plan," he said in a confi 
 dential tone, " and you 11 agree it s a good 
 one. We re going to lay a course for Rio, 
 and some time between now and landfall 
 we shall expect you to make yourself scarce. 
 That s all. God knows, I ve enough murders 
 on my conscience to last me, and I don t want 
 another. So, Jim, any time you don t like your 
 company you can either get a prescription from 
 the doctor or jump." 
 
 " Thank you," I said. 
 
 " And meanwhile," said he, " you will be 
 free day times to go and come as you like; to 
 eat with us, and to steep your sense of the pic 
 turesque in such bacchanalian scenes as are 
 liable to occur from time to time. Boys will 
 be boys!" said he. "And now let us bury 
 the dead!"
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII 
 
 WAITING 
 
 SINCE I was allowed to come and go as I 
 pleased, I passed the rest of the day with 
 the women and Lichee in the cabin. They were 
 no longer bound, but had been forbidden the 
 deck under pain of death; it being the inten 
 tion, I suppose, to reduce them to quiet sub 
 mission, by this and other bullying methods. 
 And woful as was my own prospective fate, 
 I am happy to think that at this time my 
 thoughts were mostly for them. I was to 
 die, before very long, by my own hand, accord 
 ing to Carrol s calculations; but Bessie and 
 Carmen were to furnish sport, before their 
 necks were wrung for them; and dreadful 
 as that thought must have been to them, yet 
 I think it was more dreadful to me. And I 
 was resolved that when the time came, when 
 the first violence was offered to one or the 
 other, I should choose that moment for my 
 enforced act of suicide. But it should not 
 be a meek and sheepish finale. Man of peace 
 that I was, I was determined to go war-
 
 234 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 likely out of the world, with blood upon my 
 hands. 
 
 " I tell you," said Carmen, " for to kill that 
 man long time ago. You not do it, an now 
 I say I tol you so/ " 
 
 We were fools," I said. 
 
 " An now what become of us woman, I ask ? " 
 
 " Now look here," said Bessie, her face 
 haggard and white with grief, but the lustre 
 and shining quality of her eyes undimmed, 
 " one thing at a time. We re not threatened 
 at the moment, and won t be as long as this 
 wind holds. For God s sake let s have no post 
 mortems, or ante mortems. Let s either get 
 together and think a way out, or let s pass 
 these last hours cheerfully." 
 
 " I think sometimes," said Carmen, " I run 
 out and jump into the water." 
 
 " I think of that, too," said Bessie. " But 
 so long as they don t hurt Lichee I m going 
 to hold on to life as hard as I can no matter 
 what happens. What difference does it make? 
 I m low enough by all human rules ; and I m 
 ready to step lower yes smiling, damn it 
 if only there s an off chance that they 11 sicken 
 of me, and not hurt the boy and put us ashore 
 somewhere." 
 
 " There s no chance they do that," said
 
 WAITING 235 
 
 Carmen, " not me. They let us go, we tell on 
 them pretty quick. They not let that happen." 
 
 " No," said Bessie, " it s just a pipe dream 
 but my little boy ... he can t hurt them 
 ... he can t bear witness against them . . . 
 he could n t, could he, Jim ? " 
 
 "Not legally," I said. "But don t you 
 worry about him, Bessie we re full grown 
 and can stand anything, and must, I dare say; 
 but there must be a white spot in every man; 
 and I believe that Carrol s got a speck of a 
 one. Honestly I think he won t hurt the boy." 
 
 The cabin floor was strongly pitched to port, 
 owing to the deep keeling of the Shantung. 
 Its angle was as a barometer of danger or 
 safety. Let it but keep its pitch indefinitely, 
 and the women were indefinitely safe; for 
 our captors would need every man among them 
 to sail the ship; but let the wind fall, and the 
 cabin floor swing back to the level ; then, I made 
 sure, other matters would at once occupy their 
 minds. But all that afternoon of waiting and 
 thinking out desperate and futile stratagems, 
 the boards maintained their sharp slant, only 
 varying it with the pitch and roll of the ves 
 sel; but toward sundown the general angle 
 began sensibly to diminish, and it was evident 
 that the wind had begun to fall.
 
 236 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 "Wind s falling, Jim," said Bessie. 
 
 " Yes, Bessie," I said. 
 
 " Well " she controlled her voice with 
 some difficulty " dear old Jim, we Ve been 
 good pals. You Ve liked me in spite of the 
 black marks, and I Ve liked you, Gawd knows 
 how much." 
 
 Carmen rose, walked to the cabin port, and 
 stood looking out upon the sea; in a corner, 
 that same occupied by Chang in his coffin, 
 Lichee lay sleeping and curled into a ball. 
 
 Jim," said Bessie, " we Ve all got to die 
 some time and the thing I mind most about 
 what s going to happen to me is oh well 
 that you should be alive to know about it." 
 
 " Bessie," I said, " Bessie dear I m a 
 weakling, God knows but if that s all that s 
 worrying you! The first hand that is laid on 
 you, is the signal I m waiting for. I step out 
 of the world then, Bess but not alone, I 
 hope. Having lived so long without my just 
 share of strength and manliness, it may be that 
 at the last the Lord will make me strong for a 
 minute or two. I have been thinking about 
 it hard all day how best to go at it, and all 
 that and I think that if I m very quick and 
 very sudden, maybe I can get my thumbs into 
 Carrol s eyes and kill him, before the rest can
 
 WAITING 237 
 
 brush me off. Any way that is how I shall try 
 to to enter my final protest that is, unless 
 I can snatch a weapon from one of them." 
 
 "Jim," said she, "would you rather I died 
 fighting or is it really nothing to you one 
 way or the other?" 
 
 " Bessie," I said, and I took her hand in 
 mine, " it s so much to me that almost I think 
 I would. But if your boy is to be let off at 
 last why then, my dear then I think you 
 must n t die." 
 
 She bowed her head gravely. Then caught 
 my hand to her lips and kissed it. 
 
 " Gawd help us all," said she.
 
 CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 SPIRITS OF LAVENDER 
 
 WITH the falling of night there came a dead 
 calm. Lichee still slept in his corner; while 
 Bessie and Carmen and I sat in silence and 
 waited. It grew darker and darker, but still 
 our captors gave no sign. At last, however, 
 we heard steps upon the deck without, and 
 presently the cabin door was thrust sharply 
 ajar, and Carrol, carrying a lanthorn, appeared 
 in the opening. 
 
 "What," said he, "no lights? Tactful but 
 cheerless. Well, my hearties, how goes it? " 
 
 He strode in, and having thrust the lanthorn 
 almost into our white faces, and laughed, he 
 stood it with a clatter upon the table. 
 
 " Now then," said he, " light up and set the 
 table. We ve had a hard day of it, and we re 
 going to have a bangup dinner and pass the 
 time with laughter and song. How s the ship 
 fixed for drinkables?" 
 
 " There s water," said Bessie, " and whiskey 
 and red wine Spanish Red " 
 
 " Spanish Red ! " exclaimed Carrol, smacking 
 his lips. "Where is it?"
 
 SPIRITS OF LAVENDER 239 
 
 "In the wine locker," said Bessie, "under 
 the lower berth in the port storeroom. 
 In there," and she nodded in the direction 
 of the closed door. " Here s the key." She 
 imslung it from her neck and held it out to 
 him. 
 
 You know where the stuff is," said Carrol, 
 " I appoint you cup-bearer. Put out a dozen 
 bottles." 
 
 Bessie flung the key on the floor. 
 
 " Now, my dearest dear," said Carrol, " don t 
 be a fool." 
 
 Carmen leaned over suddenly and picked up 
 the key. 
 
 " I get him," she said. 
 
 That s right ! " said Carrol heartily, 
 " there s a sensible girl. She knows which 
 side her bread s buttered," and he turned on 
 his heel and strolled out. 
 
 Bessie turned coldly to Carmen. 
 
 " After all your hotstuff talk about what 
 you d do to Carrol you re a pretty weak 
 sister, I must say." 
 
 But Carmen smiled almost laughed. And 
 she bent down and whispered so that both 
 Bessie and I could hear. 
 
 " There is one chance," she said, " only 
 laugh an be gay, an set that table."
 
 240 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 " A chance ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 " Better I not say a thing," said Carmen. 
 "But look I smile almos I am happy; I 
 ask you, if you hopes for paradise, you set 
 thata table an leave my little plan all 
 to me." 
 
 " Bessie," said I, " this is a straw ; but 
 what s good enough for one drowning per 
 son ought to be good enough for another. 
 Let s set the table." 
 
 :< That is fine," said Carmen, " that is fine." 
 And she unlocked the storeroom door, and 
 went in, shutting it after her. Presently we 
 heard her striking a match. 
 
 Half an hour later the table was set, the 
 cabin lamps shone brightly upon the white 
 cloth, and there came Swigot and the doctor, 
 the latter looking much the worse for wear, 
 bearing smoking dishes from the galley. Car 
 rol came in next, and last of all Brandreth and 
 Kelsey. The latter had wet and slicked down 
 his spare hairs for the occasion and Brandreth 
 had gone so far as to shave his beard. 
 
 Carrol seated himself at the head of the 
 table, forcing Bessie to sit at -his right hand. 
 Lichee, his eyes heavy witn sleep, came next 
 to his mother; then Kelsey, Brandreth, my-
 
 241 
 
 self, the doctor and Swigot. The place at 
 Carrol s left was for Carmen, but she did not 
 at once take it. 
 
 " I am waiter," she said, " I pass them 
 dishes, and pass that wine." 
 
 One by one we served ourselves from a 
 tureen of bean soup that Carmen, laughing 
 noisily, handed the rounds of the table. Then, 
 stepping to a kind of sideboard that had been 
 rigged, she took from it a bottle of wine, 
 wrapped in a napkin and went once more the 
 round of the table filling the men s glasses. 
 
 " Good girl," said Carrol, " good girl. And 
 now my happy family here s luck! " 
 
 He tossed off his glass of wine at one gulp 
 and held it out to Carmen to be refilled. 
 Warmed by the generous liquor, he laughed 
 aloud, and catching Carmen playfully round 
 the waist drew her on to his knee ; she giggled, 
 resisted, but went to him willingly enough, 
 as it seemed. 
 
 " That wine smells funny to me," said the 
 little doctor. 
 
 " Were you speaking to me," I said coldly. 
 " I did n t taste it." 
 
 " Nor I," said he, " it s gone bad." 
 
 Swigot rose suddenly from his place. 
 
 " I feel kind er giddy," he said. " It s the
 
 242 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 smell of the lamps." He went out into the 
 fresh air. 
 
 " Funny," said Kelsey, " / feel sort of giddy 
 I ve got a gripe in me stummick." 
 
 From her perch on Carrol s knee Carmen 
 smiled toward the speaker. 
 
 "Maybe," she said, " you take one two 
 drop Spirit of Lavender, you feel better. You 
 not remember? You have little bottle label 
 Spirit of Lavender? 
 
 Kelsey rose to his feet with a sharp cry of 
 terror and anguish. 
 
 What s the matter," cried Carrol sharply. 
 
 " The matter ! " cried Kelsey. " My God 
 my God the slut has poisoned us, and we 
 are all dead men." 
 
 "Is that true?" cried Carrol in an awful 
 voice. He rose, unsteadily, casting Carmen 
 violently from him. 
 
 " True," she said, " it is as true as Roy 
 Cunningham look down from heaven know 
 you have drunk, an you an you, an now 
 your dam soul go howling into hell." 
 
 Carrol caught up the empty bottle of wine 
 by the neck and, swinging it over his shoulder, 
 hurled it with frightful velocity into the wo 
 man s face. She dropped with a sound of 
 shattered glass and
 
 SPIRITS OF LAVENDER 243 
 
 " Go first," he shouted, and the next second 
 I had felled him with the chair upon which I 
 had been sitting, and snatching a blunt knife 
 from the table forced it somehow through his 
 right eye into his brain. 
 
 Then I rose, still howling like a wild beast 
 with fury and horror; but there was no need 
 of any further effort. Kelsey and Brandreth 
 were in convulsions on the floor; Swigot had 
 not come back, and was undoubtedly suffering 
 his last throes, like a poisoned rat, in some 
 corner of the ship. The doctor alone, who 
 had not touched the wine, sat stiffly in his 
 place. He was blue with fear. Bessie, hold 
 ing Lichee by the hand, had backed against 
 the wall. Carmen had not moved. 
 
 Gradually the horrid sounds that came from 
 my throat ceased ; and I ran to Bessie, sobbing 
 aloud, as a child runs to its nurse. 
 
 "Buck up, Jim!" she said, "buck up! 
 We re not out of the woods yet. Never mind 
 there. You look out for Lichee, and I 11 
 clean the slate." 
 
 She darted around the table and caught the 
 little doctor by the shoulders, and dragged him 
 from his chair. 
 
 " Now my little bomb," she cried, " you ve 
 burst once on this ship and done quite some
 
 244 YELLOW MEN AND GOLD 
 
 damage, but you 11 never burst again. Over 
 board you go ! " and she began to force him 
 toward the cabin door. They disappeared, 
 struggling violently, the strong deep-chested 
 woman, and the weak spindle-shanked man. 
 One wild cry rang in my ears. 
 
 A moment later Bessie, breathing hard, 
 stood once more beside me. 
 
 "Jim," she said, "it s all over now, and 
 unless you and Lichee and I play each other 
 false why all s well. The money s ours 
 now and there ought to be bright days 
 coming to us all. Lichee, you monkey, you 
 be fine, rich Melican man some day. And Jim 
 -Jim-" 
 
 Here Bessie broke down and sobbed, and I, 
 catching her in my arms, had at that moment 
 no memory of any other woman. 
 
 THE END
 
 A 000816435 2