CHAPTER II

Communication between certain individuals in China and their relatives

and friends in Chinatown must, for political and other reasons, be

conducted in a secret way. In Shanghai, Moore had made the

acquaintance, under somewhat mysterious auspices, of Ching Gow Ong, an

important figure in the silk traffic.

Moore, so it was said by those who were in a position to know, had once

performed a favor for Ching Gow Ong, of which no one seemed to know the

particulars. What was of equal importance, perhaps, was that Ching Gow

Ong would have willingly given Moore any gift within his power had

Moore been so inclined.

But it appears that Moore was not a seeker after wealth, thereby giving

some real basis to the common belief that he possessed that rare

thing--a virginal spirit of adventure. He cemented this queer

friendship by conveying messages, indited in Chinese script, which he

did not read, between Ching Gow Ong and his brother, Lo Ong, officially

dead, who conducted a vile-smelling haunt in the bowels of Chinatown.

Peter Moore made his way through the narrowing alleys, proceeded

through a maze of blank walls, down a damp stone stairway, and rapped

upon a black iron door. It opened instantly, and a long clawlike hand

reached forth, accepted the yellow envelope from the operator's hand,

and slowly, silently withdrew, the door closing as quickly and as

quietly as it had opened.

No words were spoken. His errand done, Peter Moore retraced his steps

to the wider and brighter lanes which comprised the Chinatown known to

tourists.

He walked slowly, with his head inclined a little to one side, which

was a habit he had acquired from the eternal listening into the hard

rubber receivers. He had proceeded in this fashion a number of steps

up one of the narrow, sloping sidewalks when he felt, rather than

perceived, a pair of eyes fastened upon him from a second-story window.

They were the eyes of a young Chinese woman, but he sensed immediately

that she was not of the river type. Her fine black hair was arranged

in a gorgeous coiffure. Gold ornaments drooped from her ears, and her

complexion was liberally sanded with rice powder. Her painted lips

wore an expression of malignity.

In the obliquity of the eyes lurked a solemn warning. Then he became

aware that she seemed to be struggling, as if she were impeding the

movements of some one behind her.

It is safe to say that in his tramps through the winding alleys of

Canton, of Peking, of Shanghai, Peter Moore had encountered many

Chinese women of her type. There was a sharp vividness to her features

which meant the inbreeding of high caste. She was unusual--startling!

She looked into the street furtively, held up a heavily jeweled

hand--an imperial order for him to stop--and withdrew. He lounged into

the doorway of an ivory shop and waited.

It was quiet in Chinatown, for the time was noon and the section was

pursuing its midday habit of calm. The padding figures were becoming a

trifle obscure, owing to a cold, pale fog that was drifting up from the

bay. In a moment the woman reappeared, examined the street again with

hostile eyes, held up a square of rice paper, and slowly folded it.

Peter Moore nodded slightly and smiled. It was a habit with him--that

smile. The sensitiveness of his nervous system found a quick outlet,

when he was nervous or excited, by a disingenuous smile. He proceeded

to the shop directly underneath her window, observing it to be Ah Sih

King's gold shop. The window was rich in glittering splendors from the

Orient. He picked up from the sidewalk a crumpled ball of red paper

and stowed it away in his coat pocket.

To an alert observer the indifference with which Moore turned and

pretended to study the gold ornaments in Ah Sih King's window might

have seemed a trifle too obvious, and the smile on his lips, one might

go on to say, was uncalled for.

As he waited, a soft thud sounded at his feet, coincident with a flash

of black and white across his shoulder. He covered the object with one

foot, as the oily, leering face of Ah Sih King appeared in the doorway.

The blanched face surmounted a costly mandarin robe, righteously worn,

a gorgeous blue raiment with traceries of fine gold and exquisite gems.

At this moment he seemed to exhale an air of faint suspicion.

"Gentleman!" accosted the thin, curled lips in a tone that was

well-nigh personal.

"Buy nothing," Peter Moore said curtly.

"You see my--my see you," observed Ah Sih King, reverting, as he deemed

fitting, to pidgin.

The wireless operator turned his back impolitely; Ah Sih King did

likewise. When he turned again, sharply, the oily smile was gone, a

look of concern having crept into his sly, old face, and the slightly

bent shoulders of the much slier young man were several strides distant.

A faint hiss, as of warning, issued from the carmine lips of the

Chinese woman. Then the window closed noiselessly, and Chinatown,

having paid not the slightest heed to the incident, pattered about its

multifarious businesses, none the wiser.

There was an indefinable something in this incident which caused

creases to appear across Moore's brow. Why had two notes been thrown?

The puzzle sifted down to this possibility: Some one behind the Chinese

woman had thrown a ball of red paper, a note, into the street.

Then she had beckoned him to wait, had written a second note, perhaps

to warn him away. He glanced furtively at the second note, saw that it

was written in Chinese, and thereupon decided in return for many favors

to call upon Lo Ong for a translation.

Chinatown now was slowly vanishing from view, swallowed by the gray

blanket of fog which rolled in from the Pacific through the mouth of

the harbor. Retracing his steps through the mist, Moore descended the

narrow stone stairway and tapped on the oblong of iron with his heavy

seal ring. A shutter clinked, uneasy eyes scrutinized him, and he

heard the bolt slide back. He opened the door and entered, restoring

the bolt to its place.

The room was low, deep and dark under the flickering light of a single

dong, which hung from the ceiling at the end of a roped-up cluster of

fine brass chains. The rich, stupefying odor of opium tainted the

heavy air. The orange flame, motionless as if it were carved from

solid metal, showed the room to be bare except for a few grass mats

scattered about in the irregular round shadow under it.

To one of these mats Lo Ong, gaunt, curious, even hostile, retreated,

squatting with his delicately thin hands folded over his abdomen. A

look of recognition disturbed only for the instant the placidity of the

ochre features.

"No come buy?" he intoned, as if Peter Moore had never passed under

that piercing gaze before.

"My never come buy," said the wireless man curtly. "Wanchee you come

help; savvy?"

"Mebbe can do," asserted Lo Ong, in the voice and manner of one

incessantly pursued by favor-seekers. Lo Ong's draped arm, as if it

were detached from his body and governed by some extraneous mechanism,

indicated a mat. Moore slipped down in the familiar cross-legged

attitude, lighted a cigarette and blew the smoke at the belly on the

dong.

"You Wanchee cumshaw?" demanded the Chinese, uneasily.

Peter Moore disdained to reply, extracted the two lumps of paper, slid

one under his knee and unfolded the other, while Lo Ong looked

unfavorably beyond him at the door. Three rows of Chinese markings

were scrawled down it. Lo Ong's body commenced to sway back and forth

in impatient rhythm.

"Lo Ong," stated Moore, "my wanchee you keep mouth shut--allatime

shut--you savvy?"

"Can do," murmured Lo Ong indifferently. He reached for the rice

paper, lifting it tenderly in long, clawing fingers, and held it to the

flame. He seemed not to believe what he read, for he twisted the paper

over, looked at it upside down, then sat down again, his lean fingers

convulsing.

"No can do," he muttered, replacing the paper on his visitor's knee.

"Mino savvy."

The white forefinger of the wireless operator pointed unwaveringly at

the flattened nose. "Read that," he ordered.

Lo Ong glanced the other way, as if the subject had ceased to interest

him, and tapped the floor with his knuckles.

"Wanchee money--cumshaw?"

"Lo Ong," declared Moore, losing his patience, "you b'long dead. Now

savvy?"

"Mebbe can do," said Lo Ong faintly.

Moore ran his fingers down the first row of fresh markings.

"O-o-ey," commented Lo Ong, shifting uneasily, "'My see you allatime,

long ago on ship.' Savvy?"

"What's next?"

"'You no see my. My see you allatime.'"

The long, sloping shoulders seemed to jerk. "Keep away. Savvy?"

"It says that?"

"Take look see," invited Lo Ong, poking his claw nervously down the

column. "'Keep away. Keep away.' One--two times. Savvy?"

Peter Moore nodded thoughtfully.

The Chinese, officially dead, replaced the sheet gingerly on his knees,

as if it were an instrument of wickedness. His bony fingers twitched a

moment.

"High lady," he added nervously; "velly high lady. You stay away.

Huh?"

"Wait a minute." Peter extracted the other paper ball, unfolding it

near the orange flame. The inner surface was red, the earthly red of

porphyry, and cracked and scarred by the crumpling. Nearly obliterated

by the lacework of wrinkles and scratches was a scrawl, evidently

scarred into the glazed surface by a knife-point. The upper part was

unintelligible. On the lower surface he made out with difficulty the

single word, _Vandalia_. He carried it to the door, slid back the

shutter and let the dim, gray light filter upon it. The other words

were too mutilated to be read.

"Hi!"

He returned to Lo Ong's jacketed side. The bony finger was circling

excitedly about a smear of black in the lower corner of the rice paper.

"What's this?"

"Len Yang. _Len Yang_! Savvy?"

"O-ho! And who is Len Yang?"

Lo Ong shook his head in agitation. "Len Yang--city. Savvy?

Shanghai--Len Yang--fort' day."

"Fourteen days from Shanghai to Len Yang?"

"No. No! _No_! Fort'."

"Forty?"

"O-o-ey." The flattened nose bobbed up and down. "Keep away--ai?"

"Maskee," Peter replied, meaning, broadly speaking, none of your

business.

Lo Ong unbolted the door, to hint that the interview was concluded.

"You keep away--ai?" he repeated anxiously. Moore grinned in his

peculiarly disingenuous way, swung open the black door, and a long,

gray arm of the fog groped its way past Lo Ong's countenance.