The Ragged Edge, Harold MacGrath [great books of all time txt] 📗

over this phenomenon, he continued his patrol.

"Hey, you!"

Ah Cum stopped and turned. Framed in one of the square ports of the packet was a face which reminded Ah Cum of a Japanese theatrical mask. One side of the face was white with foamy lather and the other ruddy-cheeked and blue-jawed.

"Speak English?" boomed the voice.

"Yes; I speak English."

"Fine! I'll be wanting a guide. Where can I get one?" asked O'Higgins.

"I am one."

"All right. I'll be with you in a jiffy." Quarter of an hour later O'Higgins stepped off the gangplank. He carried a small bag. "This your regular business?"

"For the present. Will you be wanting me alone?" asked Ah Cum. "I generally take a party."

"What'll it cost to have you all to myself for the day?"

Ah Cum named the sum. He smiled inwardly. Here was one of those Americans who would make him breathless before sundown. The booming voice and the energetic movements spoke plainly of hurry.

"You're on," said O'Higgins. "Now, lead me to a hotel where I can get breakfast. Wait a moment. I've got an address here."

O'Higgins emptied an inside pocket-and purposely let the battered photograph fall to the ground. He pretended to be unaware of the mishap. Politely Ah Cum stooped and recovered the photograph. He rose slowly and extended it. An ancient smile lay on his lips.

"You dropped this, sir."

"Oh. Thanks." O'Higgins, bitten with disappointment, returned the photograph to his pocket. "Victoria; that's the hotel."

"That's but a short distance from here, sir."

"O'Higgins is the name."

"Mr. O'Higgins. Let me take the satchel, sir."

"It's light. I'll tote it myself. Say, ever see any one resembling that photograph I dropped?"

"So many come and go," said Ah Cum, shrugging. "Few stay more than a day. And there are other guides."

"Uh-huh. Well, let's beat it to the hotel. I'm hungry."

"This way, sir."

"What's your name?"

Ah Cum got out his black-bordered card and offered it.

"Aw Come. That sounds kind of funny," said O'Higgins. Smiling, the Chinaman gave the correct pronunciation. "I see. Ah Coom. What's the idea of the black border?"

"My father recently died, sir."

"But that style isn't Oriental."

"I was educated in America."

"Where?"

"At Yale."

"Well, well! This part of the world is jammed full of surprises. I met a Hindu a few weeks ago who was a Harvard man."

"Will you be taking a pole-chair?"

"If that's the racket. I naturally want to do it up in proper style."

"Very well, sir. I'll be outside the hotel at nine-thirty."

Ten minutes' walk brought them to the hotel. As O'Higgins signed the hotel register, his keen glance took in the latest signatures.

"Anywhere," he said in answer to the manager's query. "I'm not particular about rooms. Where's the dining room? And, say, can I have some eggs? This jam-tea breakfast gets my goat."

"Come this way, Mr. O'Higgins," said the manager, amusedly.

O'Higgins followed him into the dining room. That register would be easy to get at; comforting thought. It did not matter in the least what name the young fellow was travelling under; all James Boyle O'Higgins wanted was the letter H. There was something fatalistic about the letter H. The individual twist was always there, even in the cleverest forgeries.

The eggs were all right, but nobody in this part of the world had the least conception of what the coffee bean was for. Always as black and bitter as gall. Coffee à la Turque wasn't so bad; but a guy couldn't soak his breakfast toast in it.

Two women entered and sat down at the adjoining table. After a while one began to talk.

"The manager says there is still some doubt. The change will come to-day. Ah Cum had no business taking him into the city last night. The young man did not know what he was doing or where he was."

O'Higgins extracted a cigar from a pocket and inspected it. Henry Clay, thirteen cents in Hong-Kong and two-bits in that dear old New York. He would never be able to figure out that: all these miles from Cuba, and you could get a perfecto for thirteen cents. He heard the woman talking again.

"I feel guilty, going away and leaving that ignorant child; but our days have been so planned that we dare not change the schedule. Didn't understand me when I said she would be compromised! He won't be able to leave his bed under four weeks; and she said she hadn't much money. If she had once known him, if he were some former neighbour, it would be comprehensible. But an individual she never laid eyes on day before yesterday! And the minute he gets up, he'll head for the public bar. There's something queer about that young man; but we'll never be able to find out what it is. I don't believe his name is Taber."

O'Higgins tore free the scarlet band of his perfecto, the end of which he bit off with strong white teeth, and smiled. You certainly had to hand it to these Chinks. Picked up the photograph, looked at it, handed it back, and never batted an eye! The act was as clear as daylight, but the motive was as profoundly mysterious as the race itself. He hadn't patrolled old Pell Street as a plain clothes man without getting a glimmer of the ancient truth that East is East and West is West. He would have some sport with Mr. Ah Cum before the day was over, slyly baiting him. But what had young Spurlock done for Ah Cum in the space of twenty-four hours that had engaged Ah Cum's loyalty, not only engaged it but put it on guard? For O'Higgins, receiving light from the next table, had no doubt regarding the identity of the subject of this old maid's observations.

A queer game this: he could not move directly as in an ordinary case of man-hunt. He had certain orders from which on no account was he to deviate. But this made the chase all the more exciting. What was the matter with Spurlock that was to keep him in bed three or four weeks? He would dig that out of the hotel manager. Anyhow, there was some pleasurable satisfaction in knowing where the quarry would be for the next three weeks.

There was now a girl in the picture, so it seemed. Well, this was the side of the world where things like that happened. The boy would naturally attract the women, if the women were at all romantic. Good looks, with a melancholy cast, always drew sentimental females. Probably some woman on the loose; they were as thick as flies over here-dizzy blondes. That is, if Spurlock had been throwing money about, which was more than likely.

"As long as I live, I'll never forget that dress of hers," Prudence declared.

"Out of a family album, you said," Angelina reminded her sister.

O'Higgins struck a match and lit his Henry Clay, thereby drawing upon himself the mutual disapproval of the spinsters.

"Beg pardon," he said, "but isn't smoking allowed in the dining room?"

"It probably is," answered Prudence, "but that in no wise mitigates the odiousness of the procedure."

"Plumb in the eye!" said O'Higgins, rising. "I'll tote the odiousness outside."

He was delighted to find the office deserted. He inspected the formidable array of rifles and at length walked over to the register. Howard Taber. From his wallet he brought forth a yellow letter. Quickly he compared the Hs. They were so nearly alike that the difference would be due to a shaky hand. But for perfect satisfaction, he must take a peek into the bedroom. Humph. A crisis of some kind was toward. It might be that the boy had taken one drink too many, or someone had given him knock-out drops. The Oriental waterfronts were rank with the stuff.

But that Chink, Ah Cum! O'Higgins chuckled as he passed into the hall and rested his hand on the newel-post of the staircase. He'd have some fun with that Chinaman before the morning was out.

O'Higgins mounted the stairs, his step extraordinarily light for one so heavy. In the upper hall he paused to listen. There was absolute quiet. Boldly he turned the knob of a certain door and entered. The mock astonishment of his face immediately became genuine.

The brilliant sunshine poured through the window, effecting an oblong block of mote-swimming light. In the midst of this light stood a young woman. To O'Higgins-for all his sordid business he was not insensible to beauty-to O'Higgins she appeared to have entered the room with the light. Above her head was an aura of white fire. The sunshine broke across each shoulder, one lance striking the yellow face of a Chinaman, queueless and dressed in European clothes, the other lance falling squarely upon the face of the man he had journeyed thirteen thousand miles to find. He recognized the face instantly.

There came to O'Higgins the discouraging knowledge that upon the heels of a wonderful chase-blindman's buff in the dark-would come a stretch of dull inaction. He would have to sit down here in Canton and wait, perhaps for weeks. Certainly he could not move now other than to announce the fact that he had found his man.

"I beg pardon," he said. "Got the rooms mixed."

The young woman laid a finger on her lips, cautioning O'Higgins to silence. The detective backed out slowly and closed the door without sound.

Outside in the hall he paused and thoughtfully stroked his smooth blue chin. As he understood it, folks saw in two or three days all there was to see of Canton. After the sights he would have to twiddle his thumbs until the joints cracked. All at once he saw a way out of the threatening doldrums. Some trustworthy Chinaman to watch, for a small bribe, while he, James Boyle O'Higgins, enjoyed himself in Hong-Kong, seeing the spring races, the boxing matches, and hobnobbing with Yankee sailors. Canton was something like a blind alley; unless you were native, you couldn't get anywhere except by returning to Hong-Kong and starting afresh.

Satisfied that he had solved his difficulty, he proceeded to his room. At nine-thirty he climbed into the chair and signified to Ah Cum that he was ready.

"You speak English better than I do," said O'Higgins, as the coolies jogged across the bridge toward the gate. "Where did you pick it up?"

"I believe I told you; at Yale."

O'Higgins laughed. "I'd forgotten. But that explains everything."

"Everything." It was not uttered interrogatively; rather as though Ah Cum did not like the significance of the word and was turning it over and about in speculation.

"Ye-ah," said O'Higgins, jovially. "Why you pretended not to recognize the photograph of the young fellow you toted around these diggings all day yesterday."

Many wrinkles appeared at the corners of Ah Cum's slant eyes-as if the sun hurt-but the rest of his face remained as passive as a graven Buddha's.


CHAPTER X


Ah Cum was himself puzzled. Why hadn't he admitted that he recognized the photograph? What instinct had impelled him swiftly to assume his Oriental mask?

"Why?" asked O'Higgins. "What's the particular dope?"

"If I told you, you would laugh," answered Ah Cum, gravely.

"No; I don't think I'd laugh. You never saw him before yesterday. Why should you want to shield him?"

"I really