The Apple of Discord

"Crude indeed!" said Big Sam with energy. "And will destroy itself by its own violence. I have here a paper showing the sentiment of your people in the Eastern States. It makes a protest against the policy that would exclude us."

"I shan't begrudge you the pleasure you can get out of that sort of comment. But I can assure you that race feeling will prevail."

"Over private interest? I believe not. And the private interest of your governing classes is with the free admission of my people. But enough of that. Where is your charge–and mine–Moon Ying?"

He threw this question at me as though he hoped to surprise some admission.

"She is still with Miss Kendrick."

"What arrangements have you made to protect her?"

"Protect her? From what? Are the highbinders so desperate as to think of attacking Mr. Kendrick's house? I trust you will warn them that this would be something far more serious than all Kearney's oratory. It would mean the destruction of Chinatown."

"I understand you," said Big Sam suavely. "I have no doubt that an attack by the tongs on Mr. Kendrick's house would bring a terrible reprisal. Fortunately there are few among my people who do not understand that quite as well as you."

"Nevertheless there is something you fear," I said, as Big Sam hesitated.

"You must understand, Mr. Hampden, that this girl is a very desirable piece of property. There is her money value, which is considerable. And there is the further consideration that the possession of her would give a tong a certain power and distinction. The contest has come to be a point of honor–or perhaps you would say dishonor. At all events the tongs have not ceased to plan to recover her, and I have information that the Hop Sing Tong has devised a plan to seize her by force. It would, of course, be suicide for them to carry out the plan themselves. But what they can not do themselves can be done by white men. Your race is not more scrupulous than mine, Mr. Hampden. I have reason to believe that the Hop Sing Tong has found a gang of white men who are ready, for a money consideration, to break into Mr. Kendrick's house and carry off the girl."

This warning struck me with the force of a physical blow. It was scarcely possible that Big Sam could be mistaken, and I must reckon on the attack as an imminent danger. And in swift imagination I could hear the screams of Laura Kendrick and Mercy Fillmore joining those of Moon Ying, as they struggled in the grasp of ruffians, and could see the crackling flames as the raiders left destruction behind them.

"I have had reason to-night to surmise that something was afoot," I said, "but I did not suspect this." And then I retailed to Big Sam the story of the visit of the old Chinaman, the attack of the three raiders of the early morning, and the questioning of the mysterious tramp.

"The old man is Chung Toy, sometimes known to your people as 'Little John.' He was, you will remember, the custodian of the girl. He is now in the employ of the Hop Sings. The white men I can suppose were spies, sent to reconnoiter, though I am puzzled about the morning raiders."

"Does your information go so far as to suggest when the attack will be made?"

"No."

"And have you any word of advice?"

"Advice? Yes. I should advise that you return the girl to my custody. I confess that she would be an embarrassment–"

"You will not be put in any such awkward position," I interrupted. "I can speak for Miss Kendrick, and say that she will keep the girl till the conditions are fulfilled."

"Then," said Big Sam composedly, "I leave to your best judgment the way to meet the danger." And with a bow that signified the end of the interview, he clapped his hands, and a young Chinaman appeared to conduct me down the stairs. And as I passed the sullen guards, and heard the door bolted and barred behind me, I admired the diplomacy with which Big Sam had washed his hands of his responsibilities, and left them to me.

CHAPTER XVIII

LITTLE JOHN AS A MAN OF ACTION

Big Sam's warning was enough to drive me once more to the Kendrick house to make certain that all was secure. I could suppose, from his words, that he did not expect an immediate attack, yet it was by no means unlikely that Little John's ruffians would take advantage of the disorders of the night to make their attack. But all was quiet in the neighborhood, and Andrews reported nothing more threatening than a few disorderly hoodlums who had gone shouting past an hour or two before.

I confided to Andrews the warning of an intended attack, and directed him to engage six men instead of the two I had previously ordered.

"I think I can find the right sort," he said. "There's some boys I used to know up in Nevada when we were holding down some claims against big odds. Six of 'em would chew up a hundred of these cigarette-smoking hoods." And he told with keen enjoyment of the adventurous days of the claim-jumpers, when a man's life and property depended on his strength and courage and sureness of aim.

I paced the watch with him till the stars began to pale before the coming day, and then gladly sought home and bed. My sleep was troubled with vague, indefinable dreams of coming danger, and it was late when I rose with the presentiment that a crisis was approaching.

It was a Sunday morning, yet the apprehensions roused by my dreams found abundant reinforcement when I was once more astir. The echoes from the Nob Hill meeting were still to be heard in the city, rousing apprehension among the orderly. The newspapers treated it as the sensation of the day, yet, from their comments, I saw that they had no conception of the real designs that lay behind the activity of the anti-coolie agitators. Clark reported to me that the Council of Nine had been in session till long after midnight, and that the anti-coolie clubs had been ordered to hold daily drills. One of the two spies who were detailed to keep watch on Peter Bolton came at noon with the report that Bolton had reached his office before seven o'clock in the morning, where he had received a visit from Waldorf, Parks and Reddick, the three most active members of the Council. As they left Bolton's office, Reddick had been heard to say, "Before the week ends, we shall be masters of the city." And as a final fillip to anxiety, I found at my office a tangle-worded letter, which I recognized as the product of Kwan Luey's pen, that recalled the warnings I had received from Big Sam.

With this accumulation of mental disturbance, I took my way at last to the Kendrick house, to lay the tale of impending dangers before my client, and to give hint to the young ladies of the need for caution.

On my arrival, I found the house in confusion. There was sound of excited voices within, and, as I touched the bell, a servant rushed out and down the steps without taking time to close the door. I entered without ceremony, and a moment later met Laura Kendrick coming down the stairs, her face clouded with fear and indignation.

"Oh, I'm so glad you've come!" she said with a gasp of relief, and the look of fear faded out of her eyes. "We've been scared out of a year's growth, and it's one of the mercies of Providence that we haven't lost Moon Ying. It's not often I've wanted to be a policeman, but I did to-day."

"Well, I'll be your policeman, if you'll only tell me what it's all about."

"It's a comfort to have you say so, but I'm afraid you're too late. He must be ever so far away by this time."

"Who is it? What has happened?" I demanded eagerly.

"Somebody tried to steal Moon Ying–that's what has happened," said Laura Kendrick indignantly.

"Who did it? When? Did they attack the house?" I cried, startled at the promptness with which my warnings had been fulfilled.

"Come right up-stairs," said Laura, impulsively seizing my arm and leading me. "You shall hear at first-hand for yourself."

This sudden captivity gave me so pleasant a thrill that for a moment I forgot Moon Ying and my responsibilities, and betrayed such inclination to loiter that I was sharply ordered to "walk faster." So in a minute or two I found myself entering a room where Moon Ying, with pale and frightened face, leaned back among the pillows that covered a reclining chair, and Mercy Fillmore, at Moon Ying's side, looked at us with anxious eyes.

"This is Mr. Hampden, Moon Ying–the man who rescued you from Chinatown," said Laura. "Tell him what happened to you."

Moon Ying's resources of English were scant at best, and between fright, excitement and shyness, it took much prompting and explanation from Laura and Mercy before her story was fairly begun. But when all the tangled threads were straightened out the tale ran thus:

Moon Ying had of late spent an hour or two in the middle of the day, taking the air and the sun, on the lawn behind the house. An hour before she had been assisted to her sunny corner by Mercy, who had, after a time, returned to the house. Suddenly the back gate had opened, and a Chinaman had slipped in.

"How many?" I demanded.

"One–jus' one," replied Moon Ying.

"How him look?"

"Him small man–old man–all same Chung Toy you one time see," said Moon Ying in her plaintive voice.

The picture of Little John with his wizened face, his white, horse-hair mustache and his scant chin-whiskers, rose before me.

"Did he come alone?" I asked, incredulous of his boldness in venturing thus by himself.

"Him say two men come 'longside him, but I no see. Him talk velly soft–say I come Chinatown, him makee me velly nice dless–get velly fine house–find me velly good husband. I tell him go 'way, I too muchee sabby him. One time I thlink him good man–now I heap sabby him tell big lie–no got nice dless–no got fine house–no got good husband–I all time stlay Miss Kenlick. Him get velly mad–him say velly bad thling. Then him say I no go alongside him, two men come takee me so–" and Moon Ying raised her pretty little hands and gripped fiercely at the air, with the motion of one throttling a victim.

"What you do then?"

"I cly velly loud–likee so–" and Moon Ying let out a feminine screech that caused Laura and Mercy to cover their ears. "Then Chung Toy catchee me, so–," and she seized her arm roughly,–"put hand so–," and she covered her mouth with her palm. "I cly one time again. Miss Kenlick come. Miss Muh See come. One man come. Chung Toy him lun away."

"Did you see him?" I asked of Laura.

"Indeed I did; and I could have caught him, too, if I hadn't been such a goose as to be scared into a graven image. But by the time I came to life he was out of the gate. But it was the same man who was here last evening; and if he had any one with him. they took precious good care not to show themselves. He went in such a hurry that he left behind him a peddler's basket. It had a few silk handkerchiefs in it. I suppose he was going to make them an excuse, if he had been stopped on coming in."

"Where were my men? There should have been two of them on hand to stop such fellows. I must look into this." And the spirit of judgment rose stern within me.

"Well," said Laura, "there was one of your men here, and the other was sick, so you needn't look so cross. This one was at the front of the house, and he ran around to the back at Moon Ying's scream. When he got there that awful creature was out of the yard, so I got him to help us carry Moon Ying into the house. Then he went out the back gate, but by that time there was no heathen in sight anywhere. But I've sent one of the servants for the police and the doctor, and I want your miserable Chung Toy put in jail where he'll be out of mischief." And she gave her head a determined nod, as though his fate were settled beyond recall.

"I'll have a warrant out before night," I said, with anger tingling in my nerves, "and he'll be laid by the heels in the City Prison if he dares show himself on the street."

"I don't think jail is a very good place, even for bad people," said Mercy, "for it makes them worse; but I shall feel easier if that man is locked up. It is too dangerous to have him at large."

"I suppose you don't need any instructions," I said, "but I'll venture to suggest that Moon Ying had better take the air from an up-stairs window for a few days."

"I hope we have sense enough to know that much," returned Laura soberly, "though I don't blame you for thinking we haven't. I shan't dare let her out of doors unless there's a regiment of soldiers about the house."

"I'll have a few more men here to-morrow; but you'd better keep her in till I give the word that all is safe."

Laura Kendrick looked sharply at me.

"You needn't try to hide it," she said. "I see in your face that there's something more you're afraid of, and you'd better tell it now rather than later."

"I wasn't intending to conceal it. In fact, I was going to warn you against letting strange white men into the house. I've had a warning that leads me to believe that the fellow who was here asking questions yesterday is one of a gang hired by the highbinders to recover Moon Ying. They are much more dangerous than Little John, but if we don't give them a chance they won't hurt us."

Moon Ying had followed our conversation with eager attention; and though many of the words were beyond her understanding, she had caught the meaning of what we said.

"Too bad–too velly bad," she said, with sudden resolution evident in her face. "Bad man come, makee you 'flaid, maybe shoot. I go 'way, bad man no come."

"Indeed you shan't go away," cried Laura. "There's no place on earth you could be safe, even if we did let you go."

"I go Big Sam. Him velly big man. No bad man catch-em me in Big Sam's house. No bad man catch-em you when me-gone."

At these words, Laura impulsively flung her arms about Moon Ying.

"You dear creature!" she cried. "Nobody shall hurt you here–and nobody will hurt us, either. My uncle can protect you much better than Big Sam, and Big Sam himself has said so."

Moon Ying tried to express more fully her fear that her presence brought danger to the household, but her language was unequal to her thought, and Laura and Mercy both talked at once to assure her that they feared nothing, and would refuse to give her up, even though all the tongs of Chinatown should come in force to demand her; so Moon Ying at last with a sigh of grateful content said:

"I likee stay–I likee you." And Laura on one side, and Mercy on the other, twined their arms about her with a laugh that was almost a sob.

It was a pretty picture of the sisterhood of Occident and Orient, and I admired it, with something of the feminine emotions raising a lump in my throat, when I was observed by the lady of the house.

"Go away," she said. "This is no place for men." And in spite of my remonstrance that I was in perfect harmony with my surroundings, I was driven forth, and went down-stairs to find Wharton Kendrick taking a Sunday afternoon nap in his den.

He gave me a sleepy greeting, but roused himself to attention at my account of the Nob Hill meeting, the midnight session of the Council of Nine, the morning meeting in Bolton's office, and the warning from Big Sam.

"Hm-m! Well, put on enough watchmen to see that we don't wake up to find our throats cut," he said. "I dare say P. Bolton is egging them on all around to do something for their money. But so far as the business goes, I think I've got everything shipshape and ready for storm. The syndicate is strong enough to protect the market, and the police can handle the Cheap John revolution, and I don't believe anybody is going to attack the house; so there's nothing to worry about. But you'd better keep in touch with your anarchist friends a little closer than you've been doing. If we can get warning over night of any particular deviltry they are going to start, it might be worth a hundred thousand dollars. Hallo! what's this?" he cried as a servant brought him a card. "Show him in." And before I could escape, General Wilson bustled through the door, his ruddy face aglow in the frame of his bristling yellow-gray side-whiskers, and his short stout frame radiating energy at every step.

"Why, God bless my soul! Kendrick–Hampden–I find you with your heads together like a pair of conspirators in the theater. Hope I don't interrupt. It does me good, Hampden, to see you youngsters pulling along in double harness with the war-horses like Kendrick and me; and you can't find a better one to pull with than Kendrick; he's the salt of the earth."

I professed myself glad to see the general, and Wharton Kendrick greeted him jovially.

"I don't believe in doing business on Sunday," said General Wilson. "In fact, I lost a million-dollar trade with Jim Fisk once, because I wouldn't sign the contract on the Sabbath, and on Monday Jim was chasing after something else. But I thought you'd like to know that I got a telegram from my people about that swamp-land deal. Here it is, and you see they'll come up to that eight hundred thousand dollar offer. That's the limit, and it won't last long at that. I don't like to boast, Kendrick, but I'll tell you that there isn't another man on the footstool that could have got 'em up to that point–I'm the only one that could do it; and, by George, I'm astonished at my own success, the way things are looking in the East with those confounded railroad strikes and rumors of riot. Now, I want you to understand that I'm not asking you to take up with the offer to-day, for of course you remember the Sabbath just as I do. But you can have a good chance to think it over. You know well enough that you're going to take the offer, so I'll warn you that I'll drop around in the morning and get your acceptance."

"Hold on, hold on, Wilson. You're running as wild as a mustang colt. I'm not so sure about this thing. I've got to have more time to consider it. I said I'd let you have the land for eight hundred and fifty thousand, but I believe I'm a fool to let it go for any such figure. However, I'll let it stand for a couple of days. I've got some affairs booked for to-morrow that will take all my time. But if you'll come in on Tuesday with your eight hundred and fifty thousand you can have the land. After that it'll cost you more."

"Kendrick, I'll wait another day for you, if I have to telegraph that I've broken a leg. Business, sir, is, next to war, man's most important pursuit; but even business must give way to the call of friendship. You'll see me coming into your office on Tuesday morning, Kendrick, like a conquering hero, ready to receive your sword–or your pen, which is mightier yet–but at eight hundred thousand, mind you."

"Come, come, Wilson, you're getting ahead of your horses," said Kendrick with a laugh. "I'm thinking of getting up a company to reclaim those lands, and if I conclude to do it, I won't sell for double the money."

"Talk as long as you like, Kendrick; but I've got a sixth sense that tells me when a bargain's made, and it never fails me. I can tell, nine times out of ten, when the other fellow has concluded to take my figures before he knows it himself, and that gift has saved me a pretty penny more than once. Why, when the Ohio Midland was enlarging its Chicago terminal, there was one piece we had to have–but the story's too long to tell. However, I made a hundred thousand dollars the best of the bargain by knowing what the other fellow was going to do before he knew it himself."

Wharton Kendrick gave a hearty laugh at General Wilson's diplomacy.

"Well, I shall take warning by that and hold out for my hundred thousand–or, I should say, fifty thousand, as I've given you a price."

"You're getting your extra hundred thousand with the price I'm offering you," said the general testily, "and I know well enough you'll not be fool enough to refuse it, especially after such a row as you had on Nob Hill last night. I hope my New York clients don't hear of it, or everything will be off. I was there, sir, and of all the howling mobs I ever saw, this beat anything since the draft riots. Why, sir, that blatant beast, Kearney, shouted arson and manslaughter, and another fellow called for the overturn of society, and if it hadn't been for the police, I believe they would have worked up the crowd to the point of blood-letting." Then General Wilson went at such length into the proper methods of handling mobs that I seized upon a favorable moment to slip out the door.

As I left the boom-boom of General Wilson's voice behind me, I caught sight of Mercy Fillmore's perplexed and anxious face.

"Oh, I thought you had gone," she said, "but I'm glad you haven't, for I want to thank you for your thoughtful note of last night. And now Mr. Parks has sent me word that he is too busy to come up this afternoon, and I was wondering how I could get a few lines to him. I am so afraid he is planning something very reckless–something that will get him into trouble. If I did not fear that he would be angry, I should go down and speak to him myself."

"If that is all that's worrying you, I'll see that he gets your letter–that is, if you can give me any idea where he is to be found."

"He wrote that he should be detained all the afternoon at Mr. Blasius' place, with some very important committee meetings." The idea of Mercy's seeking Parks in the House of Blazes struck me as slightly amusing, but I forebore to enlighten her as to the social position of H. Blasius, and she continued: "Now if you know where that is, you might send one of your men down there with this note." And she handed me an envelope addressed to "Mr. Gerald Parks." "You are sure it is not asking too much of you? I hope you are enough interested in him to wish to keep him from trouble."

I assured her that I was glad to be of service, and she thanked me with a dash of color in her pale face.

CHAPTER XIX

MISCHIEF AFOOT

My first thought in accepting Mercy Fillmore's commission had been to intrust her letter to one of my men. But once outside the house, it dawned upon me that I held in my hand a provident excuse to seek the conspirators in their lair. The hint by which Parks had roused such enviable anxiety corroborated the information I had received from my spy service. The campaign of action was evidently at hand, and I might possibly learn from a personal visit what I could not learn through others–provided I could pass unchallenged through the doors of the House of Blazes. The letter I held was a card of admission certain to be honored, if Parks were there. For the rest, chance must serve to expose or to conceal the plans that were keeping the agitators' committees in prolonged session.

H. Blasius received me with reserve born of suspicion, and his bleary eyes searched my face coldly at my name and my demand for Parks.

"Meestaire Park? Why do you want him?" he inquired at last.

"I have a very important message for him," I replied.

"Gif to me ze message," said Blasius. "When Meestaire Park he come, he shall have it."

"I couldn't give it to you," I said. "I am to deliver it into his hands only. And I can tell you that he will be very angry if there's any delay about it."

H. Blasius' pasty face took on an expression of dismay at the thought of an angry Parks, and with a grumbling of French interjections that suggested the cracking of his ill-regulated internal machinery, he waddled to a doorway at the end of the bar, and disappeared up a box stairway.

I looked around the saloon at the dozen or more men who lounged about in varying degrees of alcoholic stupefaction, and had just noted a group of men half concealed at a table at the farther end of the L of the room, when a rapid step descended the stairs, and Parks appeared.

"Hampden!" he cried, shaking my hand. "What can I do for you? It is a surprise to see you here."

"If I need an apology for intruding, here is a good one." And I held out Mercy's letter.

Parks seized it with a start of emotion as he recognized the handwriting, looked about with apparent thought of the profanation of reading Mercy's words in that place, and then giving me a nod to follow him, strode to a secluded table and opened the letter. His face lost something of its aggressive resolution as he read and re-read the pages.

"Hampden," he said in a softened voice, "did you ever realize that the sympathies of women are individual and concrete? The welfare of the masses is but a shadow to them, except as they see it through some one they know and care for. Here my petty personal welfare is put before the interests of the whole people!" And he laid a monitory finger on the letter. "I am asked to give up an enterprise of the greatest moment lest I shall get my head cracked or be thrown into prison."