The Apple of Discord

"Perhaps the hackman has a pistol," said Mr. Baldwin coolly. "I may be able to get a loan."

The hackman proved to be supplied with a fire-arm and he surrendered it cheerfully to Mr. Baldwin.

"Oh, the place has a bad name, but I've been through it for tin year and niver fired a shot," said he, laughing at the apprehension of the two innocent strangers he supposed us to be. And we crossed the street and opened the door of the shop that made the entrance to Big Sam's lodgings.

Four or five Chinese lounged about the place and one took my name to Big Sam. The others watched us furtively, and one made some comment upon us that caused his companions to give us a quick look and grim smile.

The action was not lost on Mr. Baldwin.

"Our friend's body-guard do not seem to anticipate the same ending to the affair that you do, Mr. Hampden," said he, with a shrug of the shoulder.

"I do not suppose they are in his confidence in the matter," said I. Then as the messenger returned with word that I was to "come up," I continued: "Keep near the door in yonder corner where you can not be taken from behind. If anything happens, get to the police station as soon as you can. I shall probably be back inside of ten minutes."

Mr. Baldwin bowed as his reply to this injunction, and spoke affably to the shopman who had paused from the swift reckoning of his accounts on an abacus, and was watching us furtively with the innocent pretense of casting up sums in his mind.

I mounted the rough stairs and in another minute was ushered into Big Sam's office.

The softer lights of the night that came from the gas-jets brought out the richness of the apartment far more effectively than the coarse light of day. The carvings and painted ornaments showed to more advantage, and the colors were softened into harmony with the western eye. In spite of the preoccupation of my errand, I could not repress an exclamation of pleasure at the sight.

Big Sam sat at his desk as he had sat when I left him in the morning, and looked at me with bland impassiveness.

"Good evening, Mr. Hampden," he said politely. "Can I serve you again?"

"No," I said, a little taken aback at this greeting. "It is on your business I have come."

"And your companion down-stairs?" he said, looking at me out of half-closed oriental eyes.

"He may be of service in case–"

Big Sam raised his hand to check my speech and spoke in Chinese. At his words there was the soft sound of the closing of a door somewhere behind the screens.

"A prudent precaution," he said. "You have found a place for the girl?"

"Yes," I replied. "I must say I do not fully approve of what I am going to do. But it is not on account of your ward. Nothing could be better for her than what I have to offer."

Then I explained with some detail the plans that had been approved by Miss Kendrick. He listened with studious attention.

"Miss Kendrick is too kind," said Big Sam diplomatically. "She is young, I believe?"

I bowed.

"And Miss Fillmore also?"

I bowed again.

"And you do not approve?"

"I do not."

"I see your reasons. Perhaps you are right. Do you wish to abandon the girl to her fate?"

"Oh, not at all. But with more time–"

"There is no more time."

"Not to-morrow?"

"The tongs are even now in session. I have word that before morning there will be a demand for the girl, and if she is not surrendered there will be the reward of blood."

"You are more powerful than they," said I, remembering the scene of the morning.

"I have passed the limits of my power," said Big Sam placidly. "What is it you say of Russia? 'Despotism tempered by assassination?' Well, I am but little of a despot, and the assassin has so much the better opportunity."

"And by to-morrow you would give her up?" I asked.

"To be frank with you, I would give her up to-night, Mr. Hampden, if it would purchase peace and safety."

I looked sharply at Big Sam, but the oriental mask gave back the record of nothing but bland and child-like simplicity.

"Then why not?" I asked.

"There is but one girl. There are two tongs," said Big Sam.

"That makes a difficulty," I admitted. "Yet only one tong owns the girl."

"I fear I could not explain to you the attitude and customs of the tongs in this matter," said Big Sam with a smile. "One tong demands the delivery of the girl, or five thousand dollars. That is the one you would perhaps call the owner of the girl. The other demands the girl, or twenty-five hundred dollars."

"Seventy-five hundred dollars for a girl–that is a little expensive."

"I believe some of your countrymen have paid more. Though the bargain has not been made in so simple a fashion."

Big Sam allowed himself to smile.

"I don't see how we are to help you then," I said. "But if you think it will put the tongs in better humor to have the girl in our custody, we are at your service."

"This evening," said Big Sam, "I saw three dogs quarreling over a bone. A fourth dog much larger came by and snatched it. The three dogs ceased to quarrel and started in chase of the fourth."

"A cheerful augury," I said. "I wish no quarrel with assassins, and least of all would I wish to bring them upon Mr. Kendrick's household."

"The fourth dog," continued Big Sam, "was larger–much larger–than the three put together. They ceased the chase before it was fairly begun, and joined in mourning their loss."

"You put me in doubt," said I. "I must not bring danger to others."

"I can guarantee their safety, Mr. Hampden," said Big Sam. "Your police have impressed it thoroughly on the minds of our people that the white race is not to be meddled with by any but white men."

I hesitated, still fearful of the dangers that might follow the custody of the girl.

"There is then no resource but to turn the girl into the street," said Big Sam decisively. "I can not risk my plans merely to secure her safety."

"Nor your life," I retorted.

"Oh, a man will die when he dies. Life, death, riches, poverty–they are man's fate. But my plans–they are much to me and my people."

Big Sam then pulled a cord that swung behind him. The door opened and the Chinese girl, frightened and tearful, was pushed in.

"The decision is for you, Mr. Hampden," he said.

I looked upon her and thought what the decision meant to her.

"Does she go with you, or with the tongs?" he asked.

"I have decided. I will take her," I said with sudden resolution.

"On the conditions I mentioned this morning?"

"It is late to bargain," said I.

"On the contrary," he said, "it is necessary. It is only with these conditions of compromise that I can hope to make my peace with the tongs."

"You have my promise," I said, rising.

"One moment," said Big Sam. "I believe you are a brave man, Mr. Hampden."

"I really don't know," I replied.

"At least you do not mind hearing a few revolver shots?"

"Not at all."

"They will serve to amuse some of our friends who are on the watch."

The implied information that we were spied upon by sentinels of the tongs startled me for a moment, though I might have known that they would not neglect so obvious a precaution.

"If you and your friend wouldn't mind breaking a window and smashing something and firing a shot or two yourselves and making a good deal of noise before you carry off the girl, it would oblige me."

"Why should we attract so much attention? Is it not better to slip out quietly?"

"Do you think to avoid the eyes that are watching?" said Big Sain. "The bold course is the best. We make sound as of a fight. The watchers of the two tongs will each believe that the other has made an attack. They will hasten to the meeting places to summon help. For a minute the road will be clear. Then you must run for it."

This was more of an enterprise than I had bargained for, and if I had had time to think I should have got out of Big Sam's net and left him to carry out his plans through some other agency. But I did not stop to reflect and acted at the urging of the wily Oriental.

"Take the girl," he said, and spoke to her in brief command. "My men will assist you to disturb things down-stairs."

I picked my way down the steps, and the soft clack of the Chinese shoe sounded behind me as the girl followed. Big Sam accompanied me to the lower floor, and, after making sure that our hack was where we had left it, he gave orders to his men. I hastily explained the situation to Mr. Baldwin.

"Ah–a comedy performance," he said with affected carelessness. But I could see that he cursed himself for a fool for being drawn into the affair.

"Draw your revolver, but don't fire more than one shot," I said.

Big Sam gave a shout, and in an instant the place was filled with a medley of voices raised in tones of anger and alarm. A table was overturned, boxes were flung about, cries of men rose, a dozen revolver shots followed in quick succession, a woman's scream pierced the air, and there was an excellent imitation of a highbinder affray on a small scale. I fired one shot into the breast of a mandarin, whose painted outlines ornamented a chest, and providently reserved the rest of my bullets for possible need. Then two of the Chinese lifted a heavy box and flung it at the closed doors. There was a crash of wood, a jingle of breaking glass, and the door fell outward.

"Well, I should judge it was time to go," said Mr. Baldwin.

"Come on," I said, seizing the Chinese girl. And we started on the run for the hack as the lights were extinguished.

We had just reached it when two or three more shots were fired and a bullet sang uncomfortably close to my head.

"In there, quick!" I said to Mr. Baldwin, as I lifted the girl to her seat "This place is getting too hot for us."

"Aren't you coming in?" he asked, with a trace of anxiety in his tone.

"No. I'll ride with the driver." I slammed the door and was climbing to the box when two breathless Chinese ran to the side of the hack and wrenched open the door with angry exclamations. There was a howl as one of them staggered back from a blow from Mr. Baldwin's revolver. I gave the other a kick alongside the head that sent him in a heap on his fellow.

It was all done in a second.

"Now!" I said to the driver; and with a cut at his horses we dashed away as cries and shouts and sounds of police whistles began to rise behind us.

As we lurched around the corner of Sacramento Street, I could see three policemen turning into Waverly Place from Clay Street and hurrying to the scene of disturbance. A crowd of shouting Chinese had already gathered about the entrance to Big Sam's store, and a man was waving his arm and pointing after us, while half a dozen Chinese had started on the run in pursuit. Then, the corner turned, the sight was shut out, and we went down the street on the flying gallop.

We slackened speed as we neared Kearny Street, for a policeman stood on the corner. If the sounds of battle had reached him he must certainly have suspected and stopped us. But if he heard anything of the uproar we had raised he had doubtless placed it to the credit of the leather-lunged orator and his clamorous hearers who held forth but a block away. He scarce looked at us, and we swung into Kearny Street on a swift trot, and were soon in the quiet precincts of the shopping district.

The hackman had been silent, heeding only my directions; but now he said:

"I don't know what you've been a-doin', an' it's none of my business. But I'll want pay for this night's work."

"Make yourself easy," I replied. "We've done nothing against the law."

"Oh, it's not the law I'm botherin' about. There's little law for a Chaynese; an' it's not me that would be hollerin' murther if you've sent a dozen of 'em to sup with the divil to-night. But you might have damaged the hack, an' ye'll pay for that."

I promised him a liberal reward, and we rolled rapidly out Sutter Street to Van Ness Avenue, and in a few minutes more had drawn up before Wharton Kendrick's house.

"I am afraid," said Mr. Baldwin as I opened the door to the hack, "that our charge is hurt. She has been groaning for a while, and now I think she has fainted."

My nerves had served me without flinching through the dangers of the escape. But at the apprehension that all our efforts had been in vain, and that death, not we, had been the rescuer, I fell a-trembling.

"I hope not," I cried. "Perhaps she is only scared. Let us carry her into the house."

As I put my hand to the girl, however, my fears received a fresh provocation, for the back of her dress was wet with the sticky wetness of coagulating blood. We lifted her between us, and carried her up the steps. We had scarce reached the upper landing when the door was flung open, and Miss Kendrick peered out.

"Have you brought her?" she cried.

"She is here," I replied, "but–"

"Oh, what is the matter?" interrupted Miss Kendrick in a voice of alarm, as she saw that we carried a senseless burden.

"She is hurt," I explained as we laid our charge down upon a hall seat. "There was a row over her, and she got one of the bullets that was meant for us."

Miss Kendrick grew white, and I looked to see her follow the Chinese girl by falling in a faint. But her small figure straightened as though in rebound from a physical shock, and in a moment she was directing servants to carry the girl to the room that had been prepared for her, ordering hot water, hot blankets, lint and bandages, and sending me on the run for the nearest doctor.

CHAPTER VII

IN THE CURRENT

The Chinese girl's wound proved a desperate matter, and for days she hung between life and death, dependent for the flickering vital spark upon the ceaseless ministrations of her self-appointed nurses. Mercy Fillmore was brought to the house by Mr. Baldwin at an early hour of the morning that followed the rescue, and took her place as naturally and unostentatiously as though she had always been one of the family.

"She's a thousand times lovelier than I had expected," confessed Laura Kendrick, "and when you see her you're to be very nice to her. I'm sure you owe her that much, after making her all this trouble."

I promised to use all gentleness and courtesy toward Miss Fillmore, but the full significance of my debt to the young lady did not appear to me till later. Eventually I found that by some inexplicable freak of logic I was supposed to be chiefly in fault for the Chinese girl's wound. I had bungled the enterprise, it seemed; otherwise she must have been brought safely off. The sense of my delinquency was finally stirred within me by overhearing the comment of two indignant servants, which ran something like this:

"Those two big men without ever a scratch on them, and that poor heathen creature bleeding to death between 'em–that's what I call a shame."

Below stairs, it thus appeared that I shared equally with Mr. Baldwin in the discredit of the outcome. In my lady's chamber it was different. I learned that in those sacred realms I had all the blame for my very own. Mr. Baldwin appeared to be regarded, like the gallant army of Bazaine or Mack, as merely the unfortunate victim of an incompetent leader. Nothing of this judgment came to me directly. But it was conveyed delicately, imperceptibly, intangibly, through the days when the girl's life hung in suspense, mingled with an unspoken assurance that as I didn't appear to know any better I should ultimately be forgiven.

All this was galling enough, but it was nothing compared to the afflictions I suffered from the sight of Mr. Baldwin's airs. He was possessed of a cold and haughty nature, but the situation roused in him something approaching an enthusiasm. For my sorrow he was endowed with an odious gift of competency, and no false modesty restrained him from exhibiting it to the fullest measure. Whenever I offered to perform a service, I found that he had already performed it, or was then engaged upon it, or was just about to perform it, until I was consumed with regret that the highbinder bullet had not found its billet with Mr. Baldwin, instead of with the Chinese girl.

I should not go so far as to assert that any one of the self-sufficiency of Mr. Baldwin would be at a loss for an excuse for following his own inclinations; yet it struck me that he carried the pretense of devotion to the interests of the Chinese girl to an extent altogether indecorous. The prosperity of the firm of Hunter, Fessenden and Baldwin had never before appealed to my fears or my sympathies, but I was at this period distressed to observe that its law business appeared to be at a low ebb. Either that, or the junior partner was grossly neglecting his duties. Whatever time of day or night I called at the Kendrick house to seek news of the Chinese girl, and incidentally to enjoy the society of the ladies, I was sure to find Mr. Baldwin there, or to learn that he had just gone or was presently expected, until I grew to resent the sound of his name. Furthermore, his air of proprietorship in Laura Kendrick and her affairs, which had disturbed me on our first meeting, appeared to grow more marked. If Miss Kendrick, her uncle, and all things beneath the roof had been turned over to him in fee simple, the sense of ownership could not have been shown more clearly in his manner. And, worst of all, I could not see that his attitude roused resentment in any breast but my own. Miss Kendrick smiled on him, called him by his first name, and discussed the theory and practice of surgery with him in a manner most confidential.

At this day I can confess with freedom that my dislike of Mr. Baldwin found its root in the fertile soil of jealousy and envy. At the time, however, I stoutly maintained to myself that I hated him for his faults alone. In the light of later experience, I am willing to concede that men are not hated for their faults, or even for their virtues. Had Mr. Baldwin been an angel of light, instead of a cold and supercilious young attorney who was receiving an undeserved amount of favor, I should have disliked him none the less heartily.

Mr. Baldwin returned my dislike with acridity. Whenever possible, he affected to have forgotten me, had to be assisted to my name when compelled to speak to me; and when he did decide to remember me, was so patronizing in his condescensions that I longed to throw him through the window.

Miss Kendrick was not long in discovering this suppressed hostility; and at first alarmed by it, she presently found it a source of amusement. Then she appeared to derive a certain pleasure in blowing the smoldering coals into a blaze; for she would, with the most innocent air imaginable, bring forward topics of discussion that served to range us in hostile argument. As we held opposite views on almost every question of politics, law, sociology, and the arts, she had usually more difficulty to close the argument than to inspire it. Yet she handled the situation with a skill that would have been the admiration of a diplomat, and had a tact in diversion that enabled us both to retire from the heat of battle in good order with the conviction that we had each won a substantial victory.

In the anxious days through which the Chinese girl's life hung by a thread, I learned that Laura Kendrick's characterization of Mercy Fillmore was no example of feminine exaggeration. Miss Fillmore proved to be a young woman of about twenty-five, a little above the average height, a little fuller in outline than was demanded by the rules of proportion, a little slow in her movements. Her face was round, and though lacking in color gave a distinct impression of prettiness. But her chief characteristic was a certain calm sweetness in expression and manner, a certain gentle tact that made her presence as soothing as a strain of sweet music. It was on the evening following the rescue that Miss Kendrick introduced us.

"I am glad to meet you," she said in a voice that was low and melodious. "I am glad to find a man who is not afraid to do the right thing because somebody is going to laugh at him."

Miss Fillmore gave me her hand, and I found that her touch had the same soothing quality that was manifest in her voice and presence.

I professed myself gratified at her approval, and murmured that any one would have done the same in the circumstances.

"No, indeed," said Miss Fillmore earnestly. "It isn't every one who would have followed Mr. Baldwin to that den and risked his life to rescue a poor Chinese slave girl."

Mr. Baldwin's part in the affair had evidently lost nothing in Mr. Baldwin's telling of it, and Miss Fillmore's imagination had filled out the blanks in his narrative in a way to make him the promoter of the enterprise.

He was quick to see the peril of his situation, and said stiffly:

"Oh, if there's any credit to the affair, it belongs to Mr. Hampden alone. He discovered the distressed damsel, and is entitled to all the rewards."

Laura Kendrick gave him a pleased look and a gracious nod, which afflicted me with a pang of unwarranted resentment.

"I claim all the credit myself," she said, with a little air of importance. "I seem to remember two rather reluctant knights who were anything but pleased to be sent out to storm the ogre's castle at the call of beauty in distress."

"It was well done, whoever was responsible for it," said Miss Fillmore gently. "It is a noble thing to have rescued Moon Ying."

"Moon Ying!" cried Mr. Baldwin. "Is that the creature's name?"

"I never thought to ask it," I said.

"So like a man!" sighed Miss Kendrick.

"I want you to tell me," said Mercy Fillmore, "how you came to find Moon Ying, and be interested in her. How long have you known her?"

"She's a very recent acquaintance. I first saw her yesterday morning." And then I gave in detail the story of my visit to Chinatown, and the adventures that came of it.

"And that is all you know about her?" asked Miss Fillmore, in a voice that imported disappointment. "I had hoped that you knew more. She is so much above the type of Chinese girls that we meet at the Mission that she has interested me particularly."

"Big Sam gave me the idea that except for her beauty, which I understand to be of a sort highly considered among her countrymen, she is not above the girls you find at the Mission."

"Well, then, it's only another romance spoiled," said Miss Fillmore.

"Oh, you needn't despair. Big Sam appeared to be dealing frankly with me, but that proves nothing. Big Sam is an accomplished diplomat and would tell any story that suited his purpose, and tell it so neatly that you couldn't distinguish it from the truth. For all I know, she may be the daughter of the Empress of China."

"Nothing so interesting, I fear," said Miss Fillmore, with a sober shake of the head.

"Well, then, let's make believe. She shall be a princess of the blood royal, and shall have a story suited to her dignity."

Miss Fillmore smiled dubiously, as though she were not quite certain whether I was in jest or earnest.

"It isn't necessary," she said, her practical mind refusing to descend to frivolity. "Whatever her origin, we must see that she has a better fate than the one that threatens her."

"Yes, so far as it can be done within the conditions laid down by Big Sam."

Miss Fillmore's forehead drew into a knot of lines in which could be read a mingling of disapproval and anxiety.

"I have been thinking," she said, with an apologetic reproach in her voice, "that you didn't do quite right to make those conditions. Can't they be–" she was going to say "evaded" but after a moment's debate with a feminine conscience changed it to "modified."

"I'm afraid I didn't make myself clear," I said. "Those were the only conditions on which the girl could have the opportunity to escape. Unless Big Sam can arrange better terms with the tongs, we have no choice but to live up to them."

Miss Fillmore was silent at this, and I wondered whether I had not, on my side, given too strong an emphasis to the reminder that we were discussing a question of good faith.

"Well," said Miss Kendrick with decision, "we'll leave all that till Moon Ying is quite well, and then I'll see Big Sam and the highbinders myself, if Mr. Hampden can't get them to listen to decency and reason."

"Good heavens!" cried Mr. Baldwin, with chilling protest in his tone. "You surely can't mean to do anything of that sort. You don't suppose that those creatures are open to reason and decency, do you?"