Outside the bar where the Whangpoo empties into the Yang-tse lay the
thousand-ton yacht _Wanderer II_, out of New York. She was a sea whippet,
and prior to the war her bowsprit had nosed into all the famed harbours of
the seven seas. For nearly three years she had been in the auxiliary fleet
of the United States Navy. She was still in war paint, owner's choice, but
all naval markings had been obliterated. Her deck was flush. The house,
pierced by the main companionway, was divided into three sections--a small
lounging room, a wireless room, and the captain's cabin, over which stood
the bridge and chart house. The single funnel rose between the captain's
cabin and the wireless room, and had the rakish tilt of the racer.
_Wanderer II_ could upon occasion hit it up round twenty-one knots, for
all her fifteen years. There was plenty of deck room fore and aft.
The crew's quarters were up in the forepeak. A passage-way divided the
cook's galley and the dry stores, then came the dining salon. The main
salon, with a fine library, came next. The port side of this salon was
cut off into the owner's cabin. The main companionway dropped into the
salon, a passage each side giving into the guest cabins. But rarely these
days were there any guests on _Wanderer II_.
The rain slashed her deck, drummed on the boat canvas, and blurred the
ports. The deck house shed webby sheets of water, now to port, now to
starboard. The ladder was down, and a reflector over the platform
advertised the fact that either the owner had gone into Shanghai or was
expecting a visitor.
All about were rocking lights, yellow and green and red, from warships,
tramps, passenger ships, freighters, barges, junks. The water was streaked
with shaking lances of colour.
In the salon, under a reading lamp, sat a man whose iron-gray hair was
patched with cowlicks. Combs and brushes produced no results, so the owner
had had it clipped to a short pompadour. It was the skull of a fighting
man, for all that frontally it was marked by a high intellectuality. This
sort of head generally gives the possessor yachts like _Wanderer II_,
tremendous bank accounts; the type that will always possess these things,
despite the howl of the proletariat.
The face was sunburned. There was some loose flesh under the jaws. The
nose was thick and pudgy, wide in the nostrils, like a lion's. The
predatory are not invariably hawk-nosed. The eyes were blue--in repose, a
warm blue--and there were feathery wrinkles at the corners which suggested
that the toll-taker could laugh occasionally. The lips were straight and
thin, the chin square--stubborn rather than relentless. A lonely man who
was rarely lonesome.
His body was big. One has to be keen physically as well as mentally to
make a real success of anything. His score might have tallied sixty. He
was at the peak of life, but hanging there, you might say. To-morrow
Anthony Cleigh might begin the quick downward journey.
He had made his money in mines, rails, ships; and now he was spending it
prodigally. Prodigally, yes, but with caution and foresight. There was
always a ready market for what he bought. If he paid a hundred thousand
for a Rembrandt, rest assured he knew where he could dispose of it for the
same amount. Cleigh was a collector by instinct. With him it was no fad;
it was a passion, sometimes absurd. This artistic love of rare and
beautiful creations was innate, not acquired. Dealers had long since
learned their lesson, and no more sought to impose upon him.
He was not always scrupulous. In the dollar war he had been sternly
honest, harshly just. In pursuit of objects of art he argued with his
conscience that he was not injuring the future of widows and orphans when
he bought some purloined masterpiece. Without being in the least aware of
it, he was now the victim, not the master, of the passion. He would have
purchased Raphael's Adoration of the Magi had some rogue been able to
steal it from the Vatican.
Hanging from the ceiling and almost touching the floor, forward between
the entrance to the dining salon and the owner's cabin, was a rug eight
and a half by six. It was the first object that struck your eye as you
came down the companionway. It was an animal rug, a museum piece; rubies
and sapphires and emeralds and topaz melted into wool. It was under glass
to fend off the sea damp. Fit to hang beside the Ardebil Carpet.
You never saw the rug except in this salon. Cleigh dared not hang it in
his gallery at home in New York for the particular reason that the British
Government, urged by the Viceroy of India, had been hunting high and low
for the rug since 1911, when it had been the rightful property of a
certain influential maharaja whose _Ai, ai!_ had reverberated from Hind to
Albion over the loss. Thus it will not be difficult to understand why
Cleigh was lonely rather than lonesome.
Queer lot. To be a true collector is to be as the opium eater: you keep
getting in deeper and deeper, careless that the way back closes. After a
while you cannot feel any kick in the stuff you find in the open marts, so
you step outside the pale, where they sell the unadulterated. That's the
true, dyed-in-the-wool collector. He no longer acquires a Vandyke merely
to show to his friends; that he possesses it for his own delectation is
enough. He becomes brother to Gaspard, miser; and like Gaspard he cannot
be fooled by spurious gold.
Over the top of the rug was a curtain of waxed sailcloth that could be
dropped by the pull of a cord, and it was generally dropped whenever
Cleigh made port.
It was vaguely known that Cleigh possessed the maharaja's treasure.
Millionaire collectors, agents, and famous salesroom auctioneers had heard
indirectly; but they kept the information to themselves--not from any
kindly spirit, however. Never a one of them but hoped some day he might
lay hands upon the rug and dispose of it to some other madman. A rug
valued at seventy thousand dollars was worth a high adventure. Cleigh,
however, with cynical humour courted the danger.
There is a race of hardy dare-devils--super-thieves--of which the world
hears little and knows little. These adventurers have actually robbed the
Louvre, the Vatican, the Pitti Gallery, the palaces of kings and sultans.
It was not so long ago that La Gioconda--Mona Lisa--was stolen from the
Louvre. Cleigh had come from New York, thousands of miles, for the express
purpose of meeting one of these amazing rogues--a rogue who, had he found
a rich wallet on the pavements, would have moved heaven and earth to find
the owner, but who would have stolen the Pope's throne had it been left
about carelessly.
It is rather difficult to analyze the moral status of such a man, or that
of the man ready to deal with him.
Cleigh lowered his book and assumed a listening attitude. Above the patter
of the rain he heard the putt-putt of a motor launch. He laid the book on
the table and reached for a black cigar, which he lit and began to puff
quickly. Louder grew the panting of the motor. It stopped abruptly. Cleigh
heard a call or two, then the creaking of the ladder. Two minutes later a
man limped into the salon. He tossed his sou'wester to the floor and
followed it with the smelly oilskin.
"Hello, Cleigh! Devil of a night!"
"Have a peg?" asked Cleigh.
"Never touch the stuff."
"That's so; I had forgotten."
Cleigh never looked upon this man's face without recalling del Sarto's
John the Baptist--supposing John had reached forty by the way of reckless
passions. The extraordinary beauty was still there, but as though behind a
blurred pane of glass.
"Well?" said Cleigh, trying to keep the eagerness out of his voice.
"There's the devil to pay--all in a half hour."
"You haven't got it?" Cleigh blazed out.
"Morrissy--one of the squarest chaps in the world--ran amuck the last
minute. Tried to double-cross me, and in the rough-and-tumble that
followed he was more or less banged up. We hurried him to a hospital,
where he lies unconscious."
"But the beads!"
"Either he dropped them in the gutter, or they repose on the floor of a
Chinese shop in Woosung Road. I'll be there bright and early--never you
fear. Don't know what got into Morrissy. Of course I'll look him up in the
morning."
"Thousands of miles--to hear a yarn like this!"
"Cleigh, we've done business for nearly twenty years. You can't point out
an instance where I ever broke my word."
"I know," grumbled Cleigh. "But I've gone to all this trouble, getting a
crew and all that. And now you tell me you've let the beads slip through
your fingers!"
"Pshaw! You'd have put the yacht into commission if you'd never heard from
me. You were crazy to get to sea again. Any trouble picking up the crew?"
"No. But only four of the old crew--Captain Newton, of course, and Chief
Engineer Svenson, Donaldson, and Morley. Still, it's the best crew I ever
had: young fellows off warships and transports, looking for comfortable
berths and a little adventure that won't entail hunting periscopes."
"Plenty of coal?"
"Trust me for that. Four hundred tons in Manila, and I shan't need more
than a bucketful."
"Who drew the plans for this yacht?" asked Cunningham, with a roving
glance.
"I did."
"Humph! Why didn't you leave the job to someone who knew how? It's a
series of labyrinths on this deck."
"I wanted a big main salon, even if I had to sacrifice some of the rest of
the space. Besides, it keeps the crew out of sight."
"And I should say out of touch, too."
"I'm quite satisfied," replied Cleigh, grumpily.
"Cleigh, I'm through." Cunningham spread his hands.
"What are you through with?"
"Through with this game. I'm going in for a little sport. This string of
beads was the wind-up. But don't worry. They'll be on board here
to-morrow. You brought the gold?"
"Yes."
The visitor paused in front of the rug. He sighed audibly.
"Scheherazade's twinkling little feet! Lord, but that rug is a wonder!
Cleigh, I've been offered eighty thousand for it."
"What's that?" Cleigh barked, half out of his chair.
"Eighty thousand by Eisenfeldt. I don't know what crazy fool he's dealing
for, but he offers me eighty thousand."
Cleigh got up and pressed a wall button. Presently a man stepped into the
salon from the starboard passage. He was lank, with a lean, wind-bitten
face and a hard blue eye.
"Dodge," announced Cleigh, smiling, "this is Mr. Cunningham. I want you to
remember him."
Dodge agreed with a curt nod.
"If ever you see him in this cabin when I'm absent, you know what to do."
"Yes, sir," replied Dodge, with a wintry smile.
Cunningham laughed.
"So you carry a Texas gunman round with you now? After all, why not? You
never can tell. But don't worry, Cleigh. If ever I make up my mind to
accept Eisenfeldt's offer, I'll lift the yacht first."
Cleigh laughed amusedly.
"How would you go about to steal a yacht like this?"
"That's telling. Now I've got to get back to town. My advice for you is to
come in to-morrow and put up at the Astor, where I can get in touch with
you easily."
"Agreed. That's all, Dodge."
The Texan departed, and Cunningham burst into laughter again.
"You're an interesting man, Cleigh. On my word, you do need a
guardian--gallivanting round the world with all these treasures. Queer
what things we do when we try to forget. Is there any desperate plunge we
wouldn't take if we thought we could leave the Old Man of the Sea behind?
You think you're forgetting when you fly across half the world for a
string of glass beads. I think I'm forgetting when I risk my neck getting
hold of some half-forgotten Rembrandt. But there it is, always at our
shoulder when we turn. One of the richest men in the world! Doesn't that
tingle you when you hear people whisper it as you pass? Just as I tingle
when some woman gasps, 'What a beautiful face!' We both have our withered
leg--only yours is invisible."
The mockery on the face and the irony on the tongue of the man disturbed
Cleigh. Supposing the rogue had his eye on that rug? To what lengths might
he not go to possess it? And he had the infernal ingenuity of his master,
Beelzebub. Or was he just trying Anthony Cleigh's nerves to see whether
they were sound or raw?
"But the beads!" he said.
"I'm sorry. Simply Morrissy ran amuck."
"I am willing to pay half as much again."
"You leave that to me--at the original price. No hold-up. Prices fixed, as
the French say. Those beads will be on board here to-morrow. But why the
devil do you carry that rug abroad?"
"To look at."
"Mad as a hatter!" Cunningham picked up his oilskin and sou'wester. "Hang
it, Cleigh, I've a notion to have a try at that rug just for the sport of
it!"
"If you want to bump into Dodge," replied the millionaire, dryly, "try
it."
"Oh, it will be the whole thing--the yacht--when I start action! Devil
take the weather!"
"How the deuce did the beads happen to turn up here in Shanghai?"
"Morrissy brought them east from Naples. That's why his work to-night
puzzles me. All those weeks to play the crook in, and then to make a play
for it when he knew he could not put it over! Brain storm--and when he
comes to he'll probably be sorry. Well, keep your eye on the yacht."
Cunningham shouldered into his oilskin. "To-morrow at the Astor, between
three and five. By George, what a ripping idea--to steal the yacht! I'm
mad as a hatter, too. Good-night, Cleigh." And laughing, Cunningham went
twisting up the companionway, into the rain and the dark.
Cleigh stood perfectly still until the laughter became an echo and the
echo a memory.