THE SPY IN THE RIVER
Gilbert had been sitting next to Jennie Bartlett; and, as he uttered
the words recorded in the last chapter, he caught the young lady by the
arm. There was a window of the house handy,--a long affair, reaching to
the piazza floor,--and through this he sprang, taking the frightened
miss with him.
Bang! crash! One side of the tree struck the piazza fairly and
squarely; and in a twinkling the roof was completely shattered, the
table with its dishes crushed flat, and Amos Bartlett was caught and
pinned to the ground, with his wife beside him. There was a cloud of
dust and splinters, followed by a yell from the Chinese servant, who
was of the opinion that the whole building was doomed, and who fled out
of the house and up the street at his best speed.
“Oh!” came from Jennie Bartlett. “Father and mother!”
“It is over now,” said Gilbert, as the crashing stopped and the dust
began to settle. “You were not touched, were you?”
“No; but poor father and mother--” She could say no more.
Leaving the girl in the house, Gilbert stepped outside once more. A
glance showed him that the tree had settled as far as possible, so
danger from this source was now over. He ran to the side of the elder
Bartletts, to find Mrs. Bartlett trying to regain her feet. The lady
had a slight bruise on the shoulder, but was otherwise uninjured.
“My husband! He is dead!” she panted. “Oh, poor Amos! What shall I do
now?”
“He isn’t dead. He is only unconscious,” said Gilbert, as he knelt
by the tea-merchant’s side, and applied his ear to the elderly man’s
breast. “His heart still beats. See, he has been struck in the back
of the head.” And he pointed out the wound, from which the blood was
trickling.
“What shall I do?” repeated Mrs. Bartlett, wringing her hands. The
disaster had completely unnerved her.
“Get a little water and a towel, and we will bind up his head. Is
there a doctor anywhere about?”
“There is a doctor on the street behind ours,--Dr. Fairchild.”
The water and a bandage were brought; and Amos Bartlett was raised
up, taken into the house, and placed on a couch. By this time he was
regaining his senses, and he slowly opened his eyes.
“Oh!” he murmured, and looked around him. “My wife and Jennie, where
are they?”
“We are safe, Amos,” answered his wife; “but you have been hurt.” And
the tears sprang to her eyes. “Oh, how I wish we had all gone to Taku!”
“Yes, perhaps it would have been best. Oh, my head and my back! I feel
as if I should never be able to walk again!”
“O papa, do not say that!” burst out Jennie. “Does your back hurt you
very much?”
“It feels numb, as if it was paralyzed.” Amos Bartlett gave a groan
he could not suppress. “The weight of the--the tree was more than
I--I--could stand!” He gave a gasp, and then fainted away.
More alarmed than ever, Mrs. Bartlett begged Gilbert to go for the
doctor she had mentioned; and, receiving directions as to where the
medical man lived, the young lieutenant hurried off, through a lane to
the rear of the warehouse. As he ran along, he heard several shells
whistling through the air; but none came down in that immediate
vicinity.
Reaching the doctor’s residence, his message was quickly delivered; and
Dr. Fairchild returned with him to Amos Bartlett’s home. It was found
that the tea-merchant had again recovered consciousness; but he was now
in a fever, and talked wildly.
“This is a bad case,” whispered the doctor to Gilbert. “He may be
paralyzed, and that blow on the head may affect his brain. I will do my
best for him, but you know as well as I that his age is greatly against
him.”
“Yes, do your best by all means,” answered the young officer. “I hope
he recovers entirely, for the sake of his wife and daughter.”
Gilbert remained with the family for an hour longer; and during that
time the Chinese servant came sneaking back, and began to put the house
in order. “Welly muchee flightened me,” said the servant to Gilbert.
“Shung Sing flink whole house clom down on head.”
“Well, you are frank about it,” was Gilbert’s comment. “Don’t you run
away again! Your mistress needs you.” And the Chinaman promised to
stay, but Gilbert knew that his word amounted to nothing. Shung Sing
was honest and a hard worker; but he thought more of his own skin than
of anything else in the world, and was prepared to run at the least
alarm.
When Gilbert returned to camp, he found an earnest consultation going
on among the officers. A guard was needed at a certain point along the
river, where a pontoon bridge was to be put down; and it was finally
decided that the guard should consist of a company of Americans and
a company of British infantry. Captain Banner’s command was called
out; and by nightfall Gilbert found himself stationed along the Pei-Ho
once more, near a row of deserted huts of bamboo and mud. There was a
small road running down to the stream at this point; and the Americans
guarded one side of the highway, while the English detachment guarded
the other.
It was felt that the utmost caution must be exercised, especially
during the night; and, after going the rounds himself, Captain Banner,
on turning in, requested Gilbert to keep his eye on the corporal of the
guard and the pickets.
“There is a rumor out that several Chinese spies are around,” said
the commander of Company A. “If it is true, we don’t want any of them
slipping through our lines.”
“I’ll caution the boys myself,” said Gilbert.
It must be confessed that, though tired, the young lieutenant did
not feel in the humor for sleeping. His mind was filled with what
Amos Bartlett had told him, and he could not help but wonder if the
tea-merchant would recover.
“If he doesn’t recover, his evidence against Ramsey Polk will be lost,”
thought Gilbert, dismally. “I believe I ought to take what he has to
say down in writing, get him to sign it, and then have it witnessed.”
The more he thought of this, the more necessary did it seem to become;
and, at last, he resolved to have the evidence put on paper at the
first opportunity.
The night was dark, and it looked as if it might rain at any moment. A
hot air was blowing from up the river, carrying with it a smell that
was far from pleasant. The picket line stretched a distance of two
hundred yards; and at one point there was a truck garden, now deserted,
containing potatoes, onions, and a few vegetables peculiar to this
district of China.
As Gilbert went the rounds, he came upon Carl Stummer, who was
stationed where there was an inlet surrounded by a fringe of tall
reeds. He found the German soldier peering intently into the reeds.
“See anything unusual?” he asked in a low voice.
[Illustration: “SEE ANYTHING UNUSUAL?” HE ASKED.]
“Hush!” came in a whisper. “I dink a Chink vos schwimmin’ out dare!”
At once Gilbert became silent, and felt of his pistol to see if the
weapon was ready for use.
A few minutes passed,--just then the time seemed much longer,--and Carl
pointed to a spot just beyond the reeds. “See dot?” he asked lowly. “Is
dot a log of vood?”
Gilbert did not reply immediately, for he was straining his eyes to
pierce the semi-darkness. He felt certain that what the German soldier
saw was a log of wood; but it was moving along in an uncertain
fashion, as if the tide was sending it one way and some unknown agency
another.
“Something is under or behind it,” he answered at last, in a voice
which Carl could scarcely hear. “Perhaps the log is hollow.”
“Chust vot I vos dinkin’,” replied the regular. “Und I vos dink der vos
von Chink under dot log, hey?”
“I shouldn’t be much surprised. Have you a bit of rope handy?”
“Rope?”
“Yes; a piece about thirty feet long?”
“Yes, dare vos a rope up der stream, vere da stharted to but town dot
pondoon pridge.”
“I will get it, and we’ll soon see if that is only a log or not.”
Running to where the engineering corps had been at work, the young
lieutenant quickly procured the rope Carl had described, and also a bit
of an iron bar with a ring at one end. Through the ring Gilbert shoved
an end of the rope, and made it fast.
“Here goes,” he said, as he rejoined Carl. “If that is nothing but a
log, it will come in easily enough.”
Holding fast to one end of the rope, he let fly with the other, that
containing the bit of iron. His aim was true; and with a splash the
iron landed in the water on the outer side of the log. Then Gilbert
began to pull in.
No sooner was this movement commenced than an extraordinary thing
occurred. The log gave a sudden wobble, and seemed about to turn over,
when up came a yellow hand and arm, and hauled it back. Although he was
not positive, Gilbert imagined that he also saw the top of a yellow
man’s head.
“He’s there, sure enough,” said the young lieutenant.
“Shall I schoot at him?” asked Carl, raising his rifle.
“Not yet.” Gilbert raised his voice. “Come in here!” he called out.
To this there was no reply, and he gave a sudden yank on the rope. Over
came the log, in spite of the efforts of the yellow man under it. Then
came a splash, and the two on shore saw a Chinaman swimming away for
his very life.
“Stop, or we’ll fire at you!” cried Gilbert.
But the Celestial would not stop; and, raising his pistol, the young
lieutenant blazed away. At the same instant Carl’s gun spoke up; and
both reports were followed by a scream of pain, for the shots had
entered the fellow’s shoulder.
“I think he would rather die than be captured,” said Gilbert. “But we
must take him if we can. He may prove to be an important capture. No
ordinary Chinaman or Chinese soldier would be swimming around here this
time of night.”
“Of I vos a first-class schwimmer, I vos chump in for him,” replied the
German. “Put he might grab me und drown me, hey?”
By this time the corporal of the guard was hurrying to the spot,
wanting to know what the two shots meant. He was a tall, powerful
fellow from South Dakota, and was perfectly willing to leap into the
stream and bring in the “pig-tail” by his hair, as he expressed it,
although he ‘allowed as how it would be dead easy to plug him fer
keeps.’
“I don’t wish him killed,” answered Gilbert. “Bring him in if you can,
but beware that he doesn’t knife you.”
“I’ll have my eyes open, lieutenant,” said the corporal “I’ve been in
the mines where the Chinks worked, and I know ’em all around.”
The corporal was soon in the water, and his powerful strokes speedily
took him to where the Chinaman was making for the other side of the
Pei-Ho. Although wounded, there was still a good deal of fight left in
the yellow man; and it was not until the corporal hauled off, and hit
him in the back of the neck, that he became limp and next to helpless.
Then he was dragged ashore, and made a prisoner.
The Chinaman was well dressed, and had on even his elaborately
decorated wooden shoes. He would not speak, although it was afterward
learned that he understood English very well.
At Captain Banner’s tent the prisoner was submitted to a thorough
search. On the inner side of one of his garments a little pocket was
discovered, containing several sheets of rice paper, very thin and
folded into the smallest possible space. The prisoner tried to throw
these sheets away, but Gilbert saw and prevented the movement.
On the sheets of paper was a message, written in Chinese, which no one
in the camp could decipher.
“We’ll have to take it to the colonel,” said Captain Banner.
The matter was talked over; and a little later Gilbert was sent off on
the mission, and with him went Dan Casey and a private named Hunter, as
a guard. In the mean time the prisoner’s wounds were attended to, and
then he was tied up in the guard-tent.
The colonel was stopping at a deserted Chinese residence, nearly half
a mile from the river. He had with him the third battalion, who were
guarding a line of communication leading to the Taku road.
Fortunately, the way to the residence was already known to Gilbert;
otherwise the party of three must have been lost on the road, which
wound in and out over the marshland, with here and there a dangerous
ditch to cross, where the Boxers had torn up the sods, so that no
artillery or cart train might pass. Occasionally there would come
to their ears the dismal croak of a night bird, feeding upon some
corpse in the vicinity. On every hand were those mounds of the dead,
previously mentioned. But Gilbert was growing used to them now, and he
scarcely noticed them.
“Who goes there?”
It was a cry from out of the darkness; and, standing along the
roadway, the young lieutenant saw a picket from the third battalion,
with gun levelled, ready to shoot.
“Friends!” shouted Gilbert.
“Advance, one friend, and give the countersign,” went on the picket,
still keeping his rifle levelled; but, when he caught sight of Gilbert,
he lowered the weapon. “Oh, it’s you, lieutenant.”
“Yes, my man.” Gilbert gave the countersign, which was Manila. “Can you
tell me if the colonel is up at the house?”
“He was an hour ago.”
Gilbert passed on, and his guard with him. At the entrance to the house
another picket challenged him; but he soon went in, and the colonel was
aroused.
The Chinese message puzzled the commander as much as it had Captain
Banner. “I must find some Chinese scholar for this,” he said, and
proceeded to hunt up a missionary without delay. When translated, the
message ran as follows:--
“All is ready to blow up the Cross Mission. The powder train leads
from Chow Fun’s house. Will fire at signal of three rockets.
“CHING WO.”